The Headless Eyes (1971)

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Prepare yourself for the terror the prison of madness. We
have a few inter and nonritter.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Welcome to Unsung Horrors with Lance.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
And Denica.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Leave all your sanity behind. It can't help you now.

Speaker 3 (00:36):
Welcome to another episode of Unsung Horrors, the podcast where
we discuss underseen horror films, specifically those which have fewer
than one thousand views on letterboxed. I'm Erica, I'm Lance,
Happy pride, Lance, Happy pride to you. Yes, we love
our lgbt QIA friends, listeners, and everyone in that space

(00:59):
in general. I did want to highlight a few creators
that I think folks should put their ears and eyeballs on.
So we have our friends Parker and Ryan who started
a podcast fairly recently called Where is My Mind? And
they are shining a spotlight on lesser known films like

(01:20):
we do, not just in horror, though. They have a
profound love for Udo Kir which mad respect for that
of course.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
He is a He's a beautiful man. You can't you.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
Can't, I how can you not love him? And then
we also have Bill and Sam over at the Driving
Asylum slash Bill is Groovy doom on there, so you
should be following him for all the work that he
does there. And then they have their driving Asylum almost
every weekend. Sometimes they take a break or alternate kind

(01:53):
of things, but check them out they do. The live stream.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Bill has great scenes too, picking up amazing scenes.

Speaker 3 (02:00):
He does such a good job finding old ads for
films and so we love we love them. Sam did
ask like, hey, I just want to come back, and
I was just like mental health, sorry, like I'm okay today.
I'm having a good day today, but I'm still in
my like ups and down. It's a roller coaster still.

Speaker 2 (02:20):
Yeah, it's hard to commit to things when you're yeah,
you're in certain states exactly.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
I don't want to be like sure and then that
day just be like, oh god, I can't get.

Speaker 4 (02:28):
Out of bed.

Speaker 2 (02:29):
So they when we were on though, that was such
a blast. But I mean they made it a good time,
no matter kind of what state of mind you're in.
But yes, I want to get back on. I know
you need to.

Speaker 3 (02:39):
I will. I'll be okay soon. And then Friend of
the show previous guest Sam Degan. She has her new
podcast Earros plus Massacre. She's everywhere in special features contributions,
so I'm sure I don't need to tell people to

(03:00):
follow and listen to her. And then a new new
ish podcast they've been They started late last year, in
twenty twenty four, and I think a few of our
listeners may not have discovered this podcast yet, but I
think it's definitely in a lot of folks wheelhouse. The
hosts are Christopher Anthony Velasko and Dakota Newt, And I

(03:22):
know a lot of our listeners follow Dakota and his
beautiful paper art. Yes, fantastic, But they started a podcast
about Japanese pink ou films and hands down greatest podcast
name ever. It's two in the pink Ou.

Speaker 2 (03:38):
Oh my goodness, that's perfect. I know, hang it up,
everybody and get out everyone else.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
You're done, like you can't. You can't beat that. So
I've listened to some episodes, mainly the films that I've seen,
because you know, spoilers, don't I don't want to spoil
something I haven't seen yet, but have gotten some great recommendations.
That's still kind of a blind spot for me. I've
seen a handful of them.

Speaker 2 (04:00):
But same, I mean, Dakota is I think they're probably
both pros on this subject matter because following Dakota's Letterbox diary.
It's you should see how many films he's seen. Pinky Hill.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
The Letterbox is like one of my favorites.

Speaker 2 (04:15):
Yeah, and his write up and reviews are you know,
very knowledgeable and full of information, and it makes me
want to jump more into the genre.

Speaker 3 (04:22):
Yeah. So I'll put links to all the folks that
I mentioned in show notes for you guys, But you
should celebrate the work that they're doing because it's all
it's it's amazing, pretty big pivot here to talk about
this film for has nothing to do with pride whatsoever.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
No, No, I'm trying to think of something that I think.

Speaker 3 (04:45):
The only connection you could potentially make is that this
was double billed with Andy Milligan's The Ghastly Ones, So
that's the closest I can get. But I mean I
picked this one because I was like, I need something
with a minimal amount of you back end research, and
the director has only done a few things, so that

(05:08):
was helpful. So we are going to be talking about
the Headless Eyes from nineteen seventy one.

Speaker 4 (05:15):
Headless Eyes. Now here's a guy with an unusual hobby.
He collects eyes and doesn't care where he has to.

Speaker 2 (05:23):
Go to get them.

Speaker 4 (05:24):
You will want to close your eyes for a second
while you're watching this screamer.

Speaker 3 (05:29):
This is currently available to watch on YouTube and has
eight hundred and ninety six views on letterbox as of
this recording. So instead of a film summary, I am
going to share what Stephen Thrower wrote about it in
an interview with Love Horror UK. A lot of what
he wrote for that interviewer said in that interview is

(05:51):
taken from our bible and weapon of choice, Stephen Thrower's
tomb Nightmare USA, which I've grabbed that off the shelf
and I just I forget how heavy it is sometimes.

Speaker 2 (06:04):
I've noticed you have your arm in a sling. Recently
read it.

Speaker 3 (06:08):
I pulled it off a few times because I forgot,
like a few things that he wrote in there, and
I meant to write down anyway.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
I don't own it a gun, but I have that
next to my bedside table for a burglar byes.

Speaker 3 (06:18):
So that's what every exploitation horror film fan in Texas
has in lieu of a gun. We don't need guns.
We have Stephen Thrower's Nightmare USA. Okay, so he wrote
about this quote, are you tired of stock and slash movies,
why not try The Headless Eye, The first and so
far only stock and scoop horror film and inept New

(06:43):
York burglar has his eye gouged out by an irate
homeowner whose implement of vengeance is a teaspoon lying on
her bedside table. The thief, with his eye drooling down
his face, crawls from an upstairs window and flees down
the fire escape. After words, we see the burglar working
out his resentment by plundering the eyes of various unwilling

(07:05):
donors to make avant garde objects to the art, which he
sells in his scuzy little gallery somewhere in the bowels
of Manhattan, his specialty human eyes in the cubes of perspects.
Eat your heart out, Damien Hurst.

Speaker 2 (07:21):
That's good.

Speaker 3 (07:22):
So I'll share the rest of what he wrote later
when we get more into discussing the film. So The
Headless Eyes was written, directed, and I assume shot by
Kent Bateman. He's only got a few other films in
his credits. One of them that he directed is Land

(07:42):
of No Return from nineteen seventy eight. Meltormae crashes a
plane with his trained hawk. The whole movie is wilderness
porn and him trying to get rescued. I fell asleep
twice watching this. It is dull.

Speaker 2 (07:57):
Let me ask you, did it have any narration voiceover
narration that you remember?

Speaker 3 (08:03):
No?

Speaker 2 (08:03):
Okay, why well, because I know that the Headless Eyes does,
and I tried putting on his I think he wrote
a movie called The Rogue and Grizzly. I put that
on a little bit. It's like a family adventure, but
it started off with just this long winded narration scene.

Speaker 4 (08:19):
It was just like, I.

Speaker 2 (08:21):
Mean, narration is really not my thing, Like the Legend
of Boggy Creek, And yeah, I.

Speaker 3 (08:26):
Mean there's a lot of like I guess inner inner
monologues that you hear kind of things, so I think
there's that, but no, it's mostly just like him talking
to his hawk and eagle whatever the.

Speaker 2 (08:39):
Will Forte, the falconer, that wil Forte's skip, That's what
I'm envisioning these characters.

Speaker 3 (08:46):
But yeah, it's him just trying to get rescued. Anyway. Yeah,
I fell asleep twice. I didn't. I woke up and
he was still talking to his hawk, like trying to
get rescued or walking through the snow and oh, look
there's a leopard, and I don't fucking know. The most
interesting thing about this film is that it was shot
by I can never say the Brazilian Joe like Joao

(09:10):
like jow Joe Fernandez. I don't know. He did like
one of the Friday Thirteenth movies in the Final Chapter
and The Prowler and a few other like well known
horror films. But that's the only like interesting thing about
this movie. It's got William Shatner in it, as like
I think he's the producer of the show because mel

(09:30):
Tormee is like the animal trainer, and that's why he's
got the hawk that just doesn't peace out once he's like,
oh we're we crashed and now we're in the wilderness freedom.
He just fucking sticks around. So so you also mentioned
the Roguan Grizzly from eighty two. He's got a writing
credit on that, as well as Love Me Please from

(09:52):
nineteen sixty nine. He also directed some TV episodes, including
one four Family Ties, which launched the career of his
daughter Justine Bateman.

Speaker 2 (10:03):
Every time I hear Bateman, I always think about Idiocracy,
Go Away Baiten, But Yeah, didn't he produce I read it.
I was reading through old reviews and stuff, and somebody
suggested that he produced Teen Wolf two. Kent Bateman did he?

Speaker 4 (10:18):
Well?

Speaker 2 (10:18):
He, I mean he launched just Jason Bateman's career by.

Speaker 3 (10:23):
Making him Sure, there you go. But he didn't. He
didn't bait to make a mini Bateman his load inside.

Speaker 2 (10:33):
Someone he baited in. Maybe it was Missus Bateman at
the time. I don't know what. Okay, let's stop. But
did you read his own IMDb review on this movie?

Speaker 3 (10:47):
No, he did.

Speaker 2 (10:48):
I was I've been going. I was going through IMDb
for a little bit. Kim Bateman reviewed The Headless Eyes
on IMDb.

Speaker 3 (10:54):
Well, I'm okay. See, I don't normally read IMDb reviews
because it's like a cesspool, so I usually stick to
just letterbox. So no, I missus completely please share.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
Yeah, I mean I'd usually skip IMDb two. But I
wanted to find out who did the music to this. Yeah?

Speaker 3 (11:08):
Did you find out?

Speaker 2 (11:09):
I mean I had read that it was based it
was pooled from TV Music one oh one and TV
Music one o two library by Cecil Looter and George Tepperino. Okay,
so it was just like some library music, all right,
But I did come across Ken Bateman's review from his
earthlink dot net email address. This was from two thousand

(11:35):
and seven, so a lot of what he says has
since been fixed on IMDb. Quote WHOA, this low budget
experiment in horror was directed by me Kent Bateman. I'm
assuming this is really him, and with few funds, we
did the best we could. Obviously, it wasn't filled with
enough blood and gore for the distributor, so the producer,
Ron Sullivan, added some scenes. I only wished to make

(11:58):
a comment on the assertion of a reviewer who erroneously
referred to me Kent Bateman as aka Henry Patchard. Mister
Ron Sullivan, the producer of the film aka Henry Patchard,
producer of over three hundred porno films, took my director's
cut and added footage I never wrote or directed. This

(12:20):
is just to set the record straight. Kim Bateman is
not Henry Patchard. Please refer to my own IMDb listing.
If you go to Henry Patchard's IMDb listing, you will
see that he doesn't even list Headless Eyes as one
of his films. And this was written, Like I said,
back in two thousand and seven. But he gave his
own movie like six out of ten stars.

Speaker 3 (12:39):
So that's all. I mean, it's it's a seven.

Speaker 2 (12:44):
Come on, it's a seven. Yeah, I mean, I'll talk
about it more, but it's a seven when you go
back and rewatch it with more scenes for me personally, Okay,
I'll get into that.

Speaker 3 (12:56):
I did like it more on the on the rewatch.

Speaker 2 (12:58):
So it answered a lot of questions I had after
my first watch. I was like, my notes were like
I had all these questions, and I rewatched scenes and
I was like, oh, there's the answer. There's the answer,
and it's a lot better.

Speaker 3 (13:09):
Okay. Well, I mean you kind of got into the
producing credits because there's really no crew credits on letterboxed
or even even in the film credits, Like when you
watch the opening, there is no credits. At the end
of the film. You just have four cast members and
then a few producers and then Kent Bateman listed, but

(13:30):
Henry Patchard aka Aron Sullivan lots of sex films. The
only other films the non sex film that was listed.
I thought was interesting that he had a producing credit
on was Putney Swape.

Speaker 2 (13:43):
Well, it's a good one.

Speaker 3 (13:44):
Yeah. Thrower actually notes in his essay about this film
that there is an unconfirmed hypothesis that Sullivan was actually
the director. But given what Kent Bateman wrote on IMDb
about his own film, let's let's go with that's.

Speaker 2 (13:59):
A yeah, it sounds like Sullivan might have yeah, thrown
in some of his own foot Yeah, but that's.

Speaker 3 (14:06):
Not directing the film. That's just like, that's that's punching
it up with some goren, some some boobies. I mean,
there's no boobies in this, but that's what people have.

Speaker 2 (14:15):
Yeah, it's odd that there is.

Speaker 3 (14:16):
It.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
It's okay, is it?

Speaker 3 (14:19):
Though?

Speaker 4 (14:19):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Okay, sometimes it's okay.

Speaker 2 (14:23):
It is okay.

Speaker 3 (14:24):
So getting to the cast, Bo Brendan plays Arthur Malcolm
or Mel. He's a Swedish actor. Got roughly twenty film credits.
One of them is Meteor from nineteen seventy nine, starring
Sean Connery and Natalie Wood. I watched this one years
ago and I don't remember it, but I know I
made some snarky comment about Natalie Wood in this and

(14:48):
it had something to do with her drowning, and I
don't remember what.

Speaker 2 (14:51):
It Was's their review on Letterbox.

Speaker 3 (14:53):
I didn't know. I looked at it. I looked and
I just have it like as watched, So I think
it was like pre might have been pre letterbox days.
I don't know. Oh, I forgot to watch this. Fuck.
I put Raise the Titanic. I was gonna watch that one,
but then I saw it was almost two hours and
I didn't have time yesterday and watch it.

Speaker 2 (15:11):
Yeah, a lot of his movies were are kind of
like long run times. Yeah, because I even looked at
the Great Waldo Pepper George roy Hill that he's in
with Robert Redford and another bow Bo spencon m, you know,
two bows. Yeah, but that also was like two hours long. Yeah,
and I ain't got time for that. Yeah, I mean,

(15:32):
I mean we do, but yeah, lately, Yeah, we're easing
our way into like we're not slacking.

Speaker 3 (15:38):
We're doing is We're doing the best we can right now, folks,
we are. I'm sorry I didn't watch two hours Raise
the Titanic, but I will and I will report back,
all right, I gotta watch I'm holding movies anyway.

Speaker 2 (15:50):
Oh yeah, you did, you for probably Sweets Taboo.

Speaker 3 (15:53):
Yeah, because I'm doing a sidebar about like frozen dead
babies so.

Speaker 2 (15:57):
Or drowning or yeah, okay.

Speaker 3 (15:59):
I mean mostly, but I prefer if they would freeze
yea but whatever, mostly.

Speaker 2 (16:04):
Trapped like eyes in an ice cube or a plastic cast.

Speaker 3 (16:09):
There you go. Some of the other cast members. Ramon
Gordon was also in Putney Swape, an uncredited guest in
The Great Gatsby from nineteen seventy four, and then he's
also in the plot against Harry. This actually has a
Blu ray release from one of the Vinegarsen Droom partner labels.
It's been on my Blu ray list to buy when

(16:29):
I have money again. But yeah, that one I really
wanted to watch. But again I'm waiting to pick that
one up on Blu Ray, so I'll do that. And
then we also have Kelly Swartz no other acting credits.
And then Anne Wells slash Mary Jane Early. She had
two different changed her name at some point to maybe

(16:52):
to get away from this film.

Speaker 2 (16:54):
And then there's the Silvers played by Larry Hunter and
what was named Mary LeMay who were Doris Wishman and
a few other.

Speaker 3 (17:01):
So Stephen Thrower actually had a note in his write
up about Doris Wishman film because this.

Speaker 2 (17:09):
This movie gives off Wishman Milligan by Hershonal Gordon Lewis
saw that, so.

Speaker 3 (17:15):
Thrower wrote that the audio of you know, when he
gets his eye taken out, like and he's like my
eye and actually like distorted and repeated over and over, yeah,
throughout the whole movie. He said the audio was used

(17:37):
in a trailer for Doris Wishman's Another Day, Another Man.
But I went on YouTube. I watched They're all like
almost two and a half minutes long, the trailers for it,
Like I think they were mostly radio spots.

Speaker 2 (17:50):
Do you have her box set, the AGFA box? I don't,
I do, I should. I didn't know that I could
listen to to confirm it, but.

Speaker 3 (17:55):
Yeah, I was, and it wasn't in there. So maybe
it's in like another something that's just not on YouTube.
And I trust Stephen Thrower. I do not think he's lying.
Please do not think that I said that at you
I would know. No, No, I would never I would
never say, excuse me, Stephen Thrower, I think you're wrong. No,
I would never ever say that. But that's one of

(18:21):
the things that I love about Thrower is his stupid
amount of knowledge that he has, like you know, and
just how he picks up on some of the smallest
things so read. I read his essay before rewatching it,
and that certainly helped my my experience watching watching this

(18:43):
film again, I want to share the rest of his
comments about The Headless I again, this is from his
interview and Love Horror UK, but this is basically taken
from his write up in Nightmare USA, so you can
get it from there too. He said, quote, It's worth
seeing this film for the opening sequence alone. As the
thief makes his escape, we hear the loop of his

(19:05):
shrieking voice, my eye, my eye, my eye, which is
just the most it goes on as he slowly climbs
down the fire escape of a dingy apartment block and
skulks off into the night. It's a great beginning, and
it leads into a film just as Crazed. Once you're
over the initial hilarity, the Headless Eyes becomes a bleak

(19:28):
and sorry tale with perhaps a smattering of already ambition.
The production company Lavinyeich Films is named after Virgil's The Aneid.
After all, it's not a straightforward slasher film. The killer
is on screen from the start, and it's not exactly
a gore film. The graphic violence is limited to some
red smears and a few fake eyes. It's almost a

(19:51):
mirror of the destitution it depicts and feels like a
piece of celluloid outsider art. I'm willing to bet The
Headless Eyes was made with out a finished script. It's
almost plotless, as if the narrative has been scooped out
along with the protagonist orbs. Nevertheless, it's a fascinating trip
through the slums of exploitation, far away from the gentrified

(20:13):
avenues of mainstream horror. The essence of the film is
a sort of shabby, gutter level weirdness, the cinematic equivalent
of a scary old bag lady. All right, so double
feature picks exactly.

Speaker 2 (20:25):
I was just like, that's all my notes, like, because yeah,
I have the artsy scenes that I want to point out.
I will say the intro. But I think he I
think in his right up he said something if once
you get over the hilarity or something. I think the
intro is legitimately creepy.

Speaker 3 (20:40):
I think so too.

Speaker 2 (20:41):
It's realistically creepy, like him breaking it and the scene
of the girl laying in bed in her eyes open
and she hears something, but she's afraid to slowly turn around.
I really I think it's I think it's really effective,
and I didn't think it was that Finn obviously when
he starts looping my eye that that's the funny part.

Speaker 3 (20:58):
Right, yeah, it and then the fact that it just
you keep hearing it.

Speaker 2 (21:04):
I think this is that's the main reason that people
kind of throw this away his garbage or give it
low ratings because it I don't know that that's a
big reason, because almost every review I read was the
looping of the my eye yelling, which could is a
turn off, I think, and a lot for a lot
of people.

Speaker 3 (21:22):
I mean, I get it, but it's also the centerpiece
of the film is like him losing his eye, his eyemobile,
his art. Like you have to like over and over again.

Speaker 2 (21:33):
You know it makes sense, it does, it does.

Speaker 3 (21:36):
Thrower also said that he thought that Brendan at times
reaches silent film levels of over emphasis. So we don't,
you know, watch low budget films like this for the acting.
You know, we're in it for the ambition, the what
are people doing with a limited amount of money and

(21:59):
just impressing us Like obviously I'm not expecting any like
really solid performances out of this. Yeah, I agree, Like
he does go over the top sometimes.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
Oh, he goes for that Oscar worthy performance. I've read
one inner. Sorry I'm not given credit to where I
read this review on again, it was I started diving
deep in IMDb. But somebody says he pulls off some
of the greatest Sniegel to Gollum grade Z horror performance
I think I've ever seen. Or he's just calm and
then switches completely to just losing his mind.

Speaker 3 (22:32):
Yeah, I think too. And getting back to the Andy
Milligan comparison, one scene in particular, I was like, good God,
you could just pluck this and put and drop it
into any Andy Milligan film because those don't make sense either,
some of them. But the scene where he's in Oh
he's having the conversation with his ex love, yes, his

(22:54):
ex wife or whatever Anna, and the dialogue and the
accents and like the word choice, all those things straight
up fucking Andy Milligan. I was like, good God, did
I is this in the box set?

Speaker 2 (23:07):
Like I have that under my list of favorites. How
dramatic that everything could just suddenly turn Yeah, and yeah,
that whole that's actually became my favorite favorite scene on
a rewatch because that dumps his whole backstory into that
conversation how he's how he's now an artist, Because one

(23:27):
of my first questions was, why is he you know,
she's like a rich lady, a rich sugar mama. I
guess she's not a sugar mammy. She looks hung her
on him, But I'm like, okay, why is he stealing
if she's rich? The first time I watched it, and
he obviously he kind of harbors these these bad feelings
of her pain for everything, which he like voices yeah,

(23:49):
and she also established that it's two years later. It's
a really good scene. It's the only scene that actually
provides a little bit of backstory in the entire movie.

Speaker 3 (23:56):
Yeah, And I think it's it's it's fun to have
that at that point in the film because up until
that point, you're like, why the fuck, Like, is his
only motivation to scoop out eyes because it was done
to him? Like is it just straight up like literal
vengeance and exactly, Yeah, And then you just you learn
more about him and you're like, Okay, well it still

(24:17):
doesn't make sense, but I'm glad I know this about him.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
Yeah. He even says something like, uh, he's been there
all along, like we just never saw him or something,
and he's like referring to his new crazy psychotic side.
I think, yeah, it's because that was the first time
I watched it. I was all, what's his motivation? What's
his reasoning? Obviously it's a traumatic event when somebody scoops
out your eyes, but why not just go after that girl?

Speaker 3 (24:41):
Like?

Speaker 2 (24:41):
Where's she?

Speaker 1 (24:42):
Now?

Speaker 2 (24:42):
That's my biggest question. What happened to the girl that
scooped out her?

Speaker 3 (24:45):
Is I she uh? Yeah, she uh, She's got a
great dinner story to tell. Now.

Speaker 2 (24:51):
Apparently she began she probably became that Texas eye killer
in real life. What was his name, Charles? She became
she became the eye he would scoop or I think
it's a she. She would scoop eyes out of her victims.
That's who she became. That's where she is.

Speaker 3 (25:11):
There you go. So I think what I like about
this film too, is that for the short run time
it's it's under eighty minutes, there's a lot of kills
in this. So you have the couple who makes fun
of his eyeball art, you know they're they're at the window,
and it's this very confusing scene because of the way

(25:32):
that it's shot. It's unclear who's inside and who's outside
at first.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
Right, completely pitch black around everybody.

Speaker 3 (25:39):
Yeah, and then you realize, like, oh, they're outside looking
into his gallery, at his art and they're drunk and
making fun of it. So he follows them and goes
to their house and then kills them and thus begins
the eyeball scooping. After that, he walks around the streets
with a bloody hand. The sex worker actually notices it.

(26:03):
I thought New Yorker's minded their own business, but you
know whatever, So he kills her for being a busy
body and a sex worker, and then it jumps to
the headlines fourteen I victims so far. So we don't
even get to see all of which is fine. We
don't need to see twenty of these. It's all the
same thing, essentially.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
There's a budget, there's vegetary reasons. Of course.

Speaker 3 (26:24):
You've got the laundry roof Lady h.

Speaker 2 (26:26):
That's a cool scene.

Speaker 3 (26:27):
I like that one a lot, like where she gets
tangled up in the laundry.

Speaker 2 (26:32):
Dry cleaning and hanging out. Yeah, Yeah, that one's really
call on the rooftop.

Speaker 3 (26:37):
He strangles a secretary at the Talent Manager. Yeah, the
talent manager secretary.

Speaker 2 (26:44):
That's my favorite kill, is it, Yeah, just because that's
when he starts really losing. I mean he he profusely
sweats in a lot of scenes, but that one is
like dripping and the secretary is kind of a comedic
element like it that whole kill I was really into.

Speaker 3 (27:01):
I like a good meat locker kill, so like that
one's my favorite. But yeah, he definitely takes a turn
with the secretary. I do like he tried to have
a semi redemption arc by stopping to kill people instead
going to the cemetery and taking eyeballs out of corpses,
which is you know.

Speaker 2 (27:21):
And yeah, then that also leads to one of my
favorite scenes as well, which is the off duty cop
just kind of breaking up the whole mood and adding
this humor and complete shift in tone which just all
was up.

Speaker 4 (27:33):
Man.

Speaker 2 (27:36):
Yeah, it just it's so many just random scenes and
it is like a you know, it's a stock and
kill type of stock and slash. What's the troupe stock
and scoop. Yeah, it's just a bunch of scenes of
those scenes, so like these tiny little like that cop
in the in the cemetery really like jarred me, like

(27:56):
my attention.

Speaker 3 (27:57):
Yeah, and then he meets up with uh, he's got
a fan someone, an art student walking by, and he
developed sort of a little relationship with her when she
shares that she likes his art and she doesn't know why,
but she just does.

Speaker 2 (28:15):
Yeah. I don't think I liked her. I didn't know.

Speaker 3 (28:18):
I didn't like her either. She doesn't. I don't think
she does anything for it. I think she's like most
of this film just say what's next? Where does he
go next? Because they don't They clearly don't have a script,
so it's like we got to fill some time, now
what like, you know, let's let's get him outside of

(28:41):
doing these things. Let's go do a shot in the
park by the bridge.

Speaker 2 (28:46):
The lighthouse.

Speaker 3 (28:47):
The lighthouse.

Speaker 2 (28:48):
Yeah yeah, she I mean that was my least favorite
part is I feel like the first time I watched it,
especially characters are introduced with no closure. But then I
watched it again, I was like, Okay, well that actress,
she's obviously in the end, you know, and her his
ex lover. She's there to provide all the backstory, but
the art student was like, I guess she's there to

(29:10):
help change his ways because it seems like he's like
falling for her. But it's so short lived that I
feel like that whole thing's kind of pointless.

Speaker 3 (29:17):
Yeah, it is, especially like when he starts stalking the model.

Speaker 2 (29:24):
Well, yeah, because he's driving to meet the art student
for like a date or something, but he remembers, oh,
I have the model's actress whatever she is addressed, so
I'm going to go get her there. Yeah, so I
get why she's there, but yeah, I just didn't like it.

Speaker 3 (29:41):
Yeah, so he stalks the model flash actress and they
end up in this meat locker. He kills her, scoops
her eyes, but then he is apparently locked in the
freezer and this is how he dies.

Speaker 2 (30:02):
Yeah, it is. And I feel like it's very again,
like maybe they had more plans with all these subplots. Yeah,
and Kent Bateman said that obviously scenes were inserted, things
were changed around. There's budgetary reasons. There's no script at all,
it seems like. Yeah, so the ending felt very abrupt

(30:23):
and tact on. But I did like how he's all
he cares about is his art, like I didn't show
my art. I'm not finished, is pretty much what he's saying.

Speaker 3 (30:32):
He said the same thing when he was scooping the
eyes out at the cemetery. That's why he was so
mad being interrupted by the cop, like I'm not finished.
And yeah, so I think, I mean, I'm not trying
to get like too deep on something like this, but
it really I think kind of underneath all of this,
it is about just sort of this unfinished ambition. The

(30:55):
film itself is that, you know, it's this idea about
an artist being unable to fulfill his passion and being
terrorized and being attacked and can't even get by kind
of like you know, the film itself being made that way.

(31:15):
And I think, you know a lot of people, especially
in current times, are having a hard time like getting by,
being appreciated, being on, you know, people understanding like what
it is that they're putting out into the world. So
I think there is depending on when you watch this,
I think that you could read a little bit more

(31:37):
into what's actually happening there. I got a lot more
out of it on that level because I was like,
oh fuck, I'm having a rough time right now. So
this this speaks to me, I would like to scoop
some my balls.

Speaker 2 (31:47):
Out I could see. Yeah that makes sense. I mean
this is Kent Bateman's first movie, and yeah, it seems
obviously any first filmmaker is going to want to present
something that they can be maybe remembered for just kind
of artsy, and I think he does a really good
job at presenting great art There's a lot of scenes

(32:08):
that are just I don't know if it's intentional, but
there's a lot of use of black, white and red. Like.
There's scenes that you can kind of like frame like
freeze frame and be like that that's like an album cover.
Like when the first couple of the Silvers are they're murdered,
and then the scene ends with them kind of propped
up against each other and she's wearing like a red

(32:29):
and white striped outfit. He has like a red blazer
with a white collared shirt and there's like red blood
just streaming down. There's like the red Lighthouse. There's a
lot of paintings out are red and white like. There's
a lot of artsy scenes where it really works. Then
there's a lot of like filler of him just walking
around the streets or waiting on an elevator, right, and
the character of Arthur Malcolm himself where he just he

(32:52):
finds a passion, he finds an artistic like drive, but
he's not going to be able to show it to
the world. Yeah, So it just ends with him freezing,
his eyes, freezing, his whole body freezing in the meat locker.

Speaker 3 (33:03):
Yeah, and like the whatever do you know what was
written in blood above his head because it kept like
it ends so quickly, and then YouTube kept fucking popping up,
like next up, I'll fucking stop at YouTube, and I
can't like turn that.

Speaker 2 (33:17):
Definitely had his last name. It had Malcolm written there,
but I don't I was hoping and I'm maybe I'm
just interpreting it the way I want it to be.
But he was like signing his last piece of art. Okay,
that's what I think, Like that's his autograph.

Speaker 3 (33:30):
I did see the last name, but that I think
You're right. I think that's exactly what it was. I
was hoping it said I am in hell help me.
But that's okay. I do love how this ends, like
I do you know, just like a fucking Shaw Brothers
film that's just like, oh, we killed the bad guy,
he's done. End credit. It's another show production.

Speaker 2 (33:52):
Like I jumps up, kicks her head off.

Speaker 3 (33:55):
Yep, I love it. So I I do love that
all of a sudden, this is the end, even though
it's clear like they didn't have an idea how they
were going to wrap this up when they started making
the film, So it does feel abrupt, but it's also
like it makes sense in the context of how this
entire film was made. It's like, of course it ends

(34:17):
like that.

Speaker 2 (34:18):
How else would it end exactly? Yeah, and it's a
memorable ending. I mean, you're not going to forget it,
and that's what I think. It achieves its job any
movie that you remember and we'll keep going back to
just thinking about it. Yeah, and I do if people,
like I said, the first time I watched it, I
had a lot of questions. So this is a type
of movie. Great because it has a short run time,

(34:40):
but it deserves a rewatch because you learn so much more.
You pick up a lot more for me personally, at
least that's the way it worked out. Yeah, and you
just enjoy it way much more.

Speaker 3 (34:50):
So.

Speaker 2 (34:50):
Yeah, Yeah, i'd give it. This is a rewatchable film.

Speaker 3 (34:54):
So you would recommend it though, but more so want
to rewatch.

Speaker 2 (34:57):
I would or just be completely just yeah, because the
first time I watched it, I felt like I was
looking for clues or answers or reasoning to why he's
who he is and why he became this I gouging
out killer, and I was overlooking. I think I was
just concentrating too hard. Like if you watch it the
first time and listen to the conversations, which I've kind

(35:20):
of failed to do, then you don't only need to
watch it once. But yeah, I think on a second
rewatch it's or on a second watch it's a lot better.
So I do recommend it.

Speaker 3 (35:31):
So before we get into our double feature picks, I
wanted to share what some double feature picks were from
some letterbox reviews, some folks that we know. So Stephen
Thrower mentioned in his write up he made a lot
of comparisons to Able ferraras the driller Killer. Absolutely see that.
Liz Purchell wrote about this film and at the end

(35:54):
she said, whoever had the inspired idea to pair this
up with Andy Milligan similar Staten Island Gorefest the Guests
Ones was a genius. So we we mentioned Milligan already.
This is one hundred Milligan vibes in the best way
that is not a derogatory. I love Andy Milligan for
I have to be in the mood for him, for sure,
but I do I do love I do love the

(36:16):
world of Andy Milligan. It that way. And then Dan Budnick,
he is Amanda's co host over on Made for TV,
Mayhem written a book eighties Action on the Cheap. He's
been a guest on another podcast in our network. Oh
my god, I'm such a bad network person. I don't

(36:39):
know the name of the podcast. It's Hunter. He just
started it. It's about westerns. I can't remember. Anyway, He's
had Dan Budnick on a few times, but Dan's said
team this up with screen Blady Murder. Do our episode
about that? Or my brother has Bad Dreams, which was
my double feature pick for Dreamstalker. Another plug Lance and

(37:03):
I have a video essay on the Terror Vision release
of Dreamstalker, so link to that in show notes as well.

Speaker 2 (37:10):
Pick it up. Jocks are all bastards.

Speaker 3 (37:11):
Yeah, so I thought those were like all very appropriate
double feature picks for this. I think there's a lot
of directions that you could go with, But what is
your pick?

Speaker 5 (37:21):
For it.

Speaker 2 (37:21):
I mean the first one that popped up for me
was Anguish. When Michael learned or plays that, I obsessed.
You know, Maniac moves eyes for Zelda Rubinstein.

Speaker 3 (37:31):
Yep, don't like. Yeah, don't say anymore about that one
of them.

Speaker 2 (37:34):
No, it's I love that movie. It's great. Someone else
actually an IMDb when I was going down that wormhole.
The Severed Arm is a movie that someone recommended with
this where a guy loses his arm and he becomes
a maniac and starts killing, specifically for revenge purposes. Yeah,
I thought of the last horror film because of his
obsession with that model actress. Also, there's maniac vibes going

(37:57):
on in The Little Joe Spinell, Row and Row. But
I went with The Zodiac Killer mainly due to the
scenes and the headless Eyes where you know, the cops
are looking for the Eye Killer, and those are cool
scenes where they're all being interviewed in the street.

Speaker 4 (38:12):
You know.

Speaker 2 (38:12):
There's fourteen Here comes the Coffin out of the apartment.
It's from the same year, nineteen seventy one, directed by
Tom Hanson, and it follows a month in the life
of the Zodiac Killer. Retelling a highly fictionalized version of
the murders and potential suspects like the Headless Eyes. For me,
it gives off Milligan and Wishman vibes. It's not nearly

(38:36):
as sleasy as Headless Eyes, but still has that DIY
early seventies griminess to it. Ag funds something weird. Release
this on Blue right back in like twenty seventeen. But
I mean, one blurb that I always find fascinating with
the Zodiac Killer is the director. He pretty much stated
that this production and he made this film was an
elaborate plot toptfully capture the active still you know, still

(38:59):
out Thereodiac Killer at that time. And for the opening
night screening, he had audience asked to write their answers
to a question I think the Zodiac Killer kills because
dot dot dot fel in your reasoning. And they would
drop their entries into this large box to raffle to
win a motorcycle, and volunteers would grab these handwritten things

(39:22):
and compare them to the Zodiac Killers handwritten letters out there.
And there were like these the squad and people and
even like cast and crew ready to like apprehend and
question people that had similar writing. Yeah, fascinating movie. But yeah,
I love the Zodiac Killer. I saw in a theater
for it might have been a Terror Tuesday, but it
was so much fun. I think it would pair well

(39:42):
with Endlessize.

Speaker 3 (39:43):
I think it's a great pick. I have the candle
that AGFA put out. I have them gave me that
for my birthday for years.

Speaker 2 (39:49):
Oh nice, Yeah, exciting.

Speaker 3 (39:52):
All right, So I'm lazy with you know everything right now,
So I stole one of the double feature picks from
the ones I just mentioned. I'm going with what Thrower
talked about. I'm going with Able feras the Driller Killer
from nineteen seventy nine. Ferrara himself plays Reno. He's an
artist struggling to make ends meet. He takes the streets

(40:14):
of New York to kill people with the drill. It's artistic,
it's New York, grimy, and it must be played loud.
So I think I think this would be such a
great like triple feature with all three like Zodiac, Driller
Killer and this like yeah.

Speaker 2 (40:30):
I mean all of them mentioned, I mean the ghastly ones.
There's there's a lot you can do in Anguish I
think would work really well.

Speaker 4 (40:35):
Yeah, but yeah, I.

Speaker 3 (40:36):
Didn't even think Banglish. That's a great pick.

Speaker 2 (40:38):
I wish I pick that now. That's okay, I should
have picked English when I know.

Speaker 3 (40:43):
Zodiac Killer is a great pick. Cool, all right, next episode.

Speaker 2 (40:47):
Okay, I'm excited about this next pick. We're going to
jump back into the acid Western subgenre. Oh okay, which
means that this pick may not be considered horror by some,
but yeah, I find it creepy due to the absurdity
of all the characters involved. Think Jack Hill, Spider Baby cast.
It's also filmed in sixteen millimeter black and white, so

(41:10):
it has that very dark and ominous presentation. And it's
a movie called Run Home Slow from nineteen sixty five,
directed by Ted Brinner, written by a high school English
teacher named Don Serviss. I did that, huh?

Speaker 3 (41:28):
I was a high school English teacher.

Speaker 2 (41:30):
Well, yeah, this is written by high school English teach.
I'm gonna wait for your movie so we can cover it. Erica,
I wrote a book I'm not writing, but services he
talked an old student of his into doing the original
score for this movie. And the student was a young
Frank Zappa.

Speaker 3 (41:45):
Holy shit.

Speaker 2 (41:46):
Yeah, composing his first original score. And we'll talk about
all that history in the next episode. But I do
want to warn listeners some of you might find this
on unpleasant and just kind of I don't know, just
some pleasant viewing experience. Not because it's mainly the only
version I can find on YouTube. Is very very dark,

(42:06):
which most of us can overlook. But there's kind of
an annoying aspect to some And it's the characters that
are in this one might consider. And I'm sorry for
planning this see right now, but I found it difficult
to ignore. But like inspiration or blueprints for like Rob Zombies,
Firefly Family, Oh God, which I do I like? I like?

(42:27):
I mean, I'm one of the Rob Zombie like. I
like a lot of his movies.

Speaker 3 (42:30):
I dare you.

Speaker 2 (42:31):
I like a House of a Thousand Corpses for sure.
But the cast rules in my opinion. Again, you can
also look into Jack Hill Spider Baby though, because they're
so absurd and kind of creepy. But the cast is
led by Mercedes Mcambridge and she's in a lot of
great movies which we'll talk about, and Gary Kent, who
worked with al Adamson a lot. Yeah, but in this
film essentially just following this family who seek revenge for

(42:54):
their father's murder, and they hide out and fight amongst themselves,
triggered by their own personal demons. And since this is
an acid Western, and one of the main reasons I
picked it was to get my bff, doctor Julia Smith
on she's been.

Speaker 3 (43:09):
She's been making the rounds, mistress. Yeah, she's been getting it.

Speaker 2 (43:13):
She has, she's been working hard. And you know, we
already discussed Orville Wanzer as a devil mistress on an
episode last year. That was last year as a year ago.
And Julia she's currently working on a documentary about Wansar,
the Los Crusis, you know, new Mexico film scene, and
the whole birth of the acid Western. So she will
be joining us oh to chat about Run Home Slow

(43:36):
and then the acid Western subgenre and horror and just
in general. Run Home Slow has only forty five views
on Letterboxed.

Speaker 3 (43:44):
Is this a record?

Speaker 4 (43:47):
It could be.

Speaker 2 (43:47):
It's under fifty. I was the forty fifth watch.

Speaker 3 (43:50):
Okay, I'll have to think. I'd have to look back
and see.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
Yeah, I don't. We've had definitely some, I feel like
right around the hundreds.

Speaker 3 (43:58):
Yeah, I know, there's definitely been a few. We've had
under one hundred, maybe even one or two under fifty.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
Yeah, well anyway, this could be. It's incredibly undersene. It's
on YouTube, which we'll add to show notes. Okay, and
it's only seventy eight minutes long.

Speaker 3 (44:11):
Which is yeah, keeping that streak going.

Speaker 2 (44:15):
Run home Comma slow.

Speaker 3 (44:18):
I like it excited. It doesn't have a horror tag.

Speaker 2 (44:21):
But you know it doesn't. But I think we're to
get more views and of letterbox and people start updating it,
maybe it will get the horror tag. Okay, we'll see excited.

Speaker 3 (44:30):
To find out. If you're not already, You can follow
this podcast on Instagram and Facebook at Unsung Horrors. You
can follow me on Letterboxed and Instagram at Hex Massacre.

Speaker 2 (44:44):
You can follow me on letterbox and Instagram at l Shiby.

Speaker 3 (44:48):
Thanks everyone for listening. We'll see you back next episode
for run Home.

Speaker 2 (44:52):
No thanks, but we've been together for a million ye.

Speaker 5 (45:00):
And I bet we will be together follow a million miles.

Speaker 4 (45:06):
Which is like I started breathing all the night and
I can't read.

Speaker 6 (45:14):
I never before what.

Speaker 5 (45:17):
We do, what we do, and.

Speaker 3 (45:29):
There ain't know nothing.

Speaker 1 (45:30):
We can't love these other truth whether.

Speaker 4 (45:34):
We shot the mind.

Speaker 6 (45:49):
Thank you for listening.

Speaker 1 (45:51):
To hear more shows from the Someone's Favorite Productions podcast network,
please select the link in the description.

Speaker 6 (46:01):
Hey, this is Jason Kleeberg from the Force five podcast,
a show that forces a guest to come up with
a movie themed top five list topic, and then we
reveal our picks on air. Top five heist Films, top
five tier Jerkers, top five movie dogs. Every show you'll
be asking yourself what would.

Speaker 2 (46:17):
Be on my list.

Speaker 6 (46:18):
Guests include directors, screenwriters, actors, podcasters, musicians, authors, and even
a professional wrestler. Subscribe to the Force five podcast and
you won't just be a listener, you'll be a list nerd.
The Force five podcast available wherever you are listening now

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