ANIMAL HOUSE hits the slopes in the semi-autobiographical eighties skiing sex comedy HOT DOG… THE MOVIE!, on Blu-ray from Synapse Films.

Farm boy Harkin Banks (Patrick Houser, WEEKEND PASS) has saved up all year to make the trip to Squaw Valley to place in the freestyle skiing competition, picking up comely seventeen year old hitchhiker Sunny (Tracy Smith, BACHELOR PARTY) along the way. Harkin is star struck when he bumps into Austrian Olympic champion Rudi (John Patrick Reger) who rudely snubs him as a nobody. Harkin, however, finds fast friends in "The Rat Pack," the American team of freestyle skiers lead by "veteran" Dan O'Callahan (David Naughton, AN AMERICAN WEREWOLF IN LONDON) and including frustrated horndog Squirrel Murphy (Frank Koppala), seemingly polite but raunchy Japanese-only speaking Kendo (James Saito, THE HUNTED), and other such characters with names like Fergy (Erik Watson), Slasher (George Theobald), and Michelle (Lynn Wieland). Dan and Harkin place in the competition, but a few other members of The Rat Pack fail to make the cut in favor of more Austrians. "This is a business," Dan is told, but when crowd favorite Harkin always places lower than Rudi despite his impressive performances, Dan realizes that the judging is rigged in favor of the German sponsors and tries to even the score behind the scenes, leading to a "winner takes all" downhill race between the two teams.

One of a slew of snowbound sex comedies during the eighties, HOT DOG… THE MOVIE! Has an autobiographical basis in the life of writer/co-producer Mike Marvin (THE WRAITH) who shot a series of skiing films all over the globe that contributed to it being considered an extreme sport (with one stunt film he shot being recreated for THE SPY WHO LOVED ME); that said, it is a pretty formulaic work that almost seems as much a checklist of sports movie/teen sex comedy clichés as SOUTH PARK's later homage episode "Asspen," with wet T-shirt contests, drinking, now non-PC jokes about taking advantage of drunk girls, the main couple succumbing to temptation – with Harkin getting to roll around with Shannon Tweed (NIGHT EYES) as a wealthy ski bunny Sunny nicknames "Plastic Tits" while Rudi gloats to Harkin that he got to have "Sunny side up and Sunny side down" for breakfast – large-scale pranks, and plenty of T&A. As outrageous as the film tries to be, somehow it is never as raunchy or shocking as the likes of ANIMAL HOUSE to which it has been compared. The film's successes lie in the likeable main cast – even Reger's over-the-top villain – and some truly impressive photography of freestyle skiing and stuntwork, as well as an infectious theme song and some memorable soundtrack choices like Duran Duran's "Hungry Like the Wolf." Although Marvin was not able to direct HOT DOG… THE MOVIE!, he did direct follow-up comedy HAMBURGER: THE MOTION PICTURE.

Released theatrically by United Artists and then on video by Fox sublabel Key Video, all American video versions of HOT DOG… THE MOVIE! – including MGM's 2003 fullscreen DVD – have been the American theatrical R-rated version (~95 minutes) while a longer cut (~98 minutes) was shown overseas and the longer original camera negative is the source for Synapse's 1080p24 MPEG-4 AVC 1.78:1 widescreen Blu-ray labeled the "unrated producer's cut" (98:25). The new 4K restoration is stunning throughout thanks to the bright, sharp exterior second unit ski slope photography (the work of writer Marvin) and well-lit interiors while only some bare flesh gets the glamour treatment. Eighties primary colors pop and facial features and skin tones look healthy, and dig that detail in the wet T-shirt contest scene! The original mono mix is included in English DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 and is lively enough, but a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 remix is also included that spreads the music, livens up the surrounds, and gives directionality to ski scenes. It is still conservative compared to modern films but gives this eighties film a nice vibrancy to suit the video. Optional English SDH Subtitles re included.