Dallas Doll

1994, vhs

Sandra Bernhard and Victoria Longley film clip (collages below)

Johnny's comments:

Dallas Doll is 1994 black comedy.

School boy Charlie (Jake Blundell) comes back from a failed attempt at mile high sex with his girlfriend - for his girlfriend's seat has been taken by Dallas (Sandra Bernhard). Charlie and Dallas hit it off but they part and he goes back home to his family including mother Ros (Victoria Longley), father Stephen (Frank Gallacher) and sister Rastus (!) (Rose Byrne in her first movie).

Charlie comes across Dallas once again. She's a professional golfer/motivational speaker, who has just insulted the members of the local club. He introduces Dallas to his family. First mistake. Second mistake is spying her undressing through the window and falling for her, eventually losing his virginity to her. Dallas decides to make her presence felt in the family Poison Ivy-style by attempting to sleep with everyone, well except Rastus who despises her and is more interested in spotting UFOs. Dallas doesn't stop there as she has her sights on taking over the whole town with her special kind of outsider knowledge.

A movie that has an interesting idea but gets too bogged down with Dallas seducing the family and doesn't focus so much on the more interesting stuff regarding Australians blindly thinking anything an American says is worth listening to. Not so much a black comedy as it wants to be but strangely feels like a lighter version of Poison Ivy. Bernhard is interesting casting and is both good and bad throughout the movie, Longley is the real stand-out here as someone who becomes emboldened by Dallas's arrival. The movie ends in the stupidest way possible involving UFOs, it might've been better to just cut to credits.

Capped this movie from a VHS rip which is pretty good except for the bottom line being slightly higher than normal. Also the sound is a bit noisy, most notable in the silent scenes and can definitely be heard in the Victoria Longley videos. Highly doubt this movie will ever get an HD upgrade as this is a rare movie made with government money. It didn't get a cinema release and struggled to get a VHS release. It's a hard movie to describe and I think that's what turned off distributors more than the quality. The movie seems to have got some Gay and Lesbian cred thanks to Dallas and Ros's relationship which is barely sexual, even the kiss that happens between them seems to have not happened. This may be the only way it'll get any upgrade but I seriously doubt that. If this movie couldn't get a release during the height of Bernhard's popularity, then it's never going to. Just a bit of a mess all round.

Probably the most memorable thing about the movie is how Bernhard absolutely trashed the director during and after making the movie. Worth having a look for. Also interesting to find out that the director was working at the university I went to around the time I went there but I can't for the life of me remember her being there. So weird...

Johnny's Bernhard collages

Johnny's Longley collage




additional Bernhard images