Evening Entertainment: Kate Bush's Christmas Special (1979)

I'm not sure who thought giving Kate Bush a Christmas special just as variety shows were starting to fall out of fashion, but I love the fact that they did.  Peter Gabriel also shows up, but really, it's lots of Kate Bush being Kate Bush.

Evening Entertainment: Michael Moorcock on 1979's "Time Out of Mind"

"Time Out of Mind" was a 1979 BBC TV series focusing on science fiction and fantasy that I can't find a heck of a lot of info about, but it sure looks nifty from what I've seen.  This episode serves as a great documentary/interview on Michael Moorcock, the science fiction/fantasy writer, artist and Hawkwind collaborator, who turns 75 today.  Happy birthday, sir!

Get your "Meteor" game piece at Jack in the Box!

Everybody is very excited about possibly winning this contest that ties into the 1979 sci-fi flick METEOR.  Presumably, this is because none of them have seen METEOR, one of 1979's most notable duds.

Evening Entertainment - 1979 Canadian animated special "Intergalactic Thanksgiving, or Please Don't Eat the Planet" from the director of ROCK & RULE

Made by Nelvana productions and featuring the voices of Sid Caesar, Catherine O'Hara and Al Waxman, INTERGALACTIC THANKSGIVING presents a musical, cosmic retelling of the United States holiday, as a family of puritan farmers (they forbid singing for some reason) comes to a new planet only to discover that they're not the only ones there.  Their new home is ruled by a king determined to be the funniest creature in the land, and he's not happy that the rest of his kingdom finds the new country folk so amusing.  It's an odd special, and I'm a little unclear as to what lessons are supposed to be learned by this other than something vague and environmental, but it's certainly interesting.  Director Clive A. Smith later directed 1983's ROCK AND RULE.

Morning Music Video: Russell Mulcahy directs The Buggles' "Living in a Plastic Age"

One of those pieces of trivia that everyone knows is that the first music video ever aired on MTV was The Buggles’ “Video Killed the Radio Star,” a catchy piece of nerd synth-pop that’s  become a shorthand way to identify the time period as “early ‘80s” in films and TV shows, even if the song itself was released in 1979.  The video itself, an early effort from video director auteur Russell Mulcahy, is relatively unmemorable, consisting largely of repetitive images of singer Trevor Horn singing and playing guitar as Geoff Downes plays synthesizers in the type of completely white room that only exists in music videos and existentialist dream sequences.  If it’s remembered at all, it’s for the appearance of backup singers Debi Doss and Linda Jardim as shinily-dressed space girls who appear mostly within a television set.  The nostalgic lyrics are driven home by some TVs popping up via superimposed explosion over a pile of old radios.

“Video Killed the Radio Star,” wasn’t, however, the only Buggles video on MTV that day.  Much later in the day, just before midnight of day two, MTV aired “Living in the Plastic Age,” also directed by Mulcahy, and a short that stands as a much more creative, bizarre piece of work.


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Morning Music Video (?) - Airport Disco featuring Doctor Who theme

I have no idea what this is for, but it seems to be a dance routine filmed at the Cardiff Wales Airport featuring a disco version of the theme to "Doctor Who."  I'd say it was some sort of homage to Tegan, the stewardess-turned-Doctor companion, but she didn't appear until 1981, two years after this video claims to have come from.

Stop-motion SPACE: 1999 fan film from 1979

Fan films are nothing new -- they've existed since the first sci-fi/fantasy fan got access to a camera.  This 1979 fan film, a Super-8 spectacle by 16-year-old French fans riffing off of the second season of "Space:1999," is pretty amazing, featuring tons of inventive stop-motion effects.

Marisa Berenson sings Shel Silverstein's "You're Always Welcome at Our House" on The Muppet Show

"The Muppet Show" was always at its best when it was pleasantly dark, and there are few greater examples of this (save for the Vincent Price or Alice Cooper episodes) than actress Marisa Berenson's perky vocals on Shel Silverstein's song about capturing and torturing home visitors. 

Watch This Thing - Brooke Shields has pinball fever in 1979's TILT

Forget video game movies -- the world needs more pinball movies! In the mostly-forgotten TILT, pinball hustler Brooke Shields hits the road (she has "Pinball Champion" sewed on to her jeans) and longs for the big time, encountering the likes of Fred Ward, Geoffrey Lewis and Charles Durning on the way. Why isn't this on DVD? Check out this apparently Australian trailer.