So today kicks off the 4 day cine-thon that is the Maryland Film Festival. The MD Film Fest is great. It gets better every year, in fact. Or at least that’s what we hear. If we’re telling the God’s-honest truth we’ve never actually been to the Film Festival. Pretty scandalous, huh?
It’s not that we’ve been unaware of it or have been purposefully staying away. Last year we even lined up a date and were in the car on the way to the Charles when we decided the weather was too nice to sit in a dark theater so we went to the ballpark instead. Perhaps this is finally the year we at least make it out to see one of the insider’s picks.
If you’re in the position tonight where you waited too long to get tickets for opening night, or if the whole idea of a film festival is just a little too highbrow for you, we suggest you check out Mondo Baltimore instead.
Now in it’s 3rd year (!!!) Mondo Baltimore is as tasteless and wonderful as ever. Tonight’s program starts with the Heckle Bestest competition, in which several Mondo regulars will goad, groan, and grunt at a selection of the trashiest film clips ever screened in a game show type effort to determine who among them is the lewdest, crudest, cleverest and bestest Baltimore film heckler. personally, we love the idea of competitive heckling and we can guarantee that you won’t find anything like this among the shushy snobs around the corner.
Tonight’s feature is 1994’s The Dallas Connection. As you can see by the trailer above, it’s pretty much a live-action version of Team America World Police with titties. So, so many titties. You see Choppers, in 1994 there were no iPads. There was no wifi, no cell phones that play movies, and barely any porn on the internet at all. There was no The Wire no Sopranos and no Girls. When people signed up for premium cable channels, it was basically understood that they were signing up to have smut cabled into their living rooms.
The Dallas Connection is a prime example of that. It stars 3 Penthouse Pets and two Playboy Playmates (because porn stars used to want to be real stars instead of pretending to be porn amateurs). They get naked. A lot. And when they’re not naked, there are giant guns and explosions and fistfights and helicopters and stuff. That’s what used to qualify as premium cinema.