What did he say?...

Someone at the FBI must not have had much to do in 1964 and 1965, according to this blog post at Daily Dose.

Apparently, in early 1964 a disgruntled parent wrote to then-Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy complaining that the lyrics to the song "Louie Louie", by The Kingsmen, were "filthy." What I want to know is, how could she tell? I've never been able to tell what the singer is saying in that version of the song, which has been covered, some claim, by more singers and bands than The Beatles' "Yesterday", which is a lot of cover versions.

At any rate, the FBI reportedly spent the next two years attempting to decipher the song's lyrics, using such strategies as playing the 45 at 33 1/3. (If you're too young to remember 45s and LPs, you might not get that reference. Look it up.) However, according to the report the feds didn't ever bother to contact the band's lead singer, Jack Ely, or the man who wrote the song back in the 1950s, Richard Berry. Perhaps the agents tasked with the investigation were too embarrassed to ask either of them, "Did you sing/write a dirty song?" We can only hope.

The FBI never did figure out what the lyrics say (maybe the complaining mother has the superpower of being able to understand all song lyrics), and so they never said whether or not the lyrics are obscene.

Of course, there is a larger question here. That is, why are some people so determined to find something dirty or otherwise offensive in everything?

This all reminds me of the rumors that the 1963 song "Puff, The Magic Dragon", by folk group Peter, Paul and Mary, was really all about - gasp - marijuana. That would have come as a great shock to my second grade teacher (during the 1963-1964 school year), who required everyone in my class to memorize the lyrics to that song.

There were also the stories about The Beatles' song, "Lucy In the Sky With Diamonds", which was supposedly really all about LSD. Even Paul McCartney is reported to have admitted (in 2004) that the song really was about acid, but John Lennon always maintained that it was not about drugs, but was inspired by a drawing his son Julian made in nursery school. Call me naive (it's okay; people do, all the time), but since Lennon was the primary writer of the song, his testimony is good enough for me.

Sometimes, it takes a little work to find this objectionable content. For awhile, it seemed like the national pastime here in the US was to play songs backward to find messages that bands had supposedly left hidden in their music. These messages went from supposed clues in Beatles songs that Paul McCartney was dead and had been replaced by a look-alike, sound-alike, all the way to accusations that a variety of recording artists had put tributes to and recruiting messages for Satan in their songs that could only be understood when the music was played backward. A few conservative Christian speakers made names for themselves traveling the country and giving presentations about this activity.

Most of the accused, of course, denied putting any kind of reversed messages in their songs, while a few admitted to using a technique called backward masking to hide messages in their music. Most of those who admitted to doing this said they did so only after the accusations, and then to answer their accusers. Or, to make fun of them, which wasn't really that difficult a thing to do.

It isn't just music people search to find objectionable material, however. For awhile, finding the phallic symbols and other obscene messages in Disney animation was somewhat of a cottage industry. And some people managed to find things that they could get outraged about, like the minster with a supposed erection in "The Little Mermaid." The thing was, you generally had to be viewing the films in slow motion or frame by frame to see most of these "obscene" drawings, although some accusers claimed otherwise. An Arkansas woman, who will remain nameless here to protect the guilty, even went so far as to sue Disney and its video distribution company, Buena Vista Home Video, claiming that Disney displayed an "explicit sexual message" on both the package and in the movie "The Little Mermaid", although she later dropped the suit, according to Snopes.

Personally, I think the people who go looking for these things, or read things they object to into music or films or other art, have too much time on their hands and excessively dirty minds. If you have to play a song backward or watch a film frame by frame to find something objectionable, it isn't that much of a threat to the innocent.

Movie Monday: The "Parent Trap" (1961) Edition

I watched part of "The Parent Trap" last night. Not the remake, but the original film released by Disney in 1961. What is known in my universe as the "real Parent Trap."

Not that there is anything wrong with the remake, which starred Lindsay Lohan and Dennis Quaid. It isn't a bad movie. I just isn't the movie that I grew to love as a child. There's just something missing. I don't know what that something is, just that whatever it is, it isn't there.

The original version, if you haven't ever come across it, stars Hayley Mills as Susan and Sharon, identical twins who don't know each other exist until they end up at the same summer camp as adolescents.

Now, stop right there. How could this be possible? Well, their parents divorced shortly after the twins were born, with each parent taking one child. They live on opposite coasts, and neither parent talks about the other or about their marriage. It sort of makes sense in a pre-Internet world. Anyway, it's a Disney movie. Disney has managed to get away with all sorts of things over the years that other studios wouldn't have been able to make work.

Anyway, Susan and Sharon don't like each other much and a series of pranks against each other eventually gets out of hand at a dance with the boys from the camp across the lake (no, I'm not telling what the prank is; you have to watch the movie), and so they are moved into an isolated cabin with the hope that they will resolve their differences. They end up figuring out that they are sisters (not telling you how they do that, either...watch the movie) and hatch a plan to trade places so that Susan can meet her mother and Sharon can meet her father.

Yes, again, I know this is far-fetched. That's what the willing suspension of disbelief is all about.

There is also, of course, the hope that Susan and Sharon can somehow get their parents back together. Only when Sharon arrives in California, she discovers that Mitch (played by Brian Keith), her father, is engaged to a younger woman. The wedding is coming up soon. Alarmed calls go back and forth across the land, and back in Boston Susan ends up 'fessing up to her grandfather (played by Charles Ruggles) that she's not Sharon after he overhears her talking to Sharon on the telephone in the middle of the night. Here's that scene:



Back in California, Mitch's housekeeper, Verbena (played by Una Merkel, who is wonderful) thinks that something is up, but hasn't quite figured out what it is.

At any rate, when the truth comes out in Boston, Maggie, the girls' mother (played by Maureen O'Hara) sets out to return Susan to her father and to bring Sharon home, after some shopping and a make-over instigated by Ruggles' character, who has a pretty good idea that Maggie is still in love with Mitch.

Much hilarity ensues once everyone is in California. Not the least of that hilarity comes from Reverend Mosby, who is slated to perform Mitch's wedding ceremony. As Rev. Mosby, Leo G. Carroll is wonderful in his amused reaction to the whole situation. Vicky, the woman Mitch is going to marry (played by Joanna Barnes), and her mother, who are mostly just interested in Mitch's money, are not nearly so amused, which is also pretty funny. As is the camping trip...but I'm not going to say any more about that.

You have to see the movie.

Yes, the story is unbelievable. Yes, the movie was made in the early Sixties and looks it. Doesn't matter. It's still a good movie and you should see it.

I feel compelled to mention, under the circumstances, that the film's title song was performed by Tommy Sands and Annette Funicello, who were making the film "Babes in Toyland" at the time. Funicello passed away today at the age of 70, and judging from my FB feed, will be sorely missed.

Anyway. Yes. Go see the original version "The Parent Trap". It's on Showtime right now if you've got it. Otherwise, find a copy. It might mostly be a reminder of a slightly more innocent time. But that isn't a bad thing from time to time.

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I also want to mention the passing of film critic Roger Ebert, who died last Thursday, also at age 70. I didn't always agree with Ebert's movie reviews, but I always enjoyed reading them or listening to them on "At the Movies". It was so obvious that he loved film - loved watching them and loved talking and writing about them. I understand that while he was a Roman Catholic, he wasn't convinced of the existence of God. However, ever since I learned of his passing, I've had this mental image of him arriving at the Gates of Heaven to find St. Peter with a huge smile on his face and two huge "thumbs-up", welcoming Ebert to heaven with a huge bowl of popcorn and an invitation to the movie theater that never closes.

I'm going to miss seeing Ebert on my Twitter feed.