BLUE SUNSHINE (1978)

Director: Jeff Lieberman

Writer: Jeff Lieberman

Producer: George Manasse

Cast: Zalman King, Deborah Winters, Mark Goddard, Ray Young, Robert Walden, Ann Cooper, Charles Siebert, Richard Crystal, Barbara Quinn, Alice Ghostley, Stefan Gierasch, Bill Adler, Adriana Shaw, Bill Sorrells, Jeffrey Druce, Brion James, Meegan King, Argentina Brunetti, Laura Booker, David Schwartz, Steve Tannes, Jim Storm, Sandy Robertson, Mary Moon, De Etta Adams, Bill Cameron, Marcy Hanson, Brandy Carson, Phyllis Glick, Rock Riddle, Richmond Johnson, James Carroll, Jeff Lieberman (uncredited as the macaw’s voice) 

People are losing their hair and becoming homicidal maniacs. Frannie Scott (Richard Crystal), becomes so afflicted and attacks his friend Jerry Zipkin (Zalman King). Frannie is accidentally killed in the struggle leaving Jerry on the run to avoid arrest. Jerry conducts his own investigation to find out what is responsible for the outbreaks of spontaneous murder. 

The Flashback Fanatic movie review 

These days, shaving one’s head is a convenient fashion statement. Any macho, movie hunk will go for that skinhead extreme when they start losing their hair. Back in the hair-conscious 1970s, hair loss was much more traumatic. But the absolute worst-case scenario for baldies was not just a blow to one’s vanity. In Blue Sunshine, when someone loses their hair, they also lose their mind. Then those around them lose their lives. 

Writer-director Jeff Lieberman’s film has a witty and subversive bite to it. The irony of the story is that the college crowd of the 1960s winds up being just as conventional as those squares they had for parents. But their youthful rebellion and indulgence in the drug culture comes back a decade later to ruin their conformist, thirty-something lives. These new establishment types are either freaking out on murder sprees as a decade-long delayed reaction to “Blue Sunshine” LSD, or they were dealing the drug in their college days. This plot is a nasty way to tweak the anti-establishment idealists of the '60s who ultimately sold-out to become the status-conscious consumers of the '70s. 

When Lieberman’s production budget was reduced, he had to simplify his script and eliminate some flashbacks to the 1960s scenes of characters’ involvement with the Blue Sunshine drug. I think this plays much better. We are dealing with the mysterious consequences from past choices and behavior of people that seem contrary to their current lifestyles. It drives home the point that the past may seem remote, but it can still have set things in motion that much later will have an unexpected impact. 

Zalman King plays this film’s odd protagonist. In what little background we get about Jerry Zipkin, he is very leftist and probably not trusting of any establishment institutions like the police. That gives Zipkin some motivation to keep dodging the law until he can figure out why his friend Frannie went crazy, which would justify Zipkin accidentally killing Frannie in self-defense. 

As Zalman King’s character Jerry Zipkin conducts his investigation, he reacts in ways that are manic or uncomfortable. As a result, some people feel that this is a bad performance on King’s part. Others, like myself, feel this adds to the unsettling vibe of this film. King’s offbeat manner also increases our paranoia about the Blue Sunshine danger. We wonder if King’s Jerry Zipkin was popping that acid back in his college days, too. 

Deborah Winters’ performance as Zipkin’s girlfriend Alicia Sweeney is almost as quirky as King’s. She is a steadfast ally to her unstable, on-the-run boyfriend Zipkin while being quite testy with everyone, including Zipkin at times. It’s no wonder she needs to take the edge off by getting party-plastered at the start of this flick, popping open a beer as soon as she gets out of the shower at home, or knocking back those vodka martinis at the discotheque as things start to really get out of control. She will definitely need some of that liquid courage. 

Robert Walden is quite funny as Zipkin’s friend, Dr. David Blume. Like many other characters of a certain age in this film, he makes us a bit uncomfortable wondering about his behavior and if he has any connection to the Blue Sunshine problem. 

Big Ray Young has the unforgettable role of campaign manager/bodyguard Wayne Mulligan for politician Ed Flemming. It would be easy to have his character step way over the line into thug territory, but writer-director Lieberman does not give us any obvious bad guys to condemn. Young’s most outrageous scene unintentionally became something of a death-to-disco/pro-punk statement. 

Of course, Mark Goddard is best known as Major Don West from the CBS television series Lost in Space (1965-68). Goddard is really good here as aspiring congressman Ed Flemming. Goddard does not play an outright jerk. There is actually no behavior we see on his part that seems unreasonable. It is only his character’s past, like that of many others in this story, which is questionable. 

This is a movie about a menace resulting from a cultural trend. Back in 1978, Blue Sunshine based its horror on the long-term results of past recreational drug use. In retrospect, the real horror of this yarn is that nowadays politician Ed Flemming’s potential scandal would probably be excused or denied by all the media, politicians, and voters on his side of the political fence, regardless of the proof. We don’t need drugs anymore to alter our perceptions of reality, just the addiction to overpaid talking heads pandering to a market.