MOVIE REVIEW: Madhouse (1990)
The Motion Picture Association (MPA) “PG-13” rating in its early days of usage marked a very small zone between “PG” and “R” ratings where you could get away with almost anything — sex, cartoonish violence, drug references, and all unsavory implications. Because it wasn’t an R-rated move, parents felt comfortable exposing children to some really wild stuff! Who could have thought things like this could be found in a comedy about unwanted house guests? It is in this context I present one of my fondest movie-watching memories: a dark comedy called Madhouse that truly comes alive with the wisdom of age and experience that comes with adulthood.
Stockbroker Mark Bannister (John Laroquette, “Night Court” [TV-NBC], Star Trek III: The Search for Spock) and his TV reporter wife Jessie (Kirstie Alley, the Look Who’s Talking franchise, “Cheers” [TV-NBC], Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan) have recently moved into a nice Santa Monica home, with his & hers BMWs in a 2-car garage. Mark’s making moves at work and so is Jessie: they are upwardly mobile at work and things couldn’t be better. Speaking of things, they take a left turn when the forwarded mail comes three months late. The bills are manageable, but the note about a visit from Mark’s cousin Fred (John Diehl, Stargate [1994], Falling Down) and his wife Bernice (Jessica Lundy, “Dinosaurs” [TV-ABC], RocketMan [1997]) comes far too late: they’re flying in from New Jersey that very day.
Fred (who Mark remembers as confident and successful) is unemployed and hen-pecked by Bernice…who is three months pregnant on top of being incredibly rude to their hosts. They also brought a temperamental cat named Scruffy (which Fred didn’t mention) with a host of medical issues that would kill any other cat…but it mysteriously stays alive. They were only staying for 5 days and during their stay they annoy the hell out of Jessie and Mark, who keep them at arm’s reach and no closer. It’s only 5 days, so it’s not like anything bad would happen to them in the interim—
Bernice slips on the welcome mat as she was leaving and falls on her back! After consulting her OBGYN, Dr. Penix (see CHOICE CUTS for more on that gag), Mark & Jessie were told to keep Bernice bedridden in the nearest bed for the remaining SIX MONTHS of her pregnancy — the worst possible news for Mark and Jessie. Somehow things gets worse with MORE unwanted house guests:
- Jessie’s sister Claudia (Alison La Placa, “Batman: the Animated Series” [TV-WB], “Duet” [TV-FOX]) recently divorced her rich Persian husband and he cut both her and her drug-dealing son Jonathan (Bradley Gregg, Fire in the Sky, “Lonesome Dove” [TV miniseries-CBS]) off from any money and properties. So she moves on to…
- Dale (Robert Ginty, Harley Davidson & the Marlboro Man, The Exterminator [1980]), the Bannister’s macho neighbor with two bad kids: psychotic C.K. (Aeryk Egan, Dead Man on Campus, Book of Love [1990]) and precocious gymnast Katy (Deborah Otto, The Magic Flute [1986]), whose house burned down because of fire from Mark’s grill. To evade a potential lawsuit, Mark welcomes Dale and Claudia (and all their kids) into the house.
It becomes a battle of keeping their wits as opposed to matching them with the new arrivals as more and more pile into the Bannister house with all of their stuff and habits. Mark and Jessie do their best and hold out until they get their break…and the resolution is so satisfying that you’ll suspend disbelief at the ending circumstances.
This movie was a great experience, and I remember watching the TV cut of the film. When I re-watched it for this review, there were scenes I absolutely do not remember! They were a very welcome addition that made me alternately retch in disgust or laugh, in true 90’s XTREME fashion. So many of the jokes I remember as a kid take on a whole new dimension with the onset of experience and adulthood. Oddly enough, this movie has incredibly low ratings across the board from adults: I’m not sure what movie these people saw, but it wasn’t the amazing movie I watched today.
While many have said it’s like a tasteless feature-length TV show, it would seem to be in good company with shows like FOX’s “Married…With Children” and its WB clone “Unhappily Every After”. It can even be seen as one of many early examples of extreme or shock comedy that was found in FOX’s sketch comedy shows (“In Living Color”, “Haywire”, “MadTV”). That said, if you’re interested in good belly laughs and can stomach late 20th-Century gonzo comedy and near-subliminal ideology about gendered behavior, give this one a watch! I highly recommend it!
CHOICE CUTS <<spoilers beyond this point>>:
- It’s a competition to see who’s the worst: Bernice is very rude and has no money but is on the Home Shopping Network buying out the store…on whose dime? Fred has no money! And as I typed this, I remembered Mark gave Bernice his credit card…
- Claudia isn’t much better: she is an irresponsible, emotionally stunted gold-digger and constantly plots to shack up with the richest man she can find — preferably a rich man over 80 to inherit wealth after the man’s imminent death. She eventually settles on Mark’s boss Mr. Grindle (Wayne Tippit, Taps [1981], JFK [1991]).
- I’m pretty sure the writers (director Top Ropelewski and producer Leslie Dixon) may have been working out some personal issues through this script; the characters Mark and Jessie read like author-inserts. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…
- CAMEOS: Blink and you’ll miss Mark Bringleson (The Lawnmower Man, Soldier [1998]) and SNL alumni Dennis Miller (The Net [1995], Tales From the Crypt: Bordello of Blood)!
- Despite only a handful of people of color in the film as speaking extras, I still like this movie.
- NO ANIMALS WERE HARMED: Scruffy the cat died three times — drowned in the fish tank, run over by Jonathan, and overdosed on cocaine. There’s also Fred’s pet elephant Tiny who was arrested by the cops. Can’t forget Fangster, C.K.’s pet snake that was killed for escaping its enclosure and slithered into a warm place (Jessie’s butt).
- My siblings and I still do the Snowball overdosing sound effects, and we always laugh.
- PRICELESS QUOTE: Jonathan’s line of “Uncle Mark, you are a Yuppie dickhead!” still stands out as one of the best — in terms of delivery and spiking my curiosity to learn about Yuppies.
- Watching Fred and Mark re-connect over reminiscing and impromptu karaoke was the most wholesome thing in the movie.
- SPECIAL CUT: I don’t remember the cat’s projectile vomiting in the car, C.K. cutting bad words into the lawn, or the Night of the Living Dead reference. It seems these were cut from the TV release to shorten the film for commercial slots.
- Watching Kirstie Alley have her mental breakdowns shows why she had the best crying face. She had a gift: somehow her voice and red puffy face while crying were absolutely perfect.
- SEX APPEAL: Kirstie Alley was one of my 80’s crushes, so getting to see her put it out there like she wanted to eat someone was HAWT.
- Glad to see Dale find himself a woman who can keep up with him AND keep C.K in check; better the psychotic child experience the police this way than any other. Considering the level of violence in the country that followed, perhaps not.
- PRICELESS QUOTE: When I watched this as a child and Katy says to Mark “I got my first period today”, I didn’t think it was funny, chiefly because I didn’t know what a period was. I understand it’s meant to be funny as a way to be shocking and over to top, but I didn’t need to hear that again.
- The repeated encounters between an unwilling Mark and the precocious Katy were an odd and tasteless addition.
- PRICELESS QUOTE: I don’t find the idea of injured or injuring pregnant women to be funny, but Bernice’s exclamation of “I’m gonna have a flat baby!” sends me.
- Dr. Jack Penix is an actual medical professional — not an OBGYN, but a DDS — who most likely became a minor sensation because of this movie.
