D2D entry #48: H.O.T.S. (1979, Gerald Seth Sindell)
(Featured in Grindhouse Universe.)
The advertisements and plot descriptions of H.O.T.S. make it sound like a typical collegiate flop-and-jiggle flesh fest, but it’s more like one of those films interspersed with dreams caught in fragments while watching the film at 2:30 AM on the couch and fading in and out of consciousness. Imagine trying to tell a friend about this film; it’d go something like, “So yeah, I saw this movie last night, and there were all these hot chicks trying to ace out these other hot chicks, there was like some fraternity shit or something… and there were boobs everywhere, it was awesome… and then there was a seal, and this topless woman skydove into a swimming pool… and there was a hot-air balloon… and then this kid dressed up as a Conehead and started running around during a game of strip football… then there was a dance-off and a catfight… and this mob goombah dressed up like a cleaning robot and a bear climbed a ladder and drank a bunch of bathtub hooch. Oh yeah, Danny Bonaduce was there, too, and somebody fed him some saltpeter. And then there were rape jokes.”
You get the picture. While H.O.T.S. doesn’t have the go-for-broke cheerful sleaziness of something like The Cheerleaders, it’s refreshingly unafraid to get silly in the name of lowbrow yuks. Genial, amusing and a lot weirder than it should be.
Footnote: One of the producers on this was Don Schain, who in the ’70s crafted a mini-empire of super-sleazy spy capers starring his then wife Cheri Caffero (I’ll be getting to those films in due time). After dropping out of the business in the ’80s, he got a second wind. He’s now a producer who specializes in Disney made-for-TV movies. His credits include the High School Musical films. Fucking wow.
