214 STOP-MOTION!

214 STOP-MOTION!
Kelly throws shade at the nicest guy in the industry before the gang gets into their Stop-Motion picks.
Also discussed: Velma, Missing, Extreme Prejudice.

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Oh, I'm sorry, did I break your concentration somewhere between science and superstition such sights to show you strange aeons. Welcome to strange aeons radio. That's Eric over there. That's finesse over there. Hello, I'm Kelly. You know, guys, I was listening to MC Harris's podcast, you know, I have a lot of respect for MC guess. And he had an episode where they did a 40th anniversary retrospective of the thing. John Carpenter's The Thing. Now, if you listen to our show, you know that we did an episode like that too, right. So I was very interested. I was very interested to see what he had to say about this because there's a tie. He was actually on set for a couple of days. And he did the behind the scenes making of documentary. You know that I am my worst critic. Our episode was way better than their episode. Oh, way better. We had so much more interesting information. Through That's right. Hey, listen, if you don't believe me, go back and listen to our episode. Listen to Mick Garrison's episode and then call to 532374266. And say, Kelly, you were right. The lines are flooding right now. Everybody Oh, guess what, Kelly? You were right. You were right. I saw some stuff on TV. Oh, TV. I'm going to do a an animation list as my stuff to talk about. So the first thing I saw was Japanese tales of the macabre Junji Ito's cartoon on Netflix. Oh, how was it? Not very good. Oh, no, I was primed to really love this. There were a couple that I thought captured the mood of his original comics. But otherwise, I don't know. There was something his art style does not translate well to animation. So they matched the Yeah, it looks it looks like his his actual illustrations. And I don't know, I was just very bummed when I watched his so you guys haven't seen any of it gets a 10 part thing on Netflix. Now, I don't know. I'm about six episodes into it. And I liked one of them so far. And it was one that I really loved from the comics. So once I find my TV and plug it in, I'll let you know. Still no TV. How are you watching anything? I have my wife. My neighbors have a really big window. Oh, wait, there's computers and tablets and phones? Well, I wish I could throw in, you know, an animation to follow up with that. But I have not seen any. Instead I did see missing? Which is the follow up film from the guy who did searching. Oh, yeah, read about that. It really says out. Yes, it stand up. It was a lot of fun. Good. I had a good time with it. I might have liked searching a little more. But I think that missing it was pretty delightful. I felt searching had the advantage of you know, as the first first one fully do what it did. Yeah. And it did it really well. Yeah. And it doesn't quite stick to it in the same way. That that did. I think they were kind of like, let's play with this format. Just a tiny bit. That's what I was going to ask is it. Is it a gimmick like that? Or? For the most? I mean, yes and no, it's all seen through this girl's laptop screen. But at various points, you kind of it sort of becomes like okay, now am I looking at a phone screen or a laptop screen or like it feels like it's switching whose screen you're looking at now and again. I'm weird. And it's not a direct sequel? No, it's just in a similar vein. It has like It's like feels like it's in the universe. Yeah, extended searching in verse 100% I'm hoping that like the guy who did this or guys who did this you know go out and try something really different at some point but in the meantime, I don't care I'm enjoying it. It's it's kind of pulpy, dumb fun to an extent. His new movie just got analysis called looking. Binding rule with a conclusion But there's got to be some way that could be worked. So I returned to the realm of Walter Hill this last week with extreme prejudice. Can I love this movie? Is this available on something now? Did you have restaurant video now has now seen last episode and explosion of boutique things. I don't know if it's themselves but restaurants back and they're releasing their stuff and very, very well remastered with some nice extras. And not what a Walter Hill's best, but but it's it's a lot of fun. Yeah, it's got it just has some weird character. strangeness that. But Jesus that cast a cast every time somebody shows up. Oh, is that guy? But yeah, nema late 70s, early 80s. Cool ass actor you're probably going to be in this film. But Clancy shows up right? Yeah, yeah, he's he's one of the one of the main guys and give me a quick rundown. Yeah, remind me exactly who's in this. So of course got Nick Nolte is the leader. Powers booth. Michael iron side Rip Torn. Clancy Brown William Forsythe. Larry B. Scott. He's the guy who makes noises Oh, movies. And Matt Mulhern was probably the other guy and then a bunch of other like background tough guys are alright occasionally show up with people that aren't necessarily lead speakers. But you've seen in the background, right? I saw this in the theater and I remembered fucking loving it and recently watched it again maybe four years ago. And I was struck by how fucking handsome Nick Nulty is. Blue eyes are like his I know. I was like, wow, I don't remember him being handsome. I cannot imagine in my wildest dreams. It's gotta be the cowboy hat. Because they think he wears it the whole time. And it's got Maria Conchita Alonso is the it's still an entertaining film. There's no doubt she's the sister of powers booth right? Is that how it? No no, she's the X. Oh, she didn't notice dating powers booth this x right and he's the sheriff and powers booth is the crime lord. Yeah. Date his acts. We were friends. Oh. Oh, God, I went one way you went the other powers Booth was super handsome. And that led me to what he and the whole white suit. The they knew what to do. And I mean, the movie has issues. But if you want if you go into it go on. Walter Hill being ridiculous gal in it. I read a or heard an interview. Somebody's talking about 48 hours. Which made me go oh, I want to watch extreme prejudice because I hadn't seen that one. Maybe ever. I know. I've seen 48 hours. I know how good that is. But he's talking about Walter Hill is one of the best directors for portraying character and violence. And he is not wrong. That is so accurate, because he was using the scene in 48 hours where Eddie Murphy busts up the Redneck bar. And he said there's me there's words and stuff here. But the violence that's going on is showing you far more of the character than what he's saying. extreme prejudice has that warriors has that and it's just it's such a neat. I love that. He's just one of my favorite directors. He's just too damn good. Yeah, unfortunately, not anymore. His last couple of Unreal stinkers. Yeah, it's been a few years since he was as good as he can be. Well, very cool. Continuing with my animation, gripes. I made it about three episodes into Velma. Three when I made it one. At first I was kind of like, I'm not sure what everybody's complained about. This is kind of fun. And then it just gets really really dumb, fairly offensive. And I know that I think what the real backlash is, is that they thought the harlequin cartoon Yeah, that is so much fun, sobered female empowerment and filthy so filthy. Yeah, but everything there kind of ties back to the characters that they are making fun of so it makes sense that Bruce Wayne is completely insane over the loss of his parents because that's kind of how he is in the comics anyway, they just took it to 11 and in Velma they just decided to change everybody's character and and, you know, there's nothing to make fun of any more These, these are a group of people that are supposed to like each other so much they can travel around the country in a van. These days, there may be two of the characters that can hang out for an evening and put up with each other. But the rest what? There's no way they're hanging out ever. Yeah. Am I supposed to like all of them, even if we think they're kind of dorky and stupid or silly? So I thought that you know, I'm like, Okay, I'll watch a filthy animated. Yeah. Scooby Doo franchise thing. No, Scoob no scoop in the series. They just not get the rights for scupi. I'm sure that can't be. They own all of that. Maybe they just thought well, he'd be too old. We can't have him be in the movie yet. Yeah, we'll bring you back in season two as a puppy or some dumb shit like that. I don't know. I was just bombed. I wanted to like it. Yeah, the people coming out that are ready to con. Oh my god. There's like cockroaches screwing in the first two minutes. Well, that's not a big deal. I actually thought it was funny. Yeah. Really weird. That's like what? Yeah, no. Interesting. Yeah, I've waited it because the the hype anger, anger hype was strong. And I was like, Oh, maybe I won't waste my time. Yeah. I was like, I'm no, I'm going to end up liking this based on what they're all complaining about. But I just had different issues with it. Well, I've been meaning for a while to see a film and finally got to watch her which is bodies bodies bodies. Okay, have you guys seen? I haven't. Okay. All right. Kelly, you would hate this movie. is a matrix is right. Yeah, it is a mix of people talking and be it's a very style movie. It's very based on a specific kind of feel and style of what is cool with like, I don't know what generation it would be now z or? Yeah, Gen Z years. Like, it feels like it's trying to synthesize that down. And then it's also like, a break in movie kind of thing. So Oh, you mean like a home invasion? Yeah. Like it has like a lot of feel to it. I thought it was a comedy. It's got a second viewing it would be much more of a comedy. Yeah. Cuz the first viewing like, you're spending a lot of time wondering, like, who's gonna die and who's killing people and there's a big hurricane outside. So everyone's trapped while people are dying. So it has that recent thing a lot of movies seem to be doing where there's really nobody like, in this there are. There's moments and every once in a while characters kind of goes like okay, this is the one that nope, now they're being a dick. Yeah, it's tough. It's really tough to find somebody to like, I thought it was watchable. I thought there wasn't anything in it that I was like, this sucks. Like I you know, it was an interesting film. But it feels like a slice of a moment in time. So I was watching Gordon and I don't know if I'm gonna make it through this. And I read something. The brilliant Tony Kaye wrote about it. While I was watching it, go on. Should I really continue? Okay, I'll keep continue. And I think he was right. If he nailed what makes this movie work. The problem is commenting on it. wipes the whole film away. Yeah. So I'll just leave it at that. Yeah, it's one of those that's better to come in cold. as cold as you can be. The trailer gives you no true sense of the actual filmmaking takes the most irritating, frustrating seconds of anything anyone says and just smashes them together. It does not feel like that when you're watching the film. Interesting. Eric, could you please not? Tony Dix. Tony is Derek while I'm sitting right here in front of you. Yeah, brilliant. Last time you liked watching so she is slowly anyway. Speaking of now, there's nothing to do with this film. I'm gonna talk about finally watch Megan. Oh, you find that watch. Megan Are you gonna watch that with Dina and I watched that one gone? I think she's gonna be fine watching this one. Not like the Hellraiser but and she did she that is a lot of fun. And it's, it's a lot of fun. It's really good. It's kind of ridiculous. And kind of terrifying. Especially last week when you're talking about the AI things or I don't know that was on air off air. But the just the whole idea of what they're presenting is kind of creepy, but in the movie, it's a lot of fun. I was I was trying to kind of figure out why I liked it so much more even than the checking stuff. And I liked it because she She, Megan, she comes to her. Her decisions on how she's going to hurt somebody, honestly. Oh, she's not she's not evil so much as she's going to protect her friend, right. Yeah. And I really liked that. I was like, That is the way you should have done this. I, you know, I think there's a cool, weird realism thing in there where there's a lot of pressure in the tech industry to come up with the coolest shit. And maybe you don't always have time to check all the code. Maybe you just fucking stick it out there and you're like, oh, shit, it works. I guess we're good to go. And then later, you'll do a patch note and it'll be fine. But what if it was just a very bad code that needed to be inserted? You know, like, there's there's some cool, I don't know, there's a lot of cool little logic things about it. It's like the article I read this week about, they're working to bring back the dodo. Yeah, genetically. Oh my god, the dodo, and the woolly mammoth. Like, how would you guys see Jurassic Park? I will take the woolly mammoth. We should definitely bring that back. Can't wait for woolly mammoth burgers. Right? It means the woolly mammoth comes back just like with the buffalo then I'll put up with it. But anyway, so it's a it's a fun over while check out a sequel for that one. I was kind of like oh boy of course there's going to be a sequel that was so popular but man it'd be nice to just have these great movies that aren't the is the land on squeezed for every last dime Blumhouse Blumhouse is so frustrating to me. Yeah, because this was a really smart script. And the gal that wrote this is working on I think the the sequel right now that's not tie her up in Michigan. Let's give her a chance to write another really cool different movie but and then they will put out the worst schlock and follow it with something amazing and I'm like what what is the quality control? Like? I feel like no there are many Blumhouse films where I'm like did Jason just like even stick his head in the edit room ever? You know? Just go let's just watch it once Just once before it goes to theaters no time off the line off the line well cool is that streaming now or yeah you know, maybe I should have just gone to theater to watch it price level but yeah, it's out there $20 or whatever but if you jam pack a bunch of human beings into the room and make them each pay a percentage Don't be totally worth it. Wow All right then. Okay, well how about we take a little break guys and when we come back we're talking stop motion film Oh, but don't miss work this Christmas. Yeah. How will you pay for things like food electricity bills. You need a backup plan. That's why we have Aflac so I'll have cash to help pay bills. But what if you're still not better by Christmas? We've got you under our wing Rudolph's better and we're back. Okay, guys, this was my sub genre pick. And the idea was it had to be a film that had a significant stop motion segment. I'm giving myself 10 minutes. Thank you. With that in mind, I chose Jason and the Argonauts. From the makers of Sinbad Columbia Pictures presents, Jason and the Argonauts. The mightiest band of warriors the world has ever known. We are sailing to the ends of the earth, battling against an incredible number of obstacles. Wherever you find this miracle, I heard there was a tree at the end of the world with a piece of gold hanging in its branches in search of a fabulous magic Golden Fleece. Jason and the Argonauts caught on the clutches of browns giant Taylor's battered by treacherous falling rocks, containing vultures harpies, facing the dreaded seven headed Hydra battling the merciless army of skeleton. Jason and the Argonauts, the classic story of Jason, a man who challenged the gods Madea, a temple dancer We'll be traded kingdom for love. The Argonauts, the mightiest band of warriors the world has ever known. Jason and the Argonauts. A classic adventure story brought to the screen through the incredible special effects magic of Dinah Rama, Jason and the Argonauts. The search that became a legend. Oh cool. 1963 this was this might as well have been a first feeling for me because the last time I saw this, I was eight years old. I remember it very well, but I didn't remember a lot of the film. Spoiler is really good. Oh, so the budget of 1 million box office of 2.1 million, not like a huge splash but no Rotten Tomatoes. Critics give it 89% The audience gives us 79% It was directed by Don Chaffee, who has 90 credits, mostly TV, but he also directed Pete's Dragon. Oh, 1 million years BC and the creature the world forgot. That sounds awesome. Yes, it was written by Jan Reed, who wrote just a ton of television from the 50s 60s and 70s. But also written by Beverly cross, he wrote Sinbad and the eye of the tiger and Clash of the Titans as well as this one. So you can see there is a a the strong line through these films, starring Todd Armstrong 16 credits, including episodes of Gunsmoke, Hawaii Five Oh, he was also in King rat, the silencers and an episode of Greatest American Hero. Nice. Now I'm gonna have that song in my head. Thanks, man. Also stars honor Blackman as Hara 115 credits, including to the devil, a daughter. Dr. terrible's house of horrible and mostly known as Pussy Galore in Goldfinger. And Neil McGinnis who plays Zeus, 90 credits including island of terror, the devil's agent and Krakatoa, east of Java. I used to use that at Suncoast for here's the movie guys need to find training. Okay, you guys both seen this film? Yeah, yes. Okay. Wait, no, I have not. You'd love this. Oh. So Jason, who was funded by King playas puts together a group of men who will sail with him across the world to find the legendary Golden Fleece. His whole point of doing this as he wants to use it to overthrow King players. He doesn't realize the king place has funded his his search and is hoping that he will die on the way. That's such a Greek tale. Yes. In order to do this, he has set up this huge games that will pit man against man so he can find the best men to help him do this and his crew includes. And I love this, Hercules. Sure. The best part is Hercules shows up in this movie, he does not look at all like the Italian Hercules strong men. He's got a bit of a belly on him. Big Hairy dude. super strong. So I just love that he's like, you know, why would I work out I'm so strong. But also, on his crew is a saboteur, a Costas, who is the son of Elias and he is there to make sure that Jason fails in this task. The reason of course is 20 years earlier, police overthrew the king and killed Jason's mother, but he did it in the temple of Hera. And because her temple was profaned, Hera has named herself Jason's protector. So there is a number of just amazing stop motion scenes in this. The first happens when the Argonauts called The Argonauts because their boat is the Argos or the Ark go. It's named after our gusts. The builder. We follow on all this? Okay. They stop on an island that is filled with treasure, but they are worn to take only provisions. But of course, fucking Hercules. This, this tie tack that's the size of a javelin, and he's like, Hey, I have to have this surely they will miss this. And of course, once he does that, there's this gigantic statue that is guarding the treasure and it comes to life and attacks. And it is an awesome scene of these tiny humans, trying to fend off a 50 foot tall stone warrior. Jason finally is able to stop him by removing a plug from his ankle and letting its anchor Dre now. It's surprisingly gruesome. I really loved it. The next great scene is when they have to help a blind man who is being tormented by herpes, herpes or kind of devil women with huge bat wings. It is a another amazing scene. Just gorgeous cars. In this scene, the wings are flapping, they're flying, there's guy trying to fight them off. And then of course, Jason's men come and they take care of them, they catch them in a big net. And then there is another really great scene when they attempt to take the fleece but have to face the Hydra, which is a dragon with seven heads. All of the scenes just look amazing. And it helps that it's got like the big 1960s, Technicolor and everything, just everything looks too real. You know, that makes sense. A hyper realistic is really cool. And of course, the final scene is probably the one that everyone has seen, which is after defeating the Hydra. The king spreads the Hydras teeth on the ground, and they suddenly explode into skeleton warriors. And this is the one where you see all of these men versus skeletons in a sword fight. It's, it's so fantastic. The movie holds up really well. But this scene in particular holds up really well. And I will get to that with the trivia. The interesting thing about this, and I didn't remember this as a kid, and I didn't quite understand it as an adult, but the movie kind of ends halfway through the actual story of Jason and the Golden Fleece. He gets the fleece and then he is now going to start his journey back. And that's where the movie ends. Okay, obviously, sequels supposed to be happening here, but it did not ever happen. I believe that is probably because Madea who was the wife of the king who had the golden fleece, she turns out to be a full fledged witch in the actual legend. And after helping Jason Jason just dropped her off on an island was like fuck you. That probably audience would have been like, last night. So yeah, loves this movie. cannot recommend it enough. I have some cool trivia here. It took Ray Harryhausen four months to produce the skeleton scene at the end. It runs just under three minutes. Wow. Yeah, the live action work had been done a year before in Italy, with the actors doing the kind of shadowboxing against imaginary opponents. So Harryhausen then had to animate seven skeletons, with each one having five appendages. That meant he had 35 different things to move for each frame of film. In addition, he had to make the skeletons movements fit in with the actors movements, so that all 10 could be seen hacking away at each other with their sores. Sometimes he only managed to do 13 or 14 frames a day. So movies are shown at 24 frames per second. So he would get about a half second of footage in a day. Oh, my God. Insane. Remember, I was telling you about the Ichor coming out of the stone ankle, it is also stop motion. It is red cellophane, animated by Harryhausen to look like flowing blood. I mean, you got to see this movie again just to see this stuff. It's I just watched it. I had popcorn had a little truffle salt on the popcorn. You know I went through about 14 Coke zeros. I just watched this like a little kid good. This movie is so good. Oh. Presumably in order to capitalize on the success of the seventh Voyage of Sinbad, which predates this film by five years looks like Harryhausen, originally conceived of the film as Sinbad in the age of MUSES. The story would still have been set in ancient Greece and would have involved Sinbad joining Jason in search for the Golden Fleece. And that's what's really interesting about this, written and directed by the people I had mentioned earlier, but Harryhausen came up with the idea. And that's kind of how it worked with a lot of his films because he was the stop motion guy. He was like, Well, what if you wanted to do this? And they were like, Okay, we'll write a movie about that. So, this one I love it the 1992 Academy Awards in honoring Ray Harryhausen with a lifetime achievement award actor Tom Hanks says, some people say Casablanca or Citizen Kane. I say Jason and the Argonauts is the greatest film ever made. Oh, Tom Hanks. Yeah. I was blown away. And I found this on TV. And then of course, it auto played right into the seventh Voyage of Sinbad which I watched and loved. And then I found out there was like a early 80s. Or maybe it was late 70s sequel to seventh Voyage of Sinbad. And I think what was going on with the Sinbad movies were doing very well, and this one did not do well. So the sequel was just kind of like, because it was Harryhausen. It was kind of like, I've got something that's going on right now. So I'm not going to work that hard for another thing that's not going to do that. Well. Really interesting. Really interesting parallels to clash of the titans in this, which was Harryhausen film that he actually had control of, in that the gods are portrayed on Mount Olympus looking down on the mortals, you know, in this pool of water. But there's also these are chess pieces of all the players in the game that they're moving around. And I was like, Wow, he really came back to this kind of thing hard in Clash of the Titans. In my head, I can picture that scene from Clash. Absolutely. Yeah, there's the course the skeleton scene is what sticks in my head from Jason. It I have to admit, I loved it. But it's one of those scenes that I remember well, and you see that in all sorts of movies. Yeah, they're talking about it. The other scenes I thought were way cooler. The hydra scene was really awesome. The harpy scene was really great. And the stone Guardian was amazing. And fun. So God, I when the master has a good revisiting it sounds like Vanessa, what did you pick? Well, as soon as you talked about a stop motion animation, for at least one scene, I knew exactly what I was gonna pick. So I went with one of my favorite movies Better Off Dead does it ever feel like everyone's got more going than you do? Everyone is smart. Show your outliers. pretty stupid to me. Thank you. You see the best deal in town just ran off with your girlfriend. Even your younger brother does better than you do. And that nobody even cares. That broke up with me. Oh, that's nice. Well, you might be right. But remember one thing? I haven't even been to New York City. Nobody was ever better off. The truth is I cannot see you any day of the week. Oh, really? Yeah, you want to race I'll take you on any day sucker. Go that way really fast. If something gets in your way, turn. All you need is alright. Now. In a race, I'm going to lose and I'm going to die in that order. And you'll never doubt yourself again. On one ski better off. That's a real shame when folks be throwing away a perfectly good white boy like an abnormal look at a normal teenager does have stop motion or big fans. I had so I know I've mentioned it before. We've all talked about it a little bit here and there. But it was really fun to kind of do a deeper dive on this came out in 1985 Rotten Tomatoes score of 77 from critics 87 from audience budget of 3.5 million and box office of 10 point 3 million it was a success. Written and directed by Savage Steve Holland 44 credits including better off dead and One Crazy Summer but then he say Wade pretty hard into TV has since worked on things like Lizzie McGuire even Stephens encyclopedia Brown. The Jonah is one of the Jonas things Zeke and Luther. He wrote 16 episodes of eek the cat Sabrina the animated series he worked on fairly all Christmas. So he actually carries his humor on I think through writing at least in some of these other interesting little animations. starring John CUSEC ADA credits. This is his fifth film after Sure thing and 16 candles. He went on to do of course, stand by me say anything verse point blank on air, high fidelity, and a lot of stuff that we will not talk about. Although he wasn't eight episodes of Utopia, and that was kind of nice. Nice to see. Diane Franklin. Isn't this 47 credits including Amityville to the possession, which, if you stay tuned, you will be able to catch on some kinds of podcasts that might be associated with ours. Also in the Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure as Princess Joanne Joanna and of course Yugi aka moto aku Mota 99 credits including real genius Karate Kid Part Two Cobra Kai and of course the paper tigers which is how I know him rice. I when I worked with him, I did not know he was in this film and then later after I was working, not working with him anymore. I kicked myself endlessly, so I didn't ask him for an autograph or talk to him about it. It's fine. He's incredible. Anyway, also Curtis Armstrong from Revenge of the Nerds. Vincent Shiva Shia Valley who plays the subway ghost and ghost. David Ogden steers who plays Major Charles when and mash TV show as well as Cogsworth and Beauty and the Beast. So a lot of familiar faces. The story follows Lane Meyer who is desperately in love with his girlfriend Beth, his whole world revolves around her and we open into a scene of his bedroom decorated and with just kind of plastered with photos of her. He then goes to retrieve some clothing and every single one of his hangers has her face and a picture format cut out and stuck on it. So you can see just what his shirt will look like on her. He sleeps with a framed photo of her under his pillow. He cannot live, breathe, do anything without her. However, Beth has other plans. She decides pretty early in the movie that she's gonna break up with Elaine, after tryouts for the prestigious school Ski Team. Roy, the popular high school kid. I know the ROI. The popular high school kid who runs ski team has a thing for Beth. And basically he leaves the timer running during lanes trial to make sure that he doesn't qualify. So right afterwards, Beth dumps him because it's basically better for her to date a popular attractive guy who's talented, and that's exactly what she says. There is no this this film is very upfront and on it does not have anything behind a curtain in any way. Lien falls into a deep depression decides to end everything so he attempts to commit suicide, but is both forwarded and helped by strange friends and family around him. His mom who cooks weird, alien looking food that sometimes walks off the table is a starring character she accidentally pushes him over and right when he's about to hang himself and decides he doesn't want to hang himself. She opens up a door that pushes them off and he is desperately clinging to life and the rope as she vacuums around him. His best friend who's desperate for drugs, so much so that he resorts to snorting jello and snow is trying to talk him off the ledge. His dad who is in a battle against the Paperboy, who has broken all of the glass in his garage, is trying to make sure lean doesn't fall deep into drugs. And his little brother who's a genius obsessed with sending away for things advertised on the back of cereal boxes, who basically does not say a single word in the whole film and is kind of like what lanes should be. He's just always cooler always smarter, always more on top of it, and is like eight. While lean tries to kill himself, he almost let slip pass the beautiful foreign exchange student across the street, who is stuck with a horrible family and meeting a friend and a confidant their paths cross and they find a way to help one another will lean beet ROI in the K 12 ski challenge. And when Beth back. Well, he figured out that the sexy French Monique is actually a much better match. Like significantly. Will he win a race against the Asian brothers who only learn English through the Wide World of Sports. And will the paperboy ever get his$2 stay tuned to see this film. I love it. I cannot say enough good things about it. This sense of humor is incredible. And every time I watch it, there's something else that stands out to me. It's just going a million miles a minute. It's so weird. It's so strange, but absolute incredible. A little bit of trivia. People protested the original tagline which was sometimes you're better off dead. And it was changed to relax. You're never better off dead. Just a terrible tagline. Henry Winkler was instrumental in getting the film made in the early 1980s. Savage Steve Holland's short film my 11 year old birthday party played at an LA Film Festival. When Claire saw the film took a liking to Holland. And his suggestion, got him hooked up with John Cusack. Then according to savage Steve Hall in the film that he made was mostly autobiographical. Holland really was suicidal in high school, when his girlfriend left him for the captain of the ski team. Also, he really did have a paperboy named Johnny Gasperini, who would harass him for $2. According to Holland, when the film came out, the ex girlfriend contacted him and apologized. Stephen said of his suicide attempt, I went into the garage and put on an extension cord around up on a pipe and I'm on a garbage can and I'm thinking should I do this? Maybe this isn't a good idea. Anyway, it was a plastic garbage can and my weight just crashed through it and it fell through and the pipe broke and it started pouring water everywhere and I'm basically a garden a garbage can drowning. And my mom comes out and starts yelling at me for breaking the pipe, which is what any mom would do. So I started writing down stupid ways to kill yourself and that you could fail at it. And that became a sort of diary which became better off dead. He also based the mom very heavily off of his mom who also gave him TV dinners as a I believe birthday present one year. Steve. Steve also stated in an interview that John Cusack hated the movie and walked out of the film after 20 minutes during a special screening prior to the stars production on One Crazy Summer, on said the next morning, Cusack basically walked up to me and was like, you know, you tricked me. But afterward was the worst thing I've ever seen. I'll never trust you as a director ever again. And don't ever speak to me. He was really upset and said, what I said, What happened, what's wrong. And then he said that I sucked. And I was the worst thing he'd ever it was the worst thing you've ever seen, and that I'd used him and made a total fool out of him and all this other stuff. It was so out of left field that I was just floored. Hoosac then completed principal photography on One Crazy Summer due to contractual obligation. But if it had not been for that CUSEC would likely have not done a second film with them. Wow. Yeah, she said was do you know if he still holds that I believe in CUSEC I don't know what he's like. Thanks. Bye. Do you know he's apparently mellowed out significantly because he was like that for a lot of these early massive alcoholic. At that age, Jews Aaron Dozier insulted, who plays like the cool ski Captain guy insulted Steve. Before his audition for the role. He came in and said, I don't know who savage Steve was at first as you're told movie Moviefone. I looked at one guy and said, Who's the chubby kid? It turns out, he's the director. Remembers DOS, you're interrupting him as he watched the dailies. And all of a sudden, he was like this pompous jerk is coming in and said, Who's the fat surfer? And I'm like, wow, who's this? And they say savage. This is the guy who's trying out for boy and he's like, man, you got the part you're perfect. Last but not least, Siskel and Ebert gave it two thumbs down, was the stop motion part of this? Oh, the hamburger. Lane Meyer does. In fact, work does one day of work at a burger joints. And he has these sort of fantastical moments where he falls into animation, or in this case, a stop motion for her scene, where he creates a Frankenstein ish burger that comes to life and dances around with some fries. And it's of course, it's a funny, weird fucking moment. But so good. First of all, the fact that you chose a comedy and that you liked this comedy is so strange. floored me when you said it was one of your favorite movies? Oh, yeah. has been for a long time. Yeah. Because it's, it's not smart humor. It's quite wacky. So I was like, wow, there's something about like, the weirdness of it that I truly enjoy. Because it's not like a joke. That's obvious. It's just there's all these strange, weird moments that one of my favorite jokes in the film is when he tries to jump off a bridge, and he ends up in a garbage truck. And he just sort of sits there in the truck and lets it drive him home. And there are two guys standing on a bridge and kind of see him go past these two black dudes, I look at each other and they go, man, why somebody got thrown away a perfectly good white boy like that. And it's just one of the funniest things I've ever seen. It's just, there's just so many great moments of us. I am really surprised at cusecs response to it. Because this film, kind of put his particular style of everyman together, right? If you look at a lot of his catalogue, that weird quirkiness started here, absolutely. He had to have had such a big ego to think I look silly in this movie to think I'm not cool, immediately. But you still have to read the script. I know for say anything. He was so pissed at having to hold that boombox, and he was basically sitting there chewing bubblegum and being a dick about it. And that's why it's so late in the night when you see that scene. It's like pre almost dark out. When you've got that moment, that romantic moment that every girl fell in love with John Cusack over. He hated it and wanting to leave. So basically you're saying when John CUSEC is an alcoholic and was drinking heavily his taste was shit. Yeah. He really didn't have a grasp on why people were into him. Oh no. Which was the the, the moment of vulnerability that he always portrayed. I might even like One Crazy Summer better really this movie I just because it is even wackier. I have Have not seen it. I've been kind of saving it for a rainy day. He plays pretty much the exact same character and he's an animator in this cartoonists and so there's a lot of cartoon scenes where he's interacting with a cartoon. And then don't sleep on stuff savage Steve's third movie how I got into college which was in the late or maybe early 90s Also very wacky, but huge flop and I think that they never gave him another thing to direct after that. Yeah, yeah, I mean, that would make sense why he ended up in like children's TV essentially weird and wacky it's really unfortunate because he's got such a specific wonderful style. Yes. Eric You got a lot to live up to after these two movies. Oh, as I often say, I did something completely different. You always do you gotta be the weird 110 minutes on the buzzer. All righty. I did a film from 2015 called Anomalisa What is it to be human? What is it what is it to be alive each person you speak to has had a day some of the days have been good some bad each person you speak to has had a childhood each has a body each body has a look for what is special about each individual focus on that remember, there is someone out there for everyone think extraordinary. Why? I don't know. It's just obvious to me that your time is limited. We forget that. Sorry, grabbed your hand. That's okay. It's a reflex. But I don't like to fly. I said it's okay. And let go now though. This has a rotten tomatoes rating of 91 Critics 71 from the audience budget of 8 million and a box office of 3.4. Directed by Duke Johnson. He's the primary animator. He made a movie called Mary Shelley's Franken hole. And he also did the community to stop motion episode or communities to stop motion episodes. Like the Christmas one. Yeah. And he also worked on the wonderfully subversive moral oral hate yes, if you ever see moral oral, it's absolutely savages religion. Very funny. And direct. The other director was, you know, guy kind of node for quirky ship, Charlie Kaufman, of course, oh man, for my thinking of ending things and Being John Malkovich and just we have the amazing adaptation, I think is a really underrated film from him. Also writer, Charlie Kaufman, writer of endless or Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, Confessions of a Dangerous Mind. And the two movies I've just mentioned. So if you've seen Charlie Kaufman movies, you know he's a little quirky. This movie doesn't have a lot of Charlie Kaufman in it. Other than the writing is very good. There are three actors in the film, there's David Thewlis, who you might know from Big mouth as the shame wizard. Also an I'm thinking of ending things and he plays I think it's pronounced Rs from Justice League. They are es Fargo TV show all the Harry Potter movie Oh, Aries Aries, and he played rumus Lupin in the Harry Potter and it was in The Big Lebowski 102 credits. A frequent discussing on this show Jennifer Jason Leigh from Fast Times at Ridgemont High shortcuts, Fargo law expects it to Brooklyn, which is one of the most depressing films I've ever watched the HITCHER and ABC after school special. Oh, she has 107 credits. And every other voice in the movie, which gets very confusing at times, is done by Tom Noonan who's 12 Monkeys TV, and every other TV show bullet in the brain short film, which I think shows that that myth years ago, which is a fantastic short roll cup, too. And he was Frankenstein's monster and Monster Squad also appeared in Wilson, which really talked about at one point on the show. That's it. That's all the actors involved, it's all voice over this entire movie, a stop motion uncle, there is no real people in this one. The black screen starts with a black screen with all these interesting voices and stuff and the sound effects combining and coming together. And then introduced to the characters. They're very unique looking stop motion characters, a little unnerving. And one of the design things where they made a mouth plate for everybody. So there's lines like it looks like everyone's wearing glasses without lenses. Because there's lines from the eye to the ear where they would interchange these mouth plates. Interesting. So that's a little weird take some getting used to movie takes place in Cincinnati. And of course is if Steve Lang ever listens to us, he talks a lot about Cincinnati chili, which the cab driver tells him he's got to try it. Which is basically like chili on spaghetti. And chocolate or some shit. I don't know what the movie is the story of the banality of life. And it does a great job of setting that up. The I've landed in the things I call my wife, going through the airport, found a cab cab driver is a little annoying talking to me, I've got to my hotel. I mean, it is all real. If you saw scenes of a marriage, or some of the movies like that, and your goal is I want the most realistic movies can be. This may be stop motion, but Jesus it is life real. Took me a little while to realize is the movie is shot and to 15 but takes place in 2005. So I've got well there's no phones, nobody's using phone, and people are using phone books. So I had to check on that. I think that's done for a reason there'd be they're still phones, but there's no smartphones. So it is a little really weird seeing the trends on the hotel, TV and is watching a black and white movie, but the black and white people are the same style as that. Oh, that's weird. He reaches out to an ex who lives in the city and says he kind of still loves her. So they go on to get together in a hotel bar, and it's horribly uncomfortable, and they really don't have anything in common anymore. And she's pissed about him calling her cuz she said I didn't leave bed for a year getting over you. And he is married with a kid cab driver. So oh, a toy store yelling for a toy store while there's one nearby that's open 24 hours a day. Like, that's kind of toys he wants but he goes there and ends up buying a toy for his kid. Oh my god. Then this is the first R rated animated film to be nominated for Best Animated Feature. And as puppet Venus. The guy is a famous speaker. So he's gone there to speak at a conference and he's for some reason goes out knocking on people's doors looking for something and runs into two women who just go nuts over him and they go oh my god. One of them is Jennifer Jason Leigh, while the other is Tom Noonan as in every other woman. So when he called his wife initially I thought he was gay, you know? Because it's Tom Noonan's voice it's very male sounding voice Oh, he doesn't he doesn't even do this a little bit, but not much. Oh my god. So it's kind of interesting. But the repti this is incredibly well written it's very interesting the acting is wildly well done considering it's coming through puppets it the puppet sex, not like Team America. It is such it's even uncomfortable talking about it shot so intimately. And so real feeling of two people who've never gotten together just sort of having sex for the first time and apologizing if they do something. Like I feel uncomfortable watching this. It's just puppets. So it's the movie is incredibly well done. And it's it's a slice of life film. It's I mean, he sort of goes through some stuff but by the end he's resolved he's not complete deck The tagline Welcome to the conference surreal Neil Neil realism tail in adult world of sameness. I can't imagine why this movie didn't answer Fox. At one point, Lisa played by Jennifer Jason Leigh sings a song to him that was supposed to be, my heart will go on, but they couldn't afford those rights. So it's Cindy loppers. Girls Just Want to Have Fun, which I think actually works a whole lot better than the other one would have. Because it would have been way too on the nose for that scene to have her singing that the sex shop that Michael goes to buy his kid a toy. It's called Dino's toys. Dino is a producer of the film, called the head of starburns, injurious free whatever. According to his bio listen active and varied sex life. That's why he got the sex toy shop named after the first version of Anomalisa was actually a audio performance in LA called theater of the ear, which was just sound play. There were not actors there were not puppets. It was just audio. And somebody commissioned said, Hey, why don't you do this as a movie? And they said, I guess they actually and this is a little annoying. They did the old it was still in a time you could get away with doing big budget Kickstarter. So part of the movie was funded by Kickstarter. See, oh, one more interesting thing. The puppets were created with 3d printers. Oh, wow. Okay. There's eight team Michael's six laces were made for them. And he's in it by far the most. But it was a good movie. This was seven years ago. Yeah. I wonder I wonder how good this 3d printing things were back then. How long it took to print? Yeah, well, they're covered with something. So I think they pre printed it and then covered it with a felt or some kind of theory. Okay. Yeah. At one point he he has a nightmare. There's a Charlie Kaufman dream in the movie. That's very weird. But at one point, he pulls his face off the lower half of his face, he sees the mechanics inside. And that looks like something that was 3d printed, gray kind of color. But it has. But other than that, it's it's well done. One of the main comparisons I read was lost in translation, which I found a lot more boring in this movie I got lost in translation although incredible acted by the two leads, of course was just sort of there. If you really love lost in translation, you're probably going to really like this film. What a strange sounding film. And how was this just in your research for stop motion? You came across this and decided you're gonna do it? Yeah, popped up. Sure What the hell? Charlie Kaufman. He's a weird man. I was expecting a lot more weirdness till I started watching God. Whoa, this is like real. That sounds very unenjoyable to me. But I also don't even like watching people kiss on screen. So I don't know if I can so weirdly uncomfortable. Wow, okay. Eric, yeah, is your please be nice. Okay, we're gonna dip in a little bit to our listener, who has been over time just doing the monthly makes Monthly Deposit for us. And Jason Weiss. And I asked him, hey, you've been doing this a while, something you'd like us to talk about? And he said, Yes. i His idea is a movie that's decent. But the music and soundtrack are so good, that it enhances the enjoyment of the film. So I found a different score or a different group of songs. It'd be just a mediocre movie at best. Okay, interesting. Yeah, that's gonna be a challenge. But a fun one. I've got some ideas. Obviously, I can't use trick or treat or the Wraith since I've spoken about those over and over again. Oh, that's too bad. That's a good point. Yeah, you have done that. But okay, I like that idea. And also, thank you very much, Jason for donating so regularly, if you if somebody wants to take advantage of the value for value thing that we are doing here, Eric, how would they do that? There's all kinds of fun ways you can do that. You can donate through bicep coffee still. Or you can go to our website and there's a direct PayPal. Or you can share our stuff. Tell people we're good. Bring it on. Tell all these people Well that we enjoy that enjoy our memes so much but don't listen to our show Hey guys should also listen to the podcast. The memes are fun and all that but there's a reason they're here. Check it out. So cool you can also drop us a message on the strange aeons radio hotline which is 253237426 6am I just Okay anything else guys Vanessa? I know you're just dying to get your TV on packed Oh man. Yeah, no, I've just I like can see our boxes even when I close my eyes boxes. So this is a nice change of pace for me and yeah, thanks everybody for tuning in for listening and being a part of the value file you Yes, big thanks. All right, we will be back in seven short days and we are going to be talking about movies that are okay but made better by their soundtrack pretty good. I have to come up with a better title for that one. Transportation other considerations for strange aeons radio produced by Pan an airline. When you think of traveling think of pan and you can't be expected. Yes, the strange aeons radio stay at econolodge ever. It's an easy stop on the road. You know, strange aeons radio is recorded live in front of a studio audience. If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a positive review on your favorite podcast app. Set we will set that sounds very unenjoyable to me