A Hard Day's Life was originally a collection of random shots that I took while I was learning to use my Super 8 camera. It was one of the first movies finished for Temple City High School's Dragonflicks Film Class, which was started by Ms. Carolyn "Corky" Dunn in the early '80s.
When the footage was roughly assembled together, it looked like some of the wacky song clips by the Beatles and the Monkees. There were four members in those bands, and our footage featured four members of the so-called Steve Ross Klan (SRK), so the film became our version of A Hard Day's Night: it was fine-tuned and edited into A Hard Day's Life.
It now serves as a living yearbook for Temple City High School circa 1982-1984.
A Hard Day's Life is also dedicated to the memory of Timothy S. Pinkham, a great friend, and one of the funniest, most creative guys I have ever had the honor of knowing.
Written, produced, filmed, directed, and edited by Steven A. Ross
Starring Scott Buehl, Tim Pinkham, Vallen Thomas, and Steven A. Ross
Also featuring Frank Alioto, Andy Nahabedian, Patrick Robinson, Shawn Payne, Todd Plaas, Darin Johnson, Jason Lorge, Lana Alley, Glenn Lamar, and Mike Gerard
Scott "Otto" Buehl was our "wild man." He was into the Beatles and played guitar, he was the one with a girlfriend, and he was the one who instigated most of our grossest gags and practical jokes. One day, he declared that he wanted to be known as "Otto." Later, someone on campus had been successful in converting stoners and rocker dudes to Christianity; Scott--er, "Otto" gave his life to Jesus and cleaned up his act (mostly), but even after his conversion, his humor still had an edge to it. Last I heard, Otto was playing lead guitar for a couple of Christian bands.
Vallen "Val" Thomas was our resident Mormon. He had a subversive, rebellious streak, but he never went against his religious beliefs, and always stood up for what he thought was right. As the rest of us devised Animal House-like pranks to rail against the injustices that went (and still go) on in high school, Vallen was the one whose conscience kept us on the straight-and-narrow. Last I heard, Val went to BYU and became an Elder in the Mormon church.
Tim "Pink" Pinkham appears in A Hard Day's Life pretty much the way he looked every day at school: the hat, the glasses, the towel cape, and everything else were not just for the camera (although he did borrow my Devo Spudring Collar, but that was a semi-permanent loan).
Tim claimed that he was "The Ruler of All Known Universes (save one)": the "one" being the Marvel Universe.
He had the ability to twist his feet around and stand with his toes pointing behind him.
His "salute" was basically a reverse of "the finger": middle finger down, all other fingers up (he does it a couple of times in A Hard Day's Life).
"Pink" identified one student as a galactic serial killer: "Dude killed 17 people on 27 different planets!" As Ruler, it was Pink's responsibility to stop him, using his geometry compass.
He had an escalator to Hell under his bed, and kept his space ship in his basement. (He must have had something similar to TARDIS technology.)
He also said that he was "on a 17-year vacation here on Earth."
Three months before his 17th birthday, while crossing the street to catch a bus, Tim Pinkham was hit by a truck.
The report said that his body died instantly; I prefer to think that his responsibilities as Ruler forced him to end his vacation early.
A few lines here--and less than five minutes of film--don't do justice to our four years of friendship; not to mention the fact that the world was deprived of whatever Pink would have done after he graduated from high school.
Nevertheless, I think that Pink would have loved the idea that there is now a worldwide audience for his antics that were caught on film.
For the record, the beard I'm sporting in A Hard day's Life (at age 16-17) is absolutely real. George Lucas, Steven Spielberg, and all the big movie directors at that time had beards. One guy in auto shop called me "Jesus," and would either want to confess his sins to me, or ask for my blessings. Another guy called me "Lenny," because he thought that I looked like Leonard Maltin.
As we said back then: WHAT-EVerrr
The titles were created with black rub-on letters on white paper. A negative was made at a local print shop, then placed on a light table and filmed with a Super 8 movie camera. It took bit of experimenting, but I eventually got the exposure right. With iMovie, I could whip up flashier, more readable titles in seconds, but I wanted to show off what I achieved back in my misspent youth.
(Originally filmed and edited on Super 8, transferred to VHS, then transferred to Quicktime and remastered on iMovie. My apologies for the picture quality, but there's only so much that could be done, on my current budget.)
Loading...
4:10
THE BEATLES - FREE AS A BIRD (UNRELEASED TAKE 1 OF OVERDUB SESSION ACOUSTIC)by JohnyBleed51,453 views
"Partick Robinson"? PATRICK?
PoofDuddy 1 week ago
Steve, Wow I had totally forgotten about this, but it brought back some funny memories of high school days. I cant believe you even found me, I hardly use facebook, except to play bejeweled blitz LOL. Anyways keep in touch man, I'de love to hear what you have been up to.
Frank
Surgeonjr 2 years ago
Wow!! Thanks Steve, that's the first time i've seen this also the first time i've seen my brother in about 27 years. it was hard but i made me laugh and remember how crazy he was.
your friend,
Tye Pinkham
BHC81 2 years ago
Vallen "Val" Thomas was our resident Mormon. He had a subversive, rebellious streak, but he never went against his religious beliefs, and always stood up for what he thought was right.
omiolo2 2 years ago