A Scream in the Streets (1973) is yet another of many obscure films with erotic/sexual content "discovered" and released by the great label, Something Weird Video, which is seemingly defined by the unusual, wacky, risque, surreal, provocative, envelope-pushing, often no-boundries-exist content. I love that there are all these kinds of exploitation fare out there just waiting to be seen by a brand new audience. Streets is essentially reminiscent to the softcore of the 2000s. While not hardcore as the decade of the 70s would be known for, Streets ties numerous sex scenes strung together around the case of a transvestite who happens to peep and seems to turn psychotic while dressed as a woman. This singular thread opens at the beginning of the film but doesn't technically define the whole of it in Streets. The guy pops up on occasion to attack a few women, but most of the film is concerned with the police and their sex lives, with the peeping of a lesbian couple thrown in for good measure. Its vintage softcore sex with plentiful nudity and the performers appear to be actually participating although the scenes are shot to not depict actual explicit details needed to move it into the hardcore description. I'm not sure what the audience will expect when they rent this film based on the title, but this isn't some psycho-on-the-loose-in-the-big-city film you'd believe. That is merely a strand that happens to hold the sexual situations together. This should probably be called the people-get-it-on-while-a-maniac-shows-up-occasionally. The transvestite angle seems thrown in because, for whatever reason, it might raise eyebrows at the time. A lot has changed since then, so the angle might appear a bit offensive and politically incorrect nowadays, but this will be seen, I imagine, as a curio of how it once was used by filmmakers at the time. It doesn't seem to indicate the reasoning necessarily for the crimes but just a means to throw in the plot in a trailer at a drive-in to seduce audiences into seeing it.
4th of July 2025 Marathoning
McDowell and Comi prepare to leave for Mars. Aliens visiting the UN, dropping off their cook book, providing goodies for humans on Earth, easing them into trusting them, spiriting them away to be food for them on their home planet. To Serve Man is nearly 60 years ago. I've been watching Twilight Zone since I was a teenager in the mid 90s thanks to Sci Fi Channel. Many of my family have passed since (for instance, my mother's siblings are all about gone except one last sister), and it wouldn't be right to avoid a marathon during the 4th if just for nostalgic reasons. Syfy didn't see the value of TZ on Independence Day, except last year, so even though I cannot watch episodes like I do during New Year's Eve and Day, it is nice to try and sneak in a block of episodes whenever possible. I started with Death Ship from the fourth season, continuing with Stopover in a Quiet Town and The Gift . To Serve Man would feel like a later afternoon watch but SYFY showed it at 3:...
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