Cautionary tale features a fictionalized take on the use of marijuana. A trio of drug dealers lead innocent teenagers to become addicted to "reefer" cigarettes by holding wild parties with jazz music.
Director: Louis J. Gasnier
Stars: Dorothy Short, Kenneth Craig, Lillian Miles, Dave O'Brien.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0028346/
Watched on AmazonPrime, colorized version; smoke is colorized too: green or red not gray.
Notorious for being a bad film serving up horribly wrong information, I only watched it as antecedent to the musical spoofing it.
Dave O'Brien (b. '12) is the only name and face I know, mostly from the series of short films under the Pete Smith Specialties banner, where he was a silent pratfall man illustrating "Pete Smith's" narration.
The only thing worse than heavy-handed propaganda is hhp that is wildly inaccurate. Here they treat "marihuana" intoxication as though it were cocaine's or PCP's. So this deserves the low rating is has. However, it does not deserve the attention it's gotten; it's more worthy of complete neglect.
Rated 3.8 (7,139)
indie, dir. Gasnier; 5
An outrageous tongue-in-cheek musical comedy adaptation of the classic anti-marijuana propaganda film Reefer Madness (1936).
Director: Andy Fickman
Stars: Kristen Bell, Christian Campbell, Neve Campbell, Alan Cumming, Ana Gasteyer, Steven Weber.
Jamie Bishton ... assistant choreographer
Mary Ann Kellogg ... choreographer
Kristie Marsden ... choreography skeleton crew (uncredited)
Watched on AmazonPrime.
14 songs in the Soundtracks. all Lyrics by Kevin Murphy, Music by Dan Studney; IMDb doesn't have any musicals by them since then. No dubbers are listed among the performers.
Since this is a parody of the ludicrous '36 film, they were shooting fish in a barrel. The film has plenty of energy, and I see enough potential in the songs that I went the extra meter to document the songwriters (not listed on the Soundtracks page).
Since this is a parody of the ludicrous '36 film, they were shooting fish in a barrel. The film has plenty of energy, and I see enough potential in the songs that I went the extra meter to document the songwriters (not listed on the Soundtracks page).
Passing thought while the film was rolling: was this a successful part of changing the American attitude toward reefer, or was the attitude already so changed that the musical was now acceptable?
This followed the "plot" of the '36 film fairly closely, mocking it and exaggerating to communicate "comedy" rather than fear.
It was ok. The dancing may have been pretty good, but I just wasn't attracted. Perhaps it had too many songs that filled too much of the time.
This followed the "plot" of the '36 film fairly closely, mocking it and exaggerating to communicate "comedy" rather than fear.
It was ok. The dancing may have been pretty good, but I just wasn't attracted. Perhaps it had too many songs that filled too much of the time.
Rated 7.1 (5,823)
Showtime, dir. Fickman; 6
