For all of its cultural infamy, Allan Carr’s disco fiasco Can’t Stop the Music reminds us of one important thing: Valerie Perrine really hated to wear clothes. I say this because even though the film was rated PG and she spends most of her onscreen time surrounded by gay dudes, she still manages to somehow flash her moneymakers in front of the camera.
For many heterosexual male viewers, this probably amounts to the film’s lone highlight, but count me amongst the minority who are willing to defend Carr’s folly. For all of its faults (supreme tackiness, nonsensical scripting, Bruce Jenner in cut-offs and a half-shirt, the fact that none of the gay dudes are actually portrayed as being gay dudes, Steve Guttenberg), the film has a cheerful innocence and lack of cynicism that harks back to the old “Let’s put on a show in the barn!” musicals of the ’30s and ’40s.
A fictional look at the creation of The Village People, the film features Perrine as a retired supermodel who decides to use her industry connections to propel her composer roommate, Guttenberg, to the top of the charts. The two of them decide to throw together a group of colorful locals — a collection of “village people,” if you will — and happily discover that they combine to make sweet, if bland, danceable pop.
And somehow the future stepfather of those Kardashian babes gets involved. I’m still not sure why, but it probably has something to do with those cut-offs. —Allan Mott
I’m pretty sure that Bruce Jenner was the only guy they could find who could do all the sports in the YMCA montage, and would still be willing to both wear that half-shirt and kiss Valerie Perrine.
I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, but I always thought that “moneymaker” referred to ass. James Brown chanted “Shake yo moneymaker,” not “Shake yo moneymakers,” and he would know.
I’m pretty sure “moneymaker” can be used to refer to any part of the anatomy from which a person can claim to have earned their fortune. In Perrine’s case, my use is entirely accurate.