Episode 258: On The Line, Punch, The Island, Race For Glory -Audi vs Lancia, Scooby Doo in Spring-trapped, Vendetta

In this episode Mike, Rich and Steve take a look at four new releases - as usual clicking the links will take you to the trailers...

Kicking off with 'ON THE LINE' (Miracle Media), in which a telephone operator finds herself involved in a murder and kidnapping...

'PUNCH' (Miracle Media) is set in an off-season seaside town and deals with a young woman being hounded by a killer wearing a "Mr Punch" mask...

'THE ISLAND' (Plaion Pictures), an action-filled film featuring Michael J. White trying to solve the murder of his brother on a Caribbean island...

RACE FOR GLORY: AUDI Vs LANCIA (Signature Entertainment), based on the true story of underdogs Lancia taking on Audi during the 1983 rally championships...

Our Short Shot is  'SCOOBY DOO WHERE ARE YOU? IN SPRING-TRAPPED!', a stop-motion version of the classic cartoon, mashed with a Five Nights At Freddies parody! Click the link to watch the whole film.

The DTV Throwback is  'VENDETTA', starring WWE's The Big Show and Dean Cain, and directed by the Soska Sisters! This is currently available on Amazon Prime and probably other streaming services...

Follow the Short Shots  on X (formerly Twitter) where you will find hundreds of links to awesome short films!

Don't forget to also check out our main show, the DTV DIGEST on X and FACEBOOK!

 

Episode Transcript

(00:02):
This is the dtv digest the podcast that brings you news and reviews of films
which didn't make it to the cinema and now here's your host mike parkin,
hello everyone and welcome to the dtv
digest i'm your host mike parkin and joining me
as usual are Richard Hawes hello everyone

(00:24):
and Stephen Lockridge hello this
week we've got four main reviews we're going to
kick off with on the line followed by punch and the island and then we have
race for glory Audi versus Lancia now a short shot is Scooby-Doo where are you

(00:45):
in spring trapped And then in our DTV throwback,
we have the Oscars film Vendetta.
So without further ado, let's crack on.
Our first film then is On the Line.
In Alderney, UK in 1964, a telephone operator ends up being the pivotal piece

(01:12):
of a drama unfurling, which puts professional integrity and relationships to the test.
I have to admit, I had no idea what this was going to be like going into it.
I have to admit, I was expecting something like...
A bonded media finance film what

(01:35):
was the one where the guy was oh
the hot seat you know remember the hot seat yeah yeah oh
yeah that's it i was expecting something like that i have to admit mel gibson
has done one of those called on the line yeah that's exactly yeah when he's
like a shock jock radio dj or something yeah yeah that's so on so so this did

(01:57):
surprise me but even right Right at the beginning, right from the opening credits,
I was intrigued because, you know, they'd put a lot of care and attention into
those opening credits to resemble a certain type of film, you know,
of that period, basically.
So even then, when, you know, all these sort of graphics and things are coming
up and the music, right then I'm thinking, OK, this is a bit different to what I was expecting.

(02:23):
What we get is it's a COVID film, basically, isn't it? At the end of the day,
this is a COVID production.
It's a ship in the bottle. We've seen variations on this.
And, yeah, a lot of the time they do work really well.
For example, Solid Rock Trust that we reviewed right at the beginning of last
year. You know, it's a similar sort of idea.

(02:46):
There was the one with Frank Grillo where he was a getaway driver.
I don't know if you saw that one. It was on Netflix.
Yeah, it was Wheelman. Wheelman. That was, yeah.
Tom Hardy did one. called lock and ryan
reynolds did probably the first one of this type which was when he's
like being buried in a coffin and there is it buried and you know it's literally

(03:09):
just him in a box listen you know with people on the phone and stuff like that
so so the big variations of this and and you know like those films for me you
know this worked really well it starts out as one thing.
And then it sort of like morphs into something else. You know,
you think it's a thriller about a dangerous psychopath sort of thing.
And it kind of is, but it also turns into like a damning report on sort of mental

(03:35):
health, you know, following the end of the second world war and that sort of thing.
It was, yeah, it was a really interesting watch.
Steve, what did you make of it? Yeah, it was interesting.
The thing that kind of got me was, you know,
she's there stuck in the middle trying to do this and do that and it just seemed

(03:55):
like everyone was so unhelpful like the other people and the other end in the
phone just couldn't be asked what she was saying and put me asked following
up with it and you know i kind of built the tension for.
The film and this and the character in but
it was the performances on
the event as well were decent and sometimes in stuff

(04:18):
like this you know it can sound like they
are literally falling in the end if you know what i mean but on
this i thought it actually worked quite well the i
know the set wasn't very big and everything but i thought the attention
to detail was really good as
well you know the art direction was great on it as well and yeah

(04:40):
i just thought it was actually done quite like well there seems to be a lot of.
Care and attention in every
department really yeah but i felt
that i actually you know really helped
build the tension and move the
story along and it all worked in its favor
i thought yeah i agree rich what

(05:02):
did you make of on the line well i've got
some observations but i want to ask because my experience
was kind of framed by a a couple of things and one of
them was i wasn't sure when i mean
i know we've just read the synopsis from from imdb which
very clearly says alderney 1964 that seems
like you know actually yeah thinking about it that seems late i thought this

(05:25):
was early 50s but does it come up at the start of the film or anywhere what
time this is set i don't know because what was interesting is Is it the set
of the year and location are noted on the end credits?
Right at the end of the credits, which I thought, well, I've never seen that before.
But basically, Alderney is in the Channel Islands. That's right.

(05:46):
Yeah. I thought it was out of white. I must admit, I thought it's very much on an island.
So they're in a small island community. I looked it up. Alderney's got like
a population of 2000. It might have even been less back then.
So that's why she's like, oh, you know, everyone knows each other on the islands
and all this sort of stuff. And she's kind of involved in all their lives and,

(06:09):
you know, connecting all these calls.
So the other thing that was really throwing me was, and I might be being completely
stupid, but it seemed like they had mobile phones because they were,
she was contacting people who were on the move,
you know, and they were, they were in vehicles and they were heading to get,
you know, petrol stations and stuff.
And I was thinking, am I being stupid here? I think the police had sort of car phones or car radios.

(06:37):
Even when she's talking to one of the people, the lady she's trying to help,
it's like, where are you now?
It's like, oh, we're just coming past this. I'm sure there was something like that.
Anyway, I kept getting distracted by the thinking, how are they talking to these
people who are on the move?
Because surely they'd be very landlines, very limited court.

(06:57):
I was i was just completely sort of
pulled out and sort of thrown around by that thinking is this
kind of it's it's now but it's
kind of a retro kind of setting or something it's like a community that's never
moved on but they've they've got this kind of you know a bit like the john wick
thing you know it's it's very very modern but then they're using this old technology

(07:18):
and stuff so yeah so i don't know if that was me just missing missing something I'll be honest,
I think the bit you're on about, because there's one part that he does say,
I'm at the petrol station using a phone box.
Oh, I see. Okay. That would make sense. Because I was thinking,
I was feeling like, it was like two or three times during the film,

(07:40):
I was thinking, it sounds like they're on the move or they're going somewhere.
But maybe you're right. Maybe they've gone from one place to another.
They've picked up the phone. you can hear vehicles
in the background which is why it sort of got that sort of
sense of so yeah it could be that i was just not sort
of on the ball enough with it yeah that i was getting
thrown the the setup obviously

(08:02):
is the we've sort of you've already mentioned it but
it's that kind of one person thing the call center sort
of switchboard operator sub-genre i
guess or sub sub sub you know type of film
that we've got because we've had the call with hallie berry and which was then
remade with Jake Gyllenhaal so there's been two of those there's also a short

(08:24):
film I watched recently which was also about I think there's quite a few actually
around there and to an extent this all goes back to Phone Booth,
with Colin Farrell so this is quite a short film very independent cast of actors
who I'm not familiar with vocal performances mostly because it is a a one woman show,

(08:47):
essentially, apart from the voices on the other end of the line,
some of whom, I think sounded better than others. So was there were times when I was thinking.
What is elevating this over above just doing
it as an audio drama as a radio for play of the
day or play of the week or whatever which it is
it does feel like that at some times and

(09:08):
you do have to sort of pay attention to the to the
to the way it's shot and the camera work and stuff like in this
very small what i thought was that what you
know what i assumed like like yourself what was a set it's
actually they filmed it at avencroft museum in
birmingham so they've gone to they've gone
to a location where it's you know it's

(09:30):
been very authentically presented and they
film and they filmed it there which i think is a very very clever idea
it's like why build why spend you know limited
resources trying to trying to build your own you know
period set when museums have
got this sort of stuff all sorted so uh so very that's very
good you get the production value from that so this film was probably made on

(09:53):
tuppence i would have thought but they've you know because they've managed to
get that location and you know they've been able to invest in the in the standard
of the the cinematography and stuff i think that's really where it sort of comes into its own,
i did disengage from it a few times i wasn't i wasn't entirely with it and say
there were a a couple of reasons i think for that but overall i found it quite

(10:16):
interesting and it say yeah the.
There are more bombastic versions
of this kind of thing i'd say but the bigger brother would say whether that
i haven't seen the mel gibson on the line to say whether it's a relate this
in say it's saying the world radio whether it's a similar kind of thing but
i would say that even though i haven't seen films like the guilty and the call

(10:39):
i think the call has or is it kidding I can't remember. There's the Halle Berry one anyway.
I think that sort of has cutaways to action or something at times.
I mean, the only one I can really say that I've seen which is quite different
is Cellular, but that's quite a different beast. It's very much...

(11:01):
Constantly shifting locations and on the go. It's like the phone device is kind
of linking the characters, but you've got all the other stuff going on as well.
The original phone booth was more sort of just in that location.
Anyway, I'm getting off track.
This is a really good, interesting example of a low-budget, independently made
British movie working with very limited budget and resources and stuff and putting

(11:24):
together something really quite interesting.
I was confused with stuff, but I was quite interested in,
oh where is this where is the location i want to know more about where
it's set and stuff so actually i did appreciate the the
filmmakers actually putting that in the credits so that
i could sort of dig a little deeper on the film and stuff and yeah and if i
ever get up to birmingham i'll probably check out evencroft museum you know

(11:47):
just just while we've been talking i've been thinking about that date as well
and it probably is right but you know it's certainly a 1964 because Because, you know,
one of the main protagonists is in an old people's home,
you know, and kind of reminiscing about the war.
So it makes sense. But, yeah, she's been through that.

(12:09):
And, you know, she's in that sort of age bracket, excuse me.
So, yeah, that probably does fit, you know, and that was the sort of the level
of technology back in the early 60s.
So, yeah, I'm quite happy with that.
You know you mentioned coming off like
a radio play and it it does to a certain degree you know

(12:32):
it it wouldn't have surprised me if this had started out
as a radio play and then was adapted you know into
a film but you know the director oliver pern
i think he does enough visually to
keep you interested yeah with with various
angles and you know and close-ups and
things yeah absolutely yeah so sometimes you know

(12:54):
you're just staring at the switchboard kind of thing you
know what while people are talking or or you know
there's a call coming in and it's sort of drawing your attention to it so yeah
i i found this quite compelling to watch unless i mean i i love the you know
the twist when you know the little bits of information that you glean and until
you realize what's actually happened and it's you know it's quite Quite shocking and sad in a way.

(13:19):
So, yeah, it was a good watch, this one.
So, Steve, what are you going to score out? I'll give it a seven.
I'll join you on a seven. And Rich?
Because I wasn't quite as engaged with it, I'm going to go for a six.
Two sevens and a six for On The Line. Go check it out.
Music.

(13:44):
Our next film is punch a young
girl celebrating her last night out in her hometown is stalked by a mysterious
killer in a mr punch mask so this is not so much a british slasher as a british
basher you're here all week i'm here all week i thought of that one while i was watching it.

(14:09):
So that's actually a good one i like okay so this is this is probably the most working class,
slasher movie i think i've ever come across you know i mean a lot of stuff is
either set in a you know university or college whatever or in a reasonably well-to-do neighborhood,

(14:29):
you know this is the arse end of nowhere sort of like seaside town you know
imagine somewhere like sorry what i think it's supposed to be clacton on c clacton
it's well it's it's it's kind of a
they've gone to various locations to kind of create this one sort of unnamed
seaside location but maybe i mean i was watching it going that's hastings i

(14:53):
know that you know i know those locations but then there was other bits i was
like well that's definitely not hastings then i looked other bits so there's
a long list of they went to brighton and like say clacton on c Brighton,
Hastings and a few other canvass stands.
They went into a whole bunch of locations around the sort of south-east and
stuff to create their run-down It's the off-seas.

(15:19):
It's wintertime in a seaside town and it is the most desolate sort of place.
Loads of arcades and things locked up for the winter months.
You know not much going on you know
we got our protagonist julia coming
back well she's been back a while her dad's committed
suicide her mum has attempted suicide i

(15:42):
believe is what's been going on and she's
been staying with her mum for a while but has decided she
wants to go back to university and you know finish her
course so she goes out with her best mate for one
last night and somehow out
of nowhere this whole urban myth about the mr
punch man sort of suddenly you know she's she's

(16:02):
grown up in this town and never ever heard it but all of a
sudden everyone knows about this thing oh yeah i'm gonna watch out
for the mr punch man well this sort of stuff and then we do get this guy dressed
in a mr punch mask with his his whacking stick seemingly indiscriminately just
killing people for a good chunk of the film and slowly making his way to this

(16:25):
girl Julia and her friend.
What do you make of it, Steve?
Um yeah it's weird it is weird because it like you say he does just kind of like come out of nowhere,
but everyone knows about him but she doesn't even though
she's only been to uni it's not like she grew up somewhere else or moved into

(16:46):
town and it's not just like they know about him it's like they're helping him
and stuff you know it's it's very weirdly unsettling to be fair i I thought it was done quite well.
I mean, it's quite nasty.
I mean, there's a bit where he like what attacks two girls who like on a separate

(17:09):
end. Yeah, that's right.
We've seen it before in like other things.
Things graphic design and stuff like that. Oh, yeah. She's been quite recently.
I remember them level. I thought That bit was actually quite nasty.
I mean, the rest of it's really just, you know, a bit of bashing and stuff like

(17:32):
that. But that bit was pretty brutal.
The twist wasn't really a twist, really.
You know, sorry, coming a mile off. There is one, it does sort of trip itself up.
There's one bit where you start questioning, you know, it's the old teleporting bit, isn't it?
And so, well, if he's there, then how is he over there now, sort of thing.

(17:53):
And then they start you know then you start thinking well okay yeah and
that happened quite early on yeah i mean
also as well i mean if you look
at imdb it kind of gives it away right don't look at imdb folks yeah there's
a name there quite early on on the cast list he was not really in it that much

(18:16):
i would say i was like well why have you got him so far up if he's not on it
if he's not not being like that much,
you know what I mean? Oh yeah, definitely.
You know, but all in all, yeah, it wasn't bad.
Seen a lot of people calling for like a prequel a prequel
yeah a prequel in the sequels although a franchise which

(18:38):
i could see i must admit you know i think it has got
legs i think it's definitely got prequel legs
you know just to give a bit more backstory to explain what's
going on and stuff like that uh but yeah all
in all nothing nothing we haven't seen before done quite
well to be fair it's it's managed to find
a unique angle you know

(19:00):
i mean i mean this as you say the actual you know
the setup and everything is pretty right
you know it's another you know crazy guy chasing girls and killing them sort
of thing but it has got and it is a very sort of quintessentially english kind
of thing you know it might be not something we like you know it's almost as
if somebody decided to make a slasher movie out of morris men you know morris stances.

(19:25):
It's not something we're exactly proud of, but it is British.
Give it time. Give it time. There was one from years ago with Jennifer Ellison in.
It was just so British, it was like on a farm. That's the cottage.
The cottage, that was it, yeah. It seems like that, but more rough and ready. Yeah.

(19:45):
As I say, it does feel very working class, this one. Rich, over to you.
What do you make of Punch?
I liked it. it uh the you know i was i
was quite warm to it initially because of all let's say
the the familiar locations i mean we talked about
the there was the wolf werewolf santa
or whatever it was called a few weeks ago which was set in hastings but i didn't

(20:07):
believe for a second they actually shot in hastings and if they did they certainly
didn't make the most of the location but here they've gone out their way to
you know they filmed on location that's you know on the seafront got some some
nice drowning shots and stuff as well.
And they've, and the beaches and, and,
And they've gone to not just one place, but multiple places.

(20:28):
So there's a bit of big effort to go and get all the different bits that they
needed to create this run-down seaside, sort of anywhere.
Everywhere kind of representational sort of, not fantasy version,
but like non-specific, really sort of gone to waste kind of seaside town location,

(20:48):
which, as you say, couldn't be more British, really.
I mean, I know America and other places have equivalents of that.
Do you know, the really surprising one, and it's actually not in America, it's Niagara.
You know Niagara Falls? Oh, yeah, yeah. That is, they've modelled that place
on an English seaside town with all the really tacky rides and arcades and burger

(21:13):
joints and all that sort of stuff.
If you ever have a, you know, it's quite funny.
I think it was Suze Kempner when she went, she posted online and said,
well, yeah, this is what you expect. you know it's all waterfalls and shit but
if you turn around the camera and face the other way and it's all these weird
like dinosaur burger joints and all this sort of weird stuff.

(21:36):
Crazy yeah so the sort of i think it
is a cut above the other sort of british slasher movies or or these novelty
british slasher movies that we've seen so like nutcracker massacre came to mind
yes from a similar kind of it's from the same sort of wheelhouse essentially
the guy directed it you mentioned graphic designs early he he directed that
graphic desires sorry so he's,

(21:59):
he's sort of i mean he actually hasn't done that many
features he's done a lot of shorts and sort of buildings build up the segments
and stuff like that so uh he but he's coming from that same world i mean rebecca
matthews i saw was on the producer she's not listed on imdb for some reason
as being associated with it so she was definitely involved and she's done all
those you know loads of those those sort of British horror movies.

(22:21):
Some of the stuff like Tom Jolliffe got involved in writing,
you know, all that stuff.
There's a whole ton of it. This, I felt, was a bit different, sort of stood out.
This was by Paranoid Android Films, director Andy Edwards' company,
or writer and director, I should say. And I think he was producer as well.
I thought he did a good job. I think he made the most of the setting and location.

(22:43):
The main character, you know, we get introduced to what is effectively our final
girl in the story and she's not, she is different to those we're usually involved
with, you know, sort of connected with. She's a bit more...
Rough around the edges and so i would i
would say that this film has a dash of and
i don't know if it's self-con you know consciously so but as

(23:06):
a dash of bodies bodies bodies about it where you've got these young people
who uh you know very at ease you know
you know with sexuality and drugs and stuff and you
know they're a bit obnoxious at times and whatever i mean there's a
whole there's a whole scene i don't know if it was written ages ago
or something but there's a whole sequence in this which is basically a rave scene
which seems like it should have been from like dark lands or something

(23:27):
in the 90s but whether that was in you
know intentional or not but the the same thing was quite
funny because you know punch goes and he starts killing people and
there's still people dancing around it's almost like that scene john wick for
you yeah it is actually and again was that intentional i don't know but i think
we've seen variations on on that kind of thing but i did think that was a well

(23:49):
executed scene no pun intended i did like like the kill that you mentioned earlier,
the baseball bat kill with the actress who I always say looks a bit like Sadie Sink.
You know, different age. She's got the ring to her nose.
She's been in, like you say, graphic. I didn't see graphic designs,
but she was definitely in, like, at least a couple of films we've watched.

(24:09):
Sarah Alexandra Marks turns up. She's also from that world of all these films.
I liked, you know, it was nice to see her again.
The actress who played the main character, I think it was Alina Allison.
Person as Frankie I thought she was good she's done she's working her way up
she's got a few she's done a lot of shorts and things but I thought she was

(24:31):
good as a as the as the lead there was all the stuff with.
Her mum the actress playing a mum i thought that was quite quite well
done because um you know clearly saw some a
lot of issues going on there so this is kind of it's what
you've seen before but they've managed to put a little bit of a a twist
on it not just make the britishness and the seaside town

(24:52):
and everything but also you know for good
or bad they've kind of made it tried to make it a little bit more edgy you
know with with this with this with the character and you know
not basically do 100 exactly
what you would expect these characters to do it sort of
goes off in a few different directions and i did i thought the cinematography and
the music was was good and you know

(25:15):
it touches on all the conventions we've even got a crazy ralph kind of character
who's like oh you've got to beware a kind of thing i know you were saying about
that earlier mr punch uses a voice changer there's a bit of a scream kind of
thing going on there that annoyed me mean but unfortunately that's that's the
bit that really sort of grated was the voice the voice i,
mean it was meant to be but it was just yeah

(25:37):
a bit at times just a bit too much i wasn't sure whether they made enough of
the you know miss you know the punch and judy kind of thing i thought there
was some nice nods to that and actually they don't over explain it which i think
is quite interesting as i we would we would sort of naturally they don't have
enough a lot of of references,
but there are bits in there like, you know, he gets on the phone,

(25:59):
tell Judy, you know, that kind of stuff.
And there's a thing with a copper and that. There's these little references
to what the Punch and Judy shows are or where he comes from,
but they don't establish that at all. There's no...
There's no like yeah there's no prologue set
with a small child who who's you know

(26:21):
watching a punch and judy show on the seafront or anything
like that there's nothing there's no which i think they should have
done that a little bit but they literally
do not show any punch and judy performance as
an indicator they just introduced this character as mr
punch and that's it and but there's the whole thing that
say american viewers wouldn't necessarily get which is

(26:42):
our punch and duty shows are essentially cancelled now
because they're they're they're comedy performances about
domestic violence domestic abuse yeah so and
all this sort of stuff so that's where it's kind
of coming from and i thought it was pulling in those bits quite
well but you know i kept waiting for him
to say that's the way to do it you know and he sort of

(27:04):
said a variation on it but it wasn't the way
i quite wanted it to be so i was a little bit
disappointed which is a stupid thing to be disappointed i know but it
was kind of that is the fundamental that is the main
line and you really want want that sort of delivered
100 or perfectly well at least i did anyway but
i thought it was pretty good type of character and the seaside

(27:25):
town and now the i'm not
going to go into spoilers and stuff i know we talked touched on a little
bit earlier but i did think as as
derivative as it was the way
it turned because we've seen it you know in various
films british otherwise i thought it was cool.
I liked it it's like added a little bit of you know

(27:45):
i did you know i mean we'll talk off air in a minute because i want to spoil.
It but but i i was kind of surprised as as to the direction it went in and i
thought it worked as well yeah cool all right steve what What do you score?

(28:06):
Yeah, I'll give it a seven. Yeah, it's definitely worth a seven. And Rich?
Well, I was hovering on a six, but I think I've talked myself up to a seven.
Cool. There you go. Three sevens for Punch.
Go check it out. Can you take, take, take? Can you take, take, take?

(28:28):
Our next film is The Island. when
his brother is killed lapd officer mark leaves
the city to return to the island he grew up on
seeking answers and vengeance he soon
finds himself in a bloody battle with a corrupt tycoon who's
taken over the island paradise this is a very straightforward film very straightforward

(28:52):
but it's not bad you know it's not it's not a bad film it's just not a surprising
film There's no real bells and whistles here. However.
This film sort of made me realise how cynical I've gotten watching this kind of thing.
There was two characters in this which I automatically pegged as guys who are

(29:16):
going to betray Michael J. White.
You know, I thought, well, sure, obviously he's going to be,
you know, he's going to betray him and all this. Oh, he hasn't.
Okay, well, this guy, you know,
he's definitely going to be the one who's somehow going to betray him.
And it's like no they're just like guys who you know loyal to the characters

(29:37):
i thought it was really cool yeah i i enjoyed this but at the same time you
know it's it's just nothing special,
steve what did you make of it yeah i'll be
yeah i agree with you really um i
think i know you mean as well about who
you thought was going to betray because i thought exactly the same thing there's
lots of shots of his face looking really pensive and you think oh you

(29:59):
know is he you know reaching for the phone and this sort
of thing and you don't know who he's calling anything yeah and
he's not he's not he's just yeah he's trying
to do his job yeah um like i said i said to you early on i mean i'm not as you
can probably tell i'm really not well this week i've got like a throat infection
or chest infection or something going on every morning and i must i did drift

(30:24):
out concentration wise on this one.
Just because I'm not feeling too good. But like I say, it was pretty,
pretty much straightforward. You know, low budget action.
Michael J. White wanted a holiday, basically. I think that's.
Yeah, with his wife. Yeah.
He's got his wife in it again. It's like, that I know of, it's like third or

(30:47):
fourth they've done together now. Yeah, I think so.
There could be loads more in the past that I'm not aware of, but yeah.
To me, it's a Ron Seale film. film does what it says on the tin exactly yeah
no real bells and whistles nothing exciting and yeah it's okay you know it's
not it's not trash but it's far off you know.

(31:10):
And a bit more a bit more to it if you know what i mean it
was i mean you know the whole setup of
the film was was just a bit ridiculous as well
really but you know we need
we need this guy to die somehow for some reason
let's pick the most stupid thing going anyway rich
what did you make of the island i wasn't

(31:33):
i wasn't sure what to expect going in but i actually quite liked as you say
the sort of straightforwardness of it it's very much in the in the kind of rhythm
of a of like an 80s or 90s action film about basically with with the get Carter
plot, basically your brother's been killed.
You got to go, got to go back to where you came from. And, you know,

(31:55):
I mean, we saw a Ross boy, ask you is it with vengeance?
And that's probably sort of the closest relation that I would say recently that I can think of.
I mean, back in the nineties, we've had all sorts like, I think Hawks vengeance
kind of did a variation on that plot. and, but,
Oh, next of kin, yeah, the Patrick Swayze, yeah.

(32:16):
So, yeah, I thought, so usually, though, the death, the motive,
you know, the murder that motivates
sort of the action, there usually ends up being a bit more to it.
And in this case, it was just, I mean, for one thing, sometimes it's a bit of
a mystery, you know, something's happened, you've got to find out.
In this case, you see it right up front. And it's so arbitrary.
It's like he really brought it.

(32:39):
And then kind of Michael J. White's character comes over because we've had an
introductory scene, which is the drug deal gone wrong kind of bust or bust gone
wrong kind of thing, where it has a nice action scene to introduce characters,
establish who they are, got this kind of buddy, you know, buddy cock dynamic going on.
You know, Michael J. White is the sort of gruff stern one of the two.

(33:03):
Jackson Rathbone's doing the comic relief. But then they kind of move,
they kind of just say, okay, that's done.
And that's just out of the character. We're going to leave Jackson Rathbone
out of it for most of the film now.
And it's just going to be a Michael Joe Wyatt going over to the island in the
Caribbean, which is nice. Lovely. Great location.
Provides some nice production value. Funnily enough, it's the second film set

(33:27):
on a small island. This one's actually got a much higher population.
It's St. Kitts and Nevis, which is about 53,000 approximately.
Approximately so quite a bit bigger than than
that channel islands one in on the
line but here we actually see the island which is nice so yeah
lots of fantastic locations in this michael joe white could say comes in does

(33:50):
does what he does you know he's i have i like michael joe white but i'm very
very behind on his standalone action hero movies i've seen him in supporting
roles I was like, one more shot.
But, you know, I haven't seen Outlaw Johnny Black. I haven't seen As Good As Dead or a thing.
I think The Commando might have been the most recent of his films,
and that was not very good, really.

(34:11):
I'm not sure if Gillian White was also in that. But the...
You know, he does. I mean, he's definitely still got that star power,
that charisma. You know, he's really magnetic.
And, you know, he still does the kicks and stuff, which is great.
So you get some really nice moments. There's not a lot, not a huge amount, but there's enough.

(34:32):
And I think action fans will enjoy it. They'll enjoy the location.
There's a bit where he goes and gets his weapons, which they've just copied
blatantly from John Wick, which I think is a big mistake.
I mean, I know it's a derivative film, but come on
sledgehammer and everything it's like really
i just thought that took that again sort of took me

(34:52):
out i mean it was maybe that was supposed to be a bit of a fun thing
that they threw in but i don't know i just saw that undermined it a bit i did
like all the supporting characters and as you say there's certain allegiances
that you think there's that you know we just so jaded and you know we just automatically
assume well of course he's he's he's going to turn out to be a dirty cup or

(35:14):
whatever, you know, it was like,
but there's stuff like this, but the, you know, Steven Seagal,
you know, there's a few, Steven Seagal did films with bits of this in it.
So like when he did fire down below, there's the whole, you know,
he goes to the sort of, you know, you know, a rural location.
You know, there's, there's a conspiracy sort of thing going on.
And, you know, some one guy in charge of the whole town and everyone's afraid of him.

(35:35):
Cause they will get them. They will get their, their living from this guy.
And in that case it was Chris Christopherson and you know and there's a whole
scene where Seagal goes to the church and he gives a talk and says you know
you've got to help me out here guys it's like we've got to get on top of this
you know because this guy's not good and the same thing happens in this you
know and I like all that stuff I thought that was good and.

(35:56):
I did think Gillian White was really good in her role as the ex-wife.
Good to see her in this again, yeah.
They've got a lot more depth to their relationship in this, which I think is really good.
They've separated, but there's a lot of warmth. He says, you know, I'm still married.
You know, he's like, they never really, he left several years ago and they've
parted, you know, they've parted ways, but they never stopped loving each other, really.

(36:20):
And you realise later what that was. and
they try to throw that that's quite a big dramatic scene that they
add in there which you wouldn't typically have which
i thought was quite a bold move to sort of add that
in there but it definitely adds real weight to their relationship i think they've
got that i mean the husband and wife in real life i mean on screen as well they've
got fantastic chemistry yeah you know the they just work really well and i would

(36:44):
say yeah the the guy just one quick thought before i step out Now, Eduardo Costa,
I thought, was really good as the villain.
You know, very much a stock kind of bad guy.
But he pulled it off really well. And I thought, you know, there was the other
film we watched, Freelance, which had a similar kind of character who was actually

(37:08):
more of a good guy in the end.
But this guy's very, very much a bad guy, which I liked.
And so he was good. So, yeah. he's a guy who's got serious anger management issues.
Yeah yeah it's like well I mean he burned some of our men on his own but it's
like Richard's saying though I mean at the beginning the murder of his brother hmm.

(37:31):
You know, it's over that quick and over something so trivial. Yeah.
Like I said, like, because the space has been shot, I didn't realise that that,
you know, that was what it was until about 25, 30 minutes in. Hmm.
Because I'm just thinking, well, what was it then?
Yeah. Because it can't be. It's so trivial and throwaway.

(37:56):
Yeah. But, you know, it can't be, but no, it is, you know.
Yeah, Yeah, in a way, that's kind of refreshing in itself, though,
isn't it? Because it isn't this sort of big, dramatic, you know, sort of thing.
There's no, as you said, Rich, you know, there's no conspiracy attached to it or anything.
You know, he hasn't uncovered some dark secret and he has to be killed for it.
It's just this stupid, minor infraction or, you know, genuine mistake that his

(38:21):
boss has taken umbrage to and just killed him.
Well, you know, the other film that this is referencing, I'd say,
whether intentionally ripping it off or otherwise, but especially as you get
towards the latter part of the film the revenge kind of part sort of sets aside
because he he ends up being i mean not set aside entirely but.
He the the quest is is sort of resolved

(38:41):
very quickly it's like he knows where he stands you're the villain you
know they he's he's you know having conversations with him he says i know what
you've done kind of thing all that but it turns into walking tall he even becomes
that even takes over the role of like the the lead law enforcement local sheriff
kind of thing that's to sort of clean up the town and sort of motivate the locals and stuff.

(39:03):
So I think, yeah, this is a nice sort of mix and mash kind of throwback to 60s,
70s, 80s, you know, action, you know, that kind of mix of, you know, a little bit of revenge,
a bit of cleaning up the town from the bad guy who's kind of, you know.
The crime boss, you know, who's got everyone sort of under his thumb.

(39:27):
And although the opening is a bit extended with you know that's performance
and then the interview with the the singer and you think something's going to
happen with them but then actually this other thing from the side i thought
that was actually although although a bit arbitrary,
in terms of the plot motivation because it doesn't really

(39:47):
have anything to do with you know it kind of it's a side swipe
kind of thing and i think it almost works i think you
kind of see it it coming too much for it to completely
work but I thought it was an interesting way to start the film and actually
the film doesn't play out entirely as I was expecting because usually in that
sort of thing you know there's a witness she's got to be protected you know

(40:08):
so they team up and all this sort of stuff but he'd be like basically no there's
the witness right send her away.
And that's it. She's gone, basically. Even that whole sequence as well.
I mean, you know, going back to what I was saying about a particular character,
you know, who, you know, she's put into his care to then sort of,
you know, and then he has to sort of put her on a boat to send her off to get her to the airport.

(40:33):
And for that whole bit, until later on, when he speaks to, you know,
Michael Terry White's partner, up until then, you're thinking, what's happened to her?
You know we we just don't know you know you get a bit of tension out of that
i thought that was quite good so i want to talk about the director just for
a second so we've got sean sean paul.

(40:55):
Piccinino just murdered your name sean sorry mate who we've come across before
because he directed a film called american fighter all the way back in 2019
with sean patrick flannery which we we We enjoyed it,
I seem to remember. Yeah, enjoyed that, yeah. We did enjoy that one. Yeah.
Since then, he seems to have been doing a lot of, like, Christmas movies and stuff.

(41:19):
Yeah, I think he must be doing, like, Hallmark or something.
Yeah, Hallmark, well, it looks a bit.
But, you know, so this is obviously a bit of a change of pace for what he's
been doing for the last few years.
I think he could do quite well at this sort of stuff, to be honest.
You know, I don't think it's beyond him to, you know, do something a bit more
sort of complex with it all. I thought the actual action scenes for what they were were well done.

(41:42):
You know, Michael J. White got to shine. You know, we could see all his kicks
and blocks and everything. It was all really good.
So, yeah, I think this is, you know, he could definitely do this. So, yeah, good on you.
Okay, scores. Scores. Steve, how are you going to score The Island? I'll give it a six.

(42:03):
And Rich? I'm going to give it a seven.
I did enjoy this you know I think it is a 7 I could easily re-watch this.
It's a comfort film basically is what it put us down to I just need to mention
one more thing that really bugged me at the end of the film if you don't mind
I don't know if you so there's a scene that happens at the end where,

(42:27):
Michael Joe White's character is you know in a location let's say I'm not going
to sort of give it away entirely but somebody else comes along and sort of has a chat with him.
And then we get a pull-away sort of drone shot,
which makes it very clear that that person would never have been there because

(42:47):
the place that he was, he's like walking on a boardwalk kind of thing.
And I was like, no, there's nowhere to be heard unless he's miles away and shouting.
Bad continuity there. I'm not usually good at spotting this sort of thing,
but it was very clear that those were shot very individual bits and then mashed

(43:11):
together later on sort of thing. Yeah.
But anyway. Okay. So, Rich, how are you going to score it?
Seven. Mm-hmm. Okay. So it's six, two sevens for The Island. Go check it out.
Our next film is Race for Glory, Audi versus Lancia.

(43:35):
A film inspired by true events that occurred heard during the fierce rivalry
between Audi and Lancia at the 1983 Rally World Championships.
I remember there was a Top Gear segment where they documented this and went
through what happened and how Audi were the dominant force at the time because

(44:00):
they'd introduced four-wheel drive to their car.
Everyone else was playing catch-up, basically. you know it's
it's interesting the way the film goes into the detail at the beginning as
to what that actually means you
know and and why nobody else had figured it out you know it was a sort of real
piece of ingenious engineering that that allowed them to do it it was very interesting

(44:25):
and and this film i thought was was pretty damn good overall i was kind of hoping
it It would be the actual documentary.
What we'd get is a sort of dramatization of what happened.
Although there is a very interesting sort of afterword, which I'm sure we'll
talk about in a bit. Yeah.
But anyway, Steve, what did you make of Race for Glory? Well,

(44:49):
there seems to be a rake of films like this at the minute. There's a what?
A rake of these type of films. Oh, yeah. Sorry. I thought you said something else then.
It's majestic. Sorry. You know, you've got like... Oh, Ferrari.
Yeah, Ferrari. The one that we...

(45:09):
Oh, the Lamborghini one, yeah.
Yeah. yeah and i'll be honest motor racing
does nothing for me at all i'm i'll okay like you i used to watch top gear but
it was nothing to the cars it's more for the comedy you know i found it funny
this type of film really does nothing for me and to be honest i found it quite flat quite boring,

(45:37):
even the you know the rally sequences i thought just seemed a bit slow i thought there's no,
excitement to them I don't know he just really didn't get me at all I mean part
of the performance was pretty good I mean the main guy.
Ricardo Scamaccio yeah I mean,

(45:59):
he's fine. You know, I mean, the character seemed so, so laid back,
he was horizontal half the time, you know, and just didn't do anything to get
my blood pumping whatsoever.
I just found it very, very boring. And just not me at all.
Very rich. What did you make of this film?

(46:22):
Yeah, it was all right. I mean, yeah, there as a whole, there's a whole load of these things,
especially like if you if you encompass all the sort of
brand story movies like air
that would call the founder and all all that sort
of stuff so this one i actually thought from the title
because of the way the title was presented it would be more about audi but it's
not it's about lancia they were the underdogs so

(46:43):
yeah yeah so it's the which i
didn't know coming in i didn't know anything about it so the the film
is interesting because it comes up straight away saying
an italian and french co-production which you don't
normally see anything like that normally it would say just
the names of the companies that are involved and stuff but this is shot
largely in english but it's multi-language there's italian

(47:05):
there's german also which i liked i thought that added a lot of
color it's not often we see films from italy on the show so i quite i thought
that was quite nice to see a reasonably budgeted you know italian production
aiming for the international market which you know know and being marketed originally
it was called to win or at least originally one of the posters.

(47:28):
But they say they've kind of intentionally marketed it
not just in the uk but in other territories on the back of the ford versus ferrari
kind of thing yeah so they've kind of copied the aesthetic that in the in the
poster design and stuff and there's even some stunt casting here actually because
we've got daniel brule in a supporting role who was also in rush which was the.

(47:53):
Yeah yeah so nikki louder
that was it so the this is kind
of feeding on different conventions and stuff and and telling telling
its own version of the story and let's say i think lamborghini's probably the
closest i would say in terms of this is
much more you know in terms of budget
and stuff it's more that than it is big budget

(48:14):
hollywood movie and they sort of do a lot
here with archive footage there's some
racing scenes they've actually recreated and stuff so there is stuff
in there but it's it's kind
of one and it's kind of the footage the
rally footage the new stuff and the uh archive
footage the thing that sort of draw would make me feel really

(48:35):
tense was all the people just standing at the sides
of these corners and stuff and i was thinking it's
like death wish or what you know it's like so incredibly dangerous
i know some people have done but i think it's miracle that more
people haven't got it you've done it i've done it yeah when i was younger i
did it with like the tt races but with motorcycle racing on the isle of man

(48:59):
so i've done it from that perspective kind of thing which is similar but you
think geez all these cars just hurtling around it's not going to take much for
it to just go knock somebody off anyway there's,
there isn't a tragedy like that you know there is a little bit of tragedy added into the story.
Funnily enough, it made me think of the Gran Turismo film, which I watched recently,
because that has kind of a similar structure as a lot of these films do.

(49:21):
It's kind of the underdog story and then there's like a dramatic turn of events
and things like that and there's a little bit of, there's the stuff with the.
Engineer is really reminding me a lot of the interplay between Lamborghini and
his main guy in that Frank Grillo movie.

(49:41):
And so I think there was enough that was interesting for me,
not being a fan of motorsports either, the period detail, I thought they did sort of carry that over.
But I did think the climax felt a bit flat.
I think, you know, it sort of leads into, it sort of has this sort of race climax.
And I kind of got to the end and I was like, oh, oh, is that it?

(50:04):
I was thinking it was going to be a bit more or something. And I was like, oh, oh, okay then.
All right. Yeah. So I thought it maybe peaks a little bit early.
I thought the lead, the guy in the lead, Riccardo Scamaccio.
Who was Keanu Reeves' nemesis in John Wick Chapter 2, I believe.
Leave he's very charismatic he was good

(50:27):
and so but it's kind of another one of those films which is about the
person behind everything more than like the
racing driver and that which i thought was quite interesting to
say it's a bit more like air you know what like where air is
not about michael jordan it's about the guys in the suits who
are trying to get michael jordan to do stuff in
this it's kind of him he's trying he's called he's

(50:48):
coordinating the drivers and trying to get them to do the thing to help
him achieve sales that's what it's about they're trying to win well at the end
of the day he you know they are working for lancia in the same way that you
know that the rally drivers are working for audi and the whole point is yeah
i mean they're going to sell millions of cars off the back of you know their

(51:09):
achievements or is that not,
Which is similar to air in a way, because that was all linked to sports,
but it's actually we want to exploit the sport to get the promotion,
to get the adoration of this thing to sell our products and stuff.
So I don't know anything about the story. I thought it was really interesting

(51:31):
to see it from that vantage point.
Yeah, there's some good off-race anecdote spits in there.
Like there's a scene where as as
part of the the rules of rally driving you
know you have to have a basically the rally car has
to be a production car so and you need
200 you know as

(51:53):
a minimum you need 200 production cars produced in
order to to race and they'd only
done 103 at the time so they do this whole elaborate scam where they trick the
the auditor into thinking that you know there's actually 200 cars by saying
oh you know the rest of the cars are in another car park over there i'll take

(52:14):
you there and then in the meantime they drove all the cars around you know to make it.
It's good there's also the thing about bringing in
a a nutritionist to help the
you know the whole team to keep them going because you know because the whole
thing is like you know it's an adrenaline sort of peaks and troughs all the
time and just sort of there to help regulate their their sleep patterns and

(52:37):
their calorie intake and all
that sort of stuff to sort of just keep them going throughout the season.
I thought that was quite interesting. All the little sort of dirty tricks that
he and the, and Daniel Brühl's character play on each other throughout the thing, like, you know.
Tricking him in, in tricking Audi into putting snow tires on,
you know, after, after, you know, he's sort of like, you know,

(52:59):
gritted the roads and all this sort of stuff.
So yeah, there was stuff like that. I was thinking, Am I supposed to be on his side?
Because that seems really underhanded and sneaky. I'm not really...
Don't really like what you've just done there so am i
supposed to be cheering for you or not i don't know it's a bit weird yeah it's
gaming the system and you know it's it's it's it's

(53:19):
gamesmanship it's it's playing exploiting the
rules to your advantage well they do the bit don't they
where it says oh you've broken the rules i guess i think i find i
haven't broken the rules it doesn't say i can't do
this it says it says it doesn't
say you shouldn't do it doesn't say you can't just because
it doesn't say i can't do it doesn't you know it doesn't mean they can

(53:40):
or whatever anyway yeah so so
there's a lot of interesting bits in there now right
at the end of the film you know we get the sort
of epilogue where it sort of explains what happened to the various people
you know and the fact that you know lancia went on
with it was the lancia delta was you know the the sort
of like the dominant car for the next couple of seasons but then

(54:02):
we get this afterward which basically basically said yeah everything you've
just seen is bullshit it's like yeah they obviously skirted with the truth so
much you know or tweaked it for dramatic effect too much that people were starting
to object you know you can't really sort of say this is the true story of what happened.
Probably possibly so one or two people got a bit upset

(54:24):
with the way they were being portrayed in the film but yeah
it's interesting how long and lengthy that particular disclaimer
was at the end you know it was okay
you're obviously trying to avoid a lawsuit here basically
well i think you get it like two or three times even
i think i mean you get it like at the end they put it what the at the at the

(54:46):
end credits as you would normally expect but i think there might have even been
something at the beginning i might be completely wrong on that i think you do
sort of say that oh you know so i mean certain characters have been sort of
amalgamated you know Yeah, there's a lot.
That's quite common in that. But yeah, they do make a very specific sort of
long point of it at the end to sort of really cover themselves.

(55:09):
Yeah, like I said, my interest in this was piqued because I remember the particular
bit that Top Gear did and John McClung's thing was.
So I knew there was an interesting story there to be told.
And I think they do a pretty decent job here.
It's not it's not particularly flamboyant or you know it doesn't have a lot

(55:32):
of visual flair we do get a lot of sort of in-car driving scenes to sort of
get a feel for it but overall it was,
yeah it was one shot where.
The car came flying out of the corner onto a straight, and the camera followed
it, looked like it was going to T-bone it, and then just turned out nice and went alongside it.

(55:57):
That was the only bit of flair that I saw in the film, obviously.
There's not one shot of that. That's nice.
The other thing about rally driving as well is you're
competing against time
rather than the other competitors as
a world you know that sounds a bit bad but but so so

(56:19):
you don't get like you know sort of thrilling overtakes or
anything like that or you know trying to bash somebody off the road it's it's
literally you've got to get to the other place before
you know in a quicker time than the next guy in order
to you know to win so so it's a
little bit different i guess so so not quite as
cinematic as sort of you know days of thunder i guess or

(56:39):
something along along those sort of lines but anyway okay
steve how are you going to score race for glory i'll give it a five and rich
i will give it a six i'm going to join you on a six yep two sixes and a five
for race for glory audi versus lancia go check it out.

(57:04):
Our short shot this week is scooby-doo where
are you in spring trapped when the scooby gang visits freddy fazbear's pizza
they must investigate a mysterious case of the animatronics getting a bit quirky
at night okay i love scooby-doo i you know ever since the first series,

(57:28):
okay possibly not the scrappy-doo ones but
just about just about every variation of scooby-doo
i've you know sort of watched mystery inc
is my favorite version of it i thought that was absolutely superb and i think
this which is a sort of stop motion version of the sort of scooby-doo you know

(57:51):
recreating the music the the credit sequence you know the characters i think
it It does an absolutely superb job.
Yeah, I totally love this. Obviously, it's a mash-up between Scooby-Doo and
Five Nights at Freddy's.
There's a lot of good mods towards that franchise as well.
Steve, what did you make of Scooby-Doo? Where are you in Spring Trapped? Yeah, it was cracking.

(58:17):
Not really what I expected, to be fair. I mean, I pressed play and it came up.
And like I said, it is basically just a stock motion version. Mm-hmm.
Well, not an original Scooby-Doo story, obviously, it's the crossover with Five Nights at Freddy's.
But the way they recreated the original title animation, it's exactly the same, it's just the motion.

(58:44):
I thought they did a really, really good job on it. So much good detail, yeah.
Yeah, the voices sounded spot on, to be fair, even to the original.
Now i'm wondering i'm looking at
it on imdb and there's a couple of people but
some of them like shaggy apparently that

(59:04):
character he was called sweet life of shaggy so i'm wondering if there's a bit
of ai manipulation going on in there there's a bit of controversy over this
yeah there's apparently online there's been people sort of saying that oh you've
used ai versions of the voices you know i didn't notice i mean obviously hasn't
got casey kelson doing them Shaggy, you know, but,
you know, I thought I didn't mind it.

(59:28):
No, I don't mind. It just sounded too similar to the originals, if you know what I mean.
I literally thought that it had been overdubbed from an original episode and
they just reanimated it, to be fair.
Well, I don't know. Yeah.
Apparently what they did, they sampled it from the original and then,
you know, redid it with AI.

(59:51):
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah that was really good and rich
you curated this one have we come
across um egan tyman before no
i think he's done a couple of shorter sort of other bits and pieces in
a similar animated style but no this was i
think the first thing i'd seen from him and yeah

(01:00:13):
it's very very impressive i'm not sure i don't recall
whether the whether scooby-doo's ever
been done in like a stop motion style but they're definitely that his his particular
style here is stop motion with a with a view to recreating or homaging sort
of like late 60s hannah barbara and i think it really nails it i think the all

(01:00:34):
the the editing and stuff's fantastic the characterization.
The the i mean the design and everything of
the the characters which were i believe done in stop not motion but
animated in blender yeah the the
voice stuff yes that's quite interesting the
controversy about the the ai which i think was only a couple of the characters

(01:00:54):
i mean the the guy playing shaggy is like is is like a an impressionist or somebody
who who sort of imitates that character so he's i think i think i mean he's
got like a twitter account and everything I think it has Sweet Life of Shaggy.
It doesn't say his actual name.
So that seems to be what he goes by rather than his actual name.

(01:01:16):
And that's how he's credited here.
The original upload, I think, I don't know if it's the original upload or the
re-dubbed version, which was done after the backlash.
Either way, the film has had well over 2 million views, and deservedly so.

(01:01:36):
It's a really good pastiche mash-up, like you say, with the Five Nights at Freddy's
stuff, which perfectly work together.
I mean, it's a great mix of the two. The stuff with the Five Nights at Freddy's
villain and stuff, it's just, I mean, it's more that than the,
it's not so much about the animatronic characters that the movie was based on and everything.

(01:01:58):
It's much more to do with like the the bad guy
behind the whole thing so the that's what
that's how it fits in nicely with with the scooby-doo
sort of you know themes and
plot you know resolutions and all that other that sort of stuff so
it does it does exactly what you would want a scooby-doo
pastiche to do even the song and does it

(01:02:19):
really well yeah with the music and everything and there's that song
in there which i presume is like a real song from ethereum something that's
sampled the during the montage sneak where they're chasing around yeah there's
the chase song basically yeah yeah i don't know if that's a new song that's
been made to sound old or or it's like a source one or something i'm not 100
sure i did want to look it up but i didn't get a chance but that all fitted

(01:02:41):
well you know great you know period feel and obviously they've added all the.
When he's animated that he's added all the uh sort of aging sort of features
and stuff a bit like like people do with the grindhouse-y kind of stuff to try
and make something look old.
But that all really works nicely. It's not too distracting.
It adds to the sort of, I mean, it's all four by three. It sort of adds to the

(01:03:03):
feel of authenticity of the whole thing.
It doesn't feel like it's, it's not parody, but it's very respectful.
You know, it's just a sort of a really good sort of what if kind of fan film scenario.
Yeah, no, I thoroughly enjoyed it. I mean, I enjoy,
I mean, as much as I enjoy the actual show as I did when I was a kid,

(01:03:26):
the the mystery inc version is it's
a good update because it's all you know it does sort
of poke fun at some of the the bits in it you know that with the very first
episode they get arrested for meddling and things like that it's very good there's
been some really good parodies over the years or good mashups it was a great

(01:03:47):
one with johnny bravo which which really really nailed it,
well there's the scooby-doo project which is the blair witch one that was really
good that the Cartoon Network did.
Yeah, it's just a very sort of enduring thing. And it's really great to sort
of see, obviously, other fans putting so much time and effort into a project

(01:04:08):
like this and putting it off with such aplomb, basically.
I mean, quite different to this, I know you've seen it as well,
is the Mystery Incorporated pilot episode from a couple of years ago.
It's not a short film. It's like 50 plus minutes long.
But that's a really good teen series kind of take on the... It's basically Riverdale but Scooby-Doo.

(01:04:34):
But that worked really well. It's a real shame that no one's run with that.
But that was very good as well. Yeah, you're right.
The other thing I wanted to mention was it's just a complete aside,
but there's a book called Meddling Kids, which I've read.
I've read it, yeah. It is really good.
Because that's the whole thing about that is that it's all...

(01:04:55):
Are homaging or parodying the Scooby-Doo kind of thing. And this was before,
I think, Stranger Things.
So it's kind of, it's sort of doing similar things, if I recall correctly.
Is it, tell me a little bit about it. Sorry, just a brief aside, like a quick synopsis.
Well, basically it's about this bunch of kids who do sort of solve a mystery

(01:05:16):
when they're young, but then something happens and they all sort of disappear
and then sort of drawn back to their town as adults.
A bit like it, you know, in a way, you know. Right.
And it turns out, you know, things are starting to kick off again in the town.
Yeah, I really enjoyed it. I submit, I thought it was very good.
I'll have to check that out at some point. So, yeah, Spring Trapped,

(01:05:36):
very highly recommended.
Animate Short, whether you see the, I don't know if the original,
I don't know if the original original version still exists, but there are versions
that are labeled re-dub and stuff that you can find if you're concerned about the AI usage.
But it wasn't, if I hadn't read anything about it, it wouldn't have come up.
And I don't think that's really to the detriment of the project.

(01:05:58):
I think the animator was just, you know, he's just trying to do his best with
really, really good resources and, you know, did something that, you know, upset people,
which I can understand why they're upset because there's the whole thing about
the, you know, the, the, the strike and everything that's been going on recently
about, you know, the way voice actors and stuff are being, or actors in general,

(01:06:19):
you know, could, you know, are at risk of being replaced by technology and stuff.
So these things can, you know, start out small and get bigger.
But I think, you know, that I would definitely not be on the team of,
oh, don't go and watch this film because it's got some AI stuff.
You know, the director himself said, okay, fair enough. I've heard what you've
said. I didn't even think about that. It's a good point.

(01:06:40):
I've tried to address it. And I think that's as much as you can do. Yeah, absolutely.
We don't score the shorts, but we do recommend you check them out.
And we certainly recommend you check this out. and we're going
to put a link in the footnotes go check it
out the dtv throwback this week is vendetta a detective pushed beyond his limits

(01:07:01):
will stop at nothing for vengeance when his wife is killed by a criminal that
he put away mason a hard-nosed detective deliberately gets arrested in order to get revenge.
Okay, so this is from WWE, WWE Studios.
One of many films that they were putting out, we had things like No One Lives,

(01:07:26):
which didn't actually, it had one wrestler in it.
It wasn't really sort of a wrestling showcase, but it did come from WWE.
There's a few others, The Day.
There's another one with Catherine Isabel, with one, I can't remember which wrestler it was.
There's loads, basically. They took over the 12 Rounds franchise,
for example. There was the Condemned franchise.

(01:07:49):
The Marine, they started the Marine. The Marine, of course, yeah.
Scorpion King. Scorpion King, yeah.
Involved in those. And to be honest, I think most of them have been very watchable films.
I've enjoyed most of them over the years.
This is directed by Jen and Sylvia Soska, who did american mary and a recent

(01:08:12):
remake of rabid and they've been working with wwe and other things as well and
and this is a pretty violent film this goes all out basically,
you've never seen dean kane like this for sure the
wrestler is a guy called the big show also known
as paul wright in this he is just fucking

(01:08:34):
massive and i think he he does a
good job here you know play i mean he is a
menacing bastard in this film and i think he does a good job yeah i i did like
this i like this a lot it's it's it's messy and violent and horrible and i think
it's yeah works really well steve you're well known for liking your blood what

(01:08:56):
how do you make what do you make of vendetta.
It was all right. I say it's messy, it's violent, but to me it was,
I mean, it's ridiculous. Don't get me wrong.
You know, it kills his wife. So he killed his brother and get sent to the same,
we get sent to the same prison.

(01:09:17):
You know, it's never going to happen.
They do at least say, Oh, we, you know, somebody pulled some strings and stuff.
Well, I mean, after that point, then he's just.
D&K and I were beating the shit out of someone while getting the shit kicked
out of him and it just gets a little bit samey you know what I mean I know that

(01:09:38):
you know you've got the usual,
oh the governor's in on it and he's running a dodgy operation and they're together you know,
it's the same as any other prison movie in base and yeah it's a little bit samey
for me I'll be honest I mean it's it is quite nasty I mean,
quite nasty to sing it like the bit with the same jesus that

(01:10:03):
oh you know that that must have it that and the
whole bit with the shank as well when it would be with the pain well i mean
to be fair the end credits got me as well where it's basically basically showing
you how they make shanks in prison basically what type what it is what type
of shanks they got and what are you used to making come like,

(01:10:25):
they surely can't get away with it but yeah he's there one thing I think they got right is.
The, the, being Kate's wife, she's quite a small person. Yes.
So when the big shows go on, I think, oh yeah. He's six, eight,
six, nine and built like a big ship.

(01:10:46):
You know? Yeah. He, yeah. When he, when he picks it up, he's like half the size
of him. And she basically, yeah.
Yeah. Cause he's always been huge. He's not some, especially he's not something
I watch all the time, but I do remember seeing him a few times a few years ago and stuff and yeah,
when he picks it up and just like yeah she looks absolutely timely and i think

(01:11:08):
they've done that really well,
and dean kane surprised me as well yes to
me he's always quite it's always content really
yeah yeah you know that's all kind of
well this is a hard ass you know okay he doesn't
like no but like for prisoners he's all
out all out and which was
a decent and well wrestling they call it

(01:11:30):
heel turn in a way you know but just it's
a completely different character from what i've seen him do before even that
kid that's probably watched a while back you know
even though he's still quite after what yeah it's
just a hard art in this really impressive well i could say as good as the forms

(01:11:51):
and the characters were it just got a little bit saying it to me it was just
an hour and a half for him beating someone up or someone beating him up and
that was that way until the last 10 minutes where.
Well riding shoes which is what i expected anyway
you know yeah yeah not bad
cool rich how about you what

(01:12:12):
did you make of vendetta yeah i was quite
surprised by actually because it does and it's a bit like the island
in a way that you know it's got a very
standard kind of setup but the difference was with this was that it kind of
went in a direction that i completely didn't i mean there were things that happened
in the island that i wasn't expecting but they were all very much of of a standard
combination of genre tropes kind of thing that you would have expected.

(01:12:37):
Whereas this kind of went off the rails a bit more.
It sort of sticks within the... I know he's not an undercover cop because he
puts himself in the prison, but we've seen variations on the cop or agent goes
into a prison to reach a certain objective and uncovers things.
But in this case, I mean, other examples,
whether there was a Knight Rider episode death warrant

(01:13:00):
with van damme had a bit had that kind of
thing naked gunner with leslie is exactly this
yeah i guess gets himself sent to
prison for this exact same thing to oh interesting i haven't seen riot so um
good you should see that so the so yeah so the the setup is basically we have

(01:13:21):
that say initial conflict he catches him he gets out he goes after you know
The big show goes after his wife,
and then he finds him, and he's done that.
The thing they then do is like, oh, Dean Cain's a bit on the edge,
so he basically gets some clippers
and shaves his head around the side to make him look a bit edgier.

(01:13:46):
But which I thought, OK, they're kind of doing the cleat because,
you know, Dean Cain, as you guys were saying, he's Mr. Clean Cut.
You know, he's like Clark Kent, Superman.
He always is that guy generally.
But no, they really do take him, you know, quite far. And I think this is down
to the to the Soska sisters.
They've really taken him out of that comfort zone and made him into this kind of monster.

(01:14:09):
Because the the movie it isn't about
him sort of you know playing you know doing the usual
prison thing of you know think about something like uh
christopher lambert in in fortress yeah you
know where he's himself but he's gonna sort
of rally right he's gonna make friends with the old guy in his cell or
whatever and you know they're gonna rally around he's not being corrupted
by the system which is which is what we get here in it he's like

(01:14:32):
well he's not he's not engaging with the system and
stuff is he's in this one he like really gets
quite essentially quite feral you know he becomes
he just starts going after people and he's like so i was
thinking of as i was watching this i was thinking this is dean kane's avengement
is what it is basically he's he's such
he's so unhinged in this and he essentially becomes a

(01:14:53):
background character as the film's unfolding because he
all he's doing is attacking people so there's not
really anything he's not engaging with people he's not having dialogue scenes
uh very very often he does occasionally he goes
and sees the warden and they have some
stuff going on but they essentially make him this beast
who's uh who's you know who's just kind

(01:15:14):
of unstoppable now i thought i would i'm on sort of steve's wavelength with
the film is just crazy nonsense i can't imagine that in a minute that this would
be allowed to happen at all you know there would be i mean he's taking out people
and there would There would be inspections.
There would be stuff going on. But there's no... It's almost like this warden has complete...

(01:15:38):
Unrealistic control over over that prison environment but
anyway the the guy play michael ecklund playing the
warden he really reminded me of like a cross between alan rickman
in diehard and andrew divoff i
thought he was quite entertaining is there's something called a little bit pantomime
about him and stuff but he was quite he was quite a fun fun villain it is mainly

(01:16:01):
dean kate show but the the big show gets a lot of really good scenes i really
liked him i I thought he had great presence and he is very imposing.
So that all worked really well. Yeah. So I think, you know, we were saying about
Dean Cain being pushed by the Soskers to, you know, really go feral and,
you know, really, really push it.
But similarly, I think, you know, the big show, you know, bearing in mind this

(01:16:23):
is a WWE production and they are pretty precious about their stage personas, you know, usually.
I mean he does sort of put you know he is
an evil bastard in this he really is it
goes beyond being a heel in the ring sort of thing you
know i mean this is um you know that and i was

(01:16:44):
i was quite surprised how how far
they pushed it right you know he's not a pantomime villain he's he's just like
you know he is an animal basically you know which i thought was really refreshing
having seen so many of these WWE films to see someone who was sort of so outside of his stage persona.

(01:17:06):
Yeah, well, one of the, I mean, the previous I think the previous film that
the Soskos did before this was the WWE Kane film See No Evil 2.
Yes, that's right. But that was Kane. In those movies, Kane is essentially playing,
a variation on his stage persona who was this evil, you know,
he's supposed to be this sort of bad guy sort of character anyway.

(01:17:26):
They're doing something a bit,
I've seen the first film, I haven't seen the Soska's sequel.
But the big show, yeah, I'm not sure on whether, is he in the wrestling world,
was he kind of a bad guy character or is he more?
He's on the fence kind of thing. It really depends who he's wrestling against.

(01:17:47):
He was supposed to be the Undertaker's brother. Oh, okay. Do you mean?
Originally when he came out, I think, yeah. A lot of people thought he was actually
for the same bloke because Kane used to wear the mask all the time,
but then that all got taken apart so I'm sure it was supposed to take it away

(01:18:09):
but yeah the Violet I think it's because of the Soskas I think at the time the
only non-horror film they'd ever made might even be still the only non-horror
film they've ever made but it's definitely got,
it's got a mean streak to it definitely a lot of blood and goat A lot of blood and gas.
I mean, Dean Cain basically makes these sort of improvised knuckle duster kind of things.

(01:18:32):
Yeah. With bolts sticking out of them to really do a lot of damage. Yes, dear.
Which is like, whoa, geez. Which is sort of, again, sort of leaning me into
sort of thinking about things like a Benjamin. But he's a real psycho, basically.
Dean Cain's character becomes essentially quite a psychopath.
And I wasn't really sure what he was aiming to do because he kind of has the
opportunity to take out the big show or at least go for him at a couple of points.

(01:18:57):
But he kind of focuses on all the supporting characters, you know,
the background people or whatever. And I know he's sort of trying to...
I guess he's trying to thin the herd so maybe he's got less people to rely on.
Exactly, yeah. I didn't really think that was...
That was that compelling a reason like it didn't make it
it seems like he could have just got the job done a

(01:19:20):
lot more quickly especially towards the end because he kind of has has.
His moment and then walks away from him and then they come back i think.
No they're not going to end it like that because you know they haven't
resolved it and i was like no like they do circle back to it because
there's a big rising and everything but yeah i thought
it was it was definitely not what i was expecting really interesting
to see a different side of you know really interesting to

(01:19:40):
see dean Kane do something this you know brutal you
know and I thought he I thought he really he did a
really good job I mean say playing very much playing against type
starts out as the guy you expect him to always
be and then yeah they sort of really make
him into this brute and I know and
I believe and convincingly so you know I didn't for

(01:20:01):
a second I wasn't laughing I was always Dean Kane doing that one
I know he said I was with him I was I was with the character yeah absolutely.
Okay we don't score the throwbacks but
we do recommend you check them out you can find this on amazon prime
at the moment possibly other services as well
i wouldn't be surprised but definitely worth checking out i
also recommend riot with adolf lundgren and

(01:20:23):
matthew reese film which is very very
similar in plot but with um better state
of action it must i must admit it but there
you go okay thank you for listening that is the end of the show don't forget
to check us out on facebook and twitter at the dtv digest also check out the
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(01:20:47):
shorts other than that thank you for listening tune in next time.
Thank you for listening to the DTV Digest. Let us know your thoughts in the comments and.
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