Matthew Krouse Down the tube
If God is directing television broadcast programming, then He’s trying to tell us something about the past. Why else would the hipsters and swingsters of the Sixties and Seventies keep cropping up?
Bell bottoms, stiff cupped bikinis, sideburns, big medallions and some very outdated morality has crept into the fuzz box lately, bringing back terrifying memories of who we used to be.
On weekdays, at 6pm on SABC2, the adult
comedy Three’s Company does little more than remind us of how popular bamboo and kaftans once were, in the decades of free love. The premise of the series, that life becomes hysterical when young men and women are forced to share lodgings for convenience, is lame to say the least.
True to the attitudes of the period, the women – whether single or married – spend their waking moments hankering after sex. Pity is, the men in their lives are too busy dealing with the supposed fickleness of femininity to oblige.
No character personifies the naivety of Seventies’ television better than the dumb blonde. This week she crops up in many guises, but remains stupid and fair headed. In the 1996 parody of the period, A Very Brady Sequel, on M-Net at 2.30am on May 3, she can be witnessed in full orthodontic splendour, talking rubbish through bands on her teeth.
In the Roger Moore classic The Saint, on Tuesdays at 2pm on SABC2, it is usually the wickedness of the femme fatale that threatens to topple the man. I haven’t managed to catch the current re-runs, but if my memory serves me correctly, the more exotic the female, the easier she is to get.
Another great relic of the Seventies is the major soapie Dallas, showing at 1pm on SABC2 every weekday afternoon. The portrait of the ludicrous private lives of the wealthy Southern ranching family was the first real encounter South Africans had with television from the outside world. Plot-wise, Dallas kept reiterating one sweeping judgment: that too much money leads to bad sex.
Melodramas about adultery were big in the Seventies – probably something to do with the clash of old and new moralities. The decade, of course did have its meaningful side, but it’s not something you’ll find to any great degree on television this week. However, there is a serious adultery story from then, playing on M-Net on May5 at 1am. Coming Home, made in 1978, is not only about a failed marriage, but is also about that other Seventies chestnut – Vietnam.
On May 4, at 11.30pm on SABC2, you can see the Seventies masterpiece of the week. The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith is regarded as one of the finest political pictures ever made. Its epic proportions may be a little big for television, so expect to see those bell bottoms really small.
It’s a Seventies celebration all the way. And for those who have kids, on Tuesdays at 1pm on SABC1 there are the Smurfs.
All we need now is a good session of blaxploitation flicks, and we’ll be the hippest retro-cats on earth!