Initially planned as a TV special to air when “Saturday Night Live” was on hiatus but rejected by NBC for being too risque and vulgar, “Mr. Mike’s Mondo Video” created a minor brouhaha in 1979 when it was theatrically released. Viewed today, however, there is absolutely nothing edgy or provocative to be found in Michael O’Donoghue’s spoof of the classic shockumentary “Mondo Cane.” In fact, the film is downright tame and dull by contemporary standards.
But perhaps “Mr. Mike’s Mondo Video” was always a case of the old carny ruse of selling the sizzle and not the steak. The film’s opening scrawl offers a tempting warning that seems too good to be true: “The film you are about to see is shocking and repugnant beyond belief. It contains scenes of disturbing sexual practices and mindless violence. If older people with a heart condition are watching, or people under psychiatric care, make them sit close so they won’t miss anything. Do not let children of an impressionable age to leave the room. If they are sleeping, wake them up and slap them. Give them hot coffee.”
Alas, what emerges is a mild skein of misfired skits hosted by O’Donoghue doing a creepy riff on Rod Serling’s TV persona. Some skits drag on too long with no real payoff, such as early segments about swimming lessons for cats or a “Hawaii Five-O”-inspired Church of Jack Lord presided over by Dan Aykroyd as a bewigged evangelist. Aykroyd also appears as himself in a weird segment where he shows off his genuine webbed toes and declares, “I am proud to say that I am an actual genetic mutant.”
There are blink-and-you-miss-them cameos by several prominent stars like Margot Kidder, Teri Garr and Debbie Harry plus then-SNL cast members, most notably Bill Murray as a homeless man offering sluggish answers to reporter questions; one genuinely funny moment has Joan Hackett appearing as a framed photo and a voice squeaking through a telephone receiver. There are also oddballs including Jo Jo the Human Hot Plate (he holds spaghetti in his hands while standing minus much of his clothing) and a segment debating the death penalty for elephants that includes the 1904 Edison film “Electrocuting the Elephant.” Another old film, the 1929 nudie cutie “Uncle Si and the Sirens,” is also included. Footage of Sid Vicious performing “My Way” is seen minus the soundtrack – a screen scrawl explains the film’s inability to secure the rights to the Paul Anka-penned song.
Some skits feel like second-rate Benny Hill humor, such as the military breakthrough of the LaserBra 2000 weapon, while others feel like third-rate Monty Python ripoffs, particularly a Parisian restaurant where the waiter insults American customers while serving “glazed rabbit pellets” and setting their tables on fire. Considering O’Donoghue’s background as a National Lampoon editor and “Saturday Night Live” head writer, the wobbly nature of the writing is baffling.
Back in the day, critics panned “Mr. Mike’s Mondo Video” and it wound up being moved into the midnight movie circuit after failing to find audiences in daytime screenings. Today, it plays like an odd relic from an era of prehistoric outrageousness.