"Thank You God!": The Animal House Thread

He's being doing TV adverts in the UK for EE, the shitty mobile network I have the misfortune to be signed up to, for years now. I think he's now on the verge of going from "Oh look there's Kevin Bacon in an advert" to "Oh this film has that guy from the EE adverts in it".

Stripes becomes a bullshit military adventure at some point. John Candy utterly wasted.

I bumped a Bacon thread

(xposts) Okay--fair enough. I think because I'm a little older than some of you guys, the centrality of Footloose is a blind spot for me. I run into that a lot on ILX; I have a different set of a reference points. But I will hold to my view that the Six Degrees idea is an important contributor to Bacon's fame.

and Kevin Bacon is famous because of Tremors, obviously

I was 13 when Footloose came out. I knew it was big, but I didn't know it was that big. (I've never seen it. Top Gun, either.) Also, I've heard that song "Almost Paradise" about 700,000 times over the last 35 years and had no idea it was from the Footloose soundtrack.

Footloose is the first movie that I remember playing non-stop on cable. I imagine that plus its hits-spawning soundtrack are the reason for its continued ubiquity, which it would not necessarily have achieved had it come out in the 50s or 60s (when its basic plot was already being done to death).

bacon has baconed

but having hit movies over three or four decades cant be handwaved away by referencing whoever lori singer is

like, tremors ffs

his invisible man launched sony movies

he is the skinny liotta

he plays second man and steals shows

he is maybe the greatest living canadian

he's from Philadelphia

did u mean clemenza

canadianism is more than just geography cmon guys

Canadian Bacon

if anythings going to make sense in this crazy world any more you cant hold kevin bacon up as a yank

xp boom

I think we’re missing a demographic here in the Bacon stakes. The people I know who really loved Footloose had it on their VHS shelf next to Mystic Pizza and a few others of that era that belong to a different canon. They’re... not dudes on message boards

Ah, and Dirty Dancing! how’d I miss that one

flashdance

fame

maybe

and lookit i say maybe but rly its not maybe

maybe you have a very fixed notion about dudes on message boards

kevin bacon wasnt in tap but he couldve done a job holding the walking sticks in that one scene imo

yeah maybe I mean dudes posting on this thread, tbf

present company and actual lovers of these films excluded

Because I had about 30 seconds in Alan Zweig's record-collector documentary Vinyl, I actually have a Bacon number of 2 if you go through Don McKellar, 3 if you go through Harvey Pekar.

I think I'll take another look at Animal House within the next few days. Thinking about it a bit more, I don't think Bad News Bears fits that well with AH and all those other films.

The director of Bad News Bears also directed the Golden Child and Fletch, and has the story credit on Cool Runnings... he's the real Kevin Bacon here.

kevin is the reduced fat bacon

harsh to call him streaky tho

Thinking about it a bit more, I don't think Bad News Bears fits that well with AH and all those other films.

Agreed, and glad you pointed it out. The "curmudgeon has to take care of a bunch of unruly children" genre is not really part of the "snobs vs. slobs" cycle, though there are overlaps (Meatballs, most obviously).

yeah except the movie is about a team of slobs playing a team of snobs

True. I was more just thinking that Animal House invented/popularized the "slobs vs. snobs" genre while The Bad News Bears was drawing upon a tradition of older comedians having to deal with children (I'm sure there is some W.C. Fields precedent here, but I can't think of the specific example).

Comedy at the expense of snobs has been popular forever. Animal House was a particular variant on a very old theme.

I think in general, whether you think it gets there or not (I loved it the one time I belatedly watched it a few years ago), The Bad News Bears aims higher than the other films--specifically, how horribly adults can behave when it comes to kids' sports.

karen allen was v. cuet

The director of Bad News Bears also directed the Golden Child and Fletch, and has the story credit on Cool Runnings...

That's Michael Ritchie of The Candidate, Smile, and Downhill Racer. Please take a course on New Hollywood, f. hazel.

Pretty sure I saw The Golden Child twice in theaters, for some reason. More recently I found it unwatchable, for good reason.

yes he had a rough start but eventually was able to realize his vision: not one but two Fletch movies

The Bad News Bears, now yer talkin'.

look i've been out all day, has somebody done a "is famous movie star Kevin Bacon famous?" poll yet?

i mean thanks to UK advertising i hate the cunt but please

Is bacon star famous movie

(xpost) I think the disagreement concerned why/when rather than whether. But we did move on.

I watched Fletch recently and it's kind of a fascinating artifact.

the plot makes no fucking sense

the gritty beach scenes is such a cool world

it takes some serious conjones for an approaching middle age guy to wear a Lakers jersey with nothing underneath to the office

Harold Faltermeyers score is brilliant

XPS

https://media1.tenor.com/images/76595bd5d8fdcbc68afa6f8b138ddee4/tenor.gif?itemid=3409083

^^ the expression that put the humor in the mayhem

xxxpost

The thing that surprised me most about Fletch when I watched it was how well it plays as a straight-up mystery thriller. At the risk of sounding seriously trolly, I'll note that I prefer it to The Big Sleep (speaking of plots that make no sense).

Also, we polled the films of Michael Ritchie a while back.

I've never seen the movie 'cause even as a kid I was like "Fuck Chevy Chase," but the book was a good California noir with some jokes.

I’ve never seen it for that reason, although it’s my dumb bias

I love when send-ups do a genre by the books so I’ve probably done myself a disservice

I've known two separate women who were enormous Bacon Brothers fans.

u sure they werent saying "butty"?

I really love "Fletch", a great saturday evening watch

I had no idea there was a TV spin-off of Animal House.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delta_House

When the most notable thing about your show is that Jim Steinman adapted his theme song into Meat Loaf's 'Dead Ringer For Love', you're onto a loser:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWR94gcQX1o

i remember that