dougdoepke
The material's often questionable, the characters often stereotypes, but the results are pretty darn funny. Nearly all the scenes erupt at an LA car wash where boisterous Black workers and colorful street characters bounce off each other. There're a few subplots but no real story. We get to know the guys and gals over the 90-minutes, usually as they show themselves in humorous situations and not through dialog. It's a distinguished line-up of name comics, with Carlin and Pryor leading that list if not the screen time. Instead, the focus wheels around from one episode to the next like a laughing merry-go-round. At times, more serious pieces intrude like boy-girl problems or just keeping the fun-loving guys at their work. Some might object to what amount to Black stereotypes-Pryor's churchman huckster, the sexy street hooker, the angry Black Muslim, et. al. Then too, some of the humor is time-bound, like Mao's Little Red Book that the White guy wannabe waves around. But that hardly matters when the luscious Mona pours coffee.True, the movie may be a matter of taste since the humor does cut across racial lines. Nonetheless, as a White guy, l got a big bunch of laughs from the loony goings-on. Thanks be to Universal for taking a chance on the tricky material.
assimilator47
I don't look at color, at age, or stardom, when i watch a movie. I watch a movie as the story they want to portray. A good story makes a movie great. A great story makes a movie legendary.This is one of the great movies, representing the seventies. If you look besides the story, you'll see a great movie about a period in history. The cars, the clothes, the music: all representing a wonderful careless summer in the 70's.More than that, it shows us a dramedy about a very close group of co-workers at their job, with very human, down-to-earth, daily problems that make up life.Social and financial issues, relationships and friendships, professional attitude and problems cross the screen like a smooth sailingboat, riding the waves, meanwhile accompanied with some of the best funk, soul and disco music ever made.From beginning to end, the movie focuses on the daily routine of personnel at a local car wash in a big city. While not a traditional comedy, it is more a relaxed popcornmovie, following a huge group of main characters.What i liked most, was the tempo of the unfolding story, very relaxed and watchable, with comic undertones everywhere. If you want a true original feeling of the careless 70's, this is the movie for you.Don't expect wonderful quality acting, but do expect a great piece of true movie history and an original setting for a fun movie.
ElMaruecan82
From the first time I watched "Car Wash" as a kid, on an ordinary Saturday night, it instantly became one of my favorite cinematic pleasures and not in a guilty way. The film drew the 70's in my mind and made me realize that a time existed before I was born, where life had a certain quality cruelly missing in our cynical years: something flamboyant, lively … funky! "Car Wash" is an exhilarating journey driven by J.B, the deejay of the fictional radio station KGYS providing the musical background, the soul of the film. No pun intended since the soundtrack includes disco, funk and R&B ballads, the unique sound of Afro-American music encapsulating the 70's. The cast is multiracial with an Afro-American predominance but there's something refreshing in the way some serious issues are tackled in "Car Wash" despite the cheerful mood.Take Lindy's character, remarkably played by Antonio Fargas. It's extremely challenging to see a homo drag played with such sophistication. When confronted to Duane aka Abdullah, Bill Duke as the, no pun intended again, 'straight man' of the film, Lindly proudly delivers one of my favorite movie lines : "Honey, I'm more a man than you'll ever be, and more a woman than you'll ever get". The comedic aspect never deserts the film, neither does the social commentary. The tormented Abdullah sounds on the surface as the group's killjoy, but he mirrors the confusion of a community in quest for identity, an issue the running gag involving his name humorously deal with. Abdullah's resentments are echoed by Lonnie, Ivan Dixon as the cigar-smoking respected veteran of the group."Car Wash" opens on a summer Friday morning where we discover the group inside the locker room. With his inseparable radio, there's Hippo, whose name gives a subtle hint about his size, Lloyd and Floyd, the two James Brown-wannabe with a priceless musical entrance. T.C. aka The Fly, is another engaging character in love with Mona, the beautiful waitress of the neighboring restaurant. To invite Mona to JB's Disco Dance Show, he must get the tickets by calling KGYS whenever he hears 'Disco Dance'. His buzzing around about his gigantic afro haircut, his secret identity, and his mission will provide some of the film's funniest moments.The rest of the team involves Chuco, the Latino guy, whom you may remember as the ill-fated Angel Fernandez from "Scarface". With Goody, the Native with the most memorable cinematic pig-eared hat ever, they share an amusing complicity whether they tease each other or take their revenge on Earl, the foreman, the one who 'doesn't get wet' as he proudly declares. And to complete the gallery, Ray Vitte is Geronimo whose weird outfit equals the worthlessness of the marital advices he gives to Jack Kehoe as Scruggs, the man from "The Sting" and "Serpico" with a cowboy hat. Hats and haircuts are the character's trademarks while the orange uniform is Dee Luxe Car Wash' signature besides its hilarious motto "We're not responsible of you car" ... which speaks a lot about the company's work ethics.These characters create a childish mood that Abdullah described as 'clown show'. His opinion is demonstrated by the constant interventions of Mr. B. who sounds mostly like a playground monitor with his classic "Wash the caahs!" a cigar clenched between his teeth. Mr. B. played by Sully Boyar, is the fatherly type of boss keeping an eye on his workers, on his Maoist pot-smoker, but genuinely sympathetic son Irwin, who wants to be part of the working class, and occasionally an eye on the feminine assets of Marsha, the sexy cash register employee, the only staff member who calls him Leon."Car Wash" is driven by the dynamics between the characters, an ingenuity of Joel Schumacher's script, where we get to know people from the nature of their relationships. And at the end, the character's arcs are unequally complete, but the day changed one thing or two for the better, like Mr B. giving a chance to Lonnie to submit his ideas to improve the service, one of the films' nicest touches. But more than a car wash, the place seems like a converging point in Los Angeles for the strangest visitors. As Hippo said: "Boy, there's been some weird people".Weird is the word. A bandaged man, a hysterical Lorraine Gary as 'Ms. Beverly Hills', the woman whose carsick son puking all over her made me laugh to tears, a pooping dog, a mad pop bottle bomber hiding a no less disgusting stuff in his 'weapon', Calvin the skate-boarding brat, and of course, Richard Pryor as the TV evangelist 'Daddy Rich', an ambiguous character whose message is exaggeratedly revered to highlight its excesses. Still, his cameo is an occasion to appreciate the Pointers aka Wilson Sisters's "Believe" song. The whole movie is a tribute to American Black culture, incarnated by Snapper, the wise shoeshine man, played by Clarence Muse –and I learned that- the first Black American to star in a film. A fitting symbol.And the romantic touch of the film is poetically incarnated by 'Marlene', the quiet hooker who stiffs a taxi driver, played by George Carlin, and starts looking for an ex-client named Joe, while Carlin spends all the day asking people if they saw a 'big, tall, blonde, black chick?' The female cast is delicately treated with the three M : Marlene looking for her charming prince, Mona, the waitress who finally accepts T.C.'s date, and Marsha who gets a date with a Redford look-alike, so stereotypical it's hilarious.But these stereotypes are never intended to mock but to display the everyday working class with a humorous social commentary. The plot-less concept was risky but it worked because the film is so genuinely funny, and the characters so endearing, it immediately impacts your memories, to forever associate "Car Wash" with an iconic disco song, a sunny color orange, and the delirious spirit of the 70's!
MARIO GAUCI
This modern 'black' comedy is something of a cult but also patchy overall: surprisingly, it was written by future Hollywood film-maker Joel Schumacher and director Schultz, then, would eventually go on to make the fiasco that was the film version of The Beatles' seminal album SGT. PEPPERS' LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND (1978). It basically provides a microcosm of mid-1970s American attitudes (and converging cultures) in its 'day in the life' depiction of the titular workplace: characters, costumes, hairstyles, soundtrack, even language are so obviously of their time that they both make and date the film.Popular stand-up comics put in an appearance as well: George Carlin is a taxi driver forever in search of a female customer who ditched him but then doesn't recognize the girl when he comes face to face with her(!), while Richard Pryor has a showy role as a millionaire (i.e. hypocritical) evangelist. It's telling that perhaps the film's funniest gags are both gross in nature: one has a boy constantly throwing up and another in which an old man's urine sample-bottle is mistaken for an exploding liquid and destroyed!
