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The premise of 1976's Tunnel Vision was to look into
the future and show how one network managed to dominate 1985's
programming with "no bullshit" shows and news. The United States
Senate is holding hearings to investigate their virtual monopoly and
its impact on America's children, giving the director a chance to
enter short snippets from the programming as evidence in the hearings.
Somebody obviously saw Groove Tube and liked it, and
thus decided to make their own extension. It sounded like a better
idea than it was.
Frankly, almost all of the sketches fall flat on their
faces, despite the presence of some of the once and future stars of
the sketch comedy biz, including Dr Johnny Fever, Larraine Newman, John Candy, Chevy
Chase, Roger Bowen, Joe Flaherty, Ron Silver, Gerrit Graham, Betty
Thomas, Al Franken and Tom Davis. The film strikes me as evidence that
pot will improve your experience if you smoke it before watching a
dumb comedy, but not if you smoke it before writing one.
On the other hand, even though the transfer stinks and
the film is almost as bad, I really enjoyed going back in the time
tunnel to see this film, which has often been unavailable in the
intervening years. You older guys might enjoy the nostalgic aspect of
it. |
Tuna's thoughts
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Tunnel Vision (1976) is one of
those films made up of a series of short sketches with some
underlying premise, in this case, a senate hearing into the
damage being done to America in 1985 by a censor-free TV
station. They supposedly screen excerpts from a typical days
programming. Despite some real talent, most of the skits just
weren't funny, especially in 2002. However, Henry Kissinger
calling Nixon a big jerk on a children's show would have gotten
a big laugh from me in the mid 70's. Several of the skits were
biting satire, for example, Charlie's Girls, referring both to
Charlie's Angels and the Manson family.
The best exposure is from Dody Dorn where she starts dressed as
a bishop and ends up showing full-frontal in an ad to join the
church. She abandoned acting shortly after this film, and tried
her hand at several other crafts, finally becoming a talented
editor, and received an Oscar nomination in 2000 for Memento. |
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| IMDb
guideline: 7.5 usually indicates a level of
excellence, about like three and a half stars
from the critics. 6.0 usually indicates lukewarm
watchability, about like two and a half stars
from the critics. The fives are generally not
worthwhile unless they are really your kind of
material, about like two stars from the critics.
Films under five are generally awful even if you
like that kind of film, equivalent to about one
and a half stars from the critics or less,
depending on just how far below five the rating
is. My own
guideline: A means the movie is so good it
will appeal to you even if you hate the genre. B means the movie is not
good enough to win you over if you hate the
genre, but is good enough to do so if you have an
open mind about this type of film. C means it will only
appeal to genre addicts, and has no crossover
appeal. D means you'll hate it even if you
like the genre. E means that you'll hate it even if
you love the genre. F means that the film is not only
unappealing across-the-board, but technically
inept as well.
Based on this
description, this film is a D+ (both reviewers). Sub-par for a sketch comedy
movie. Very few creative laughs.
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