Summer Summer Summertime

Summer Summer Summertime 

(for B-Movies...because you’ve seen everything else)

Ahhh…summer!

The Sand! The Surf! The Sun! The July 4th fireworks spectacle! 

Or in reality, none of that while we stew inside suffering through the same stupid shit on Netflix.

As we continue into the Covid-19 apocalypse I’ve run out of stuff to watch. Until now.

While I’m safely hidden in TheArchive’s Top (Pop) Secret (thank you to our popcorn sponsor) bunker (totally not a broom closet), I’m going to share some B-Movie Summer fun from the dark corners of…not the broom closet! Or Roomba closet! (Thank you Roomba)

How great is this image?!?

So grab your sunscreen (can you get a sunburn from your iPhone?), stay six feet away from the TV, (can I give the virus to the actors in the movies? Some of them deserve it!), and enjoy a vision of days gone by….

I haven’t felt the sun on my skin in three months...

Our first movie from TheArchive’s Summer Summer Summertime is the newly restored to 4K Welcome to Paradise (1995), which is anything but! Though if I’m talking about it here, that should be implied. Either way, it stars Shelley Long, fresh off of burning her bridges with the entire cast and crew of Cheers and an Ian Ziering who has no idea he’s going to headline 74 Sharknado movies one day.

The movie follows a stressed-out mother of three (Shelley Long) who decides to abandon all of her responsibilities for some tropical fun! She also ropes in her two friends, who apparently have nothing better to do so they drop everything to join her! The trio travel to Florida for Spring break in an effort to recapture their college days (There is a 14 year age gap between the three, so maybe one was super smart and the other, well, ends up writing crap like this).

“I’m older, I’m evil and I won’t rest till I get my revenge!” That’s the reason she was only in one episode of Frasier.

They arrive at the Floridian version of Bate’s Motel, where they con the dreamy Ian Ziering into giving them a room. Now given this is a “wacky 90s comedy” starring attractive women, you know what that means? Badly written romcom subplots for all of them!

That’s what you get for treating George Wendt so poorly Shelley.

Meanwhile, Mel Harris (yup she’s in this too) starts dating a coworker, and while that may be a problem with HR, it’s perfectly acceptable in this movie of the week! Thanks to the slackers in Standards and Practices, everything is acceptable! DeLane Matthews, rekindles her romance from 20 years earlier, which is a much-needed reprieve from her failed marriage...

"I promise you, if you go to the police, they'll be looking for a new mother" Run DeLane, Run...

At the same time, Ziering turns on that smoldering Apprentice Season 14 charm and directs it to Shelley Long. So hot. Like 90210 hot.

But not as hot as Ian and Geraldo in a two-shot. It's pronounced "Eye-an" damnit!"

The thing is, Long’s character is married, Ian knows it, and all go along with it! Luckily for Ms. Long, she realizes giving up life - to run off with the guy who said yes to every Sharknado movie -  isn’t the best idea, and turns him down! Weirdly enough, he’s happy she turned him down (he probably heard from Kelsey Grammer how she acts when the cameras are off).

So in the end, the three friends become closer and find what they came to Florida looking for (Mara Lago?). That and spoiler alert: apparently they become witches since they can teleport whenever their photo is taken. So weird!

“Burn Shelley Long at the stake!” - The Entire Cast and Crew of Cheers

Next up from TheArchive’s Summer Summer Summertime, is Prince of Bel Air (1986). Nope. Not The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, just the Prince of Bel-Air. Wait, come back!

The intro to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air seems different than I remember...

Ok, so it may not have Will Smith or even Will Rogers, but it does have Mark Harmon! Everyone loves Mark Harmon! Housewives and my mother love him...which means at least one person is still reading this. 

"Sounds Good to me," Mark Harmon’s reaction to NCIS being renewed for season 18

Go Mark!! So this movie doesn’t have much of a plot. It’s a slice of life movie, and how do I know? It took a slice of my life and I'll never get it back...Anyway, handsome Mark Harmon plays a beach bum who is living the bachelor life.

Some guys have all the luck...

Great establishing shots of 1980s Los Angeles and its beaches abound. You can just feel the Reagan years oozing off the screen! Who needs a plot? 

Oh yeah, love I guess...

Thankfully the romcom Gods intercede and Mark Harmon’s perfect life gets better when he meets Operating Thetan Level 8 uber auditor Scientologist Kirstie Alley. Yet another Cheers alumnus! What’s going on here? BTW, for you TheArchive aficionados (thanks Ma) Ted Danson was also in the first episode of Tucker’s Witch! Did I explode your brain? The next blog I write will be all about the Cheers actors in movies and TV titles on TheArchive and what it all means. We go hard here!

So Sea Org sailor Kirstie is a preppy artist who catches Harmon’s eye, much to the chagrin of her wealthy uncle, who is his pseudo-mentor cum benefactor. He blackmails Harmon into breaking off the relationship or else he’ll cut off all financial support and break their business partnership. That’s some deep Gordon Gecko shit right there. Is this tracking? Well, it shouldn't because this makes no sense, for a couple reasons.

He won’t allow Markie Mark to date, Kirstie, because he’s an irresponsible bum, yet he’ll give Mark a bunch of money to go into business with him? 

If he’s that much of a loser why trust him with money then, Mayor from Jaws? Wait, that’s not the same actor? Are we sure?

This is the same actor, I don’t care what you or IMDB tells me.

Despite being blackmailed by The Mayor from U.N.C.L.E, this being a romcom, can you guess how it ends?

Sharing Chapstick, if you’re wondering.

Boy meets girl, boy falls for girl, and if statistics hold, there is a 50% shot the relationship will fail and he’ll still be broke. Well, at least til NCIS hits syndication….

Now the interesting thing about this movie is, not this movie, but the one it clearly inspired. One year later, half the cast would go on to star in another summer movie, the RIP Carl Reiner classic,  Summer School! Mark Harmon, Kirstie Alley, Patrick Labyorteaux (who?), and Dean Camron all play the same characters, in a similar setting that ends with the good looking slacker getting the crazy Look Who’s Talking Xenu lady from the Galactic Space Force who sells weight supplements. It’s just like when plagiarizer Pete Berg was up late one 1997 night watching that Andrew McCarthy and Jerry Stiller (RIP) gem, Stag, and decided he was the only one who ever saw it so he came out with the 1998 gem Very Bad Things. Look it up. Trust me. Now I would never say Carl Reiner (we miss you already!) is a plagiarist per se and this is only my humble opinion...but that Peter Berg's IP heist was pretty blatantly egregious dontchya think?

While we mourn one of America’s most beloved post-octogenarian (by two decades) comedic legends and target another aging director of crimes against cinema, these two movies, and other summer summer summertime fun movies like Independence Day are all available at your local Blockbuster. And if by local you think I mean Bend, Oregon, then you, my friend are shopping local. Failing that, you can probably find something on TheArchive.TV. But who wants all that free 4K streaming drivel when you can rewatch Netflix? Or that ridiculous Peacock. I mean can we spend time on that service for a hot minute? 

Next time. Although it’ll probably be gone by then.

For now, I’m gonna go lay out on the roof of our building until I get a face mask tan.

And after these rave reviews, you're gonna rush to the TheArchive!

TheArchive channel is dedicated to aficionados and lovers of story, craft, and silver screen fun – streaming rare, retro, and restored films and classic TV. From indies and series, to Oscar winning documentaries, unearthed MOWs, and a killer horror library, TheArchive delivers forgotten, never-before-seen gems for free and many in 4K. Marilyn, Karloff, and Orson Welles stream alongside Reese, Keanu, and Samuel L. Jackson. Find true stories of Queen, Hendrix, and Sinatra, an LGBTQ library, MLK bios, and world history docs. TheArchive has the movies and shows you either saw, should’ve seen, or should be watching now!