AMAZON WOMEN ON THE MOON (1987) - Andy's Kino Lorber Blu-Ray Review

[AndyDursin]

AMAZON WOMEN ON THE MOON
7/10

A follow-up of sorts to the classic sketch comedy “Kentucky Fried Movie,” AMAZON WOMEN ON THE MOON (85 mins., 1987, R) less consistently sends up an assortment of movie genres and – par for the course for its era – TV and home video trends.

John Landis “presented” and was one of several directors – alongside Joe Dante, Carl Gottlieb, Peter Horton and Robert K. Weiss – of this amusing comedy that scores with segments that mock “In Search Of...” (with Henry Silva), The Invisible Man (with Ed Begley, Jr. as the mad scientist who doesn't realize he's actually quite visible!), and even Siskel & Ebert, with a pair of critics reviewing a man's uneventful life after his passing. Familiar faces abound – Rosanna Arquette, Steve Guttenberg, Carrie Fisher, David Alan Grier, Arsenio Hall, Kelly Preston, Ralph Bellamy and many others – with most vignettes that generate a laugh followed by segments that are lucky to raise a chuckle. Still, it's fun overall, and I always laugh when I think of the “Video Pirates” segment (see below), where swashbuckling pirates raid a vessel of MCA Home Video titles! (“Video discs? What good are they?”)

Making its long-overdue premiere on Blu-Ray, Kino Lorber's Blu includes a perfectly acceptable Universal catalog master (1.85 with segments in 1.37), DTS MA mono sound and a number of extras. These include a retrospective featurette on the movie's production with Landis, Dante and others; deleted scenes as well as more recently discovered outtakes from Dante's personal archive; the trailer; and a new commentary with Kat Ellinger and Mike McPadden.

The punchline to this is fantastic!