CALENDAR GIRL MURDERS

Tom Skerritt

CALENDAR GIRL MURDERS (1984 telefilm). Director: William A. Graham.

Richard Trainor (Robert Culp) is the publisher of Paradise magazine. He has just issued a new calendar with shapely naked women in it, when one of those women is shoved off a tenth floor balcony. More murders of models follow. Lt. Dan Stoner (Tom Skerritt of Alien) is assigned the case, but would rather be doing anything else. He is drawn to pretty Cassie Bascomb (Sharon Stone), who wants to have an affair with him despite the fact that he is married. Suspects in the case include everyone from Trainor's assistant Cleo (Barbara Parkins) to comic Nat Couray (Robert Morse). Robert Beltran [Eating Raoul] plays another cop; Alan Thicke is a photographer; and Meredith MacRae plays herself as a TV reporter. Calendar Girl Murders features good performances from Skerritt, Stone, Morse, and some of the others, but it's pretty bad, even dull, like a slasher film that excised all the slashing and suspense. Talented Morse has had a strange, if interesting, career. In the sixties, around the time of How to Succeed in Business, he had a fairly high profile. Some years later he was appearing on sit-com episodes but wasn't even listed as a "special guest-star." But weep not for Morse, as now he is playing the real Dominick Dunne on American Crime Story and all along has had a busy career. This movie is not one of its high spots. Sharon Stone [Catwoman], of course, went on to better (?) things. Despite the success of the big-screen Alien, Skerritt has kept busy mostly on television.

Verdict: Clumsy TV movie looks thrown together with spit and chewing gum. **.

EATING RAOUL

Paul Bartel, Mary Woronov, and their trusty frying pan

EATING RAOUL (1982). Director: Paul Bartel. Written by Bartel and Richard Blackburn.

"Horrible, sex-crazed maniacs that no one would miss!"

"Do you think you can buy another frying pan? I'm just a little queasy about cooking in the one we use to kill people."

Conservative wine seller Paul Bland (Paul Bartel) and his nurse-wife Mary (Mary Woronov) are aghast at their huge rent increase, as well as the antics of the won't-take-no-for-an-answer swingers who live and/or party in their Hollywood building. Having already killed off a man who was trying to have his way with Mary, the couple hit upon the idea of advertising for swingers and murdering them for their money, batting every "pervert" on the head with a frying pan. But a shady locksmith  named Raoul (Robert Beltran) figures out what the Blands are doing and wants his cut -- only he's less interested in the money than he is in the bodies! This very dark comedy is completely absorbing and sick, and also highly amusing, if not for every -- pardon me -- taste. Neither of the two leads are exactly highly-skilled comic actors [although Woronov had a funny bit on the TV show Wings years later], but other than that they are well-cast. Woronov is at least professional, but Bartel really isn't much of an actor. Buck Henry certainly scores as the lecherous Mr. Leech, from whom Mary tries to get a loan; Susan Saiger is terrific as a friendly dominatrix; Edie McClurg makes the most of a bit as a bisexual swinger; and Ed Begley Jr. shows up as another wannabee client of the Blands. Beltran, who later had a significant role on Star Trek: Voyager, is excellent as Raoul. At the core Eating Raoul is a study of ultimate hypocrisy, as the Blands' activities are much, much worse than that of the swingers' they abhor.

Verdict: Certainly a different bill of fare. ***.