Hollywood High (1976) Peter Perry Pictures/Comedy RT: 81 minutes Rated R (nudity, sexual content, language, drug and alcohol use, crude references) Director: Patrick Wright Screenplay: (uncredited) Music: Scott Gale Cinematography: Jonathan Silveira Release date: December 1976 (US) Cast: Susanne (Severeid), Sherry Hardin, Rae Sperling, Marcy Albrecht, Kevin Mead, John Young, Richard Hynes, Joseph Butcher, Patrick Wright (uncredited), Marla Winters, Kress Hytes, Hy Camp, Phil J. Macias, Mark Lawhead, Lori Bump, Dan Howard, Scott Gale, Dale Caldwell, Jon Page, Tino Dominguez. Box Office: N/A
Rating: NO STARS!!!
The teen T&A comedy Hollywood High is the dried-up, caked-on crap on the inside of a toilet bowl in a filthy public restroom. No amount of scrubbing or disinfecting will wash away the stink of it. If you were to make a comprehensive list of all the bad Animal House and Porky’s clones, you’ll find that not a single one of them is nearly as bad as Hollywood High. It’s the worst of the very worst. Not only is it spectacularly unfunny and ineptly made, it fails at the most fundamental level of the genre. Let me put in this way. Not even 13YO boys with their raging hormones would be remotely excited or titillated by it. Oh, it has boobie shots aplenty but somehow director Patrick Wright manages to botch this aspect of Hollywood High as badly as everything else in it. It’s that bad.
It may be hard to believe but Hollywood High has even less of a plot than Screwballs, a movie that I personally enjoy while fully acknowledging its barely existent storyline- i.e. five horny high school boys scheme to see the school prude’s breasts. Hollywood High concerns four airheaded girls and their bonehead boyfriends looking for a private place to screw each other’s brains out. If it matters, the girls are Jan (Susanne), Candy (Hardin), Monica (Sperling) and Bebe (Albrecht) and the boys are Mike (Young), Sam (Hynes), Buzz (Butcher) and Fenzie (Mead). The only one that stands out is “The Fenz” (as he’s also known) for obvious reasons. It’s a wonder Paramount Television didn’t sue. ANYWAY, they get a lucky break when the girls help out aging silent movie vamp June East (Winters) at a gas station. If case you don’t know who they’re alluding to, she actually says, “Why don’t you come down and see me some time?” It’s just different enough to dodge a copyright infringement suit.
Wright tries to distract the viewers from the movie’s plot deficiencies (that’s putting it kindly) with scenes of the characters at a curiously unpopulated section of Venice Beach hanging out, talking, smoking pot, cavorting in the water and fooling around in a pup tent. When they’re not doing that, they’re cruising Hollywood Boulevard in a souped-up car (girls) and van (boys). Occasionally, they’re hassled by a cop so incompetent, it’s a miracle he’s not on permanent desk duty. The cop is played by Wright who, for some reason, goes uncredited. What’s the point of that? He admits to directing this piece of crap. It’s not like he can be further embarrassed by taking the acting credit too. Hell, the screenwriter wisely removed his name from the credits assuming there even was one. Then, of course, there’s the obligatory food fight. It takes place in a crummy pizza joint where they seem to have plastic trash cans filled with tomato sauce at the ready. When the cop finally shows up (after getting lost!), one of the girls pulls his pants down and hits him in the rear with a plate of spaghetti. This food fight isn’t funny, it’s just gross.
Something seems to be missing from Hollywood High. What could it be? Oh yeah, the “high” (as in high school) part of the title. There are exactly two scenes of the characters actually going to class and both of them end with a teacher (one gay) seducing a student. How do we know he’s gay? He checks every box on the 70s gay stereotype checklist and does a bad job of it. This movie is so desperate for laughs, there’s even a forced joke about “doing the Greeks” (as in Greek-style, get it?) shoe-horned in. These scenes also serve to show how no-budget Hollywood High really is; they’re both shot in the same bare-walled classroom. Not that it matters since these kids spend as little time at school as possible. As for the level of humor, it’s as lowbrow as any other entry in the genre- e.g. the cop urinates on his shoes. The only problem is that, at no time, is it even remotely amusing. It’s not even funny by accident. I’ve never seen a movie that avoids laughs as successfully as Hollywood High.
I’m not even going to comment on the acting because to do so would be awarding dignity where none is deserved. You can’t even call it acting. I’ve seen grade school history plays wth more convincing performances. The chubby kid with his finger up his nose playing George Washington is more likely to receive an Oscar than anybody in Hollywood High. If I had to single out the absolute worst “performance”, it would be the guy playing Fenzie. YIKES! Mercifully, this is the only credit on his IMDb page. I hope he went to barber college or something.
A movie like Hollywood High typically gets by on hot girls. It fails in that area too. The girl’s aren’t that hot; one is a total dog. The guys aren’t hunky. The characters have no discernible personality traits other than the blonde girl being dumb and the fat guy eating a lot.
Hollywood High is very, VERY poorly made. I know that teen T&A comedies generally are not high-water marks in the art of filmmaking but Hollywood High sinks it to a whole new level. Scenes go on too long. Some of the editing looks like it was accomplished with a Cuisinart. The sex scene in the pup tent is confusing and redundant. The same is true of the food fight. This is a level of incompetence you rarely see in movies that actually make it to theaters.
Yes, Hollywood High actually got a theatrical release but I have a theory about that. It was designed to play at drive-in theaters on hot summer nights to teenagers too busy making out to watch the movie. If they did, they’d notice how bad it is and demand their money back. I can’t imagine anybody liking Hollywood High, not even a little bit. Not even 11YOs at a sleepover sneaking downstairs to watch a dirty movie on late-night cable would get much of a thrill from it. This is the kind of movie that gives T&A exploitation flicks a bad name. It’s not even enjoyably sleazy. It’s just dull and boring. It deserves to be scrubbed from existence by the strongest toilet cleaner on the market.
