If remembered at all today, Loose Shoes is done so not for the nudity of Hill Street Blues‘ Betty Thomas (trust me), but for marking the screen debut of Bill Murray. A scrappy, Kentucky Fried Movie-style comedy of faux coming attractions, it’s the very definition of “mixed bag,” which means it’s not without some laughs.
One of them arrives with the first trailer out of the gate, for a biopic of a Howard Hughes-like character; intones the narrator, “But his hobby … was watching planes fuck.” Blue humor reigns throughout, with such bits as The Invasion of the Penis Snatchers, 2069: A Space Orgy, The Bad News Bears in Getting Laid and the African-American musical Dark Town After Dark, featuring a catchy number whose chorus celebrates “tight pussy, loose shoes and a warm place to shit.”
The longer segments tend not to work as well. These include the prison drama Three Cheers for Lefty!, in which Murray’s death-row inmate incites a riot over quiche; Scuffed Shoes, a ballet-set murder mystery; and Billy Jerk Goes to Oz. In the latter, a snake bite sends the Billy Jack-esque rebel to the wonderful world; how many of today’s young viewers would know who Billy Jack is?
Other targets of parody are Woody Allen, nature documentaries, Walt Disney family films, the Ma & Pa Kettle and Francis the Talking Mule franchises, Charlie Chaplin, spaghetti Westerns, Macon County Line, concession-stand commercials and Star Wars, which is rendered as a Jewish space opera with laser-shooting menorah. If Mel Brooks didn’t steal this idea from director/co-writer Ira Miller for History of the World: Part I, then … well, he totally stole it. —Rod Lott
I wonder if anybody besides me remembers where that “tight pussy” line came from originally.
During the 1972 Presidential campaign, Earl Butz, Nixon’s Secretary of Agriculture, was chatting with Pat Boone, who wondered why the GOP was having so much dificulty in attracting black voters. What did they really want?
Butz’s reply was the now-famous line, which was overheard by a reporter on the plane, and subsequently saw print in a book that was published after the election.
I’m fuzzy on the details after all these years; any correction is welcomed.
You are pretty much correct. I looked up that story last week when I rewatched this movie, just to reacquaint myself:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Butz
Can you imagine the Twitter thrashing Butz would receive today?