Like many reviewers on this film I first saw "Ladies and Gentlemen, the Fabulous Stains" on late night cable in the mid 80's. I loved the music as I was just digging Punk and getting into New Wave. The more adult themes went over my head but I got the gist - the conflict between men and women in the music business and how media can build up and tear down stars.I had wanted to see the film again but until 2008 it was still only available if it were shown on TV or if someone had a copy from a previous TV showing. The studio finally released a DVD of a restored print and I fell in love with it all over again.Diane Lane, 15 at the time, plays the leader of The Stains, "Third Degree" Burns. Laura Dern, 13 at the time, plays Third Degree's cousin and bassist "Peg". The British punk band The Stains hang out on tour with is made up of members of the Sex Pistols and The Clash and fronted by Ray Winstone. Fee Waybill of The Tubes plays a hasbeen metal band singer. Christine Lahti, who plays Lane's Aunt and Dern's mother, kills in the two short scenes she's in. Other notable cast members are David Clennon, Cynthia Sikes, Elizabeth Daily, and an uncredited Brent Spiner. The film was directed by Lou Adler who had directed "Up in Smoke" and was written by Nancy Dowd who had written "Slap Shot".Diane Lane shows once again her raw untrained talent in only her 3rd film at the time. Laura Dern also looks natural in her role. Along with Lahti, Waybill also turns in a great performance.The film does a good job of showing one part of the rough and tumble music business before the MTV era. It's rough around the edges with some cringe worthy scenes and stiff dialog but overall it makes its gritty point about the nature of show business and the media and about gender roles. The happy ending that was filmed 2 years after initial filming fits in that it reminded me of the rise of the group "The Go-Go's" They had started in the punk scene and moved into the new MTV scene and got the same make over "The Stains" get in the final scene.The film has reached cult status not only from the late night cable showings and lack of a previous home release but also because it influenced future women singers most notably Courtney Love.As noted before the film is jagged but Lou Adler made sure the music was as polished as possible to be heard. That of course is what is important - the music and the message.*Side Note* If you are an "Old Fart" now and want to reminisce about the film and the time of the story, listen to the commentary by Diane Lane and Laura Dern on the DVD. They were a bonus and added to the value of the disc.

The oddest thing about this movie was that it was produced and directed by Lou Adler — an important manager in the 1960's and 1970's whose most important artists were the Mamas & the Papas and Carole King (just the man for a punk movie!) and that it's a no-holds-barred vision of the rock world as cynically exploitative and manipulative, taking honest expressions of teen angst and turning them into phony commodities. One wonders whatever possessed Adler to make a movie exposing the seamy side of the business that had made him rich enough to produce a major-studio feature film! Aside from that, it's a sometimes dull, sometimes stupid, sometimes incredibly compelling movie held together mostly by the marvelously deadpan performance of Diane Lane in the female lead. Adler's direction doesn't have the excitement we expect from a rock 'n' roll movie but it's serviceable, and Barry Ford's performance as the Black bus driver who's the voice of reason is quite good. Incidentally, it occurred to me that the story might have been inspired by the real-life band the Shaggs, three no-talent teenage sisters who recorded an album called "Philosophy of the World" in 1969, funded by their father and released privately. They developed an Ed Wood-style so-bad-it's-good following and copies of their album went for four-figure sums until it was recently released on CD.

My DVD player crapped out on me and I was going through my old VHS pile and watched this again. Like most, I had taped my copy off of Nightflight in about 1985. I was a devoted fan of that show; as a sophomore in College at Montana State U, it certainly helped develop my taste in music and I was extremely vexed when USA replaced it with idiot Gilbert Gottfried and those dumb cut up teen sex comedies (Up All Night). I wonder whatever happened to the voice over woman from Night Flight and Radio 1990? She was attractive and had more than a "voice for radio". Or whatever happened to the other Radio 1990 alum Lisa Robinson?My recollections on the movie1. First off, how great is it that back in the mid 80s USA could run a movie without obsessing over bleeping out shits and fucks etc and tolerating glimpses of underage flesh 2. The commercials from cable in the 80s are hilarious to watch today (Videos on break dancing!) 3. How about the young Ray Winstone as the Looters/Johnny Rotten doppelganger (the beefy guy from Sexy Beast in his pallid youth) 4. Fee Waybill was awesome. I couldn't tell if it was cinema verite' or self parody in his performance 5. The whole "I Don't Put Out" empowerment is sure a far cry from Britney, Christina and the rest of the current pop trollops infesting the airwaves and TV twenty(!) years later 5. Loved Lawnboy and the whole way reggae and punk intertwined as music made by those on the margins. "Everybody want to go to heaven, but nobody want to die"; from Peter Tosh lyrics 6. I loved the added ending "Emp-TV" video for Join the Professionals. Awesome. They didn't release that as a 45 single did they? 7. Diane Lane was perfect for the part but Laura Dern didn't really impress considering how her acting career developed a few years later 8. Christine Lahti was also good in her limited time on screen 9. With all the crap in the DVD racks, why can't this little gem get re-released? Didn't Lou Adler make a fortune on those $80 Complete Monterey Music Festival DVD box sets? 10. Any hope of any TV DVD box sets of Night Flight? Or is that more of a pipe dream

I was a student in high school when the film crew and actors/actresses came to Vancouver, British Columbia Canada to film this movie.They had a radio contest at the local radio station called 14 CFUN and they wanted people to come down to the radion station to sign up to be "extras" in the movie. I had never done this before, but took a chance and was selected. I was to play a "skunk".We filmed down at the exhibition grounds of the P.N.E. {Pacific National Exhibition}. I missed 3 days of school to do this movie and had the time of my life! Actually, it was even more fun when I found a friend of mine was also picked as an extra.I remember meeting and getting the autographs of the Sex Pistols and Clash members who were there. I actually didn't even know that there were other "stars" in this movie until I had found this website and saw the cast list.I also remember eating way too much "White Spot" {burgers and fries}. It seemed like that is all they fed us. I had been "called back" for a 3rd day of the shoot because they had chosen me for some "close-up shots".....much to my surprise. I remember the costume and the makeup that we wore as "skunks". We all wore see-through red blouses with very high pumps on our feet. The makeup was kind of "skanky" and the big white stripe that they put down the middle of your hair. I can barely remember what we looked like.I signed a contract with Paramount Pictures when the movie was still called "All Washed Up". I never did see it. Actually, when I was in Waikiki, Hawaii a couple of years later, we had been watching "sumo wrestling" on one of their channels and had fallen asleep. When I woke up, the credits to this movie were scrolling by!!!!!I was soooooo upset about it, because I had never even seen the movie.I have still yet to find this movie and would like very much to attain a copy of it on DVD.