If you enjoyed the cliché stranded-travelers-during-a-storm suspense of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, but you wanted more full-frontal nudity and sex toys, and no musical numbers or colorful glam, then Thundercrack! might just be the perverted time warp you've been hankering for. Both released in 1975, with Rocky Horror premiering slightly earlier on screens (after debuting on stage in 1973), Thundercrack! is a whole hour longer and harder, with a sexual octet (plus a gorilla) undoubtedly influenced by the former story. Although both films have acquired cult followings in the 50 years since their releases, Thundercrack! is especially noteworthy to celebrate in San Francisco for this golden anniversary as the brainchild of two Bay Area DIY legends: Curt McDowell, who directed, edited, and shot the film, and George Kuchar, who wrote the script.
On a dark and stormy night, our characters find themselves lumped together in random car-shares off the highway while trying to get out of the rain. One by one and two by two, they all end up at Prairie Blossom, the house of Mrs. Gert Hammond (Marion Eaton), a farmer's widow whose isolation has led her to seek solace in alcoholism and masturbation fantasies. Gert is ready to perform as hostess when each of the strangers appear seeking shelter and a telephone line. With her dark painted eyebrow arches and overly drawn-on lips, she embodies the saccharine housewife of a melodrama. At the same time, she's a (charmingly hospitable) fiend for strange insertions (peeled cucumbers being her favorite), voyeurism, going commando, and bisexual seduction. Of her initial six visitors—Willene (Maggie Pyle), a religious prude; Ruta (Moira Benson), an unashamed dominant slut for anything phallic; Sash (Melinda McDowell, Curt's sister), Roo's submissive friend; Chandler (Phillip Heffernan, as "Mookie Blodgett"), impaired sexually by witnessing his wife's death by flammable lingerie; Toydy (Rick Johnson), a nihilist with a slight preference for men; and Bond (Ken Scudder), a drawling guy who seems to take whoever'll come—Gert doesn't play favorites. Instead, she plays with everyone when she isn't peeping on them. Only with the mid-film arrival of Bing (Kuchar), a circus employee whose truck of animals has run off the road in the storm, does terror start to seep into Prairie Blossom as the creatures prowl the property, including a flesh-hungry, oversexed gorilla specifically looking to bang Bing.
And I haven't even mentioned Gert's non-existent son, the pickled husband, the two cross-dressing scenes, or the museum-like collection of porn drawings and graphic photos in the room of dildos and sex dolls. Attempting a blow-by-blow of this film undermines the genius that's evident in watching it. Despite frequently being described as campy, Thundercrack!, especially Eaton's superb performance as the maternal and horny housewife, recalls early slapstick comedy and dramatized silent-era cinema more than it does theatrical kitsch. Kuchar and McDowell did the special effects on it, masterfully filming with tight shots to portray "rain" on a "moving" vehicle, the closeness within a car's interior, and the sense of a large house despite the fact that we only ever see a few rooms at Prairie Blossom. With sound and music by Mark Ellinger, who created the original story with McDowell, the whole film is made remarkably solid by its sound design, which never leaves a moment audibly unaccounted for. Come for the amazing dialogue that'll have you laughing out loud, stay because everyone else is coming.
Thundercrack! screens Wednesday, December 10, at the Alamo New Mission as part of "Weird Wednesday."
