The Flop House - The Flop House: Episode Thirteen - The Invasion

Episode Date: March 30, 2008

In our least-edited show yet we discover that big stars, glossy production values, and a classic story can't save you from being snatch'd by the Flop House, as we discuss The Invasion.  Meanwhile, El...liott tries to sell us on his medical humor, Stuart imagines the sassy sentient skateboard of his dreams, and Dan auditions for several other podcasts.0:00 - 0:35 Introduction and theme0:36 - 2:46 A podcast warning is issued, and a dead-on George Takai impression is met with thundering indifference.2:46 - 40:54 We talk about The Invasion, the latest and least-greatest take on Invasion of the Body Snatchers.  At least Nicole Kidman wears a tight sweater.40:55 - 42:38 Final judgments.42:39 - 55:09 The sad bastards recommend.55:10 - 56:05 Some nonsense about Karate Kid to close the show.56:07 - 58:56 Thanks, podcasty business, goodbyes, theme, and outtakes.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:00 On this episode of The Flop House, we discuss Invasion, the only film to tackle the body-snatching So, as you start with the tinkle of ice cubes in a glass, as if Jean Martin was hosting this sort of floppin'. This is the flop house celebrity roast. So this is the first daytime recording of the flop house. Sure. I don't know whether that's gonna affect the attitude, the sound quality, the general atmospheric. The atmospheric.
Starting point is 00:01:02 Also, I will probably be doing minimal editing on this so I warned the listener ahead of time that you might be hearing a lot more ums and general nonsense. Yeah, because the reason we're Uncontrolled cursing with the reason we're doing a detime Recording is because Stewart has been in Baltimore recently running a wiretap. I assume I can't talk about it. And next week, I'm going to be out of town on my first vacation in years.
Starting point is 00:01:29 So this was the first... Where are you going, Dan? I'm going to San Francisco. Very nice. Or as I would say, if I was Sulu in Star Trek 4, San Francisco, which he did. That's the one with the whales, right? Yeah, the whale one.
Starting point is 00:01:43 The one where the message is Gilling whales is bad I didn't know that before the movie when I was a kid Actually had posters I had posters of wailers. Yeah You like to whaler trading cars. Yeah, whaler teen beat Up to 70 whales this season He's got a good cast to his harpoon. Sorry, my knowledge of whaling is basically exclusively on one cursory reading of the, uh, yeah, of the illustrated movie dick.
Starting point is 00:02:15 I think the one I think illustrated, I believe. Pretty much the same now as it was at the time that Melville wrote, uh, probably. The classic, illustrated version of Melville wrote probably the classic illustrated version of Moby-Think. Melville, we like your book. But we need to condense it for this classic illustrated. All right, I am working as an anonymous civil servant. I will do it for you. Yeah. It's a little bit of information about Melville's life.
Starting point is 00:02:37 Good listener. I think that probably sunk into that one story of his that I can't remember. Bart will be the swim way. Bart will be. Well, let's talk about the movie. We have a lot of this for my American Literature History podcast. So we watched the movie Awake, which I would say. No way, wait, wait, that's not what we watched. No, we didn't watch it at all.
Starting point is 00:02:57 Jesus fucking Christ. That shows how well the movie we did watch today. So can you remember? I'm glad. That was the other way. This is the one I chose to do a little editing on the invasion Daniel. The invasion. The invasion. Which is probably the highest star power of any film that we've watched. It starred Virginia Wolf and James Bond. Yes. And they were playing
Starting point is 00:03:23 the characters Nicole Kidman and Daniel Craig in the movie. In the role of American woman and English doctor. American woman with an inexplicable pinchant for running into a bit of an Australian accent at moments of high stress. But give us some background on the invasion. But give us some background on the invasion. Well, it's the fourth cinematic remake of invasion of the body snatchers. The fourth official one, even though you would argue that that concept has been stolen by a lot more movies. After there was the Don Siegel version, there was the Phil Pchauffman, the second one,
Starting point is 00:04:04 and the Abel Farara one in the 90s the Directors are getting less and less famous as the movies go on. Yeah to the point that I don't know the director of this one Well, the thing about this movie is it was directed by I it was a German director started out with a German director I think it was the guy who did the movie control. I'm not sure about that. So I could be giving false information over the meeting with podcast, which I believe is an FCC, uh, findable violation. It was either him or Fritz Lang. Yeah. But, uh, his version apparently was too, uh, slow. And I can't imagine like, this movie was incredibly slow, but they brought in the Wachowski brothers, brought in the person who did V for Vendetta to do reshoots
Starting point is 00:04:48 Oh, that makes sense because V for Vendetta was also very boring. Yeah This film was as they say Reshoots it was this movie was plagued by the idea that exposition is inherently interesting. We were talking about this during it That much of the movie is people explaining how they other people are being invaded and body snatched in the driest way possible. And it's like, no, normal viruses are this size, but this virus is this size, and it doesn't die when it's heated up to 700 degrees. Okay, fine. Can we get to some body snatching like this is yeah because the idea of heating up something to 700 degrees is really scary to me I'm like oh shit if I heat it up an alien to 700 degrees it would still be an a-right? Well what they're saying is like You could not not be
Starting point is 00:05:36 Snatched by say walking into a fire like which would that wouldn't save you yeah So nice because I like to think that her thought process, Nicole Kidman's thought process. Her first idea is like, oh shit, somebody vomited alien shit all over me. I'm gonna jump and do a fire. That'll kill it. But the joke we made during the film
Starting point is 00:05:57 was that this movie was rated PG 13 MD. Yeah. It meant a lot more to someone with an advanced medical degree or. It was a really funny joke when I was a daily We told it but yeah, we left the now like in previous versions of the story Usually there's a pod of some kind. Yes, that creates a duplicate and that's where the phrase pod people comes from Oh, I didn't know that. Thank you. Yeah. Well, this has been
Starting point is 00:06:26 people comes from. Oh, I didn't know that. Thank you. Well, this has been science fiction facts. I'm Dan the Lord. If any other questions about the work of Finney or other science fiction greats, let me know. Email me at heliakalen at sciencefictiongrammasters.blogspot.edu. That's good. Subject line, Query. I have the name of the author you'd like to ask me about. That's good. Subject line query. I don't know the name of the author you'd like to ask me about. Yeah, but the thing is about everyone from, I'll just buddhist to Roger Zalazni. Just write on in.
Starting point is 00:06:54 I have a question about Stanislaw Lem, sure. I've been wondering why our numbers have been going down and I think I've discovered what it is. I, but yeah, usually there's a vegetative pile I've been wondering why our numbers have been going down and I think I've discovered what it is. But yeah, usually there's a vegetative pod sort of thing that actually creates a duplicate and when you laugh, you might screw it. Rogers Elastic's fun. Oh, the name is really funny. For other funny names of science fiction authors.
Starting point is 00:07:24 That's where theologist Budras is not the name that you left at the Rodgers of Lesney. Well, because I don't even know that person. I think you made it a little. No. You wrote a book called Who? Which is very good, actually. It was made into a movie, actually, that we could watch sometime with Elliot Gould
Starting point is 00:07:37 in it that I picked up a long time ago because it looks terrible. I think it's called Robo Man. It sounds really good. But in this version of the invasion of the body snatchers or shortened to the invasion. Because people like long titles. Yeah, modern people can't after two words. Frankly, I'm surprised they called it the invasion and didn't just call it invasion. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:07:56 Or I. Yeah, or just I. I think it was originally. Because movies tend not to have the word the in the title anymore Yeah, it used to be very common place. It was it was originally Invasion, but then when the Wachowskies came in and replaced the director there like we've just got to be able to thought in here That's invasion that could be anything. It could be any invasion. This is a particular invasion Not just the idea of invasion
Starting point is 00:08:22 But um, yeah, here it was a virus Yeah, a virus was a virus. A virus that was spread by people puking on people. It's almost the same. Unlike normal viruses. It's almost as if they wanted to make a zombie movie but had already paid for the invasion of the body snatchers, you know, rights. Yeah, I think Ellie brought this up.
Starting point is 00:08:41 Is that this movie does not fuck around. It goes right to the hey these people are aliens Primus like right away like within five minutes a the presidential aid is approached by a girl carrying a chunk of Space debris. Yes, which he touches because she's like hair look at this He's like of course little girl. Ow. I'm bleeding and Then we go back to then he drops it. She hands it to him, it infects him. He's like, ow, he drops it.
Starting point is 00:09:09 He turns around, walks away from the little girl that's saying anything, without taking the space degree. This is all taking place, by the way, in case he didn't know his space debris, is what the listener might be thinking. No, this is at a locked down site where a spaceship has crashed and there are guys in hazmat suits everywhere and he just came out of that
Starting point is 00:09:27 So really he should have known that she was carrying a piece of a spaceship And I think I'd much rather watch a movie based around the adventures of this like really sassy little kid who sneaks into Fucking a space shuttle crash site and is like hey, let me pick up this chunk of space to bring Let me show it to this smart guy But you're saying about the like the movie doesn't set up the characters before they get involved in This the body snatcher stuff. It's like body snatchers. Okay. Oh, we need some characters to get their bodies snatched throw them in And then after about 20 minutes of dicking around it's like Clock sticking let's get some fucking body snatching going on. Let's get some vomiting out of this
Starting point is 00:10:06 Yeah, but by the body snatching a lot of um seeing Nicole Kidman at work. Yes, um singer fix Breakfast for her child and surprisingly revealing pajamas. Yeah, but it's one of these movies where like There's no progression at all instead of her slowly realizing that they're aliens around It's almost as if it suddenly everybody in the world is an alien. And it didn't tune what it just happened overnight. And then later on when the problem is solved, it's like, oh, good, everyone's not an alien anymore. Like there's no logic to it.
Starting point is 00:10:37 Right, and that's such a bad choice too, because I think that in horror movies, really, the setup is the best part. Like seeing the world slowly fall apart is the creepy thing. Not the actual release of the chaos. But also the fact that once she discovers there are aliens around, she runs into maybe a dozen people at different places who are all like, whoa, don't show any emotion. That's what they notice.
Starting point is 00:11:04 Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, like, whoa, don't show any emotion. That's what they notice. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, walk slower. And these are just innocent bystanders. And it's like, why are we following the last person on Earth to learn about this? It really seems like everyone else had that moment of discovery before the main character of the film did. Yeah, and as I said at the time, I think that they pitched this movie by saying,
Starting point is 00:11:19 there'll be a lot of thrilling scenes of Nicole Kidman walking very slowly and trying not to show a motion as she walks by aliens and furtively looking around, which is thrilling. But the thing is, they could have actually tried to make an effort to make it seem like she's actually going through some effort to not show a motion, but instead they're just like, let's just do this normal scene of her walking from one place to another place, she'll just be walking slower and her eyes will be moving more.
Starting point is 00:11:47 Yeah, it was it's very lazy stuff. Like I think I think the scene in Sean on the dead where they're trying to pretend to be zombies is more thrilling than any scene in this movie. Well, it's almost like they felt like the movie would get by on the gimmick of like shit everyone she knows is turning into an alien. She's got a pretend to be one, but there are three other versions of this story It's like if Peter Jackson and remade King Kong and made it like an hour and a half long It was like don't worry people are gonna get blown away by the idea of a giant ape climbing a building Peter Jackson this is the you know the third official King Kong that with not counting the sequels in the Japanese movies like it's you know
Starting point is 00:12:22 Thinking of King Kong vs Godzilla King Kong in the Japanese movies. Like it's, you know, the thing of King Kong vs Godzilla, King Kong skinks, refights mechekon, the best, maybe the best scene involved in any King Kong movie. Yeah, well, I think a robot monkey. Yeah, well, it's a robot gorilla. Alright, alright, Elliot. It's a different type of animal, completely. A great ape. Yeah, great ape. Yeah. Alright. Well, this movie had a lot of teachers about society. That's for sure. Oh, yes.
Starting point is 00:12:49 Nice segue. Yeah, well, there was a guy. A Russian guy. There's a Russian guy. And we know this because he was at a party where everyone had an accent. His accent was a Russian accent. That party was in place at a diplomat's house. Okay, fair enough.
Starting point is 00:13:02 This whole movie takes place in Washington, DC. And here's another, before we get into that, here's another flaw what the film is. The movie is about a force of conformity coming in and turning people into basically robots. And one, it's hilarious because they all talk like robots, which is something we didn't mention before. Right, like two seconds in.
Starting point is 00:13:19 Like, yeah, the first character we see who gets turned into an alien who's the guy who holds the space debris. The next scene we see of him he calls his ex wife Nicole Kibman and he says hello I'm in the old house we used to live in I like humans and and she was like and she's talked to Daniel Craig later on and she's like There was something different about him. It's strange. He never and this is like he never calls me like that was what was What it is like this is a man she's been me. Like, that was what it is. That's strange about it.
Starting point is 00:13:46 This is a man she's been married to and had a child with, and that's the most strange thing she can find of it. But like, it's a movie about conformity coming in and smoothing out all the differences between people. So they choose Washington, DC, a city that yes, has its difference, and it's like racial troubles, and things like that. But visually, is a very boring looking city
Starting point is 00:14:04 in terms of, it has these beautiful monuments, but they don't look particularly. It's not like, uh-oh, this is a city with a crazy social life. Like the second version of movie is set in San Francisco, which is a city that has this very specific vibe of like anything goes in San Francisco. That's where you can be yourself. But watch it in DC. It's like, well, guess I'll go lobby the government. You know, there's no Just lots of bunch of listeners by the way. Wow. Oh, because of my pro San Francisco and your anti-Washington DC I don't it's not saying I don't like Washington DC, but they could have picked a more a City that was that conformity maybe is less
Starting point is 00:14:40 We are hosted on the Pentagon website. That's where all our fathers But you were talking about... Well, no, actually, you made a good point. We should go back and say that, you know, in the original, the first version of the invasion of the body snatchers, which is still my favorite, even though I really liked the 70s version. The thing about the people who are snatched is they're exactly the same. It's just that because we are human,
Starting point is 00:15:05 we can recognize what is human in another person, and the people are like, there's nothing different about these people, but I know they're different. And that was what was creepy about it. The idea that nothing rational could be explained, but what's different. But these guys, basically,
Starting point is 00:15:20 they could be wearing signs that say, like alien across their chest, and they march in. And there's a scene early on, Nicole Kidman is a psychologist, and she's with one of her patients, and the woman's like, my husband isn't my husband. And one of the examples she gives is the husband comes home, and the dog runs up to him barking, and the husband breaks the dog's neck.
Starting point is 00:15:43 And Nicole Kidman's response is to up the dosage on the woman's medication. Rather than, you know, as you pointed out, maybe giving the medication to a husband. I think it was stewardess. Yeah, that was mine. Well, the podcast listeners can't, don't know who I'm looking at when I say these things anyway. That's, you can't, like in the original, I think it's in the original story. And maybe it's in the first movie that they mentioned
Starting point is 00:16:06 is that this person's uncle, I think, is different. She can't pinpoint how. And she checked to see if the uncle's birthmark on his neck or something like that was there. And the person she's talking to, who is a doctor, says, and it wasn't there. And she goes, no, it was. It was.
Starting point is 00:16:19 Like, she's scared that he's an exact duplicate in every way, so she can't convince anybody. Whereas as you're saying in this You know the man came home and snapped his pet dog snack like this is if it's at the very least a criminal offense That's cruelty. Yeah, it's not a very sly invasion. No, but if the other is this is maybe the worst hidden invasion World to the point that they might as well have just sent in red-nought spaceships and started blasting the White House Like it was almost like the aliens from Independence they decided to invade, but they were like,
Starting point is 00:16:47 we're not very good at being secretive. Like, let's just take everything over and do this thing. You know, and they broadcast their motives to anybody who will listen. They don't, they're- You don't have to worry special sunglasses to see him. No, and they're not good. Exactly.
Starting point is 00:17:00 You have to get it on a really awesome seven minute fight to put on those sunglasses. And the way to, and the way they change a lot of people is that they projectile vomit into their mouths, so that this virus gets in it. It's like, really, that's not a very sly way of, of dating. Yeah. And I mean, they use the projectile vomit attack in the, in the movie Slyther, which I think it actually worked in that movie because that movie was really gross.
Starting point is 00:17:23 And it wasn't trying to be sneaky in any way. Yeah, this movie had like this like this classy sheen over it. They have big name actors and actresses. They have James Bond. It was shot like it was Michael Clayton in terms of visual style. Like it looked like- With vomiting. With vomit. Michael Clayton where there's a scene where- Which by the way that would be a better version of Michael Clayton's. And Michael Clayton where there's a-
Starting point is 00:17:42 Tell the swimmer vomiting all the time. Came up to George Clooney like, maaah! That would be a better version of Michael Clayton's. And Michael Clayton, to the swimmer vomiting all the time. Came up to George Clooney's like, maaah! But also like the fact, they made it, they changed it so that these are, this is a virus instead of pod people to go back to what you're talking about before.
Starting point is 00:17:54 And what was scary about the other ones is that, in this one, you change. You become a different person. But in the original ones, you get murdered by your double and your double takes your life. They hide pods in your basement. The pods duplicate you and while you're sleeping, the pod people come and kill you and take over. So there's a great scene where Kevin McCarthy goes down and finds his double being formed
Starting point is 00:18:15 and it's almost finished and he has to stab it to death with a pitch fork and he's stabbing his own body basically. That he's not himself but he's's standing at duplicate of his body. Where as in this, it's like, oh, well, I still have all my memories and I'm just, I'm just sick. I've got a flu, I've got an alien flu. I'm just not as emotive as I once was. But there's no danger of you being replaced. It's more a danger of you just, you know, you're gonna be like.
Starting point is 00:18:37 Well, and there's a scene in this movie where Nicole Kimmon has a dream where her double is going to kill her. And that was actually shown in the trailer. And remember that like we're seeing that in the trailer I was like, oh, that's a great shot of like Nicole Kidman's like double sneak up behind her like like swinging I forget what it was like. Is there a pipe or crowbar? Yeah, I might have a wrench and No, that's just like part of her little dream dream. Yeah, it's like a curve ball The three so if you wanted a cat fight between two Nicole Kidmans, you're at it. It's almost like they were trying they tried so hard. And
Starting point is 00:19:10 this happens a lot with what I like to call classy horror, classy science fiction where they tried to tone down the more melodramatic aspects like that, like a cat fight between two versions of the same person. And it's like, no, this would make your movie immeasurably better if it had like more excitement. And the same way, this was almost like the road to tradition of science fiction horror movies, where it's like, we wanna make a movie
Starting point is 00:19:32 that makes a point about how conformity, about how we're sacrificing peace for our individuals. Yeah, well let's get back to that. Except we wanna make it as unexciting as possible. Because the Russian diplomat at this party goes off on a like I would say a three-minute at least monologue At Nicole Kibman like they're apparently having a conversation, but Nicole Kibman doesn't say anything until the end She has a little you know she refutes what he says and everyone around the table is like Well done smashing
Starting point is 00:20:10 Daniel Craig's character you should marry her But I mean that's all what we're just friends right now Wow, Bob's you don't go and told me send I want but I'm but this Russian guys like You're on co-op, what's always saying? But um, but this Russian guy's like The humans are a world like creature who always will fight There's no way to have peace in my time But in your country What a cool kid. What a cool kid.
Starting point is 00:20:39 Oh yeah? So... You're a little shrimp on the batty You're listening to funny voices. We have to stereo difficult accents, the podcast. But um... Good day mate. But uh...
Starting point is 00:20:54 But no she was in foreign away. Which was in foreign away, the best film. Now she's a cock me. But um... So what you were saying is that basically, he states the theme of the movie. At length. Almost as if, it's almost like he's almost looking at the viewer when he says it. It would be better. He just literally turned the camera and said, audience, I am telling you this. What do you think? It's like the end of the Return of the King anime movie where Gandalf looks to the audience is like Maybe you have a little hobbit in you
Starting point is 00:21:29 And you're like gross Plot me. They're not fucking hobbits It reminds me of my favorite movie my favorite point line in a Godzilla 2000 Which I'm sure you guys remember well. Yeah, just at the end. I do Godzilla destroys the alien that basically tried to take over Godzilla's territory. And Godzilla is walking away from the battle and destroying much of Tokyo while doing so. He's literally smashing buildings of his feet and shooting fire at them. And the little kid says to the GeForce scientist, uh, says, why does Godzilla save us all
Starting point is 00:22:00 time after time? And he says, perhaps there's a little bit of Godzilla in all of us. And it makes no sense. Also Godzilla is basically just defending his turf. And then, this is as he's killing him. And then they literally do the the end question mark. It's my favorite ending maybe a vault. It is set it up for Godzilla final wars in which Godzilla and Minya basically forgive America for Adam bombing Japan in a complicated way. Well, that's only right.
Starting point is 00:22:27 I mean, I mean, he was created by the Adam bomb. Did I, that movie, so I don't know if you guys have seen Godzilla final wars? No, I don't. It's the movie that involves monsters fighting, but if they cut to a scene, Rodan attacks New York, and it's like a stereotypical New York in the 80s, there's like, it's, there's like a shot in Toronto. It looks like it was, but there's also like a cop arguing with a pimp, you wearing a hat with a feather in it, but they're with around an 80s car.
Starting point is 00:22:50 It feels like a scene from, you know, trading places and all that. But then Rodan flaps his wings and the pimp's hat flies off and you hear this sound effect ZOOM! When the hat flies off. And they're like all these matrix style fights in the movie. And like, there's this very big message about forgiveness at the end and the atomic, you know, destruction in Japan, but you do hear a hat fly off with a ZOOM sound effect. Oh, it's so good. It sounds really good. Now, the invasion, the invasion almost feels like the science fiction
Starting point is 00:23:23 movie that would have been made if everybody involved making it was actually a pod person. That's a very good. That's about how exciting it was. Yeah well they I really think that they directed the actors to not emote even before the the pod people started taking over the the director was like oh now it'll be a really subtle deep message about how we're already pod people. But it just made it really dull. But also, like, one goes against the theme in the movie, but to give back to what you're saying
Starting point is 00:23:53 about the Russian guy stating that, states we're all monsters underneath, the pod people take over and world peace happens instantly. We find this out on CNN. Yeah, but let's not gloss over. Basically, there's like 20 minutes or so or half an hour of just like running around, running around, and then like in the background of a scene, we see CNN on and we see that world pieces happen now that the pot people have taken over. And
Starting point is 00:24:18 then another like long chase scene, and then at the end we discover that, oh, once the pot people are defeated, everything goes back to normal but in between there's no there's nothing in reinforcing the theme at all Nicole Kidman looks at the looks almost at the camera and remembers the Russian guy saying those lines about where all animals inside and it's like here's the more I like he didn't hear it the first time if you went to go to the bathroom during that scene. This is the end of the film.
Starting point is 00:24:47 Yes. CNN is on again. Smash cut credits. I don't think CNN's on I think Daniel Craig, who's been healed is reading a newspaper. That's the other thing. He probably has a cane sitting right next to him. Daniel Craig, the first time we see him, Nicole Kim,
Starting point is 00:25:01 and I guess gets in his car and he says, did you see this 83 more people killed in Iraq Iraq when will it end then that okay so that's his hobby is that he's a pessimist he never says anything like that again until the very end of the movie when it's like again when we just end seventy five more people killed you know cut to a quiet shot of the cool kidman looking off into space, thoughtfully, and Russian being the Russian words coming back to her, and then, as you say, completely, just be cut to black, and it is the most abrupt, strange ending.
Starting point is 00:25:36 I literally said what about eight times? I believe in the cutting of black, it actually cut to some excellent computer graphics of cells and stuff. And when we talk about these computer graphics There's a lot like throughout the entire movie I mean it was like anytime there's anything that wouldn't just be a person standing around They're like hey, why don't we wouldn't that be better if we use a computer like if somebody's like sick and covered in alien goo
Starting point is 00:25:59 Instead of doing it with practical effects. It's all fucking computer shit It's really weird. It looks really fake, but also doesn't look gross it actually looks really like really clean alien well you have to understand like as you said this is basically like a medical horror film so they got the team from house to do it there's just like you know what we do it over in house is we see GI every disease and I know that sounds good that makes sense I was thinking about I remember a long time ago I was here watching the 80s version of the blob. And one of the things that's so great about it is that there are a lot of, you know, their compositive effects and things, but it's basically like real goo and real puppets. They don't have computer effects because it was like 1980 what, five or six.
Starting point is 00:26:38 Right, yeah. And computers are only green and black. And it, like, back when everything was wireframe, yeah. But like, it was so much, it would have been, it's so much grosser than if it was like only green and black. Yeah. And it left back when everything was wireframe. Yeah. But it was so much, it would have been so much grosser than if it was like a computer-animated blob where we'd be like, oh, okay, that looks really smooth. Like it does, like, if you're going to have alien goo all over people, it should be like chunky and messy and like sticky.
Starting point is 00:26:59 But this looked real, this looked literally like you could peel it off and people do that at times in the movie. Like Nicole Kidman literally like peels off spit. That's not her face. Oh no, no, hold on. The first like she takes the this piece of goo to Jeffrey Wright who is a- He's united with his Cassino Roy Alcoe starred in O'Creg. Yeah, who's a scientist who eventually solves the alien problem.
Starting point is 00:27:23 But she's literally handed the first piece of evidence. Like, she's like, what is this little piece that looks like wax paper, except for there's veins in it and shit, and she's like, huh. And well, even though I found this at a Halloween party, and this could be like a Halloween thing, I'm gonna take it to Jeffrey Wright, and he's gonna put it under the microscope
Starting point is 00:27:43 to solve everything. She did find it on a creepy kid who had just survived a dog attack. That's true Yeah, who was dogs don't like aliens candy Yes, who's kid that's how you know that's the first time you know that he's an alien because dogs hate him and because he was Carefully organizing his candy or he has LCD Yeah, the aliens are more obsessive compulsive Candy is delicious Humans these sugary
Starting point is 00:28:06 Commestibles are Quite enjoyable to myself. They would love these back on my home planet. I mean The place that you live also our home planet gotta go Homely walks their robots. No way. That's the name of the place you live in. There was also this theme of, if you become an alien you dress very like for business. Everyone was alien war. They're very Natalie dressed. Yeah, war very good, very expensive suits or pants suits if you're a woman.
Starting point is 00:28:36 And when the kid comes back as almost one of the leaders of the alien, this obsessive cabal subcandy kid, he comes back looking like Leonard D. Moie from in search of like a blazer over a turtle neck and he'll or like a mini bond villain. Yeah, by the way, I've never done a bond movie where the villain was a kid. No, that's great idea. It would be really awesome. Dude, we oh man. Let's don't do not send this podcast out. Okay. I don't want anyone stealing. Million dollar idea. Oh, and maybe we'll drop our other million dollar idea at some point. Okay, but the one the thing that I wanted to say though about that kid was perhaps the best
Starting point is 00:29:08 thing about the movie other than Nicole Kidman sweater was the scene where Nicole Kidman threw a child across the room into a bed and almost broke his neck. Like he was an evil alien child, but still to see a Oscar-winning actress. Nicole Kidman threw a small child around is pretty entertaining. It was like Nicholas Cage and Wicker Man Where he keeps punching women exactly exactly like that? The That he there's a scene let's talk about this there were so many scenes in the movie that could have been just much better if they had been set up Yeah, it's right. That was a scene. Nicole Kidman is taken into I looked like a very nice business hotel like I'm not quite sure what it was or a or a part like a very fancy apartment building but and she's and her by the alien leaders who are a kid her ex-husband and some woman that I don't
Starting point is 00:29:54 remember if we'd met before and she's brought into a room and her son is there she's been what she's been looking for her little boy son and the two of them are staring at each other, and both of them, it seems, have been pretending to be aliens, and neither one wants to tip themselves off if the other one is an alien. There's this moment that could have been great tension of like, neither of them trust the other, even though the thing they want most in the world is to be with that person, the boy with his mother and the mother with her son. And, but neither of them wants to make the first move, because if the other one's an alien, then they're screwed.
Starting point is 00:30:27 But instead, it just kind of happens for a moment, and then the mother refers to an in-joke about pickles that came up earlier in the film, and it's over. But like, we didn't also didn't know what was going on with the kid, so it should have been, like, I guess they're going to first suspense with the audience, but it might have been stronger if we knew the kid was protecting.
Starting point is 00:30:43 You're going for like the hitchcock thing, where it's better if you know that there's a bottom under the sea. Yeah, exactly. Also, the fact that that's one of those things. Someone read screenwriting 101 or I guess like Sid Meads book or something and I didn't do much more than that because it was like, they did the screenwriting trick of, oh, they used that in joke from earlier to find out if they were still human or not, but that in joke appeared earlier to find out if they were still human or not, but that in joke appeared just once and it appeared so obviously that we knew it must have been a clue is that
Starting point is 00:31:09 like or the same way that Daniel Craig's pessimism about the news showed up once at the beginning and once they're these matched pairs of moments much like every time Nicole Kidman remembers her son that she loves all the memories happen to be times that we've seen them in the video. Oh no, it's the little kid lying next to his throat. Oh it was weird. They did have a weird moment too early on when Nicole Kidman figured out what was going on where she like flashed back to things that happened earlier and was like, huh, there must be an alien invasion. However, it wasn't like, it wasn't like, you know know a real puzzle film where oh all these flashbacks
Starting point is 00:31:46 Finally the picture comes into and you're not sharp relief instead of just like oh remember all those moments of foreshadowing Earlier they were foreshadowing something Yeah, oh my god, they were fucking aliens when those people were just weird and those people were ominous and trying to vomit on me It turned out that they were fucking aliens. When those people were on it. I thought they were just weird. When those people were ominous and trying to vomit on me, it turned out that they were aliens. Also, when they sounded like aliens. When those people I knew sounded started talking like robots, it turns out there's something wrong with them. But they weren't robots.
Starting point is 00:32:17 They were aliens. But they taught, you know, like that. They talked in robot cave. If there were robots, I would love it. If like aliens came from outer space and they replaced us all with robots Well, that seems like such a waste of resources. Yeah, I don't know what the point would be then Fuck with us aliens you could use the aliens are practical jokers
Starting point is 00:32:35 Why are you wasting all this steel and like circuitry? Why do you assume they're man on a steel dude? They could have been plastic That's true. Well, why are they wasting all that plastic? That's not gonna like data I can't have a steal dude, they could have been plastic. That's true, well why are they wasting all that plastic? That's not gonna blow, dude. Like data? Yeah, data's plastic right, is he? I don't know. I don't know.
Starting point is 00:32:49 He had it at heart, he was as human as you or I. Speaking of which, Brint Spiner, data as Brint Spiner, that's one of these few. Out to C star Brint Spiner. That's one of the few celebrities people have told me I look like. I'm like, thank you. Thank you for saying that I look like Brint Spiner spider. I kind of see it a little bit in the nose I see a lot now that you mentioned but I never would have thought that well, you know, it's it's weird
Starting point is 00:33:12 You know you always get like you always get the spectrum you know like if people I don't have to have this experience But I've had the experience that like you know people will be like, oh you look like this person You look like this person and then there are people that you're like really like happy to be told that you look like and the people like Fuck you You look like this person, and then there are people that you're really like happy to be told that you look like, and the people like, fuck you! You know, on my good side people will be like, oh you kind of remind me of John QSAC, or, oh you got a bit of a, like a, David Covey thing, and then like it's a Brent Spiner, or Kevin Spacey! That's what I was thinking! People tell me that they're like, oh you look like KCF, like, and then other times they'll be like, you know who you look like? You know the guy from the Goonies, like the retarded guy? That's who you look like. But that's more like little kids say that. Little kids used to say that around the time Goonies came out.
Starting point is 00:33:50 I think they're just making fun of me. I think it's because your eyes are really weird. That weird ear that sticks out. You're also strangely muscular. You know pinhead from that new movie Hellraiser? You look like him. What? I did have pins in my head at the time.
Starting point is 00:34:04 Yeah. Well, watch the time. Yeah. Well, watch the video. Well, watch the video. Sure. Let's feel it, thanks. That's the only thing that we said. You look kind of like that. They couldn't go to sleep.
Starting point is 00:34:12 As you said, this was like a weird holdover from the original version, because like, it doesn't make sense. It was on the, like, the same way that humans have a vestigial tail inside their asses. This movie had little elements from the original story that were kind of like appendixes Like appendices they were there, but they didn't serve any discernible function anymore like you can't go to sleep Be well why cuz the virus won't attack you if you're not sleeping like it doesn't make it. Yeah, it's good science Dude well, yeah actually sleep is better for you Why blood cells go to sleep?
Starting point is 00:34:41 But like when you have a fire when you have sickness you're supposed to sleep. But like when you have a fire, when you have sickness, you're supposed to sleep. No, Ali, that's why you're sick. When you go to sleep. That's why I should be out running 10 Ks when I'm sick. Yeah, when you go to sleep, dude, that's when the virus sees your sleeping and then pounces. That's when the virus tip toes out from behind your blood cells. Yep. And I'm saying that I would like it if the virus looked like little Freddie Krueger's Going through the guy's system. Oh, we've come up with an animation mock-up here to show you exactly how the alien virus works He's got this really really fashionable stripe sweater
Starting point is 00:35:19 Have any really homo erotic jokes. We don't have any research prove that the virus says one liners afterwards But we think it we're thinking it's pretty likely yeah, but it's oh man the research jumps really fast in this movie There's also yeah, there will that's the thing it's taken they should get Jeffrey right on the AIDS problem because he found a cure for Alien virus in roughly 48 hours. Yeah, yeah, including he and then it took while he was saddled with sassy Eddie Murphy. Yeah, I was just gonna say it took another 48 hours to cure the virus, globally. Nice. The thing about it is that he not only like figured out a way to solve the problem and also show people the problem. He also set up some kind of an animation so that you could see like, it's that fucking whole like movie computer thing where there are like most people have never seen a computer,
Starting point is 00:36:08 right? Okay, let's just show this really cool like CGI animation thing. Let's say that computers do that. Yeah, and it's like what like swordfish and like every other thing. I had the guys dream works mock this up for me. This is what you should show them. Or hackers where they're like actually like flying through like CGI blocks. They're like, oh this is what the internet internet looks like it's a bunch of colored blocks.
Starting point is 00:36:26 There's a Fisher Stevens trying to stop us. I think he's an Indian. We shouldn't mention anything. He's a skateboarder. He's a skateboarder. It takes Stewart off into it. He's on Fisher Stevens' world. He looks like a turtle.
Starting point is 00:36:37 Thank you, that was my point. Thank you for proving my point. But, Stewart, you mentioned before Daniel Craig and a cane. and I think that the audience has been spending those whole time being like Understandably what what was that about a cane and there wasn't even a fucking cane but we'll get to that Yeah, there was something that we called that didn't happen um so uh you know there's the moment in all of these movies where the love interest gets turned Yes, and that's the shocking sad moment. And in this film, he's known to turn to.
Starting point is 00:37:09 Yeah, my cool kidman is protecting her kid and Daniel Craig shows up. And he's a rock. And in the first one, in the first version of the Biasnatches movie, that's one of the scenes I like a lot, although when I saw it with an audience, people laughed uproariously at it. Where he kisses his girlfriend and then realizes that she does not kiss him back and That's when he notices that she's turned and it horrifies him right and not that he's had this contact with it Also, and audiences now it is find that hilarious, but but it's like a really good way of
Starting point is 00:37:37 Kissing hilarious It's happened back in the 50s. It was an audience of 11 year old Daniel Frank shows up and he's like threatening Nicole Kidman. But very calmly. Yeah, Nicole Kidman shoots everyone around Daniel Craig with perfect aim. By the way, she is a hell of a marksman with that handgun. Yeah, it was a lot of like point of like view of the gun. Yeah, it was like a weirdly like video game. I was surprised they didn't have a scene earlier in the movie where she was trying to hit a target
Starting point is 00:38:06 and she was just off, like, and they're like, gonna need more practice than that one, Dr. Bunnell, you know, that's... Call him Randaur. Someday I'll be able to shoot well and then they get to that scene. It's like, is she gonna be able to shoot these people? Probably her aim's not that good. But her solution with Daniel Craig, who she still loves, even though he's an alien, and she hopes that he can be cured, is to shoot him in the knee, terminate her two style,
Starting point is 00:38:27 and then leaves him. And we don't see him again until the ending. And I was always thinking, okay, she's writing a note to herself on her hand. She's like, all right, remember, after Cure is found, go back to pharmacy, get Daniel Craig, who I left bleeding to death on the floor, and we do sure enough painful wound
Starting point is 00:38:45 To be one thing. He is extremely painful. Yeah, and I thought that they were gonna deal with it by showing Daniel Craig With a cane later on in the movie so that audience is like oh That's right. I remember that was something that happened earlier in the film But they dealt with it by not dealing with it at all. They showed you sitting down at the table with a newspaper and they cut to that abrupt ending. But also, here's the thing. Here's the difference again between the two.
Starting point is 00:39:15 Well, Jeffrey Wright found a cure for a shot kneecap, by the way. Jeffrey Wright, attention's joke. We'll revive you as soon as we have a cure for 17 stab wounds in the back. Well, how are you guys doing? We're up to 15! Like, the uh, the... It was a virus and Jeffrey Wright cures it, which means Nicole Kidman is a murderer. She's a mass murderer who's killed somewhere in the realm of 20 people in this movie, either shooting them,
Starting point is 00:39:37 hitting them with their car, and then sending them through the window, the display window, what was the name that's for Lucy? Lucy. Uh, and that, or like, at one point, I think, I don't remember, like her car's for Lucy Lucy and that or like at one point I think I don't remember like her cars on fire and she's driving into people and you like so I wonder if she has this on her Conscious that's yeah, that's what she's thinking about at the end the final monologue like I can't believe I killed all those people By the way, I need you to pick me up from court later. Unless they're taking me to jail, in which case, I don't need you to pick me up. Yeah, so everyone else managed to make it through
Starting point is 00:40:10 the alien invasion, like killing anyone, the cool kidman. Yes, blood thirsty. And also, and speaking of, I don't know, I remember this because it was around the same time. So being a bad CGI, Jeffrey Wright is flying around in a helicopter with some soldiers relaying to the cool kidman where she needs to go. Much like a character in a video game would talk to you when you're on the way to, you know, on the way to where you're supposed to drop the hookers off at Grand Theft Auto. But uh,
Starting point is 00:40:33 turn right here, the kids, the guys are getting nervous, you know, and it's one of the worst CGI helicopters I've seen in a long time. Yeah, it was really awesome. Okay, we've talked way too long by the way, so I got to cut us off because uh... We didn't even talk about snatched. No we'll say that. Say that for your own blog. Okay. Maybe we'll put that in a movie minute or something. Sure. But so final judgments quickly. Is this a movie that you would not recommend at all or movie that you recommend as a good bad movie or a movie that you kind of liked a little bit Who's going first? I would say I would not recommend it at all because this is kind of similar to a wake and that was so
Starting point is 00:41:14 Passionless that there was a lot to To latch on to it was very and also like Michael Clayton in that way It was like this took place in a world where there were pod people But everyone had no emotions. So it was very hard to, although that you do see, I don't know if, Stuart was gonna mention this, you do see Nicole Kim and Wayne basically a see-through shirt at one point. So, you know, that's...
Starting point is 00:41:34 Yeah, you can see that elsewhere. It's true. Yeah, I'm gonna keep this short and sweet. This movie was a piece of shit. Don't watch it. P-U. Yeah, I was gonna, like, there was a point early on when I was like, you know, I would watch this on like the late night like it's glossy. It's you know,
Starting point is 00:41:51 but then as it progressed, it just got more and more just straight up doll. Yeah, very doll. And then the absurdly truncated ending came. So I think the editor might have fallen asleep. Surprise surprise. And his head fell on the delete rest of movie. And so that was all there was. And they really really not put those on those avid machines. I don't know why he has the movie. So many lost. So it's very easy to hit so many of Orson Will's classics.
Starting point is 00:42:22 Because he's editing them on an avid. Where's the internal consistency in your joke, Dan? and wills classics. Because you're editing them on an avid. Where's the internal consistency in your joke, Dan? Fair enough. That's how they lost Eric von Stroheim's greed. In the avid, they digitized all the footage. You're a dick. You're just a dick, just.
Starting point is 00:42:37 Just when it comes to editing jokes. All right. Let's move on to movies that we have seen recently and we would recommend or at least have something to say about about if nothing else. So I went first last time. Yeah, I was doing it. Okay, I was doing it. I went and saw a paranoid park the other night, the Gus van Zahn, skateboarder movie.
Starting point is 00:42:57 Sure. And unlike previous skateboard movies I've seen, like the skateboard kid with the talking skateboarder. This movie did not have a talking skateboard. Surprisingly choice for Gus Van Sand. No talking skateboard. I was expecting a talking skateboard possibly with like a wise cracking Brooklyn accent. But instead I got, I don't know, like a phantasmagorical dream like film.
Starting point is 00:43:23 And however it was pretty good and about halfway through it there's a scene where a dude is cut in half and is crawling around with his guts hanging out which was awesome. Yeah, thumbs up. Yeah, it seems like it seems like that's made just for you. Yeah, I mean they could have used a skateboard. Then it would have been made for you a sassy skateboard That's the guy gets cut in half and the skateboard goes whoa that looks like it. Oh, yeah, just wait a minute You can talk you got that right, you know, so like that You and me buddy
Starting point is 00:43:59 Wheels don't fail me now Don't fail me now. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You know, drives away. It basically turned into Jabberjaw at that point. Then they're in a band, the skateboard's playing drums. It's awesome. There's a guy with a snidely whiplash mustache. I have to get my hands on that skatefall.
Starting point is 00:44:17 Yep. The guy who's gotten half his playing keyboard. We just wrote my favorite. I have his keyboard's body, but he's playing Tamarine or something Yeah, I want to see this movie so bad and we'll call it talking skateboard Skateboard friends My god, I I saw a lot of good movies recently I
Starting point is 00:44:39 I'll recommend one and I'll just sit there like I have two short things to say about two other movies that are just parts of those movies. But I watched Ms. 45 speaking of Abel Farara who made the 90s version of invasion of the body snatchers. I guess, was that early 80s or was it late 70s? I don't know. It's an exploitation movie about a woman who basically is raped twice in one day, although it's the most, for a movie where there's two rape scenes, it's the most sensitive and quick version of those scenes. It's not like, it's not irreversibly. Yeah, it's not like, there's not even any nudity. It happens very fast. The whole point is just the impact on her It's not like hey check out this rape scene, you know like which would be terrible obviously, but um
Starting point is 00:45:31 But the point is what it's that on the poster for the film So it's poor But they were voting Roger Ebert. That's the thing That was directly from his review the point of the thing is like that just Sets up the idea that this is a this is a damaged woman who goes out and then um basically avenges herself upon like at first any men who are clearly like a threat and then just men in general but the interesting thing about is for an exploitation movie of this kind it is so clearly on the woman's side even when she goes
Starting point is 00:46:04 crazy even like when she goes crazy it's just like shooting random guys is so clearly on the woman's side, even when she goes crazy. Even like when she goes crazy, it's just like shooting random guys. It's like on the woman's side, but it's like a hitchhike exploitation show. Because it's beautifully shot. It's beautifully put together. And there's some really funny stuff in it too. Like the woman is a mute and like she's like seducing all these men into like coming to get shot and none of the men notice that she's mute. Like all the men are just happy to talk about themselves for the whole time and don't make any reference to the fact that she hasn't said anything. And so it's sort of like, and that joke isn't called attention to, but it's clear that
Starting point is 00:46:42 they're making fun of the guys. But to summarize how's the nude scene? There aren't no nude scenes. That's another reason. That's another reason why I think it's clearly on the woman's side. There's a part where you think that there's going to be a nude scene and in a normal exploitation film, there would be, but it's subverted. And it's well done.
Starting point is 00:47:07 And- I'm one of the other 50 movies you wanted to talk about. No, there are two other movies. I w- REEF things that I wanted to say about them. Number one, I saw the most dangerous game. Sure. This recently?
Starting point is 00:47:19 The old one? Yeah, yeah. Where one with ice cube? No, the new- No, the old one. The old one. And it's iced tea. I gotta make- I get my ice to make stuff, the new, the old living the game and it's iced tea. I get my ice to make stuff.
Starting point is 00:47:27 I saw the most dangerous game because you know it's a lot of the same people who did the original King Kong which is one of my favorite movies. That's what they shot it on the same set. Yeah, yeah. But the one thing I wanted to say about that and you know everyone has probably read the short story of the most dangerous game in school at some point. The most dangerous story. The most dangerous story. The most dangerous game in school at some point. The most interesting and out creek.
Starting point is 00:47:46 Exactly. Yeah, and a gift of the Magi. Yeah. Exactly. So, and the necklace. That's another one. Yeah, that's true. And a Panhouse Forum J.185.
Starting point is 00:47:56 Did you guys not read that in school? Just the letters. Just the letters. Oh, okay. Sure, yeah. So everyone knows that the most dangerous game is mad. That's it, it was later fired. But so everyone knows that the most dangerous game is mad. That's what he was later fired.
Starting point is 00:48:06 But I think it's hilarious. There's one point early in the most dangerous game where they're talking about like, so what do you think the animal feels like when it's hunted? And the guy goes, he literally says something along the lines of, well, they're hunters and they're the hunted. And luckily, I will never be the hunted. I think irony was less subtle back then. It was the most hilarious foreshadowing. and they're the hunted and luckily i will never be the hunting i already was less subtle back
Starting point is 00:48:27 it was a mess hilarious for shadowing i've ever seen in any movie and the other film i saw that i wanted to say something briefly about was uh... i saw the lucha full-time movie zombie and i hate italian horror and i've said people you say you say that a lot outside of the pod. Shh. Don't. Please. We look big.
Starting point is 00:48:46 Mom, I'm a me. Italian. You're Italian. Again, funny voice outweigh. But I watched it mainly because this is a movie that's famous because it has a fight between a zombie and a shark. Yes. Sure.
Starting point is 00:49:04 And I knew this going in. That was the reason that I wanted to see it, even though it was an Italian horror movie. I'm like, zombie and shark fight, A. But what no one told me was prior to the zombie and shark fight, there's like a minute of nude scuba diving. Like this woman is like... This isn't Italian horror movie. Basically almost entirely nude has like the tiniest of thongs
Starting point is 00:49:24 and she straps on like an oxygen tank and she goes scuba diving so the order of events is nude scuba diving woman is threatened by shark woman is threatened by zombie zombie and shark fight which makes it like the best seven minutes ever committed to film the rest of the movie you can ignore but that's Sequences great. There's that really great splinter in the eye scene. Yeah, that's the other good part of that movie There's a terrible Italian hard movie called zombie lake Which is all women taking their clothes off and then zombies attacking them and it the opening is like a bad version of that
Starting point is 00:50:00 where women takes off her clothes swims for the Entirely of the opening credits and then a zombie kills her and later on like it gets really ludicrous like a woman literally hikes up her skirt to fix her garter and a zombie attacks her and it's like come on really seriously this you know so zombie lake you say like Nazi zombies or something right yeah fucking Nazi zombies no no that's a different they are Nazi zombies and zombie lake wait they're too not to zombie film there are not see zombie movie that's the kind of idea like not see vampires where you're like why has anyone ever done this and turns out like 75 people are doing it I do not see vampires for a deal sure so I think Dan's finally done I think you're just waiting for
Starting point is 00:50:39 time I was just a lot of really fast mouth stopped moving and then unfortunately I've seen a lot of fun and so I stopped moving and then Unfortunately, I have seen a lot of not very good movies lately A lot of stuff that I had who's the worst the worst was The film version of the play equis which has these moments of very brilliant like horse or something right? Yeah, well, it don't know if Jenny I got her if you're not familiar I don't remember she the girl in it yeah I mean I was watching it may know her from American where with the London walk about yeah real I was watching it rarely to see how Richard Burton who plays the psychologist in it deals with his part and how Cindy Lymette directed it and Cindy Lymette directed it by making the monologues
Starting point is 00:51:21 scenes brilliant and making every other scene terrible. And they opened up the movie as you do, oh you opened up the play as you do, by making it more of like a mystery thriller. Like in the play there's a certain amount of mystery why did this young boy stat like blind all these horses and it turns out that he is a fixation partly sexual, partly religious on horses and he's just very screwed up but in this they open it up by showing like oh his parents are arguing a lot oh and also you know there he this is his job interview when he got the job at the stables it got increasingly silly at times until they flash back to the first
Starting point is 00:51:56 time that the young boy had ever seen a horse and the guy it's a horse he's on the beach and a man rides up on a horse clad all in black Nehy almost like cat high half calf leather boots like this beautiful granite man, you know Slighten goes oh there hello little boy. This is my horse Trojan Trojan whoa Trojan Whoa, and he's sell ridiculously over the top and the end the boys parents are like get away If don't put him on that horse, what are you doing? He get hurt? What are you talking about? You're scurrying the horse stopper. Oh, and it's his voice is ridiculous Sounds like it's a joke on itself. So that was a bad one and I saw Zoot this is totally unrelated. I had on my TV the same time Equus and zoo, which is another movie about why did you I?
Starting point is 00:52:40 I saw a zoo having me on TV and like'm like, it's supposed to be good. I might tape no, I don't want to see a documentary about a man having sex with the �. It was a documentary that was afraid to be tasteless. So it was more a meditation on the idea of loneliness and being an outsider to the point that the facts of the case that this is a man who died having sex with a horse don't come in until halfway through the movie. And you're like, these guys keep calling themselves zoos and they kind of get together and hang out at this one
Starting point is 00:53:07 guy's house. This is why I haven't seen a lot of good stuff lately. But last night I saw the first time this is a movie that I should have seen earlier I guess, but Modern Romance, one of Albert Brooks's early movies, which was very good. It was back when Albert Brooks looked like he was about to take Woody Allen's crown, I guess, as the man who made kind of serious comedies. And there's a lot of funny stuff in it, and Albert Brooks is very good, and it's a really creepy movie, Dan and I were talking about this earlier, because it's about a man who is so jealous of his girlfriends that he basically torments up her and keeps breaking up and
Starting point is 00:53:41 getting back together with her. And it's this doomed relationship that he can't seem to let get lose hold of. Probably because she's super pretty and he just doesn't want to go of a super pretty girl. But it's really funny, but he is. It's a movie that in a different tone could have been a thriller because he's basically stalking her. But there are also moments where as the movie was released in 1981 and it's like Albert Brook said to himself, this movie is being made in 1981, but people gonna watch it 27 years from now and the way people did things in 1981 is gonna seem hilarious.
Starting point is 00:54:11 So let's play that up as much as possible. I'm gonna wear a jogging suit that looks ridiculous, I'm gonna have an old-fashioned, it's new now but an old-fashioned alarm clock, old-fashioned record player, I'm gonna listen to nothing but pop songs on the radio that are round at the time and it just there are these moments that are Very silly and you almost get the idea that he knows This movie will be funnier in the future because of how ridiculous the present is at the moment He strangely has his shirt off through much of the movie which is bizarre to me because you know He was in pretty shape. I guess no, but this thing is he's like it's in the 80s
Starting point is 00:54:42 There were different standards for men and women. Women and movies had to be pretty sexy, but men could be just normal looking. I used the movie Bachelor Party recently for something at work. Women and men are pretty hot, but women go to a male strip club, and the men are not even particularly muscular. They're just kind of not ugly guys, and it's just funny the way the standards were different. So like, Alarproek's girlfriend is very pretty, but he is... Albrebrook, he's not out of shape, but his body is covered in brillo pad like hair, you know, so.
Starting point is 00:55:10 Every time I think of that scene in Bachelorette, I always imagine, like, for some reason, my brain is fucked up, and I always imagine all of them having the face of the guy who runs the Cobra Kai dojo, and Karate did. Like, all of that guys like, weirdly like, simmian features. I don't think they do, but that's, you know. It's my imagination. That's how I like to remember visual party. Yeah. Not the guy in charge. Not William Zabka. No, no, no, like, yeah, yeah, William Zabka is great. The one who's like, you're a bunch of the week. The one who punches out the window at the beginning of... Try to compare to it. Yeah.
Starting point is 00:55:41 To say one more thing about modern romance, in case you're not a big fan of it. Yeah, I'm not a big fan of it. the one the one who's like There's a bunch of the week the one who punches out the window at the beginning of Try to compare to yeah, oh to say to say one more thing about modern romance case anyone's not sold on it It is a movie that has George Kennedy and metal-larke lemon of the Harlem Glow Trotters playing themselves in one scene Which I did not expect to do it and also and a pretty good joke about the incredible Hulk at one point like it's all over the place The movie but it's very good. What tremendous recommendation? Well, um, we should uh Get out of here, but um, I wanted to get this sad right now live end of show music to start playing at this point I should hire um, what's his face g smith. I'm sure he's not doing anything
Starting point is 00:56:21 So it might be going to he might be backing up bowie again before he's on side of life He was part of bowie's backup man. Oh my god. This has been music facts That's what's called a callback If you have any other questions about musicians from the 80s through the 18 80s And he john phillipses the questions just write Elliott Kaelin at musicfacts.blogspot.edu so But I want to speaking of which I want to, speaking of which, I want to thank people for,
Starting point is 00:56:46 a lot of people actually did go and vote at podcast alley. Yeah. And we got bumped up to number 48. Nice. Number 48 in comedy for March. That's awesome. Not overall podcast, but in comedy for March. And over or yet before.
Starting point is 00:57:00 We were at 101. That's a huge jump. That's a huge leap. That's a big jump. So I want to tell people that you can make a difference. I would In like too much of this week. Unlike in your I'm like in American politics. Sure. Your vote can make a difference in the flop house. So Yeah, Dan, I have to do a vote for change. Yeah. For instance, changing flop house from number 48 to number one. Why don't you do that? Remember, you can vote every month. So after March has ended, if you voted before,
Starting point is 00:57:30 you can vote again. It's totally legal. Nice. So, but also, if you want to see show notes or anything else, you can go to theflophousepodcast.blockspot.com or you can send us an email at the Flophouse Podcast at gmail.com. I bet you have to Google it too. You can totally Google that shit up.
Starting point is 00:57:50 That's the brain and so Google. And that was one of the things that the invasion got right is when Nicole Kidman has suspects things, she Googles, my husband is not my husband. Yeah. There's a lot of text messaging in this movie. Yeah. And video text messaging. All right. Well, while they continue
Starting point is 00:58:05 to talk about the invasion, I'll just sign off saying that I'm Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. I'm Emily Kaelin, or am I? Oh! Good night. It's not even night, really, yet. I Used to follow my jokes, but you better believe of music snatched
Starting point is 00:58:41 I called out all right, I think that's fine. I was gonna use your snatched? Who snatched now dog? I don't know if it's some kind of reason in that movie. You're all about now. You're all the man now dog. So should we start her? What? You're the boss. Am I?
Starting point is 00:58:55 Yeah.

There aren't comments yet for this episode. Click on any sentence in the transcript to leave a comment.