MovieChat Forums > Fantasy Island (1977) Discussion > Was anyone else creeped out. . .

Was anyone else creeped out. . .


I was watching an episode tonight on COSI because I wanted to see if Georgia Engel had any range past playing Ted's wife on Mary Tyler Moore. I thought the entire plot that played beside it where the brother and sister revisit a haunted house was pushing the creepy envelope. The siblings later find they are not brother and sister, but that's just fine with them because they are very attracted to each other. Is there anyone else out there that remembers this story? I just don't think it would air these days without viewer backlash. Tasteless and weird!

*The Manitou is in and will take your calls now.
🐈  

reply

Hi Dianne, When I watched this episode as a kid in the 1970's, this episode didn't bother me. I saw it a few years ago, and it still didn't bother me, except for the harsh response of the uncle to the maid's profession of love. I thought, "Well, that's his character: strong type, uncomfortable responding to such professions, and perhaps he was surprised and relieved that she felt the same way."

Fast forward to 2014, and I watched this episode on the same date you did. (Actually, I recorded it and watched it a week later.) My reaction to the "brother and sister" and the uncle's reaction totally changed.

The brother and sister part was reminiscent of "Flowers in the Attic," especially due to their physical likeness to the characters in the movie, but a little lower key in the intimacy department. I kept thinking of this movie and its sequel when I watched this "Fantasy Island" episode, which did give me the chills and creeps as an adult -- worse than all the ghostly phenomenon ever did as a child.

The uncle's response to the maid was a bit over the top. Sure, I understand an initial laugh or two accompanied by a look of excited surprise, but the uncle's response was degrading -- never mind how long it took for him to get over the laugh and finally profess his only feelings, which was too late.

Back to the brother and sister in Fantasy Island, I think the backlash would depend on the audience. I would balk, but considering the world today, where violence and dysfunction are the norm and we've become so desensitized and inundated by shows like "Married with Children" and the successors, I'm not sure how others would act.

If it were nonfictional, then I think people would really be angry with the story line.

By the way, I like your kitty icons at the bottom of you post! I just love cats too! :)

reply

Very good response and well written. Yup, I'm crazy about cats. :)

*The Manitou is in and will take your calls now.
🐈  

reply

Thank you very much! :)

I was thinking about my feelings concerning this episode, and I realized why it didn't bother me before. It was because my view of "love' as love as a kid in the 1970s was much different than my view of "love" as an adult. Even the re-airing of the episode a few years ago didn't phase me because I was still viewing love in the "dreamy" sense of the word. I know better now!

reply

They were still raised together, like the Brady Bunch kids. LoL!!!

*The Manitou is in and will take your calls now.
🐈  

reply

LOL! :) Then, why didn't Mr. Brady marry Alice? :) Or is this for another board!

By the way, may I ask what are the origins of your signature? I recall seeing a movie in the 1970s in which a character was called a Manitou. I think it was a scary movie. I know the movie creeped out my sister and me. Then later she moved to a house -- near Manitou Road!

reply

Good question. First let's get to Dianne Bellmont. That was Lucille Ball's name when she modeled. I had to use an extra 'l' and 'n' for some reason when signing up. "Manitou" is used a lot in the Great Lakes. It means a creator or diety. Sometimes it's the spirit around us. A character in one of my books was mistakenly regarded as a "manitou". There are cities and islands named for the Manitou including Manitowoc, Wisconsin. I chose that name because of my character. Additionally, I never have the same look or hairstyle each year. Sometimes I change my appearance twice a year. 😊 My family was in the theater, so that has a lot to do with it, I guess. 😊

*The Manitou is in and will take your calls now.
🐈  

reply

Thanks for your explanation! You sound like you have an interesting life! I bet you have quite a family tree!

reply

yes there was a movie it had tony curtis called "the manitouj, there was a woman who had something growing in her neck, it kept growing and it bacame a full grown person (manitou) it was a trippy movie!!!

reply

I actually wasn't. Maybe that's why they stayed away from each other for so many years. What they felt for each other probably seemed initially inappropriate to them. It would probably not play today. I am a history buff, and I find that step-siblings or those raised in the same household, etc. occasionally marry each other. I was appalled at how irrational the uncle became in reaction to the maid's declaration.

reply

"I am a history buff, and I find that step-siblings or those raised in the same household, etc. occasionally marry each other."

Yes! I have noticed this myself while doing genealogical research.

----

Hervé Villechaize is a sex god and my eternal soulmate. <3

reply

Georgia Engel stunk in this episode, almost as bad as the tired Carol Lynley, who's on every other FI episode.

reply

Yes, I had an interesting life. My mother wanted me to become an actress and I seriously considered it, but got into writing instead. Then she got my kids in beauty pageants. This was before the T-Rexes in Tiarras and Baracudas in Ballgowns. They went their own way also. My grandmother had a write-up in a magazine before she died about twenty-five years ago, because she was quite the name in theater.

*The Manitou is in and will take your calls now.
🐈  

reply

A brother and sister attraction has played out numerous times in Hollywood entertainment.

It's been done more times than I care to think about on daytime soap operas, it was supposed to be something we always wondered on the Brady Bunch (while I never did) and that spilled over in that second movie.

I always remembered Dermot Mulroney (you don't forget a name like that, regardless of how unimpressive his acting may be) in a tv movie where he fell in love with his step-sister and that turns out to be his first performance). That was in '86.

A quick check of this episode, which I don't recall, the brother and sister were played by Stephen Shortridge and Dianne Kay (one of the Eight is Enough daughters, who oddly enough, I recall an ending joke in one episode when eldest brother David Bradford was set up on a blind date with his own sister, Mary. I've always remembered their behavior when they feign trying to recognize one another), so that wouldn't have been much of a stretch of believability with those two.

I remember being totally creeped out by the hurricane episode of The Love Boat, when Donna Mills is looking for her mother (she was put up for adoption) and finds out it is David Birney's mother, with whom she has fallen in love.

He conveniently points out she adopted him when he was three, thereby making it okay. Even tho they didn't 'grow up' as brother and sister, it still looked bizarre to me.

reply

played many times before... yes indeed.

Luke, I am your father... and Leia is your sister... (revealed later)
(Remember when Leia plants a major kiss on Luke in the cockpit of the Millenium Falcon? That was just after Luke and Han Solo were having an argument over which of them Leia found more attractive... STAR WARS IV: A New Hope --- or has that been "Lusas'ed out" among all the other changes since the original movie?)

reply

Except that it was obvious that she kissed Luke because she was angry at Han and actually liked him. She wasn't attracted to Luke (her later admission that she always felt there was a connection between them seemed like the writers made their brother-sister relationship up on the spur of the moment.)

reply

No-actually the uncut episode shows a lot more interaction between the adopted brother and sister and their chemistry is just laughable. If anything, it just proved that Stephen Shortridge was a good actor but Dianne Kay was awful. I actually enjoyed Richard Anderson as the uncle the most.

reply

Dianne was not one of the daughters on eight is enough she was the girlfriend of the oldest son , david,... they got married later on the show

correction....she played the blonde daughter on 8 is enough...not david girlfriend who he later married

reply

Diane was not one of the daughters on eight is enough she was the girlfriend of the oldest son , david,... they got married later on the show


Dianne Kay, who guest starred in the Fantasy Island episode this thread is about, was one of the daughters on Eight is Enough. She played Nancy, the blonde 4th daughter (5th child) of Tom Bradford.

Joan Prather played Janet, David Bradford's girlfriend/wife.

Tom's 8 kids were, in order of birth:

David (Grant Goodeve)
Mary (Lani O'Grady)
Joanie (Laurie Walters)
Susan (Susan Richardson)
Nancy (Dianne Kay)
Elizabeth (Connie Needham)
Tommy (Willie Aames)
Nicholas (Adam Rich)




I don't know what they have to say. It makes no difference anyway. Whatever it is, I'm against it.

reply

This must be the episode you guys are talking about, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0577785/?ref_=nm_flmg_act_12, I've never seen it and I'm not sure if I want to.

reply

I think you're right. And yes, that was also after my Fantasy Island watching days.

reply