Review #1 by Frank

 

Zapped! has a few aspects that make it an easy sell in my book: 1) You've got Scott Baio and Willie Aames showing a virgin world a glimse of what the future held for sitcoms about male, Italian babysitters (Tony Danza should have been paying attention); 2) Scatman Crothers falling into a pot-induced fantasy haze; 3) Boobs; 4) Midway rides; 5) and violently off course remote-controlled airplanes.

 

There's quality ingredients going in, and luckily a pretty good movie comes out. Yes! I told that good things can happen to people like us. Zapped! is a classic power fantasy for

 

nerds, with it's heart in about the same place as Revenge of the Nerds or Weird Science, but with a different tone. A smart kid takes over the high school lab for his own experimentation and accidentally creates an explosion that gives him telekinetic powers. He then goes from nerd to cool dude because of said powers. It's a geniunely funny movie, with a nice blend of intentional and unintentional laughs, although at times it's difficult to tell which is which.

 

The film floats along much of the time on 80's-style, pot-induced humor, as demonstrated in the following clip. A lot of trippy things happen when there's a telekinetic dude around...

 

 

And likewise,  a lot of trippy things seem to happen around guys who grow pot in the school laboratory and then burn it in the school incinerator. Funny how that works:

 

 

 

But enough with the random video clips...

 

The acting in Zapped! is absolutely serviceable by 80s comedy standards (You get to decide what that means. We're nothing if not interactive here at RadRev.) Baio and Aames play essentially the same guys you remember from 'Charles in Charge,' only 75% creepier. After watching this, someone remind the scientists up in their laboratories to never to give Scott Baio telekinetic abilities, because he'll only use it to rip off their daughter's clothes and pummel their sons. Here's a list of things he used his powers for in the movie:

• Makes women's clothes come off in public (Seems to be his favorite.)
• Makes men's clothes come off in public.
• Fights men.
• Makes his dad throw a drink into his own face.
• Cheats during baseball games by making his team win.
• Cheats at carnival midway games (Ok, this one can pass.)
• Causes midway rides to operate in an unsafe manner.
• Terrifies priests.

He sort of sounds like the last guy who you'd wish telekinesis on. But then again, who better to star in an 80s sex comedy about telekinesis than Scott Baio? And the answer is probably not that many other people, although possibly quite a few. It's hard to say.

 

As you may have guessed by now, there's no lack of nudity in Zapped! There's an entire prom scene full of it, which usually sounds like perfect fodder for any respectable film. But in this case it's a strange kind of nudity, because the naked women are being victimized by a baby-faced Italian dude who we all know and love as Chachi. So it's funny nudity, but not particularly sexy nudity.

 

I recommend this movie if you like wacky comedies. It's not the work of Shakespeare or his ghostwriters, but it is something, damn it. Something is better than nothing.

 

4/5 Scuba Diving Mice

 

Good in a Good way

 

 

 

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Review #2 by Mordicai

 

Scott Baio and Willie Aames were the Redford and Newman of the 80’s. The world should lament that they didn’t make more cinematic art together. If you’re jonsin’ for a fix from the decade of legwarmers and mullets – Zapped is a heapin’ spoonful of China White.

 

Scott Baio, right off the set from 'Jonie Loves Chachi,' and pre-'Charles in Charge' teams up with a post-'Eight is Enough,' pre-'Charles in Charge' Willie Aames and attempt to hook up with a snobby pre-'Fall Guy' Heather Thomas.

 

Zapped is a hip, sexy teen sexcapade - drug jokes, synthesizer laden songs and bra’s-a-poppin’. Baio stretches his acting talent by playing a guy who can’t get laid. Somewhere along the way, his nerdy character Barney gets psychic powers -apparently plant food mixed with cannabis extract makes you telekinetic (I can attest from personal experience that it does not.) He uses his new powers to terrorize his parents, look at boobs, and woo nosy school paper reporters. Who could have guessed that it all culminates in a wacky conclusion where all teen movies are destined to end, the prom.

 

This flick is a special effects extravaganza – a lot of test tubes and ventriloquist dummies levitating on visible strings. What makes Zapped really work is its tongue-in-cheek approach and early entry into the glut of sexy 80’s teen comedies. Believe it or not, a lot of those movies took themselves way too seriously. There are a lot of random movie-in-jokes that add to the shenanigans. What I don’t get is the fact that Scott Baio is a good kid with good grades, but his atypical out-of-touch 80’s parents make Mommie Dearest look like a parenting guide.

 

The supporting cast is excellent gumbo of 80’s faces. Scatman Crothers adds a touch of class and cool to the production (he has a great “dream” sequence). I don’t know why I remember this, but Merritt Butrick, a school hoodlum was part of the ensemble from the cult 80’s show Square Pegs. The school principal, Robert Mandan is best known as Jack Tripper’s disapproving father-in-law on the 'Three’s Company' spin off, 'Three’s a Crowd.' LaWanda Page, Aunt Esther from 'Sanford and Son,' makes a hilarious cameo. You will catch yourself saying, “hey, it’s that guy” several times.

 

I wish I had psychic powers, so that I could will this one onto DVD. [Editor's Note: You're in luck! It hits the DVD shelves on 2/12/08!] Everything works in Zapped--I was truly impressed; the film is consistently funny and has a hip spontaneity that dangles it on strings far above the rest of its tired genre. I have notified my attorney to add a provision to my will that I be buried with a copy of this film.

 

5/5 Floating Test Tubes

 

 

 

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