Six Pack: Warning, Kenny Rogers Makeout Scene!
For reasons to complicated to list, I was recentlhy reminded of the classic movie Six Pack starring… Kenny Rogers. Yes, that’s right, singer Kenny Rogers, perhaps best known cinematically for The Gambler (and a host of craptacular sequels to it), plays a race car driver who sort of adopts a crew of six car-stripping kids (who become his pit crew). 
The absurdities in this strangely charming, moderately entertaining film start and end with Kenny Rogers, Oh, there’s a very jailbait-esque Diane Lane and an almost larval Anthony Michael Hall for set dressing, but Kenny Rogers is the star of this show, and one wonders how much of a hand he had in the film’s presentation of his character. Rogers’ “Brewster Baker” is a hard-fighting action hero of a stock car driver, who can fight off multiple opponents with his fists when he’s not being hit on (and smooched up) by every easy honky tonk waitress from Texas to Georgia. He’s a rogue with a heart of gold, a man of action with a tender side, a father figure who knows how to have fun, and a reluctant patriarch to his adopted clan of car parts thieves.
Oh, and the film should bear a gigantic warning. It should say, WARNING! THIS FILM CONTAINS A HIGH PERCENTAGE OF KENNY ROGERS MAKING OUT WITH ERIN GRAY.
Now, this is not to imply that there is ever an acceptable level of Kenny Rogers making out with anyone — even in 1982, when Erin Gray was young and Buck-Rogers-hot and Kenny still had his original issue face (a face that has subsequently been transformed through multiple operations into a Cher-like death mask, fashionable among Hollywood celebrities such as Mickey Rourke and Wayne Newton).
The hypnotic horror that is this movie does not stop there. Much as the only music in Deliverance is varying tempos of “Dueling Banjos,” the only music permitted in Six Pack is the Kenny Rogers tune “Love Will Turn.” Now, this is a fairly inoffensive song, but after the fifth or sixth time you hear it, you’re heartily sick of it. It’s stuck in my head even now, and no amount of trying to claw out my mind’s eye with a teaspoon is going to get it out of there.
Despite all this, if you have the chance to watch the movie, I’d recommend you do so. It’s a fun little film that isn’t terribly long and has a feel-good ending. The kids are cute (though the young Diane Lane seducing a rival race car driver — “A mirror over the bed? I can’t believe my good fortune” — make me uncomfortable in that way that potentially getting arrested for statuatory rape should make you uncomfortable). Kenny isn’t too wooden (he’s a passable actor, and The Gambler is a good film). The race scenes aren’t anything to write home about, as this is no Days of Thunder, but they’re fun and the movie’s not going to leave you feeling like you’ve wasted your time.
For a long time, however, you will be figuratively scrubbing from your brain the mental image of a post-coital Kenny tenderly brushing Erin Gray’s cheek. I warn you now.