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Amazon Women on the Moon

Amazon Women on the Moon is a 1987 American satirical science fiction film that parodies the experience of watching low-budget films on late-night television. The film, featuring a large ensemble cast including cameo appearances from film and TV stars and even non-actors, was written by Michael Barrie and Jim Mulholland, and takes the form of a compilation of 21 comedy skits directed by five different directors: Joe Dante, Carl Gottlieb, Peter Horton, John Landis, and Robert K. Weiss.

Amazon Women on the Moon

  • John Landis
  • Robert K. Weiss

Daniel Pearl

Malcolm Campbell

Ira Newborn

Universal Pictures

  • September 18, 1987 (1987-09-18)

85 minutes

United States

English

$5 million

$548,696[1]

The title Amazon Women on the Moon refers to the central film-within-a-film, a spoof of science-fiction films from the 1950s that borrows heavily from Queen of Outer Space (1958) starring Zsa Zsa Gabor, itself a film that recycles elements of earlier science-fiction works such as Cat-Women of the Moon (1953), Fire Maidens from Outer Space (1955), and Forbidden Planet (1956).[2]


John Landis had previously directed The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977), which employed a similar sketch anthology format.

as a man who experiences a series of mishaps around his apartment;

Arsenio Hall

as a model who goes about her daily routine in Laguna, California, completely naked;

Monique Gabrielle

as a man named Murray, zapped into the television, wandering throughout sketches looking for his wife;

Lou Jacobi

and Peter Horton as a young couple having trouble with eccentric doctor Griffin Dunne delivering and then concealing their newborn baby;

Michelle Pfeiffer

as the presenter of a commercial recommending stapling carpet to a bald head as a hair loss prevention measure;

Joe Pantoliano

and B.B. King in a public-service appeal for "blacks without soul" featuring "Don 'No Soul' Simmons";

David Alan Grier

as a young woman on a blind date, employing unusual methods of investigation to reveal the qualifications of Steve Guttenberg;

Rosanna Arquette

as the host of a show entitled Bullshit or Not?, clearly intended as a spoof of Ripley's Believe It or Not! with Jack Palance and In Search of...;

Henry Silva

as a man who dies after being mauled (by Roger Barkley and Al Lohman, mimicking Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert), then is roasted at his funeral by a variety of people, including Steve Allen, Henny Youngman, and even his own wife; the funeral becomes so entertaining it is held over for weeks.

Archie Hahn

as the leader of the Video Pirates, who hijack an MCA Home Video ship, uncover a vast amount of videotapes and laserdiscs, and promptly begin illegally bootlegging the media;

William Marshall

as the son of the Invisible Man, having trouble with his formula;

Ed Begley Jr.

as a president's First Lady who is also a former hooker;

Angel Tompkins

as a sexually frustrated teenager trying to purchase a pack of condoms, with unexpected results;

Matt Adler

renting a personalized date video that spills over into real life;

Marc McClure

"Reckless Youth" – an epilogue at the end of the credits, with and Paul Bartel in a black-and-white ephemeral film warning about the spread of "social diseases" in the style of Reefer Madness.

Carrie Fisher

as Apartment Victim

Arsenio Hall

"Mondo Condo" (directed by John Landis):


"Pethouse Video" (directed by Carl Gottlieb):


"Murray in Videoland" (directed by Robert K. Weiss):


"Hospital" (directed by Landis):


"Hairlooming" (directed by Joe Dante):


"Amazon Women on the Moon" (directed by Weiss):


"Blacks Without Soul" (directed by Landis):


"Two I.D.s" (directed by Peter Horton):


"Bullshit or Not" (directed by Dante):


"Critics' Corner" (directed by Dante):


"Silly Pâté" (directed by Weiss):


"Roast Your Loved One" (directed by Dante):


"Video Pirates" (directed by Weiss):


"Son of the Invisible Man" (directed by Gottlieb):


"French Ventriloquist's Dummy" (directed by Dante):


"Art Sale" (directed by Gottlieb):


"First Lady of the Evening" (directed by Weiss):


"Titan Man" (directed by Weiss):


"Video Date" (directed by Landis):


"Reckless Youth" (directed by Dante):


"The Unknown Soldier" (directed by Horton)


"Peter Pan Theatre" (directed by Gottlieb)

Production[edit]

Amazon Women on the Moon was filmed in 1985 with plans for a August 1986 release, but due to the ongoing legal fallout from the Twilight Zone accident which had director John Landis at the center of, Universal repeatedly pushed the release date and issued a gag order on publicity for the film while the trial was ongoing.[3]

Reception[edit]

The majority of critics agreed that the quality was inconsistent throughout the film. Variety called it "irreverent, vulgar and silly... [with] some hilarious moments and some real groaners too."[4] Roger Ebert in the Chicago Sun-Times felt that the exercise was somewhat unnecessary: "Satirists are in trouble when their subjects are funnier than they are."[5]


Janet Maslin of The New York Times, in a largely positive review, described the film as "an anarchic, often hilarious adventure in dial-spinning, a collection of brief skits and wacko parodies that are sometimes quite clever, though they're just as often happily sophomoric, too."[6]


Certain portions of the film were singled out for praise. "The funniest episode probably is 'Son of the Invisible Man', directed by Carl Gottlieb, in which Ed Begley Jr. plays a man who thinks he is invisible but is not", wrote the Chicago Sun-Times.[5] "The film's best sight gags come from Robert K. Weiss, who deserves kudos for the inspired idiocy of his Amazon Women segments", was the opinion of The New York Times.[6]


In a retrospective article for Entertainment Weekly, Chris Nashawaty called this film "the beginning of the end of Landis' career". He cited the episodes featuring Monique Gabrielle, Archie Hahn, Ed Begley Jr., and David Alan Grier as "inspired", but criticized others for their failure: "You'll never see Michelle Pfeiffer look as trapped as she does in her skit with Thirtysomething's Peter Horton, or Joe Pantoliano and Arsenio Hall as unfunny as they are in their skits."[7]


Amazon Women on the Moon has a rating of 65% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 20 reviews, with an average rating of 5.7/10.[8] On Metacritic it has a 42% score based on reviews from 11 critics.[9]

(1977), a similarly formatted anthology comedy from John Landis

The Kentucky Fried Movie

(1978)

Disco Beaver from Outer Space

(1989)

UHF

at IMDb

Amazon Women on the Moon

at AllMovie

Amazon Women on the Moon

at the TCM Movie Database

Amazon Women on the Moon