Okay, this is not really what I do here at Colin Timberlake, but I keep getting questions, given that I’ve provided a few posts on the great action montages and soundtrack songs of the 1980s, which means naturally that I can’t go without mentioning Teen Wolf, Michael J. Fox, Mark Safan, Amy Holland, Win in the End, Styles, Shooting for the Moon or…Lorie Griffin, the hot chick who played Pamela Wells and then promptly disappeared into thin air when she could easily have parlayed this role into 20 years of moderate pay in B-list horror movies.
So first off, I don’t know where Lorie Griffin is, and no she won’t go out with you.
But just for the hell of it, here are a few classic Teen Wolf pictures…
Ummmm, yeah. So I was wondering what happened to that hot girl from Teen Wolf and a quick perusal of the resume showed that Lorie Griffin (right) followed up the Michael J. Fox classic with a film called Cheerleader Camp in 1987.
Okay, sounds all right. Sounds kind of Friday the 13th. Sounds kind of Slumber Party Massacre. Mixed bag of teenagers stuck in the woods for a decent old-school 80s hack-and-slash. Scary villain, ominous old guy warning people about the danger in the woods. I’ll give it a try. Oops.
Undoubtedly the worst-acted, worst-written, least scary, least-planned, most poorly executed horror film to emerge from this era and achieve any sort of distribution. It comes really damn close to the horror movie a few guys from my high school made by camping in the woods one weekend with their Dad’s handicam and a bottle of ketchup.
They had a good five-plus years to build upon the original Friday the 13th horror model and somehow managed to take some enormous steps backward. The only front on which this movie even remotely delivers would be old-school horror nudity, which we at least know was left in the hands of professionals.
To the left, we see aspiring actress Teri Weigel in a scene from Cheerleader Camp. To the right, we see how the mainstream Hollywood career worked out for Teri Weigel.
I have little doubt, however, that nothing that occurred in the last twenty-something years of hardcore porn would have had as poor a plot or lower production values than Cheerleader Camp. I am also willing to bet that most of the porn was also more frightening.
Yes, Cheerleader Camp appeared to be something of a career-killer, given that it completely halted any positive momentum Lorie Griffin might have been enjoying from the success of Teen Wolf. Leif Garrett managed to survive, however, to a small degree, possibly by spending every dollar he earned from The Outsiders to buy and bury every circulating copy of Cheerleader Camp.
In the case of the film’s top-billed star, Betsy Rusell, twenty years of penance appeared to be a sufficient penalty for her participation in Cheerleader Camp, as she was permitted on screen again for Saw III in 2006, reprising her role in the following two installments of the franchise.
I had never seen the trailer before I decided to piddle away an hour plus on this experience, but had the trailer and I crossed paths earlier…this may never have happened. I think the following 90 seconds sums up the movie pretty well.
Well, technically this end credits sequence may not meet all the formal criteria of a proper montage. Nonetheless, it is welcomed into the Hall of Fame on several peripheral grounds.
It combines several elements that have become key factors in great montages: Teen Wolf, Michael J. Fox, a 1980s soundtrack queen (Amy Holland), high school and sports.
Perhaps second only to E.G. Daily (Summer School) and Robert Tepper (Rocky IV) as a pop music soundtrack specialist, Amy Holland also made a notable mark on the Scarface soundtrack, among others.
Here, Shooting for the Moon provides the backdrop for the end credits (and character resolutions) of Teen Wolf, and commences mere moments after the film’s other great montage (Win in the End).
With back-to-back double montage action, Teen Wolf brought us not only gnarly music, radical basketball action and montage supremacy, but also…ahem…Lorie Griffin (see right).
Sure, Boof was nicer and certainly not bad-looking, but there must have been some kind of shady double angle Michael J. Fox could have worked here.
And from the files of songs that absolutely belong on your workout playlist (provided you have seen the associated movie) is Win in the End by Mark Safan. The song was used as the backdrop for the final conflict between Michael J. Fox’s high school basketball team and the opposing squad led by his nemesis, Mick.
Due in no small part to the soundtrack, Teen Wolf remains an 80s teen classic, and virtually everyone who has seen the movie and has an appreciation for sports will instantly conjure up images of high school basketball upon hearing this track.
The film also featured Jerry Levine, James Hampton, Mark Holton (who would later play serial killer John Wayne Gacy) and Jay Tarses as the most apathetic coach in the history of high school athletics.
In a tragic turn of events, Lorie Griffin (pictured right) didn’t really appear in any other notable movie roles following her portrayal of Pamela Wells in Teen Wolf. I don’t think anything bad happened to her. It was just a tragedy that we were limited to this and an episode of Charles in Charge.
Enjoy one of the most effective pieces of soundtrack music from a decade that specialized in linking music and film.
And for people that want a little refresher, here is the actual basketball sequence from the movie.
“How much more of this can you take?”
“As much as you can dish out…”
I am a longtime fitness advocate and a veteran of many grueling battles in the gym.
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