The Decline on the American Empire (1986) is a French Canadian production where a group of friends, all fro the History department of a University, talk about sex. Early in the day, the women are at an exercise spa, and the men are at home helping a gay member of the group prepare dinner. We can surmise that all history department folks are sexuality liberated and have more sex than a porn star based on these conversations, all, that is, except one wife. She does admit to one wife swapping party, and assumes her husband has cheated while away on business, but is sure he is faithful when he is home. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, he has had sex with most of the other women she is talking to.

Ebert's idea of Nirvana, evidently, was listening to a bunch of French Canadians delivering pretentious dialogue about sex, as he awarded three stars. He was even glad for having both a French sound track but also English subtitles, as that gave him twice as many wonderful words to savor. I found more enjoyment from the English sound track, which was supposedly dubbed, but was actually people reading the English subtitles, making a special effort to never say anything when the actors lips were moving.

Geneviève Rioux, as the youngest of the group, a history post grad, and massage girl, shows breasts in two scenes. Louise Portal briefly shows breasts in a flashback scene, and an unknown shows breasts in a flashback to the wife swapping party. This frank sexual talk may have seemed daring in 1986, but it was pure torture for me, as well as describing life styles no longer healthy given todays STDs. These people are self absorbed, pretentious, and not very nice. IMDb readers say 7.4 with over 70% of the votes coming from non US voters. The highest scores come from the over 45 crowd. I found very little to enjoy here, other than the nudity. This is a C-.

Mischief (1985)

The 1980s were the Golden Age of "coming of age" comedies. Mischief didn't have the charismatic star power of as Risky Business or Ferris Buehler. It didn't have the zany raunch of Porky's or Revenge of the Nerds, and it didn't have the surreal wit of Better Off Dead. Hell, it didn't even have Curtis Armstrong! It did next to nothing at the box office, but it did have a generosity of spirit and a romantic view of the 1950s that made it and still makes it enjoyable, if not always believable. Perhaps it is better to watch this film now than it was in 1985, because our memories of 1950s reality have slipped farther away, with more of the reality replaced by a romanticized view like the one exhibited in this flick. I suppose in another 20 years, this view of the 50s will seem more real than reality.

The basic plot is familiar and forgettable. Our hero, the average guy, is still a virgin in small town Ohio in 1956, but has his eye on the hottest girl in school (Kelly Preston). His goal doesn't seem promising, since he's about the size of Spike Lee and still rides his Schwinn to High School, but he stumbles into a stroke of luck. A tough, handsome, and cool delinquent from Chicago moves in next door, and makes our hero's cherry his senior project. It helps that both Kelly Preston and her best friend have a crush on Mr. Cool, thus enabling a double date situation, and giving our hero a chance to slip into Preston's life. As it turns out, the cool guy falls in love with the other girl, so it's all good. Our hero eventually loses the babe, but by then he has grown up and realized that they aren't right for each other anyway. Besides, the dorky chick with a crush on him has her braces off and got some contact lenses and ...

You get the idea.

Not an important film, or even a very memorable one, but a pleasant watch.

Some quick thoughts about Mischief.

1. I don't mind watching the past through a rose tint, but some of the period detail is far too romanticized. Assuming that it takes place in 1956, every car in this film is new. That's crazy. Why isn't anyone driving a 1949 Packard or a 1937 Hudson? You could make similar comments about the houses and stores, all of which seem to have a fresh coat of paint.

2. The sexual conquests are also romanticized. The screenwriter was recalling the period of his youth - he would have been 19 when these events took place - but this storyline is the author's sexual fantasy, not an account of reality. Our wimpy little hero gets laid too easily.  First of all, just about nobody got laid in 1956, not even the very coolest people. Even by the time I went to high school (1962-1966), I didn't know anyone who actually got laid with another high school student. Not even the quarterback. Some of the guys would sneak off and enlist the services of some more exotic ... er ... fancy women, but my friends and I never even did that, and neither did most of the "good" kids. Oh, sure we always carried a rubber in our wallets, but that was just for show. The very luckiest might get laid on prom night, but even that was uncommon, and required a long-term dating relationship. Sometimes a "good girl" turned up pregnant, but it was really rare. I think there was one in my high school out of 250 senior girls. It just isn't realistic that this clumsy inexperienced kid was soon getting invited over for a weekend with the hottest girl in school, with her parents out of town, and that they were actually having intercourse rather than a substitute activity with no risk of pregnancy. This guy would have graduated from high school as a virgin, although he might have gotten close. He might not have admitted that to his friends, but in his heart he would not have been that ashamed of it. If he was a real romantic, he'd remember the kisses, the smell of his date's perfume, the breezes of a summer night, watching snowflakes melt on her lips on a winter day, and the exhilaration of being in love for the first time. The actual rumpy-pumpy would come later.

3. The tunes are great. It features a steady stream of the very best mid 50s be-bop rock from Elvis and Buddy Holly and just about everyone else who was anyone then. If you remember the era, or even if you love your oldies station, this score is 45 RPM nostalgia heaven.

4. The characterizations are reasonably complex. Kelly Preston, although the hottest girl in school, is always friendly with our hero, even in the beginning when she simply thinks of him as a klutz. She seems like a nice person even when she reveals how shallow she is at the end of the film. We sense that she's not mean, and she doesn't regret her sexual liaison with our hero, but she just isn't in love with him, and is ready no move on to somebody hotter. The other three main characters are also multi-dimensional. The only important character who fails to ring true is the stock teen film antagonist, the rich snooty guy who looks down on everyone, who is basically Snidely Whiplash with a 1950s sweater tied around his waist.

5. Although the film in general doesn't have much original to say, it does have some moments which brought back vivid memories for me. The schoolyard dialogue, the slang, the pranks, and the sexual misinformation included a lot of elements which seemed familiar, and not just because of some post-modern faux memories induced by other movies, but memories of things that really happened.

6. The love stories may have been unlikely, but overall the lead actors and the script did a good job on showing the nature of male friendships in the 50s. Doug McKeon did an excellent job in the lead, but he never had any star power, so he had kind of a fringe career, the kind of acting resume that pays the bills, but leaves one short of being a household name, or even a very recognizable face. McKeon is still acting today. He has a 2004 credit at IMDb, although I can't recall seeing him in any of those movies he is supposed to have made in the past few years.

7. Kelly Preston - completely naked - full-frontal - standing up - in daylight, her face and her body close to perfection. That alone made the film worth watching.

• Kelly Preston collages (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)
• Kelly Preston (zipped .wmv) This is my conversion of somebody else's clip. He did a nice job. I, unfortunately, screwed up the audio synch, but it looks good. Big file, nearly 8 meg.

A few more film clips:

Here's the short list of nominees.

Juliette Binoche & Lena Olin in "The Unbearable Lightness of Being"
Juliette Marquis & Cheyenne Silver in "This Girl's Life"
Asia Argento & Selen in "Scarlet Diva"
Sarah Michelle Gellar & Selma Blair in "Cruel Intentions"
Charlize Theron & Penélope Cruz in "Head in the Clouds"
Helen Shaver and Patricia Charbonneau in "Desert Hearts"
Jennifer Tilly and Gina Gershon in "Bound"
Chloë Sevigny and Michelle Williams in "If These Walls Could Talk 2"
Sharon Stone and Ellen DeGeneres in "If These Walls Could Talk 2"
Susie Porter and Kelly McGillis in "The Monkey's Mask"
Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve in "The Hunger".
Elizabeth Mitchell and Angelina Jolie in "Gia"
Anne Heche and Joan Chen in "Wild Side"
Jessica Pare and Piper Perabo in "Lost and Delirious"

Email Scoopy Jr. with more nominees, comments or suggestions.

Here are the results of our most recent other polls...
The Top 20 Nude Scenes of 2004
The Best Nude Film Debuts of the 80s
The Best Nude Film Debuts of the 90s
Which actress has been the most convincing playing a stripper.
Who has the best bum in Hollywood?
Best All Time Television Comedy
Best Nudity in an Oscar-winning performance
The Top 20 Best Sex Scenes

Bliss season one DVD set
All eight episodes fully uncut but with no special extras.

• Gina Wilkinson: mega-boobs and bush in "In Praise of Drunkeness and Fornication".
• Peggy Mahon: cougar cleavage and kissing Gina.
• Mitsou Gelinas: tight sweater only.
• Victoria Sanchez: boobs having sex in "The Footpath of Pink Roses".
• Karyn Dwyer: cleavage only.
• Torri Higginson: boobs having prison sex in "Valentine's Day in Jail", full dorsal nudity getting rubber glove treatment afterwards.
• Michelle Lipper: nude in very hot lesbian sex scene in "Leaper".
• Paule Ducharme: nude in sex scene with Michelle.
• Millie Tressiera: pawing up Michelle. Do all homeless women look like Halle Berry?
• Tara Spencer-Nairn: plumber's crack and skivvies humping gay guy in "The Value of X". Don't ask.
• Rachelle Lefevre: tight sweater only.
• Mikela J. Mikael: topless in "Voice".
• Veronica Hurnick: breasts having lesbian sex with Mikela.
• Michelle Duquet: full nude in "Six Days".
• Jenny Levine: topless in "Guys and Dolls".

Samhain update:
England's amazon.co.uk has a tentative July 18, 2005 release date which they moved back from 2010. However there is very little info if this is even the title in question. Anyways the b-movie horror babe with the big boobs has been identified.

• Alana Dash: boobs almost falling out of nightie.

First up we have Christy Chung showing some skin in a couple of movies. Despite the fact that she was born in Montreal, Chung was voted FHM's Sexiest Woman in Asia (2000), and was also the winner of the Miss Chinese International crown (1992).

• Christy Chung baring her breasts in a couple of love scenes from "Samsara" (2001). (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

• Christy Chung, no nudity in these scenes from the Jackie Chan movie "The Medallion", but she did look sexy and while kicking some ass!

• Christy Chung, topless in scenes from the Thai movie, "Jan Dara" (2001). (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)

Next up we have two babes showing some skin in scenes from the Japanese movie "Gokudô sengokushi: Fudô" aka "Fudoh: The New Generation (1996).

• The pint sized Marie Jinno bares breasts and bum and is even joined by Miho Nomoto for some mild lesbo lovin' in #3. (1, 2, 3)

• Miho Nomoto shows toplessness and a close up view of her undies with an easy access zipper. Links #2 and #3 feature more lesbian lovin'. (1, 2, 3, 4, 5)

AIRLINE WORKER STEALS CAMEL SUIT
Airports Are A Zoo - David Cox boarded a Qantas Airways jet in Sydney, Australia, and after a few minutes, a child announced, "There's a guy with a moose head." He looked out the window and saw a baggage handler wearing a camel costume. Cox said his jaw dropped because it was his. He'd checked it in just minutes before, in a bag labeled "animal costumes," along with a crocodile outfit. Qantas said they're investigating and called it "completely unacceptable."

If you have your own site or blog, sign up today and earn some extra cash in 2005 by promoting the Fun House!