200 Motels (1971)

User Rating:

5.6/10   

Directors:

Tony Palmer
Frank Zappa

Writers:

Frank Zappa (story)
Tony Palmer (shooting script)

Release Date:

10 November 1971 (USA)

Genre:

Comedy | Fantasy | Music

Plot:

"Touring makes you crazy," Frank Zappa says, explaining that the idea for this film came to him while the Mothers of Invention were touring...

Plot Keywords:

Mothers Of Invention | Band | Cult Comedy | Rock 'n' Roll | Redneck

Cast

The Mothers of Invention
Theodore Bikel	...	Rance Muhammitz / Dave
Keith Moon	...	The Hot Nun
Janet Neville-Ferguson	...	Groupie (as Janet Ferguson)
Lucy Offerall	...	Groupie
Jimmy Carl Black	...	Lonesome Cowboy Burt
Martin Lickert	...	Jeff
Dick Barber	...	Bif Debris - The Vacuum Cleaner
Don Preston	...	Don
Pamela Des Barres	...	Interviewer (as Pamela Miller)
Ruth Underwood	...	Fake Drummer
Judy Gridley	...	Chorus Leader
Ringo Starr	...	Larry The Dwarf / Frank Zappa

Also Known As:

Frank Zappa's 200 Motels (USA) (complete title)
Two Hundred Motels

Runtime:

98 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.66 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

USA:R (certificate #23033) | Argentina:16 | Singapore:(Banned) | West Germany:18 | USA:TV-MA | Sweden:11 | UK:18

Filming Locations:

Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, England, UK

Company:

Bizarre Productions

Trivia:

People offered parts in the movie included Vivian Stanshall, Mick Jagger, 'John Lennon', Pete Townshend, George Harrison, Bob Dylan and Eric Idle.

Quotes:

Lonesome Cowboy Burt: So long as I get some beer and I get paid, you can make me do anything, I'm professional!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in John's Arm: Armageddon (2008)

extremely weird and silly with some good music

Should you watch this film? I believe the following questions may be a decent guide to making this decision. Are you a Zappa fan who likes many of his different musical phases? If so, then this is a must. Are you a casual Zappa fan, partial to newer stuff only? If so, then approach with caution. Do you like very bizarre sequences put together seemingly at random? If so, this is a must. If you hate that kind of thing, then you will probably hate this. When in doubt, have a backup ready so you can switch to that if you lose patience. Oh, and guys out there, I wouldn't recommend showing this to your girlfriend unless she is a big Zappa fan. By all means, I do NOT recommend planning a romantic evening with a girl with standard pop culture tastes that is bookended by playing her samples of your Magma and King Crimson collection and then ending with a screening of 200 Motels, not even as an experiment. Trust me, I have tried this (once) and the results were not good. But I digress...

What do you get from 200 motels? Random weirdness and silliness with a very 1965-1970 feel to it, kind of like a strangely lighthearted feverish dream. You also get some very interesting music of highly variable quality and some great in-jokes that you will find hilarious if you have followed Zappa's career. I will never again be able to drive past a town named "Centerville" (there are lots of these in the midwest USA) without having that Flo and Eddie zombie-like sequence flash through my head. I would certainly not consider this a good film or anywhere close to a good film. But it is certainly oddly interesting.