The Review Review
Hosts Ben and Paul welcome special guests from all walks of life to watch, rate, discuss, and RERATE the films close to their hearts. You'll laugh (hopefully), you'll cry (maybe), you'll reconsider everything you have ever known! Welcome, to "The Review Review"
The Review Review
YCR 8 - Cabin in the Woods / Honey is Under Appreciated
Well, it's the end of Spooky Season, and what better way to do it than with a "You Choose the Review," poll episode? And what better movie, than a bit of every horror movie/trope/sub-genre "Cabin in the Woods?!" Answer: there is no better way. (2011 d. Drew Goddard). Starring: Kristen Connolly, Chris Hemsworth, and Fran Kranz. Sawfaces, Scorpion Robots, Mermen, and Mutant Redneck Zombie Buckners OOOOOO MY. All this, and coffee thermos b*ong tech talk 10/28!
****A member of the “Review Review,” family is in the fight of her life, you can help! - TAP/CLICK HERE
**All episodes contain explicit language**
Artwork - Ben McFadden
Review Review Intro/Outro Theme - Jamie Henwood
"What Are We Watching" & "Whatcha been up to?" Themes - Matthew Fosket
"Fun Facts" Theme - Chris Olds/Paul Root
Lead-Ins Edited/Conceptualized by - Ben McFadden
Produced by - Ben McFadden & Paul Root
Concept - Paul Root
This is my uh cousin's place.
SPEAKER_05:Come on in. Do you even have a cousin? Are you talking about your first cousin?
SPEAKER_03:The one I think I might replace the cabinets in my kitchen tonight. Are you even listening anymore? That's how the movie starts.
SPEAKER_05:But your cousin's so hot. But it's okay. It's your first cousin. Because it's your first cousin.
SPEAKER_03:I mmm is that how that works? Yeah. That's that's pretty spooky.
SPEAKER_05:It's 69 degrees outside. Oh hey, Ben. What the fuck is going on here?
SPEAKER_03:Oh, well, what's going on here, folks? Welcome in to the Mr.
SPEAKER_05:Ed.
SPEAKER_03:What the hell? I'm surprised Mr. Ed wasn't one of the options on the whiteboard. Yeah, they do. It probably was. They do have a unicorn.
SPEAKER_05:They do have kind of a fucking super evil Mr. Ed, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Welcome in, folks, to the review review. There's a fly in my house once again. Not the fly, but a fly.
SPEAKER_05:It's gonna fuck you. It's gonna fuck you so good.
SPEAKER_03:If it's Jeff Goldblum, I might let it get fucked. Well, if you're tuning in for the first time, you're tuning in during spoogie season of the review review. This is scary. It's super scary. The review review, what is it? What do we do here? We're a movie podcast. We are two co-hosts. My name is Ben or Boo McFadden, like scary boo. I should have come up with something better, but I didn't. I'm just going with putrid Paul Paul!
SPEAKER_05:Did that scare you? Ooh. Sure, but I thought I'd be powerful Paul. Pow pow powerful Paul.
SPEAKER_01:Cocaine.
SPEAKER_03:All right. I'll go with that. Sure, buddy. It's your it's your spouse. It's one of the monsters. It's a spooky season. It's it's it's it's Paul's favorite season. This podcast that Paul presents. I ran out. Uh oh my god, this fly.
SPEAKER_05:We I produce it, that's for certain. We I'm one of the producers.
SPEAKER_03:We usually have a guest. That guest usually brings us a movie, something seven years or older, something they feel passionate about, they want to rewatch, revisit, and then we all re-watch it. We come back together, we talk, we chat, we laugh, and we see if our rating system out of five has altered over the course of the conversation. In this case, we don't have a guest, unless that guest is a ghost. Is it a ghost guest, or is it just a ghost?
SPEAKER_05:Is that what that smell is?
SPEAKER_03:Oh yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Is that ghost okay?
SPEAKER_03:Farting ghost.
SPEAKER_05:You know that they leave emanations. We've gone over this.
SPEAKER_03:There are ghosts in this movie. This was a you choose episode from our Instagram poll on Review X2 Podcast on Instagram. You should follow us. We put up fun polls, and this was the winner. Cabin in the woods.
SPEAKER_05:I do find it interesting that our finalists in this were Cabin in the Woods. Tales from the Crypt presents Demon Knight, which was my pick. Cabin in the woods, yours. Both movies about groups of people being trapped in houses or locations. It's a good one for a period of time.
SPEAKER_03:The other two that got blasted out were uh the host and that other you know, the other one that I picked.
SPEAKER_05:That's who's its who's its, yep. The host didn't I did not get a vote.
SPEAKER_03:I think we've tried that set. I think we've tried the host several times. A couple few times. And people just aren't feeling the the Bong Jun Ho of it, I guess.
SPEAKER_05:I guess not. And Demon Knight comes close. Yeah, it's been involved a few times, so we it'll keep coming around.
SPEAKER_03:But you chose, if you're listening to this and you pick clicked that button and you chose Cabin in the Woods, that is what we are doing tonight. It's true. Cabin in the Woods. But before we do that, Paul, what you been doing?
SPEAKER_05:The original Fright Night. Yeah, Charlie Brewster, Chris Sarandon.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. I do like I like both Fright Nights actually.
SPEAKER_05:Oh man, we've talked about this before that the remake is maybe, depending on who you talk to, just about equal to the original. The original is very, very special, don't get me wrong, but they're both pretty great movies. Then I've had like this hand injury that has been driving me nuts forever. I basically tripped over something and like punched the ground to like catch myself with a closed fist, and it was very painful. I've had to put ice on it off and on, and I have to pop it and I have to stretch it and reposition it and alternate things and Arnica gel and all this stuff, and it's just driving me crazy. And I like to make myself meals, as we've talked about on here. It's good to eat. It is. I let Robin, Red, the red Robino, make me a meal this evening. Went with the Klux and fries. Oh, classic. A classic. Bottomless. Enjoyed the heck out of it.
SPEAKER_03:Love that fry seasoning.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely. So save my hand, the tiredness and the pain. Yeah. And had a delicious all-American fried meal.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, hell yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Ben, what have you been doing?
SPEAKER_03:I love a good chicken strip, chicken nug situation with some fries.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely. Give me two.
SPEAKER_03:Top tier. Top tier. Good dips. Good, you know, get some good dips in there.
SPEAKER_05:That's what the they're they're calling us in the reviews. Good dips. They're pretty good dips.
SPEAKER_03:So one of my favorite meals growing up was chicken strips, corn, and macaroni and cheese. It's what I got my papa to make anytime I was visiting my grandparents.
SPEAKER_05:Well, and if you needed, you had to make sure you got all your different forms of starch.
SPEAKER_03:Of course.
SPEAKER_05:Your yeah, your pasta starch, your vegetable starch, and your breading starch.
SPEAKER_03:My grandparents made like fried bar food for us and it was just my chicken strips in honey back in the day.
SPEAKER_05:That was that's very advanced.
SPEAKER_03:I liked it.
SPEAKER_05:Because now people are doing like the Mike's hot honey is the big thing. It took me until I was how old am I now? I'm 72 years old. No, wait, I'm almost 91 years old. That's something Mariner's 91, 92, somewhere in there, but it took me until well into my teens or 20s to understand the greatness of honey.
SPEAKER_03:Honey is pretty a pretty magical substance. It comes from bees. There's so many things at the end of this movie. Yeah. Uh what have I been doing? Um, great question. Uh I uh didn't plan anything to say, so I'm going to say You're kidding me. Yeah, I know, right?
SPEAKER_05:No fucking way.
SPEAKER_03:I know. I'm so good at ad-libbing, you couldn't tell.
SPEAKER_05:Um but I am trying to try some improvisational comedy now.
SPEAKER_03:And um yes, uh, yes, Tylenol. It's bad, it's not good. Don't take it.
SPEAKER_05:Um, no, no, bad happened, only good happen half happened half happened, good can happen.
SPEAKER_03:Nothing bad can happen. It can only be what are we doing? Uh we're so screwed. Not even a year, Paul. Not even a year. Oh, yeah. I guess I've been I've been worried about the fate of our country in some ways, but also mostly worried about the you know, uh, the assault on freedom of speech and this idea that anybody we talk movies here, but we try to be funny. We like to talk truth to people.
SPEAKER_05:We try, and you can feel it. What? Yeah, we can feel the push of it.
SPEAKER_03:But I think like we also like to push against, and no one's ever gonna listen enough to us or think that we're worth silencing in any capacity. But I I do think that it was like fascinating over the last week to just like hear the rhetoric, uh, the outcry and the and the concerns around just taking people. You know what I was thinking of? Have you seen uh V for Vendetta? You know how in that, like the one of the first uh friend, the um the host of that comedy talks.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it's like Stephen Fry or someone that looks like Stephen Fry, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Some yeah, and that he like does a puppet of their like dictator replacement or whatever, and then he's like fucking murdered. It's dictatorship 101. You know, we're just letting it happen. And luckily there was pushback and it like came back, but it's still I don't know, man. There's this there's just like we're on the precipice of something that is is either like could be really great in changing how this shit goes, or it could be really, really fucking awful. I was really pissed for a lot of this last week. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_05:Makes me want to sit on a knife.
SPEAKER_03:That was a long time ago now, if you listen to this. So the world's probably ended. Everything's spooky.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, we're both we're both in prison.
SPEAKER_03:These giant and these giant gods came out of the earth and destroyed everything. And you know what? It's done. Frankly, uh we're probably fine.
SPEAKER_05:You know, in this case, I would support the ending of that movie in this case.
SPEAKER_01:Let's do it.
SPEAKER_02:Me, you, you, me, me. Talk about it.
SPEAKER_05:Me, me?
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:It's spooky season. Okay. We're gonna get back to it. We shed our little tear for the incredible Robert Redford and we meaning me.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I started the Chucky television series. Okay. We're in the thick of spooky season. No, it's Brad Doroff, does the voice. Okay. It's Don Mancini who originated the franchise. I really like the first child's play movie. Oh, I like the way it's lit, I like the puppetry, I like the way it's shot, you know, suspension of disbelief. It does ask a good amount from you, but the ride is pretty fun, yeah, in my opinion.
SPEAKER_03:I like that movie.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, and boy, man. Just the way that you can kind of telegraph what's gonna happen, and it's not that the show is not decent, it absolutely is. It's just not for me. It's it's very melodramatic. Some of the the threat that was Chucky in the first one, outside of like, oh my gosh, are they gonna hurt this kid in this movie? Like, this child is in peril, and that always feels like its own device. Yeah, but this movie that like this movie, this show, there is no sense of dread watching that pilot, and they also kill a cat. So I was just like, I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think so, which was like kind of a bummer because I was like, Oh, cool, we're in spooky season. There's a couple seasons of this show, maybe you know, it'll spark something, and I'll yeah, watch it through. And we gave it a shot. We gave it a shot.
SPEAKER_03:Then do you have a favorite horror series?
SPEAKER_05:It's nightmare on Elm Street, like hard in the paint, dunking at home, backboard coming down, glass raining everywhere, the whole thing. Do you? I know that's not really your thing as much.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, I do enjoy a good horror series. Uh do I have a favorite though? Um, I'm trying to think if there's anything I've gone back to. Do Twin Peaks count?
SPEAKER_05:I mean, it's an existential horror. Yeah. That's kind of horrifying imagery.
SPEAKER_03:Uh, especially actually, I really like the second season of American Horror Story. I enjoyed that a lot. That that series kind of went on. Which one is that? That's the Insane Asylum. There's an episode in that with fuck, what's his name? Um, from Justified. No, not Justified. Timothy Oliphant? Uh yeah, no, he's in this other show. The the show Peters? Timothy Oliphant was in before Justified the Western show. What was that? Deadwood? Deadwood. With Ian McShane in him? Yeah, Ian McShane. There's an episode with Ian McShane where he plays like a Santa Claus. Oh. Who like Cyril kills on Christmas Eve. And it's like just a boss.
SPEAKER_04:Silent night, deadly night, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. And it's I remember that episode very vividly. It's great. Um yeah. I mean, I think that series, Ryan Murphy went off the rails at some point. The cocaine got too high, and the parties, Hollywood parties were too fun, and I don't know what happened, but I used to like some of his stuff.
SPEAKER_05:So I like the first season of American Horror Story. Yeah, me too. I like the first season too. It was a haunted house situation. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Speaking of haunted houses, I so I watched I finished Spooky, I finished Alien Earth. Oh, you know, gotta bring it full circle here.
SPEAKER_04:I I appreciate that.
SPEAKER_03:So I finished Alien Earth. I'm so excited for a second season if it ever gets if it they better, they better. I don't want to say anything more, but they better green light it, or I might be very, very, very upset with how that does no Holly want to do it?
SPEAKER_05:Do you know?
SPEAKER_03:They have to. I mean, not to give it away, but there's not there's there's not there's just not like a definitive resolution. I can't imagine they don't. And so right after I uh I finished it, because that series does such a good job of sort of like giving a reference to a bunch of different alien properties, um, and so I just went right into watching aliens, alien dollar sign.
SPEAKER_05:What a movie.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, what a movie. Wow. And you know, spooky season. Listen to our alien v alien dollar sign episode, uh, listen to our alien three episode. Absolutely. We Xeno Xeno, we love Xenoporn here.
SPEAKER_05:We have like gone pretty in-depth with that series, maybe more so than any other series. Not that we touch a lot of those here.
SPEAKER_03:If we ever want to do if we want to do an angry episode where we're both mad, we should do Prometheus or Alien Card. I think that's your favorite horror series. Oh, I was talking like serious okay. So here's where we're confused.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, you were asking me about a television show. Yeah. Holy smokes. I don't know. I really liked of things that are more recent, I guess, if nothing else. I thought Midnight Mass was pretty good.
SPEAKER_03:I really enjoyed it. Midnight Mass was great. I almost re started rewatching that actually. Talk about not a Stephen King, but feels like Stephen King.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, what that which seems to almost always be the goal from that filmmaker.
SPEAKER_03:Flanagan, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Which I mean, I don't have a problem with that. No, I'm totally good with that.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, it was kind of like a better version of Salem's lot in some way.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely, it was. Yeah. And uh, I want to say for those who are listening, when Ben said, What's your favorite series? And I said, A Nightmare in Elm Street, no, that doesn't mean Freddie's Nightmares. Weirdos.
SPEAKER_03:I was gonna, I thought, yeah, freakos.
SPEAKER_05:No, but I mean William Bradley Pitt shows up, Mariska Hargate, various other recognizable people, baby. Freddie's nightmares.
SPEAKER_04:Are you ready? Are you ready? I'm so ready. Let's go. Let's go in. Facts, bitch. Archaeology is the search for facts.
SPEAKER_05:Okay, we watched The Cabin in the Woods. This was produced by Mutant Enemy, an MGM. It was distributed by Lionsgate. It is rated R. It was released in a big kind of release more so in 2012, but 2011, and it's an hour and 35 minutes. Budget on this film was$30 million. That's$43.2 million adjusted. Opening weekend wide release was April 13, 2012. Is that a Friday? December 2011 for several different festivals,$14.7 million opening weekend,$21.1 million adjusted. Final gross in North America,$42 million. That's$60.4 million. Final gross worldwide,$70 million. This made$100 million adjusted. Not too shabby. Other releases this weekend. The Fairly Brothers, three stooges. What was better between Three Stooges and Green Book? Don't fuck around. Be serious.
SPEAKER_03:What was better? I would say Three Stooges was more racist.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, you know my answer either way? Better to die. Better to die.
SPEAKER_03:Green Book was funnier.
SPEAKER_05:Lockout. Woman, thou art loosed on the seventh day. What? Those were the releases that weekend.
SPEAKER_03:That's not a thing.
SPEAKER_05:That is look it up.
SPEAKER_03:I don't want to. Look it up. I really don't want to. I don't want anyone in the room that I Google searched that.
SPEAKER_05:Weekend top five. The Hunger Games. The Three Stooges. This movie. Dark Time. Dark Time as well. Wow. Other films from 2012, Jack and Jill, The Apparition, Gone, Dread, Silent Hill, Revelation, Katy Perry, Part of Me, and Arbitrage.
SPEAKER_03:Is Dread the best movie of the year? I mean probably. That movie's incredible.
SPEAKER_05:That apparently Alex Garland actually directed secretly, I guess.
SPEAKER_03:He wrote the script, right?
SPEAKER_05:That's the rumor is that he basically directed the fucking movie, too.
SPEAKER_03:It is I it is so solid. It's movie very good.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. Visually and storytelling-wise and everything. I mean, consider thrillers or high suspense movies that take place in like essentially like one location that you can't escape, similar to. I mean, that's that's the cream of that crap.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Letterboxed averaged 3.4. Follow us, won't you? I'm at run BMC. I'm at Paul Axe Badly. There ain't no guest. We don't need no guests.
SPEAKER_03:You can ask my cousin.
SPEAKER_05:Your cousin's pretty hot. Thanks. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:We used to, we used to we used to have a thing.
SPEAKER_05:Never got past first place. Leonard Moulton says, yes, watch this movie. Rotten Tomatoes 92%, 74% popcorn, Metacritic 72, 7.4 user. Major award wins a nomination.
unknown:What?
SPEAKER_05:Nation. Nations. Saturn. Best horror. Brahm Stoker Award for Best Horror Screenplay. And it was a critic's choice nominee for Best Horror Film.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:Ben. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Talk about peeper. The director of this movie, Kevin in the Woods, is Drew Goddard, not Joss Whedon, as some people think. Bad Times at El Royale, the good place. Bad Times at El Royale is a awesome movie.
SPEAKER_05:I need to rewatch that movie.
SPEAKER_03:I really like that movie. It's very like Tarantino coded. I really enjoy that movie. Uh writers, Drew Goddard, The Martian, World War Z, and Joss Whedon, aforementioned, Titan A.E. Director of Photography, Peter Deming, The Menu, Muhalin Drive, Drag Me to Hell. All very good looking movies. What a talented person. This movie looks great. Music, David Julian, The Prestige, The Descent, Heartless. Producers, Jason Clark, Ed, 42, and Josh Whedon in your eyes, and a lot of other things. Starring in this movie, Kristen Connolly as Dana, The Happening, The Bay, Meet Dave. Happening was a movie I rented from Blockbuster, and I watched 15 minutes of it and went, no, thank you.
SPEAKER_05:What? No.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:No, Kurt, I'm producing Entourage. Watch my movie, The Happening. You're gonna like it. Ah, come on, play the top.
SPEAKER_03:You're gonna kill yourself because there's a plant. Say what up to your mother for me.
SPEAKER_05:You want me to hug my cousin? Look at her.
SPEAKER_03:Chris Hemsworth plays Kurt. A young Chris Hemsworth plays Kurt. Rush, Black Hat, Thor, the Dark World. The worst one. Anna Hutchison plays Jules. Robert the Bruce Encounter and Bachelor's. Franz Kranz plays Marty. The Dark Tower, The Village, Fanboy. Jesse Williams plays Holden. Brooklyn's Finest, Your Place Are Mine, The Butler. Richard Jenkins plays Citerson, Step Brothers, Spotlight, Jack Reacher. I love him. He's so funny.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, same.
SPEAKER_03:Bradley Whitford plays Hadley, Billy Madison, get out, scent of a woman. Oh, Eric's gonna have a baby. Yes, he is.
SPEAKER_05:He's gonna be a Jacob player.
SPEAKER_03:Eric drinks his own pee. Brian White plays Truman. Brick Stomp the Yard, the game plan. Game plan!
SPEAKER_05:Hey, listen to our game plan episode.
SPEAKER_03:Cornish's chosen son, Charles Norris. Amy Acker plays Lynn. Catch me if you can. Dear Santa, ordinary angels, and Tim Desarn plays Mordecai. Gone in 60 seconds. Tim Desarn! I'm just saying it how his name is Tim Desarn. Desarn. Tim Desarn. Gone in 60 seconds. Fight Club. Tales from the Crypt Demon Knight. Oh, we were gonna get Desarn. Double Desarn.
SPEAKER_05:No matter what.
SPEAKER_03:A double Desarn.
SPEAKER_05:We were gonna get a Darn it Darnold no matter how we did it.
SPEAKER_03:Darn it Darnold. Double Desarn Demon Knight. Alright, Paul. Fun facts?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, let's have some fun. Fun facts, fun facts, everybody. It's fun fact time. Times noodles out. Marty, the character played by Fran Krans, stays clothed in the doc scene because Fran Krans was in as good or better shape than the other male actors playing students. In the commentary for the film, the writers joke that he was ripped like a muscular Jesus. Hence his baggy and strange clothes throughout. You can tell that guy is fucking ripped, by the way. His shoulders are a perfect line.
SPEAKER_03:I know him. I knew him from watching Dollhouse. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah. I mean, he played like a nerd in that, but he was also like a love interest. So you were like, oh yeah, that dude's for Eliza Dushku. Yeah. Nice. Yeah, I do love my Eliza Dushka. I love that show. I actually I'm a big early Whedon fan, and I all the shit that he has done since whatever, like, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I like a lot of what I've seen of Buffy. Sorry, yeah. I love I was a big fan of watch from start to finish, but I like a lot of what I've seen. Yeah. I'm a casual man. Yeah. I didn't watch Firefly, but I watched Serenity and I was like, this is great.
SPEAKER_03:Oh yeah. Firefly's great too.
SPEAKER_05:Everybody says, and I believe it.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon wrote the script in three days. Insane. Insane to me. Chris Hemsworth booked the Red Dawn remake and the Kenneth Brana Thor while filming this movie. Thor was released before both as a result of the MGM bankruptcy and sale that was revolving around this movie being kind of in flux. Lionsgate loved this movie and picked it up for distribution rights in turnaround. And basically what that means is MGM couldn't afford to put the movie out. They used the movie that they owned at the time as leverage to buy themselves out of some debt, so they sold those distribution rights to Lionsgate. Kevin, one of the monsters on the whiteboard, is a tribute to the Elijah Wood character of the same name from the movie and graphic novel Sin City, movie 2005, directed by Robert Rodriguez, graphic novel Frank Miller. And in addition, Goddard and Wheaton created 60 other original monsters for this film. That's pretty cool.
SPEAKER_03:Well, semi-original, right? Like probably like sure.
SPEAKER_05:I agree with that a thousand percent.
SPEAKER_03:But I think that's kind of the purpose. Like there's just so much homage in this movie.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah. It's a our our werewolf had like a little pat like a patch here. It's like theirs goes doom doom doom chick doom doom. And our has doom doom doom chicko.
SPEAKER_03:Our hellraiser has blades coming out of it.
SPEAKER_05:Exactly. That's not pinhead, that's saw face. Yeah. Thermal coffee mug bong was a fully functional mug and bong.
SPEAKER_03:That's incredible.
SPEAKER_05:As portrayed in this movie. The prototype that was actually made cost five thousand dollars, and certainly it was worth every fucking penny.
SPEAKER_03:As Paul pulls it, you own that. He is currently smoking out of it. I thought that was coffee this whole time.
SPEAKER_05:You wouldn't pull a nice man over that's just drinking a delicious warm beverage.
SPEAKER_03:He is very funny in this movie.
SPEAKER_05:Just leave me alone. You can you want to tell the people the log line?
SPEAKER_03:I'll tell the people the log line. I'll tell all of you, my cousins, this log line. A group of kids goes to a go to a remote cabin in the woods where their fate is unknowingly controlled by technicians as part of a worldwide conspiracy where all horror movie cliches are revealed to be an elaborate sacrifice ritual.
SPEAKER_05:Whoa.
SPEAKER_03:That's a long log line.
SPEAKER_05:That's intense. That's a situation I'd love to be stuck in, my cousin. He's resourceful, he could get us out. So forget about cuff. I'm gonna come back. I don't know.
SPEAKER_03:I don't bring I'm gonna bring choppers. We're gonna take this whole place down. It's such good comic timing.
SPEAKER_05:That speech that apparently got him a few different roles, he really does fucking nail it.
SPEAKER_03:He does, and then the is so well timed after that. Like the comic.
SPEAKER_05:We're gonna get into this movie when we get back from this break after marrying our cousins, because they're so attractive.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, I didn't know that was it. I don't endorse that sounds too spooky for me.
SPEAKER_05:Tony, get the fuck out. Get the fuck out of here. We're back!
SPEAKER_03:We are back to this spooky episode. This is spicy. That's got to be by your cousins, which are you hanging out with cousins? That can be dangerous.
SPEAKER_05:That can be that's get spicy. You're at a family reunion, something like that, you know?
SPEAKER_03:You're like, oh she's cute, who's that? And she's like, that's your cousin.
SPEAKER_05:And then you're like, first cousin, and they're like, yeah. And you're like, you wanna get out of here?
SPEAKER_03:So we watch You wanna get a subway sandwich?
SPEAKER_05:You wanna get out of here? Get a subway sandwich?
SPEAKER_03:That is dangerous. Be careful though.
SPEAKER_04:Moonball.
SPEAKER_03:We watched Cabin in the Woods. That's the episode you are listening to. Oh spooky episode of Review Review. Sans a guest, no guests, no cousins, no ghosts, just me and Paul being dips.
SPEAKER_05:And whatever is making that foul emanation. Yes. That's my dips. Uh see a doctor. Watched Cabin in the Woods and know we don't have a guest, but Ben, do you have the cards handy?
SPEAKER_03:You mean my whore crux?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, I was gonna say, because I mean you're gonna kill me unless you get these cards for me.
SPEAKER_05:I was gonna say you're physically here digitally with me and not six foot under the ground with an epitaph, so you must have the cards.
SPEAKER_03:We are at least 500 feet away.
SPEAKER_05:It's true. Who gets the freebie, you or me? I guess you should just take it since you're sitting there.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:Just pick a card, pal.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:And read it out loud in Latin.
SPEAKER_03:For you who are just tuning in, we play a game of Cinephile to determine the order of who tells their story of watching this movie for the first time and the most recent time. It is a card game uh that has an actor on it and a movie, and we basically play round robin to name a movie that actor puts in until one of us can't. That's basically it. Let's see what I got. I got I don't know if we've had this one. I need you to remain calm. I need you to get ready because it is Sir Vester Salone. I just turned around.
SPEAKER_06:Oh, Paul, I need you to get the switch that goes on. When the switch goes on, I feel like I've got the first switch.
SPEAKER_01:I'm gonna go with first blood. I feel like a demolition man. Um I will go with Rambo two?
SPEAKER_05:I'll give it to you.
SPEAKER_01:What's the subtitle?
SPEAKER_05:First blood Rambo two.
SPEAKER_01:Oh okay.
SPEAKER_05:First blood two, Rambo. That's who cares. I'll just say Rambo three.
SPEAKER_03:Okay. I I know there's like I d I I don't know if do we need the subtitles for these? Because I know there's four Rambo four.
SPEAKER_05:I think I think we can let that happen. Yeah. As long as I can do Rambo Last Blood, which I believe is the fifth.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah. Okay. I believe that's right. Um The Expendables.
SPEAKER_05:Expendables two.
SPEAKER_03:The Expendables III. The Expendables Four. Spy Kids?
SPEAKER_05:Paradise Alley.
SPEAKER_03:Jesus. That's a deep cut. I've never heard of that movie. Um your big sliced alone. Let's go. Did we do Rocky yet?
SPEAKER_05:No.
SPEAKER_03:Rocky II. Rocky III. Rocky Four. Rocky Bal Ba or Rocky Five? Those are two different movies, aren't they?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I'll just take I'll take the opposite one. Okay. Your turn again.
SPEAKER_03:Creed? Creed two. This is a good this is a good mass. This is around. I'm just gonna take I'm sure I could sit here and think of one, but I I don't have one immediately in my head, so I'll take the L.
SPEAKER_05:Okay. Nighthawks over the top, and the party at Stud and Kitties, and Oscar and Stopper My Mom will shoot. I'll go with those.
SPEAKER_03:I was proud of my spy kids poll.
SPEAKER_05:That was pretty good. I was a little surprised by that.
SPEAKER_03:Anytime I can bring spy kids into the conversation, I will.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely positively. I was also gonna say Guardians of the Galaxy.
SPEAKER_03:Oh yeah, and Guardians Galaxy 2. Yeah, and technically the Suicide Squad.
SPEAKER_05:Absolutely is the shark monster thing. This is the thing that I normally will feel really confident about when we do those like action titans, when those pop up, I'm gonna be able to go for a bit. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Good thing he's also the um America's Hollywood back to greatness.
SPEAKER_05:By the way, I uh am pleased that you were like, I'm he wasn't in cleed three. I'm not I'm not taking that.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:For you to move off Creed three because I I would have called you on it. I knew the way to go. Way to go, baby.
SPEAKER_03:You know, I can I can get there sometimes, but I knew I was screwed.
SPEAKER_05:Um it was a good match, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:So I remember the first time I watched this movie very, very vividly. I was uh touring Shakespeare around Washington State in a van with five other folks down by the river, sometimes in the most rural bumfuck areas of Washington, eastern Washington you could think of, where people at gas stations will probably call your girlfriend a whore.
SPEAKER_05:Oh yes.
SPEAKER_03:Oh yes. And we had our night free, and I think it was like let's all go to a movie at uh this like small movie theater, and I I couldn't even tell you what town we were in. We were in one of the small ass eastern Washington towns. And I remember me and my friend Brandon, Brandon is a huge horror movie guy. Um, he does uh you saw his uh improv troop Blood Squad. They do an Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So he he was like, I'm down to see that. I really want to. And there was another girl in our cast, and she was like, I don't know, it just looks dumb. And we were like, it's it's not, it is kind of dumb, but it's not it's not the dumb, bad, dumb like you think it is.
SPEAKER_05:It's intentional, it's intentionally being that, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:And she was like, I don't know, I'm not really into those into horror movies. And we're like, no, but it's we think it's like subversive or comedic or whatever, and so we convinced her to come see it, and 15 minutes in she leaves, and she goes and watches Hunger Games instead.
SPEAKER_05:Wow, yeah, left her fucking snacks or and like afterwards we were like, Why did you go?
SPEAKER_03:And she was like, Well, I like I told you, it's dumb, and it it was dumb. We were like, we then explained the entire movie to her, and she was like, Oh, oh, like she didn't realize that it was this whole like deconstruction of horror tropes and shit like that.
SPEAKER_05:It takes a while for that first scene to make sense if you don't stick around.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, especially when you leave, you're just seeing like the beginning of Evil Dead or something. Yep. I get it, but anyway, uh, I really enjoyed it. I bought it uh once it came available on the Blu-ray. It has been a regular rotation for me uh on during spooky season in Halloween. Oh I throw it on quite often during on Halloween, if we have folks over. I love it as a background movie, and so I'm yeah, yeah, I I feel really good about going to bat for this movie. Um, I have some issues with the ending, but I always enjoy this movie. It's such a fun time, and it's so script is so quick and sharp and it's tight. So I'm gonna sit at four and a half. Whoa! Four and a half husband bulges.
SPEAKER_05:For those that are uneducated, that's a boner.
SPEAKER_03:He's got a he's got a husband bulge.
SPEAKER_05:We'll go into this. We'll be talking about your rating system at length the length of a husband bulge.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, it depends on the husband, really.
SPEAKER_05:I saw this movie in the theater opening weekend. Don't remember any of the other context. I'm sure it's not that important. Relaced his weed. It could be, could have something to do with it. And I know I've seen pieces of the movie since then, but that was the only time I sat and actually watched the movie. And I remember walking away, and when I saw pieces of it being like, oh yeah, this is pretty good. I have recommended this movie to people with never really having sat and watched it again.
SPEAKER_03:Oh wow.
SPEAKER_05:In one sitting. So this is perfect for this. Because it is the movie that I have absolutely been like, yep, solid movie, good movie. Should definitely watch this movie, but I haven't seen it in well over a decade.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:I would have, I guess, given it, it must have been somewhere in the neighborhood of three and a half. Guess what my rating system has been.
SPEAKER_03:Husband Bulges?
SPEAKER_05:No, it's the Bong Thermos. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's gotta be. I'm a stereotype, right? That's my archetype, right? The fool.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, you would be a great, not not just as you as a character, but you as an actor, you would play that role really well.
SPEAKER_05:I appreciate that. It's a role that would be really fun to play, I think.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I love the archetypes in this movie, and I love how it very purposely goes further into them. Keep going.
SPEAKER_05:No, I I want to keep what you just said because I also want to say in this moment that I want to give the script credit while specifically removing a ton of credit for the dialogue, but I like the way the script is built and executed. Yeah, it's re that is pretty cool. The the movie has some interesting stuff in terms of the tone that I think it mostly juggles pretty well, like which is in this movie, can I sure was probably pretty difficult to do, considering it rides a lot of different lines. I was, and I watched this on HBO Max. I was not in love with the visual presentation, it seemed a little over dark at times where it was like, I don't know a hundred percent what's going on. Is that the movie? Is that the presentation? I'm watching it on streaming, eh? Those sorts of things. I like the practical effects. Yeah, I don't love the digital effects. And the movie feels there's a level of, you know, we talk about this with certain writers or directors or certain movies or whatever, where there's a level of like you feel like somebody's masturbating while they're writing this and laughing at their own jokes. And that comes across in this movie to me at times, but you actually put it in a way, and it this kind of happened to me with Dawn of the Dead, and it's happened to me with Underworld and just some other horror movies, where it's like, this is such a perfectly fine like background movie or movie where I think you can go to a horror aficionado or a horror novice and go, yeah, Cabin in the Woods, similar to Dawn of the Dead. It's like, yeah, it's pretty inoffensive. It's like it's not bad outright. So I'm in a pretty sturdy three extended bong thermoses. I don't have a huge desire to sit and consume this very seriously again, but this is one of those rare things where you said something about background movie, and I was like, I feel like I could just have this on in the background and occasionally tune in and be like, oh, fun at times. I'm gonna go with the three. I'm so shocked that you said four and a half. I love that we're doing this.
SPEAKER_03:I find this, I find the script very smart. I am ready to back it up. Um to me, I would rather watch this movie than so many of the other things that it's referencing only due to how fun this movie is. Like how fun and fast this movie is. Like I can, like you said, I can put this on during Halloween while I'm decorating and just enjoy the shit out of it as opposed to putting on Hellraiser.
SPEAKER_05:Um yeah, that is a specific Yeah, but you're right. Yes, there is imagery and stuff in this movie that makes you think and feel things in terms of Clyde Cabal, Hellraiser, that whole deal. Let's just you wanna do it? Should we do it? Start the movie.
SPEAKER_04:And now, our feature presentation.
SPEAKER_03:Like casting the uh two sort of like people controlling this, Bradley Whitford and Richard Jenkins, inspired because both of them to me are so fucking good at understated throwaway humor. You know, we are jumped into this seemingly like lab situation or sort of work situation that looks just like it's like a water cooler talk.
SPEAKER_05:It's two dudes chatting at the fucking water cooler about cabinets and world powers like falling.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Like and it's very casual.
SPEAKER_03:It's very casual, and the whole like their chemistry is great, and the you know, Bradley Whitford's desire to get his make his bet of who what he thinks. We don't really know what's fully going on at this point, but I love no this sort of like introduction to something bigger going on before we get to what feels very cliche.
SPEAKER_05:Coming into this movie for the first time in a long time, totally forgot that it starts out with these guys, and that they have such an intricate, large role in this movie. I was like, I feel like they don't really show up until like act two, and I start the movie and I'm like, oh shit, wow. I completely forgot how involved they are, as well as just one of the things that I really try to do for movies with this podcast is like listen really closely to dialogue, like best that I can. And when they're talking about Sweden falling and it's just between the US and Japan, and it's like, what the fuck is going on here? And it it starts off really interesting, and it doesn't hurt to like just like you cut to an idyllic neighborhood in this kind of push-up shot of this beautiful house, and it I feel so much of scream, like this feels like a Kevin Williamson meets Kevin Smith, directed by something along those lines. And there's even like a girl dancing in her panties, like right in the very beginning of the movie. It goes into tropes like quick after this, like, what the fuck are we doing here? And I mean that it's working really well.
SPEAKER_03:What I was quoting was like, they're just like driving on the golf cart, and he's like, Yeah, I might replace my cabinets later. Are you right? Are you even listening to me? And then it's just scream, like just like jump scare, scream, cabin in the woods, like really violently on the screen. The titles are great, and you're like, What? And then yeah, it cuts right into this like kind of a cliche opening, kind of like scream-ish. And to me, it's like I think Josh is uh accusations aside and all that, and feel like he's really good at understanding genre and understanding how to approach genre in different genres in different ways, and that we start in this, yeah, she's in her panties, and like her best friend shows up, she's dyed her hair blonde, and she's got a jockey, she's got a jockey boyfriend, right, and then this like hot new dude who's joining their group, and she's heartbroken over her professor dumped her, and you're seeing all of her incredible drawings and stuff, which like never really come back or play a part.
SPEAKER_05:But I do like it, it's funny because of course you're thinking as these gentlemen come in, and Chris Hemsworth like makes this awesome pass out to Jesse Williams through a window, and it's like, holy shit, like sign back. But when he says, and you're not wearing pants, and it's very it's like a casual aside, it's not awkward, it's very breezy, like in that moment. I'm super locked in at this this first.
SPEAKER_03:The the scene does a lot of other heavy lifting that I really appreciate. It does. Is that it first off, it shows how how sort of like willing, I forget her friend's name, um, Jules. Willing how Jules is funny and has like a good sense of humor uh towards her boyfriend. She's not like subverse subverting herself to him. She's like, I learned it from watching you, like all this like funny jokey stuff, and that Kurt is actually like intelligent, and you know, he's a sociology major, which we love.
SPEAKER_05:The books, like the don't read that, read this. Uh, like this is way better, more fun.
SPEAKER_03:But it's showing us that these characters who we're going to watch fall farther away from themselves, right? Like, this is who they actually are. Like Jesse Williams Holden, yeah, he's like a receiver for the team, but like he seems like just kind of a dorky dude and kind of like well and he's like the isn't he the scholar archetype in the end?
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, so it it's one of those things where it is doing something that is fun and original in that it's doing so many things with and against type with casting, yeah, but I think are all kind of like working for me. Like when Marty shows up, he's totally playing type, like goofy, shaggy hair, like I love weed. All these archetype type things are absolutely they're totally working for me. The idea, the concept that's in the script, and the way that they execute it and the details of it, that stuff definitely works for me. And I think the archetypes are so vital to this thing, and they they really knocked it out of the park with that piece of it, and to the with the casting.
SPEAKER_03:The casting strong. But they get into Kurt's RV and they're heading to Kurt's cousins brought to you by cousins. Sounds dangerous to me. Uh cabin on the lake. I see. And we see uh right when they pull away, we see that there's um somebody watching them from the roof. So they're clearly being surveyed. Yeah, like there's this there's this whole other conspiracy going on. But right now it's just like pretty by the book cliche horror movie, five college kids head into a cabin in the woods.
SPEAKER_05:But it does it for like a scene where we meet these core characters, the the core five characters, and then we go back to the control room. I know that that happened, but I just didn't I guess I didn't remember that I spent as much time there as I did, but they're talking about this very first leg that these kids have to get through of this kind of the game situation that they're in, that they have to see the Harbinger who is this gas station weirdo who is also Homer in no, not that Homer, Homer from Tales from the Crypt Demon Knight Tim Des Tim Desarn, Desarn Don, Darnold, dang it, Don, Dan, Sam, Darn, Tim Desarn. But the movie it starts doing this, and I have mentioned this about other properties, as we've discussed on this program. I'm like, oh, Friday the 13th, uh Hills have I's uh Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Like, I I'm starting to my brain is starting to overwhelm itself to a degree with how referential or inspired this is by so many things. Yeah, purposely. Yeah, and I know that it's kind of trying to posit that potentially as it zooms out with the cubes later, that all these horror movie situations have essentially all been sacrifices through the years through different means. So as they're driving, this CG has aged like a fucking turd in a punch bowl. Oh, yeah, in terms of the hawk.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, before we go, but before we move on, that scene with Mordecai is so funny to me.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, yeah. No, we need to go into that. You're right.
SPEAKER_03:It is like uh uh how long have you been here since the war? Which war? You know damn well which war.
SPEAKER_05:Like Nam, motherfucker, you know it's Naam.
SPEAKER_03:But just like out of nowhere, you damn know what well which war. It was just like I think that is one of the funniest lines ever written.
SPEAKER_05:This first scene with him and his level of commitment and like the tobacco spitting and the level of venom in which he delivers stuff and whatever, absolutely love it. Guy doing absolutely awesome like character actor work, knows the assignment and absolutely delivers. Like A. In this scene, I again I'm still mostly into it through this scene, and you're you're right, it is so vital as we've seen this in mainstream movies that I just mentioned and less mainstream movies so many times. Like the the weirdo that's like, don't go over there, there's an evil dead over there, pet a million different movies.
SPEAKER_03:I just love the interactions that they have, and that we see Chris Hemsworth like step up, and then we see Franz Cranz just be this. Marty kind of steps up-ish. Yeah, well, you know, they're you know, they're gonna be bringing the railroad through here soon. Good luck with your business. Good luck with your business.
SPEAKER_05:That was that line I like, and I'm mostly into it here until uh it's I don't know what it is. It's just like that CG of the hawk is so fucking rough, and the CG of the RV coming through the tunnel is so fucking rough. There's a part of me that almost is like, is this supposed to be some sort of homage to Evil Dead or Evil Dead 2? And how rough the the transition is, like of them driving over the bridge and the bridge being broken, and it and again, that's how my brain works. I'm a crazy person. And yeah, the the bird hits the shield and dies, and that basically tells us like the movie's way of saying, uh oh, there's no turning back from here.
SPEAKER_03:It doesn't look great, but we get this idea that they are now like trapped in something, some sort of cage arena cage. Yeah. Um, you know what's funny is the person who went and saw Hunger Games when I started describing this movie, and I was like, Oh, yeah, you know, actually, it's very it's actually kind of like Hunger Games. Yeah, or the Running Man, or this is me on a screen. Listen to our Running Man episode.
SPEAKER_05:Please, it's so good. Chris Holmes, we love you.
SPEAKER_03:I I love the design of the cabin, by the way. When they pull up to the cabin, it looks great.
SPEAKER_05:Best moment of the movie in terms of the visuals, and I'm not fucking around when they pull up to that, because everything feels so practical on location until that point, and I'm sure a lot of it isn't, but it's lit really well. This is a very talented DP director of photography, cinematographer, person who uh sets up the camera shots for movies. He does such an excellent job of being like, okay, now this is a set, this is control. Like you the everything about the visuals and the tone and the feel of the visuals just changes in an instant. It's fantastic.
SPEAKER_03:Like the way that they sort of like they're throwing these kids into this cabin. There's a a mirror, there's a one-way or two-way mirror, one-way mirror, whatever. Two-way. Uh yeah, and I love that one-way standard.
SPEAKER_05:You just kind of stand with your cousin for like a hug and or like a kiss and kind of a tender and you just want to look at each other, and that's a one-way mirror.
SPEAKER_03:That's your cousin. But I love this sequence where Holden is like, he sees Dana in there, and he's like, and I think his um Jesse Williams' performance there is great, where he's like, uh, do I I don't know, am I supposed to? And then when she starts to like unbutton, he's like, Okay, okay, okay, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.
SPEAKER_05:I have a question.
SPEAKER_03:Okay.
SPEAKER_05:He walks away at a point where he's like, I shouldn't be watching this, I'm just gonna walk out of here.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And then he walks back.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Before he decides ultimately, I can't do this. Yeah. Do you see all of that coming? Him going, I I can't watch this, this is wrong. I'm gonna walk away. That he's gonna walk back and then ultimately do the right thing. Do you sense that coming? Can you telegraph it?
SPEAKER_03:I've I've seen this movie so many times. I mean, maybe like again, it's leaning so hard into tropes, so probably, yeah. Okay, like I don't think it's trying to hide anything. I don't feel like it's trying to mask anything. It feels very the only thing that maybe it's trying to mask is like this overarching conspiracy, uh, which that that is my one problem with this movie is I feel like the ending is is kind of a cop-out.
SPEAKER_05:But I yeah, we'll talk about that.
SPEAKER_03:I don't think anything is trying, I don't think anything is trying to reinvent the wheel here.
SPEAKER_05:Sure. I I don't disagree with you. It's one of those things where sometimes those things that I guess I can telegraph I'm satisfied by, and some things I guess I'm not really as much. And this is one of those moments where it feels like a writer or somebody like jerking off, being like, Aren't I so clever? I just didn't find it that clever necessarily, and of course, the there's a level two when they switch rooms and now she can watch him because he has to give the admission. He starts undressing immediately, and it's like he knows she's watching.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, did you see him with a shirt off? I would start he looks fucking amazing. I would start undressing immediately. I thought he was my cousin. He has sorry you can't. I hope he's got that he's got that V.
SPEAKER_05:That deep V, the sex lines as they're called. He looks fucking great. There's no doubt. Like the the cast of this movie, it's a bunch of gorgeous human beings, as it should be, especially Brad Whitford and Dicky Janky, by the way. Janky Dickey? Gorgeous. Janky Dicky, Dickey Janky, no, Dicky Janky.
SPEAKER_03:The the Dickey is I do like now we are seeing them, and I they start to mention like we're starting to see them like dissolve, desolve, dissolve, yeah, dissolve into their archetypes in some and they're using it.
SPEAKER_05:How people perceive would perceive them, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:And yeah, and like we learn later, like these are necessary archetypes, like everyone here is necessary for a reason. In terms of like just slasher movies, like we need to see the jock become this dumb alpha jock. We need to see his girlfriend become the like and they start playing truth or dare, which I think is such a great, just such a great, like obvious but fun way to sort of like launch us into what was gonna be um the inciting incident.
SPEAKER_05:It's so there's a couple things. We go to the control room again, and this is where it's really prevalent to me, and this is a thing that I like, like a detail that I like that they have all this old tech and modern tech that's kind of been blended together, which feels very government-y to me, and like it's a it's a cool detail that I really enjoy. Very well, and that they're going, yeah, that they're gonna go through the we're gonna ramp up their their libido because we can pump in drugs or what have you at this place like anytime we want.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And then they have the speakerphone call with the harbinger with Mordecai.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And it's a joke after a joke for me that also again feels like this is not that clever.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, it's so funny now.
SPEAKER_05:Stop tripling down on this. Like, I'm still on speakerphone, aren't I? Ugh. And it's it's just not the tone gets shaky for me at points. There's a level of, and I get that he's like way too passionate about his job, he's super into it, he's like a method actor. Like, I understand everything the movie I think is saying. I think it's just I think that's the thing that is not working for me. Similar to this podcast, the movie wants to be very funny, and I'm not sure how funny it is.
SPEAKER_03:See, that's the thing. I find it very funny. Yeah, and I I get that. I like you said, I don't I don't laugh out loud. I watched this movie for like the 400th time and I was laughing at moments. I I and again, I am very I love Josh Sweeton's writing. Yeah this to me, I hear what you're saying in terms of like seeing the writer, but like these are bits that I find we gotta have these bits in here. You gotta find those bits because like sure, otherwise, we're just doing what are we doing? We're just taking taking your harbinger who's yeah, takes it very, very seriously, and then putting them in a situation with people who don't take it seriously.
SPEAKER_05:That's a funny bit. I get it, like the dichotomy of it and whatnot. I don't know. There's just there's a level of I understand that this is everybody else's like everyday job in the control room, and I understand that there's one person that really takes all of that very seriously, and it's the security guard guy. Yeah. But there's a level of it that just I mean, the thing is though, that's it's not that he doesn't he doesn't take it seriously, he's new, right? So that's the only reason he does, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:But to me, it's it's less about him taking it seriously. What I see from that is so we we're we're in this, like we learn there's a you know that these two guys are sort of like the uh they steer the ship, and then you have like producer woman who kind of is like communicating back and forth about departments, and this new security guy from upstairs, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:She's like a liaison for yeah, something.
SPEAKER_03:What I see, at least from what I get from his performance, and what I think the script is saying, is like he's kind of seen how casual and banal these people's lives are to them. Yeah, he's the human in the room, and he's like kind of stunned by it because these people are they're awful. So he like I just feel like he is us watching them be horrible humans and killing just killing people, and he doesn't really understand, and we don't understand the bigger reason behind it.
SPEAKER_05:This is like us watching football, like at any moment, and people bet money on this and whatnot. At any moment, something absolutely terrible can happen, and this is just for people's entertainment. And so I think there is uh the movie is definitely wanting to say a lot of things, and it's also creeping a little bit into like creep show territory for and like so many different horror movies, and I know that that's what the movie wants to do. I just never feel the movie stand up on its own legs completely and really start running, and when it really tries to and will get there, I don't know how fast it really runs. Like for me, it's like I think I said at the very beginning of this, it's irrefutable that this movie is not bad. This is a solid fucking movie. Yeah, it's just so much of it feels more subjective than so many of the things that I've ever watched. It's like I personally think anybody that's like Jurassic Park, that movie sucks. It's like you're a fucking idiot. What the fuck are you talking about?
SPEAKER_03:But if somebody's there's a Jurassic Park reference in this movie.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, I but this movie, if somebody's like, that movie fucking sucks, or that movie's fucking great, it's like, yeah, that's why I think this is one of the perfect movies for us to to talk about. And while they're playing Truth or Dare here, and she like makes out what the wolf head Jules does. I know they're trying to create dread here and the camera shots and the way that things are kind of like feel a little bit like misty or foggy at times, and the way that like it almost looks like there's the wolf is maybe a puppet or has a hand in it at a moment, something like that. But it's just again, it's so many things are not fully landing for me. There's I guess there's a part of me in terms of the wolf or something that I'm like, get to it, let's go. Like, do I have a level like do I have an unearned level of impatience already at this point? Where I because I I don't think I am rooting for anybody, but I'm also I'm not rooting for death, but I'm rooting for entertainment.
SPEAKER_03:Like oh, interesting. Yeah, I don't have that issue. I find I honestly find like That is like such a great weird buildup. It's like creepy and weird, and we don't know what's gonna happen with that wolf. Then it switches to the door. The door opens. That's great. And you're like, oh, it wasn't about the wolf at all. I feel like that it's sort of like a yeah, it's a red herring sort of thing. Um, I agree. What we get to the basement, and with all of these things, that to me is like this is so much fun. We are now watching our heroes pick what their fate is, and I think that that, and we see all these different things and like different options, and like he had the conch in his hand, like we're seeing the big conch shell. Yeah, like if he just blew the conch shell, that merman is coming.
SPEAKER_05:Dude, yeah, he had it in his hand. I was rooting for you. There is stuff, you're right. There's a lot of stuff about this that's good. There's like even things where they say, Oh, what about the cellar door? When the cellar door pops up, and I'm like, this feels like an homage to Evil Dead, as there, I think, are many in this movie, as well as like maybe even Donnie Darko to a degree, yeah. Uh that happens through this movie. But I like that Dana, when the door flips up, that she's dared to go down there into this cellar with all these cursed objects. Dana Dana's dared to go down there with Don Darnold, darn it.
SPEAKER_03:Darn it, Darnold Design. Damn, dude. Design. And yeah, there's the music box, there's all this creepy shit, but the the journal of the the husband bulge and whatever the like the Necronomicon.
SPEAKER_05:The DM husband bulge, the the the necrococacon.
SPEAKER_03:Zombie. What is it? What do they say? Yes, you had money on zombies, but this was homicidal. Yeah, redneck homicidal zombie.
SPEAKER_05:Bloodthirsty. Yeah, it's it's a sub, they're totally different. Yeah, yeah. This is what I wrote, by the way. It's Kevin Smith's story, screenplay by Kevin Williamson, directed by Sam Raimi.
SPEAKER_01:And not another Kevin.
SPEAKER_05:And yeah, but like not all these elements always fit for me. That's it's like, wait, you're giving me like the Scream guy versus the guy who wrote the unproduced Superman with the Evil Dead guy. I don't know where I'm at here. By the way, Scream, arguably the best series of horror movies in terms of overall quality.
SPEAKER_03:I think you're tapping into something that I think is purposeful for me. Sure. Is that I I don't feel like the movie is trying to be stand like it's it's standing on the shoulders of giants, and it's the love letter in some degree of like, look at how fun these movies are and how fun they are to pull apart. And that's all the movie needs to be for me.
SPEAKER_05:Do you feel like this is like a hot shots of Evil Dead to a degree? Like less less ridiculous, but yeah.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, I was just I was thinking about Naked Gun while you were talking, like the new because like I was thinking like that to me is almost too. I enjoy the new Naked Gun. It's like a three or a three and a half for me, but it feels almost like too much of a joke per minute. For me, I really appreciate that this movie doesn't do a joke per minute and leans back into the plot sometimes, but then brings us back into this sort of like meta idea of building these horror movies, which are in in their own right kind of ridiculous and silly. And so, like when we see like the Japanese on the screen, oh my god, it's great.
SPEAKER_05:The girls are like, ah, yeah, they're just singing, they just love that it gets all love and happiness and like together, and it and it ruins like Samara from the ring or whatever it's supposed to be. Yeah, the zombie buckners, though, are the ones who are chosen to bring the red blood wood, yeah. And they have a 100% clearance rate, yeah, like they they never fail. So the idea is that these zombie buckner folks are gonna kill all of the campers because now that Japan has fallen because of love and togetherness, and everybody being like, You're my cousin, but I love you. That the frog is so great, yeah. The happiness frog. That is a very good scene.
SPEAKER_03:I didn't see it coming that it would be a little frog.
SPEAKER_05:Um that is a very good scene. But when Hemsworth and his girlfriend are getting really horny, is he's like, I love beers and wet titties and whatever, and he's not being himself.
SPEAKER_03:And I love that Franz Kranz does that. He's like, he's a sociology major. Yeah, he calls everything out. What is wrong with everyone?
SPEAKER_05:When he has this theory that everyone's being puppeted, because the weed, and of course, I love this. The fact that he's a stoner makes him see things more so for what they are. That his mind is open to think of like, yeah, but what could this be this?
SPEAKER_03:And Paul, not to yeah, he already thinks I feel like he already thinks the world's a conspiracy in some way. So go back to the he's one step ahead of them already.
SPEAKER_05:Well, and they say in the in the movie, too, that his weed was helping him for certain. They mention it a couple different times. Hemsworth and the girlfriend are super horny, and they start getting after it after they go through the horror trope of, and this is the thing that is odd, is that she'll make out with a wolf or whatever, but they have to do the trope of like the girlfriend or whatever being resistant, but the pheromones come in and they end up doing it. There's a line here that I really like when we're back in the control room as they're doing it, where I don't remember who says it, but it's you know what's at stake here. Like you've been told what's at stake here. So that's the thing that is the mystery that is keeping me more interested, I think, than anything. Because I'm not super worried about any of the characters or what they're doing. There's a level of a voyeurism feel that I think you're right, I think is intentional, but it's like, yeah, the banality of like people betting on people dying and what the monsters will be and so forth. And so I just feel like I'm going through the motions a little bit.
SPEAKER_03:Sure. Well, you know, you know these deaths are gonna start happening, right?
SPEAKER_05:It breaks it up with cool, interesting stuff that is involved with the mystery that has me more so gripped. Sure. Which is like this we offer in humility and fear for the blessed peace of your eternal slumber as it ever was, and then they're kind of like all culty about it as it ever was.
SPEAKER_03:Three different sides of a triangle here, right, Paul? Always that's what's happening here. The Buckners come and they they get them before they come.
SPEAKER_05:Not the merman. Not the merman.
SPEAKER_03:I just want to see a merman one time, one time he had the conch in his hand. I know, buddy. I know, bud.
SPEAKER_05:Bradley Whitford, I just know they're so great, they have great chemistry.
SPEAKER_03:I love Bradley Whitford and get out too. Oh my god, dude. I would have voted for Obama the third time, like that line delivery.
SPEAKER_05:That I hope we get that movie at some point. Yeah, that movie is so so wonderful. It's a special one, and layered and incredible. So there's a blood sacrifice that has nothing to do with this or the Etsy witch. And it almost looks like Blade, yeah, where the it's uh and the CG's about the level of that movie as well. And we're finding out that like these lines in these stones, just like Blade, have to be filled with these blood sacrifices, and that's all we know about it at this point is that Bradley Whitford goes over and pulls a lever, and the blood that hits the ground goes to the sacrifice.
SPEAKER_03:Nana, or Nana, Nana, who's Nana? Nina, uh Julie, the sperm claimant, uh, and she is the hoo'er, apparently.
SPEAKER_05:The the the who'er appropriate for me to quote too short in that moment, I guess.
SPEAKER_03:The who-er. And um Kurt comes running back in, and uh I think they brutal stabbings and bear traps and yeah, these guys I do like when the Buckner husband, the husband bulge is standing there and he throws the fake head. Yeah, I think that's a great prosthetic. The head looks great, it does. The her hair's all bloody, throws the head, and like I think Dana's scream is good. Like Kristen Conway, I feel like does such a great job of playing the the final girl in this. Her response is when they try like they close the door, and uh I love I just love the sequence of being like, Great, we have to stick together, we we have to stay in one room together, and then being like seeing uh Janky Rich uh Richard Jenkins, Janky Dix, like with his doing doing the Patrick Stewart hand in his hand in his hand and being like, Why do they have to be so fucking smart and just like release some sort of thing for for him to just go, wait, no, we have to split up. And France Brown's just being like, What?
SPEAKER_05:I gotta say, in this makes sense in the in-between too, is like Marty's hearing voices that are saying, like, go for a walk, and he's like, I'm too smart, I'm not gonna do that. I think I'll go for a walk. Yeah, which you kind of yeah, of course he's going to, and says the husband bulge thing to Jesse Williams, where he's like, He's go to husband bulge, and it's like, in case you didn't get that when they were in the cellar, here's that joke again. But that head throw thing that you're talking about, have you seen Demon Knight?
SPEAKER_03:No, I've never seen it.
SPEAKER_05:There is a level of Ernest R. Dickerson, who was Spike Lee's protege, who directed Demon Knight, where Billy Zane throws a head into the house. Okay, and everybody says, We gotta fucking stick together. And the archetype of the dude who's like, I'm a big strong guy, I'll lead you, who's Thomas Hayden Church? Is like, fuck you, do what I say, and like whatever, and is like a total moron. And there are parts of this movie that feel a get like Demon Knight, but Demon we'll talk about Demon Knight on this program at some point, but it is Moses Olsen, help me. There, there's a Hemsworth save where he comes in out of nowhere to first Franz Kranz gets attacked, and we think right he finds he finds like a camera in his room, and he's like, What the fuck?
SPEAKER_03:And then one of the Buckners come and take him out, and we think he is gone. They pull the they pull the blood thing and we think Franz Kranz character is dead, but he Yeah, I never understood that.
SPEAKER_05:I was like, wait, so they got the blood though? He's not dead, but they got the blood.
SPEAKER_03:I don't think no, but it's not their it's not their blood. I think they have to just like they have to kill someone and then they have blood that is fed into the sound.
SPEAKER_05:Okay. I just wasn't sure. When he pulls the microphone, by the way, it almost reminds me of the the game where the tag is on the lamp.
unknown:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:But he pulls the microphone and is discovering what's happening, and he uses that bong thermos to fight, and he's doing a great job. Yeah. But he gets drug away and stabbed, and the blood is is sacrificed, but he's not dead, so the blood doesn't matter, I guess.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, like I said, I think I've always thought the blood was uh not like it was just sort of a performative.
SPEAKER_05:Interesting, but the deity knows that the person is still like the goddess.
SPEAKER_03:Okay, like there's a death that has occurred. Okay. That that's been my take. And I think maybe like the movie is I'm filling in gaps here for that the movie isn't doing for me. But yeah, so we get the they've split up now, which is the dumbest thing they could have done, and then they're locked in their rooms. Franz Crimes gets pulled away, and then Dana gets attacked through the door.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_03:Here comes Jesse Williams breaking through that fake mirror, and they get saved. And Kurt. I'm trying to remember what happens to Kurt here.
SPEAKER_05:Well, they go to the cellar, right?
SPEAKER_03:The cellar, and a new cellar.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, a different room, the black room, where sacrifices happened, according to the diary. And she stabs that one Buckner to death.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:And then Chris Hemsworth shows up again for another save because he kind of gets everybody to split up and saves people or whatever, and then does this again. But they all get in the RV, they're getting the fuck out of here. Uh Samara from the Ring is a frog in Japan, and the US people are freaking the fuck out because the tunnel is okay. It's not collapsed. Like the brid if it's Evil Dead or Evil Dead 2, the bridge is still intact. Yeah. Like the sacrifice is not gonna happen.
SPEAKER_03:So he's run into fine engineering or yeah, what do they call them? Uh demolitions.
SPEAKER_05:Demolitions, demolitions makes more sense.
SPEAKER_03:We don't know, we don't know what happened. We there was a malfunction, we didn't get the call. It's like blow the fucking, and so they blow it white when they're driving through, and they have to back up.
SPEAKER_05:But who fucked that up or who like was the were the people upstairs like trying to? Were they the ones that created the issue for demolition? For what created that issue? Oh, because he was pulling wires and stuff. Okay, yeah. Hemsworth has his big speech after they're like, okay, we can't get out the tunnel, we can't go this way, we can't drive back to the cabin. He's like, I'm gonna fucking take my motorcycle, I'm gonna ride it a hundred feet back, I'm gonna evil cinevel, I'm gonna hot rod this bitch, I'm gonna jump over this chasm, I'm gonna bring choppers, I'm gonna bring dogs, dudes with guns. I'm gonna guns. Yeah, he's I'm gonna write to the military like the kid from Monster Squad, and it's gonna be it's gonna be bananas.
SPEAKER_03:He goes right off the cliff into red dawn, like just rides right into that. Right into the shield.
SPEAKER_05:And yeah, and he does it, yeah, in terms of his career, but it changes angles when he jumps, and there's like a CG version of him, and I couldn't remember when he died or if he survived or what happened. My brain was playing tricks on me for this. But again, it was a thing where it's like, I'm like, Oh, he's gonna die, and he kind of hits the shield, and I have no real reaction.
SPEAKER_03:Oh, I'm just like, oh, I feel like it's such funny comic timing to me. Like from like I just love this whole like very serious, I'm going to save the world. Like, very he's giving so much emotion in that speech, too. Yeah, it's good, really great, and that it's just like you see this this just like yeah, this epic jump, and then it just ends with this kind of silly corpse just kind of falling down a shield. I find I find that level that comic timing very funny.
SPEAKER_05:Well, and maybe and maybe for me it's partly because I've been let in with what happened to the bird. Uh and you're expecting and I know that shield's there or whatnot, but also the editing and the angles and the music and these sorts of things kind of like give up to a degree that something is going to happen and it's probably going to be something sudden. And I think that that's the only answer in turn in terms of what was going to happen. And so I guess that's why I had no reaction.
SPEAKER_03:Interesting. Yeah. It is one of those moments that I to this day will still like quote and stand by because it's just great.
SPEAKER_05:By the way, it's a brave choice to kill your strong, charismatic male lead in the middle of a movie.
SPEAKER_03:It's a strong choice. Gotta love these guys, man. Gotta love these guys.
SPEAKER_05:The plan now is Jesse Williams and full nerd, by the way.
SPEAKER_03:Now, full nerd. He's wearing glasses. Yeah. He's full Dorktown.
SPEAKER_05:Button-up flannel.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, he's full Dorktown.
SPEAKER_05:They're gonna drive out of there. He's taking the role of the leader. Did you know he was gonna die here? Because I felt it coming. There's gotta be one of these that we're in lockstep on in terms of I shouldn't use that term. There's gotta be one of these that we agree on.
SPEAKER_03:Like, I think none of the deaths are supposed to be. I mean, maybe Chris Hemsworth is is supposed to be like you're not expecting it, but I feel like most of them aren't. Okay. The hidden, I guess. Like, yeah.
SPEAKER_05:Because you know one of the crazy hillbilly zombies got on the RV. It showed you with like the blood mark on the RV earlier.
SPEAKER_03:And for like me, I'm less interested in horror movies that are just sort of slasher deaths. Um, sure. And I and I think that like what I appreciate about this movie, I can see Scream as sort of doing a lot of doing a lot of things that this movie is doing, right? It's like commenting on tropes, it's sort of like it's a satire, it's kind of like it's lifting a lot of those tropes up and making Scream does it so well. It does it in this very serious yeah, and Scream is doing it way more seriously in a different way, yeah. In a different way, and this is very purposely like taking those tropes and making them more fun and comedic and silly.
SPEAKER_05:I agree. It's just like it's something in between hot shots and scream, like that sometimes works for me and sometimes doesn't. And please don't like I hope you don't feel attacked or anything. It's just like the the movie it has some hits for me, but how how strong is that contact? I don't know, but again, not a bad movie.
SPEAKER_03:No water off my back, baby. Okay, good. This is this is just one of ALS two seed, baby. This is one of my this is just one of my Mount Rushmores. So I'm oh yeah, no, it's okay. I'm standing by. But speaking of water, they go straight in to the lake, and we think, and this is where I think the movie is goes like this is where like act two ends, and we get into this act three that is less expected. And I think that there's parts of act three I love, and then there's parts of act three where I'm like, okay, well, they got to a point, it's like a Mel Brooks thing. They got to a point where like, yeah, we got to the point end of this thing, and we're like, well, it does this now.
SPEAKER_05:It doesn't feel strategic like Mel Brooks, though. Like, it doesn't feel like an intentional thing like Mel Brooks, it just feels like they were just like fucking. Yeah, I have okay. Oh, I'm talking about Blazing Saddle specifically. I should be I should be specific. The control room is celebrating that as far as they know, everybody's dead except for the virgin. But you know, Brad Whitford. Tequila is my lady, really rooting for her, even though it would have been cooler with a merman.
SPEAKER_03:I like that he gives this emotional speech and then just like his line delivery of like double looking.
SPEAKER_05:Really want her to win.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, I just think that it would be great if she tequila is my lady, and they're partying, and we we see in the background that she is just being like viciously attacked by yeah by the by one of the Buckners in the water on the on the deck or dock or pier or whatever it is, yeah, like on top of the water. And I love when they come up to demolition, they're like, Hey, you guys gave us a scare, and the guy's like, No, we didn't get the call. We didn't like we don't know, like he's vividly he's upset because like they did their fucking job, and then the red phone rings, which I think is such a good thing.
SPEAKER_05:I love that. That's great.
SPEAKER_03:Like just a great, like, uh-oh.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, Doctor Strange Love, or so many other things in general of like, uh oh, the red phone is ringing. Yeah, and this is where we find out that Marty is alive, he made it, he escaped into the annals. The weed, the weed, baby, the weed helped the weed, gave him the strength, stamina, and energy he needed.
SPEAKER_03:I had to destroy that guy with a what does he say?
SPEAKER_05:Different kind of spinach, baby.
SPEAKER_03:I don't remember a trowel.
SPEAKER_05:I had to the devil's let us see how to cut him up with a trowel.
SPEAKER_03:I had to cut that guy up with a trowel.
SPEAKER_05:So Marty and Dana go even deeper into the annals, into fucking what they think is an elevator, and it is a essentially prison cube that we see in the new Superman, for instance. Sure. But the first thing they see is a fucking werewolf, and then they see kind of a kind of a stinky emanating kind of ghost, and then there's like yeah, and then a boba, like a bobo pinhead, as you said, with saw blades sticking out. Tata actor does a really good job, I want to say.
SPEAKER_03:Timu pinhead.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03:But I love the ballerina. The ballerino with like the teeth.
SPEAKER_05:Mouthface? Yeah, like looks like it's from Beetlejuice, kinda or something, like the snake from Beetlejuice's. It's weird.
SPEAKER_03:I mean, that there are some really cool designs in some of these things that they like we reveal, like they chose from the basement, they chose, but yeah, they're they see all of these monsters, creatures, killers, murderers, and the people uh in the lab are freaking the fuck out.
SPEAKER_05:Yep, up to and including the fact that the CEO is now involved, or whoever, whatever her title is, through a watching you through a camera and announcing through speakers or whatever, here's the exposition of what we are doing, need you to do in a very small micro way, yeah, and then they release all of the fucking beasts in the building. And again, the CG is pretty fucking rough.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, the I mean the CG is rough, but it's so fun. They just release all of these things at once, and it becomes this absolute talk about Etsy Witch Chaos Ball. Like, this is just like it's pandemonium, yeah. There's so much happening that I can't really focus on one or two things at once. Uh, every time I watch it, I feel like I catch something else that's fun. You know, we have like the strangers, we have like we have it, we have I don't know why we have like robot uh scorpions with blade uh back, like tails. Yeah, like we have ghosts, we have a unicorn that's randomly killing people. It is just this ultimate fuck it.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, yeah, no, dude, it goes, it goes like Scooby-Doo 2, Monsters Unleashed. It's it's just like fuck it, let's go.
SPEAKER_03:Fun. And like the the parts in this when they are um uh when they get out of the elevator, they they basically like push a dude into a wall and his head bloody. And I'm like, well, that's a thin line, but okay, I guess they can get out that way. I don't know. Yeah, there are like little Scooby-Doo things in here for them to escape, you know. But I'm I am on board at this point. The amount of like crazy shit that's happening. I'm just like, sure, let's watch these awful people get eaten by all these fucking crazy things.
SPEAKER_05:I get what you're saying, and and maybe you're kind of like Marty and Dana here, where fucking Dr. Michael Morbius at your service shows up or whatever, and then he gets like killed by the giant, yeah, giant bat and killed himself, and they run back to like look at it. Yeah, that's again fucking run. I noticed that here happening.
SPEAKER_03:I noticed that too. I was like, oh, it's because they need to get inside the wall. Thin, very thin. There's a there's an there's a giant cobra that's like anaconda. There's a shot in when they're looking at all the security screens, there's a shot that looks like it's straight out of Jurassic Park. Like there's just like a girl in a lab, and this like dinosaur foot like lands in front of the cobra.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, I didn't even notice that.
SPEAKER_03:That's fucking all of these little things, and yeah, again, I feel like I'm overwhelmed by it, but yeah. I find it so fun, and it is like you mentioned Scooby-Doo. The moment I said 100%, like that is 100% what I feel like the movie has gone to. It's just like it's it's hit the fuck it button, and I am all in the fuck it button.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, it it has gone. Scooby-Doo 2, Monsters Unleashed, and it's just like I guess it's almost like uh Space Jam, a New Legacy, where you're looking in the crowd and it's like, but it's like, why am I looking at all these things that are supposed to remind me of or be direct reminders of these other properties? And I understand that that's part of the fabric of the movie, and I know you're saying it like stands on the shoulders of giants, but at times I would like it to stand on its own, and I know that it's not necessarily trying to do that, that that's not its goal, but that there's nothing that happens in this movie outside of the very original concept that like hits me any big special chords with me. I do I do have the funniest part of the movie for me that comes up right here, though, as all the monsters are killing all these awful people, and Brad Wipford through the smoke and everything, you see the shadowy figure, and then as it starts to approach him, it's clearly the merman.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and it's the merman design is not what I expected at all.
SPEAKER_05:No, and I love it.
SPEAKER_03:Hideous and great.
SPEAKER_05:It's like a nightmare, and the fact that it eats you and then shoots your blood out of its blowhole. Yeah, that was that's funny.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, it's funny. I love I I thought like the unicorn stabbing a dude was funny. Like you expect to see all these things, and then you don't like you don't expect a unicorn could have popped up out there and just started killing them.
SPEAKER_05:Do you think Death of a Unicorn the movie was based off of just this one moment in this movie? I haven't seen it.
SPEAKER_04:I haven't either.
SPEAKER_03:I heard it wasn't very good.
SPEAKER_05:Um I I've heard the same, but I would see it, I would watch it. Okay, well, would you like to talk about Dana killing Dickie Janky? Dickie Janky.
SPEAKER_03:She kills him here, she stabs him. Which, you know, at this point it's like, fuck it, kill all kill them all.
SPEAKER_05:Oh, yeah. I mean, he he was involved just as much as everybody else was in all the monstrous bullshit.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah, and I love that when we we kind of talked about how the uh all the other countries failed and they show all these different things, like there was like a volcano in one. I think there was a kaiju in one.
SPEAKER_05:We used to just sacrifice to a volcano, yeah. There was a kaiju.
SPEAKER_03:There was like all these different things that were happening on this day, and I think like we get to the final sort of place of release revealing of Sigorni Weaver as the CEO of this, and this is where for me the movie loses uh a star, is where I I feel like we a star, a half a star, a half a star, yeah. Um careful spooky is that dangerous?
SPEAKER_05:That's spicy. Careful. This is scary, and we you eat that sandwich and you will get gassy with your cousin. This house is clean. Sigourney Weaver now, instead of a micro dose of the exposition, is like, here's everything. Yeah, gives you everything, does an okay job with it as an actress.
SPEAKER_03:It's but it's it is a it is a third act boss reveal that's like not it feels it's a cop out.
SPEAKER_05:Like it's I agree.
SPEAKER_03:You need to like lay that, and I know they were laying the groundwork, the foundation of that red phone, yeah, and like there's like there's hints of it, but I just feel like if you want that to be your antagonist, that needs to be something I don't know.
SPEAKER_05:There clearly they're better writers than I am, but like there's something in there that's um well, and that's the thing is like there are little moments of dialogue where she she puts it perfectly, it's written perfectly, you can die with them or you can die for them. Like if she's trying to tell Marty, as Dickie Janky said, like, this guy has to die for the human race to continue on. Yeah, and Dana being ready to shoot him for the most part makes perfect sense to me. Yeah. And Marty shoots off the werewolf and gets into the fight with Sigourney Weaver. The fist fight's pretty satisfying because I'm pretty sure she was gonna kick his ass ultimately.
SPEAKER_03:Which is funny because he's punched him in the fucking head. He's ripped Jesus, right? Yeah, exactly. I mean, I I do think there is called Jim Jesus. There is something a little broken in the philosophy of the end of this movie because I think what we ultimately should have gotten, and like I hate doing that with movies where you're like, this is how I think it should have gone.
SPEAKER_05:Right.
SPEAKER_03:Because that's armchair quarterbacking. Yeah, but I I do think uh if you want the um satisfying arc for Marty who came into that world, this world that we've seen him as the cynical one.
SPEAKER_06:Right?
SPEAKER_03:He like, like we're being watched, it's all it's all fucking sham. Uh like there's no reason it makes sense for him to be like fuck it, burn it all, right? Like that it makes sense because like he's already there. That's where he is at the beginning. If you want it to feel stronger, he's gotta he's gotta be the one that like sacrifices himself. I agree. For the greater good or she has to kill him good for the greater good. I think it's like I think it's that I think it's like she can't she wants to kill him and then like can't. Like Dana's so pure. I think if you show Dana and like she and she can't do it, and then he gives himself up. I think that is the arc that makes more sense and is more hopeful. Now, I get a little bit of the um the sort of like cynical ending here with fuck it, this world's fucked.
SPEAKER_05:Let's just I don't yeah, it doesn't do it for me though. Like there's a level that I think that him self-sacrificing, like looking at her or having a line or having a moment, yeah, or whatnot, and then showing her later, and again, we're not experts here, but showing her and having her have a moment of like reflection about what happened or something like that, and or her fucking shooting him, and then like how this changed her, how she's a much different person, like when we see her later. And so this giant hand popping up of these gods that have been kept at bay with the blood of five people every so often. It I don't think it's defined how often, or any of those things. That's the other thing, is it can be a little loosey-goosey with the rules, but also like I'm an audience member, we're in a horror movie, it's not necessarily always going to tell me all the rules, you're just supposed to enjoy the ride. So it's not always the job of the movie. But we have come to the end of the movie. Nobody shoots anybody, Sigorni Weaver meets her maker, the world ends, and the world ends.
SPEAKER_03:The eternals, whatever, the giant thing pops out of the earth. These these titans.
SPEAKER_05:Richard, what's his name? Dick, what's his name? And that other uh Kumel Nangiani and the other.
SPEAKER_03:There are so many references throughout time though of like tight like in Hercules, the Titans come out and destroy the world. I do like the concept that there are these that we are worshipping and like we have to sacrifice them, and that we do that in the trope of horror movies. That's so fun to me.
SPEAKER_05:But yes, we this is this is part of what reminds me of like why I like Wes Craven's New Nightmare so much. Like the idea that Freddy Krueger is someone's uh manifestation of an ancient demon, and making these movies and telling these stories kept the actual demon at bay, and Wes Craven's New Nightmare is like, okay, demon's loose. And so it I like that version of uh kind of a similar thing. I don't know. Sorry, you were saying.
SPEAKER_03:No, I mean I think we're at the end. I think that like, yeah, we're at the end of the movie.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_03:We did it.
SPEAKER_02:Ben? Me? Me first. Me, you, you, me, me, you. Should I flap a coin? Doesn't matter to me. Uh fuck it.
SPEAKER_05:I'm going all the way. I'll go first. Okay. What do you think? Yeah?
SPEAKER_02:I don't give a shit.
SPEAKER_05:I am tempted to go to a three and a half because I think you're right.
SPEAKER_03:I don't give a shit.
SPEAKER_05:It's a turn no, it's age like a turn to punch bowl, man.
SPEAKER_03:Let's just let's just go win the whole fucking thing.
SPEAKER_05:Let's just win the whole fucking thing. I would like to, especially on as we're on and up here, I would like to give this a three and a half, and I feel like you've made a lot of good points about like, dude, Paul, chill the fuck out. But also while being much kinder than that. But the eh, I just maybe on the background at some other point in life, I don't know. But I I don't know if I would go out of my way or make it a point. So I'm I'm gonna stick at the three. There's another part of me that's like willing to go the down direction, but I think I had a good enough time watching it. And that's the other thing, man, that hit that blindsides me sometimes with this lovely, incredible podcast that you should subscribe to if you're not, is that the conversation can help you stay in a place even if you're willing to go one way or another. Like if the conversation is interesting and fun enough, even though I'm like, I I could be tempted to go down, I could also be tempted to go up. Let's just stay. I'm gonna stay at the three.
SPEAKER_03:You're gonna hold.
SPEAKER_05:I'm gonna hold at the three bong thermoses.
SPEAKER_03:Three bong thermoses. Uh I think I'll go to a four. Okay. I think it's a pretty solid four for me, actually. I I mean, I it's so rare to have such a rewatchable movie for me in this particular genre. I've probably watched Scream twice. Okay. And not to say Scream is a bad movie. I think Scream is a great movie. I just, you know, in terms of rewatchability, there's something about this movie that's just so fucking fun. And I think that it's really that the comedy is highlighted um in a way that I find like just speaks to me. And okay. Um I uh so I yeah, I'm gonna go with four husband bulges.
SPEAKER_05:Okay. I I'm glad that you did not go down any further. Not to sound like an asshole. I'm also glad like I must have had some sort of effect on this thing, because it's like if you had said five just now, I would have been a bit shocked.
SPEAKER_03:Sure.
SPEAKER_05:If you would have stayed, I would not have been shocked.
SPEAKER_03:There's plenty of threads to pull on this movie, and that's not something that goes I'm blinded by, you know.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah, but just let the movie fucking movie, man. That's kind of I think you made that argument really well. Just let the movie movie.
SPEAKER_03:That's kind of how that's okay. Like it's just it's just a fun movie for me. And I'd go, bud. Yeah.
SPEAKER_05:You won this round, but Billy will be back. Hey, I won't. You won't always be so lucky.
SPEAKER_03:I'm down to watch that movie. I know. I told you.
SPEAKER_05:I know you are. Yeah. You fucking ho dunk, ho dunk, well then there, motherfucker.
SPEAKER_03:That's backwoods, cannibalistic zombie family. It's a different, it's a subgenre. Well, I would like I did, I think I have paused the whiteboard sequence and just like look at all the different options because it's listen to do that.
SPEAKER_05:Because I'm sure that there's probably some gems there, without a doubt. As we said, like the Elijah Wood, Sin City, Kevin thing, Kevin Smith, Kevin Williamson. I want to mention that the folks that do that our it's good. It can't be bad if it's good. It's good happening, is what's happening is good. Our book and music is by Jamie Henwood. What uh what are we doing? What uh what have you been watching? Why are you excited? Our Matthew Foskett. Fun facts are Chris Old's, and our interstitials are the gentleman in the mariner's hat that I'm looking at right now.
SPEAKER_02:Are you looking at Cal Raleigh?
SPEAKER_05:Am I? Wait, stand up and turn around.
SPEAKER_03:I I don't got that dump permit.
SPEAKER_04:I got a Snickers Almond for you. Come on, cousin.
SPEAKER_03:What are you on the bear? What is happening? Yes, Chef. Hey, cousin.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, Chef.
SPEAKER_03:Yes, Chef.
SPEAKER_05:So forget about it.
SPEAKER_03:Is this gonna be the end of spooky season?
SPEAKER_05:Or it it is. This should this should be wrapping it up. So follow Ben on Letterboxed at Run BMC. See what spooky movies I'm watching. Follow me on letterboxed at PaulAxBadly. Listen, rate, comment, subscribe, share. We're available on all the major platforms that aren't YouTube because I don't want you to see me. It's none of your fucking business. And Good Pods, that's one that we like. That's a fun one. You can recommend and share and have a profile and all sorts of fun stuff.
SPEAKER_04:And from all of us at Review Review, Happy Halloween! That's why we marry our cousins. Because they're so attractive.
SPEAKER_00:Hi everyone, this is JJ, the co-founder of Good Pods. If you haven't heard of it yet, Good Pods is like Goodreads or Instagram, but for podcasts, it's new, it's social, it's different, and it's growing really fast. There are more than two million podcasts, and we know that it is impossible to figure out what to listen to. On Good Pods, you follow your friends and podcasters to see what they like. That is the number one way to discover new shows and episodes. You can find Good Pods on the web or download the app. Happy listening.
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