Boardinghouse (Johnn Wintergate, 1982)

This movie is craaaaaazy! Boardinghouse is possibly the most insane thing I've ever seen, and part of me is convinced it was made by aliens who took human form but didn't get enough intel about our species before rolling the camera. Is it good? Several more tests must be conducted in the lab before anyone even comes close to an answer. Did I love it? Yes, I did. Every moment seems completely improvised on the spot. Every scene is insane. Every character is a total weirdo. Is it the first telekinetic haunted house slasher hypnosis New Age self-help T&A bikini party rock 'n' roll film with an extended pie-fight sequence? Probably. Is it the first shot-on-video horror film to be blown up to 35mm and play in theaters? Yes (despite the claims from the makers of Blood Cult, another film I've reviewed on this site, who didn't make their shot-on-video horror film until 1985).

Boardinghouse is the brainchild of still-married musician couple John Wintergate aka Johnn Wintergate aka Hawk Adly aka Hawk Adley aka Jonema aka Johnima and Kalassu aka Kalassu Kay aka Kalassu Wintergate. The Wintergates are musicians who make New Age music and "spiritual rock" together, and they've also, together or separately, written and performed folk music, '80s new wave pop, and '70s guitar rock. The Wintergates were at a party where everyone was watching a print of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and they got the idea to make a cheap horror film with comedic moments and sex appeal that would also incorporate some of their spiritual beliefs. Boardinghouse is the delightfully bonkers result. John wrote and directed, Kalassu was the assistant director, and they both played leading roles and performed the music.

So, what is this thing all about? I'll try to describe the indescribable. John aka Hawk plays Jim Royce. He inherits a 10-bedroom house in the Mulholland area of Los Angeles from his late uncle. Jim has an office downtown, and his job vaguely involves blueprints and printouts of "business plans," but mostly we just see him meditating on his desk in skimpy underwear as he practices his telekinesis. Jim has mild telekinetic powers, you see. Unfortunately, he doesn't have psychic powers, because he would have known that the house he inherited is haunted by a malevolent entity that causes people to do terrible things. Instead, Jim decides to rent nine of the 10 bedrooms to a bevy of bikini babes who are single, between the ages of 18 and 25, and ready to mingle. A 10th babe shows up out of the blue, Debbie (Lindsay Freeman), and she rents the storage room. Debbie is a little mysterious, but she doesn't stick out as too strange in this bunch of eccentric characters.

Jim and his babes have a lot of fun around the pool, the house, the boudoir, the shower, and the local pizza parlor, and Jim gets especially close to Victoria (Kalassu), who becomes an instant convert to self-actualization through telekinesis. Soon, she's harnessing her own telekinetic powers. But Debbie's got some telekinetic powers of her own, with her own designs on Jim, and wild accidents and nightmarish hallucinations keep happening to the women. 

Into this maelstrom of sexy, poolside eccentricity comes a private eye hired by an angry fiance of one of the women, the angry fiance himself, a couple of police detectives who are old friends of Jim's, Victoria's new wave band 33 1/3 to play the bitchin' housewarming party (a real band of the same name fronted by Kalassu), a magician also performing at the party, an alcoholic client of Jim's, Victoria's hilariously sleazy party-loving agent, and the gardener who "came with the house" (also played by John aka Hawk). The gardener, a Vietnam vet who saved Jim's uncle in 'Nam but lost part of his mind in the process, looks like a cross between GG Allin, every member of LA Guns, every member of Motorhead besides Lemmy, and John Heard's character from Cutter's Way.

Boardinghouse is a wild, freaky ride that amps up the freakitude right at the point where the film starts to drag a little. It is a strange, unique thing, and I love that it exists. It's also super cute that the Wintergates are still married and still performing music as Lightstorm, though they left Hollywood for the Idaho mountains several years ago to raise their two children. Drag City even put out a compilation of their music a couple years ago.