BIM Stars

I remember seeing this film on late night television back in the early 80's. I thought it was a strange yet intriguing piece of work and was constantly on the lookout for repeat showings. I did manage to catch it another time in the mid 80's but never again since. For years, I was the only person I knew of that had seen "The Apple," much less heard of it. I wondered if I had imagined the whole crazy thing until I came upon a copy of the soundtrack album in a local record store that specialized in hard to find and obscure music. Finally, some hard evidence that this film existed!! A friend of mine, with whom I co-produce a local public access film review program, prides himself on his ability to get copies of hard to find movies. So I presented him with the ultimate challenge: Get me a copy of "The Apple." His unrelenting persistance paid off and last Fall he presented me with my request. I got it home and popped into my VCR and WOW! The film was just as bizarre and entertaining as I remembered! The costumes! The music! The biblical parallels! Alfie and BeBe! Obviously, everyone who has seen it feels passionately positive or passionately negative. But as for me, everytime I see it, I get nothing but the guiltiest of pleasures. If you're lucky enough to get the opportunity to experience "The Apple" do not hesitate!! If you like shiny outlandish costumes and make-up . . . If you can't live without garish production numbers . . . If limited acting (or abundant overacting) ability enhances your enjoyment of a movie . . . "The Apple" is the one for you! Take a bite and enjoy!!

If you are gay and of a certain age (as I am), you may remember a certain glossy "magazine of entertainment." This was AFTER DARK, which was the gayest non-porn magazine ever, and it was most popular during the 70's and 80's. People like Liza and Bette appeared on the cover, and lots of tasteful male nude and nearly-nude photos abounded. It was glitzy, heavily-mascared, skimpy underwear-clad, pre-AIDS fun.

That brings me to THE APPLE. Beyond the title number, set in Hell, which has to be one of my favorite bad rock movie free-for-alls (with horrid lyrics and extremely hard-working dancers), the "sex" number, with multiple beds full of women in slips and men in gold briefs, absolutely proves my point that this movie was merely a film transcription of the late, lamented AD.

If XANADU and GREASE 2 can be issued on DVD, why not a remastered and remixed wide-screen edition of THE APPLE? Call your local congressman or gay cult-film fan TODAY!

I was channel surfing a few weeks ago when this...this...this..THING showed up on Flix. I was mesmerized. I grew up in the late 70's, early 80's and this felt like I was zapped back in time to movies like "Little Darlings", "Over the Edge", and "Xanadu". The whole look was scary. It looked like it was shot in a shopping mall. When I checked out the title, I thought "Where has this GREAT BAD movie been all my life! How come I've never heard of it before?" This is one camp classic that truly deserves a full resurrection. VH-1 should do a whole "Where Are They Now" on this movie. I'd love to know what the "actors" in this movie think of it now. Truly bad in a classicly bad/great way.

I was stationed with the USAF in West Berlin when this was filmed. (There are W. Berlin landmarks in the film, even though it's supposed to be New York.) My husband was an aspiring actor and always showed up at auditions when something was being filmed. He got a part as a newspaper reporter and general all-round extra, and I got a part as an extra, too. In fact, many of the extras in this movie are service members stationed in Berlin (this was before the Wall fell, so there were Brit soldiers stationed there as well, thus explaining many of the Brit accents). We had an apartment, so some of the dancers came over to hang out and chat, to escape the hotel rooms, Finola Hughes being one of them, as well as Catherine Mary Stuart (my husband REALLY enjoyed escorting her around the base!). One of the dancers, named Dave, said the filming of the hell scene was just "magical." The costumes were pretty cheesey and poorly made; my husband probably still has the silver baseball cap he wore as a reporter and the silver epaulets... It was a lot of fun to be a part of and I'd love to have a copy of it (when I saw it on TV several years ago, I couldn't find myself in the crowd scenes!). It was great reading other comments about this movie -- I didn't think anyone else in the world knew about it!

Probably made as a "please God, let what happened to ROCKY HORROR

happen to us!", project, THE APPLE is so audacious, so over the top, so

totally awful that it is simply wonderful. The songs are cheesy, the

acting horrendous, the costumes nightmarish, the concept bizarre etc.,

etc., but when all those negatives are put together, the result is a

positively guilty pleasure to top all guilty pleasures. Please, someone,

release a letterboxed DVD of this film so that all its rocky horrors

squeezed onto the small screen can be seen in all their garish terrible/wonderfulness.......