Pat Boone is clearly suffering from Grandpa Simpon disorder (a condition which manifests itself in angry but unfocused rants, annoying whining about practically everything modern, and pointless stories about how life used to be, back in the day). His deteriorating condition is demonstrated by his latest column (it’s about the failure to pass the Federal Marriage Amendment, btw).
Here’s a sample from it:
Are we going nuts?
Is the whole nation suffering from mad cow disease or becoming senile at the ripe young age of 230?
Was Chicken Little right? Is the sky falling?
Were Copernicus and all former mathematicians wrong? Is 2 and 2 actually relative, anything we want it to be?
[...]
Or worse, I do feel we’re suffering, as a nation, a moral trichinosis — that little talked-about malady that occurs when worms, gaining entry through poorly cooked pork, infiltrate a person’s muscles, gradually sapping strength and weakening the body beyond recovery
Yeah, it lacks only an allusion to an onion on his belt, and an irate complaint about how he is disgusted with the way old people are depicted on television (“We are not all vibrant, fun-loving sex maniacs. Many of us are bitter, resentful individuals, who remember the gold old days when entertainment was bland and inoffensive.”)
But Pat wasn’t always just a crazy old coot who dresses like the Good Humor man. No, in his day, he did bland covers of other musician’s work. He was also a really mediocre actor.
In fact, Scott and I recently happened to catch one of Pat’s most memorable flicks, and we were moved to prepare this summary of it for your reading pleasure. We hope it does as much for your soul as it did for ours.
THE CROSS AND THE SWITCHBLADE (1970)
Director: Don Murray
Written by: Don Murray and James Bonnet
Our movie begins with a twilight shot of the Williamsburg bridge and a voiceover from the producer, who tells us that if the story we’re about to see were the mere product of a writer’s imagination, we would be entitled to call bullshit. But we must believe him when he says these events really happened, because if we’re watching this movie then chances are we’ve already agreed to spend the evening at a Baptist Youth Center, so we can probably be talked into just about anything.
We join a PF Flyers commercial already in progress. A young hoodlum runs his fastest and jumps his highest through Central Park, with The New Christy Minstrels in hot pursuit. But even with the patented Posture Fitness insole, the clean-cut, fresh-faced thug can’t evade his tormentors, and the Glee Club throws him to the ground and surrounds him. Armed with switchblades, bike chains, and baseball bats, they proceed to administer the most listless beating in movie history; it looks less like a wilding and more like a pajama party pillow fight sponsored by Quaaludes. On the bright side, they’re the most racially diverse group of juvenile delinquents since Kid Power, including Al Pacino’s stand-in from Panic in Needle Park, that guy from the Dry Look ads, and Ben Shapiro, and co-starring a Cowsill, Fareed Zakaria, and Jeb Bush. But since they can’t be bothered to actually hit the kid they’re supposedly beating to death, Officer Krupke steps in and arrests the entire cast for loitering.
In court, Prosecutor Sam Waterston Lite (only one-third the talent of the national brand) is murmuring to the short, fat, angry defense attorney and repeatedly groping him, so either the State’s case isn’t going well and he wants to cut a deal, or the two actors got bored and started pretending they’re in Adam’s Rib. The judge, who gave up a guaranteed 5-and-under on a soap opera to do this stupid movie, grumpily admonishes counsel to hurry up and present his case against the New Christy Gangstas, because those slices of honeydew melon on the craft service table aren’t getting any fresher.
Suddenly, Pat Boone bursts into the room and says, “May I have a word with–” But before he can even finish the sentence, the judge leaps to his feet and screams, “Get him out of here!” Two cops instantly seize Pat by the scruff of the neck and violently eject him from the court room. Okay, I’ve changed my mind; this is the Best. Movie. Ever!
Out in the hall, the cops frisk Pat, demanding to know where “the weapon” is. But they’re patting him down in the upper pants area, so they probably just mistook him for Harry Reems (who plays “Uncredited Gang Member”). Pat’s only weapon is�the Bible. Seems he�s come from Nowheresville, Pennsylvania to help the gang, and to get some hair care tips from the Dry Look guy, because his poofy combover is starting to wilt.
The cops tell Pat to get lost. He hangs his head to indicate sadness, and walks off, as the Mike Curb Congregation croons, �You�ve got to face the fact/Oooo � oooo/You�re just one guy/But on the other hand the fact is/You�ve got to try�� We don�t have a lot of experience with schizophrenia, but just on general principles we would prefer the voices in our head to be less wishy-washy and a little more assertive.
Cut to the next morning. Pat has covered the windows of his car with depressing headlines from the newspaper, and is sleeping inside. Some 12-year old black kids noisily begin stealing his hubcaps and stripping the car for parts. Two of the kids pause for the following colloquy:
Thug: There�s a dude asleep in the back seat.
Girl Thug: I dig.
Thug: What if he wakes up?
Girl Thug: He look bad?
Thug: He don�t look TOO bad. But he don�t look too good either.
Okay, as urban contemporary patois goes, this isn�t exactly dripping with authenticity. But to be honest, it�s the best description of Pat Boone we�ve ever heard. Anyway, Pat eventually notices that a racially integrated group of children are dismantling his car and steps outside so they can stab him. But Girl Thug, who is wearing hand-me-downs from Huggy Bear and Mushmouth, recognizes him from the opening scene and commands him to �lay it on me.�
He attempts to shake hands, but the thugette demurs, and offers Pat his first lesson in Applied Badness. �Don�t wrestle with me, baby. Just lay it in the sky.� They slap palms, and the girl introduces herself as �Bo,� short for Little Bo Peep. Pat pries into her religious affiliation, but Bo Peep rolls alone, and doesn�t worry about God, �just about the pigs, and hustling bread.� She does offer to hook him up with the Mau Mau gang, which involves introducing Pat to the world�s most heavily clothed hooker.
Inside the gang�s clubhouse, it�s one freaky scene, man. The Mau Maus (who are supposedly a Puerto Rican gang) are waiting for a pow-wow with the Bishops, an association of African-American youths. Pat is attempting to avoid smoking the plentiful Maryjane (�Smoke my peace pipe� commands a hippie who came straight from a �Dragnet� ep ) when suddenly the door bursts open, and Linc from Mod Squad announces, �The Bishops are here!� Oddly, he announces it in the voice of Dudley Do-right. And no, that�s not a joke; it�s deeply saddened reportage.
Linc and his warlord, dashiki spokesmodel Abdullah have come to parlay with the Mau Mau�s leader, Israel, and his warlord, Erik Estrada (playing gangbanger-cum-evangelist Nicky Cruz). Erik is quite the bad dude, even if, like all the other Mau Maus, he gads about in a Tyrolean hat and a bright red pleather windbreaker. The two factions are busy negotiating the terms of their upcoming rumble, when suddenly Pat jumps between them and says, �You guys talk about getting high. GOD�LL get you high. But he won�t let you down!�
Cut to an exterior shot, as Pat sulks around Spanish Harlem while Up With People sings about what a loser he is. Pat is taken in my Hector Gomez, pastor of the Mean Streets� Storefront Congregation. This is nice, since it allows Pat to stop living in his car and to be near a phone, which is convenient since his wife is about to give birth. It probably would have been even nicer for his wife if he hadn�t left the state just as she dilated to 10 (or if he�d left her the car), but as Pat makes clear, God MADE him go to New York and irritate hoodlums.
Then the Mau Maus and the Bishops meet. We�re not sure if this is the promised rumble at first, since they�re all dressed like the Partridge Family, but eventually they start flailing ineffectually at each other with Wiffle bats, and then Up With People steps in to clear things up by singing, �Na na na na na naaaaaaaa/We got a rumble/Getting� it onnnnnn.�
Pat is crestfallen that his inspirational message about the superior hallucinogenic effect of God was unable to stop the gangs from fighting. He is even more despondent when he is forced to admit to heroin-addicted hooker Rosa that he can�t actually help her with her problems, and she replies �Then what did you come here for?� Apparently, it was to get away from his pregnant wife, but he is tearful that these hardened gang members don�t respect him for his decision.
But tomorrow is another day. Bo is playing the trumpet to gather a crowd (one would expect it to have the opposite effect, but this was before ESPN�) so that Pat can preach at them. A cop tells everyone to move along, nothing to see here, but Pat whines, �Officer, don�t I have a constitutional right to speak on any street corner in America?� The cop replies, �Only under an American flag.�
Really? This is the first we�ve heard of this clause, and it makes us think we probably should have read the entire First Amendment, and not just skimmed to the parts with sex. But Linc, who has apparently teleported from the rumble, snaps off a car aerial with a tiny American flag ornament and gives it to Pat. Then he uses the rest of the antenna to make a zip-gun so he can give one of his bullets to Pat, too.
Warlord Erik and the Mau Mau CEO Israel stumble upon Pat�s sermon. Pat offers his hand to Erik, who looks at it for a long time, clearly wondering where it�s been, then decides it�s probably safer just to spit in it. Pat says, �God loves you, Nicky.�
Erik is nice enough to warn Pat, �If you come near me, I�ll kill you!�
Pat replies, �Yeah, you can do that. You can cut me up in a thousand pieces and lay them in the street. And every piece�ll still love you.�
Erik speaks for all of us by staring at Pat as if he�d just set his tie on fire, put on a pinwheel hat, and begun juggling fetal pigs.
It�s three o�clock in the morning and Erik is asleep, when there�s a pounding the door of his shabby room at the YMCA. He gets up, wearing nothing but his tighty whiteys, and stands beside the door, leaning back against the wall with his package jutting into the camera as though someone had mistakenly told him the film was in 3-D. He opens the door and learns that he�s being stalked by Pat Boone. Erik says, �Did I tell you to leave me alone?!�
Pat says, �You didn�t really mean that.� Then, as the swarthy, sweat-glazed youth stands there in his underpants breathing heavily, Pat murmurs, �Aren�t you lonely, Nicky?�
It�s the next day, and the Association is singing, �Love is only a word to me/A word you use when you�re not sure what to say�� when junkie Rosa finds Erik moodily enjoying a phosphate in Ned Glass� candy store from West Side Story. She tells Erik that although she was gang property and she had to share her favors with all of the Mau Maus, it was Erik whom she always loved, for he was the Mau-Mauiest in bed. Then she tries to cadge 10 bucks for a fix. But Pat has gotten under Erik�s skin and into his tighty whiteys, and Erik is suddenly having trouble relating to the other hoodlums his age. Instead of having quick, grunting coitus in a trash-choked alley in exchange for a dime bag, Erik hands her a switchblade and subcontracts her to kill Pat.
Back at Pastor Hector�s apartment, everyone�s abuzz about how all the gangsters were flocking around Pat earlier. �I didn�t see Nicky,� Pats says, glumly. Meanwhile, at the Mau Mau�s clubhouse, Erik is stewing about the Preacher. Israel says, �Are you still thinking about him?� Then he inserts a cigarette in Erik�s mouth. [Note: As you may recall, a couple of months ago Pat had a hissyfit about all the homo-eroticism in Brokeback Mountain, which certainly seems a tad hypocritical under the circumstances.]
Anyway, Rosa shows up at the Pastor’s to hit Pat up for that $10 (�I need a fix! CAN�T YOU UNDERSTAND!!!� she over-emotes), but he tells her �I�m no easy touch. I�m a man of God.� So she tries to knife him. (He really should have given her the ten bucks instead of being such a prick about it.)
It looks like strapping young Pat will be bested by the frail junkie until the pastor�s wife informs Rosa that God wants Pat to help her get off Horse. This strikes a chord with Rosa for some reason, and in no time at all, she�s writhing and moaning as she goes through the agony of a cold turkey withdrawal from the stuff. Or maybe she�s just writhing and moaning because the sappy soundtrack (“Music to Have DTs By”) is so damned painful.
Meanwhile, the Mau Maus throw a lovely funeral for Mingo, the gang member whom Erik accidentally murdered for chickening out of the last rumble. But it is crashed by the Bishops, who want to continue to fight. Floral arrangements get crushed. Somebody gets pushed into the open grave. Erik gets stabbed. It�s just how Mingo would have wanted it.
A bleeding Erik manages to stagger home. But Pat, to whom restraining orders mean nothing, tracks him down and continues to pester him. �Can�t you give a poor Spick a break� pleads Erick. Good question, but I think we all know the answer to it . . .
Pat replies, �Some day you�re gonna stop running. And when you do, I�ll be there.� Yes, this is a motto to encourage stalkers everywhere.
Love-sick Rosa shows up at Erik�s apartment and tries to minister to him. She coos that she�s clean now, but when Erik learns that she’s drug-free because of Pat, he shouts, �The Preacher! The Preacher! All I ever hear is the Preacher! I�m sick of the Preacher!� Hey, man, we feel your pain.
Erik rejects Rosa because of her Preacher-taint, so she immediately tries to score some H from a handy central casting pusher (�The first one�s always on the house� he purrs). However, thanks to Pat�s rehab program, the drug no longer has the power to get her high. It�s a miracle! (Or maybe it�s just that the crappy soundtrack is blocking all her pleasure receptors.)
In any case, it�s finally time for Pat�s big anti-gang preach-a-thon at a local movie theater. The police, who don�t want to cramp Pat�s style (and who are still angry about that toy flag stunt), are boycotting the event, thus making it the perfect locale for the Rumble-to-End-All-Rumbles planned by the M&Ms and the Bishops. But when Abdullah asks the gang bangers if they are ready to rummmmmble, Erik, who was deeply touched by Pat�s words (whatever they were — personally, I kinda nodded off at this point) interrupts.
Erick tells everyone to �cool it� and listen to the Preacher. He adds that, �He�s here, in this room, and He wants to touch you.� Erik was probably talking about God, but it sounds like of creepy, so you can understand why Abdullah tries to stab him. However, Erik manages to grab the knife from Abdullah — and to show that he has completly fallen under Pat’s spell, he spares Abdullah’s life and tells him that that God loves him. Erik then announces that he�s �gonna give his life to God, baby.� He chirps to Rosa that he�s �two-minutes old.� She confides that she�s �different too.� They kiss. While this scene implies that he and Rosa will marry, start a family, and live happy ever, we recall the smoldering looks Erik exchanged with Pat, and so we have our doubts that his same-sex attraction can be quelled so easily.
Meanwhile, the gang members all eagerly take the free Bibles that Pat is passing out. They even demand big ones, so that people can see them carrying the word of God — plus, you can use the big ones to bludgeon one�s foes and weight them down when you thow their bodies off the pier. Israel opens his Bible and discovers that his name �is all over this book.� Gang bangers say the darndest things!
Pat intones something about how this was just the start of his ministry, and that there would be “more Nickys, more Israels, more Rosas,” for . . . (get ready for it!) � the cross is mightier than the switchblade. And since the announcer told us at the beginning of the movie that we can�t call BS on anything we saw, I guess we have to believe Pat�s claim, although we suspect that Pat is actually talking about a really bad-ass cross that has been made into a shiv.
And while ‘Up With People’ babble a final ditty, Pat heroically walks out of the theater, spots a drunk in the alley, and rolls him for enough money to buy a dime bag of heroin and a hooker.
The End.
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