MILL CREEK THE SWINGIN’ SEVENTIES: Wacky Taxi (1972)

Pepe “Pepper” Morales (John Astin) already has four kids and another on the way with Maria (Maria Pohji). What better time than now to quit his job at a can company and paint a car so it looks like a taxi and be his own boss?

Directed and written by Alexander Grasshoff — who also made that Fascist warning movie we watched in high school The Wave that no one paid attention to — with directing help by Astin. This is a movie where John Astin beats up an innocent Frank Sinatra Jr., where Alan Sherman gets in the cab and a female soldier is taken to Tijuana for an abortion. In a family movie. Yes, that happened. Avco Embassy released it, so maybe they weren’t used to family audiences.

Don’t have the box set? You can watch this on YouTube.