Sleep Debt Cinema (3rd April 2012)

By Gerald Fie


If you weren’t awake between 1.30-3.30 am in Australie this morning, you may have missed the movie C.H.O.M.P.S  on 7TWO which was more or less about a young man (Wesley Eure) who made a robot dog that could see through walls and sense when crime was about to occur; so the mutt had Minority Report moves. As nearly as I could tell the young fella did all this to impress Valerie Bertinelli from ONE DAY AT A TIME, HOT IN CLEVELAND and the Cindy Crawford “Meaningful Beauty” infomercial (also a fave of insomniacs everywhere).

Everything about this movie was cartoonishly poor and it turned out that animation legend Joseph Barbera helped to write the screenplay. There was a cast of veterans including Jim Backus, Red Buttons and Conrad Bain. Apart from this, the only other thing going for it was the cross-sectional robot dog models (as seen in top photo). In addition to robo-Benji there was also a couple of Doberman cross-sections that were probably the work of some obsessive in the Art Department.  So an A+ for the robot dogs and a D for the film itself.

If I have The Insomnia again  tonight (ie early tomorrow morning), then I’ll check out Hope and Crosby’s last Road movie, THE ROAD TO HONG KONG (1962); their only one without a significant contribution from Dorothy Lamour  (although she did make a cameo). The Wikipedia claims that 58 year-old Crosby thought 48 year-old Lamour  was too old to play the female lead, so 29 year-old Joan Collins was hired instead.  So, 50 years ago this kind of BS was going on in the movies, still. 

Comments

Tobias Ampersand said…
This is the first movie I ever saw at the cinema. It was at the Forrest in Bunbury, which is now a car dealership I believe. I was excited, but I remember being quiet young, and not being able to sit still through most of it. I think we almost left and went back in a couple of times. Maybe I was bored? But ever since then, I've always loved those dogs.

I can't believe it was on TV! I should try and track it down.
11:29 am
Mr Trivia said…
What about a robotic CAT, eh?
10:33 am
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