I’m all for supporting one’s children in their endeavors. I wonder if Hollywood feels the same. Like, when the likable Chris Lemmon found himself starring in several unlikable B movies throughout the ’80s (like C.O.D.), did his famous father — Jack Lemmon, legend — watch those? Specifically, the aggressively stupid military comedy Weekend Warriors.
And if so, what did he say? “Well, Son, I was not expecting the plane to go loop-de-loop when the pilot got a beej from the showgirl.”
Anyway, Weekend Warriors, also known as Hollywood Air Force. Unofficially, it’s Police Academy on a Military Base. Whatever you choose to call it, one thing’s for sure: Bert Convy never directed anything better. To be fair, the perennial game show host and Cannonball Run second-stringer never directed anything else, so there’s that.
From The Movie Store — purveyor of fellow low-rent titty flicks Ski School, Meatballs III, Meatballs 4 and Basic Training, which this most resembles — the film takes place in the summer of 1961. To avoid the draft, a number of horny ne’er-do-wells spend drill weekends in the Air National Guard, where they pull pranks on authority figures — namely, their oblivious colonel (Lloyd Bridges, in what amounts to a Hot Shots audition) and strict sergeant (Vic Tayback, Mansion of the Doomed), whose bald head they top with whipped cream and a cherry after drugging him. (Convy, you card!)
Serving as the Steve Guttenberg fill-in, Lemmon leads the ragtag assemblage, which includes a nerdy mortician, a bisexual gossip columnist, an entire doo-wop group and a muscleman meathead with an Elmer Fudd speech impediment Convy leverages from start to finish. Among the actors sinking their teeth into these challenging roles are Matt McCoy and Tom Villard, thereby marking the We Got It Made reunion no one wanted.
When the boys embarrass visiting Congressman Balljoy (Graham Jarvis, Mr. Mom), they’re in danger of being sent overseas to face real danger, lest they pull off an upcoming inspection. If you think a missile gets knocked askew, a sexual assault is played for laughs, a puking contest is held and a massive fart becomes an actual story point … well, you’re wrong. But only because there’s no puking contest.
Weekend Warriors isn’t funny. (Disagree? Dude, you were probably 12.) It’s also amazing the degree to which its third act misjudges what its target audience wants from such a film. An elaborate tarmac show of military hardware sure ain’t it — with or without little person Deep Roy (Charlie and the Chocolate Factory) disguised as a little girl. —Rod Lott