Spoilers Ahead:
I saw Pretty Maids when it first came out, and I must say that as much as I enjoy Roddenberry's work, from Police Story to Star Trek, I despised this movie on many levels. The movie basically revolves around a 17 year-old male virgin who can't seem to get laid while every other kid around him is screwing constantly, while grisly murders are occurring at his high school. Who could possibly be doing them?
Roddenberry's view of high school girls is that they are ready at any moment to take off their clothes and seduce the 40-something (or older) football coach. All the students at high school are portrayed as mating like rabbits (with no-one ever getting pregnant), with no regard for feelings, and the girls at school are found raped and murdered, one by one, without many eyebrows raised. This is presented as * funny * by Roddenberry. `Hey Joe - this is hysterical! You're daughter's just been found - chuckle - strangled and naked in the bathroom in high school. Oh yeah, she was raped too!' Expecting the audience to find this funny was in fact sickening to me when I watched it, and was just as sick when I saw it years later. At one girl's funeral service, a student is seen blowing bubbles indifferently, apparently Roddenberry's view of the attitude of high school students toward their peers. Frankly, he should have been sued for liable by anyone under 21. Expecting the audience to find this amusing is scary, and makes one wonder how agitated Roddenberry's mind was at the end of the Star Trek series. (He in fact left Star Trek to write/produce this movie; not a good career choice.) There are several scenes where raped/murdered children are found, nude or nearly nude, and they are all treated chevelierly by the characters and as visual punchlines to jokes. I hate to say it, but this is a sick movie, with a sick story. That it comes from a man like Gene Roddenberry is a sad fact I will never quite be able to reconcile. That it was produced and released in 1971 is truly bizarre. Roger Ebert once described a movie called "The Hitcher" as "Diseased and Corrupt." I think that is a pretty fair description of this movie as well.
One out ten stars
I saw Pretty Maids when it first came out, and I must say that as much as I enjoy Roddenberry's work, from Police Story to Star Trek, I despised this movie on many levels. The movie basically revolves around a 17 year-old male virgin who can't seem to get laid while every other kid around him is screwing constantly, while grisly murders are occurring at his high school. Who could possibly be doing them?
Roddenberry's view of high school girls is that they are ready at any moment to take off their clothes and seduce the 40-something (or older) football coach. All the students at high school are portrayed as mating like rabbits (with no-one ever getting pregnant), with no regard for feelings, and the girls at school are found raped and murdered, one by one, without many eyebrows raised. This is presented as * funny * by Roddenberry. `Hey Joe - this is hysterical! You're daughter's just been found - chuckle - strangled and naked in the bathroom in high school. Oh yeah, she was raped too!' Expecting the audience to find this funny was in fact sickening to me when I watched it, and was just as sick when I saw it years later. At one girl's funeral service, a student is seen blowing bubbles indifferently, apparently Roddenberry's view of the attitude of high school students toward their peers. Frankly, he should have been sued for liable by anyone under 21. Expecting the audience to find this amusing is scary, and makes one wonder how agitated Roddenberry's mind was at the end of the Star Trek series. (He in fact left Star Trek to write/produce this movie; not a good career choice.) There are several scenes where raped/murdered children are found, nude or nearly nude, and they are all treated chevelierly by the characters and as visual punchlines to jokes. I hate to say it, but this is a sick movie, with a sick story. That it comes from a man like Gene Roddenberry is a sad fact I will never quite be able to reconcile. That it was produced and released in 1971 is truly bizarre. Roger Ebert once described a movie called "The Hitcher" as "Diseased and Corrupt." I think that is a pretty fair description of this movie as well.
One out ten stars