Weirdhouse Cinema: Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!

In this episode of Weirdhouse Cinema, Rob and Joe discuss the 1965 cult classic crime thriller “Faster, Pussycat! Kill! Kill!” directed by Russ Myers and starring Tura Santana, Haji and Lori Williams. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema.

Speaker 3 (00:15):
This is Rob Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. And
today we are going to be discussing a cult classic,
the nineteen sixty five let's see, what would you call it?
The Go Go murder exploitation film Faster Pussycat Kill Kill.
I think I'm to understand a favorite of many filmmakers.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
Yeah, especially a filmmaker John Waters. He is the ultimate
champion of this film. And I'm going to be touching
in on his thoughts regarding this film several times, especially
in the run up to the plot here. But yeah,
this is a very well known cult classic film. And
as we are approaching the Halloween season here, Joe, when

(00:57):
I had this discussion, like, well, maybe we should we
should have avoid doing horror movies until we get either
to October itself or right to the edge of October,
so as to enhance the punch of all that horror.
So last week we did The Man Who Fell to
Earth science fiction drama, and this week, yeah, it is
basically a crime yarn, a sixties go go dancer desert

(01:20):
crime movie.

Speaker 3 (01:21):
What brought you to this pic, rub, you know, I
don't remember specifically.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
It's one of those that I've always been aware of,
just because it does have a its B cinema cult
following footprint firmly. It was more of a bootprint firmly implanet,
you know, in the face of the American public. So
I've always been vaguely aware of it, and I've heard
samples from it, seen some stills from it, but I've
never watched it in its entirety. And yeah, I think

(01:48):
I was just I did a quick brainstorm. It's like,
what's something that doesn't have horror, What's something even further
doesn't have a speculative element at all that would still
fit the profile for weird house cinema. And I was like, oh, well,
it's got to be faster. Pussycat Kill Kill.

Speaker 3 (02:02):
I had never seen this movie before a couple of
days ago, and I was very impressed by it in
multiple respects. But one of the ways it impressed me
was how entertaining it is for a B movie. Now,
we love B movies, but a common problem with a
lot of B movies is that they they often have

(02:22):
dull stretches. Not all but a lot. You often get
the sense that, like, you know, a B movie director
is trying to like work up to the monster scene
and that's really what they're excited about, and they're like, Okay,
before we do that, we got to have like a
love scene here. We gotta have like a character explaining
how the monster was made to kind of dry, you know,

(02:43):
a scientist explaining the origin of the monster whatever. And
these scenes feel kind of perfunctory. It's just like they're
even the director is not very excited about them. They're
just trying to get through them to show you the
stuff that's that you're really here for. This film was
made with the idea, yeah, clearly that every moment should
be thrilling and entertaining in some way, even when it's

(03:05):
just kind of routine plot execution or just exposition that's
setting up later scenes. The script is written in such
a way that, like every line a character says is
weird in a way that makes the scene entertaining. Like
I think the sensibility that russ Meyer and from what

(03:26):
I've read, russ Meyer to a great extent credits one
of the main cast members Tasatana as also being a
sort of a truth not just a member of the cast,
but a true like creative influence behind like the movie
and its style. Whoever's responsible for the dialogue in each
scene knew that it is more important to be entertaining

(03:48):
than to be realistic. And I appreciate that.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, yeah, I think this is a strong point. I mean,
you even see it in the title, Like the title
is faster pussy Cat Kill Kill, And I've read that,
like the whole take on this is that like you have,
you know, a hint of sex in the title, you
have speed, you know, racing in the title, and you
have murder and death in the title. And it doesn't
actually make all that much sense as a statement or

(04:12):
a title. Like John Waters, when we're in writing about
the film, often refers to the gang of three here
as the Pussycats. I don't think they ever refer to
themselves as such, but you know, fair enough, I guess,
but you do have to sort of twist the title
to make it work in a literal sense. Now, as
we'll discuss, this is certainly a film produced through the

(04:34):
male gaze. It's about go go dancers starring go go dancers,
or at least two of them, and while it's not
as provocative as you might expect by modern standards. I mean,
this is a mid nineteen sixties movie that was shown
at the drive in. You know, it's still clearly intended
to titillate, but it's also action packed. And it's especially
interesting to read various reviews that talk about it's kind

(04:56):
of dual nature because at the time of its release, Yeah,
a lot of people saw it as just a sexist
B movie, and a lot of people didn't like it
to understand, it didn't actually perform all that well, but
it was later embraced as this kind of iconic counterculture
film with a grandiose vision of female power to match
the grandiose visions of masculine power found just everywhere else

(05:18):
in cinema. So this is this film that has been
very influential. It was a major inspiration for Quentin Tarantino's
Death Proof from two thousand and seven, and both Tarantino
and more recently actor Norman Retis have expressed an interest
in remaking it in one form or another. I think
you can ask a lot of questions about what form

(05:38):
a remake of Faster Pussycat Kill Kill would take. In
the twenty first century, but you know, maybe they have
a particular vision or visions in mind.

Speaker 3 (05:47):
I was actually thinking, without knowing that, I was thinking
about Quentin Tarantino when I thought about modern filmmakers who
had clearly been inspired by this movie. I can see
direct lines of influence going from this movie to Yes
to Death proove his half of the release that was
originally called Grind Grindhouse.

Speaker 2 (06:07):
Is that what it was called, Yes Grindhouse.

Speaker 3 (06:09):
But then also to the kill Bill series that there
is some strong shared material there. Of course, I knew
about the John Waters connection, and we can talk some
more about some things that come through in John Waters
films as well that that seemed to be inspired by
this movie. But coming back to your comment about Norman

(06:29):
read Us, I have to lodge a complaint that is
not about this movie, but about how Google search results are.

Speaker 4 (06:34):
Now.

Speaker 3 (06:35):
We were just recently talking about how, for some reason
it seems like Google search results are just getting worse
and worse. I think I don't know exactly the reason
for this, but I would suspect it has to do
with just like the Web is getting worse and worse,
more packed with junk, and you know, search engine gaming
AI generated content and garbage. So the other day, when
I just googled this movie, Faster Pussycat Kill Kill the

(06:58):
top result, What do you think it should be? An
image of the poster of the movie, an image of
the cast of the movie, or a promo still from it. No,
it's a picture of Norman riatas oh Man.

Speaker 2 (07:10):
I mean, I love Norman Reada's a very fun actor,
have been in a lot of things I love. But
come on, now, coming back to John Waters, I did
pick up his book Shock Value where he talked He
talked about a lot of things in that book, but
he does specifically talk a little bit about Faster pussy
Cat Kill Kill. He writes that this film, russ Meyer's
tenth film quote is beyond a doubt, the best movie

(07:33):
ever made. It is possibly better than any film that
will be made in the future.

Speaker 3 (07:39):
Don't try to argue with him. You don't want to
get pulled into this. He's had more practice having this
conversation than you have.

Speaker 2 (07:46):
Exactly. I mean, yeah, Like I said, he's the ultimate
champion of this film, and I think the ultimate expert
on it. He has meditated on this movie more than
any other person. In this book, he goes on to
talk about how initially he was drawn in by the
radio ads during the film's initial release. They promised that
the movie would leave a taste of evil in your mouth,

(08:09):
and then he went and saw it, and he fell
in love the picture and ended up seeing it every
night at the local drive in, often alone, for the
remainder of its run there. So he cites this movie
as the primary influence on all of his characters in
all of his films.

Speaker 3 (08:25):
I can absolutely see that in many ways, and I
think he so. In one sense. You can see the
similarity in the way that John Waters movies, I think
often go for that feeling of trying to make every
single moment interesting and entertaining rather than going for realism obviously,
and so it's like more important that a character say

(08:48):
something that is shocking or funny or entertaining in some
way than that they like strictly stay in character or
I don't know, do something that would be realistic. But
another big similarity I see is this may be a
weird thing to single out, but I think you'll have
to agree with me, is in a very strange and
idiosyncratic style of line delivery that is characteristic of this movie,

(09:14):
like especially Taurusitana, but also the character Billy. They have
this way of saying lines where they're almost not really
acting them. They are just like shouting their lines, like
just spitting them out with this forceful, venomous, high octane
delivery for every line, just the same every time. And

(09:39):
that comes through in a lot of performances in John
Waters movies.

Speaker 2 (09:44):
Yeah. Yeah, this this feeling, especially in this movie, that
it often feel any given scene will often feel like
a pro wrestling promo, you know, it has that kind
of energy. It maybe one note, but that note is
played super loud and there's no missing it and it delivers.
There's something about that character very loudly.

Speaker 3 (10:03):
Like I'm specifically thinking of a lot of divines. Line
delivery and pink flamingos feels like Varla's line delivery in
this movie. Yeah, yeah, I think there's a direct connection there.
So we'll keep coming back to some Waters quotes because
again I think he's the authority on all these all
things faster, pussy, get, kill, Kill. But as we normally

(10:25):
we'd touch in the elevator pitch, I'm just going to
read you how John Waters describes this movie as a
quote violent gothic melodrama built around three bisexual, psychotic go
go girls, Varla, Billy, and Rosie. There's an interesting angle
that the movie approaches you with, and I wonder what
you think about this, rob It almost feels like it's

(10:47):
trying to imply that this movie is connected to current events,
and those current events, which you must have seen in
the news, are that now everyday women are are like
breaking men's necks in the desert. It's just something that's
happening in this crazy world we live in today, and

(11:07):
this is a movie about that phenomenon. But I don't
think that there really was a phenomenon to base this on.

Speaker 4 (11:14):
No.

Speaker 2 (11:14):
I mean, maybe it's exploiting a little bit this idea
that they actually you call out in some dialogue in
the film, or it's like women or they're doing all
these things now that they didn't used to do. In
one of those things is perpetrating violent crimes in the desert.
You've come a long way, baby.

Speaker 3 (11:31):
I mean, I'm sure it happens sometimes, but I don't
get the feeling that this was like there was a
sudden spike in the sixties of women just doing assassinations
related to auto racing.

Speaker 2 (11:42):
Now, I mean obviously, Yeah, women have always engaged in
murder and violence just as men have. I mean, we
have tales in the Old Testament and various myths and
legends and so forth. There are plenty of there have
been plenty of varlas throughout history. All right, let's go
ahead and listen to the trailer audio for a faster
pussycat kill kill.

Speaker 4 (12:07):
If you want, ladies and gentlemen, gold gold for a
wild wild ride with the watusie cats. But beware, the
sweetest kittens have the sharpest claw or your own safety.
See Faster pussy Cats Kill kill, wild women, wild wheels,
Race the fastest pussy cats and they'll be Jill, not dead,

(12:30):
sober woman, faulted, wild and FOTD.

Speaker 3 (12:38):
You're plating yourself on this kid, then hanging itself for nothing.

Speaker 1 (12:41):
For nothing, got nothing to do with the money jeers.

Speaker 4 (12:45):
The money Jack and Jill. They make them Moffia look
like Brownie must have all. Yeah, ten percent of your
action be enough for anyone, too much for one man
to handle. And again you never can town. You girls
a bunch of newdists. You just uh short of clothes

(13:06):
right now, You're first on my list, and I always
got top. You'll only go one chill and your channel's
busy tune in and outside. You really shippy, am benefm?

Speaker 2 (13:21):
So who do I get to take care of the
muscle man?

Speaker 4 (13:24):
You got two of everything and some left over?

Speaker 2 (13:29):
You did one?

Speaker 1 (13:32):
You want a big crust or side darling?

Speaker 4 (13:35):
Why did you take one of each? Son? A? Uh,
both look tender. He's got a big motor to feed.

Speaker 3 (13:43):
But did you you did?

Speaker 2 (13:44):
My mother never wrote shot baby rock would.

Speaker 4 (13:51):
Be rough the last time.

Speaker 2 (13:53):
All right, here's how it works.

Speaker 4 (13:56):
Everybody's gotta go your name it. We've got faster pussy hats, kills,
delivers tone board on the opposition on ladylike karate chops,
ungentlemanly haymaker, spirited gymnastics, corrective table attic sandbox jousting, or
a muscle bound chat wrestling with a roaring sports car

(14:17):
that's intent upon squashing him like a grape bazaar kidney
and chessie rattling chases and for the first time on
the screen, a hay making, belly busting, karate chopping, judo
flipping fight. Go in them all, sober woman against man,
the prize life itself slashing, tackling, gouging, hacking, clipping, felting, smashing,

(14:37):
and muscle to muscle, bone to bowl or an incredible
evenings entertainment. A film so totally satisfying see Russ Meyer Faster,
pussy Cat Kill.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Chill See really sells it. You can you can imagine
being the young John Waters hearing that or some version
of that trailer for the first time. All right, as
for availability on this one, I do wish it was
easier to get a copy of it or to have
an official stream of the movie. It doesn't seem to

(15:10):
be widely available on disc right now, and I couldn't
find an official stream video Drum has a copy of
it here in Atlanta. But yeah, I've given this film's
cult status. Would I would want it to be more
available than it is. But if you look hard enough,
I think you can probably find it somewhere. So if
you need a break and go see this movie, you know,

(15:31):
come back. We're going to talk about the cast and
some of the filmmakers, and then from there we're going
to get into a more spoilery discussion of the plot.
All right, Well, let's start, yeah at the top, with
the director, the producer of the editor. He also is
a story credit. It's Russ Meyer, who lived nineteen twenty

(15:54):
two through two thousand and four, American exploitation director known
for camp, be sex ploit tis films from the nineteen
fifties through the nineteen eighties, with a couple of brief
returns after that. He directed the nineteen seventy film Beyond
the Valley of the Dolls, the only film that film
critic Roger Ebert ever wrote.

Speaker 3 (16:11):
I think that movie was also not super well received
when it came out, but I've heard people kind of
appreciate it now. It's also allegedly just wild. The moment
to moment weirdness quotient is apparently quite high.

Speaker 2 (16:28):
So Meyer's film immediately prior to Faster Pussycat was nineteen
sixty five's Motor Psycho same year, same release year, about
a violent gang of male bikers, so he essentially flipped
the script on that for this movie, focusing on female
characters instead. His films are often categorized as being very
technically proficient, ludicrous in their dialogue, campy, and often using leering,

(16:54):
low angle shots, but those low angle shots often do
create this sense of weird kind of almost like mythic tension,
like it makes it makes the characters in the film
feel larger than life. I mean not just their physical bodies,
but like their their sort of hero or villain status.

Speaker 3 (17:13):
I would say that russ Meyer's style is very much
in that category of schlock, but not hack. Somebody who
is creating what is supposed to be you know, yeah,
lowbrow exploitation cinema, but who actually is bringing quite a
bit of style and in a weird way you could

(17:35):
almost say say taste to the experience.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
Yeah, Like I say, never a dull moment. If nothing else,
you're just wondering what are these characters going to say next,
And at any moment someone might get like slapped in
the face as well. Again, John Waters idolized russ Meyer,
called him quote the good old boy of exploitation films,
and in Waters' view on things, quote exploitation films are

(17:59):
the only ones that come close to that dreaded word art.

Speaker 3 (18:04):
That's an interesting idea. I almost feel like I've heard
John Waters talk about this in some other context, that
there's almost kind of a like a horseshoe theory of taste,
where for some reason, a lot of people who seem
to have some of the highest tolerance for I don't know,
avant garde art and you know, the like the I

(18:31):
don't know what you call it, the kind of fine
art that really asks you to be open minded and
go outside of your comfort zone. For some reason, are
also often people who are into very low brow B
movie type stuff.

Speaker 2 (18:46):
Yeah, yeah, that's sort of you know, putting yourself in
a place of open minded vulnerability where art can potentially
hurt you. But like it's it's what does it make
me feel? It's creating feelings and then I'm supposed to
make sense of those feelings. Yeah, it's not unlike the
place you have to put yourself in with various exploitation films,
though to be sure, not all exploitation films are created

(19:08):
equal and in many different ways. All right, Moving on
to the screenplay itself, written by Jackie Moran, who lived
nineteen twenty three through nineteen ninety. As a writer, he
only worked on a handful of produced screenplays, all russ
Meyer pictures, but as an actor, his credits go back
to Believe the mid nineteen thirties. As a child and

(19:29):
youth actor appeared in various old serials such as Buck Rogers,
as well as a nineteen thirty eight adaptation of the
Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Oh and he was also in
a nineteen thirty nine film called Gone with the Wind.

Speaker 3 (19:42):
So I mentioned that a lot of what makes this
movie unique is the high grit of the script, you know,
like the way that each line just kind of like
grips you and rubs your brain. And I don't know
exactly where to put the credit for this. It should
should we be thinking about this as like a feature

(20:03):
of Jackie Moran's screenplay, or since this seems to be,
from what I've read, a characteristic of Russ Meyer films,
is this something that's coming more from Meyer's influence? But
then again, as I said, also, I've read that that
tourist Satana is usually given credit for shaping a lot
of the tone and style of the movie.

Speaker 2 (20:24):
Yeah, I mean, you probably want to side with Varlain
this one, because otherwise she's gonna chop you and Kidney.
So I mean, it does seem like a lot of
those lines are coming from the heart. So yeah, I
don't have a lot of clarity on this, but I
kind of have the suspicion that the screenplay was one place,
and then maybe the actors and or the director on

(20:46):
the set kind of like punch things in a different direction.

Speaker 3 (20:49):
Hmm.

Speaker 2 (20:49):
Okay, well, let's talk about Toura Satana, not Santana, as
I sometimes keep mispronouncing it. This is this is her
show name. Lean into the sort of evil nature of
her persona. So Satana lived nineteen thirty eight through twenty eleven,
and yeah, this she plays the leader of our gang

(21:10):
of three of violence loving fem fatale, criminal, mastermind, and
goth queen of the Desert. Satana was born Tura Yamaguchi.
She was a Japanese American exotic dancer and burlesque performer
turned actor. She started out in the early sixties with
bit parts for TV and film, including the TV series
hawaiian I and The Man from Uncle. Then came this film,

(21:33):
followed by an uncredited role as a dancer on sixty
six is Our Man Flint, and then the role of Satana,
essentially playing herself to some degree in the nineteen sixty
eight low budget sci fi horror film The Astro Zombies
starring Wendell Corey and John Keradine.

Speaker 3 (21:51):
That's a movie I have seen and remember almost nothing about,
which is a feature of most films I've seen starring
John Keradine.

Speaker 2 (22:00):
Oh well, you know, Peep busted. He's in a lot
of films, but he's in a lot of forgivable films,
It's true. Astro Zombies is definitely one of those. It's
a classic B movie in many ways. It has this
super cool mask, very cool poster, but as I remember it,
a very plotting pace. I believe Satana plays the Mad

(22:20):
Doctor's evil hinch woman, but I cannot remember a thing
that anyone does in this aside from you do get
some creeping astro zombies from time to time.

Speaker 3 (22:29):
That was a Ted V. Michels movie, wasn't it.

Speaker 2 (22:32):
I think so? So After this, she was in seventy
three Is the Doll Squad, a kind of Charlie's Angels
inspired romp. She left acting after that, but emerged again
in the two thousands, appearing in two thousand and fours,
Mark of the Astro Zombies, two thousand and nine, Sugar
Box Rob Zombies, The Haunted World of l Superbisto, and
Astro Zombies M three cloned in twenty ten. I mean,

(22:56):
what can you say though, she's a force of nature
in this movie, alluring intended, but also just believably mean
and above all cool, Like she's she's so cool that
even though she is and a lot of people have
pointed this out, like she is arguably the villain or
one of the two main villains in the picture, but
at the same time, you're rooting for the whole time,

(23:18):
or I was. It's like, even if she's engaging and
kidnapping and mass murder, I'm kind of on team Varla
the whole way. And Yeah, it's just an amazing performance
and you can't look away, you can't stop listening. What
is she going to say next? Who is she going
to hit next?

Speaker 3 (23:33):
I love how she's just automatically immediately rude to everyone.

Speaker 2 (23:38):
Yes she is. She's rude and cutting to everyone. No
one is safe, and it's just one step away from
murder at all times.

Speaker 3 (23:47):
Also, I'm pretty sure in all her fight and action scenes,
we're not looking at a stunt double, are we.

Speaker 2 (23:52):
No. No, I believe she did all her own stunts,
And to understand, she also did her own fight choreography.
So when we see her beaten up various folks and
throwing them to the ground and chopping them like she
she brought the technique.

Speaker 3 (24:04):
I'm trying to think of another movie. I know there
are movies like this. I can't call examples to mind
right now of a movie where really, essentially the main
character is also the main villain and you're just you're
basically on their side and seeing the world through their eyes,
even though they are in a technical sense, the bad
guy that must be defeated at the end.

Speaker 2 (24:27):
Yeah, like what we discussed talking about Riddick, there's there's
always this temptation to to have this sort of redemption
arc to your your antihero, and that is not what
goes on here. Yeah. You know, you might be fooled
into thinking that's where it's going at some point, but
it's not.

Speaker 3 (24:43):
She does not get a heart. She is not a
go go dancer assassin with a heart of gold. She
has a heart of a drain cleaner. I would say,
a heart of the most caustic, toxic substance. Maybe you
could say she has a heart of raid on.

Speaker 2 (25:00):
Yeah, all right, So she's the leader of our trio
of go go witches here, our gang of three. Up
next is the character Rosie played by the actor Hodgi.
Hodgi is her screen name and based on her New
York Times oh bit from twenty thirteen. This was a

(25:22):
nickname that her uncle gave to her. So she was
born Barbarella Katon in nineteen forty six. So Canadian American
dancer turned actor. She also appeared in Motorcyco. She also
pops up and Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. She
was in nineteen seventies Bigfoot starring John Carradine once more

(25:42):
Christopher Mitcham as well. She was also She also pops up.
It's kind of in the background in some bigger films,
like she's in John Cassavetti's The Killing of a Chinese
Bookie from seventy six starring Ben Gazzara. It's like a
bit roll as a dancer. She also pops up in
the nineteen eighty one horror film Demonoid starring Samantha Agger.

(26:02):
I've seen part of this. This is like set in
Mexico and has some sort of a demonic disembodied hand.

Speaker 3 (26:08):
Oh demonic hand movie, you know what. We've mentioned so
many of those in passing in episodes since we did
The Beast with Five Fingers and Mad Love. I wonder
if we should just do a whole like Hand Monster series.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
We easily could. Yeah, there are a number of of
I mean a number of them are based on the
Hands of Warlock and part of that direct tradition. But then, yeah,
you have other films like the Michael Kane filmed The
Hand and so forth.

Speaker 3 (26:36):
Was that the one directed by Oliver Stone?

Speaker 2 (26:38):
It is? Yeah, Oliver Stone directed that one.

Speaker 3 (26:41):
Where you find out that the CIA was actually behind
the Hand all along.

Speaker 2 (26:45):
Yeah, I think it's a rare you know, it's from
that period of time when he almost directed a Cone
in the Barbarian movie. All Right, So the character Rosy
in this different, different style, different presentation, she is she
doesn't really have time for any of the app that's
going on in this movie. She isn't necessarily down with
all of Varla's violence, but she is devoted to Varla. Nonetheless.

(27:08):
Hodgy's performance is I would say, richly entertaining. At times,
it seems like maybe the greenest she has this. I
think she's doing an Italian accent in this. I'm not
entirely sure.

Speaker 3 (27:20):
I interpreted it as an Italian accent, Yes.

Speaker 2 (27:24):
Yeah, waters and shot in the in the book, I
referenced earlier, says quote, She's a mean Mexican with a
weakness for switchblades who emphasizes her many moments of disgust
by spitting or picking her teeth with whatever is handy.

Speaker 3 (27:40):
Yes, she she is the most disgusted of our three
anti heroes.

Speaker 2 (27:45):
Yes, that is her. That is her one note played
loudly discussed, but also occasionally a little bit like. She's
the only one of the three that also shows like
a little bit of empathy or even remorse at times.
So in a weird way, she has more her role
has more range.

Speaker 3 (28:02):
I agree, she's the only one of the three that
seems to have any hint of a soul or kindness
at all. And it's not much of a hint, but
there's a little spark in there somewhere. She is often
set against the third of the gang, Billy. They're kind
of butting heads a lot of the movie.

Speaker 2 (28:19):
Yeah. Billy is played by Laurie Williams born nineteen forty six.
He's our blonde, sassy, provocative, wise cracking, sensation junkie. He's
just always down for a swim or some just extracurricular dancing, fighting,
a little racing, you know whatever, whatever, She's up for anything.
She's also ridiculously laugh out loud seductive in a manner

(28:43):
that reminds me of Gina Moroney from thirty Rock. So
many moments where she's being sexy and it's just hysterical.

Speaker 3 (28:51):
She just like sees a man with muscles fifty feet
away and it's like.

Speaker 2 (28:56):
Hey, hot stuff, yeah, exactly now. Williams was not a
go go dancer, but was a beach party film actor
for the most part. Her other credits include mostly dancer roles,
but in some notable films, including nineteen sixty three's The
Prize starring Paul Newman, the Elvis movies Viva Las Vegas
and Kissing Cousins in sixty four, as well as the

(29:18):
Elvis movies Girl Happy and Tickle Me, both in sixty five,
So multiple Elvis movies here. She's an arman Flint in
sixty six. She has a passenger role as an extra
in nineteen seventy two is The Poseidon Adventure, and an
uncredited victim role in nineteen seventy fours, ninety nine and
forty four Out of One hundred Percent Dead, directed by

(29:39):
John Frankenheimer and starring Richard Harris Waters in Shock Value says, quote,
Billy is the film of the group, the main things
on her mind being sex and alcohol. In her white
short shorts, haltertop, and knee high patent leather go go boots,
Billy is forever breaking into torrid go go steps whenever
trouble arises.

Speaker 3 (30:00):
Yes, so they're professional go go dancers, but Billy likes
to go go dance when they're off the clock, and
her gang, her fellow gang members will say, you know, hey,
why are you doing that? You know that's we left
that behind at work, and she's like, I do what
I want.

Speaker 2 (30:19):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, she does. In a way like she's
the perfect opposite but equal of Varla because they both
do whatever they want. They have their own compass, but
the things they want to do are drastically different.

Speaker 3 (30:41):
Okay, so we've got our vicious, murdering gang of go
go dancers. We got to have some innocent people in
here to be victimized by them, right.

Speaker 2 (30:51):
That's right, and so that the main victim being Linda,
played by Subernard who lived nineteen forty eight through twenty nineteen.
She plays likable American every girl and the gang of
three are of course not impressed with her here, but
Bernard has the interesting history. She was the daughter of
legendary glamour and pin up photographer Bruno Bernard. She was

(31:13):
an author, actress, model, and businesswoman. She was a playboy
model in nineteen sixty six. This was her first film role,
followed by a couple of notable films. I guess nineteen
sixty nine is the witch Maker in nineteen seventy two's Necromancy.
A noteworthy family connection is that at one point she
was married to actor and playwright Jason Miller, who, of

(31:33):
course is famous for having played Father Damien in The Exorcist. Ah, yes,
father kais Yeah, and their son is was actor Joshua
John Miller born nineteen seventy two. He has a number
of interesting credits, but his first film role as a
child actor was playing the hero's son Willie in Halloween

(31:55):
three Season of the Witch.

Speaker 3 (31:57):
Okay, wait, how many degrees of separation is that from
Halloween three to Faster pussy Cat? I guess it involves
a family connection.

Speaker 2 (32:06):
Yeah, it's a family connection. So it's harder, but it's
it's close enough. It's in close orbit.

Speaker 3 (32:12):
I'm just imagining a film that could have been like
the Go Go Murder Gang here versus Tom Atkins from
Halloween three. Doesn't doesn't he seem like the perfect victim
of their treachery.

Speaker 2 (32:26):
Yeah, I could see him taking a beating from this bunch. Now,
speaking of taking a beating, the character Linda has a
boyfriend named Tommy, and Tommy is one of, if not
the only likable male characters in the whole picture. Withst
caveats will come back to that. He's a kind of
square and nice guy who just wants to work on
his car, improve his race time, and spend spend a

(32:47):
little quality time with his girlfriend Linda. He doesn't, you know,
leer at any of the women or speak to them
in a sexist manner, and you might think this means, well,
this might be the hero of our picture, but he's
certainly not. No.

Speaker 3 (33:01):
No, he's a nice guy, which means he's marked for death.

Speaker 2 (33:04):
Mark for death. We'll get to that death in a
bit because it's pretty spectacular. Played by Ray Barlow. I
don't think any dates are known for this actor. This
was one of only four credits for him, alongside nineteen
sixty seven's a Countess from Hong Kong and the nineteen
seventy one TV series The Goodies. Oh and also a
single episode of Highway to Heaven from the late eighties.

(33:27):
All right, now we do have another sort of villainous
trio to cancel out our main villainous trio. But these
are This is a male villainous trio of a family
they encounter in the desert, the leader of which is
the Old Man played by Stuart Lancaster, who lived nineteen
twenty through the year two thousand, American actor with credits

(33:48):
going back to the early sixties. He appears in the
original Outer Limits episode Tourist Attraction, but he's mostly known
for appearing in Russ Meyer films and various other exploitation titles. However,
you can also find him in such films as nineteen
seventy three's God Monster of Indian Flats and Tim Burton
cast him in two films. He plays a retired man

(34:08):
in Edward Scissorhands, and he plays the Penguin's doctor and
Batman returns what oh not a role I remember, but
you know I can. You can see the kind of
thing Tim Burton was going for. And that weird, weird
Batman sequel Batman returns.

Speaker 3 (34:25):
Does we could do Batman returns on Weird House Cinema?
I think does Penguin go for a check op in there?
I really don't.

Speaker 2 (34:33):
I don't remember when this would be, if this would
be like a flashback to when he's a baby, like
maybe that's the penguin's doctor, or maybe it's some time later,
because there's that whole yet intro to the character that
involves who isn't that who plays his father? Pee wee
Herman plays his father? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (34:48):
Oh, I'd forgotten that too. Well. So anyway, this character
of the Old Man, it's playing on the principle that
we talked about just recently with like a danger diabolic
in a movie where you have an anti hero, though
I don't know if you call Varla an anti hero,
just where you're like, main character is bad, it always
helps to up the ante by having to meet a

(35:10):
character who is much worse.

Speaker 2 (35:12):
Yes, so, yeah, our.

Speaker 3 (35:13):
Main characters character or characters are bad and they do murder.
But what if there's a somebody who also wants to
do murder but is even grosser.

Speaker 2 (35:23):
Yeah, and that's that's the Old Man. As we'll discuss,
he's pretty villainous. He lives in the desert with two
of his sons, one of which but I forget if
he even has a name aside from the vegetable he's
They call him this because he's a doesn't say much,
but he's a big muscle guy. And then the other son,
the elder of the two sons, is Kirk, played by

(35:45):
Paul Trinka, who lived nineteen thirty two through nineteen seventy three.
Mostly a bit player on TV, this is his most
well known role. He also appeared on Hawaii and I
My Three Sons, Gomer Pyle USMC, Voyage to the Bottom
of the Sea, Land of the Giants, and an episode
of Night Gallery. Now we also hear a little bit
from the narrator. We'll touch on that in a second.
The narrator for this film is John Furlong, who lived

(36:08):
nineteen thirty three through two thousand and eight American actor
who I believe got his start in Russ Meyer films
and worked for him several times, you know, often being
dubbing the director's voice or being this narration voice. He
ultimately accumulated a lot of TV and film credits over
the course of his career, having appeared in the likes
of nineteen seventy four's Blazing Saddles, ninety four's Wiatter, and

(36:29):
nineteen ninety eight Vampires, the John Carpenter film, along with
many others. And as for the music on this one,
I'm not going to go into a lot of depth here,
but Ego Kantor was the music director who lived nineteen
thirty through twenty nineteen. Interesting fella in a name that
weird cinema fans may have noticed in the credits before,
you know, sometimes kind of stands out. It worked a

(36:52):
lot doing the music for various films, but also was
a producer as far back as nineteen seventy one and
such films as Kingdom of the Spiders, nineteen seventy nine
Is the Dark and nineteen eighty fours Mutant starring Wingshauser
and Bo Hopkins.

Speaker 3 (37:07):
We could come back and do Kingdom of the Spiders
as well, because that is a killer tarantula movie starring
Captain Kirk.

Speaker 2 (37:18):
Yeah, it's also a reference to a Warren Zyvon Warren
Yvon song. Rather so, I always like a nice musical
nod to be cinema. All right, shall we get into
the plot.

Speaker 3 (37:30):
Yes, now, I think this is another movie where we're
not going to recount every scene in order. I think instead,
maybe we'll talk about the intro in some detail, maybe
you know, the first chunk of the movie, and then
do a basic recap on everything else and then focus
on some things that stand out. But first thing, this
movie begins with a narration and has one of the

(37:53):
all time great opening lines I've heard in any film.

Speaker 2 (37:57):
Yes we hear that, rich Veld. The narrator's voice say,
ladies and gentlemen, welcome to violence.

Speaker 3 (38:05):
To violence. It goes on to say the word and
the act. While Violence cloaks itself in a plethora of disguises,
its favorite mentals still remains sex. Huh. Okay, So the
opening narration here, It goes on for a while, and

(38:26):
there's while this guy's talking is just sort of a
black screen with these lines that are undulating as if
showing like a like an audiogram or something. You know,
they're they're vibrating with the sound of the narrator's voice.
And the narrator goes on to explain in a rather
wordy and roundabout manner that America's most trusted brand, violence

(38:47):
is still in business, but it is under new management. Women.
The narrator says, you know, you guys out there, you
might think women are beautiful, you might think women are nice,
but also they will cut your head off with a
power saw. The women of today they murder all the time.

Speaker 2 (39:05):
That's right. Women are more dangerous than they've ever been
in human history. This is a new breed of violence out.

Speaker 3 (39:11):
There, alrighty. And so the narration ends with him saying
who are they? One might be your secretary, your doctor's receptionist,
or a dancer in a go go club. Smash cut
to a go go club.

Speaker 2 (39:25):
Yeah, and this is where we get our first look
at our trio of evil go go dancers here all
black and white sequins and tassels. Yeah, we had to
mention it already. This is a black and white film
and looks pretty gorgeous, and we have the theme song
playing in the background, but also we have do we
keep cutting to these brutish men who were chanting at them?

(39:47):
They're chanting go go And I was wondering, like, I
didn't even look this up though. Is this the origin
of the term go go dancer? It's just you're supposed
to yell go and shout go at them.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
I have no idea. But also this scene is so
funny because of the lack of humor or enjoyment evident
in the men who are shouting at the go go dancers.
Just I have to applaud the deadly seriousness with which
the dudes are shouting, go, let's go, come on go.

(40:23):
They sound like Hollywood cowboys yelling at their horses. And
they're puffing on cigars by the way.

Speaker 2 (40:29):
Yeah, I mean, watching this, especially from a modern perspective,
you can't help but assume that the message here is
that men are gross and terrible, and that you're supposed
to take that with you into the film proper. And
I don't think the film really presents us with any
any information to counter that thesis. But I just don't
know what was really intended by this.

Speaker 3 (40:50):
Oh do you mean, like maybe there's there's an unspoken
understanding that because in their day job, these women are
like dancing for these horrible creep all the time, and
so they take that with them to the other scenarios
in their life, so like when they murder a man
in the desert, that they're sort of like seeing in
that man all of the like the go go guys.

Speaker 2 (41:12):
I mean, I don't know. I think one looks for
nuance in this film at their peril. You know, Varla
would not stand for that. You know, if I were
to broke that hypothesis, she would she would shot me
in the neck, so she would just kill you.

Speaker 4 (41:27):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (41:27):
Yeah, it is interesting, Like why do they seem so mad?

Speaker 2 (41:33):
Yeah, I mean, well they are also they're criminals. They're
out for that. They want a quick score. Oh you're
talking about the audience.

Speaker 3 (41:40):
I mean the guys they're yelling out. Why do they
sound angry?

Speaker 2 (41:44):
Yeah, I don't know, unless again, we're supposed to take
something home about this that that that men in general
are awful. So I don't know, worth something something we're
thinking about. But then again, this is a film that
I don't think necessarily well, you know, it goes two ways.
I think it's a film that is also about like
surface level interpretation. But this is a film that a

(42:04):
lot has been written about there. I glanced at a
number of serious film critic papers out there that in
papers that we're looking at this film and talking about
like gender dynamics and various forms of representation that are
going on in the film. So there is a lot
to chew on. You can certainly have it both ways.

Speaker 3 (42:27):
Well, yeah, there's a very interesting duality and that in
one sense this movie is straightforwardly very sexist, but on
the other hand, it is presenting a more kind of
empowered and larger than life vision of female characters than
you would get in pretty much anywhere else in movies
of this time.

Speaker 2 (42:46):
Yeah, and I think a lot of the interesting commentary
comes from like trying to piece it apart and figure out, well,
how much of this was intentional, how much of it
is you know, sort of happy accident, etc. I mean,
that's often the case with films that really stand out
during you know, that really stand out to the future interpretation.

Speaker 3 (43:05):
But okay, there's another great smash cut here, because so
like the goga, the ladies are dancing, the guys are screaming, go,
and then it just like suddenly we're somewhere else.

Speaker 2 (43:16):
Suddenly we're in the desert. Here's our lead character, Varla,
laughing maniacally as she races her sports car through the desert.
And then we quickly see that they are to the
two other dancers, Rosy and Billy, are racing behind her
in their own sports cars laughing as well.

Speaker 3 (43:32):
It's like they're already fleeing the scene of a crime
when we first meet them here, and who knows, maybe
they are. We don't They never mentioned that.

Speaker 2 (43:40):
Right, right, I mean it would make sense. Yeah, they're
going because there is a there's a desperation, uh to
a lot of what they do, and there's a you know,
they clearly don't care about the future.

Speaker 3 (43:50):
Well, I see what you're saying about the desperation, though,
I don't want to convey the wrong feeling in the
scene because instead they feel it's like they're having fun.

Speaker 2 (43:57):
They are, Yeah, they are completely free.

Speaker 3 (43:59):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Another thing I will say is that
the soundtrack really adds a lot of pep to this movie.
It's like good hot music selections, and they change so fast.
I think I noted. By the time we're like four
minutes into the movie, we've already heard like five different songs.

Speaker 2 (44:18):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, a lot of saxophone too, a lot
of jazz saxophone. And yeah. So they're racing through the desert,
but you know, Billy has needs. Billy needs a swim break,
So everybody stops so that Billy can have a swim.

Speaker 3 (44:31):
This scene so yeah, Billy's like, I want to swim.
I'm going to swim even if it's you know, this
is a muddy drainage canal. I'm going to swim in that.
And then I think Varla sends Rosie to go make
her stop. She's like, get her out of there, and
so yeah, Rosie goes to do it, and this leads
to a fight scene where they're just like beating each
other up on the beach. Billy and Rosie are and

(44:53):
I think this establishes the dynamic between the characters that
will continue for the rest of the film. First of all,
Varla is the boss, mean, tough, dominant violence. She gives orders.
If you cross her, you know, well you don't want
to cross her, you don't want to find out. Meanwhile,
Billy is the free spirit. She does whatever she wants

(45:14):
whenever she feels like it. To hell with anybody who's
trying to tell her it is not time to go
swimming in the muddy canal. Meanwhile, Rosie, you know, we
were sort of talking about this earlier. Like Rosie is
the most complicated of the three. She's more resentful and
reserved and sometimes seems kind of unsure, but somehow. Okay,

(45:36):
So they end up Rosie and Billy end up fighting.
I guess about the fact that Billy was swimming, and
then they start they all start arguing, and Setana eventually says,
you want to prove something, chicky, Let's see who the
real chicken is. Another smash cut to they're playing a
game of chicken in their cars on the salt flats.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
That's right, let's settle this honorably with with with with
the dangerous vehicular action.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
If you're not familiar with vehicular chicken. Yeah, it's where
these cars, like they drive head on toward each other
and I guess the first person to swar of loses.

Speaker 2 (46:16):
Yeah, but don't try this.

Speaker 3 (46:17):
Yeah, who wins Varlow of course?

Speaker 2 (46:20):
Oh yeah, because yes, she is the meanest and the
toughest and she will not stop.

Speaker 3 (46:26):
But after their game of chicken, I guess they're just
hanging out in the middle of the salt flats and
what do you know, Uh, oh, here here comes some
people and things are not going to go well for them.

Speaker 2 (46:36):
Yeah. Here come Tommy and lynd, a couple of well
meaning squares who are just so pleasant, just so pleasant.
They're like, oh, strangers, in the desert. This is great,
more people to hang out with. Little do they know
that this band of go go witches is gonna They're
gonna be their their death and doom.

Speaker 3 (46:54):
It's a couple of teenagers who are just like meat loaf,
mashed potatoes, and canned peas.

Speaker 4 (47:00):
You know.

Speaker 3 (47:01):
They love cars, soft drinks, good clean fun. And Tommy
is here to do some timed trials because he loves,
you know, tuning up his car, which to me did
not look like a hot rod. I was like, really, Tommy,
he's the car guy and that's his car. But I
just don't know my sixties cars.

Speaker 2 (47:18):
I guess, yeah, yeah, the sixties car expert can shine
in here and tell us what we're looking at.

Speaker 3 (47:24):
But so they're here to do timed trials, which Varlap
makes fun of, by the way, time trials. You know,
I only race against the living. But I think Linda's
idea is she's gonna sit there and like, enjoy some
soft drinks and do the stop Watch for Tommy while
he drives around.

Speaker 2 (47:42):
That does it?

Speaker 3 (47:42):
It sounds like a great time. And at some point
Linda offers the the Go Go murderers soft drinks. She's like,
would you like a soft drink from our cooler here?

Speaker 2 (47:54):
Yeah, And Rosie says, honey, we don't like nothing soft.
Everything we touch is hard. So let's get some more
that rate russ Meyer dialogue here.

Speaker 3 (48:02):
But we should add like nearly every exchange in the
movie is like that. It's just like nobody says anything normal.
They're they're always like spitting one liners at each other.

Speaker 2 (48:14):
Yeah, And basically this whole interaction with Tommy and Linda
is they're just picking a fight with them the whole time.
They're trying to tempt them into some sort of a confrontation.
You know, it's a I thought that it ultimately has
kind of Varlas especially has kind of like an Old
Testament Satanic aspect to our character, because in Tommy we

(48:36):
see a good man. You know, he's not leering, he's
not saying inappropriate things like the gas station attendant from
from earlier.

Speaker 3 (48:44):
That's later the.

Speaker 2 (48:46):
Yeah, okay, yeah, that's right, because Linda's are even kidnapped
by that point. But you know, most of them the
males in the film are like that. You know, they're
saying some some stuff here, or they're they're leering at
our at our trio. But you know, Tommy seems good.
You know, he couldn't possibly be provoked to violence. But
you know, our Satanic character might say, well, you know

(49:07):
he's been protected from those temptations, but what if someone
were to criticize his racing, What if someone were to
beat him in a desert race and also take his girlfriend?
Stop watch, So.

Speaker 3 (49:20):
You're you're talking about like the Satan from the Book
of Job, Satan as the prosecutor of the court of Heaven.

Speaker 2 (49:27):
Yeah, so I think Varla has that kind of energy here.
So yeah, so just constantly picking a fight. There's a
great bit where he's starting to get a little annoyed
by all this. He's like, are you are you trying
to say something and she's like, I never try anything,
I just do it, which awesome Varla line just sums
it up, prefigures Yoda as well. Mm hmm, yoda Varla

(49:49):
see that?

Speaker 3 (49:50):
Yeah?

Speaker 2 (49:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (49:51):
She also at some point she's trying to get him
to do a dangerous drag race with her, and he's
at first using and she at one point says, you're
the all American boy, a safety first Clyde.

Speaker 2 (50:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (50:08):
So eventually the go go murder gang tricks. They like
goed Tommy into racing, and so they're you know, driving
around the track, and then it looks maybe like Tommy
is gonna win the race, but then Varla pulls some
kind of I didn't understand exactly what happened, but she
pulls some kind of dangerous stunt to like run him
off the course.

Speaker 2 (50:27):
Yeah yeah, And so from here things escalate pretty quickly,
and Varla finally provokes nice guy Tommy into a fight,
into an actual physical altercation, and it is amazing because
she proceeds to just karate chop the crap out of them.
And I've said before, I love karate chops in these

(50:49):
old timey fights. I don't think we see enough karate
chops anymore. Today it's all like Mma moves, and I'm
so bored with characters throwing out you know, either or
a wrestling souplex or certainly some sort of an arm
bar scenario. I want karate chops to come back in
a big way, and all man, Varla throws out some

(51:10):
wonderful ones. Finally Tommy starts punching back, and she takes
him down with this cool arm based takedown thing. And
then proceeds to apply a standing surfboard lock, so he's
laying on his belly. She grabs both arms, puts her
boot to the back of his neck, and snaps his
neck with her boot. Just a complete, solid kill. This

(51:32):
whole scene John Waters described as just mind boggling.

Speaker 3 (51:35):
It is shocking, and you know, if you didn't understand
up until this point, you're like, oh, okay, this is
why this movie is so infamous.

Speaker 2 (51:43):
Yeah, because he just killed him in cold blood. Like
it escalates from just and she just met him. They
just met these people and they've already provoked him to
violence and then killed him.

Speaker 3 (51:54):
She does multiple times claim to be giving him a
chance to walk away, but it's like he didn't start it.
It's just like you can walk away if you just
allow me to like humiliate and insult your girlfriend some more.
Because they steal Linda's stop watch and they won't give
it back to her, and Linda's like, help me, Tommy,

(52:16):
and Tommy's like, oh, come on, be nice, and no,
they're not going to be nice.

Speaker 2 (52:22):
Yeah, So they kill Tommy in cold blood, and there's
nothing left to do at that point but to kidnap Linda.

Speaker 3 (52:27):
More crimes right, Tommy's dead. And in a way, I
think this is no big deal for them because killing
men in the desert, this is just a regular part
of a day off for Varla and company. Yeah, but yeah,
Linda's a witness. So what are they going to do
with this goody two shoes teenager who knows their fondness
for go go assassination. They've got a kidnap her, take

(52:47):
her with them to somewhere. I think they're planning to
kill her also later. I don't know why they don't
just do it there.

Speaker 2 (52:53):
Yeah, it's they kind of skip over that, but at
any rate, Yeah, they throw her in the car, they
get some pills in her. They have a lot of
pills on hand for this sort of thing, and then
it's off to wherever. I guess they got to get gas.

Speaker 3 (53:07):
First, right, So next they go to the gas station,
and you mentioned the interaction with the gas station attendant.
This is where, like, you know, the guy's like cleaning
the window and he is he is ogling Varla and
at some point he says like, Wow, I'd really like
to see America one day, and she goes, you won't
see it down there. Columbus another great line.

Speaker 2 (53:31):
Yeah, all of our those lines are just gold, and
all three of them, I think, say you get to
get to jab at this this sort of happy go
lucky gas station attendant. They say such mean things to him,
and they're all wonderful.

Speaker 3 (53:44):
He stays relatively pleasant despite the fact that they're just
all viciously insulting him over and over.

Speaker 1 (53:51):
It.

Speaker 2 (53:51):
Yeah, yeah, in a way, he's the most pleasant male character,
if not the most pleasant character in the whole film.

Speaker 3 (54:06):
Also, while they're at the gas station, it sets up
the dynamic that will take over for the rest of
the movie, which is Billy. She's wandering around and she
sees a hunk with muscles. She's like, wow, look at
that hunk a man, and the gas station attendant I
guess he just happens to know everything. He explains that

(54:26):
that guy is the son of a local rancher who
lives way out in the desert, and the rancher is
he some time ago was injured and now has to
use a wheelchair. Because Rob correct me if I'm getting
any of this wrong. I think he says that the
old man was injured while rescuing a girl from an
oncoming train, and as a result of his injuries, he

(54:51):
was paid a huge sum of money. I don't know
if that was insurance or from the train company or something.
And then somehow the gas pump guy knows about this
and knows that he is hiding the money in cash
form somewhere on his land.

Speaker 2 (55:06):
That's right, So now he has like a lot of
paranoid delusions about the evils of trains. He hates women,
and he doesn't want to put his money in the bank,
so he has it hidden somewhere in the desert. It's
the local lore.

Speaker 3 (55:20):
Right, So the old man, he first of all, he
is a nasty, lecherous old creep who is the most
leering of all the leering men in the film. But
he also you mentioned he hates women. So the way
I think this was explained is that he wants to
kill women for revenge because he was injured and disabled

(55:41):
while trying to rescue a woman. Is that the case.

Speaker 2 (55:44):
I believe that's what they're laying out.

Speaker 3 (55:46):
Yes, okay, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (55:47):
All right, Now, he can't do much on his own,
but luckily he has this muscular sign who they lovingly
call the vegetable.

Speaker 3 (55:56):
Yes, so the muscle sun is portrayed as having some
kind of unspecified mental disability. Obviously this is not portrayed
in the movie with great sensitivity.

Speaker 2 (56:08):
No, and of course neither is the disability of the
old man. Yeah, but you know, you are in the
mid sixties exploitation film at this point, so right, that's
what you're watching.

Speaker 3 (56:18):
And then you've got Kirk, the other son. Who he's
the other son, that's his deal.

Speaker 2 (56:24):
Yeah, I mean he has an interesting place as well,
because he's I saw some papers pointing out, you know,
he's kind of the domestic and the domestic role of
the group. He looks after the old man, he looks
after his brother. He also seems to aspire and is
ultimately positioned in a place of moral superiority, but also
seems like he has turned a blind eye to a

(56:46):
lot of bad stuff in the desert. So I was
never really sure what to make of Kirk. And it
also this has helped tip the scales for me and
just rooting for Varla the whole time.

Speaker 3 (56:57):
You wanted Varla to succeed in murdering him and Linda.

Speaker 2 (57:01):
Yes, yeah, I'm sorry, but Varla's just compelling. I'm just
not going to argue with her.

Speaker 3 (57:06):
So the Go Go Killers set their sights on this ranch.
Varla wants the money that the old man apparently has
stashed somewhere there. I don't know why they believe the
gas station attended though, like why would he know this?
But so they just take his word for it. Varla
wants the money and Billy wants the muscle sun. So
they're going to go to the ranch and rob You

(57:26):
and I off Mike earlier were discussing this comparison. They
head for the ranch where the rest of the movie
is going to take place, and I could not help
but notice the similarity between the family on this ranch
and the family in the Texas Chainsaw Masacre, which of
course came later.

Speaker 2 (57:46):
That's right, Yeah, I also thought that there was kind
of a solar esque vibe going on here. You know,
they're perverse, they're up to bad stuff out in the
middle of nowhere, but they're all but they don't go
all in on the hoar and same way that the
Texas Chainsaw Masker does, obviously.

Speaker 3 (58:02):
Right, But I mean the comparisons are almost kind of eerie, Like,
so the old man, there's like a nasty, mean spirited,
lecherous old man there is the muscle son you know
who in I think you could compare to leather Face,
And I guess the difference is that in the Sawyer
family there is no Kirk. There's not like the nice,

(58:24):
normal sun.

Speaker 2 (58:25):
Yeah right, instead of Kirk, you either get the hitchhiker
or you or you get chopped up. Yes, yeah, totally
different vibe in that regard. But yeah, I feel like
there's there are a lot of similarities. I wonder if
this influenced the shape of Texas Chainsaw Masker to any degree.

Speaker 3 (58:41):
Well, it also makes you wonder like how Texas Chainsaw
Masker would be different if the people who show up
at the Sawyer residence are not just like hapless teenagers
who are trying to go to a concert or trying
to you know, find visit their old family home or something,
but are instead just tough as nail dancer murderers.

Speaker 2 (59:02):
Oh, the Sawyers wouldn't have stood a chance. Varla would
have made short work of all of them, leather Face,
the hitch Hike, or any of them. No chainsaw would
be even revved up.

Speaker 3 (59:14):
She would snatch, She would snatch the chainsaw out of
leather Face's hands, grab it by the blade and pull
it out of his hands and then bend him over
and break his neck.

Speaker 2 (59:23):
Yeah, karate chop that neck, you know. Also like TCM,
a different vibe here, but we also get a big
sit down meal.

Speaker 3 (59:31):
That's right. Yeah, So it takes a while. They've got
a sort of elaborate plan that I'm not going to
get into in great detail. But so like Varla and
the gang arrive on the property and they make a
plan to sort of trick the family while they search
for the money, and so they claim to have been
stranded there and need some water for maybe the radiators

(59:53):
in their car or something. But they end up getting
invited to lunch, I think, especially because the old man
is again nasty and lecherous and wants to ogle them
and do much worse. So they're all having like fried
chicken and whiskey at lunch. We're not all having whiskey.
They're all having chicken that Kirk cooked for everyone. And

(01:00:14):
at some point Billy is like, oh, and Linda's there
at the table with them, just the hostage is there,
and I think at some point she's begging for help,
and they're all like, I don't know what to make
of this, but Billy at some point is like, hey,
give me some of that whiskey, old man, and he's
like okay, And then she just proceeds to immediately get
blackout drunk and pass out and let Linda escape.

Speaker 2 (01:00:37):
Yes, yeah, it is interesting that the whole vibe of
this dinner is like the dinner table is this place
of decorum, but everyone there is either a villain or
a hostage, and yet there is this like weird like
truth in place here as they engage in this strange meal.
Of course, eventually Varla goads the old man by mentioning

(01:01:00):
I think she's the one who mentions trains and gets
him all upset and he ends up storming off. Oh
and there are also a lot of a lot of
comments about how much chicken the beefy son can eat.

Speaker 3 (01:01:11):
Oh yes, I think at one point he is advised
to help himself to both a breast and a thigh.

Speaker 2 (01:01:18):
Yes, a lot of winkie dialogue.

Speaker 3 (01:01:22):
Oh oh, but we forgot a part earlier on which
I think is that the old man is like I
think it happens off screen, but he tries to assault
Linda the hostage, and she flees away into the desert
and is like, okay, I'm going to escape now, and
is picked up in a truck by a nice young

(01:01:42):
man who seems very helpful. But it turns out this
is Kirk, the other son, and he just like drives
her back to the house and she's like no, no, no,
not back here, and he's like, oh no, it's fine.
This is my family's house.

Speaker 2 (01:01:56):
We've probably been more impactful if we the audience did
not already know that Kirk was a member of that family. Yes,
but it's still pretty great. She escapes a couple of
different times. They're not very good at keeping her in place,
but then she's not particularly good at getting away.

Speaker 3 (01:02:12):
Oh. At some point, I think also Varla seduces Kirk.
I do not recall why. I think somehow, I guess
she thinks this is going to help her get the money.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
It's just is a multi stage plan to get that
money that involves violence and seduction and dinner. I mean,
don't try and create a flow chart of all of this.
Just trust the plan.

Speaker 3 (01:02:33):
But at some point Kirk Finally, it takes a lot,
but finally Kirk wises up to the fact that not
only is his own family evil, but Varla and the
gang are evil as well, and so then he's like, oh, okay,
I need to help Linda. So at some point, Kirk
and Linda try to escape into the desert. Meanwhile, back

(01:02:54):
at the house, Varla, they've started murdering everybody and that
let's see that murder. Varla and Rosie murder Billy I
don't quite remember why. She's leaving at some point and
they like throw a knife in her back.

Speaker 2 (01:03:09):
Yeah, great, great kill scene. Yeah. She's like I'm done,
I'll see you gals at church, and she's gone off
and was like pass me the switchblade and then throws
it into her back.

Speaker 3 (01:03:19):
So they end up murdering the muscle Son and the
old man, and they discover where the muscle Sun kills Rosie.
The muscle Son kills Rosie, and then they they Varla
kills well let's see, Yeah, they kill him and the
old man. The old man it turns out had all
of the money that he was hiding stash somehow inside

(01:03:41):
his wheelchair, and when they hit him with their car,
it is all it like busts out all over the place.

Speaker 2 (01:03:48):
Yeah. Yeah. Varla goes into revenge mode at this point though,
and she gets. She's this great scene where she's trying
to run over the mussel and and he's pushing back
like he's hercules, you know, against the horsepower of the car,
and there's just kind of a stalemate that of course
eventually wears him out completely and he toppless. Oh he's
like Samson, you've cut his hair at this point, he's powerless.

(01:04:10):
But I don't think he dies. What I don't think
he dies? Does he?

Speaker 3 (01:04:14):
Oh? Well, I don't recall actually.

Speaker 2 (01:04:17):
That he has defeated.

Speaker 3 (01:04:19):
But finally there is a showdown where okay, so Linda
are our good character and Kirk are I guess kind
of good character. They're escaping into the desert. They're trying
to run away from the farm and and and get
out of all this madness, and Varla must get revenge.
So she's like hunting them down in this truck. And

(01:04:40):
I think you compared her to the terminator at this point,
and I think that that is a good comparison. She
is just a machine out for destruction.

Speaker 2 (01:04:48):
Yeah, completely relentless. There's no way you can possibly get
You can't stop her, you can't get away from her
because she has no quit in her at one point,
she's driving after them and they like cross over the
railroad tracks and I was I was afraid they were
gonna I was like, oh, man, is this how they're
going to defeat Varla, because they're going to bring the
train back into it somehow. But that's not what happens. Instead,

(01:05:11):
they end up reaching this point where the like the truck.
She gets out of the truck. Varla does and and
now they're going to have this this final fight Varla
versus Kirk and Linda in the desert, just fisticuffs and
chops and boots.

Speaker 3 (01:05:27):
Well, at this point, Varla is again beating Kirk up
totally because Kirk doesn't stand a chance against Varla. Of
course he would, she would kill him. But I think
Linda comes to the to the rescue with the truck.

Speaker 2 (01:05:41):
Yeah, she jumps back into the truck, starts it up,
and hits Varla with the truck, and so we end
up with with again. Varla's already totally kicked Kirk's butt
at this point, like she she she hits first, she
like kicks him in the kidney or something. She's chopped
him multiple times, and she's now she's been hit by
the v She's laying there next to him, and she

(01:06:01):
raises one last karate chop into the air to bring
down on him. You just know it's going to be
a death blow. But then uh, she succumbs to her
injuries and dies.

Speaker 3 (01:06:11):
The ending is great, though I did have one note.
I was like, one way you could make this movie
better is if at the end of Varla, instead of
just succumbing to her injuries, is it somehow explodes like
the Shark and Jaws, you know, like they put like
a pressure air tank in her mouth and shoot that
and then she explodes into ten billion pieces.

Speaker 2 (01:06:32):
That would have been good, you know, I could just see.
I could see the train ending having worked. I wonder
if that was ever on the menu as a potential
ending for this film. But I also like the idea
of I think Varla should have just won. I think
Varleass should have murdered Kirk. But then again we back
come back to the question of well, what is the

(01:06:53):
where is she gonna go with Linda? Like, what's the
plan here? Does she just kill Linda as well and
then go off into the desert or is there some
next step there? I'm not sure, so I guess it
ultimately is just as well that she that this character dies.

Speaker 3 (01:07:07):
I think, let's see what would Varla have done if
she'd want Yeah, she'd get the money. She would stand
there and declare that she is not sad that her
friends are dead. She's like, I don't miss them one bit,
and then she would get in her car and drive
away to her to the next adventure.

Speaker 2 (01:07:23):
Yeah, yeah, I think maybe just leave Linda alive in
the desert to you know, to surely die. That would
have probably worked. I feel like that's the ending this
film would have had in the seventies. But already, you know,
even mid sixties, it was ahead of its time, and
there's only so much meanness that it could muster.

Speaker 3 (01:07:39):
I just remembered something about the final dialogue exchange after
Varla is defeated, and I had to look it up.
So what exactly they say? It's so, you know, Varla dies,
and then Linda gets out of the truck and she
says I killed her like she was an animal, like
she was nothing, and then Kirk says she was nothing

(01:08:00):
thing human. And so I wonder if the ending maybe
means that Linda now has acquired a taste for violence,
and she has been set on a path to become
like them.

Speaker 2 (01:08:11):
Hmmm, well that would be interesting. Again, I'm not sure
how how deep we can dig into the into the
paint on this film, but I like that interpretation.

Speaker 3 (01:08:22):
Like immediately after the camera stops rolling, I imagine Linda
next is like, Hey, Kirk, would you like to go
racing on the salt flats? We'll see who wins.

Speaker 2 (01:08:33):
All right, Well, there you have it, faster Pussycat Kill Kill. Yeah,
this one was a lot of fun, and I think
now just in general, in all movies that we watch,
I'm at least going to have that voice in the
back of my head what would Varla do in this scenario? Yeah,
she's an unforgettable character.

Speaker 3 (01:08:52):
At the very least, she would welcome us to violence.

Speaker 2 (01:08:54):
That's right. All right, Well, just a reminder that we're
primarily a science podcast year and the stuff to blow
your mind feed but on Fridays we set aside most
serious concerns to just talk about a weird film here
on Weird House Cinema. And if you want to see
a list of all the films we've done over the years,
where you can go to a couple of places I
blog about these films at some meuto music dot com,

(01:09:15):
but also over at letterbox dot com. It's L E
T E R B O x D dot com. You'll
find we'll find us. We have a user name there,
weird House, and we have a nice list of all
the movies we've covered. You can, you know, slice them
up and rearrange them by decade, by genre and so forth.
So it's a it's a pretty good way to see
what else we've talked about, and maybe if you haven't

(01:09:37):
listened to many of them, find some older episodes that
interest you.

Speaker 3 (01:09:41):
In particular huge thanks to our excellent audio producer Jjposway.
If you would like to get in touch with us
with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
a topic for the future, or just to say hello,
you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow
your Mind dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:10:02):
Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.