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Oh, poop. Welcome to the Wall Card Podcast. I'm your host, Jerry Eaton, and my co-pilots on this journey to wherever are my good friends, Jeff Curtis. Hello.
And he has a powerful weapon. He charges five dollars a pump. Put your money on the dresser for fun, the man with the golden dick. Ronler.
Oh my, yes. I'm gilded. Yes. So we always said it.
That's right. Yeah. It's small, but it's gilded. Isn't it strange that Lulu wrote an entire song about you?
Isn't that great? I knew she would. I knew she looked at me when I was a tiny little baby and she was like, that one. And I like him.
I'm going to write a song about him. Yeah. It's adorable. Speaking of him, yeah, well him tell everyone what this podcast is all about.
This podcast is about throwing Trump to 33 RPM. But that's the regular speed of record. What? What's the lower one?
The $7,8. $7,8 and $7,8. The slower one? The lower one.
The lower one, the lower one. The lower one. The higher the number, the slower it goes. Oh, OK.
Well, I'm not a mathematician nor am I a sound engineer. Nor do you ever own a record player. I had a record player. I remember I think I talked about it at the stereo where I listened to my life.
I never read a record player. My life, 45, 100 times in my life. Well, 45 is, you know, that was, yeah. The lower record is the greater.
That's what a tiny record. And you have the little, I don't know what their call, but to match the size of the needle, or not the needle, but the thing in the center. No. No.
You know the little discs that you put in I don't know if they have a name. I don't know but anyway Actually, I was incorrect the higher the number the faster I was 33 is still the normal speed for records. I thought 45 was the normal speed for singles. Oh, what's the one that goes really slow?
That's when you just dial it down They don't make a really slow one but they you you can adjust the speed on records or at least the ones that we own then you Could make them go slow. I'm gonna show backwards If you put if you go backwards you have to do your finger But if you put a 45 on 33 all place low right yeah, well there we go Yeah Going quickly this week's favorite section. He's not exactly a lightning round. Oh good But it's close because it's a bunch of right now.
I was a rabbit park. I got a bunch of favorites I figured couldn't feel an entire favorite section. So this is a psychiatric exam I still want you to give like as quickly as you can I don't want you to say you're actually a little bit just occasion I get something like a huge is the answer. So for example, what's your favorite day of the week?
Oh? Saturday why because it's when I'm often usually free. Okay Monday. What?
I feel like I deserve like you know I've had a weekend off I have to go back to work Monday I get it Tuesday is the pit of despair Yeah, there's no weekend insight to yeah, I deserve this yeah when Thursday hits on basically already end weekend mode like I'm like Yeah, I can see I can do anything on Friday. So Thursday like you know I'm basically there right what Saturday It's like that Monday's awfully close. Yeah, I'm going to enjoy Sundays most of time because like I don't work tomorrow You know there's a for me. There's a piece to a Sunday evening and I always try to preserve that That's why you often you'll get me say I don't want to do anything on a Sunday night That's my time.
That's like that's set aside for me when I was a kid You know you see Sunday night programming and I had the feeling of we're gonna start the week We're winding down the weekend and so there's I guess there's an astounded to a Sunday evening and my helmet was very peaceful I was ironing we were watching TV or something. It was very nice. Yeah, all right next up favorite season autumn Spring is better, but that's spring. I'm so conflicted here Yeah, because I love the concept of fall but the execution is always great because it seems like it doesn't exist anymore It doesn't yeah, that's to serve we have winter and we have summer and then we have a couple days Yeah, that's it just enough days for you to go.
Oh, it's so nice. I mean, it's really hot Yeah, I should say summer I should say summer because like that's my time off work, but it's so hot I don't want to do things. Yeah, I would rather have winter than summer. I agree I like the cold yeah personally as a teacher I love snow days.
Yeah, I love Yeah, I could be unemployed and enjoy snow day Just because it's just no day like waking up at 6 a.m. And being like now you know today Yeah, just turn that alarm off and flip it over is glorious I don't mind working into June teachers are saying that but no when I wake up in like December or January and it's dark outside I feel like trash June and it's morning and the sun's up. I'm like, okay, we can do this. Yeah, so I just I like winter a lot I I enjoy those snow days for video games.
Yeah, I want to get even now all play video games most days I feel no guilt about it whatsoever I remember playing Zelda when I was a kid on a snow day And then I would relive that the last couple of years on a snow day with with you know on the laptop You can play anything you can find anything and then Zelda were pitfall. Yeah, I feel I feel the same I'll start a video game or snow days and make me a month to finish it like it's peppered throughout the snow days Yeah, yeah, right next up. This is maybe too weird I don't know if this is something you guys have a fun time. I'm a little weird for this show crazy right?
Yeah favorite alarm if you're having alarm that was like really good or what kind of alarms you guys used to wake up in the morning? Well, I haven't used an alarm in a long time, but yeah, I've been to stay home dad. So right it's my child was the alarm I used to when I had to because there's a period when I on work Midnight late chip in the parking garage on during the week And then on the week as I tried to say it during the day so I could see my friends and sleep at night It was really screwing up my sleeping schedule. Yeah, so I got to the point where I would I would make my alarm on the radio like the loudest heavy metal station I could buy that I would hear there were times when I slept and you know it would keep going for like two hours before it turned itself off There's a couple times where I slept through that alarm That's incredible.
That's incredible. That's incredible for you. They usually do but you know when you're so tired if you're I don't Normally I'd only have the radio alarm clock with them My buzz yeah, and that's all I ever used but then when I got the cell phone I can use any alarm on my line I love cellphone alarm And so for a while there was just a nice pleasant generic tone to wake up to and I thought let's mix it up Sure, and so I wanted to see it how bad the movie groundhog day was if you woke up every morning or I got you babe It's the fucking worst I did it like three mornings and I went no no no now. It's the Sanfrid and something Okay, I'm a classic park theme songs.
Oh, that's great. Yeah, it's like it's a soothing But there was the best one ever used that worked every single time with survivors either tiger Oh, I don't know if I would be like standing like looking around for the battle Thing is if I know I have to wake up I'll usually wake up before the alarm I usually get off in myself I can't do it too, but every morning I want to hear I Wake up going I'm in the inner city of California and I feel great Favorite celebrity crush maybe your whole life if you want to do that. Oh man That's I don't know that's like my favorite buffet item. Well, okay You don't have one at all that one.
Yeah, I know you've got that thing about that like for me And I get it she's quite attractive. She's beautiful. She's intelligent. I had I For Kim Basinger for a long time during the Batman era was cool.
My god. She's something and then Joanne Wallie Kilmer in Willow She's she's has beautiful red hair She was married about Kilmer for a while. It's very sharp feature. She made a good elf.
Okay. Look at I love features Weird I know but live Tyler and the Lord of the Rings movie. She's so hot. I used to you remember the six million-dollar woman.
Yeah, yeah Not Lee Mater's that I used to really like her I don't know That's like Saint Catherine Bock, you know back in the dukes of hazard day. Yeah, she was she was it Kathy Ireland for a while, but her eyebrows bothered me favorite fish flounder. I don't like fish. You don't like fish at all I Had short Okay, I'm gonna go with Bear Kuda Okay, they're video game Holy shit, holy shit Sweet I'll go first so the Mass Effect trilogy on Xbox is one of your I play through a year Yeah, but also the Batman Arkham games are great, but my favorite games are student to no games I love Super Mario World and Donkey Kong country.
Each of Empire's two. That's a beautiful game Probably fall out new Vegas that's gonna be my favorite over time Yeah, but God, I love the Donkey Kongs then Super Nintendo Final Fantasy games were just breathtaking and Final Fantasy 7 was breath Yeah, God damn that's that's an unfair question. It's never okay. Well, if you thought that was unfair, we're for this one wrong favorite Krypton I'm going with werewolf.
I love werewolves It's like I want to say mythological creature It's a creature and who people believe even though there's not a great deal guys. Hey, aliens Mothman, I love the Mothman. It's like oh, the bridge is gonna fall. Yeah, I like to get a bit of it It was very creepy and it was really good.
I thought the next one was like favorite child. I'm quick. Yeah, like fuck you man That's not right You have an answer you don't say it. Well, you know, all right speaking of Ron and favorites and whatever on does what this is a Ron is so for better for where usually for Well, I'm not a run.
That's a oh, right. All right, so we're coming up on I think fall is what 20 days away 20 Night when this is being recorded because obviously we recorded the day we put it out, right? So I don't know if I can do the math So as we're coming up on the fall season, I've decided I'm gonna dedicate my next three episodes to that season Somewhat in some over episodes all three episodes. It's a really good trilogy I think yeah, and I'm gonna try to try to do a few things, but let me ask Jared especially What's your favorite movie to watch around Halloween?
I mean the answer is Halloween. Yes, exactly now We're not gonna talk about Halloween specifically. Yeah, I want to go over John Carpenter's career Not so much his life his life is a whole book on its own Adrian Barbeau wrote quite a bit about it in her autobiography Not quite but she dedicated a few chapters to be married to being married to John Carpenter as an intertwined with her film career Being in the state from New York and the fog The fog yeah, we'll get to that and then and then at that time She was also a West Craven had her for Swamp Thing and Georgia Mero used her for for a few She was a screenplay she was absolutely a screen queen and I can't recommend her autobiography enough I can't even remember the name of it, but I can't I know I have a copy of this book I've read it twice. It's a good book Adrian Barbeau Okay, because you know it goes from her time on Broadway to doing mod to and being a screen queen and then later on in life But it isn't about her it's about her husband former husband John Carpenter There are other things I could do that's it.
That's it because she played Rizzo on Broadway That was I don't know that she originated that role, but she was one of the first to play Rizzo That's it. That's I'm seeing the book cover now. It's signed. She signed that copy.
It's an excellent book. She's a wonderful woman But just as an overview a little background Carpenter was born in 1948 in Carthage, New York His dad was a musician a music professor and in 1953 he relocated to Bowling Green Kentucky Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's in fact I chose Western I wanted to go to Western because Carpenter had been there Yeah, and I knew he comes back once every fall to do a symposium for his buddy Corey Lashdown there I did not I did not and it killed me Josh logs and it did not attend it But he saw Carpenter on the way out of it and got me carpenters autograph, which was really nice But it's not like meeting the guy I've always wanted to meet Carpenter He had a huge impact on me as a young person, you know film wise So he was interested in films from an early age specifically Howard Hawks films Howard Hawks he did the thing from another world. He did Rio Bravo, which I've mentioned on here Rio Bravo is used by William dead and assault on precinct. Okay, it's just the people trapped inside while there's an outer element trying to get it It's just for them exactly it's that kind of a isolation for using isolation exactly it so before he started high school He was shooting on eight millimeter films and so many little film students did back in the day He attended great.
Yeah, super eight stuff He attended Western Kentucky University where his father chaired the music department and then after I think one semester at Western Maybe one year at Western he went to the University of Southern California's school for cinematic arts and then that was a transition right there Oh, yeah Yeah, he you talk about living the dream, you know want to live the dream given up everything to move out there That's what he did. I'm friend. He went to law school there. That's great school from what I understand And this was at the same time that the odd cheers were working there going to school around that area either You see a layer USA was a copeless corsese Spielberg Lucas Brian de Palma all those guys John Meleus and Carpenter was among that bunch and so in 1970 he collaborated with a producer by the name of John Longnecker Longnecker Longnecker co-wrote he edited and composed the music for the resurrection of Bronco Billy And my new carpenters still just fresh out of film school around this time.
Yeah, yeah should Bronco believe in resurrected That's a good question. He died for a reason. He died for a reason. I wish I had seen this film and I can have an answer No, I think you're not gonna answer anyway.
I know I know this and I'm ashamed that I've never looked this up and I'm not saying I'm not true. I'm gonna go to you for oh You want some kind of I want you to make crap out so we can just kind of know you should be resurrected The monkeys Paul shows us that's a bad idea. Yeah, that's a literature going way back. That's it.
Don't resurrect the day Like welcome in the first place. No, he was kind of a dick. Oh, please continue however This this short film actually won the Academy Award for best live action short film So that gave Carpenter a little bit of credit to come out of film school And then his first film as a major director or first major film as director was dark star in 1974 It's a science fiction comedy that he wrote with Dan O'Bannon Dan O'Bannon may be a familiar name because he wrote alien later on in the 70s And then he's the one that directed return to living dead around 1985 86 Is that the sequel or is that in the no? That's a whole other podcast in itself Differentiating living dead films, but no the return of living dead is almost a parody of night living dead, but it's super gory It's it's funny.
It's goofy, but it's good for it's definitely horror squarely So Dan O'Bannon went on his own path after dark star, but it only cost 60 grand to make and it's it's it's it's difficult to make Because Carpenter, oh banded multi-task the whole thing with Carpenter writing Yeah, yeah, it's this whole doing a cheap movie and multi-task this is dark star dark star which is really about a bunch of a I got hippies in space like they're definitely astronauts, but they're hippies kind of you know, it's like Yeah, I'm in space where they belong, but it was really fun. It's a fun little movie It's it's goofy as shit, but it's great And you can tell that O'Bannon and Carpenter have a love for the genre in which they're working They love sci-fi and it becomes a parent in dark star, you know, it's a lot of fun So O'Bannon acted in the film into the special effects which caught the attention of John Carpenter George Lucas Who hired him to do some special effects on Star Wars? Yeah, that that led to that and then Carpenter went his own way and he gained praise during dark star Specifically because he showed he knew how to make a love budget film Yeah, something that he I don't think he ever worked for Roger Corman But that's something that Corman would look for in directors and he ended up working with with Coplex Well, it's just how about you'll see even see it currently now It'd be someone doesn't any film and it's like what could they do if we gave them right right look what they can do with nothing Yeah, but you know the funny thing is a lot of time they can do more with nothing than they can with a budget because a lot Times the budget comes well oversight right exactly we need to this no no That's not that's not cramping that creativity that makes an original so good But speaking of which Governor's next film after that was a low budget of course thriller assault on precinct 13 in 1976 I've never seen the result. I've seen most of the make it all over.
I love the reneux I don't usually expect you know to like the remakes but They did a really good job with that and the original It's hard to put into words because it looks like an exploitation film I think I've mentioned on here where you know a good horror director Transcends the genre the exploitation it's still an exploitation film But so goddamn good and so compelling that budget didn't matter exploitation didn't matter. It just became this is a good story It's a well told story It's also easier to do a low budget movie of everybody stuck inside the same right one one of my occasion Well the assault on precinct 13 what really made it known Was near the beginning of the film There's a bad guy roll around in a there's an ice cream truck and the bad guys looking at the kids there And then he ends up killing a little girl just cold blooded on the street and it wasn't graphic You know you couldn't show him shooting that it was just eluded to and it shocked the shit The audience you didn't do that back in the day like they were taboos that you didn't cross and partner cross it with that And so that show that's so nothing is safe right from here on out There's nothing sacred at this point and the movie is very intense. It's a very top thriller for sure And so I have a book that did it once it's actually a Dean cruise book which one was it? I've not read a long time.
It was I've been tell you even if they're all from it Crazy but a child was killed. Yeah one of the protagonists show of the main guy was I did not see coming Yeah, it does no just like that cemetery you go. Oh anything happened That's the king right you expect that for at least be less thrown off by right is the everything feels lovely the thing about being You can read a Dean cook book and how long is it gonna take you to forget the name of the book that you read just you know You read a Dean cook book. Yeah, there are a lot of exceptions watchers is one watchers is great fun.
How's this great fun? How's really fun? I've heard about it. I was good.
So anyway, this is um pretty much I would like to read that I thought the film was okay. It wasn't great. It was okay, but Anyway, as with dark star carpenter was responsible for many multi-passing he absolutely did he scored I'm pretty sure he scored almost everything with his band the Coop to Vills of a one just him It was the Coop to Vills which the right exactly and that had Alan how worth in it how earth later on became a Composer in his own right for musical scores and ended up doing the Halloween score in part four with carpenter Although carpenter had very little to do with that, but Alan how worth was doing the music See I he was he wrote it directed at scored it edited it using the name of John T. Chance Which was named John Wayne's character in Rio Bravo did he use a different name so that people would think okay Well, he's doing everything he's done that a few times.
Yeah, he's using a pseudonym So that it won't be his name appearing in the credits over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again I already had a pseudonym because you could stand up. So what are Jeff my pseudonym? Oh shit. Here's here's here's It's difficult because actually we've a lot of thought when it reaper Jones And I couldn't tell you my first email address was reaper 1800 just because I like to worry stuff like that And then I got a message boards and I picked up and then I was like well reaper needs to become a persona So I use my mother's maiden name of Jones and then I added the M Just my mother's name is Mary Jones.
So reaper M Jones and then I added the F later Reaper Magnum Fernando Jones Because I'm Reaper MF Jones. Yeah, motherfucker All together no, I'm not giving you a nickname you gotta come up with your own you gotta wear it like a badge of pride Anyway, this was the first time I saw them precinct I know what just my student should be we don't like it. We'll be back. Yeah, give it to them put it on them They don't do anything they just sit there and listen come on guys The act anyway, they never hill.
This is the first movie they worked on together. They would collaborate later on they were romantically involved for a while But um, so that one did pretty well. I got a lot of notice Yeah, I'm trying so hard to not be anymore Yeah, I think so after that he wrote he wrote and directed the Lauren Hutton thriller You know he was getting a claim and noticed at this time So people were willing to work with him did one called someone's watching over me or someone's watching me I don't know anything about that. That's yeah So and then his first film for major studio was the eyes of Laura Mars Which he did not direct but he wrote that one that would fade down away in Tommy Lee Jones directed by Irvin Kirschner I remember the name of that.
I don't I must have seen it, but I don't remember the movie. I've seen it and I don't yeah I remember the end just because it's it's sort of iconic with Tommy Lee Jones busting through the window spoiler He's the guy who's been stalking Laura Mars or whatever, but I don't I really don't remember much of it either It's just Laura Mars going crazy for an hour and half Lord gains the ability to see visions from a serial killer's perspective and it happens to be her friends and associate that he is talking Oh, it's not me Lee Jones. Yeah, Tommy Lee Jones So after that he was getting oh, yeah, I love the poster when I worked with him Yes, that's one of the ones I took home from the video store one day because the box always you know Oh a good box. What a great looking artwork So by this point he had gotten enough a claim and show himself to be a good enough director that um, oh their names Get past my moustafa cod Approached carpets fish no no no Yeah Mustafa cod and Erwin Yoblins wanted to do a film called We can't just go pass the name that one I think you need to do that when you're classic country accent.
Yeah Erwin Yablins Erwin Yoblin or yeah, there we go Alright, so they wanted to make a movie called baby cinemators and they approach carpenter to write it and another story behind it I wanted to make it out of someone else to completely that's that's a thing that's a common thing though So they have an idea but they have a title remember when I did Friday 13 Sean Cunningham said I got a tagline I got a title and that's all he had and he commissioned everything What was it? What was the what was the? What came up? Well, I can't believe it.
Yeah, Friday 13 is a better title. Yes it is. So so Carpenter said he knew he wanted they wanted to do it around Halloween and Carpenter came up with the story with Deborah Hill He filmed it for three hundred thousand dollars, which is nothing even for back then And it changed the name to Halloween It ended up earning sixty five million dollars and became for a long time I think until Blair which was the highest earning independent film ever made well, it's all it's all profit Made it for that of it every last bit. They took this.
Yeah, that had a really courtesy. Yes. Yeah, that her first role It was her first major role. I don't know that it was her first She had probably done something here and there but Halloween made her, you know, it made her what she was Yes, she did poor movies for a long time I think it just gave it up completely so that she'd be taken seriously either right early to mid-80s Yeah, but she don't know she was a kid You know, she is this kid and well the daughter of Tony Curtis.
So she's a Tony Curtis in a family. Yeah, yeah Yeah, she was just a baby all of them were you know, they were all a bunch of kids Trying to figure out how to do a big budget sort of not big budget, but a big budget looking kind of film Actually, she was 19 when she shot it. Oh my god. She was the only one of the million to a teenager Yeah, the other one for a little bit older.
I think of he day souls and What's her name? But is she the only who survived? Yeah, Jamie Lee was definitely the star of the film Nancy keys That's her Nancy Loomis at the time But he the carpenter when he was making Halloween said he wanted to do a true clap crass exploitation He said I decided to make a film I would love to have seen as a kid full of cheap tricks like a haunted house at a fair where you walk down the corridor and things pop out of you We've all seen Halloween and I think we can agree that It's revolutionary the style that he Realized during that and a lot of it goes to Dean Kundi the director of photography who invented the show to do this So yeah, those scenes where he's in the first part of the movie where it's like a you know The kid puts on the mask his first person with you all that is such a long slow steady cam shot And it's so smooth nobody had been able to do that before and Dean Kundi invented the steady cam The slowness of a lot of the shots and just the tension is ratcheted. Yeah Absolutely, and I loved carpenter was one of them that he would put all the steltsies in the background Michael Myers was always in the background There were clues of it in fact one of my favorite examples and it took me several viewings as a child to watch this I understood it before I was no longer a kid, but There's a scene where Annie the the babysitter is going to pick up her boyfriend and she goes to her car Realizes she doesn't have the keys she goes back into the house gets the keys goes back to the car opens the car door And then gets into the car without it so it's no longer locked and then she realizes that there's steam on the on the windshield And which would indicate somebody is in the car and then as she's realizing somebody's in the car That's when he gets her just a brilliant sequence of events and so subtle that if you didn't notice how could she be expected And that's where we relate to that to that character the staging of that is just you know It's smart how it means just a smart movie it rose above what it was at the time and of course it it brought in the slasher genre It created it.
Yeah, it was the birth of the slasher general Thirty days twenty days yeah I knew it was a quick turnaround and it was a lot of footage to film there's a lot of complexities there They these guys busted their ass just to be completely transparent. I'm looking at trivial and I'm to be currently But that's very single thing on here's amazing. Yeah, here's here's yeah Give us some as the movie was actually shot at early spring and southern As opposed to Illinois in October. Let me finish this They took bags of tried leaves dead leaves paper leaves and spread them on the streets And so if you watch them and then every single leaf or whatever and then so if you watch the movie There's dead leaves on the ground and complete green To save money after seamless film believes were collected and re-used Absolutely, isn't that great all the actors wore their own clothes.
Yeah, no money for consuming The Curtis went to JC penny for lawyers wardrobe less than $100 for the entire set That's beautiful How much did you make her to take the movie fifteen thousand eight thousand eight thousand dollars, but what did it do for her? Like every single tree I'm like it's just makes me happier. Oh, yeah Yeah, there's so how I love the movie how we because the trivia so meet the every time you want to go back to what you want to do Every time you want to try to point to me. I'll give you a tree.
All right. Well, we're gonna move on at the moment I know we could go Halloween all day. It's the best movie. It's just such a favorite.
Yeah It's consistently my top three if not at the number one Yeah He is of course of nature just like my mind get that but I don't find this guy there kills I say he obviously she's right right, but it's not stylized right the way it doesn't work It doesn't frighten me in the way that like seeing him standing Right, right just in the middle of the daylight just seeing him standing It's funny the reverence that we have for these other horror films like honestly I like non-of-the-dead 78 better than I like Night Living Dead But how can you you can't put non-of-the-dead in any way above night living dead outside of I like that better because night living dead is Another one like Halloween that created a milestone for the origin and filmmaking in general period So speaking of tropes that they started with Halloween This is the last reveal that you move on John Carpenter and Debra Hill have stated many times over the years that they did not Consciously set out to depict virginity as a way of defeating a rent agent killer The reason why the link is all died is simply that they're so preoccupied with getting late They don't know if there's a killer large. Yeah, Roy's through the other hands a lot of time alone is there for more alert Yeah, it's an accidental Thing and then people have made a big deal like the the stabbing is actually the penetration It's a metaphor for sexual penetration and stuff like that. It's people read a lot in the world guilty to I read a lot into it as well So after that of course he could pick his job at that time not major major studio stuff But he had options at this well once your film earned 67 million dollars right off of the $300,000 budget I imagine you've got a lot of offers coming your way. Yeah, they're gonna want to hire you and hire him They did when he directed the film the television film Elvis the only reason that's that the one with um Jet no You're close.
Yes. You're there. You're so close. I know what's it.
I love it. I love my favorites Kurt Russell Yeah, Kurt Russell. That was his first collaboration. I remember watching that on TV.
How was it? Was it? I actually enjoyed it. Yeah, it starts out with Elvis shooting a television set.
I believe that's so Elvis. That's so carpenter So in 1980 carpenter of course coming off of Halloween and Elvis which is a foot note really you know considering the arc of his career It's a strange choice to hire carpenter to do a TV Movie on Elvis. Yeah, it's so weird, but I guess things happen for a reason. Yeah, just a job And maybe maybe it was like you want to try different kind of genre that you never really want to think about how do you was Elvis man?
Well, I guarantee you he was an Elvis fan car to the Coop de Villes That's very not it's not my ability, but it's obviously influenced by that's the same things that would have influenced Elvis So after that carpenter decided he wanted to make a film that was inspired by horror comics like Tales from the Crypt and And the film the crawling eye about monsters hiding in the clouds and so he and every hill came up with the fog Are you have you guys seeing it or you find I know the name I don't think I've ever seen the remake of it Maybe I don't know if you've seen the remake. There's probably a bad taste in your mouth. It was bad. It was just awful There's very I think Janet Lee and Jamie Lee Curtis been real little time on Nancy Keys Assistant in that one.
Oh, yeah, you may see the name Tommy Tommy Wallace in there in the castle in there He has his group of people he works with often, but the fog was an insanely difficult film to create And again, it looks like exploitation It looks like a comic book pop for a movie, but it looked like it was hard as hell to do this movie Especially the way he did it after the first cut. He was not happy with the result Oh, how did he do that? Why was it so difficult because he's grading a fog? Well, it's not just the fog.
Oh, that's a special effect That is difficult to wrangle But It's set on an on an ocean side town You have one of the main locations is a lighthouse and there's a wide shot of the lighthouse that shows these stairs narrow stairs leading all the way down like 100 stairs leading down to this lighthouse and every day they shouted the lighthouse They would have to pack all of the equipment down these this enormous staircase to get to the lighthouse This one shot 30 to go through this shoot and it's amazing if you watch the film and even for as much as I love How many the fog is an obvious step up well It's a more sophisticated budget on this one was significant 1,000,000 And although this is essentially a little budget independent film John Carpenter chose to shoot the film in an amorphic widescreen Panavision, which gave the film a grander feel so it didn't feel like a little bit more film No, absolutely when you watch it, it's it's there's a lot of seascapes He really gives you the feel of being in a haunted sort of harbor town in that day And of course shooting on the water is always gonna be difficult. We didn't hear about that at all. Jaws. No So he ended up filming additional footage there were a number of new scenes and as an editor That's gonna be difficult to insert that because you have the original script and you have the read-on script Was he editing this one himself too?
I don't think he edited that one Although I don't have the editor name of the editor here Yeah, because continuity is harder once you've filmed your movie and people have gone on and you have to get them back And do some scenes and whether hair's grown or All those differences in fact Russell was offered to both of us and he had to turn it down I don't know what he was doing at the time, but it ended up it was made on a bunch of a million gross 21 million in the United States alone. The critics hated it. They didn't care for it at all And I think it's because it is exploitation. It's an obvious It doesn't transcend it as much as Halloween does it's but to me it's a fun little movie It's like a little zombie movie But the zombie is the fog and there's lepers inside of it and he made a profit He made a profit and his style is so clear in this film as well.
It's even more defined There's one great example of a scene where there's the lepers the ghostly lepers assault a boat near the beginning of the film And the way Carpenter plays this is you you see this creature emerge from the fog And grab a guy by the back of the neck And then carpenter does a close-up of the guy's face The guy's eyes are wide and wide staring at this guy And then you see a like a small handheld trident And you just see it go up in the up in the air as if to stab and then you see the hand move forward And then you just hear Like that it goes into the eyes and you never see it going into the eyes But because of the way that sequence was filmed and put together It's insanely disturbing just to hear what you know is somebody being stabbed in the face with a trident And it's the carpenter was much like the diploma where hitchhock was so good at the psychology of fear and using sound And the viewer's imagination to put those pieces together and that to me is more disturbing than seeing it Couple trivia things from the fog one was that carpenter initially intended for to be a pg Yeah, there was no other Markable a dream of our boat effect. Yeah in the last thing where stevia is on top of the lighthouse and fog slowly disappears The crew realized they wouldn't really get the fog to roll out so they had a dream of our boat do this scene in reverse Yeah, yeah, and that's something age of our And they just run it backwards Age of our boat has one scene with her son and a climactic showdown with two of the ghosts Other than that all of her seems to provide herself with no direct answering interactions with any other characters And yeah, she's such an important character. She's the narrator. She's the narrator the whole story You're seeing it through her eyes, but the actual Suspense is around jammie lee curtis and uh in tom atkins and then janet lee and anse keys They're the survivors and adrien barbo is watching all of this unfold from her lighthouse And she's on the radio going get stay out of the fog lock your door is close the windows She's the voice of it the warning it's it's a great film that harkens back to the old days of cinema And you can tell that with john carpenter where this there's that um Uh, you could almost liken her bit at the end to uh kevin.
I think his name is kevin. Oh, car No, it's not kevin car I can't remember his name, but it was uh the original invasion of body snatchers where at the end he's telling the audience, you know Worn people yeah, they're here. They're here and that's what the fog has the feel of this great old timey fun kind of movie I love it the original invasion of the body snatchers and better than any of the remakes and there's been several remakes Yeah, I love the 78 version with the same name I like that one and it's probably the first one I saw if you the original the original one doesn't It's better because it doesn't suffer from any of these things that people do to try and update the story sure the special effects wouldn't get in the way Right. Yeah, and I I love the story behind invasion of the body snatchers anyway, but it's great in that So of course at this point even though it was a critical failure john carpenter made money So he was able to do what he wanted cares about the critics they know No, no, you make money if you make money if you make profit if you don't make a profit in the critics So fortunately fortunately he was able to move on and he wrote escape from new york Oh, yeah, he won and as we all know that became this cult classic Another yet another low budget movie that ended up making a ton of money critical acclaim It doesn't look like a little bit of movie though.
No, no, it's it's crazy. It's grainy, but his set pieces are so lush Uh, he captures that dinginess. It's a big guest. Oh, it's huge.
I was about to get to that It's Donald Pleasance plays the president. It's board nine earnest board nine Adrian barbo again Tom Atkins again, uh, Charles ciphers who was he was also in halloween of the fog. Uh, I've met ciphers He's a wonderful guy. He and I actually talked about plain tavia and discussed our experiences with Shakespeare He performed Shakespeare for Elizabeth Taylor.
I did not have that distinction in my life Yeah, I'd have to dig her up and uh, she could be the skull right right exactly hurt Russell Harry Dean Stanton leave and cleave the old western star. Yeah, yeah all those guys are in this movie It grows more than 25 million dollars, which was not bad in the 80s. How much did it cost? Yeah, Isaac Hayes is in it.
Um, I mean, I don't see the level. Yeah, can you can you find that? You got all those actors that would seem like it would have cost more. It's it's definitely a bigger budget than a million.
I would think Budget was six million. Yeah, it was about 25 million. These guys are these guys are legends. You know, they're not leaving a cleave shit And so snake plistons.
I patch was suggested by caressle. I think it was fantastic. I became iconic So you've seen I can see that it was it was very darkly lush, not steampunk I can't find the white word for it, but the dystopian Yeah, it was grungy dystopian 80s dystopian and for those who haven't seen it This came from New York as the president's airplane went down in New York, which has become its own penal colonies And I'm sure the date on it. I'm sure we've passed the date that it's Was it 97?
Yeah, it was supposed to be 97. So Uh, don't let's see what we mentioned. He uses Yeah, yeah, don't let his own wartime experiences as a prisoner of war for his performances in prison. Oh, I can see that You can you know that he was a prison.
He was a prisoner of war. Yeah. Yeah, the snake pliskin Kerbels characters sent in to to retrieve the president and along the way he meets Adrian barbo and Ernest board nine he meets on the way here. He's a case plays the Duke going back to people that covered like to use, you know, the opening narration Um and was the voice of the computer Adrian barbo damely curse.
There you go Oh, I was thinking of the computer of the thing, which this brings us to the thing Yeah, there were two of them that I really wanted to get to and that was Halloween and the thing Um, of course that wouldn't escape from New York became a cult classic It made some money and so therefore John Carpenter was offered he didn't want to do it But he was offered to remake the thing from another world His one of his favorite Howard Hawks movies from the day and if you've never seen it's great I've seen it before before he made the thing and I thought yeah cool I want to see this the remake of this because I enjoyed the first one so much. Well, this is pants And they have the great Howard Hawks woman who's like you fellas even i'm just as good as any man now You guys follow me you listen me for once Which Howard Hawks of course known for the Quick snappy dialogue that he would use and then that's been duplicated by people later on wasn't the thing the first movie with um Who's that old guy who ended up doing um? Oh, well for both of them. Yeah, he was I don't know if that was the first one of his first.
Yeah, he was great. Well, the whole cast Oh cast is a small cast. Yeah, yeah, like a And again a dis-kind location all men Adrian barbo was the only female she went even on set It was her voice doing the voice of the computer Deborah Hill actually was the only woman on set everybody else was guys Uh, now this was in 1982. Of course the production values for this thing.
You know, what was the budget on this? Because she actually lost money on this one. Yeah, it was a commercial failure. Well, I'm sure over the years It's made up the rest of that money, but John Carpenter said it's his favorite.
Yeah, well, it should be it's a great It's a legendary. I think the thing was a little bit ahead of its time and that's why it failed Uh, Jerry Goldsmith Was supposed to score. We passed the old war economy without doing that's the first one carpenter to do itself. Yeah, really You got any old work out and the music if you've ever sat and listened to the thing soundtrack It's just I tell you one of the reasons it was money was open on the same day's Blade Runner Yeah, I am that did it.
Although I I watched the thing over the Blade Runner any day. Oh, yeah Yeah, I like Blade Runner. I watched it last week for the first time in 30 years and what I watched was the final cut not the version I watched years before I don't know which one is right. I don't know.
I don't remember the other one I've never I've never been a big Blade Runner fan. I've finally watched the the new Blade Runner movie and I really enjoyed that one But I would have got to the thing over Blade Runner any day any day of the week I love the the solitude that these guys have these eight to ten This team of eight to ten people including Wilford Brimley Richard Dysart who played doc Charles Callahan Keith David who was a child Richard Assure the dog handler the autopsy scene. Yeah, John Carpenter said Wilford Brimley was the only one not grossed out by it Because he was a real-life cowboy hunter. So he was using Everyone else was like this to be disturbed, but well, let's talk about the testament to Rob Bottin's Special effects work in that film.
All right, let's do that at that time In what movie ever had you seen special effects like that except maybe the howling or American were See stuff like and I think Rob Bottin may have done the howling. I don't think that was written bigger I think it may have been Rob Bottin, but I'm not sure about that. Oh, it's got fantastic special effects Oh, it's it's just amazing that when the and creative because the the little legs pop out of the dude's head and starts walking away And that one guy goes you gotta be fucking kidding. That's one of my favorite lines in the history of films right there So he used the same source material which was John W Campbell's novella who goes there both of those films were based on that Unlike Hawkes film the thing was part of what carpenter later called his apocalypse trilogy The trio films including Prince of Darkness which will touch on briefly and in the Melthomannus Which I really want to get to both of them having bleak endings.
Yeah, the thing doesn't have a happy ending Oh, absolutely. They they killed the thing but you know, Kurt Russell has to well, that's the thing They kill it at the end at the end he and child's are like, I don't know if you're the thing But I don't really have the energy to do anything neither one of us have the energy to do but everything has burned down and they're never gonna They're gonna freeze today. We're gonna freeze today. And of course the comic books later on latch on to it They found a clue A way to continue the story, but you know what that's our continue because it's it's perfect the way it is It's like the first highland of a movie.
Why do a sequel to that? There's no there's no reason It ended perfectly for that movie to do a sequel just because you want to see this characters again is a terrible idea They're there being a sequel to Highlander. It completely defeats the entire purpose of the first film exactly There can be only one and the only one and Sometimes though there's a guy that comes back from time and then he comes back to kill you It was different when they they made the television series because you know, it's a re-booting of the whole idea That's fine. That's fine.
That's fine. You can't sequelize it. No, but back to John Carpenter Yeah, I can get the money, but I'm more consore for the for the thing was nominated for a razzie award for worse score It's not a horrible score. I don't think it's a classic.
Yeah. Yeah, I love it Of course, it also didn't help that it was released in the summer of 1982 which had another film about an alien in title eT Yeah, there you go. So you can either go with the cute alien which everybody did Everybody I like it Dog thing yeah in the movie. Yeah, I'm great at it who Stan Winston Stan Winston He created the alien He created the alien He wasn't actually listed Wow, that's something film was banned What do we send Finland the thing was I can see that though that wasn't the thing it wasn't at the Vince or was it sweet?
Nor is Nor is yeah, so after the thing despite it being a financial disappointment which that's still That's perfect very hard. Yeah, he would because that's his favorite movie And it well if you're up against eT and later on he was he was fucked by timing on this whole thing But I know I saw both eT and the thing in the movie theater. Yeah, but yeah, I enjoyed both But if I had to watch one now it'd be the thing even then it would have been the thing I would have chosen the thing of it which is I enjoyed in the movie theater. I'm not so fun watching it now It's kind of dated and so yeah, but at the time it was it was a good movie.
Yeah, it's not a good thing You know, which is a cult classic a legendary film. Yeah, and I don't I can't I can't know the thing is a much simpler Story and you're fighting for survival as opposed to these kids riding their bikes right exactly to save this this this alien creature Which is good? It's a good story. Yeah, yeah, it's fine But the thing is such a slow burn.
It's an hour and 45 minutes which is long for a horror film or sci-fi film at that time and During the first half hour you do spend a lot of time going well, what's gonna happen? But when when by the time something does that's what I love that he builds a spin for 45 minutes or so And then when it gets going holy shit exactly what you've got coming is insanity and it wouldn't be possible without that slow Which is what I love the horror movies that I love it's that suspense. It's not the downstairs It's not that suspense and the thing that all hell break loose, but then you're ready for all the help break Listen back you what all health to break right everything so tight You'll get that relief from being scared. You know, I don't know if you know this there's a the thing board game I did not know that or not here in town.
Well, is it like role playing or just board game? I essentially I the way I understand it is you each of you play like a scientist and you have to undergo these research projects and like Oh, wow, someone has been affected and They're kind of working as everybody else They can affect other people and if you know, there's like one versus everybody else. Yeah Well after the thing which universal still they wanted to work with carpenter of course Yeah, he made a great film despite being commercially and then the critics didn't like I think it was Yeah, it was like one really yeah, I want a horrible flop But the critics didn't like it and I think they just couldn't handle the You know, I think it was very gory. It was very bloody and they sort of shy away from that But universal offered uh, john carpenter the chance to direct fire starter.
Really the stinking fire starter. Yeah So carpenter. Yeah. Oh, yeah carpenter hired bill Lancaster bill phillips to adapt the novel into different versions of the screenplay And he wanted Richard Dreyfus to play Andy McGee David Keith Uh, but when the thing failed universal replace him with mark Lester Well, so forget what I said about them still want to work with that That was probably good for him because fire starter the way the movie they made horrible It's horrible.
It could have been a great movie. It's a great. That's an awesome. It's not the best even king books out there It could have been a fantastic movie and still could be again if someone wants to make a good movie out of it But they got exploitation The choices they made and they were trying to create a vehicle for um The girl followed Drew Barry for Drew Barrymore and Drew Barrymore while she was cute and eat eat Couldn't act for shit.
Not in the fire starter. No, it was called for much more complex actors than Drew Barrymore was capable at that No, she's become a very good actress. Oh, yeah. Yeah, she's great I watched her drug doubt team right but but fire starter George he Scott was the good thing about that movie.
I love George Scott, but he was miscast in that No, he wasn't the character. He wasn't the big native american. No, he was supposed to be but he was great No, he's George he's got George. He's got so by David Keith I love it.
He did a fine job. I don't know that he would have been driving so I don't know that drive us would have been right for the role Uh, well, probably not. I was just looking at John Carpenters credits. Yeah, he's great with Halloween.
Yeah Halloween three season the witch and Halloween four but not Halloween two well come he composed Three and four he wrote two though. That's weird that they wouldn't mention him on that, but uh, yeah It's the thing to show about I'm gonna be kind of get some stuff to me Yeah, I see I see when I go into the actual pages that he's a writer But of course you couldn't throw a rock and not hit a Stephen King movie adaptation at the time So he was offered Christine in 1983. Uh, no, it's not horrible. Uh, no, it's not good.
It's not good. I don't think it's horrible But it's not good. Uh, of course the story is about the high school nerd who gets a junk 1958 chlamathuria which has a mind of its own Did he do that would be though? He did direct Christine.
Yeah, yeah, which and there's a lot of suspense in it But carpenter leaves his mark on Christine at least there's a style to it It's a carpenter, but uh He has been it was released. It was received well by the critics. It did pretty good business So carpenter, you know was able to get back on top again But he was quoted as saying he directed the film because it was the only thing offered to him at the time So it was just a job. Yep, you know, uh, after that he did starman by Columbia pictures.
Uh, the script was well received Uh, and this was carpenter's cuddly cuddly nice That they were Jeff bridges and they tried to get back. Yeah, he started back and then uh, uh, how From it was Marion from Raiders of Los Got no, it's gonna nobody talks about star man anymore. It's not really mentioned in the pantheon of partner film. It's a great movie So then his next financial failure was big trouble in little china, which again, I think that's unfair It's a fun movie actually I enjoyed being told that he did lose a lot though.
It's oh, yeah No, but starting with I think after starman, you start seeing the decline of interest in him and his movies start not You know the exploitation huh? Well, that's the thing so many of his films that failed back then like the thing or like big trouble China are now being cult classics that everybody loves if you're a film nerd, you know, you love these movies the chances are So at this time he was after that occurred rustle in it to yeah, yeah, that was them working together again Uh, and it had a great cast of many Asian actors that we know James hollum was the main bad guy Which was great and kimmy control who was coming off of yes, can go was in that one um, but they didn't latch onto it And it's a hoot. It's a shame. It's a fun.
Well, it It's it's not for everybody's taste though. No, it's a drive-in movie is what it is It's a movie you would have gone to the drive-in and saw and enjoyed and said oh, this is a hoot minute Exploitation kind of movie. Oh, yeah, it's serious people No avoid that serious film fans. It's just a fun movie So he went back to make a lower budget movie because the big trouble little China was another big big budget studio film Yeah, so after that he did prince of darkness his second in the apocalypse trilogy Uh, and it was influenced by the bb series quarter mass I don't know that I understand prince of darkness even now There's a cylinder that is dripping Satan somewhere contained in a monaster not a monastery but like an inner city church.
Yeah, there's a Doping Satan. Yeah, it's a and then it's like they're bringing the essence his essence It's a quantum physics kind of explanation or something and it's creepy. It's a scary movie. It's really creepy But as you're going through the movie you're going, okay, these people are smarter than I am I don't know what this is this is the odd one is gonna use science to justify what you want to do exactly it's sci-fi and horror I don't know what this is.
We'll really use such a certain set of our brain assets Conversation doesn't need to continue Such a weird movie scary as hell Alice Cooper is a homeless guy image Oh, yeah, yeah, I want to check it's almost like the zombie thing when somebody gets bit when they get possessed by Satan there It's not else with all of them. Yeah, I just didn't Just laying under a pipe with Satan dripping down. They almost had a million. Yeah, yeah, it was ain't dripping into their mouth Yeah, that's what it was.
That's what it was. It was weird. It was so weird again stylistically. It's carpenter It's neat to look at it's pretty pretty pretty for a horror movie, but you just go I wish I knew what the hell that was gonna go back to writing his own music I am not sure.
Yes. Yes. I'm almost certain that for that. It has this the sound Also at the lower budget movies.
I think he wrote he wrote the music for all of them. Yeah, just say money Money so after that he did they live in 1988 they live with Rowdy Rowdy Piper. He's working with Keith David again And several of the other people he'd worked with but flower which he'd worked with for many years Buckflower. Yeah.
Yeah, he played the homeless guy and somebody he was the homeless guy back in the future at the head He was the drunk on the on the on the park Is it George George flower George about flower? He did drive driving massacre something about a drive in he wrote and directed that piece of schlock was horrible and again They live got a cold audience, but made some audiences are not gonna laugh. That's a great sci-fi. Did he make money?
I'm surprised He's gonna make money if you don't spend it. That's just only four million. Yeah, and this was the day of video where you could have one go on to the video market Not to be very good actually. It's a fun movie.
It's a really fun movie. It's about It's classes. It's the most political statement that carpenters ever made but you have these working class Lower-class working people who are now relegated to living in tents tent cities and stuff and then you have the the wealthier people and then Ronnie Piper comes across a pair of glasses that when you put them on He allows them to see these alien people are the wealthy people and then each sign the sign is actually some Some liberal propaganda billboards and stuff like that. It is like watch TV be obedient Stuff like that.
Yeah, and so right. Ronnie Piper is going to infiltrate these aliens and it's just it's fun as hell But it really makes a big point about class divide and stuff like that keeping people down. It's very Orwellian, which is wonderful Uh, he was offered the chance to direct exorcist three in 1989 He met with William Peter Blattie to the novel Legion, which I recommend if you've never read it's fantastic Um, but they couldn't agree on how it should go. So they moved on Uh in 1992 carpenter took a took a pretty big hit when he did memoirs of an invisible man with chevy chase I think that was a carpenter.
I thought it was fun. It's it's bad. He did that one really He took the biggest hit of his career. It was it became like an ishtar like flop Yeah, yeah, they lost money commercially.
I did it. I saw it driving. I thought it was great Uh in 95 he did village of the damned I don't know that one. That's the one with the blood children.
Isn't it? Yeah, it was a remake of that and here's the problem with something like village of the dam The remix rate it's christfer. Eve. It's a good movie Um At the time there was this resurgence of you remember how great those old movies used to be and so you'd see remade one Yeah, yeah Part of the souls the toolbox murders later on in the 90s or early 2000s, which was it was a good movie the toolbox murders remake Uh, it was far better than the original the problem with those is nobody knows what the village of the dam is unless you're a horror fan You're appealing to one specific audience.
Uh, he did an escape from LA, which is a critical and financial failure For good reason it was a shitty shitty shitty movie. That's a sequel that um should have been um left on the well You know they had that big resurgence of interest at the time So they were like, you know, it's gonna be great escape from LA and it wasn't it just wasn't because you take all these ideas and you make it great Movie with who wants but you can't use to try and figure out how to use these same ideas again And it was just let's see what wacky things we can do in this part of the world You're not coming out of the original story. You're trying to take it was a story beats and just find a new that was it They were like Steve Buscemi's hot. Let's have him as a smart ass character And then we'll put a tranny in there which they did it was like I think Pam Greer played a She-male and so you they just went so wacky that you go what the what are you doing?
Guys, what are you doing? This is not good because it's no longer about the story. That's exactly it It was completely gimmicky He then did a television horror anthology that was made with Toby Hoover called Body Bags And it's a lot of fun. It's very tales from the cryptish kind of it's a hoot again It's not carbon or having fun And I love it when the horror directors collaborate these legendary horror directors and they come up with some pretty good stuff And we'll touch on that briefly later, but it's 1995's in the mouth of edus that I really want to talk about here for a minute It's a it's an homage to Lovecraft With the elder god's theory and it messes with what is real what is not real the ascent the essence of the same nail is a is an insurance Investigator and he's hired to investigate A missing author who's very Stephen King like Lovecraftian really the Stephen King's the best example we can have a modern time And he thinks it's it's a publicity stunt by the insurance company So he and this lady that works for the insurance company have to find the small town that he writes about in all of his books An apparently fictional town and then they figure out how to get there and they go there and this town is fucked up It's a love crafty in town with slithery tentacle monsters and they find the writer, but the writer may just be the devil He may yeah, yeah, it's uh, and he makes it note.
He's like they see all this terrifying horrific stuff's great movie And uh, and the writers going I don't know how he made this shit happen. I don't know this stunt has gone too far It's too weird and then and then the writer makes him realize that he's writing this guy's story He's writing everything and it becomes him wondering whether he is a fictional character That's being played with and written the story. It blows your freakin mind and at the end of the movie you go I don't know what that was about, but it was great Unlike Prince of Darkness where you go that was decent, but I'm going home now What was the name of this thing again in the mouth of Matt is Sam Neal and well Sam Neal your impression I was in it uh the guy that played Vigo Vigo from Ghostbusters 2 he's in it. It's terrifying It's great.
It really is one of my favorite. Yeah, Trump has been places the publisher the main publisher guy So that one did not do well commercially or with critics I think it was marketed poorly in the mid 90s if you weren't scream you had troubles You know people were not really attaching themselves to horror films too much and screen came out the year after in the mouth of Madison sort of revitalized everything But it was also making fun of the genre at the same time that it was yeah doing it just it for as much as I love it It's another movie that is obviously made for horror fans Well, here's also part of I think what was going on with carpenters by now people think of carpenter as a certain kind of that's a director He's in a box. He's he's boxed in and so people Automate they say oh, it's a dark carpenter movie And so they make a choice to go see the movie based on him without knowing anything about the writing and at this time horror fans were relegated to to the convention scene Marginalized so that if you were a normal person you didn't go seeking junk carpenter movies out That was for the horror fans only by the 90s. Yeah Um So and then after that in 1998 He did vampires John Carpenters vampires, which is just a great fun If you could do a horror western with vampires as the main bad guys, that's what you get and it's it's ingenious The sort of way he turns these tropes on their head Uh, just a fun great movie.
I don't I don't like James Woods lately as far as his political stances the stuff that he's saying about He was so good in this movie. He was a lot of fun. Uh an actor we call fat bald one I think it was Daniel Baldwin fat Baldwin was played as best buddy in this Um, and it's about the catholic church that sends out teams of vampire hunters to root out because vampire nests and pretty much They're just laying them that's their job to go around the church pays them to go around and slay them and then shit goes bad She goes bad and then uh, then that's the movie. It's a great adventure western with vampires.
It's a western though It I'd I'd squarely call it western because it's a place in the old west or in the southwest Yeah, it definitely has a but it's a modern or that no, it's modern. Okay. I look for the 90s, you know, it was 98 Now it's vintage because it was 20 years ago, but um after that No, but when you said western imagine guys on horses. No, no writing around what there's no It's a modern western.
It's a lot of western tropes as you would have Uh, and then the last major one that we're gonna talk about is go some Mars and we're not gonna talk about that for long Uh, it was really yeah, seriously It was released in 2005 and they were sort of it's the same rio brovo Kind of thing that used in salt and free sink 13 and really the fog And uh, he has defined his involvement in that movie as I come in and say hello to everybody and go home And that was his directorial duties. It has ice cube and it was totally a studio film Uh, and it was very you know a lot of stunt casting and stuff like that They can stay them. Yeah, yeah good cast, but uh, I think at this point carpenter was like, okay, fuck and i'm done Um, but he had not been doing great in the 90s. I love his work, but he wasn't making a whole lot of money with him I'm moving the 2000s.
Uh, what was that the word? I would like to see it and I I'll just tell you one thing about it. Yeah, it was 10 million gross less than 500 000 Jesus Christ Isn't that awful? Um, so yeah, it sounds like a man whose career is Has passed the um the sell-by date.
Well right now right now he's working as a producer on the uh, 2018 Halloween remake Which looks pretty silly. It looks awesome. It's the anime right right? I think it skips like everything after the first one or the second one after the first one I can make a second one.
I would call it, but it's it's definitely she knows he's alive. She's waiting for him Yeah, it looks fun as hell Yeah, eventually say just Jim Lickerta's and that was the character. Yeah, so He directed all the second halloweenes that the no he only did the first one So the others were all the studio Yeah, I was a bit earlier when I was misconstruing what he had done was apparently it listed what he did on soundtrack for it listed him as director So I was okay. Yeah, I didn't do the soundtrack of the second one He wrote the second one but it was Rick Rosenthaw the director that one and then the fourth and fifth one Alan Howard did the music for that But it was based on the thing is for me with looking at his filmography.
Yeah, he's not a lot trash Yeah, but it doesn't take away from the great ones that he made right agree and even the ones that are trash I love yeah, I love most of them. I know some Mars, but I love most any creative person does a lot of crap because you have to do the crap to get that That's how you find out what you can't tell like his what the opposite way they started with some of the best of his career He started stronger than I don't think I've got the studio involvement on the other ones I don't know maybe sometimes his vision just didn't pin out. I bet largely it was studio involvement I would like to say I don't I think it was it was a bad time to be a legendary horror director Yeah, because at this point until 1996 West Craven had was not doing great You know he wasn't doing a whole lot of great work Romero in the 90s It was tough for him as well. He still didn't have the biggest horror really from 1988 after Hellraiser Which really kind of revolutionized modern horror at that time.
We were going away from the the slasher films We were even moving away from Nightmare in Elm Street where they had become parodies of themselves You had the Hellraiser series coming on it was new and edgy and dark and more realistic I guess you have the direct video stuff So horror became this niche audience and that niche could not buy enough tickets for these movies And I think part of the problem is when you just keep doing remakes of the original story That's it also collapses your audience. Yeah, you're not build each remake is it bringing in more people That's just right. It's a derivative for the fans who are still willing to buy off the the success of the previous films exactly and again village of the dam might have been a great It was a great old movie horror fans knew what it was and nobody else and even horror fans at the time You had I guess what you these posers and you've always got those in every marginalized group but Most people didn't know what village of the dam was I was young in the time when he was doing some of these things And I remember constantly seeing critics movies movie critics and TV shows and these were just every horror that was terrible Yeah, that was like I was like one star like I know and those are great movies I know we say I know we say now that like who cares about critics saying I'm not the agent now where I don't care But I think it wasn't having the ideas when they actually have their power Well, there that reminds me the final I know we're running out of time. I want to make here yesterday I got home.
I wanted to watch a James Bond movie Couldn't find a one except for specker and I wanted to watch some of the other ones before I watched specker So I settled I actually settled with the get smart movie with Stephen Cole It's fun. Steve Crayall. Yeah, I don't know and I was a big fan of get smart the TV show Don Adams back of the day I don't know that I've ever laughed so much. I did with that It cracked me up and those last keep coming at yeah critics absolutely hated it.
It made no money I don't think audiences understood it but there's a brooksean element to the script where there were jokes that I caught that I thought nobody's Gonna get smart the television series while it was a hit is not something that most people today would get It's a cool thing that it was a specific humor to the time. Yeah, so the movie remake I love them. I think the movie is great Yeah, because they did it they actually there were a couple get smart movies made with the original cast Yeah, oh, yes, yes, and they knew bomb and they they didn't do so well But the reimagining of the whole idea with the with Steve Crayall, um, I thought it was a really good movie But I think he's not a really actor. I agree with that No, no, is that about the wrestling code?
He played kind of the Well, he's gonna get an Oscar nomination at some point. I don't know that he already has He's done a lot of he's done a lot of battle of the sexes was a recent movie I would like to see that's really good movie. Yeah, um, but I was gonna say I think part of the problem with especially horror movies in the 90s was that they weren't coming up with original ways to um, be successful and yeah, and because if you look the movies that I love like um rosemary's baby You never it's not a slasher movie at all. It's a special hour half It's suspenseful as hell and the same thing with the thing is it's it's it builds up the suspense It's all I think that they weren't looking at new ways to um take movies that transcend sand Genros and make it horror create a horror movie and within this other kind of a story.
Yeah, yeah, you know The funny thing I when I saw rosemary's baby. I didn't understand it I need to watch it again because now that I think about it the whole paranoia that rosemary's not there with Ruth Gordon Because something's off. Yeah, even Ralph Bell me you go what a nice old doctor, but something's not right There's just that tinge of unsely You can't put your finger on body around her saying that she's the one going yeah, but she's the only saying person there Yeah, absolutely everybody else is making her have the devil's baby It's good. I know I know it happened in my 10 minutes last week We tried to force somebody to have scenes maybe and it didn't pan out and dick as if you have had sayings baby We need to know we need to see video because the catholic church has paid us to take care of sayings babies Exactly the wildcards of now in commission to take care of supernatural things like Satan's babies Have a fight that's dripping Satan Please drop it off.
We're talking to the EPA about dripping Satan pipes right now losing authority Current administration doesn't care about it, but I think the lead with the devil anyway The news the walkthrough particularly from all centric urans is right if you have any thoughts on john karford company's homography Halloween the thing yeah or his t.v. Works later with masters of horror cigarette burns You've seen some movies that wrong to see that they definitely haven't seen so that later Yeah, I always want to talk to people about them because nobody has seen these movies People that go on the tours and do the Convention all that honestly the last thing me and my brother in law we could either see Pull figure we went to the movies every Tuesday because it was dollar night Or no, they were always a dollar it was just that was the best night for us But we were going to the movie and it was either watch paul fiction for the second time or watching the mouth of madness And he wanted to watch paul fiction for the second time And so I just went along with it when I signed the mouth of madison video. I was like, you know what pal thought you Exactly speaking of my brother in law. They're hiring at nightmare forest on august 15th this upcoming Saturday at five o'clock September 15th Yeah, so if you want a job in the haunted house business These are great people with my wife on Facebook on Facebook and they'll get a hold of you You can just message them there, but yeah for further information.
They've got a Facebook page They will be hiring. It's a it's a lot of fun. It's a fun job going up into the Halloween season also just quick plug for mommy I come up soon. We got to make into that show.
Yeah, yes, it's a number 14 13 13 Tomorrow, yeah, yeah For that because we're definitely not filming this week's in advance. No absolutely not But yeah, I'll take us out here and until next time For one time That's 33 that's slower for you right just for you guys 33 RPM. No, that's normal