80's Throwback Horror Movies

Episode Transcript
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James Jay Edwards (00:25):
Welcome to eye on horror, the official
podcast of ihorror.com. This isepisode 130 otherwise known as
season seven, Episode 11. I amyour host, James Jay Edwards,
and with me, as always, is yourother host. Jacob Davison, how
you doing? Jacob,

Jacob Davidson (00:40):
tired and sore, been working the super 70s
series at work, and, man, those70 millimeter prints are heavy
as hell. Man. Well, you know,it's just those things are very
heavy. They're, like, upwards of40 pounds, and they're very
bulky. So, you know, it's and,yeah, it's like several prints.

(01:02):
So you know, it's a lot of backand forth, but my gains are
going to be incredible. By theend of the month, I'm going to
be swoll as hell.

I also with us as always as your other other
host, Jon Correia, how you doingCorreia? Doing

Jonathan Correia (01:14):
great. And I'm really excited that Jacob is
making sure that those 70millimeter prints are going
because if anything goes wrongduring the screening, I'm going
to have Streets of Fire on 70millimeter. There will be rage,
rage, I tell you, there

you go. I'll Willem Dafoe on us. Oh,

man, I'm so excited. This will be the second
time I've seen Streets of Fireon 70 millimeter. Thanks to
American Cinematheque. So veryexcited. It is a staple. Last
time it was, it was a doublefeature of Last Action Hero and
Streets of Fire on 70 and thatwas, Ooh, that was one of the
best double features ever.

Cool. What's been going on? I know that
Correia and I have finallycaught up with Longlegs. That
movie does not fuck around.

That's some scary shit at all

that is, oh my gosh that. I mean, right from
the very beginning, like,literally, pre credit scene,
you're like, Oh yeah,

yeah, no, I'm glad that Longlegs has come out
to such a massive success, andthat people are scared by it,
because it is really unsettling.
And one of the best horrormovies to come out this year, if
not the last several years, anddefinitely it's just the
combined talents of MichaelMonroe, Nicholas Cage and

(02:31):
director Oz Perkins. You know,just Nicholas Cage has done a
lot of movies in his lifetime,but I think it's fair to say
that this is the scariest. He'sa nightmare human being in this
film.

Yeah, I think you're right. It is the
scariest. It's not getting allthe raves, though. There are
some people. There are somehaters, like our old friend of
the podcast, Alok, the producerof 1br, he was not as big a fan.
But also the woman who owns thesite I write for hated it and

(03:06):
and we were at the samescreening, and we, after we
discussed it, she's all, do youwant to write it up? And I'm
like, Well, I mean, I willabsolutely write it up, but I'm
warning you, it's going to be areally, really positive review.
And she was like, I don't evenwant to think about it again. So
yeah, you write. She reallydidn't like it. But, yeah, I
didn't rave on it because Iloved it.

Well, art is subjective. You know that not
everybody's gonna go for it.
Plus, I feel like it's a typicalcase with every year or two,
whenever a movie comes out, it'slike, oh, it's the scariest
movie ever made. And, you know,people just kind of hype
themselves up so much, or, like,overestimate so much on it that
they'll see and it's like, Oh,it wasn't that scary or
something. So, you know, it'skind of a blowback from that

(03:45):
kind of thing. But still, themarketing for Longlegs is one of
some of the best that has beendone for any horror movie in
recent memory. Like all theambiguous teasers, the cipher
coding, the viral marketingstuff with, like, the crime
scene pictures, like Alok

problem was that the marketing made it
better than a way he compared itto smile, and how the marketing
for smile was, like, brilliant,right? So, so I think that it
just didn't live up to the hypefor him. But what, what Becky
said is that she she was shethought it was stupid, and she
thought that Nicolas Cage, thatthe makeup and and prosthetics

(04:27):
were ridiculous. I'm like, I'lldo now. That's what made him
horrifying. It

was uncanny, man, yeah.

I mean, you the fact that his entire face is
pretty much covered. And whatmakes him horrifying is that
little, that sing song voice hewould do, you know, you know, I
get creeped out just thinkingabout it.

I've seen, I've seen some comparisons to Tiny
Tim, and specifically hisperformance in the horror movie
Blood Harvest,

yeah, which was always brilliant, because
Tiny Tim was the scariest partof Blood Harvest, and he wasn't
even the holy Yes, the irony,but it. Also the most
sympathetic character in BloodHarvest. Like, honestly, I you
bring a blood harvest. I'm goingto rant about it because, like,
Tiny Tim is absolutely brilliantin that movie. That movie just
so strange how he ended up inthat but I see those

(05:13):
comparisons. I even said I waslike, Yo, it's, it's Tiny Tim in
Blood Harvest meets Nick Cage inFace/off as far as his
performance, like what it feltlike was, but it was, those were
the influences. It wasdefinitely something different.
I liked it a lot. I coulddefinitely see how someone after
the marketing campaign wouldthink it was one movie and come

(05:35):
in for and it be presented withsomething different. Because
it's, I'm not saying that theypulled a Drive, you know, where
some of the trailers for Drivemade it look like it was Fast
and Furious, but if you'reexpecting something that's like,
straight up horror, and you comein and it's a, you know, a
horrifying detective story, Ican see being upset. It's also

(05:55):
very slow, a really good slowburn. And a lot of people don't
like that. I appreciated it

for, yeah, well, it

wasn't slow in the respect. I mean, we'll
talk slow burn on something elseI've seen this week that is the
opposite, but, um, it wasn'tslow burn in the in the case
where, like, nothing'shappening. I mean, it's
deliberately slowly paced,right? But, yeah, I see what
you're saying. It was a lot moreoccult based than I thought it
would be same, but, but it was,I mean, basically what I've been

(06:25):
describing as Silence of theLambs. If Clarice Starling is
psychic and Buffalo Bill is intocryptography and the occult,
that's what I've been tellingpeople and and there's no
Hannibal Lecter in it, I guess.
But Well,

and that's the thing I really appreciated about
it, like you can tell that thefilm was in that style and also
very influenced by like those90s thrillers that were Silence
of the Lambs, not knockoffs, butit became its own genre. You
know, you like Kiss the Girls,Se7en. Seven, Along Came a
Spider, The Bone Collector,yeah, what paid Morgan Freeman's

(07:00):
rent in the 90s, and it was verymuch so of those, it was, it
did. They did. He did a lot ofthose movies after,

I know it's just, it's funny to hear someone
say it out loud, but

I, but I love those movies. Those were the
movies that were like, it waslike those in the big budget,
like blockbusters, likeIndependence Day, that were
constantly my parents VHSplayers. So, like, I was in it.
I was like, Oh, you're doing oneof those movies, but leaning
harder into the horror of it,hell yeah, I'm game. Plus, you
know, y'all know me, I love theoccult shit. So once that stuff

(07:33):
started popping up, I was, I waslike, I was giddy.

I didn't mind the occult stuff at all. In
fact, it explained a lot of whatwas going on in the movie, but I
didn't expect it. That's thething. I think I was expecting
more of just like a serialkiller hunt, without all that
stuff, which, you know, that'swhat the marketing kind of put
out, you know, like this serialkiller taunting the police with

(07:56):
these cryptograms. So the occultstuff was, I'd say, a pleasant
surprise for me, because I thisstuff made a lot of the movie
make sense, and

Maika Monroe was too relatable. That
character, just the whole like,do I have to socialize? Do I
have to come out? I was like,

Oh, my mom's calling about praying again.

Yeah, it's, it's so it's so weird that at
the beginning of the movie, Icouldn't decide it. And I
actually compared her in myreview to Shelley Duvall and The
Shining and then moment ofsilence Shelley Duvall passed
the day after I wrote. Butanyway, you can't tell if her
performance is bad or brilliant,until you learn a little more
about the background of thecharacter. And then you realize

(08:35):
that, no, this is brilliant, youknow, because she seems kind of
wooden and unemotional andcompletely stoic, and then you
realize, no, that's, that's howthe character, that's exactly
what this character needs to be,you know, because Shelly Duvall
is kind of the same way, whereit's like you think that the
woman can't act, but then yourealize that she's supposed to
be that timid little mouse thatthat, you know, because she's

(08:57):
been abused for so long,

although Also, I would say so much that Michael
Monroe's character was timid.
She was, she was very methodicalto like she, she

wasn't timid.
She was like, kind of wooden andsterile and clinical, actually,
is a better word for it, yeah,which, which, I think is, is a
product of her past. You know?
She, she's just like a nobullshit FBI agent, you know,
she always

takes a few moments. A lot of those,

she has that intuition, yeah, well, that,
yeah, that's

what they're saying. They're, I don't know if
it's an intuition or if you'rereally psychic, but you know,
shit that's gonna happen.
Speaking of slow burn, I sawthis movie called Starve Acre.
It stars the woman from SaintMaud. What's her name? Morfydd
Clark or something. I don't knowhow to I'm probably not
pronounced that right. And also,Matt Smith is in it too. And it
is they are in the husband'sparents house. They've moved

(09:56):
into it, and their son isstarting to hear voices from
this character named Jack gray.
Basically, the son is istroubled and ends up passing
away, and the woman, she's stillfeeling his presence in the
house, while the dad isinvestigating the past of the
house and, you know, diggingstuff up there. So it all kind

(10:19):
of culminates. And it is one ofthose. It's, it's a it's about
an hour and 40 minutes, andthere's about 20 minutes worth
of good stuff happening. And therest of it is that, is that, I
mean, there's a kernel of a goodmovie in there, but it's just so
padded and it just moves so slowand and also, it doesn't help

(10:42):
that I've never wished forsubtitles harder in my life,
because the Irish accents areso, you know, thick, and
they're, like, already going outand all in the field, and I'm
like, what? But, you know, andthe screener I had didn't have
subtitles, so I've had trouble,you know, following some things
there. But yeah, it's, it's acool, not really a ghost story.

(11:02):
It's just more like a it deals alot with grief. It kind of
reminded me of Lamb a little bitin how just cold and unsettling
it was, but it was not aseffective slow burn as Longlegs.

That's too bad.
On my end, I've seen a couple ofaction horror movies or martial
arts horror recently, that waspretty fun. Have either of you
guys seen that movie, Kill I've

heard about it. That's the let's see Indian,

the Indian action movie. Oh, dude, it was
badass. So it was basicallyabout this commando and his best
friend from the army, like he'strying to get back with his
girlfriend because she's beingput into an arranged marriage by
her tycoon father, and they'retaking the train to Bangladesh
or to New Delhi. And on thetrain, a ruthless team of

(11:56):
bandits hijacked the train, sohe has to fight his way through,
like, all the bandits to to,like, try and save his
girlfriend, and I had to pitchto me as The Raid on a train.
And it is pretty accurate,because it is just not
withholding on the violence.
Like, it's mostly, you know,like hand to hand and like
weapons, like knives and hammersand stuff like that. But like,

(12:20):
people get fucked up in thismovie, like there's blood and
gut spilling and people gettingabsolutely brutalized. And,
yeah, the action is crazy. Likeit's close quarters combats and
the choreography is just mindblowing. Yeah, I missed it
beyond fest last year, so I'mreally glad I got a theatrical
release, because it is fun ashell, and jaw dropping on the

(12:41):
stuff like that. Like, there'slike, just one sequence, kind of
like Snowpiercer from like oneend of the car to the other.
It's just almost like a videogame side scroll would beat him
up where he's just beating upprogressively bigger, bigger
guys. And so, like the biggestguy, when biggest bandit comes
out, and it just like they'rewailing on each other. So yeah,
definitely recommend checkingthat out. And on the other side,

(13:05):
I went to the Alamos notoriousweird Wednesdays, you know,
where they show a weird moviefrom their selections. And they
were playing probably one of themost notorious Bruceploitation
movies of all, The Dragon LivesAgain, which, yes, okay, you get
it. It's about Bruce Lee in theafterlife, like and, and he

(13:30):
pisses off the King of theUnderworld. And he's like,
trying to settle in theunderworld city, where I shit
you not, The Godfather with hisevil teammates, Zatoichi The
Blind Samurai, James Bond, TheMan with No Name, Emmanuel and

(13:51):
Dracula and his zombie army aretrying to take over the
afterlife. So Bruce Lee has toteam up with Popeye and Caine
from Kung Fu to stop them.

See you, you almost lost me when you said
James Bond, but then you went inwith like, Dracula, Popeye and
Caine, yeah,

yeah.

The brilliance is that he looks and the James
Bond character is quiteliterally just some random white
guy, like

with mutton chops,

with mutton chops, like he doesn't look
anything like any James Bondever, except for the fact that
he has a tux. That's

it. All white people look the same.

They do. They do. That's true. No, it's It's
definitely one of the crazierBruceploitation films. And if
you watch the the documentary,Enter the Clones of Bruce Lee.
That was one of the later ones,because they categorized it in
eras of Bruceplotation werelike, the first round was really
trying to be like peopleprocessing Bruce's death, and

(14:51):
then after essentially peoplewere able to process their
grief, it became like, Okay,well, if Bruce was still alive,
what if he was in an IndianaJones movie? What if he was in
a Bond movie? Yeah, what if hewas in this? And this one was
just like, what if he was in allof the

who plays Bruce Lee,

Bruce Long, who you may know better as the beast
from Kung Fu Hustle,

okay, the

main bad guy.

Does he look like Bruce Lee at all sort

of, but they have a an explanation where,
like, one of the King of theUnderworld assistant says, after
someone dies, the body goes fora transformation so they don't
look exactly the same. Yeah,this is how it

works. There were times where they gave
explanations on, like, why helooks different, like, I'm
thinking Game of Death, where,you know, when they when they
read, you know, ran out ofscenes very early on, and
they're like, oh yeah. He hadplastic surgery to look like
someone else, to go into hiding.
And then later on in the movie,when he fights Kareem Abdul
Jabbar, they're like, oh yeah.

(15:55):
It went back, you know, for thisscene. Sorry,

I started laughing too hard when you said
fights. Kareem Abdul Jabbar,

hey, that's one of the greatest fight scenes
ever. That's the iconic BruceLee with the yellow jumpsuit.
And that was actually him. Theydid shoot two scenes, but they
stopped filming. He went to godo Enter the Dragon, and then
never came back. That

is nothing compared to Bruce Lee fighting
Dracula and his zombie gang, Iwear spoiler alert, uh, Dracula
fights Bruce Lee, but the tideturns against Dracula, and also
Bruce Lee's dressed up as Katofrom the Green Hornet for some
reason. So Dracula has thezombies, holds him down. He's
going to bite his neck, butBruce Lee uses his super secret
technique where he somehow growsa third leg and kicks Dracula in

(16:38):
the face.

Well, Bruce Lee played Kato.

He did. That's why he was dressed up, yeah, but
in the coming that's no reasonto dress up as Kato for that
scene, just because,

well, hey, it was, it sounds like it's, it's a
fever dream kind of a movie. So,

oh yeah,

it's great stuff.

Hopefully be on the next bruceploitation set
from Severin.

I saw this movie called The Last breath.
Have you guys heard of this?
It's a shark movie. It's it's atypical shark movie. It's about
basically this. It actually isJulian sands last movie, his
last role, which I didn't know Iwhen I saw Julian sands, I kind
of did the research, and I'mlike, oh yeah, this wound up

(17:24):
being his last movie. It'sJulian sands plays this old
Seaman who his him and his firstmate, they find, hey, I was
hoping that would go by he, heplays this old, this old
seafaring guy, and him and hisfirst mate find this old warship
that that sunk in the area. Ithink they're in the Caribbean.

(17:46):
And he they're gonna report itto to the to the authorities,
but the first mate's collegefriends are all down for a
vacation, and they theybasically Money talks, and they
convince them to let them diveit. So they're diving the
labyrinth of corridors insidethis sunken warship. And, of
course, sharks show up, sothey're being hunted by sharks

(18:10):
while they're running out of airin this warship. So it's a, it's
a pretty typical shark movie,you know? I mean, if you like
shark movies like I do, you'llbe into it. But you know,
there's nothing really thatspecial at it, except the fact
that it's Julian Sand's lastmovie, which is kind of
exciting. But also, along thesame lines, have you guys seen

(18:31):
that movie Breathe that came outa few months back? It's the one
about the Earth's atmosphere hasbecome, has become unbreathable,
and all plant life is gone, andum, common is in it. And
Jennifer Hudson, he basically,he has developed a thing that
will, that will cleanse the airso him and his family can live.

(18:51):
But Mila, Joe johovich, milajohovich, however, you say her
name, she shows up with a coupleother dudes, and they say they
want to take a look at thisthing so they can fix theirs.
And, of course, nobody trustsanybody, and they all start
fighting. And, you know, andit's the, you know, this post a
lot, post apocalyptic worldwhere no one can breathe. It's

(19:12):
actually pretty bad. Um, it's acool idea, but they, they didn't
pull it off very well. I don'tthink it especially the very
ending. The the very ending is acomplete cop out. You're like,
Oh, God, really, I watched 90minutes just for it to end like
this. So, but it's a cool idea.

That's rough.
Yeah, I hate it when somethinghas a really cool idea and it
doesn't like stick the landing.
That's it's always rough. Well,in this edition of Correia's
book corner, because, speakingof cool concepts that nail it, I
finally got around to readingmaniac of New York. Oh yeah, I

(19:55):
love that book. Yeah, it's I'vehad volume one for since the
trade came out. And never gotaround to and then someone gave
me Volume Two recently, so I waslike, alright, we, let's sit
down and read it. But the basicit's written by Elliot Kalan,
who did a lot of writing andproducing for The Daily Show
during the Jon Stewart years. Hehas the podcast to Flophouse. So

(20:16):
he's, he's, he's used to satire,

oh, and also, he did Spider Man and the X Men,
one of my favorite Marvel miniseries. Yeah. So

he's written comics before too, and the
concept is very it's everythingthat we always wanted from Jason
Takes Manhattan, where it's aslasher killer mask a loose in
New York City. And thebrilliance of it is it starts
off with like, what would be thefinale of like a big budget
slasher pill, where this guy,Harry the maniac, is is the

(20:49):
killer, and he massacres 86people in times squares New
Year's Day in 2016 and then itjump cuts to 2019 and reported
sightings of Harry the maniac inNew York are treated like
traffic reports like that's whois handling it on the

news. Does it show how he gets away in 2016

and no, the last shot is him standing over a
massive pile of bodies coveredin blood, and then they don't
catch him? Yeah, they they don'tcatch him. He's just been
running around New York, andoccasionally, like, a couple
people die here, a couple ofpeople die there. They know
there's, like, a Harry free zonefor some reason, but Yeah,
nobody

can stop him either, because, like, he he's
killed a bunch of cops, andlike, bullets don't work on him.
But

it's one of those things where everyone's
just kind of accepted that it'sthat it's, you know, that it's a
thing that occasionally someonewill die by Harry and the next
big massacre is inevitable, andstuff which is very American.

Does he respect the Harry free zone? I
mean, how does that work?

Well, the brilliant, the things that well,
I'm I've never been soenthralled, like, like, sucked
into a thing within the firstthree pages, like this book has
done to me, and I love itbecause it's all a satire about,
like, gun control, and becauseof what he was when he was
writing it, it came out in 2021so, like, it became about covid

(22:11):
too, about America's inabilityto, like, be like, Hey, we
should honestly do somethingabout this, and not just accept
these horrible things, but alsoas a slasher. It works really
well because these, these littlehints, like one of the
characters turns out to have,like, a past history with Harry
before he came to New York,like, you know, like a camp
story and all that. There's areason why there's a section of

(22:35):
New York that never gets touchedby Harry. But the first volume
ends with him getting on to thefirst automated subway train in
New York City, and it does notgo well for about 200 people.
And it's, it's just so good. Thesecond volume is called the
Bronx is burning, and he ends upin a school, like a private

(22:58):
school. And that's one of thosecases where I was like, Oh, this
could go either really good orgo really, like, rough with
like, what you're doing withlike this, and they handled it
so well. And that one ends withhim ending up in Yankee Stadium
on opening day. So the bodycount is very high, but, like,
it's, it's really good dude aslike, a it's like a social

(23:20):
satire. It nails it withoutbeing too preachy. As a slasher
comic. It's enthralling, whichis very surprising, because, you
know, most of the time when I'veread slasher comics, like Jason
versus Jason X and things ofthat nature, they're fun, but it
there's a difference between,like, reading panels and
watching, like, you know, amovie of it. And so usually

(23:41):
there's a bit of a disconnect.
But they do such a good job of,like, just like, No, I don't
want to say elevating, but like,putting a bit more weight behind
what they're doing. Like, theygo through when he's going
through the train. They do,like, panels where it's like,
this is, this is, uh, this isJohn. He was heading home to his
wife and kids. He's not goinghome. And then it's like, the
next person, this is Stuart. Hejust got a divorce and is on his

(24:02):
way to celebrate the nextchapter of his life. He won't be
able to do that, you know? Andit like, goes, like, takes that
moment to like, these arepeople, not just Banta fodder.
So it's, yeah, I highlyrecommend there's a the like.
Each series is, like, four orfive comics long, and they're on
series three now, so a thirdvolume should come out within

(24:23):
the year, and I can't wait. It'ssuch a good read. I'm

way more interested in this from your
description here than I was justfrom you posting the cover in
our in our chat, yeah, andbecause when I saw that, I'm
like, all you know, I'm not, youknow, kind of lost voice. I'm
like, I'm not into horrorcomics, blah, blah, blah, but
this description that you justI'm kind of sold. I'm thinking,

(24:48):
and the

artwork and lettering are amazing, like the
whole team did such a great jobwith it. It's such a cool comic
series. I Yeah, if you needsomething to complete your
summer reading challenge, Ihighly recommend maniac in the.
Door.

Yeah, no, I I collected the whole series, and
I think the best hook is that ittook the concept of Jason takes
Manhattan, and it nailed itbetter than anything thought
possible. Yeah, it really did.
And I can't wait to see whatthey're doing with volume three,
because

how volume two ends, it's like, where are you
going to go from here? And thenI have a couple of rapid fires.
Did you guys see Thelma? No,y'all need to see Thelma. I

got confused.
Someone else asked me if I sawThelma, and I had confused it
with a 2017 movie about like apsychic girl, but I guess, yeah,
this, this one's about an oldlady, right? Yeah, yeah.

It's a June Squibb plays Thelma, and she's
93 years old, and she's the starof this action film. And it is,
it is cute. It is such a cutefilm. I love elderly shenanigan
movies. I feel like that. Weneed to bring that back. I'm
hoping, between this andLonglegs, we have, like a 90s
sub genre of resurgence. Butit's Thelma gets ripped off for

(26:03):
like 10 grand through a phonescam. And so it's her trying to
get her money back. The wholemovie takes place where I live
in. The

Beekeeper. I was gonna say, we need a
crossover film. Yes, thebeekeeper,

the beekeeper, this is almost protecting the
hive. This

is, this is beekeeper at the speed of a
rascal scooter. It is. It isbrilliant. It's June Squibb and
Richard Roundtree rip who is?
It's always great seeing him insomething, but it's great seeing
him in something where he reallygets to like work like Richard
Roundtree gives an amazingperformance in this movie. It's

(26:39):
fun. It's cute. Parker Posey'sin it. Clark Craig, Nicole
Breyer has a small bar in it.
And it's it's a lot of fun. Thehas features. One of the best
cool guys. Don't look atexplosion moments too. So it's a
nice little palette cleanse. Soif you're thinking of doing a
double feature, go see Longlegs,and then go see Thelma to like,

(27:03):
you know, come back. Yeah. Ihighly recommend it. And then I
also finally watched theanimated Batman 66' movies that
they did a few years ago, whichinclude Batman Return of the
caped crusaders and Batmanversus two face. And they are so
much fun. If you're a fan ofBatman and the original Adam
West/Burt Ward franchise, yougotta watch these. The first one

(27:27):
is very much so like all right,What? What? What if Batman 66'
had the budget to send them intospace and have all of his rogues
gallery there? They did such agood job of capturing the spirit
and what the original serieswas, while also doing like
modern references and modernstorytelling, it's so good. But

(27:48):
the second one, Batman versustwo face was, first of all, one
of Adam West's last performancesas well. And what a great send
off. But just the brilliantcasting, because they never
featured toothpaste in theoriginal series. They thought it
was too scary for kids. So youfinally get to see what two face
in 66 would look like, and whathe looks like. It's William

(28:09):
Shatner. They casted WilliamShatner as two face, which is he
kills it. He is perfect in it.
And not only that, but like youcould see, oh yeah, it would be
Shatner in 68 right, like,around that time, like he would
have been Harvey Dent, yeah,that's awesome. And it's, it's
so good. And yeah, again, if, ifyou, if you ever watched a

(28:31):
Batman 66 episode growing up, Ihighly recommend watching these
animated films. They are so fun.
Burt Ward is on, like, nextlevel, with his one liners in it
as Robin, when

you say the the whole rogues gallery, is it
just Joker, you know, Riddler,Penguin and Catwoman, or is do
they send up like King Tut andthe Mad Hatter and egghead?
Yeah, are it all those guys too?
I'm telling

you, they all pop up at some point. King Tut
plays more of a role in thesecond one, but yeah, even
Egghead pops up at one point.
They cram a lot of story inthose two, like 78 like they're
only 78 minutes each, so it's aquick watch, but there's a lot
packed into them. And they dobring back Julie newmore,

that's what I was gonna ask. Which Catwoman is
it? Julie Newmar is my favorite.
So

there's a brilliant bit in the first one
where I think it's either Batmanor Robin gets knocked on the
head and Julie newmar's Catwomanis standing over him. He's like,
whoa, I'm seeing three of you.
The other two cat women are theother two. It's really, really
good. Yeah, lot of fun. Yeah?

Some quick rapid fires for me. Again, wanted to
touch upon the super 70s serieswe're doing with the American
Cinematheque, where we'reshowing 70 millimeter prints all
month long for July. And I,yeah, no, I mean, I it is really
an experience to see in 70millimeter. Here, since it's so
rare and it is an incredibleformat, so far I've managed to

(30:05):
see Nope in 70 millimeter. Oh,Backdraft and oh yeah, oh, how
could I forget Howard the Duck?
Yes, yeah. Howard the Duck, 70millimeter, baby. And it really
does enhance that true cinematicclassic.

Now, which of these movies is the heaviest

look? Well, to be honest, I haven't lifted all
of them, so I don't know likethey, you know, just it kind of
depends on the shift. And also,you know, not there around the
clock, but just in general, 70millimeter prints are heavy,
like we even have an opening toour movies with a little video
of Matt Burris, our maintransporter, who talks about

(30:53):
how, how much effort it takes,you know, transport them because
collectively, I think it, we'reliterally transporting over a
ton of these film prints backand forth, because there's just
so many, and they're so heavy,but again, worth it because, you
know, the sound, visual qualityof these movies are really

(31:13):
outstanding. It's just such afun experience.

Well, they're literally twice the size of a 35
millimeter print, exactly 35plus 35 that's 70. Yeah. Maths,

a quick rapid fire from me, and I didn't
realize that I had not seen thisbefore, but I finally saw I'll
Always Know What You Did LastSummer. The third one, it is a
pretty serviceable remake of thefirst one. I mean, there's
literally nothing new. It isexactly the same. The only
difference is the first one doesexist in it, because that

(31:48):
becomes a plot point where whathappens is they, they dress, one
of the guys dresses up like thekiller from the first one and
chases people around. And heaccidentally, the person he's
chasing around accidentallydies. So that becomes the, you
know, the people who are behindthe prank. It becomes the, oh
no, we were responsible. Andthen, you know, the killers. But

(32:09):
it's, there's more of asupernatural bent to it, though.
It's not like a, it's, it's notlike a slasher. It's more like
a, like a, you know, a ghoststory. But it, it is a, it's,
you know, not nearly as good asthe other two, but it's, you
know, it's pretty much the sameas the first movie, The

Lifetime original,

yeah, yeah, that's the thing, yeah. It's
like, I Know What You Did LastSummer light

and back on the big Hollywood horror releases,
MaXXXine finally came out and Isaw it all right, yeah. And I
want to preface that, I saw iton 35 millimeter at one of the
only location to VISTA Theaterin Hollywood, which added to the

(32:56):
experience, because I thought itwas I was so much fun. And,
yeah, no, it's just so funny howthe series changes genres like a
chameleon with every movie.
Because X is a slasher. Pearl iskind of a psychological horror
movie, a descendant of madnessset in the golden age of
Hollywood, and MaXXXine is kindof a grim and gritty 80s, neon

(33:19):
soap, Neo noir, giallo.

You know when Correia, when you texted us with
when you were seeing it, and yousaid that they were playing the
trailer to Savage Streets. Yeah,that I love that they were
playing that. Because when I waswatching MaXXXine, I was like,
Oh, dude, this is total SavageStreets. So it made me really
happy that someone else pickedup on that enough to program the

(33:44):
trailer before and

and they played the trailer for one of the other
more comparable films, ViceSquad with wings. Houser, yeah,
yeah, no. It just really nailedthat esthetic of the of the
grime of those kind of 80sHollywood type of movies, and
also the giallo stuff, becauseit really felt like New York
Ripper, because there is avillain who wears black gloves

(34:09):
while committing murders. Soyeah, it's definitely Ty West's
showing those influences withthose and it is interesting to
kind of see the evolution ofMaxine as a character, because
she's in Hollywood. She's tryingto break in. She's going to be
in a horror movie within themovie, when she gets a very

(34:29):
threatening visit from a goodold southern boy, private
detective Kevin Bacon, andthings just escalate from there,
and also in the shadow of theNight Stalker killings in the
80s. Yeah,

I mean, I really liked it. I feel like
MaXXXine was, for me, at leaston the same level as X where,
like I liked it, you know, Iknow a lot of people were either
a lot more disappointed or a lotmore obsessed with it than I
was, but it was more so for me.
I just liked a lot of pieces ofit, but I still enjoyed, I mean,
Elizabeth Debicki as the as thefemale director behind Puritan

(35:06):
2. She was just everything. Iloved her so much. She had that
that very like, I'm an artistand I need to protect my
artistic vision, which usuallymakes my eyes roll. But for her,
I was like, we need to protectyour artistic vision. Like
Maxine, get your shit together,because we need to. We need to
see her masterpiece that isPuritan 2. And there was just so

(35:27):
many like great performancesthere. Lily Collins also was in
it for a couple of scenes, andstole everything. Halsey was
just absolutely everything aswell. So there's some really
great bits. I love theinfluences a lot, like with X,
the sudden kind of change ofthings in the in the third act

(35:47):
was a bit like, I don't know.
I'm always conflicted becauseI'm like, I love this, but also
I don't know, because I love thethird act shift up with
MaXXXine. But you guys rememberwhen, when we first talked about
x. I even mentioned, I was like,Where the fuck did that
connection of Maxine's backstorywith her father come from? Like
it felt a little tacked on. AndI don't

think it was tacked on in X, because that
whole television televangelist,he was basically in the
background for the whole movie,like on radios or on TV. So it
kind of not really tacked on,but it kind of was like the big,
oh my gosh. You know, when youfind out that she's his
daughter, yeah, I

am. And again, it could just be like, a hey,
it's, it's a Correia thing, andit's me, and, you know, it's my
problem, and it's fine, butlike, it always just felt like I
was more interested ineverything else. And so for me,
it felt like an a tack on andthat was the thing with
MaXXXine, I was so into all the80s stuff, all the filmmaking
stuff, all these things that,like, when the preacher plotline

(36:49):
came back up, I was just like,okay, like, I'm okay with this.
I'm just, I wasn't as in lovewith it as everything else I
did, like what they did with it,though there was some really
cool stuff with, like, the kindof evangelical cult stuff that
went on with that last nottrying not to spoil anything,
but with the last bit. But no, Ihad a lot of fun with MaXXXine.

(37:09):
And definitely, you know me,goth ate it, you know
everything. It was great. Butyeah, I still think Pearl is the
crowning achievement of thetrilogy for me, at least. And
that's that's just for me. For

me, I think MaXXXine is the best of the
three. I think my And granted, Ithink they're all awesome. So
this isn't, you know, this iskind of like ranking the Quiet
Place movies for me, but I thinkit goes for me, MaXXXine, X,
Pearl,

yeah. What about you, Jacob,

uh, you know, yeah, that's a tough question
again, because it was just sodifferent. But I'd probably have
to say X is probably my favoritein terms of rewatch ability.
We all have different favorites,yeah,
although, I mean, I like themall, yeah. But I also do agree

(37:55):
with Correia's critique that, Imean, I did like MaXXXine. It
just is some stuff that feel alittle scattershot, but overall
it worked. Oh, and this isn't

me saying I don't like, I don't like the
movies. That's just not saying,like, there's pieces where I'm
just like, Okay, I'm not asthrilled as I am with the rest
of it. I still, I think it's agreat trilogy, and I have a

lot of fun.
Yeah, I'm just, I'm happy itexists. Yeah, the rewatch
ability of them is very high.
Oh, yeah. And also, I'm veryhappy that there was a character
reading Fangoria in the in themovie, within MaXXXine, or just
within MaXXXine, yeah, that'sfun.

Well, I think part of that, that tacked on
thing that you know, the tackedon what what you say is tacked
on at the ending. Kind of goeswith the 80s esthetic of
MaXXXine, you know, becausethere was a lot of that going on
back then. Which leads us to ourdiscussion. I know you like that
king of segways Correia. Whydon't you introduce our topic?

(38:56):
Yeah,

so in honor of MaXXXine and getting, uh,
completely enthralled with thevibes and the and the thrills of
80s cinema. We wanted to justkind of briefly talk about some
of our favorite 80s retro films,you know, films that were shot
after the 80s that take placethen. Because, I mean, I didn't

(39:17):
live and I was born in 90 butthe the looks, the sounds, the
styles, everything about the 80sis so very specific and iconic,
it's hard not to be absolutelyenthralled. And it's so
identifiable, like you just needa couple people with the right
outfit and hair to go. Oh, thisplace, this takes place in the
80s. Gotcha. Yeah,

I feel a lot of it kind of plays into kind of
classical pop culturalnostalgia, where every decade
will be nostalgic for a decade afew decades before it, you know,
just look at how happy days wasa huge deal in the 70s and 80s,
right?

Or that 70s show in the 90s, late 90s, early
2000s and

no matter where you are, people will look fondly
back at what came before

it's. To be weird when there's like one
that, because it's, there'salways, it's always a sitcom.
There's fresh off the boat. Wasthe 90s one, and then now we
have that 90s show. So once,When's our 2000s 2000 10s, one
coming, it's

coming any day now, I'll be great.

But what are some of your guys's favorite
retro throwbacks?

For me actually took me a minute, because it
made me realize there's so manychoices specifically in the
horror genre. But my personalfavorite has to be Panos Cosmos'
Beyond the Black Rainbow, whichis implicitly set in 1983 even
though it's sort of a weirdretro future version of 1983 you

(40:40):
know, with the ArboreaInstitute, but also reflective
of, kind of the, I guess,dystopic and, yeah, just kind of
the depressing or darker aspectsof that era, because a lot of it
is set in, yeah, the ArboreaInstitute, The scientific and

(41:00):
psychological institute thatback in the 60s, was idealistic
and was supposed to, you know,begin a new age of
enlightenment. But everythingwent wrong, and now it's this
brutalist building with thispoor psychic girl being
basically tormented by this evilpsychiatrist, mad scientist. And

(41:24):
I feel like Cosmotos was kind ofkind of the core, because
there's very little to nonostalgia in in that there. But
esthetically, it is veryfitting, especially toward the
end, because, like, there's ascene where they get out of the
Institute, and there's like, acouple of heshers, like metal
heads, just hanging around acampfire, drinking beers while

(41:46):
listening to music. And thenthere's kind of a slasher set up
with like, Guy picking them off.
But, yeah, no, but if you Beyondthe Black Rainbow, is one of my
favorites of that. And again, ittells you, right off the bat,
this is 1983 I

think, oh, one of my favorites, it's not,
it doesn't explicitly say it'sin the 80s, because it doesn't
explicitly say it's in any timeperiod, but it has the 80s vibe.
Is It Follows because they,because they, yeah, well, yeah.
I mean, there's a lot of, Imean, they kind of purposely
keep it ambiguous, you know,with, like, you know, they're

(42:21):
driving around 70s cars. But,like you said, there's that clam
reader thing, which isdefinitely modern, but, um, what
keeps it 80s for me is thesoundtrack on it's just got such
a Carpenter esque, you know,score to it, yeah. And also just
the the supernatural aspect ofit, of this, you know, plus the

(42:41):
sexual revolution, you know, ofthe of the time where, you know,
it's kind of just a metaphor forpromiscuity catching up with you
so well, I

would even say kind of the backlash of the
sexual revolution of the 70s,yeah, yes. The 80s, yeah,
thanks, Reagan, yeah.

And, and, a lot of ways, it feels like it's just
kind of like an alternateuniverse version of the 80s.
Because, yeah, it's like allthese different bits and pieces
that don't quite add up, but ithas that style and does have
that setting. Plus, Nightmare onElm Street, probably one of the
biggest 80s horror movies, was amajor influence, so it totally
makes sense.

Plus, let's not forget, it follows.
Introduced us all to MiakaMonroe. So yeah,

ties all together. Yep.

Thank goodness for that one of, one of my
favorites, because it's, it'sone that's so ingrained in 80s.
But when you think about it,it's not one that's like all
neon lights and big hairs andall that. It's American Psycho.
Because that one, I was just

thinking that American Psycho, because the
book American Psycho wasactually written in the 80s,
right? Um, so it's Mary Harronstreatment of it that actually is
retro, yeah. And so it becomeskind of heavy handed when he's
like, I'm gonna go return somevideotapes. You know, it's the
treatment of it that becomesretro. Oh,

I mean, it's not just the tapes, but the
suits, the outfits, the it'sit's Wall Street, but with a
psycho killer amongst them. Andthat's one of the things I
really appreciate, becauseespecially when we're thinking
of like retro 80 movies, it'slike, okay, movies where people
wear very bright makeup and bighair and big outfits and all
this stuff, and then it's like,Well, that wasn't all of the 80s

(44:23):
that was, like, very specificpop culture influenced parts of
it. So like, American Psychodoes a really fantastic job of,
like, not only portraying butalso critiquing Wall Street and
all those yuppie bastards whoblend this country dry and set
up 40 fucking plus years of justlike, absolute

and getting reservation at the Dorsia, yeah.
And,

how could you and yeah, how could you not flex
when you see yourself in themirror now because of that
movie?

I mean, she's and, yeah, no. Like, I love a
lot of these types of movies setin the 80s because they're anti
nostalgia movies, because.
Movies like American Psycho andBeyond the Black Rainbow show
the darker sides of that decade,with American Psycho in
particular, just being like, youknow, the high speed wall rat
race of Wall Street wasincredibly hollow, and all these

(45:12):
people are fucking miserable,

such brilliance, like the kills are
great, but it's definitely theexploration of, like, Y'all are
miserable, but put on that face,because this is what you're
supposed to be achieving. Isjust, I would like, I still say
one of the best scenes isChristian Bale and Reese
Witherspoon sitting down.
They're like, Wait, are youbreaking up? Wait, no, no,
you're not. And it's just like,what an encompassment of that
misery that the film portrays.

(45:40):
Yeah,

and I also love like he keeps on renting the
Texas Chainsaw Massacre on VHS,and he goes, like, I gotta
return some tapes.

That's how you know it was really the 80s,
because he had to keep

renting it. And speaking of throwbacks, this
one's, I guess, a little bitmore positive, but as of recent,
Lisa Frankenstein has become afavorite of mine. And that one
said on the tail end of the 80s,in 89 my birth year. And yeah,

(46:14):
it's a lot of fun, you know,just kind of being a throwback
80s, dark teen comedy, but alsoFrankenstein story, and has a
killer soundtrack, you know,between the Syth score and some
of the picks, like their coverof, I can see clearly now that

(46:35):
rain is gone and, yeah, just ingeneral, Like, I mean, he got
Katherine Newton being a teenpop Frank Frankenstein, and he
had the whole Lisa Frank, LisaFrankenstein thing, with the
esthetic, with, like, the, youknow, kind of the style, but

(46:56):
there's still gore and peopleget bits chopped up. So I, I
think I thought that one was alot of fun.

One that kind of is, is more retro 80s, but
over in, like, across the pond,you'd say, is Censor, Oh, yeah.
Which Censor I thought capturedthe whole, it captured the whole
video nasty censorship, yeah,the video nasties thing of there
where, like, you know, it, itwasn't so much a time capsule

(47:25):
of, like, visually, but theideas and plot wise, you're
like, okay, they were reallydoing this back then. Oh,

man, I'll never forget seeing Censor in theaters
at Alamo. And there's this scenewhere she's listening to radio,
and Margaret Thatcher's doing aspeech about the video now
season, everybody in theaudience started booing her. Uh,

Margaret Thatcher, the Reagan of England,
the

worst. Yeah, boo. See, the 80-80s had a lot
of bad stuff,

yeah, unless you were a kid the Nate the 80s
was probably all bad,absolutely,

to kind of continue my thread of, like,
80s, but not so much heavy on,like, the pop references. Side
of things is a ParanormalActivity 3,

oh yeah, yeah, that one's totally retro.
It's,

I mean, it takes place in the 80s, but just
like the going for the not justthe VHS style, but again, I will
always applaud the practicalityof like, well, how do we make
this camera move? Oh, we attachit to a fan. Such a brilliant
fucking bit.

I love the Fan Cam.

I am such a sucker. And I mean that fan bit
was so good, it almost causedthe downfall of, or not
downfall. But, like, some of theissues with four which was, like
trying to do the Xbox bit,

which, although I love that, the
Connect, yeah, I think I still,I mean, I'll fight anybody. I
still think that's pretty fun.
The imagery

that it caused was really cool. Of seeing,
like, the green dots on like theentity, that was cool, but just
the setup was just like, Ah,come on, that's not gonna age
well.

So, yeah, it makes it a period movie, right?

It does make it a period movie, but I mean
Paranormal Activity three justlike, really captured what the
spirit of like, and what theywere doing with the franchise,
and like took on the challengeof setting it in the 80s and
made it like a fresh take on allof it, while still expanding and
continuing the more. I stillthink that's probably my
favorite of the of the franchiseas of now, we'll see what, when

(49:34):
the next one comes out, wheneverit could happen, they're
definitely going to do it.
Another one. Give it. Give itanother five years.

Have you guys seen Next of Kin, the the
latest? Yeah, it's, it's, it'sall right. Oh, wait,

yes, I did see that. I did see that. Yeah, I
thought it was okay. It wasfine.

Let's, let's rapid fire some, some fun ones.
What do you what are some onesthat you guys recommend for
people to seek out?

One that I'm not sure if it takes place in
the 80s, but it but definitelyhas that esthetic with the neon
and the and the soundtrack andall is The Guest with your boy,
Dan Stevens.

Oh, the one that introduced me to my boy,
Dan Stevens, yeah, that's whereit all began, the one

that put him on the map. Yeah,

one of my favorites that technically is
set in the 80s, is Final Girls,because, you know, it's about a
group of modern teens going intoa slasher movie from the 80s. So
technically, they're in the 80swithin the context of the movie
that was made in the 80s, youknow, down to the Betty Davis
Eyes sound sound track drop.
And, you know, you got the Jasontype killer and kind of the

(50:51):
clash between the modern teenswho understand the rules of the
genre versus the clueless 80sarchetype characters. And it has
a lot of heart, because, youknow, it's about types of Amiga
reuniting

with her mom, her mom, male and Ackerman.
Yeah, male

and Ackerman and, yeah, no, it's definitely
still one of my favorites. Oh,

absolutely for rapid fires. I gotta lean, I'm
gonna lean into the retro waveesthetic with it all, and listen
and say, Turbo Kid and PsychoGorman are just like that, like
super hyper pop retro waveesthetics, while still being

(51:37):
original with it. But also,yeah, so Turbo Kid and Psycho
Gorman definitely hit that retrowave feel with it. But also to
kind of go back to more of agrittier type title, especially
if you like Maxine, highlyrecommend Knife+Heart,

oh yeah,

French kind of Neo nuir, kind of giallo slasher
that takes place in with, likegay pornography. It's like
Cruising meets, like gialloslasher it's, ah, such a blast,
and dark and gritty and justgrimy. And, yeah, you know, you
feel it's one of those oneswhere you feel the sweat, and

(52:16):
it's great.

We can't talk about horror movies set in the
80s, without talking aboutSummer of 84

Oh, yeah. Where the kids? Yeah, the

kids, they think their neighbor is a serial
killer. So they, they decide tostart, um, basically, gathering
evidence on him, which, you

know, and it gets intense. Always ends, well,

always. I mean, I love a good kids on
bikes movie. So it's nice to geta good one that isn't just like,
hey, it's Stranger Things, youknow,

speak Yeah, speaking of, if you want, really
want to go there, StrangerThings is completely what we're
talking about. Oh, yeah,

I still haven't gotten back, man, I felt
I fell to that Netflix curse ofwatching everything in like a
day or two, and then the nextthing didn't come out for like,
a year or so. And when they weredoing the recap, I was like, I
don't remember any of this. Andjust never got back to,

you know what happened with me? With stranger,
I watched the first season, andthen was it the second season
where the episodes were like, 90minutes long.

I think that was the most recent season, man, it
was

earlier than that, though earlier than maybe
the maybe the most recent seasonis that way as well. But there
was a season where the episodestretched out to 90 minutes, and
then at that point I tapped out.
I'm like, You know what? I wouldrather watch an actual movie
than a TV episode. That's 90minutes. So, yeah, I mean, I'm
not caught up on StrangerThings, but I remember from what
I would what I did watch, thatit was very much the the 80s

(53:39):
esthetic. That's

why it's taken me so long to get through the
Martin Freeman BenedictCumberbatch Sherlock Series.
It's like, all right? It's awhole ass movie.

Well, that's different, because the british
series is, are that way, buteach season is only three
episodes, right?

That's what helps. Yeah, yeah.

So you know that, you know, when you've got
like, six episodes and they're,you know, six to eight episodes
and they're 90 minutes each,you're like, oh God, kill me.

Well, six to eight episodes, that's three
seasons right there, that show,yeah, in

the British ones, yeah, I'm talking Stranger
Things. Yeah,

that's but I also with Sherlock, I have to
remind myself, everyone rippedoff this show well after it came
out. So when I'm watching, I'mlike, no, no, no. This was the
first one to do the textmessaging and doing all the
things that became like standardafter that time. So but they're
fun. Since

we're talking about Sherlock, maybe we've come
to the end of this discussion.
So what did we miss? What do youguys, what are your favorite
movies that have that I keptcoming back to the Neon Demon,
although it's not even close toset in the 80s, only the
soundtrack, I guess, is the onlything that is but what are your
favorites? What did we miss? Letus know you can find us. On all

(54:57):
the socials to let us know, orihorror com, our theme song is
by restless spirits, so go checkthem out. And our artwork is by
Chris Fisher, so go check himout. And I think the the post
script on this episode is,everybody see Longlegs, because
it's awesome. Yeah, and we'llsee you in a couple weeks. So

(55:20):
for me, James Jay Edwards,

I'm Jacob Davison

And I'm Jonathan Correia.

Keep your eye on horror.

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