Vice Academy (Rick Sloane, 1989) Review...

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“A Vice cop?! I feel used and violated.” From 1984 through to the end of the decade, six Police Academy movies were released (a seventh came in the mid-90s). What started out as a raunchy comedy quickly turned into a family franchise with cartoonish gags and even broader characters, rendering it practically a parody of itself. And still, along came Vice Academy, a cheap-as-chips combination of sauciness and spoof, in which a gaggle of goofy police trainees – headed up by Scream Queen legend Linnea Quigley (Sorority Babes In The Slimeball Bowl-o-rama) – attempt to make ten arrests to qualify for graduation. First stop, that most hilarious of subjects: an under-age smut operation … wait, what?!...

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“Keep trying – you'll eventually hit a target.” Yeah … really. Indeed, this is probably what Jason Mantzoukas, of the podcast How Did This Get Made?, would gleefully describe as a “wild!” movie, what with it's bizarre script, incredibly low budget, and disorienting tonal mix. The aforementioned Quigley plays Didi, one of a host of new recruits being put through their paces by Miss Devonshire (Jayne Hamil, Vice Academy 2), a stern instructor with a curiously sordid back story. Along with fellow trainee chums Shawnee (Karen Russell, Murder Weapon), whose go-to tactic of disarming a gun-toting crim is to flash her assets, and Dwayne (Ken Abraham, Creepozoids), the only male in the group whose fun zone is regularly the target for a swift jab from a procession of knees, they'll have to buck up their lazy ideas if they want to graduate.

“I wish I knew what slut this résumé belongs to.” / “So would I – I'd like to meet her!” In competition with Daddy's girl/class suck-up Holly (Ginger Lynn, The Devil's Rejects), the daughter of the Chief of Police, Didi & Co are drawn to the case of Cherry Pop (Allison Barron, credited as Christian Barr), a teenage runaway who is trying to escape the porn industry. This is where the tone of the movie gets, shall we say, quite uneven. Cherry Pop, aged fifteen, has been beaten and wound up on the streets in fear for her life, and so Didi, Shawnee, and Dwayne decide to take down the production company who knowingly used Cherry Pop in their movies.

 

Now, to be fair, all these years later, this is a decidedly jarring element to inject into the plot of Vice Academy – a flick that is otherwise intended to be a silly bit of T&A comedy movie fun – but at the time of its production it was a hot topic. Not long beforehand there had been a huge scandal in the adult entertainment industry after the discovery that Traci Lords, one of its biggest stars, had been performing under-age (a fake ID and birth certificate had changed her birth name and date). At the time it was a massive story with a major fallout, but even still, it's a curious idea to take inspiration from that event and inject it into the plot of a comedy.

“Brilliant! You got the part!” / “Oh, great! I'll do it for free.” As if the movie wasn't already weird enough, Didi infiltrates the production company in question, gets a job on their next movie (using an eyebrow-raising CV provided quite readily – and suspiciously – by Miss Devonshire), and becomes infatuated with its male lead – buff pretty boy Chucky Long (Stephen Steward). Not only does Chucky know about the production company's unethical and illegal ways, but the smut flick Didi ends up starring in is directed by a sex-positive feminist woman (and Dominant to boot) who also knows about the production of illegal content!

Not weird enough? After the academy trainees make their bust, Didi spirits Chucky away to her own apartment, cuffs him to the sink, and has her way with him! Wild is certainly one word to describe the bizarrely jumbled tone of this movie, but then again, if you're expecting upright morals and virtues – or any ordinary sense of reality – to be coming from a movie like this, then you need your head examined. In fact, all these years later, Vice Academy does serve as a window into a bygone era when, seemingly, any mixture of ideas could get tossed into a comedy. No subject was seemingly taboo and there were square pegs jammed into triangular holes all over the shop.

“Severe Tyre Damage? They're my favourite group!” Iffy plot elements aside, what's the rest of the movie actually like? Written and Directed by Rick Sloane (Hobgoblins), who also gave the world five Vice Academy sequels, the movie was clearly made on a slender budget. With the cast wearing their own clothes (fans of Quigley's work will no doubt recognise that blue dress from other modestly priced productions), the scenes shot on the seedier sections of Hollywood Boulevard were done so without permits. Indeed, in one scene you can actually see one of the production vehicles waiting nearby with its doors open, ready to scoop up the cast and crew in case the real cops show up! With minimal coverage and training ground scenes shot on some scruffy sports field beside a nondescript California highway, fans of low budget filmmaking will get an extra kick out of the movie's limited production.

“The only time I watch the stars is when I'm on my back.” In terms of the film's sense of humour, it's hit and miss. Numerous opportunities to more deeply explore certain ideas (such as Miss Devonshire's apparent history of starring in innumerable outré adult films) are never really followed up on, while cartoonish sounds as Dwayne's love spuds are clobbered by every student in the class pretty much establishes the extent of the flick's funny bone. Another example would be the main villain: Queen Bee (Jean Carol), who sports a 'stinger' on her rear to match the voluminous beehive hairdo balanced atop her head. Weirdly enough (but perhaps to be expected by this point), the tonally jarring sequences in the porn production company have some of the film's 'best' gags – the cue cards in particular. Despite the ropey jokes, though, Linnea Quigley is dependable as ever and elevates the middling material with a game sense of fun and a deliberately campy performance.

“Well, I like what I do and I do it well.” As if the whole charade wasn't strange enough, Vice Academy proves to be a T&A movie with an odd lack of T&A. Even with a veritable catalogue's worth of lingerie paraded about, the movie comes off as kind of coy, especially in comparison to some of its peers of the time, like Hollywood Chainsaw Hookers and Nightmare Sisters, both of which also exhibit better jokes and a more consistent tone. All said and done, Vice Academy feels like a film that needed more of everything – more thought over the script, more money in the budget, and yes, more nudity on the screen, could have helped make this a raunch-com classic. Instead, though, you've got a good title, good poster, and a few good moments in an otherwise vaguely disappointing flick that nonetheless manages to leave your eyebrows pinned to your hairline.