TRADING CARDS :: That's a BINGO!

A few months back I tried out a new flea market in Londonderry, New Hampshire -- ever since my favorite one folded a few years back I've been on the hunt for a worthy successor. This was not that, but I still managed to walk away with a loot that justified the trip. And within that loot was a serendipitous assortment of mixed media that managed to bring about its own theme. 

Every flea market is populated with tables of junk, and most of those tables have no rhyme or reason within the boundaries of that specific junk. At the Londonderry Flea Market, one man was selling what had to be at least 100 swords of every kind (samurai, medieval, pirate, machete, and whatever other kinds there are) and also a plastic bin containing roughly 100 packs of Pacific Bingo! Trading Cards based on the 1991 TriStar movie. I noted the ironic unevenness of the stuff this guy was selling and I moved on down the aisle - about fifty feet, when I checked out another table that had its own odd assortment: military fatigues, history books (about the military), and an array of VHS tapes - many of which were documentaries (about the military) and one of which was the 1991 movie Bingo!.

I'd never seen Bingo!. (Yes, the exclamation point is part of the title.) All I remembered about its existence was from when I used to watch the Prevue Guide channel for hours at a time and they'd loop the same twelve trailers for the movies premiering on cable that week over and over again - and for a while Bingo! was one of those trailers. Even still, all I remember from that is that at one point someone holds a gun to the dog's head, and that Bingo is also served a subpoena. Needless to say I didn't seek out the actual feature on whatever channel it was airing during its run, and I don't think I've ever heard it brought up in any Pop Culture arenas in the past 35 years. But what I found at the flea market that day in the span of just a couple minutes felt like an opportunity to experience a movie in a fashion similar to the way I experienced them as a kid: see the film, collect the cards. So, I bought the video, then went back to the sword man and bought 6 packs of Bingo! trading cards. 

I let however many weeks go by before I committed an early evening to this whole immersive Bingo! adventure - but I may've been three and a half decades too late. I don't know how much I would've enjoyed this movie when it came out, but that's an almost impossible assessment; on the surface, I could say that I didn't really like these kindsa movies at any age, but now that I've seen it, I can say that there aren't really a lotta movies like Bingo!. Everything considered, I was expecting a tone along the lines of Homeward Bound or Beethoven, or maybe even Free Willy or Flipper, and it's pretty probable that that's what they were aiming for, but the whole thing is also an attempt to satirize that subgenre with a lotta weird and sometimes gross humor, generating an awkwardness that places it closer to something like Mac & Me or maybe even the Garbage Pail Kids Movie; when it tries to be funny it's distressing, and when it tries to be touching it's unnerving. 

Not surprisingly, the overall mood of the movie didn't really translate into the trading cards; opening up all six packs presented an attitude that more closely resembled the one I thought the movie was selling before I saw it: a daring journey, childhood nostalgia, lighthearted hijinks. But now I knew better as I was hip to the sordid subtext of each card. Obviously I didn't accumulate the entire set, but from these packs I pulled five singles that we can use to sorta outline some of the main events of the film - because if you've read this far, why the hell not?

- Paul

#26 "CPR Jump start"

Chuckie lies face down in a river after his older brother has left him there to die. Fortunately runaway circus dog Bingo shows up, pulls Chuckie out of the river, and manages to perform chest compressions until he regains consciousness. Bingo then strips the boy nude to dry his clothes before a bear sends them up a tree where they spend the night. Meanwhile, Chuckie's parents intentionally disregard his absence from home to teach him a lesson about being too attention-starved. 

#54 "The Duke of Franks"

Part of the setup is that Chuckie and his family are moving from Colorado to Wisconsin but they've left Bingo behind, so Bingo is following their trail across states by the scent of Chuckie's urine. En route, the family visits a truck stop restaurant where it's discovered that the chef (Glenn Shadix) is making his hotdogs out of actual dogs. Of course, Bingo eventually shows up and frees all the canines, and then drives a truck into the restaurant with a decidedly unspectacular crash. 

#66 "Saved By The Summons"

Bingo is taken in by a new family after he rescues them from a hostage situation. Because of his involvement, the dog is subpoenaed to testify in court against the kidnappers. I really just had to include this one because it's that one part I remember most from the trailer. I feel like a circle's been closed. 

#73 "Here Comes The Guard"

During the trial, the defense lawyer finds a loophole that incriminates Bingo, and so he's sent to jail. People jail. He has a little prison uniform and everything. This isn't just a quick visual gag, this actually ends up being a main trajectory in the scope of the whole plot. Typically I would applaud such a mix of bravery and madness, but it just comes across as dumb and dull.

#105 "Hoping For The Best"

This is a moment from the last scene of the movie, so spoiler I guess. Every character from the entire film is gathered in a hospital room in a dazed, gleeful anticipation for the reunion of Chuckie and Bingo. It plays out like either a dream sequence, or this is heaven and they're all dead. At any rate, we end on an announcement from Dad that Bingo is to be neutered, because this movie is entirely preoccupied with anything below the waist.