Learn Your Lesson on Prom, Parties and Peer Pressure - A Social Shockucation - Fri. May 8th - 8PM

Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter present Learn Your Lesson on Prom, Parties and Peer Pressure - A Social Shockucation, the 26th in a monthly series of programs highlighting the most ridiculous, insane and camptastic educational films, mental hygiene primers and TV specials of the collection. This month, we're going to party and you are cordially invited to this cinematic shindig of social guidance primers centered on social gatherings.  1940s glamour and goofiness comes alive in gorgeous Technicolor when four teens are on their way to Junior Prom (1946) and must discover to take off that headband, fill out their dance card, and party primly and properly. Meredith Baxter and Bill "Will Robinson" Mumy star in The Party (1971) about a bunch of teens facing some serious and sexy dilemmas against a terrible green screen backdrop. Hollywood primate Zippy the Chimp almost has his birthday party ruined by a bully, until quits monkeying around and gets revenge in Zippy's Birthday Party (1940s). Four kids are all dressed up and out for the night of their lives, but their necking and reckless driving, might just make this The Last Prom (1963). Teenaged Paula Abdul and a gaggle of young girls sing about throwing a Party in a musical excerpt from Junior High School (1978). Plus, the trailer for Carrie, Marcel Marceau mimes good manners in Bip at a Society Party (1975), party and school dance excerpts from Sid Davis' LSD:Trip or Trap?, Who's Different?, Kristy McNichol in Me and Dad's New Wife and more surprises!  It's a magical night to learn your lesson.


Date: Friday, May 8th, 2015 at 8:00pm

Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 Limited Seating RSVP to RSVP@oddballfilm.com or (415) 558-8117
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com

Featuring:
Junior Prom (Color, 1946)
Classic teen dating guide in stunning Technicolor- so very relevant today! Learn all the social graces of post-war teens as they discover what to wear, how to accessorize, how to greet their date's parents and how to arrive at the Junior Prom in style! And, of course, the most useful lesson for today: how to fill out your dance card (yes, that was a real thing).

The Party (Color, 1971)
An episode of Catholic moral-hygiene show Insight starring a who's who of young emerging talent including Meredith Baxter (Family Ties), Joy Bang (Cisco Pike, Messiah of Evil), Pamela McMyler (Halloween II) and Bill Mumy (Will Robinson from Lost in Space). They are three young couples on a weekend getaway; they've got a boat, some beers, a terrible green-screened beach backdrop and some time away from their nagging folks to let loose. Meredith Baxter just wants to sex it up with her boyfriend, McMyler is torn between her morals and the sexy time everybody thinks she should be having and Joy Bang wants to break it off will Bill Mumy who just wants to play his tunes on his acoustic guitar.  Turns out, this party isn't that fun after all. Director Nicholas Webster is best well known for his Christmas Cult Classic "Santa Claus Conquers the Martians".

Zippy's Birthday Party (B+W, 1940s)
It's primate powerhouse Zippy the Chimp's birthday and he wants nothing more than a party with his friends.  Everyone's having a grand old time, in their pretty party dresses, watching zippy roller skate in a white tuxedo and open his presents; until the town bully comes to the party with a jack in the box and a bad attitude.  When the bully steals Zippy's cake, the birthday boy is done monkeying around and plots a sinister (especially for a children's film) revenge on the human child. Not necessarily the best lesson we've learned, but revenge by bodily harm certainly is sweet when administered by a chimpanzee.  

The Last Prom (Color, 1963)
Pristine print of this all-time classic scare film centered around two pairs of teens on their way to the prom who turn the best night of their young lives into the last when they engage in reckless and sexy driving. Shot in 1963, these hot-blooded teens live and drive too fast: sex=death. So good it was remade in 1980 (replacing the necking and bad driving with drunk driving).


"Party" from Junior High School (Color, 1978, excerpt)
As if Junior High wasn't awful enough, imagine adding song and dance numbers about the most awkward aspects of your life and changing body! This musicalamity revolves loosely around a party, planned by Sherry, played by none other than 16 year-old Paula Abdul. Everybody's gotta be there, and lots of singles still need a date, which leads to triangles and hilarity. For this excerpt, we've got a gaggle of girls gathered around Sherry and singing about the eminent epic soiree. It's an epic camp musical masterpiece!



LSD: Trip or Trap? (Color, 1967, snippet)
A Sid Davis classic that starts with a fatal crash, and then traces the tragic path that led a good boy to experiment with the latest thrill on the scene- LSD-25. Wild freak-out scenes and good kids pressured into drugs by misguided peers.



Curator’s Biography
Kat Shuchter is a graduate of UC Berkeley in Film Studies. She is a filmmaker, artist and esoteric film hoarder.  She has helped program shows at the PFA, The Nuart and Cinefamily at the Silent Movie Theater and was crowned “Found Footage Queen” of Los Angeles, 2009.

About Oddball Films
Oddball films is the film component of Oddball Film+Video, a stock footage company providing offbeat and unusual film footage for feature films like Milk, documentaries like The Summer of Love, television programs like Mythbusters, clips for Boing Boing and web projects around the world.
Our films are almost exclusively drawn from our collection of over 50,000 16mm prints of animation, commercials, educational films, feature films, movie trailers, medical, industrial military, news out-takes and every genre in between. We’re actively working to present rarely screened genres of cinema as well as avant-garde and ethno-cultural documentaries, which expand the boundaries of cinema. Oddball Films is the largest film archive in Northern California and one of the most unusual private collections in the US. We invite you to join us in our weekly offerings of offbeat cinema.