By Geno McGahee
I love made for TV movies for the most part, especially those back in the day. They did them right back then and in 1975, SOMEONE I TOUCHED was released and it’s a lot of fun. I guess in the 1970s venereal disease was a big thing and singing about it was popular too. At the beginning of this flick, there is a title tune where the singer keeps singing “someone I touched”. It could be Kevin Spacey’s theme song.
Carrie (Glynnis O’Connor) is a 20-year-old girl that gets informed that she has syphilis while playing volleyball. Frank (Andrew Robinson) is the man that delivers the information about STDs and he has the required 70’s porn mustache that goes with the job. When Carrie finds out that she has the disease, she gives up a list of guys that she’s made it with and Frank is now on the hunt for dudes that have it.
Sam (James Olson) gets a visit from Frank and he recalls the one night stand he had with Carrie. He also discovers that his wife, Laura (Cloris Leachman), is pregnant. When Frank finds out that Laura is pregnant, he insists that his wife gets checked out because it can get screwy with the disease. Sam hopes to not tell her and work with her doctors, behind her back, to get her treatment but the doctors aren’t having it. They tell Sam to shove his it up his STD ass.
When Sam breaks it to Laura, she doesn’t take it too well. She pulls away, totally disgusted by her balding hubby that’s been creeping when she’s been sleeping. Laura is sort of numb at this point and her marriage is on the rocks. Although Sam is an asshole, he definitely has great working conditions. He has a full bar in his office and you don’t see enough of that these days. I’ve been pushing for it at my job. I’d be a much better employee if I could drink of the job but they frown on that. Fuckers.
Poor Carrie. She finally breaks it to her mother that she has syphilis, it doesn’t go well. Her mother slaps the living shit out of her, calling her a “whore” the whole time. “WHORE! WHORE! WHORE!” SLAP, SLAP, SLAP. What a great scene and what an overreaction.
(Spoiler) What a shocker! We find out that Laura got syphilis first and gave it to Sam. She was the one creeping while Sam was sleeping. She denies it at first and lets her hubby eat it but then confronts her boss. She started this whole shit storm. Poor Carrie got the living shit slapped out of her because Laura couldn’t keep her legs crossed.
The more I think about it, the more I’m disgusted by Laura’s reaction to Sam’s news. She was fooling around and acted all innocent and disgusted and because of her, Sam will be scratching his crotch until the day he dies. He can’t go to the grocery store anymore because people will stare as he scratches his crotch. Church? Nope…they won’t approve of crotch scrapping and a miracle healer may not fix him either. She ruined Sam. I’m sure, if there’s a sequel to this, Sam jumps off the top of his office building to his death, scratching his crotch the whole way down.
SOMEONE I TOUCHED is a great flick and should make everyone think about who they are touching and where they are touching them. I also want to note that there should be more songs about STDs. You don’t see many. In fact, this song may have been the first I’ve heard.
