281 IN THE WOODS!

281 IN THE WOODS!
Eric is keeping the Hootie and the Blowfish flag flying high and Kelly is pimping his novel.
Also discussed: Twisters, The Boys, The Bear.

Transcript

Unknown: 0:03

Oh, I'm sorry, did I break your concentration somewhere between science and superstition. We have such sights to show you strange eons. Welcome to strange eons radio. That is Eric over there. Hello, and that's Vanessa over there. Hello. You can finally see Vanessa over there. Yeah, all right, I moved the mic so you can see my face. Sorry. I'm Kelly. Hey guys, really nice to be doing this in person again. I appreciate you accommodating me with all my weird shit going on. Speaking of some of the weird shit I got going on, I have a novel out right now. It is called the secret language of spiders. It's selling fairly well. It's getting nice reviews. That's all really nice. I just want to remind people, if you are one of the 33 who subscribed to the monthly serialized novel, all you have to do is leave a halfway decent review on Amazon. Three stars. I'm fine with three stars. I'm not asking for a five star review, but you do that, you tell me you did that. I send you a copy of the novel autographed. I'll personalize it if you want it. Only a couple of people have taken advantage of this, and I'm like, what? What's going on you guys, it's a free book you pay for, no shipping. You've already paid for everything. If you liked it, and I assume you liked it, you bought it. Then leave a review on Amazon and and then I will ship this book out, yeah. And then afterwards, go to your favorite podcast thing, leave a review for us there, and then reference the book. Oh, hashtag in there. So you know, double up the reviews, leave a link, send people away. Very good. Yeah, there's been, there have been some very nice things said about the book in reviews, and it's always neat when it's somebody I've never heard of, yeah, who's this person? They have no reason to say anything nice about me. I think they might have actually liked this book. So that's cool, and you can do that at Goodreads and all that too. But what I'm trying to get is Amazon reviews. So I appreciate that. In fact, I think I saw somebody leave a Goodreads review who was one of the 33 people I won't name you. Port that over to Amazon. Copy pasta, the book. So copy and paste, yeah, for cool people. Yeah. No, absolutely that. I think that that would be Yeah, because that's how the algorithm works, and that's how people find you, and that's how you can continue to write, right? Also, if you didn't do that, but you'd like a signed copy of the book, just reach out to me, either through the strange eons talk page, or through my written by kl young page, or anything like that. I'm selling the book autographed for $16 which is basically the 999 plus the $5 shipping, handling, nice. So it's a bargain. If you want books, I've got books here now, yeah, so say came in and saw a little box of some books over there. It's like, How cool. He's ready to sign and ship. Not only that, those books are actually autographed already. And those are going to Mike Davis, who will be at Necronomicon, I believe, next month, and he will be selling these at his table. So if you want that, and you're going there find Mike Davis's table, and you're going to want to hit Mike Davis's table, because he will have the new Laird Baron novel before it's available for sale. So get two books. There you go. Yeah. All right, enough of that plugging stuff. I did watch some stuff, and I got to say the acolyte finished. I have not watched the final episode, but please spoil away. I don't care. I'll tell you this. I was furious because it was fucking brilliant, and it was everything I love about Star Wars, and they jammed it all into this last episode, which made me even more angry, because I was like, this should have been episode two, but, and the viewership was solo, doubtful it will get a second season, and it ends on a cliffhanger that I would really like to know what happens. So, yeah, it was, it was really, really good, and some really neat things suddenly came out and were revealed. I was like, this would have been very easy to reveal earlier and then build from this story, but the acolyte is really good at the end, so if you have stuck it through, then you want to watch this final episode. I will definitely watch the final episode. I'm just frustrated because there's so many episodes. You're like, Oh, cool. We're going to a planet and nothing. Really happens? Oh, cool. There's a Wookie any guy you know, like, it's just not, there's nothing. Just want plot to occur that I haven't already known or seen about so or if, I mean, is it odd that they end up on that planet that looks so much like the planet that Luke Skywalker has taken himself off to and The Last Jedi or whatever, and it's not that planet. Yeah. I was like, why would you not at least incorporate this vague evil force thing they had on this planet totally into this I don't know. So, yeah, very weird. Yeah, the acolyte, it's on Disney plus, well, I got to see a new film, which hopefully one, maybe one day you guys will watch these twisters. Oh, really, I didn't realize that was out yet. It, yeah, it came out last weekend, and weirdly, it was in theaters on Wednesday night, so I was able to sneak in strange See, like a midnight screening of it. That's that old. That's that old trick of bumping up your weekend numbers by having three extra days, 100% 100% um, so I love disaster movies. Yeah, there was a lot of good stuff going on in this film. There were some great action sequences. There were some heavy good working, like emotional moments, like I cried multiple times, which is rare for these kinds of movies. But it was also made by a very inexperienced director. It was the guy who did Minari, which was like that independent film from a couple years ago. I'm not saying he's not good, but there was so little connective tissue. At one point, I was like, this character is just fucking stalking this girl, and it's not okay, like three scenes in a row. It would start with him following her to random location that we don't know how he got there or why he is there, and he's like, all right, I'm walking up to your hotel room for no reason. Okay. Now I'm walking up to you like, you know, watching a twister out in a field somewhere, no reason. Now I'm at your mom's house in the middle of fucking nowhere where no one else knows where you are, walking up to go hang out with you. I'm like, What? What the hell is happening right now. So there's just, unfortunately, there's a lot of these in between things that really needed to be there, and it really undercuts the more powerful stuff because of that. However, I mean, it's still fun. Glenn Powell does a great job. I think he's awesome. The girl in it is, sometimes fine. Sometimes she's just like, a soggy bag of sadness. And I don't want to keep watching all the time. Well, it's just like, you need to have some levity. You have to, like, balance it. I can't just be like, I'm serious and sad all the time. Like, you've got to really as well. You gotta like, and that's probably having a good time, that part of work so well with the original was, yeah, no, you had a flying cow. Yes, there was a lot of humor, at least some. They're trying. But because of the serious, the way it balances between the seriousness and the less seriousness, sometimes it's hard to laugh because you were just like seeing people get murdered, or like, Oh, my God, I can't believe that child survived. Oh, we're in the middle with joke. YouTube is funny. It's just really tough now, like, I would say people like this movie, they have every right to like this movie. I just happen to go in it with an editor's brain, and it's really hard for me to not see those holes and be like, Oh, you could just fucking stitch it. You could stitch it in this blanket would not be chilly with the holes inside. So I'm just, I can't not do that. So it's still a good movie. It's just I was frustrated. What's the connective tissue to the first ones Helen Hunt in this one? Or oh no no, no. Her Dorothy's in it. In the first scene, Wizard of Oz, Dorothy is her little box, metal box that releases the spore, things that go up in the tornado that is in the first scene. And it's like, oh, man, this old hunk of junk. Hopefully it'll work. That's the only connective tissue, wow, but nobody else. I mean, Paxson is dead, of course, but I would have thought that there'd be some twisters then, yeah, I thought the mom was going to be the mom of the main character was going to be Jodie Foster but it was or Helen Hunt brain. Not great, right now, however, yes, no, if there was, there was a severe lack. I kept looking to be like, are you anybody? No, okay, you okay? All right, twisters in theaters now you're ringing. You might want to see it. Is impressive. I think you know, if you like disaster films and you like Twister and you want to see like more of that, or you like Glen Powell and you want to see some of him go, where are you? Snappy? He's creepy, and yet somehow still very watchable. You. So I had a fun weekend, as my wife put on Facebook, whatever the the beginning of our concert season. Oh, for I don't know, on her own reasons, she decided, after the beginning of the year, she's like, You know what? I love going to concerts, so we're going to a lot of them this year. It's like, okay, that's cool. And kicked off with her favorite band ever, just hooty and the Blowfish. We've seen him enough times, and I don't know how many times we've seen them. And one of the big surprises, Edward Edwin McCain, was the first opener, and apparently, in 1995 he was their opener on their original, giant first tour. Oh, okay, so this was sort of an homage to that a little bit. And then Collective Soul was the next one who toured with them at some point as well. I tell you, collective soul is not the band you expect live. They are rock and roll, heavy. Wow. Really spectacular guitars. Five Guys who looked like they stepped out of some kind of a older guys, you know, they're in a metal band that was huge in, like, the late 80s, maybe. And then a guy who looked like he played, he fronted much more of a Oasis style band or something, but great front man, really entertaining, lots of fun to watch and just spectacular. One of the better opening bands I've seen in a very long time, of course, obviously, they're their own giant success, and smart enough to know, you know how, like, sticks won't play Mr. Roboto and shit like that. I hate when bands do that. It's their most popular song. I don't care you're here because of that song, probably, and most of the time with these kind of bands is whatever that song is. That's why you're here. They played their biggest hit twice, nice. They played it once all the way through, and the singer said something like, do it again. All right, you get your audience. That is awesome. It's so good. And both bands hoodie and those guys were two groups that just loved being on stage together. They're so fun to watch. Edward Cain came back to sing a song, sing ACDC, the collective soul, that he came back to sing one of his songs with Darius, where they did a duet. I was like, this is fun. And we did a little Dina signed up for some kind of a special thing, like it had a bunch of their props and stuff from their original 95 tours, and their original hand drawn posters from when they were just like a college cover band. And I'm talking to this guy about it. He comes out. It's Darius rucker's tour bass player. Michael line, you play with Darius Rucker when he's doing his solo accent? Yeah. Oh, that's interesting. Like, yeah. And I also when the the bass player couldn't tour one time for some reason, he played with them, so that's how I talked to him for a while. So that was fun. And turned out the keyboard player for that same band was there as well. So talk to him a little bit. It's like, oh, this is fun. It's nice too, because it was so fucking hot. It was nice to have distraction things going on. 89 degrees at the start of the concert. And it's an outdoor arena. We were uncover undercover at least, but it's still open. Airs White River, but great show. Lots of fun. Looking forward to I think we're who's next? Stapleton. Stapleton. Nice side note, sticks plays. Mr. Loto. Do they know they didn't there for a long time. I think that they were the animosity between everybody and Dennis DeYoung is one of those ones where they really want to kind of say, Fuck it to him. But there's all sorts of live footage of them from all their tours playing Mr. Roboto. That's right, because when I saw him, they did not, yeah, I've definitely experienced that. I went and saw REM a few times, but one of them, they only played B sides. And I was like, fuck you look. I'm sorry if I don't know most these songs, and I have, like, a stack this thick of like REM albums, like, Fuck you guys. Jesus. I watched what I believe is the season finale of the boys. Oh, same, wow, yeah, yeah, glad it wasn't the series finale, because that would have sucked. I was like, I was sure it was going to be because of the way they were leading up to it. No, I hope not. No, they've announced it. Oh, good. Yeah, people died that I was not expecting to die, and people were captured that I was like, oh, no, what's gonna happen now? Yeah, there was an end that I thought, Oh, I see what they're doing. They're setting this up for all kinds, and then I guess they're doing something different, yes, yeah, I get to see everyone. I don't want to spoil it, right? But holy Yeah, holy shit. And I haven't read the comics, Have either of you, yeah? So do they go here in the comics? No, it's veered from the comics. I mean, a while ago it wasn't like season two. I figured it really was barely touching base with it, but this was such a specific way to take the plot that I was like, this has got to be, okay, weird. Okay, wow, yeah. I mean, they've taken it super political, but, I mean, that's what they wanted to do with it, and it's still very entertaining. So I don't know, I just I really enjoyed it. I was really surprised by it. I'm just in awe of Anthony Starr's acting as homelander. Every time I see him, I just like, This guy is fucking terrifying. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. He's great. He is so good at portraying all kinds of shit on his face all the time. It's just wow, yeah, yeah. I loved it. The boys is on prime, and I guess that is the end of the fourth season. Yep. So did you catch the little thing, the black screen with the white, this is not meant to reflect events. They changed the name of the episode too. Did they? Yeah, I think it was something like something very on the nose. The word assassin was was in it. So they just changed it to like episode four, and then, yeah, there was a mid credits scene at the end too, that sets up season five. So, oh, wait, did I see that? Oh, I don't know. Uh, oh. Okay, so go back and double check. Yeah, I sure will. It's hard, because often you'll start to watch the credits and they'll just bump you and be like you, like the boys. Why don't you watch? But if there is a mid credit scene, it won't bump you. So it knows when to do it and when not to So, oh yeah, okay, I will bear that in mind. Yes. Cool. Okay. Well, I didn't get to watch a lot of stuff, so I'm gonna pull something that I watched a couple weeks ago. There was a little film that came out, it was last year, called after sun, and it was like an indie film after sun, after sun, yeah, on Netflix, and it's kind of about a father daughter relationship, where they go out on vacation together in Turkey, and the something happens, and you're not really quite sure what, but it's this girl kind of remembering this awesome summer vacation she had with her dad, who's this fun, wonderful, loving guy, and is really sad, and it's stuck with me, and I feel sad every time I think about it, just like and now I would like to share that with you guys, just so you know, if you want to feel, if you want to watch one of those movies that just sticks to you, and you're like, you can't get it out of your head, and you're always sort of playing through it, going, is that what happened? I don't know. Is that part real? I don't know. Like, that's, it's a fun, it's a fun film for that. Okay, cool. Not genre that, I'm guessing. It's a drama. Okay? What drama is a genre? I suppose. Sorry, guys, I don't have as much, so you get a fucking NBS Sundance style film for me. Well, the one I'm talking about isn't genre either, the show, which I still don't think you guys are watching, but the third season of the bear started. I'm still not watching it, because I already am watching such stressful shows as the boys look I don't think emotional energy is very different kind of stress. The Bears it, well, not all the time, yeah, but it there's, uh, the second season had the Christmas episode, which I think is Christmas, yeah, the Christmas, which might have been one of the more anxiety inducing shows, episodes of show I've ever watched, with just how this family interacts on it's like that's a horrible family, but it's still great. Looks like there's going to be a little more more Joel McHale in this where he just plays an asshole. He is just a straight up mean head chef of a five star restaurant, or whatever. And. Yeah, the acting, everything's still great. It's starting a little slower than the other ones, because it's not quite on the peril that the first one had right after the death and trying to figure out how to run in the restaurant. And the second one is okay now we're getting there. And the third one starts off with things are a little more settled, but, you know, they're a bunch of psychos, so shit goes wrong, but still, spectacular show, incredibly well acted, incredibly well written, and just a lot, I don't think you've ever watched a show where there's plenty of shows that are bingeable, that you watch an episode or two and you Okay, that's good. I'll watch come back later. This one. Whenever we start it, we watch it as long as we can, until we have to go someplace. It's been one time we watched the entire season in a weekend, and then, so if we could, we would have for this, but we had to go do some shit. So So you haven't seen the whole season yet, but yeah, I think we're like four or five episodes in, but just a spectacular show, yeah, so you are enjoying it so far because I, the only thing I saw was a friend of mine who was like, fuck you season three. So I was like, I don't know. I don't maybe there's something that happens that I did see the fine the name of the final episode implies somebody dies. Oh, I don't know who that is, so maybe that's what it was. Yeah, I think they were just talking about how, like they wanted the the his assistant girl, to be like the main character, instead of him, because she's awesome. Oh, well, she's always kind of been the CO lead. I think they're, yeah, they share time fairly, well, nice. Okay. Well, the bear one day, maybe someday, they're also half hour episodes. Oh, really, yeah, oh, now I feel like 40 minute episodes. Oh, well, that's nice, man, except for the Christmas one, which I think is, like, really long, three hours real time. Okay, cool, the bear that's on Hulu, Hulu, why don't we take a little break then you guys, and then when we come back, we're going to be talking about movies that take place in the woods. In Lego City, the crooks have escaped into the forest, and we need help from the New Forest Police Station. Hey, you can build the New Forest Police Station. Send out the forest police stop the chase, catch the crooks and lock them up. But look out the crooks are planning a new Escape, the New Forest Police collection from LEGO City eats sets all separately. Hello, let's see who's called the strange eons radio hotline. Hey guys, it's Mike the Bronzo. Just listening again to your episode. We did tombstone the next you were 100% right? Bell Kimmer, just awesome. Probably his best role. I know you didn't like love the movie, but you have to admit, Billy chubby. Billy Bob Thornton getting bit slapped by Kurt Russell is well worth the price of ambition. Come on, who doesn't want to work in skin that smoke wagon and jerk that pistol and go to work in certain contexts in certain company? You know that works too. Anyhow, guys, just saying, hello. Keep it up and can't wait for the next episode. Okay, you looked like for a moment you thought he was going to back you up on the movie, not being very good. But no, no. Quite feel like he did. He did not, he did not. But I do appreciate that. Yeah, Val Kilmer. Kilmer is great in it, and I'm totally happy to be in agreement on at least that thing with somebody. So yeah, if you want to call us and leave a message on the mike de Bronzo hotline, it is 253-237-4266, we'll go back to calling it the strange eons radio hot hotline, if anybody else would ever call in but Mike, thank you very much. You music. Okay, we are back. We are back, and we are talking your sub genre. Vanessa, why did you choose the woods for this? The reason why I chose the woods is there was a film that came up in the films from filmmakers that are their first movies, but this was really their second or third film. And so I was like, this film sounds interesting. How can we, how can we get it so that I can watch it? So I am going to put 10 minutes on the buzzer. Fantastic. All right. Well, the. Movie that I went with is called Love, lovely, dark and deep. Congrats on the dream job after this for years. Ain't you leave nothing but footprints? Kill nothing but time? Warning ranger 114, responding over there's no database for people who go missing in the National Park, and there are a lot of polarities between these cases, Wake up. This is where you need to be safe. About the Rangers they take and we let them know I don't understand what's happening. They keep us here. You this. I did not put the year, but it's only a couple years ago. I think it might be this year, actually really 2024 23 at the latest. It is definitely a much more recent movie. Rotten Tomatoes score of 89% from critics and 36% from audience, box box office and budget. Could not find any information on so sorry about that. It's directed slash written by Teresa Sutherland, who has three directing credits and five writing credits. She actually wrote seven episodes of Midnight Mass, the wind and then several short films which she also directed. This is starring Georgina Campbell as Lennon. She's been in 46 things we would know her from barbarian. She also has done a hell of a lot of British TV, including freak Broadchurch, also something called Krypton, 20 episodes and bird box Barcelona. Nick blood is Jackson. He has 35 credits, including 36 episodes of Agents of SHIELD, and a lot of TV shows like euphoria, slow horses, trolleyed and Babylon, and also some video game, video work. And the third, probably largest character, person in this is a lady named waia Ching ho as Zang. She's been in 66 things, including Daredevil Sorcerer's Apprentice, and Aquafina is Nora from Queens, also seven episodes of One Life to Live, which might be the least amount of soap opera anyone has done so far that we've named in the show by a long way, by a long ways, by 100 at least. So the story is, we kind of start off by seeing a ranger named Barney, a park ranger who's leaving a note. There's a thing where, if you're if you have a park ranger that's living in the park, they have a little wooden sign that's like the Ranger is in and then they just tape a little note on the top, saying, Okay, we'll be back in an hour, or whatever it is, whenever they leave. And he writes, owes this land a body, and then he walks off with his coffee into the woods, and he is gone. Then we come up later we see Lenin. Is a ranger who is driving through the night to get to her job doing this back country work for season at the avorous National Park. She nearly hits this black deer, but does not. But when she arrives, the other rangers are whispering these strange rumors about her. People are acting really weird around her, and she's acting pretty weird around people too. She seems very stuck up and quiet and just does not want to communicate or become friendly with anybody. So when she gets to her cabin, which is out in the middle of nowhere, she has to get helicopter. Helicopter. There it is clearly Barney's old cabin. She cleans it. There's not like blood or anything. She's just cleaning it. She puts up a map that shows some information, including where a missing girl. Uh, was last seen. And then she starts to spend each day combing areas of the park disappearing for days at a time to figure out where this girl went. Turns out, of course, that this girl, Jenny, was her younger sister who went missing when they were children, and she feels responsible for now, as an adult, she's returned to the same park, determined to find her. While she's out in the park, she starts to hear strange radio transmissions that often sound like static. Sometimes she thinks it's other rangers, but a lot of times we can hear that there are words being said that she doesn't seem to catch up on catch and at one point she realized there are no batteries in her radio. She then also runs into Jackson, who's a fellow park ranger. He's friendly. Wants to know more about her. He offers her batteries. She won't. He says, Why don't you hang out and have dinner with me? And she hangs out with him, but sort of in a cold shoulder way, and then eventually just blows him off. Then one night, she gets a call that a person is missing in the woods, and she helps find somebody named Sarah, who, when she finds her, she's really disoriented, and she asks Lennon if she is real. London says, Yes, I'm real. Gives her a big hug, and then, of course, she gets flown off to safety out of the park. However, the leader of the Rangers, Zhang, says, Hey, you disobeyed a direct order from Jackson saying you should wait at camp. You went and found this girl, which is great. Thank you for that. You're fired. Wait at your cabin, and in five days, a helicopter will come and take you back. She, of course, ignores this and goes off into the woods and becomes essentially a hostage of something. She starts having visions. She sees strange things, including her family, her sister. She's being tormented and taunted into being told that she needs to kill some other people who are out in the park, and she won't do it, and therefore they won't let her go. And eventually she runs into Zang, who says that this is something that the rangers have known about for a long time, that people are taken by something in the woods, and they let it happen, and it's just how it is. And Zang does, however, regret letting her little sister be taken. That is her biggest regret, and now she will not allow Lenin to have the same fate. So we then see later, Lenin has returned to Ranger life. It is the next season. She's more chill. Her hair is down. Zang is missing, and she has a map. She's determined to find out where Zen went. Her sister went, and some other people who were missing went. Except for she runs into a lost hiker, yes, if she is real, she says no, and leaves him to his fate. Yeah. Look this movie. It's fucking irritating. It's not good. The main character is frustrating. Her motives are frustrating. I don't understand why. As an adult, she's looking for her kid sister who went missing when they were kids. Surely she accepts that she's dead or at this point long or long lost, and like, what is she looking for? She's looking for a live body, a dead body. Who knows her attitude towards other people is weird. The mysteries around her as to why she's strange are never told. We don't know. She keeps seeing that black deer. No idea why. Don't know what it is. The ending makes no sense. It's like, why are you looking for these people who are missing? But then you run into somebody who is going to be a missing person. You say, Fuck off. Good luck, sir. I don't care about you, just the other missing people who she knows she can't get back because the woods will then have to take her. The sound design, however, I think is the biggest problem in this. It sounds it looks beautiful. It looks like a great film. Somebody. They got a great cinematographer. I think it works well in a lot of ways. The sound sounds like first film out of film school. Yeah, at one point she's listening to a podcast, and it just sounds like somebody talking into a mic not far off of our own normal level. And it's no sound design done to it, nothing, to give you any indication that isn't just somebody talking to her through like a piece of glass or something. It's it's horrible, and this is consistent throughout just all the sound design is very bad. The music isn't particularly interesting or great either. I do think that this weird, sinister thing in the woods is cool. I love the idea of this monster and kind of the way it works, but we never really find out enough about it to I don't know. I don't need to know a lot more about it, but I need to know something like just a tiny nugget of why it is that it we keep hearing, you know, leave, no, leave, nothing but footprints. Take nothing but time, kill or No, take nothing but memories and kill nothing but time. And then they're like, but do kill, but do kill somebody else for these things. And the thing like, tells her that thing at her, and I'm like, but you want her to kill so you're not even doing the phrase right, sir. All right. A little bit of trivia. The title of this movie is taken from the line by Robert Frost's poem Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening. It's filmed in Portugal. It had its world premiere at Fantasia International Film Fest in Montreal, and then theatrically released, as well as VOD by XYZ films in 2024 you were right February, so early this year, a featured review by on IMDb. Great premise, disappointing, turn four out of 10. This movie seemed really promising. Initially, a ranger getting wrapped up in a missing person's case with her own missing loved one in the past. Question mark, Sign me up. But it didn't go that route without spoiling too much. It decided to go a trippy, metaphorical route, without establishing enough about the character and her own memories. It was just a scape of meaninglessness hallucinations for most of the movie. That kind of thing only works if there's a reality check, and often enough that we get scared questioning what's real and what's not. Instead, I was wondering when the unreal stuff was going to finally end. The ending was incredibly disappointing and overall mid if you ask me, not worth the run time. Watch the ritual instead, if you want spooky woods with a paranormal twist about grief, which, by the way, I didn't think the ritual was that great. So just sounds like it was better than this, though. Yeah, this don don lorsito says not lovely, dark or deep. One out of 10. Wow. Yeah, it's, it's just a little. It could have been so good. The trailer makes it look incredible, but it's, yeah, no, do we get to see a creature not really black? No, we see the black deer. We see like people who shouldn't be there, and things from their past, and, like, some people doing weird things in the background. Okay, we see, like, a thing climbing a tree in a really creepy way, but, like, it's like, you see the effects of these things, but you don't see them themselves. Yeah, okay, just not worry about watching that one. Yeah, you can pass unless you're desperate to find another horror film for your 100 then, which case, feel free to this one. It's available on Amazon. I believe every once in a while, Mike Davis and I from Lovecraft easine will pick a movie to kind of watch around the same time and talk to each other about. And that was one of them, what we were supposed to do. And then I sent him the rotten tomatoes. I was like, we sure we want to do this one. Yeah, it's unfortunate. It's really unfortunate. Could have been so good, but I'm glad you guys, for your sake, skipped it, Eric, if you don't mind, I'll go next. Dive in. Give myself 10 minutes here, and I am talking about a movie called back country from 2014 I know sure you want to know, does your boyfriend always get his way? Yes, hello, hey, ready to go your canoe be right down there by the water. Need a map? Nope, no. I know this park. Mom, bare spray. You're not gonna need it. Would be lucky to see anything bigger than a chipmunk. Of course, you're going that way. It's the way I'm are trying to turn me on right now. No, we're just walking by or inviting me up for a chat. I give back country ego tours. Sure you don't need to go. I already have one good luck in mine, Alex, why don't you find him the house next time I said, I'm sorry. Okay, yeah, Alex, I understand this. Can't be it, right? You look at me please. Just let me think. Just let me think. Let me think. We don't have a map, we don't have a cell phone. We are in the middle of nowhere, trees on a den. That's not an acorn. I. Have you seen it? I think I have. Okay, yeah, I couldn't find any budget for it. It had a box office of about $14,000 I think, probably because it was festival showings only Rotten Tomatoes. Critics give it 93% and the audience gives it 53% I have seen it written and directed by Adam McDonald, who has seven writing credits, including piwacket and 24 episodes of slasher. But he's also got 45 credits as an actor, including Jacqueline Hyde wolves and Thanksgiving, also starring Jeff roone, who has 44 credits, mostly TV, but episodes of suits Titans and Goodwitch and Missy peregrine, who has 35 credits, also mostly TV, episodes of Hawaii, 5o Law and Order SVU, 74 episodes of rookie blue and 14 episodes of Van Helsing as Scarlett Harker. I bet that she has red hair in that show, right? That's what happens when you name somebody Scarlet Okay, let's get into this movie. It's the plot in this is pretty fucking slim, so I'm not going to spend a lot of time with it, and I don't think I'll need 10 minutes for this. We meet Jenny and her boyfriend Alex, as they are driving off to go camping for a weekend. They seem happy and young and in love, and Alex is especially excited to show Jenny a trail he loved exploring when he was younger. This opening segment is really well shot because it's all in the interior of a car, but you can see the exterior through the windows changing as they cut through the scenes, as they edit through the scenes, so they go from a densely populated city to a sparsely populated suburban area to basically the boonies as they leave the comfort of Home and head into this forested mountain area as they pull into the parking lot, Alex refuses a park mat from the Ranger because he knows the park so well. So they take a kayak down the river and pull up to shore and start following the trail. And it's all lovey dovey and fun and games. They even come across a couple other hikers who are heading back, but otherwise they see nobody else on this trail, so they decide to set up camp for the first night. And Alex leaves to collect firewood, and when he gets back, he finds that Jenny is sitting with a handsome young man in their camp who claims to be a tour guide. His name is Brad, and he's clearly flirting with Jenny. He feels a little menacing though he's shot that way, and he's saying a few things that as a viewer, you're like, I don't like where this is heading. And Alex really doesn't love the fact that Jenny has invited the guy to have dinner with them, but they do have their dinner, and only a few very uncomfortable moments between the men and finally, Brad heads off into the darkness to leave them there for their first night. And I'm like, I think I probably would have said, Oh, you can stay here, and then stayed up all night watching him, rather than just let him wander off into the darkness. But anyway, the next morning, as they're walking, Alex takes them off trail to a place where he remembers a lake in a waterfall that he wants to show Jenny. Listen, hikers, don't go off trail. Go off trail. Do not do this. As they go. He spots a bear paw in the mud, but doesn't say anything to Jenny about it, and shortly after that, they discover the carcass of a half eaten deer, which unsettles them both pretty well as they crest the rise of the area where they're going to see this waterfall in the lake, they get one more surprise in the form of Alex not knowing where the fuck they are. Now, there is no lake, there is no waterfall, and there is only miles and miles of forest spread out before them. Jenny, realizing they are lost, decides it's time to call for help. And that's when it is revealed that Alex took her phone and left it in the car because he was afraid she'd be on it the whole time. This leads to a massive fight where Jenny admits she never wanted to come hiking anyway, and Alex admits that he was going to propose to her at the waterfall. Good times all around. Wow. So as they make camp and fall asleep inside their tent. We say we see a huge black bear come to investigate. He's snuffling all around their tent and everything. But they are sleeping soundly inside it. They do not wake up. When they do wake up that morning, all of their food has been eating, and they realize the bear is probably still around. So they get to moving as quickly as. The can while it's light, and then set up the tent again that evening, when Alex wakes up the next morning and unzips the tent, the bear is basically right there, and he ends up clawing his way through the tent, injuring Jenny's arm, but she gets to watch in horror as Alex is dragged away, screaming in fear and agony and yelling at her to run, we get some pretty gruesome Gore here, where the bear tears off roughly half of his face, most of his jaw, and then decides to eat his entrails and everything. And then Jenny just starts running. So will Jenny survive the night in a forest full of wildlife, and especially a big black bear that is, for some reason, specifically pissed off at her. Will she finally find the romantic waterfall Alex was trying to show her and then slip and break her ankle at this goddamn waterfall? I hope you're a fucking happy now Alex and will she finally make it back to civilization and find out that the menacing Brad really was a tour guide. This movie is shot and acted very well and has some real moments of terror and tension, but in the end, it didn't do much for me. If I have bears in a movie, I want it to be a demon bear or a mutant bear, or some kind of scary bear. I was totally waiting for you to say that Brad was the bear. Wouldn't it be awesome? He was a were bear. I gotta admit that man versus nature in the woods, for some reason, doesn't like I love man versus nature in a boat, but in the woods, it doesn't work for me. I don't know why it works for me, largely because my dad and I went backpacking a mountain climbing every summer from like eight years old to 18. Okay, there you go. Tagline survive. Sounds more like a threat. There sounds like a motivational bumper sticker. I've got trivia. This is based on the true story of Jacqueline Perry and Mark Jordan, who, in 2005 were attacked by a bear at a campsite in missonibi Lake Provincial Park, about 80 kilometers north of chappello, Ontario. In the real story, they were already married, and it's the husband who survives, while the wife is the one killed by the bear. And finally, this film is set in fictional nimu nibu nibukazo, Provincial Park. This can be seen written on the side of the canoe towards the end of the film in the native North American Ojibwe language. This translates into pretend to be dead Provincial Park. Which I assume is a joke. On the whole, if a bear attacks you, you're supposed to pretend to be dead. Depends also that does not work either. Yeah, you can't outrun a bear. You can't out climb a bear, and if he wants you and you're dead, he's still going to eat you. Yeah, I believe it's what black bears you're supposed to fight. You're supposed to, like, punch him back. Oh, you're supposed to, well, I think with anything, you're supposed to try and make yourself as big as loud as possible and fight back. The primary recommendation if you're in a bear area, is to wear, like, a bell or something that makes a lot of noise so you never even see them. I went hiking in Alaska and I had a little bell that was like, basically tied to my belt buckle, and it felt like I had a little bell on my butt the whole time. And you're supposed to sing as well, which is very embarrassing when you're just like, I just have to make noise. So I don't get eaten by a creature. You just have to make noise so I don't get eaten by a creature out here, she does have a whistle at one point where she finally starts using and it pisses the bear off. Doesn't want to kill her, but she starts doing it, and he's then backs off and just starts roaring. Sounds like this. Seems like something you could have done at any time. She did bring bear spray, which drives the bear off, but makes him very angry then. So maybe that's why he's got such a mad on for her weird, like, I'm taking this bitch out anyway, bears would be like, All right, I'll go find easier prey. Yeah, exactly turning the buzzer off. Incredible. We are kind of two for two on movies that we didn't love. Eric, are you gonna be able to break this? Oh, hell yeah. Okay, fantastic. Here's 10 minutes, alrighty. So we got a film from 1991 called clear cut on the edge of the wilderness of that is being fought between those with legal rights. We've been listening to all sides of the issue, and those with Native rights tell them they lost just a long battle we haven't won. Uh, asking him to come back and I will let me run this case again. I've got another way I can do it. And I kind of, I don't think so. Uh, red crow in vice McGuire to do a sweat lodge ceremony to fear, purify himself and get him clarity for his next course of action, whether it be lawsuits or something else. Well, the certain ceremony turns into a haunting visions of cave paintings and fallen trees and blood Arthur, playing by Graham Greene, shows up in his hallucination, hallucinations as well. The the lawyer. The next scene is a lawyer. It is hotel, and the people next door are some I think they they don't portray them exactly, but I believe they are. They feel like people that the lumber company caught it brought in to be assholes, and, you know, to break the protests, and they're having a big, loud party, and grant green talk comes in there, starts talking to him, and talks him into just go over there and confront him. Tell him to shut up. He goes over there, do that. And this is when the movie starts to turn much darker. The lawyer sort of, you know, Oh, shut up. Shut up. And they don't really give a shit what he says. And then Graham comes in with one of those. That's not a knife. This is a knife. And forces the lawyer to tie them all up with duct tape. And then when Graham ties the others up, and when he does it, he's doing across their mouths and their eyes, and just pretty rough tying up of tape. And they the guys try to get out of it, but he's not too interested. The the violence doesn't escalate real well now he basically leaves them, all, three of them, tied up, and they go on their way, because Graham's got a destination he needs to get to, because he knows where the owner of the lumber guy starts at a certain time of night or something. So he goes there to wait for him, where he is going to kidnap him and take the lawyer with him, basically kidnapped as well, you know, because he does not particularly like what Graham's doing, but so he gets taken along. Most of the rest of the movie consists of the three men talking sort of the acting is fucking incredible. Graham Greene is as good as he has ever been. This is easily his best performance, and he is menacing, terrifying and funny as hell at the same time, he pulls all that shit off, and he does it spectacularly. When the violence finally starts in earnest, it is brutal and hard to watch. His justification is, you know, just, just doing what was done to the people who destroyed our land. So he's destroying my land, so I'm doing it back to him. But the movie does this very interesting balance. I mean, it's definitely leaning towards Graham's position, but the CEO comes back a lot with my lumber company created this town you have sewage and phones and all these things because of this being here. And so it's not just a one sided impact movie. It's definitely points out and kind of tries to balance the line a little bit of preservation versus progress. So in that it's, it's fairly interesting. Graham pretty much goes on think some cops show up and kills all of them. And there's a it's, but the man the performance, Graham Greene, is amazing in this film. It's a truly powerhouse performance. He's done a lot of movies, including, of course, his critical acclaim and dances with Walter. He was one of the main natives that Costner worked with his quotas as saying that this was his favorite movie he's ever done. And I, I believe it he is. He controls this film and the other guys, the lawyers. I mean, he's a good actor, but his character is diminutive on screen, and the CEO is just kind of caught in a gotten a storm of vengeance from green. They. He wanted to portray the issues that he saw existing with more of a pacifism thing. But as the movie progressed, he realized some violence is going to be done. He hopes to show the view. He hoped to show the viewers the complexity of these issues, where good and evil is not so easily divided. And I think he did a pretty good job of that. Elizabeth Aard writing in the van. Over son praised the film as a compelling, well written movie and a nightmare Odyssey, and the Calgary Herald's comments on the film as dark and violent. Clear collect share. Clear cut shares a rare impressive intensity. To this day, clear cut remains an important part of the discussion surrounding indigenous people along the lines of missions, a lot like in Hollywood's Indian the portrayal of Native American films, clear cut is native actors get to act out that are colonial induced angst. My there's one scene that's just so brutal. This was not released on DVD, though, until 2007 Wow. And if there was a Blu Ray, the blu ray release was this one in the folk or box from Severn and elix. Spectacular. Of course, sounds great. You know, if you love thinking somewhat politically charged, but not the focal point of the whole movie, this is really good, or if you like Graham Greene at all. And if you're not sure who I'm talking about, look him up. You will immediately recognize him. He is easily recognizable. And just great watching him in this film. So highly recommended. Yeah, I remember, as soon as you started describing this, I was like, Oh, I have seen this movie, but I did not remember it was called clear cut. Does it have any supernatural elements in Not really. It's more of the horror film by way of person to person, horror. Okay, great. The scene where he really goes into the CEO alone is solidly horror enough. And you said you had it on the our Hans B hours, yeah, it's in that box set. Cool, awesome, nice. I would say that you won this episode. Oh yeah, absolutely hands down, easily. Love it. When you're sitting there watching a movie and you realize you're so into it that you kind of go, oh, wow, I really fucking like this. My favorite thing about that, too, is you had probably the lowest budget amongst all. By far. There's not much of a budget in this film, but it's I did what it needed to do cool. Okay, well, then that means Eric, that you have the pick for the next sub. John, yes, I do. And I, well, unfortunately, kind of along this way, but maybe this will help the last episode where we did lists both of you really didn't like the movies you had. You're talking about like when we picked something that we've been meaning to watch for a long Yeah, Tombstone and the Poughkeepsie tapes were not particularly well appreciated, right? Yeah, sorry. So you know what, let's do another round. Oh, I know you have plenty more movies. Oh, yeah, we do. So let's try again, and hopefully you'll both get something you'll like a do over. I like that. Yeah. All right. So then that brings us to the end of the show, where we are saying thanks to all the listeners who are liking and sharing posts, who are getting on the strange eons radio talk page on Facebook, who do occasionally call the strange hands radio hotline, which, again, is, 253-237-4266, and especially for the people who are participating in the value for value model, which is, if you get a little value out of this show, turn around and give a little value back. Sometimes that is in the form of liking and sharing posts. Other times, it's in the form of cash. Never a bad thing. Appreciated. You know, upgrade our mics again sometime. Yeah, yeah. That's how we ended up with good chairs, great mics. I think we upgraded your soundboard at one point. Yeah? So thank you guys that it all goes to a good use, yeah. Speaking of participating, by the time this one comes out, we'll be a couple days into the 100 days to horror. Oh, my God. Delphid, who, you know, if you listen to our Amityville episodes, has a page four on Facebook, but I also post all of the ones I watch to our page, along with Bob. I'm assuming Bob's going to going to start doing that. And Kim, you should do it too, but it is a spectacularly fun way to watch a shit ton of horror in a relatively short amount of days. Oh, I will start posting about those every day for hopefully the next 100 days after Tuesday the 23rd Oh, fantastic. Okay, well, that's it, then, guys, we'll be back in seven short days, and we are notching another one off of our list, awesome. See you next Thursday. Transportation and other considerations for strange eons. Radio, produced by Pan Am airlines, when you think of traveling, think of Pan Am. You can't beat the experience. Guests of strange eons. Radio, stay at econolodge. Everec. It's an easy stop on the road. You know opening strange eons. Radio is recorded live in front of a studio audience. 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