LAMBADA!
The movie, bitches.
Two things.
1.) I am in an extreme amount of pain and due to a procedure yesterday cannot sit up for very long. I'm typing this with my laptop balanced on my tummy prone in bed.
2.) I dropped my remote control about an hour ago and it's under my bed and so I can't really turn the channel. I mean I could but see #1. This was okay an hour ago when the channel I was watching showed "Beach Party" (one of my favorite films-seriously-I love all the AIP films), but now, well, now it's "Lambada". I remember when this movie came out too. There were one sheets all over Hollywood and the area I lived in with the chick and the guy in a sexy pose. I am positive I've never seen the film though.
You see, I am faithful to the best early 90's dance flick ever made.
"SALSA"
That is not a joke either. I even had the album.
But back to this movie I'm "forced" to watch.
- In the credits, Shabba Doo was listed third, even before Ricky Paull Goldin!. More interesting I actually know who Shabba Doo is! He choreographed this bad boy too. Cool.
- I'm already not paying much attention, but I think there are rich high school kids from Beverly Hills, a new really hot teacher at the high school (I totally agree with this assessment as I've always been a J. Eddie Peck fan), and everyone likes to dance?
- The snotty, irritating rich girl just dumped her equally snotty and rich boyfriend because of this:
"He's talking to some ditz. Doesn't he know my ice cream is melting?"
- Now we are at some underground (literally - it's like under a freeway overpass) club run by...wait for it...Dennis Burkley. This is only interesting to me and my favorite ex boy because we used to drink with Dennis at a dive bar back in the 90's. He's a nice guy.
- Okay so the insanely hot teacher roared into the underground area on a motorcycle, doffed his helmet and jacket and began to dance. The snotty rich girl and her equally snotty and rich best friend got into the club, saw everyone dancing and excitedly screamed, "IT'S THE LAMBADA!!!!". Then rich girls spied their teacher, "That's my math teacher!". They then inexplicably ran away.
-There's something going on at this club with the insanely hot teacher/Lambada dancer and a bunch of other young dancers. Something that one attractive Latino named Ramon wants nothing to do with. This is all very mysterious, but I have a feeling that the math teacher is tutoring these kids in dance or math. He's tutoring, y'all. Bet on it.
- No joke, you guys. This has been on for 17 minutes and my head is spinning with all these plot developments and character info and dancing. I was beginning to wonder if there was ever going to be an ad break.
- Okay so our heroine is played by Melora Hardin, and the next day at school, she has a vivid, sweaty fantasy of tongue'ing her insanely hot math teacher in the outfit she saw him dance in. Now I'm curious. Is this movie going to actually do the teacher-student relationship? Or is this a red herring?
- The insanely hot math teacher/dancer is a single father? Okay and here's this. He's white, but he was adopted by a Latino family and so raised Latino. He actually might be married but in all these random expository moments... did I forget to mention that the teacher is up for a big promotion at school?... anyway, they've not mentioned if he's married or not. Just the kid, his adoptive family, and the LAMBADA.
- I did forget to tell you that his son asked him why he goes out every night "dressed like that".
- This underground club has an upside down police car on its ceiling.
- They're making a huge deal in this film about the fact that he's white on the outside and brown on the inside aka a Guero. I guess white educators don't want to help Latino youth unless they were raised by Latinos themselves.
- Oh the snotty, rich white girl, you know, I've yet to even really learn her name. I'm sure they've said it, but it's not registered with me.
- SANDY!!!! (that's her name)
- Okay so I got distracted by her name. Sorry. Sandy got all dolled up in true early 90's style (I know this because I had a similar outfit to hers), showed up at the club and is forcing her insanely hot math teacher/dancer to boogie with her. Now that I consider it. I don't think I know the math teacher's name either.
- Sandy is sorta shimmying all around the teacher. He just grabbed her leather jacket's lapels and said, "You want to dance? Let's dance." and now they're salsa dancing together.
- Random Observation -
How will I know when they're dancing The Lambada. Will someone tell me? I don't think I know what it looks like.
I think there were two films. This one and another called "Lambada: The Forbidden Dance" which I think I did see once.
Back to the film, movie, time-waster that I have on because I can't move:
- The teacher told Sandy that "School's out." and tried to take her home or something. Anyway, they were stopped by the math teacher's hot Latino adversary, Ramon, who has propositioned Sandy and tells the math teacher, "This is the 90's, man. A girl's got a right to choose, and she chooses me."
- Fuck yeah, Ramon! Preach it!
- Ramon and the math teacher just tried to brawl but stopped once Ramon realized that the math teacher is and I quote, "A homie." To which the math teacher replied, "Everyone comes from somewhere." Or something like that. I was laughing too hard to really pay attention.
- The math teacher just took Sandy home on his motorcycle. Drove right up her driveway too. LIKE NO ONE IN BEVERLY HILLS IS GOING TO NOTICE THIS?
- Oh, the rich, snotty boyfriend who's name is Dean, and is played by the aforementioned Ricky Paull Goldin (one of my favorite soap actors), was waiting for her. He's jealous, blah, blah, blah, and wants to go get a soda. He said that. I feel a headache coming on here. This movie is like 5 different genres all rolled into 1.
- I guess the math teacher's name at the underground club is "Blade". I might actually refuse to call him this. Just out of defiance of how stupid that is. I think the same actor played a stable boy *cough* stable man on "Young & The Restless" years ago named "Cole". In retrospect, he should have been named "Blade" on the soap.
- I just verified the whole Cole thing on imdb. I'm always amazed that I can remember the names of soap characters like the back of my hand yet when it comes to a few men that I might have dated *cough* slept with *cough cough* in my 30's, I can't even fucking remember a first name. Fortunately I have a friend who remembers the names of every man I ever even looked at. She cataloged that shit for her own malevolent reasons obviously.
- I was totally right. The math teacher/dancer is teaching all these kids at the underground club! He's tutoring them to take the GED. So it's a secret dance club underneath a freeway overpass somewhere in East LA (this is a guess but since they keep hammering this Latino thing home) that doubles as a an educational co-op. That makes sense.
"This is education. Like how to use a protractor." (waving the protractor in Dennis Burkley's face)
- They're playing pool to illustrate geometry. I think. I failed at math so spectacularly that I never even learned what the protractor was for. Seriously. I was that bad at math.
- We're at the Beverly Hills school and the insanely hot math teacher/dancer is asking Sandy if he can see her in his classroom after school. Cue the sexy music. Now, for some reason we're like in a computer studies class, and we're focusing on the rich kids and a rich kid smartie that we've seen before in the film and who's name is, you guessed it, "Egghead". He's just started playing a jam on his computer and now all the kids in class are dancing a highly choreographed dance in the classroom. This dance is actually better than anything I've seen at the underground club.
- Well, I guess Cole from "Young and the Restless" is a single father because he was giving a swoon-y look to the school librarian. She had long dark hair plated down her back and glasses. How much do you want to bet me she rips off the glasses and lets her hair go wild when he teacher her how to Lambada? Speaking of which, how much longer is this movie on?
- We've got another hour to go, and I zoned out for a good seven minutes. I think the teacher tried to talk to Sandy about keeping his secret. She hid in his car, blah blah blah. I don't think I missed anything.
- Sandy and Dean just had a long conversation over their car phones. Really big actual phones with cords connected to their dashboards. Sandy is at the club and is sexy dancing with Ramon wearing a black velveteen leotard, black pantyhose, and black heels. I still don't think this is the Lambada. The math teacher is not impressed and is, instead, piling all his tutored kids onto a bus. The bus is covered in graffiti and the back of it reads "Galaxy High". Do they give the GED at night? Do they?
- Upon realizing that the math teacher was no longer even barely paying attention to her in her black leotard, Sandy asked Ramon, "Where's Kevin?!?" His name is Kevin aka Blade. Finally a name I can deal with.
- Kevin has transported "Galaxy High" school bus to the Beverly Hills School where he's sneaking the tutored kids into the computer lab so he can administer a practice GED test. This seems a bad idea, Kevin/Blade. Also, he's bought them all cute tee shirts that read "Galaxy High".
-Not So Random Observation-
- Almost every time we're at the underground club (maybe the club is called 'Galaxy'? that's probably it - this movie has a definite issue with names), everyone there is either drinking from an official Pepsi cup or a can of Pepsi. It's comforting to know that product placement was alive and well in 1990. Although they should have just named the club, "Pepsi".
- And we're back, you know as fast as this movie was moving 80 minutes ago, it's moving conversely slower now. Also, the inevitable Ramon & Dean connection has been made. Villain-y times two!
- Although I did just hear that Kevin's/Blade's last name is "Laird". Oh and Dennis Burkley just told Ramon to stop messing with Kevin Laird/Blade's good intentions. That Kevin Laird/Blade tries as hard as he does to help Ramon because he sees "College Potential" in Ramon. Ramon takes this as the ultimate compliment and leaves to help undo his machinations.
- Sandy has shown up at the school not to ruin Kevin Laird's/Blade's "Galaxy High" GED practice test/nighttime study hall but to stare admiringly at he and his students with tears in her eyes. "This is really amazing what you've done.", she says to her black leather jacketed, earring wearing teacher.
- There is, I think, a rumble between the rich snotty kids and the "Galaxy High" kids. I mean they're fighting and all, but I'm not positive about what. I don't even think they know what they're fighting about. It was a lame rumble too. No blood. I think "Galaxy High" won, but Kevin Laird/Blade has been fired. He did offer his resignation before he was fired though. It would have been cooler had he shown up for his comeuppance with the principal in his black leather jacket and earring.
- Sandy implored her rich, snotty friends in math class to understand what Kevin Laird/Blade was doing and help get his job back. Now she and Dennis Burkley are teaming up to help get Kevin Laird/Blade his job back. So that means there's like a montage of people running up and down the streets "spreading the word" to a very bass and drum heavy tune. Sandy, Dennis Burkley, Ramon, and the "kids" the underground club have shown up at the Beverly Hills High School.
"So Blade was Mr. Laird?" - the school district's administrator, echoing my confusion with his names
Somehow and, yes, I'm getting slightly fuzzy with exhaustion, somehow we are now at some sort of education decathlon or Super Quiz (this is how it is referred to in the film) between the rich, snotty kids and "Galaxy High". At last count, we've rolled 2 more genres into this 1 film bringing us to a grand total of 7. I think. I have lost count of so many things now.
- Does it seem suspicious to anyone else that Kevin Laird/Blade has not mentioned his son at all for the last 100 minutes? And who watches over the son when he goes out every night "dressed like that", and what about the shy, bespectacled librarian? I better get some answers.
- I'm not even recapping this super quiz bullshit except to say Kevin Laird/Blade has combined his two personalities and is wearing jeans, white tee, black blazer, and his hair is in its 'dancer/tutor' mode. Thinking back, I don't really think he's danced much in the latter half of this film. This does ultimately make the title of his film a cheat, right? At least in "Salsa", there's salsa dancing throughout! There's also Robby Rosa. I think I made the right choice back in the day in considering "Salsa" a far superior film to "Lambada" even though I hadn't seen "Lambada" until this morning.
- One additional thought, I wasn't paying that much attention during the Super Quiz (it was math and I hate math so I was reading something else), but I would swear that I didn't see Egghead competing. It was just Dean and his rich, snotty athlete friends. Wouldn't it make sense that Egghead would be your star at a Super Quiz? ARGH.
- The super quiz has come down to Dean versus Ramon. You knew it was going to happen. It's been foreshadowed all along (it really hasn't). Ramon is figuring out the answer to the question by thinking back to the scene where Kevin Laird/Blade used the protractor to win a pool game at the underground club. And he gets it right. Ramon tells Kevin Laird/Blade to come up to the stage and make a speech. Everyone in the audience is yelling, "Blade!" like it's a thing now.
- Kevin Laird/Blade just went through his biography in genetic detail, and either I totally incorrectly heard the earlier conversation with his son or this movie makes no sense because now he says he was born Latino (Carlos Guitterrez), and he was adopted by white people at 14 years old (then became Kevin Laird) after his Latino parents died.
Forgive me if I'm wrong here, but even if you're adopted, you don't have to Anglicize your name, right?
Also, I would SWEAR that he said he was adopted by his Latino parents earlier. Ugh.
I am not watching this movie again, but it doesn't make sense for him to be Latino born because he is such a white boy. I get the Guero thing now (earlier conversation with disappeared son), but it doesn't make sense. The son (if he even still exists in the film's reality by the end of the film) didn't look Latino either.
Why am I seeking sense in this film?
- Oh, all of a sudden we're all at the underground club celebrating, there's water everywhere, everyone is wet, and we're all dancing. Also, this is not an understatement, there is water everywhere. Water is pouring from rain machines (you can't see them but, duh, how else is it suddenly pouring in the underground club?), every single cast member save THE SON is dancing wet, and this is the finale.
UGH.
- I might have been totally wrong about Kevin Laird/Blade being unmarried too. There was a blonde woman sitting next to him at the Super Quiz and dancing in the water with him as well. I guess that answers who takes care of the son at night, but doesn't answer why he was flirting with the librarian.
- Either I missed entire scenes in this film or the TV version is edited badly or the film itself was rewritten and re-edited to incorporate all the popular genres of the time into this mish-mosh. Sadly, there's very little inside information on imdb. Probably because no one has sat through this shit in 20 years.
- Well okay so it just ended (abruptly to me) with everyone dancing in the water. I'm still not sure if they were dancing The Lambada because clearly dancing was not what this movie was about.
EDUCATION.
IDENTITY.
RACISM.
- As the credits began, it flashed through epilogues on the "Galaxy High" students to show they all had successful careers.
Someone who works with computers. (RAMON!)
Engineer.
Fashion Designer.
Teacher.
No Joke.
- Final Observations
So awful. Truly awful. This ranks right up there with Pauley Shore films for me. The music was horrible too. I barely mentioned that because I was too busy trying to understand what the hell was happening in the story, but it's bad.
And granted I was half-paying attention, half-live blogging, but I'm fairly certain that Kevin Laird/Blade had a son in the first 30 minutes of this film that was never mentioned again. I may even have to re-watch that part just to make sure it really happened.
Surprisingly, I do not have anything bad to say about any of the actors in this atrocity. I think all the issues stemmed from the script, the director, the editor, and/or the production company. They weren't given great material to work from, but they did their best. Also, the kid who played Ramon was a very natural, realistic performer.
I learned a lesson though. What started off as a fun live-recap became a 'Memento'-like puzzle of genres, plot, characters, and a never-seen-or-mentioned-again child.
I'll never leave you for another again, "Salsa".
Two things.
1.) I am in an extreme amount of pain and due to a procedure yesterday cannot sit up for very long. I'm typing this with my laptop balanced on my tummy prone in bed.
2.) I dropped my remote control about an hour ago and it's under my bed and so I can't really turn the channel. I mean I could but see #1. This was okay an hour ago when the channel I was watching showed "Beach Party" (one of my favorite films-seriously-I love all the AIP films), but now, well, now it's "Lambada". I remember when this movie came out too. There were one sheets all over Hollywood and the area I lived in with the chick and the guy in a sexy pose. I am positive I've never seen the film though.
You see, I am faithful to the best early 90's dance flick ever made.
"SALSA"
That is not a joke either. I even had the album.
But back to this movie I'm "forced" to watch.
- In the credits, Shabba Doo was listed third, even before Ricky Paull Goldin!. More interesting I actually know who Shabba Doo is! He choreographed this bad boy too. Cool.
- I'm already not paying much attention, but I think there are rich high school kids from Beverly Hills, a new really hot teacher at the high school (I totally agree with this assessment as I've always been a J. Eddie Peck fan), and everyone likes to dance?
- The snotty, irritating rich girl just dumped her equally snotty and rich boyfriend because of this:
"He's talking to some ditz. Doesn't he know my ice cream is melting?"
- Now we are at some underground (literally - it's like under a freeway overpass) club run by...wait for it...Dennis Burkley. This is only interesting to me and my favorite ex boy because we used to drink with Dennis at a dive bar back in the 90's. He's a nice guy.
- Okay so the insanely hot teacher roared into the underground area on a motorcycle, doffed his helmet and jacket and began to dance. The snotty rich girl and her equally snotty and rich best friend got into the club, saw everyone dancing and excitedly screamed, "IT'S THE LAMBADA!!!!". Then rich girls spied their teacher, "That's my math teacher!". They then inexplicably ran away.
-There's something going on at this club with the insanely hot teacher/Lambada dancer and a bunch of other young dancers. Something that one attractive Latino named Ramon wants nothing to do with. This is all very mysterious, but I have a feeling that the math teacher is tutoring these kids in dance or math. He's tutoring, y'all. Bet on it.
- No joke, you guys. This has been on for 17 minutes and my head is spinning with all these plot developments and character info and dancing. I was beginning to wonder if there was ever going to be an ad break.
- Okay so our heroine is played by Melora Hardin, and the next day at school, she has a vivid, sweaty fantasy of tongue'ing her insanely hot math teacher in the outfit she saw him dance in. Now I'm curious. Is this movie going to actually do the teacher-student relationship? Or is this a red herring?
- The insanely hot math teacher/dancer is a single father? Okay and here's this. He's white, but he was adopted by a Latino family and so raised Latino. He actually might be married but in all these random expository moments... did I forget to mention that the teacher is up for a big promotion at school?... anyway, they've not mentioned if he's married or not. Just the kid, his adoptive family, and the LAMBADA.
- I did forget to tell you that his son asked him why he goes out every night "dressed like that".
- This underground club has an upside down police car on its ceiling.
- They're making a huge deal in this film about the fact that he's white on the outside and brown on the inside aka a Guero. I guess white educators don't want to help Latino youth unless they were raised by Latinos themselves.
- Oh the snotty, rich white girl, you know, I've yet to even really learn her name. I'm sure they've said it, but it's not registered with me.
- SANDY!!!! (that's her name)
- Okay so I got distracted by her name. Sorry. Sandy got all dolled up in true early 90's style (I know this because I had a similar outfit to hers), showed up at the club and is forcing her insanely hot math teacher/dancer to boogie with her. Now that I consider it. I don't think I know the math teacher's name either.
- Sandy is sorta shimmying all around the teacher. He just grabbed her leather jacket's lapels and said, "You want to dance? Let's dance." and now they're salsa dancing together.
- Random Observation -
How will I know when they're dancing The Lambada. Will someone tell me? I don't think I know what it looks like.
I think there were two films. This one and another called "Lambada: The Forbidden Dance" which I think I did see once.
Back to the film, movie, time-waster that I have on because I can't move:
- The teacher told Sandy that "School's out." and tried to take her home or something. Anyway, they were stopped by the math teacher's hot Latino adversary, Ramon, who has propositioned Sandy and tells the math teacher, "This is the 90's, man. A girl's got a right to choose, and she chooses me."
- Fuck yeah, Ramon! Preach it!
- Ramon and the math teacher just tried to brawl but stopped once Ramon realized that the math teacher is and I quote, "A homie." To which the math teacher replied, "Everyone comes from somewhere." Or something like that. I was laughing too hard to really pay attention.
- The math teacher just took Sandy home on his motorcycle. Drove right up her driveway too. LIKE NO ONE IN BEVERLY HILLS IS GOING TO NOTICE THIS?
- Oh, the rich, snotty boyfriend who's name is Dean, and is played by the aforementioned Ricky Paull Goldin (one of my favorite soap actors), was waiting for her. He's jealous, blah, blah, blah, and wants to go get a soda. He said that. I feel a headache coming on here. This movie is like 5 different genres all rolled into 1.
- I guess the math teacher's name at the underground club is "Blade". I might actually refuse to call him this. Just out of defiance of how stupid that is. I think the same actor played a stable boy *cough* stable man on "Young & The Restless" years ago named "Cole". In retrospect, he should have been named "Blade" on the soap.
- I just verified the whole Cole thing on imdb. I'm always amazed that I can remember the names of soap characters like the back of my hand yet when it comes to a few men that I might have dated *cough* slept with *cough cough* in my 30's, I can't even fucking remember a first name. Fortunately I have a friend who remembers the names of every man I ever even looked at. She cataloged that shit for her own malevolent reasons obviously.
- I was totally right. The math teacher/dancer is teaching all these kids at the underground club! He's tutoring them to take the GED. So it's a secret dance club underneath a freeway overpass somewhere in East LA (this is a guess but since they keep hammering this Latino thing home) that doubles as a an educational co-op. That makes sense.
"This is education. Like how to use a protractor." (waving the protractor in Dennis Burkley's face)
- They're playing pool to illustrate geometry. I think. I failed at math so spectacularly that I never even learned what the protractor was for. Seriously. I was that bad at math.
- We're at the Beverly Hills school and the insanely hot math teacher/dancer is asking Sandy if he can see her in his classroom after school. Cue the sexy music. Now, for some reason we're like in a computer studies class, and we're focusing on the rich kids and a rich kid smartie that we've seen before in the film and who's name is, you guessed it, "Egghead". He's just started playing a jam on his computer and now all the kids in class are dancing a highly choreographed dance in the classroom. This dance is actually better than anything I've seen at the underground club.
- Well, I guess Cole from "Young and the Restless" is a single father because he was giving a swoon-y look to the school librarian. She had long dark hair plated down her back and glasses. How much do you want to bet me she rips off the glasses and lets her hair go wild when he teacher her how to Lambada? Speaking of which, how much longer is this movie on?
- We've got another hour to go, and I zoned out for a good seven minutes. I think the teacher tried to talk to Sandy about keeping his secret. She hid in his car, blah blah blah. I don't think I missed anything.
- Sandy and Dean just had a long conversation over their car phones. Really big actual phones with cords connected to their dashboards. Sandy is at the club and is sexy dancing with Ramon wearing a black velveteen leotard, black pantyhose, and black heels. I still don't think this is the Lambada. The math teacher is not impressed and is, instead, piling all his tutored kids onto a bus. The bus is covered in graffiti and the back of it reads "Galaxy High". Do they give the GED at night? Do they?
- Upon realizing that the math teacher was no longer even barely paying attention to her in her black leotard, Sandy asked Ramon, "Where's Kevin?!?" His name is Kevin aka Blade. Finally a name I can deal with.
- Kevin has transported "Galaxy High" school bus to the Beverly Hills School where he's sneaking the tutored kids into the computer lab so he can administer a practice GED test. This seems a bad idea, Kevin/Blade. Also, he's bought them all cute tee shirts that read "Galaxy High".
-Not So Random Observation-
- Almost every time we're at the underground club (maybe the club is called 'Galaxy'? that's probably it - this movie has a definite issue with names), everyone there is either drinking from an official Pepsi cup or a can of Pepsi. It's comforting to know that product placement was alive and well in 1990. Although they should have just named the club, "Pepsi".
- And we're back, you know as fast as this movie was moving 80 minutes ago, it's moving conversely slower now. Also, the inevitable Ramon & Dean connection has been made. Villain-y times two!
- Although I did just hear that Kevin's/Blade's last name is "Laird". Oh and Dennis Burkley just told Ramon to stop messing with Kevin Laird/Blade's good intentions. That Kevin Laird/Blade tries as hard as he does to help Ramon because he sees "College Potential" in Ramon. Ramon takes this as the ultimate compliment and leaves to help undo his machinations.
- Sandy has shown up at the school not to ruin Kevin Laird's/Blade's "Galaxy High" GED practice test/nighttime study hall but to stare admiringly at he and his students with tears in her eyes. "This is really amazing what you've done.", she says to her black leather jacketed, earring wearing teacher.
- There is, I think, a rumble between the rich snotty kids and the "Galaxy High" kids. I mean they're fighting and all, but I'm not positive about what. I don't even think they know what they're fighting about. It was a lame rumble too. No blood. I think "Galaxy High" won, but Kevin Laird/Blade has been fired. He did offer his resignation before he was fired though. It would have been cooler had he shown up for his comeuppance with the principal in his black leather jacket and earring.
- Sandy implored her rich, snotty friends in math class to understand what Kevin Laird/Blade was doing and help get his job back. Now she and Dennis Burkley are teaming up to help get Kevin Laird/Blade his job back. So that means there's like a montage of people running up and down the streets "spreading the word" to a very bass and drum heavy tune. Sandy, Dennis Burkley, Ramon, and the "kids" the underground club have shown up at the Beverly Hills High School.
"So Blade was Mr. Laird?" - the school district's administrator, echoing my confusion with his names
Somehow and, yes, I'm getting slightly fuzzy with exhaustion, somehow we are now at some sort of education decathlon or Super Quiz (this is how it is referred to in the film) between the rich, snotty kids and "Galaxy High". At last count, we've rolled 2 more genres into this 1 film bringing us to a grand total of 7. I think. I have lost count of so many things now.
- Does it seem suspicious to anyone else that Kevin Laird/Blade has not mentioned his son at all for the last 100 minutes? And who watches over the son when he goes out every night "dressed like that", and what about the shy, bespectacled librarian? I better get some answers.
- I'm not even recapping this super quiz bullshit except to say Kevin Laird/Blade has combined his two personalities and is wearing jeans, white tee, black blazer, and his hair is in its 'dancer/tutor' mode. Thinking back, I don't really think he's danced much in the latter half of this film. This does ultimately make the title of his film a cheat, right? At least in "Salsa", there's salsa dancing throughout! There's also Robby Rosa. I think I made the right choice back in the day in considering "Salsa" a far superior film to "Lambada" even though I hadn't seen "Lambada" until this morning.
- One additional thought, I wasn't paying that much attention during the Super Quiz (it was math and I hate math so I was reading something else), but I would swear that I didn't see Egghead competing. It was just Dean and his rich, snotty athlete friends. Wouldn't it make sense that Egghead would be your star at a Super Quiz? ARGH.
- The super quiz has come down to Dean versus Ramon. You knew it was going to happen. It's been foreshadowed all along (it really hasn't). Ramon is figuring out the answer to the question by thinking back to the scene where Kevin Laird/Blade used the protractor to win a pool game at the underground club. And he gets it right. Ramon tells Kevin Laird/Blade to come up to the stage and make a speech. Everyone in the audience is yelling, "Blade!" like it's a thing now.
- Kevin Laird/Blade just went through his biography in genetic detail, and either I totally incorrectly heard the earlier conversation with his son or this movie makes no sense because now he says he was born Latino (Carlos Guitterrez), and he was adopted by white people at 14 years old (then became Kevin Laird) after his Latino parents died.
Forgive me if I'm wrong here, but even if you're adopted, you don't have to Anglicize your name, right?
Also, I would SWEAR that he said he was adopted by his Latino parents earlier. Ugh.
I am not watching this movie again, but it doesn't make sense for him to be Latino born because he is such a white boy. I get the Guero thing now (earlier conversation with disappeared son), but it doesn't make sense. The son (if he even still exists in the film's reality by the end of the film) didn't look Latino either.
Why am I seeking sense in this film?
- Oh, all of a sudden we're all at the underground club celebrating, there's water everywhere, everyone is wet, and we're all dancing. Also, this is not an understatement, there is water everywhere. Water is pouring from rain machines (you can't see them but, duh, how else is it suddenly pouring in the underground club?), every single cast member save THE SON is dancing wet, and this is the finale.
UGH.
- I might have been totally wrong about Kevin Laird/Blade being unmarried too. There was a blonde woman sitting next to him at the Super Quiz and dancing in the water with him as well. I guess that answers who takes care of the son at night, but doesn't answer why he was flirting with the librarian.
- Either I missed entire scenes in this film or the TV version is edited badly or the film itself was rewritten and re-edited to incorporate all the popular genres of the time into this mish-mosh. Sadly, there's very little inside information on imdb. Probably because no one has sat through this shit in 20 years.
- Well okay so it just ended (abruptly to me) with everyone dancing in the water. I'm still not sure if they were dancing The Lambada because clearly dancing was not what this movie was about.
EDUCATION.
IDENTITY.
RACISM.
- As the credits began, it flashed through epilogues on the "Galaxy High" students to show they all had successful careers.
Someone who works with computers. (RAMON!)
Engineer.
Fashion Designer.
Teacher.
No Joke.
- Final Observations
So awful. Truly awful. This ranks right up there with Pauley Shore films for me. The music was horrible too. I barely mentioned that because I was too busy trying to understand what the hell was happening in the story, but it's bad.
And granted I was half-paying attention, half-live blogging, but I'm fairly certain that Kevin Laird/Blade had a son in the first 30 minutes of this film that was never mentioned again. I may even have to re-watch that part just to make sure it really happened.
Surprisingly, I do not have anything bad to say about any of the actors in this atrocity. I think all the issues stemmed from the script, the director, the editor, and/or the production company. They weren't given great material to work from, but they did their best. Also, the kid who played Ramon was a very natural, realistic performer.
I learned a lesson though. What started off as a fun live-recap became a 'Memento'-like puzzle of genres, plot, characters, and a never-seen-or-mentioned-again child.
I'll never leave you for another again, "Salsa".
