Friday 7 February 2014

Juicy Lucy Live from Bread (1971)



I saw the 1971 film Bread as an 68 min extra on a British Film Institute DVD, whose main feature was a 90 minute similarly themed hippy/ groupie/ music exploitation film called Permissive (1970, directed by Lindsay Shonteff). Of the film Bread, the BFI say:

An unusual mixture of pop festival documentary and saucy teen comedy, Bread was exploitation filmmaker Stanley A. Long's second attempt at what he called a "counter culture gimmick movie". His first, Groupie Girl (1970), produced by Long, was based upon the real-life exploits of the film's co-writer, Suzanne Mercer. Her encounters with rock musicians, as salaciously filtered through the distinctively seedy vision of director Derek Ford, had given Groupie Girl the grimy ring of truth, and the film made a lot of money. Unfortunately, despite its title - contemporary slang for cash - the more light-hearted Bread did not. 

Regardless of the tongue in cheek intentions, Bread holds attention and is quite engaging film for such a simple plot. It culminates in over 8 minutes of illicit and wild blues- rock pop festival headed by a band I had not heard of before called Juicy Lucy. If they were consistently as good as they played in the film, I am surprised they didn't achieve greater acclaim, although they did score a top 20 hit with their cover version of the Bo Diddley perennial Who Do You Love? Nowadays most Americans know a Juicy Lucy as a type of fucking cheeseburger.


By South Utsire

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