"You're looking for someone, and it's not KISS..."

As if ABBA – The Movie wasn’t enough:

KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park (1978)

I was chatting with my coworker City Steaks not too long ago about the band KISS, and I mentioned that I was pretty sure I had a copy of this lame old curiosity (a collaboration between Hanna Barbera and the band) on VHS. She wanted to borrow it, so I dug through my box of old tapes in the basement – sure enough, it had managed to survive the purge that occurred before the big move from Seattle. I tossed the tape into the VCR to make sure it still played; I ended up sitting through the entire film. Gee, I guess I’ll never learn my lesson.

When this made-for-television film originally aired, I was a huge KISS fan. My fandom was something that irritated my parents to no end. To their credit, they never forbid me from playing their music (and I had a loud stereo!) or buying what little KISS merchandise I could afford on my tiny allowance. I knew kids whose parents forbid the music in their house, and would throw any KISS items they came across in the trash. My parents, especially my dad, preferred to take a mocking tone of derision. “What album is this?” he’d ask, “KISS Kills a Cow?” (I hafta admit, that joke really cracked me up at the time. As a matter of fact, it still does.) I can’t recall if my folks watched this with me when it was shown for the first time, but if they did it would’ve given them plenty of ammunition to tease me with. Even as a kid, I found myself thinking “I don’t know about this…” After it was shown, the next Monday me and all of my grade school pals were asking “what the hell was that??!!??” I still think that is the appropriate response to this mess.

The plot of the film is more or less the same as a Scooby-Doo episode, but starring KISS instead of that stupid dog and his stoner buddies. KISS is scheduled to play some concerts at Magic Mountain amusement park (yeah, all of the best concerts I’ve ever seen have been at amusement parks). To insane inventor Abner Devereaux (played by Anthony Zerbe, one of the kings of 1970’s made-for-tv films), these concerts are a symbol of the shift in the park’s entertainment focus that has led to his firing. He starts using robots to trash the park, including some that look like KISS in an effort to frame the rockers. He conducts all of this activity from his not-so-secret underground lair (geez, if the guy was fired, shouldn’t they have made the wacko give up his office?). Oh, and did I mention that KISS have superhero powers? Yep, they can all fly, leap great distances, and fight in slow motion. These powers are given to them by (what else?) their magical talisman. From what I can, their other super powers are as follows:

Paul Stanley, aka “Star Child”: The ability to read minds, shoot a red beam out of his eye, and speak in an incredibly annoying Noo Yawk accent.

Gene Simmons, aka “The Demon”: He can roar like a lion, breath fire, knock down cheap sets, and brag about how many groupies he’s banged and how much money he makes while wearing a really bad wig. (Okay, I made up that last part. He only does that in real life.) His voice sounds like its being put through a really cheesy synthesizer.

Ace Frehley, aka “Space Ace”: Teleporting himself and his fellow band members is his specialty. Oh, and he squawks like a parrot every 30 seconds or so.

Peter Criss, aka “Cat Man”: From what I can tell, the only unique skill Peter has is the ability to have all of his dialogue poorly dubbed by somebody else. Oh, what the hell – he has “cat like” reflexes. There, are you happy?

Sam, the former assistant to the evil scientist, is turned into a robot that Devereaux uses to carry out more misdeeds. His girlfriend Melissa tells KISS about Sam’s disappearance, and they take it upon themselves to investigate. They wander around the park at night looking for Devereaux’s lair to get some answers, and encounter all sorts of robots that they end up doing battle with (the most memorable battle is with a bunch of white haired gorillas wearing silver spacesuits). Sam manages to steal the talisman, KISS loses their powers, and the band is captured. Devereaux sends out the robot KISS to perform that evening’s concerts. The robots change the wholesome tune “Hotter Than Hell” into a new song, “Rip and Destroy,” in an attempt to get the crowd to riot and destroy the park. Needless to say, KISS escapes and get their talisman back, fly to the concert and beat up the robots. Sam is turned back into a real boy and reunited with Melissa. The evil Devereaux ends up with white hair and you can’t really tell if he’s supposed to be dead or just insane. The poor sap who sat through this mess drinks another beer and counts the ways that the last 90 minutes could have been better spent. So, it’s all happily ever after, I guess.

This movie is out of print currently, and seems to be a bit of a skeleton in the closet for the band – it wasn’t long after it aired that their popularity slid and they started to be seen as a joke kiddie band. There are plenty of people selling copies on Ebay if you’re truly curious. I would guess that it will eventually be released on DVD as there is a buck to be made, and KISS isn’t exactly discriminating when it comes to that sort of thing.