... Like this one, for instance. Always near the top of every favorite-episode list ever compiled, the deceptively unassumingly titled Joe Don Baker vehicle, "Mitchell" (1975) is the grand centerpiece of  The Mads' infamous Experiment #512. Indeed, Mystery Science Theater 3000's finest hour is arguably any sixty minutes of  your choosing from this much beloved and rightfully ballyhooed transitional magnum opus.

In it floods a veritable confluence of exposition. This is the one in which we say farewell to long-suffering yet peculiarly blissful Joel Robinson as he makes his escape from The Satellite of Love (and in the process discover that his favorite movie is "The Seven Faces of Dr. Lao"), meet his hapless successor, ex-cheese-factory-worker-turned-tempboy, Mike Nelson, learn the dark and terrible secret of  Dr. Clayton Forrester's diabolical "Method 53" and that of all most surprisingly the fact that ..."nobody likes Hamdingers."

As a bonus, we are inescapably drawn — sucked, if you will — into the  weird and slackardly  Bizarro-Cannellean  mid-70's  world of  the most ill-conceived maverick cop in filmdom and just quite possibly the most outrageous and outright unappealing "action hero"  ever....

As portrayed by the sturdy and  usually quite adequate Baker, our titular character is a big ol' big-city cop with absolutely no discernible redeeming traits. He slouches and mumbles.  He brazenly dozes with total impunity!  But wait, there's more. And it ain't pretty. Consider, if you will:

He flouts authority with all the panache of a snotty third-grader. He muscles small children and little old ladies.  And these, my friends, turn out to be chief among his good points! Watch spellbound as he delegates his actionly duties to others...then  gropes  them with wild rheumy-eyed abandon!  Be amazed as he wallows around on the floor in a tape outline of  a shooting victim to find out the dead guy's height! Yep. In Mitchell's world, crime scene reports are for sissies. "So whaddaya a cop or...?" Hold your breath  at white-knuckle car chases which at times come perilously close to approaching the posted speed limit!  See our dauntless hero wailed on by a brace of unremarkable henchmen and crowned with a loaded trash can  ("Sorry, bud. Thought you were Rockford")!  And witness, if you dare, the truly unforgettable and somewhat sickly slapstick surrealism of the classic Roscoe-down-the-pants-leg gaffe! You'll laugh. You'll cry. Then you'll cry some more.

This movie has it all: Huge American autos just like Dad used to drive. Every last yard of polyester on the planet.  A strangely haunting industrial-film soundtrack punctuated by the goofiest of Hoyt Axton tunes over the closing credits.  Dual  plotlines  which  never once come close  to converging.  Vague  and  interchangable villains.  The poignant orange-peeling scene so eerily reminiscent of  Brando in  The Godfather.  Merlin Olsen as Benton, the hulking sinister yet sensitive houseboy.  That evil, smarmy John Saxon guy.  The other guy who could almost be Anthony Quinn.  Most notably the delectable Linda Evans as Greta, the hooker with a heart of gold. Or maybe not  ("Word on the street is you're a jerk"). And at least two of  the great unanswered questions of our time:  Just what is the deal with the baby oil on the nightstand?  And...

"Why would anyone wanna do that with Mitchell!?"

As a self-standing feature, this film's queasy quality easily merits its entry into the Halls of  Fame of  both the What-Were- They-Thinking  and They-Just-Didn't-Care categories. A labor of  love?  At minimum wage, maybe.  As an Experiment...

It is simply the best, people!  I've said it with my hand up. I can't take it back.  And wouldn't  if  I could.  For truth be told:  In the Not-too-Distant Future...every man, woman and child will come to know the Man, the Myth and the magnificent Malaise that is...all together now... say it loud; I'm slack and I'm proud... "Mitchell".  

The deep dirt on Mitchell is at Daddy-O's!

The Internet Movie Database ""

IMDb Joe Don Baker Filmography

Joe Don Baker Porkapalooza!

The MST3K Critics Guide

  Mitchell Video Clips





MITCHELL'S THE STAR OF ETHAN KOEHLER'S

PUFFYWARE  from

MSTrosoftSM

Why would anyone wanna MITCHELLIZE their Internet Explorer!? 1) Download and install Internet Explorer 5 Toolbar Wallpaper 2) Download the Mitchell IE Skin and save to either     C:/Program Files/Microsoft Internet/Bitmaps or C:/Windows 3) From IE Tools select Toolbar Wallpaper and choose MITCHIE     It's a fabulo-fun-tastic MSTrosoft Exclusive!

The Vaguely Psychedelic "Mitchell After Midnight" Black Velvet Blacklight Wallpaper! Guaranteed to make your desktop look really, really odd.  640x480  832x624  1024x768

Dress down the desktop with  Mitchell: The Icon!

Add this page to "Favorites" and Mitchell will  appear in the location bar of your IE browser.

"Rowsdower... Zap Rowsdower." Call him Boondocks Bond or the Solo of the Silos. Just don't call this big fella late for supper.

What Mitchell is to The City, slick urban wiseguys, big shiny gas-guzzlers and beer, Rowsdower is to Shackville, kooky rural cultists, rusty clunking pickups and, well...beer.

One needs only  watch MST3K's Experiment #910, The Final Sacrifice, to nearly recapture the awe and wonder of  that very first, very special, Mitchell encounter.

Not to be confused with the charming Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice, this promisingly titled film's original release name was Quest for the Lost City but for the sake of accuracy and perhaps decency should have instead been Stumbling Around Blindly and Eventually Tripping Over the Lost City.

Imagine, if you will, Ken Russell's The Devils randomly spliced with that Dukes of Hazzard episode where the boys got in a whole mess o' trouble down at Cooter's place. Now take out the scenes with the hunchbacked nun and Catherine Bach in cut-offs. This then would be a fair facsimile of The Final Sacrifice, a would-be supernatural action-thriller oddly devoid of thrills and whose action consists mainly of shots of the only overweight guy to be chased uphill in a single movie more than Ned Beatty in Deliverance.

While lacking his metropolitan counterpart's savvy and cat-like grace, Rowsdower nevertheless manages to carve his own niche in actiondom with all the cultured subtlety of  Ralph Kramden playing Grizzly Adams in a Raccoon Lodge stage production.

Sadly though, unlike the great Baker whose galaxy of enduring roles includes Mongo, Mitchell, Eischied, T.J. Geronimo, Joe McCarthy and that guy in the last couple-three James Bond movies to name but a few, journeyman thespian Christian Malcolm's legacy is forever that one brief, brilliant tour de force that made Rowsdower the household name it is today. And hockey hair the hero's halo.

 Ya gotta love this guy. He's Canadian!

PROUD TO DISPLAY
THE COVETED...

HEY, THANKS TO ALL THE MITCHELLHEADS WHO HAVE DROPPED IN
SINCE 2/1/97. EXTRA REGARDS TO AmEllenGirl, Damage & TVsCrow.


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