TV REVIEW: Maximum Exposure
By Chris Martin
Maximum Exposure? Minimal Content.
Sunday night in L.A., is dull, real dull when it comes to television.
Electro- magnetic massage for the rich and beautiful like Access Hollywood,
lies and crypto-fascist nonsense from should-be-convicted felon Ollie
North on "War Stories With Ollie North," (Hey, Ollie, how about a war
story on how the CIA through Norwin Meneses, Danilo Blandon along with
"Freeway Ricky" Ross and the Pocket Hood Crips got the crack epidemic
rolling in South Central L.A.), the 10th showing in the last six weeks
of "My Cousin Vinny, and "La Hora Pico" con comediantes y creatividad.
I know what that means "creatividad," creativity, something that two
of the above three haven't got even on a molecular level.
And then I espied somethin'.
Listed at 10 p.m. Sunday night on KCAL Channel 9, a local station corporately
owned (of course), was a show called "Maximum Exposure." At first, I
thought it was a demented moment where the producers ran soft porn featuring
giant-bosomed 400-lb. women. No such luck.
It was (poss-uhhhh-blee) more interesting than that. The blurb just
below the show title in the L.A. Times television schedule read "Funny
Car engine explodes at 230-mph," and this extravaganza would run from
10 p.m. to 11 p.m. An hour for one crash? Each rotation of the rear
tires of the flaming berserk vehicle captured in all its fury?
Jeepers. Who did I know that endured an hour of flaming terror in a
Funny Car like that? Certainly, Force would rank up there, "Jungle Jim,"
... I tried to think of all the flamers, but an hour's parameters were
too big for anything I observed. Sooooo... why not turn it on and see
what unfolds.
Punk-oriented to metallish guitars opened the show ... "Maximum Exposure."
It was like Car (and airplane) Crash Central. It sounded like it came
from some guy who had graduated from the "Dude-You're Getting-A-Dell"
School of Wiseacre broadcasting. I mean, is everyone as tired of the
frightfully unhip "Steven" on the Dell computer ads as I am? Geez, write
a script where he tries to get over with that line of petit-bourgeois
patter with the homeboys in the Varrio Nuevo Estrada Projects.
Anyway, to the credit of the show, they start out with the blurbed
Funny Car fire, and as those things go, it's decent. The wreck is in
a fashion similar to Dave Uyehara driving Ray & Shirley Strasser's Omni
into Ron Correnti in Bill Dunlap's Ford at the '86 Winternationals.
Australian Keith Angus nails an unnamed foe at an Australian drag show
and parts and flames splash out. Angus earlier had fire-balled the motor
and slammed into the rear of the car ahead of him, making for a heart-tugger
of a moment or two.
Just like on those trashy Real-Life Cops shows where the commentator
feels he has to throw in a poetic/political close-out observation on
every single incident, so it is with "Maximum Exposure."
In the next wreck, we see, blown fuel boater Gus Ward lose control
of his "Teacher's Pet" entry at Marble Falls, Texas, splintering it
and fastballing the engine over the water source. As the ubiquitous
announcer closes, "Little man, little boat, big engine equals trouble."
Gee.
And then wrapping it all up, he says, "Remember folks, it's not all
about the engine, but the motion of the ocean." Geographical considerations
aside, a stunning analysis.
For an hour, we watch video crash after video crash, including Jerry
Caminito's truly scary wreck at the NHRA Mid-South Nationals in Memphis
where he center punches the top end guard rail at 279-mph.
All the time, we get the announcer's insights. "Hey, check yourself,
before you wreck yourself," or "This will be a sprint car race long
remembered." Yeah, the sprintie clears the restraining fence and expands
your evening supper from a hot dog and a beer, to a hot dog, beer, and
a flaming sprint car boiling your marbles.
Sometimes I think that the meatballs who produce "Cops" or the "World's
Strangest Police Chases" all went to the same school of non-journalism.
Anyway, despite the fact that the NASCAR Richmond Race was on the tube
in the late morning followed by NHRA's annual Atlanta whing-ding, the
"Maximum Exposure" helped tuck the truly diehard under the covers after
an exhausting Sunday.
So get to the point, Chris. Cheese n' rice, what can I tell you? It
beats the hell out of watching an NYPD Blue re-run for the 146th time,
is not as scary as watching Creflo Dollar or Rod Parsley rip off the
old and defenseless, but better than local news where a desk full of
happy-faces have figured that Robert Blake's favorite seat at Vitello's
Restaurant is more important than the fact that medical costs (even
for the insured) could step up another 25-percent. If you can't afford
a Main Event video, which has every bit of the quality this show does
and then some, then this (as Bret Kepner would call it) "crash-tacular"
might be just the thing to close the day out with.
|
