I saw this movie on video many years ago, so I confess that my memories of it are a bit vague. Still, I can't help thinking what a sheer act of perversity it was for scenarist/songwriter Richard O'Brien to re-assemble most of "The Rocky Horror Picture Show's" cast, re-use the characters of Brad and Janet (now married) and their hometown setting of Denton, and then not do a sequel to "Rocky Horror." (The big absences here, of course, are Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon, here replaced by Cliff DeYoung and Jessica Harper as Brad and Janet, and Tim Curry, who would have had no reprise of his Dr. Frank N. Furter role but was initially intended to be the wacko Farley Flavors.)
The big joke here is that Brad and Janet go on a TV game show and unexpectedly get threatened with lobotomy. Whereas "Rocky Horror" was a delightful send-up of horror-movie conventions and clichés, the intended satire here appears to be of TV game shows, nothing that a typical "Saturday Night Live" sketch couldn't finish off in less than ten minutes. Harper, who was very good in other movies, definitively lacks Sarandon's unusual combination of naivete and sauciness. DeYoung is best remembered for a role in a 1975 TV-movie weeper based on the John Denver song "Sunshine," and has been little heard from since this movie's release. The other actors are good sports for merely showing up.
But again, what was intended by this movie? Its satiric target is too mainstream for a cult movie, and its treatment is too outre for the movie masses. "Shock Treatment" is an interesting failure, perhaps worth viewing once. But it's no surprise that you've never seen any moviegoer coming to your local theater dressed as Farley Flavors on a Friday night at midnight.
The big joke here is that Brad and Janet go on a TV game show and unexpectedly get threatened with lobotomy. Whereas "Rocky Horror" was a delightful send-up of horror-movie conventions and clichés, the intended satire here appears to be of TV game shows, nothing that a typical "Saturday Night Live" sketch couldn't finish off in less than ten minutes. Harper, who was very good in other movies, definitively lacks Sarandon's unusual combination of naivete and sauciness. DeYoung is best remembered for a role in a 1975 TV-movie weeper based on the John Denver song "Sunshine," and has been little heard from since this movie's release. The other actors are good sports for merely showing up.
But again, what was intended by this movie? Its satiric target is too mainstream for a cult movie, and its treatment is too outre for the movie masses. "Shock Treatment" is an interesting failure, perhaps worth viewing once. But it's no surprise that you've never seen any moviegoer coming to your local theater dressed as Farley Flavors on a Friday night at midnight.