Screwballs

After I finished watching this, I checked the description, and saw that it was described as being the "granddaddy of teen sex movies." It seems hard to describe it that way when it was released in 1983. There's a very minimal amount of plot to the movie. In fact, it seems strange for a movie that is so laser-focused on having a series of sex gags back to back. If I were back in 7th or 8th grade, I would absolutely love this movie. I would have found it hilarious, and probably pretty erotic. But as an adult, I didn't find it terribly funny. In fact, this is one of the strangest movies I've seen. Usually, in a teen sex movie, there's a serious plot of some sort. There will be a romance, there will be some sort of lesson learned. There will be someone struggling to pass a class... This one doesn't. This one is so singularly focused on just providing one titillating moment after another. There's only a single character who isn't fully sex-obsessed, and that's a teacher that has been bound in a wheelchair. Most of the other teachers are portrayed as being anti-sex, although later, they are shown to be just as obsessed as the core cast is. There are a few things that are memorable, but ultimately, the movie is an example of what happens when you pull all of the heart out of a movie. It narrows the audience that will enjoy it.

Mind-numbingly awful 80s sex farce. It's probably one of the worst made movies I've ever seen, but it's so awful that it kind of goes back around to becoming almost fascinating in its pure horridness. Almost. Man, these people have no idea how to construct a gag. You watch it, and you kind of know what they were going for, but it misses its marks by so far that you kind of feel sorry for it. I really do feel sorry for all the poor actors and, especially, actresses who appear in it. The story has five high school guys who plan on getting revenge on the high school's only virgin (Linda Speciale, playing a character named Purity Busch) after she gets them in trouble. Kind of a must-see for lovers of terrible movies.

In my review for the similarly themed ZAPPED AGAIN!, I noted that it came across as a whitewashed T&A offering that was much better received as a puerile comedy than anything voyeuristic in nature. SCREWBALLS, which was apparently made on a much lower budget and with much less renowned performers, is the exact opposite - a chaotic carnival of soft-core porn in which the humor is at best unremarkable and at worst painful.

Some have compared this movie to NATIONAL LAMPOON'S ANIMAL HOUSE, but that comparison is extremely unjust. You see, ANIMAL HOUSE was not just an excuse to show drunken frat boys and girls in their underwear. It also tackled such trenchant topics as class conflict, race relations, and the lure of irresponsibility in a hopelessly puritanical and joyless world. I view it more as a poignant examination of the trials and tribulations of adolescence than as the purely tawdry slice of camp which it's usually tagged. The makers of SCREWBALLS do not deserve to lick the boots of John Landis and company.

SCREWBALLS was put together by a gaggle of confirmed slackers with absolutely no regard for taste and decency. The movie is unabashedly politically incorrect (granted, the idea of "political correctness" did not exist as such in the early 1980s; but these guys violated most of its tenets just the same) and is based on the erroneous belief that high school boys do not care about anything other than sex. While the members of Delta Tau Chi may not have been above reproach, at least they didn't spend most of their time trying to separate the prom queen from her clothes.

If you are a diehard fan of this genre, I don't want to spoil the ending for you. Let's just say that it involves sartorial decay and magnets, and leave it at that.

Female moviegoers will probably not enjoy SCREWBALLS because of its sexist nature, so I recommend that they skip it. Their male counterparts, on the other hand, might have a good time. But remember this, fellows: a movie about female stripping becomes less and less entertaining every time you see it - so limit your viewing of SCREWBALLS to one night.

Oh my god! Screwballs should be at the top of everyone's list for a comedy on bad movie night! The story deals with five horny guys at T&A High(get it?)who try in the vain to attract the attention of the only virgin left in school-Miss Purity Bush! This flick turned the world on to the phenomenon known as strip bowling-which results in the most eye opening scene since the end of Sleepaway Camp and makes good use of spanish fly and magnetism. Acting honors go to Purity's mom,dad and the fat guy in the meatlocker. All in all a classic not for the whole family.

You don't go into this one expecting Shakespeare, folks. You expect first off, a little skin, and if you are lucky, a lot of skin. You expect broad locker-room type sex jokes. You expect that someone will be sexually humiliated at some point ( a must in the genre ). You expect all the cliques at your high school to be wildly parodied. You expect teachers to be portrayed as Nazis. You go in expecting all this and this film delivers. This movie was made just before video broke big time. Thsi was one of the early hits and many video hounds from way back can fondly look back as this being a rental they enjoyed. Check brain at the door and enjoy. It's all done in s spirit of goofy sexy fun and that is the spirit it needs to be seen in. Would make a great double feature with "Porky's".