Jaws Ep. 05 - Prophecy / Nightwing

This week we look at two animal attack movies that try to incorporate Native American culture into the story:

Corporate greed creates a mutated bear with a taste for blood in PROPHECY (1979) starring Robert Foxworth, Talia Shire & Armand Assante and directed by John Frankenheimer.

Then it’s time to wake up and smell the ammonia as we face vampire bats in NIGHTWING (1979) starring Nick Mancuso, David Warner & Kathryn Harrold and directed by Arthur Hiller.

Episode Transcript

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you oh
Hello and welcome to Get Me Another, a podcast where we explore those movies that followedin the wake of blockbuster hits and attempted to replicate their success.

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My name is Chris Ayanagone and with me are my co-hosts Rob Lemorgas.
Hey guys, I think we might need to clean the studio.
You smell that like ammonia smell?
Really strong.
Yeah, no, it's, mean, what could possibly be causing that?
no clue.
I'm sure it's nothing.
I hope it's not bats.

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I hope it's not bat piss, because that would be very disappointing.
Vampire bats, yes.
And Justin Beam!
Chris, every time you get emotionally upset, you want to take a hot bath.
It's true.
It's true.
Especially in like a natural hot tub that, know, when your, when your girlfriend's goingto tell you she's going to go off to med school in Houston.

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Today is episode five in our get me another JAWS series.
And this week we'll be looking at two animal attack movies that incorporate nativeAmerican culture and mythology, or at least the Hollywood version there of.
Additionally, both films seek to deal with broader environmental and economic issues,although how successful they are in that regard is something we'll talk about as we go.

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So first up today, from 1979, this is Prophecy.
It is not the offspring of witchcraft or Satan.
It was created by man.
It will grow to be 15 feet tall.

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you
It will have
hooked claws.
It will walk upright.
And it will mindlessly, mercilessly kill every living thing it meets.

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see
think it's important to remember with both of these movies that in the 1960s and 70s,issues surrounding the rights and treatment of Native Americans became more visible in the

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public consciousness than they had ever been before.
And it's shocking to me, at least, when I was doing some reading on this and discoveredthat Native Americans were only granted U.S.
citizenship in 1924.
God, shameful.
Incredible, just it's terrible.
like that, I mean, it's basically been 100 years like it and you know, for most of thattime, cinema history was very content to use Native Americans as villains in Western.

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It's like it's, you know, we here in the 20, you know, in 2025, you know, it's a differentlandscape.
And but Dances with Wolves didn't come out till 1990.
And that was a real departure.
from how indigenous peoples were usually depicted.
So both of these films, while they are certainly not perfect, either as films or in anyregard, they are at least trying to depict Native Americans in a more balanced fashion

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than they previously had been.
Yeah, and again, just to hammer home your point doesn't mean they were successful.
No, it doesn't mean that from our perspective you don't you wouldn't look at certainthings in these movies and go, Whoa, right?
Probably ah beginning with the casting in both of them.
Yes, is something that would, because here you do have non-Native American actors playingNative Americans.

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again, that's not something you would do today.
even, I think it's just important to remember that in sort of the broader sense of filmhistory, movies like this that even attempt to show Native American viewpoints and are
just very much a departure from what had been

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through most of 20th century film history.
And it's a change that I think it's just worth understanding and kind of being aware of inthe context of both of these films.
Yeah, Caucasian people up as folks from other countries is as old as cinema.
Right.
Other countries, other nationalities, other...

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It's something that is kind hard to look at.
Every Saturday night, I watch Svanguli.
And for a couple hours prior to Svanguli on MeTV is The Three Stooges.
And it's just back-to-back Three Stooges shorts.
And you really see how these other cultures are treated.
every week I'm reminded of it.
And it's so jarring to watch now to see that uh play out that way.

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And it's usually relegated to wide brush caricatures, comedy elements and things likethat.
so, yeah, I mean, this is the history of our country, right?
I mean, we're no farther in a lot of ways from that now.
And with these films here that we're gonna talk about today, these are a little morerooted in a more stark

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presentation a little more dramatic and serious, I guess.
There was after this, especially in the 80s, the Native American mythology, quote unquote,I will say cinema mythology, became a real staple of a lot of especially supernatural

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movies.
that's when you had things.
It was built on an Indian burial ground.
kind of thing.
Yeah, exactly.
And Pet Sematary and a bunch of other films where that became how the Native Americanworld was brought into genre cinema at that time.
So it's kind of weird that here there's almost like a progressive effort to a certainextent to present this with a certain realism.

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And then it fell backwards in the 80s, I think, with how it was presented there.
Yeah.
And then probably progressed further into the 90s because again, progress is not astraight line.
It's this series of zigs and zags and it's jagged.
It's a jagged line.
So I mean, these movies are at least attempting to present, I think more balance andagain, successful to one degree or another as horror movies, how successful they are as.

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as sort of more serious dramas.
And the balance between them is where these movies, I think, struggle a lot because thereis some tonal whiplash uh in both of these movies where you're going from, this is
something serious to, my God, here's a raccoon attacking somebody in an absolutely bananasway.

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it's, uh the tone changes are really something.
And we'll get to that.
uh
So Prophecy was written by David Seltzer, who had previously written the 1976 horrorblockbuster, The Omen, as well as having done an uncredited rewrite on Willy Wonka and the

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Chocolate Factory.
The film was directed by John Frankenheimer, whose career stretched over five decades,from directing live television productions in the 50s to classics such as The Manchurian
Candidate,
Birdman of Alcatraz and Seconds, as well as later films in his career like FrenchConnection 2, Ronin, and The Island of Dr.

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Moret.
Prophecy stars Robert Foxworth, Talia Shire, Armando Sante, Victoria Racimo, and RichardDicehart.
Now, Robert Foxworth appeared in movies such as Damien Omen 2 and Airport 77, and heactually turned down the role of J.R.
Ewing.
in the primetime soap Dallas and then later start on another primetime soap Falcon Crestfor a number of years.

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Talia Shire is of course famous for two ongoing roles in two very significant film series,Michael Corleone's sister Connie in The Godfather and Rocky Balboa's beloved Adrienne in
Rocky.
And she is of course the real life sister of Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola.
Armando Sante, who plays Native American activist John Hawks, is not actually NativeAmerican, but I will say he is cut from the same ethnically ambiguous cloth as Oscar

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Isaac.
Like he kinda, it's like, he could kinda play anything.
uh And he had a long acting career as well that continues to this day.
He started two of my favorite 80s mini series, 1987's Napoleon and Josephine and 1988'sJack the Ripper.
Prophecy.
It's a strange cocktail of a movie, guys.

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Like, it's...
You could say that inside this movie are two bears, both literally and figuratively.
And one of those bears is pregnant with a litter of cubs.
There's going on in this movie.
Yeah, there's a lot going on in this movie.
There's a lot going on.
Like one of the bears inside this movie is a serious meditation on legitimate issues suchas environmental destruction, the rights of indigenous peoples weighed against the needs

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of an industrial society.
And the other part of this movie, the other bear sees a giant mutant bear flinging someonein a sleeping bag that explodes upon impact.
It's amazing.
Yeah.
And you've got, you've got, um, gender relations as well when it comes to, um, you know,having a kid and abortion.

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And I mean, there is.
issues of poverty and economic injustice are front and center.
uh But then you also have some absolutely crazy stuff.
we open, honestly with what I thought was maybe one of the most effective openings we'veseen in this series since Jaws, where you're out in the woods and you just sort of, it's

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dark, you see these lights moving through the darkness, you hear the sound of the wind.
And after a few minutes, the panting of dogs and it takes a few minutes to process whatyou're seeing.
it's like the everything you see, like a bunch of lights in the distance moving throughthe darkness.
And it's like two lights kind of in sync.

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what I realized, like it took me time.
It's like, it's guys who are carrying flashlights and they have lights on their helmets.
And, you know, suddenly the music kicks in, the dogs take off in pursuit of something andwe're rushing through the woods and it's
Really chaotic.
love this intro.
It's a very different introduction to a film, I think, because usually we're meetingcharacters and things like that.

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This drops you into a frantic scenario that is alien to the viewer, because you have noidea what to expect out of the film.
And I love how right off the bat, it establishes a darkness too.
But they chose to shoot in dark.
This isn't day for night.
This was shot.
And that adds so much drama to what's happening.
And it feels very dangerous.

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It really does.
Like the guy, they have the dogs, the dog goes like the dog is charging ahead aftersomething.
It smells something, it's sense, you know, and then the dog goes over a cliff and they'reable to like pull it back because he's on a leash.
But it's like even just that all of sudden the ground could be no longer under your feetis very unsettling.

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Honestly, in some ways, it reminded me of the opening of a a a Steven Spielberg film, notJaws, but Jurassic.
like the scene with the raptors and the raptor cage and the lights on the hard hats.
You don't see what's attacking them.
And it kind of reminded me of that, especially with the lighting.

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And you you have these guys, kind of go, the dog like leash snaps.
So like the dog falls down and did this ravine and the guys kind of rappel downafterwards.
And then there's a third guy up there and like, he can't see what's happening.
We can't see what's happening.
And...
Yeah, then the third guy goes, kind of follows them down and you you, seize the bodies ofthe first two guys and a roar and something attacks him and we don't see what and it's, it

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is really effective.
Yeah.
I had also thought of a different Spielberg movie ET.
Oh, sure.
Flashlights running through.
Um, and yeah, the, the thing about this opening sequence is it is very thrilling.
mean, you know, Frankenheimers, you know, can do this and it is emotionally affecting andthat's gonna where this thing lands in the daylight after I find very interesting.

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Yeah, yeah, no, we have this whole, so basically there's this attack, the guys that areout there, we don't know who they are, we don't know the context of it, uh you know,
they're dead, you know, we see I think all three members of the Surge party dead.
And then there's this very sort of slow crossfade and we transition to Talia Shire playingthe cello in like a symphony orchestra.

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And it's a very, like you're moving from this very
natural world to a very, you know, to the civilized world, the, you know, to, you know,again, a symphony orchestra with, you know, in all of its fullness.
And in that transition, get the, we started at night, you get that daytime shot of thedead bodies lying on the rocks where you get to see more of the blood and where that

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classical music is start to play that we, when we fade over, we realize it's, uh you know,my goodness.
Maggie, character, she's playing it, but it's so interesting because the, opening is so
you know, visceral.
And then when you have that classical, very serene music playing over those dead bodies,you know, it's that thing where in that moment, then we get distanced from those deaths

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emotionally.
Yeah.
Where instead of landing, you know, um, you know, you get a little bit of a pullback isthen we're getting pulled into, uh, the other part of the world.
We're going far away with her.
And I found all of that very, um, very effective.
Yeah, no, it was interesting.
we, the performance, we see Maggie and her friend having a conversation and we learn thatshe's pregnant, but she hasn't told her husband.

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And why not?
Because he thinks that there's too much suffering in the world and doesn't want to bringin another child.
Like it's a very sort of like, like that she can't have this conversation with herhusband, that she's apprehensive about telling him.
She just knows what he's going to say.
Is is a really interesting way to serve set up the guy who's gonna be our main characterbefore we see it.

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Yeah, Dr.
Robert Fern, who is her husband, who's Maggie's husband.
boy.
Yeah, Dr.
Robert Verne played by Robert Foxworth.
This character has a lot of problems for me.
Yeah, well, yeah, I mean, first of all, let's just say he looks very similar, has a verysimilar look to Hugo Stieglitz in Tintorerra, like the curly blonde hair and the big

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beard.
Yeah, we move from the uh orchestra to what I would say is the urban blight section of theParamount backlot.
where he's treating poor people living in run-down apartments, literally, they areliterally beset by rats.

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Like there's literally a baby who's been infected with rabies and Dr.
Bob is very frustrated with the futility of his job treating these people.
Yeah.
And this is, uh, we've, we've been led into this by some stock footage, maybe of studentdemonstrations going on.
So we know we're in the turbulent city.
Yep.
And then, you know, he's the doctor making the house call, you know, and rushing in and,know, just from the jump without really getting into what's going on, this is very

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different than jaws in that this thing does not.
Right from the get go, it's not trying for the same kind of unity of time and place.
Right.
The story is kind of starting all over the place, ah you know, in physical location, wewill eventually get to a more single or singular location.
But I think that the movie, you know, for better or worse is setting you up for it's goingto be all over the place.

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Right.
Right, which is admittedly, the movie is kind of all over the place, so that's accurate.
A friend of Dr.
Bob shows up and offers him a job doing an environmental study for the EPA, a job that hedoes not seem at all qualified for.
This guy's a medical doctor.

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What does he know about like, even he's like, I don't know how to it.
He's like, oh no, you're good with people.
I'm like, he doesn't seem that great with people.
That's the only qualifier.
Yeah, like so in dispute is this area of land in Maine, which is claimed by both a papercompany who purchased it, although we don't know from whom, and a Native American tribe.

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And the claim on the land is apparently going to be settled by an EPA report that will tipthe balance one direction or the other.
So I guess Dr.
Bob, despite the fact that, you know, he doesn't really that's not really something he'sdone by his own admission, you know.
packs up his wife and her cello and they fly up to Maine.

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Which looks beautiful, by the way.
Yeah, it does.
I still have no idea why she went.
She's got a job celloing in the city.
Right.
He's going into the middle of nowhere.
Presumably this is not a like my new, my new forever job is going to be doing this study.
I know they can take a long time in real life, but I just, I just wanted there to besomething, especially considering how weirdly controlling he is.

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I'm like, which is fun.
Look, I don't need characters to all be nice, right?
I don't even need my lead character to be nice, but I,
It just felt like there were there's missing characterization in a movie that oftenportrays itself as having very deep characterization.
Right, right.
I agree.
And if he's going up there, you get the impression talking to the friend that it's a jobfor a few weeks.

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It's maybe a month or something like that.
It's not an open-ended thing.
So it's like, yeah, is she going to miss the cello season, the symphony season?
We don't know.
He doesn't seem to care.
It's a...
It's also the beginning of this movie really not treating Maggie like a real person.
No, which is a shame because Tal Yashire might be the best thing in it.

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No, no, she's great.
I mean, look, it's one of these things where it's not, this is, you know, I will be, um,looking at things, but this isn't like a terrible movie or anything by any.
I don't get it when something is so close to passing a bar.
tend to get more critical cause I'm like, Oh, there I could see where it would havepassed, you know, into something I really enjoyed.

(19:55):
Right.
It's pretty, the movie makes a.
giant meal out of the pregnancy as well.
It should.
It's a big trait.
He's going to do an EPA study about possible contamination and whether who that's going togive land to.
She knows she's pregnant.
Right.
Why did she come?
And the reason is because she's not a real person and the plot needed her to come.

(20:19):
Right.
mean, that's all of that other answer other than that.
And no, you're right.
It's a shame.
Yeah, no, you're 100 % right.
Like that's now that when you lay it all out like that, it's like, yeah, she does not needto be there going into a area that might have some kind of environmental problems.
But we do fly up to Maine and it is beautiful.

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is actually, while the film is set in Maine, this was actually one of the earliestHollywood productions to shoot in the area of Vancouver, Canada, which would become a
major production center in subsequent decades.
And they land and
And one of the first things they see after encountering a family going camping, who wewill come back to later, is the missing dog from the opening scene who has now been found

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and is being flown in, hanging from a helicopter.
I don't know why they needed to fly the dog in like that.
Like it couldn't, it's not like they're flying in a uh horse or something.
You know, it's like, it's a dog.
I couldn't just put it on the chopper with a guy.
is that...
we saw this in another movie.
What was it that we were just watching where they were flying a movie where there was theanimal being transported by helicopter?

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That was very strange, but it does continue our trend of helicopters, which we're going todo for two today on helicopters.
The second one has whirlybirds to be more specific.
got these whirlybirds.
oh So they're picked up by the manager of the paper mill, Mr.
Isley, played by Richard Diceheart, who's doing a very credible main accent.

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Like pretty good, pretty good.
And, and, you know, I like that he comments that, you know, he doesn't know anythingabout, you know, musical instruments, but he knows wood and there's three types of wood
in, her cello.
really like that.
And Isley and Dr.
Bob have this long conversation, which
I didn't get entirely the first time around because while they're talking in theforeground, I was watching the luggage being loaded onto the car right behind them.

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It like in between the two guys and you could see the luggage and the, and the, the, thepuzzle of how we're going to put this luggage on this car, including the cello.
And I won't lie guys.
I found it very stressful.
I was like, no,
What are they doing?
Why are they just putting, like, why don't they seem to be putting anything in the back ofthe car?
Why does it all have to go on the roof?

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That's such a thing from the time, isn't it?
And it was always station wagons too, which are made to haul stuff.
They're made to transport things inside.
got the whole back thing, like the whole back.
I don't know, when we go on family summer vacations, there would inevitably be stuff tiedto the roof and I'm like, how much stuff did we bring?
Like what were we bringing?

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Dear Lord.
And just, you know, like I get it's an exposition scene and you want to do something tomake it more visually interesting.
I mean, that gets done all of the time, but just, you know, look, this is in the JAWSseries.
So looking at JAWS, some of the stuff that was on the docs or whatever, know, Brody mightbe talking with Hooper or the mayor or whoever, and there would be a lot going on in the

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background, but it usually was of a piece like, they're hoisting up the shark that theythink is the one.
So like it...
wasn't as mentally taxing somehow.
Right.
Because it felt additive.
This does feel, I felt the same.
I'm glad.
I'm glad I'm not alone on that.
Because I have a thing about packing cars.

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I'm going be like, you know, it's and I'm just like, they're doing this all wrong.
was, and the conversation they're having is important because it lays out that the people,we learned everything that was going on in the opening scene that that a group of
lumberjacks went missing.
And then there was a search and rescue team sent to find them.
And they also went missing.

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And Isley thinks that the Native Americans, what they refer to as the Opeys, Opey originalpeoples, are responsible, while the Opeys place the blame on Katahdin, a spirit seeking
vengeance for the destruction of the forests.
Now, I did look up Katahdin to see if that was rooted in actual Native American mythology,and I couldn't find a reference to a creature with that name.

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But that said, Katahdin is the name of a real mountain in Maine.
It is the tallest mountain in the state.
And according to folklore, specifically that of the Panopsicot tribe, it is the home of astorm god named Pamola, who is a great winged spirit that brings cold weather and is an

(25:03):
amalgamation of number of other creatures.
Pamola is said to have the head of a moose.
the body of a man and the wings of an eagle, and his presence on the mountain is whyclimbing that mountain was forbidden.
Now, the idea of this amalgam creature, even though they don't use the name Pamola, thatis important when we get to the actual creature, because that's going to be kind of part

(25:25):
of it.
So they go up, they're going up to the Verne's cabin where they're going to be staying,and the car is stopped by a group of Native American activists, led by John Hawkes, played
by Armando Sante, blockading the road.
And we have this incredibly intense standoff between the mining company who is basicallyhelping move the Verans into their place and the Native Americans.

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And they put a chain across the road and Isley orders his men to cut down the trees oneither side.
And holy shit, things escalate quickly.
With a chainsaw!
With a-
chainsaw, like, like, Hawks has got an axe and we have like this, basically like thisstandoff, this fight between a chainsaw and an axe and it is intense.

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Like it's a very intense scene that has nothing to do with whatever creature is in thewoods.
It's, it's just about these two groups who have competing claims on the land and youreally get a sense of how heightened all of the feelings are.
I mean, holy shit, it ends with a chainsaw at Armand Asante's throat.

(26:39):
It's like, it is, it was an intense, it's one of the most intense scenes in the movie andit's very seriously played.
This for me is where, you know, there are taught it is so tricky to do social commentaryin a popcorn movie and to service both sides equally.

(27:00):
And this was a scene that for me, I just felt it.
What everything is so, you know, ham fisted and over the top that, you know, it's, it'svery.
It's very difficult and I can't explain it, but like when you wind up with a chainsawversus axe fight that is supposed to represent something else in the socio-political

(27:24):
realm, it's just hard to pull that off.
Get out or Stepford wives or things.
These are things that you could point to that have just as outlandish a metaphor as anaction or whatever.
And for whatever reason they work, right?
But it's hard to do this.
It is.
this scene is where the movie really started to turn for me and it became difficult for meto come back personally.

(27:53):
Well, I think also by this time, this scene is so incredibly intense between them.
And really we were talking earlier about the depth of characterization across the boardwith everyone in this movie.
And really instead of getting deep with the characters and really getting to know them,the confrontations in here are more cultural.
It's a wide brush general.

(28:14):
Like I mentioned, I used that term earlier.
It's a wide brush generalization of sort of us versus them and
That scene is kind of the epitome of that.
Yeah.
But also with the introduction that we talked about, the intensity of everything in thewoods followed by the hospital, which is just, I mean, it's as heartbreaking as it is kind

(28:38):
of chaotic and loud.
And, and then you run into this confrontation.
It's like the only respite that we've had so far is the beautiful cinematography when theywere driving up the mountains, is absolutely gorgeous.
But.
the stress level for the viewer at this point after that sequence is like at a peak.
And what we've, what we've had is just back to back to back, very challenging sequencesthat are really sort of shaking the audience.

(29:07):
now this is the third time we've been shaken.
so Rob, that might be part of your feeling about this is that it it's destabilizing to getthis far into a movie, you know, where maybe 20 minutes.
into the film or whatever and you're still just dealing with constant conflict, constantfighting, constant chaos.
uh so I think that definitely has something to do with the mood of the viewer at thispoint.

(29:33):
Yeah, I mean, I would agree, you know, because everything is so in your face, you know,including the dialogue.
This is a movie where for the most part, every character says what they mean and or whatthey're thinking.
And, you know, I, I know this is unfair to compare it to, you know, a movie that isfantastic.

(29:54):
But, you know, if, if you are white in this movie and you kind of have it out for NativeAmericans, you
only just say so for the most part.
There's no equivalent to I would have voted for Obama a third time if I could have.
There is no nuance.

(30:14):
And look, it's a movie with a mutant bear.
But am I asking for nuance?
But when you're playing with these kinds of subjects, I do feel that the mutant beardoesn't need nuance, but maybe the sociopolitical stuff does.
I and even then the personal you emotional stuff with a couple I just you know uh

(30:35):
And that's where I think this movie really has, has both the movies today actually havethe same problem in balancing those things and the, and the tonal whiplash between them
is, you know, it's, I honestly watched both of these movies.
I had a neck brace at the end, like I was Kevin Spacey and consenting adults.
Well, not like that because that was a fake neck brace.

(30:58):
That's why guess the neck break was real, but the need for it was.
The need for it was fake.
That was fake.
I was also, the other thing I had was like, man, are they going to have to go through thisevery time they want to go to their cabin?
Like, is this, yeah, we have to negotiate our way past the chain.
I don't know.
But the verns, settle in and Dr.
Bob, he does a little bit of fishing.

(31:19):
You know, he's doing some fishing out there on the lake.
He notices an absolutely huge fish in the lake and he takes his catch home and Maggiecooks it up for dinner.
She really wants to tell her husband about her pregnancy, but holy shit is Dr.
Bob blind his wife's emotional needs.

(31:39):
Really great with people, Chris.
He's super power.
I mean, in fairness, terms of Talia Shire's on-screen husbands, he definitely ranks lowerthan Rocky Balboa, but certainly higher than Carlo Rizzo.
That's the thing in both movies.
The leads in both films are just emotionally void and really neglect.

(32:01):
mean, straight up, it borders on like abusive relationship type stuff with how theyrespond to their partners in the films.
That scene we were talking about earlier in the next film will come up in the second halfof the episode here that it's just like shocking, revolting.
Like, what the hell's wrong with you, man?
Why, what are you?

(32:22):
Why do you behave this way?
What's wrong with
incredibly self-involved.
uh
Which is fine to have a character be that way, but at times I'm not sure the film knowsthat the character is that way.
And that is where I think the issue is.
Because the story doesn't treat it as such, that, anyway, that's an issue for me.

(32:44):
No, I agree.
I agree.
And they do have like they do have an emotional conversation here in the cabin, uh whichis interrupted by a sound outside.
What could it be?
And Dr.
Bob opens the door to see a raccoon on the front porch.
And guys, that raccoon is absolutely freaking

(33:10):
A true trash panda.
Oh my god.
Like it jumps up, it runs up Dr.
Bob's leg in an oddly sped up shot and tackles him.
And it is the most insane man versus woodland creature fight since Clark Griswold versusthe Christmas tree squirrel in Christmas Vacation.
Like it's, on that level of absolute madness.

(33:32):
And again, this is where we have the dichotomy of this movie, like serious issues andemotions contrasting with stuff that is absolutely
Bananas.
and you know, which can work, right?
We're not against having more than a single tone in a film.
But there are ways to make that work.
And it is a bit of a magic trick.

(33:54):
So for instance, here I noticed something in a little shot before this right before thesection two, this movie at times has some weird editing rhythms that I think don't help it
um as just one thing.
in this, you get it a little bit when he's on the boat earlier catching
trying to catch that fish and the bird gets is eaten by the unseen thing in the water orwhatever.

(34:19):
You get it where you get this like quick edit where it just feels like you're it's likeshort handed stuff but like really short handed and you get a similar thing at the end of
this sequence where after the raccoon goes into the fire you get that reaction shot butthen you're just it's it's too short and you're out so fast it feels like

(34:39):
the scene didn't have time to end or I'm missing something and you're not.
It's just that the rhythm feels off and it, you know, might make it a little more comicalthan even intended.
Um, you know, with, with the way that the raccoon stuff, raccoon gets tossed in fire likeso fast.

(35:01):
fight ends when Dr.
Bob grabs the raccoon with his shovel and throws it into the fireplace.
I couldn't believe it when I'm like, what?
It's crazy.
then that raccoon, you throw it into the fire.
This is where when you do ridiculous things, I do need them to have some kind of internallogic.
And this is a world that has the EPA that seems to be doing real things.

(35:25):
So the fact that when you throw a fire into a raccoon or throw a raccoon into a the otherone would be great.
If you throw a raccoon into a fire, one would expect it to go.
Like run out of the fire.
Oh, this raccoon just instantly just is like dead.

(35:46):
He did not throw it that hard.
No, no, let's be honest, that raccoon, they should just move out of that cabin now becausethey're never getting that smell out.
Like it's just, honestly, get rid of all your, get all new clothes.
Basically start over with your possessions because all of them are going to smell likecooked raccoon forever.

(36:10):
Well, we talked earlier about the lack of depth with characterization.
We don't know what the raccoon situation was prior to this moment either.
mean, that raccoon could have been ready to go.
It was like, you know what?
This guy's probably going to throw me at something.
I don't uh hear I'm here for the ride.
And then it's not really, it may have been in a way, raccoon suicide.

(36:31):
It was honestly, was suicide by Dr.
Bob, raccoon suicide by Dr.
Yeah.
And we haven't seen that kind of a throw since Orca.
Yeah, like flip, like the frog thing, like with the frog game at the,
He thrown across an expanse of space and time against iceberg by an orca who's just usinghim like he's on a teeter totter.

(37:00):
And here we have it's sister scene with the suicidal raccoon.
We saw ridiculous animal stuff in day of the animals and grizzly.
mean,
those, those movies crafted worlds where of course the rules of this world are animals aregoing to do insane stuff and it's just, we're going to roll on.

(37:22):
Right.
This movie just seems to have set up a different, more serious world.
I, that's another thing where it, told me, I think that it was one kind of movie like thatopening that's so effective is like so grounded and real.
Right.
And then to go to this place it's, you know, anyway, oh

(37:43):
It was one of those things where I'm watching it and I'm like, couldn't quite, my braincouldn't quite process it.
And that is not the last time that's gonna happen in this movie.
But when considering this double bill, guys, we need to be grateful that there is animalaction in this movie.
Because the second one is almost completely barren animal action, despite its promises.

(38:08):
Take suicidal raccoon over bats that you can't even see that aren't even in 90 % of themovie.
it takes so long for the bats to show up.
Getting through that movie made me a suicidal wreck.
Oh my god
Dr.
Bob learns that the raccoon had no trace of rabies despite its behavior.

(38:31):
He is approached by John Hawkes and Ramona, who take him and Maggie to meet the othermembers of the trident, including Ramona's grandfather, Hector Emry.
Now, Hector lives in a tipi like his ancestors did.
Except for the fact, guys, that tipis were not used by the Native Americans of theNortheast.

(38:54):
They built wooden structures.
Fucking wood in the Northeast.
Teepees were used by the tribes of the Great Plains who moved around in pursuit of food.
So it's this thing where it's like, well, you know, we want to present authentic NativeAmericans.
Let's just throw, let's have them in teepees.

(39:14):
But those people of that area would not have lived in that kind of dwelling.
Insane.
It's just.
So Hector is played by George Clutsey, who was an actual indigenous person, although hewas Canadian, not American.
And he plays the grandfather here.
He'll show up in a somewhat similar role in the second movie today.

(39:38):
And Hector, believes in the legend of Katahdin, which he describes as a mixture of allthings in God's creation.
Again, I think they did take inspiration from the real
legends of that area in creating this fictional monster who is going to be stalking thewoods.
Also, I want to point out uh that Hector fails to notice when his cigarette burns all theway down to his fingertips, but Dr.

(40:05):
Bob notices it because Dr.
Bob, you know, despite the fact that he's not in tune to his wife's emotional needs, he isputting together what is going on in this area.
It's like Shelley DeVaul on The Shining.
You're just watching that cigarette.
Yeah.
Like, wait, how far is this going to go?
And with her, it's how is that ash staying on?

(40:27):
It's
It's the most, it is so suspenseful just how that ash stays on in the Shining.
You're just like, it's gonna fall at any moment, my God.
Here, it's like he doesn't notice his, there's something amiss with him where he's notsensing the pain that he should.
So they then visit the paper mill in an effort to determine if it's having any negativeenvironmental impact and.

(40:51):
And the scale of the mill is amazing.
it's just the massive amount of like the logs floating in the water.
was not so like it was an interesting image because I don't really have a lot ofexperience with that, but it was just like visually I found it interesting.
Just the sheer scale.
As we uh as Dr.
Bob gets taken through this area, it is very, you know, that outside shot is superevocative.

(41:15):
I did really appreciate the performance because it feels almost like one of those old Mr.
Rogers little docu films in middle, like teaching kids about how the paper's made.
And it felt very real in that sense of this is a guy who is, uh you know, he's probablygiven this tour a million times, right?
The PR tour of what this paper mill does.

(41:36):
Absolutely.
And the mill appears to be non-polluting.
Eisley assures them that it is non-polluting.
Although Dr.
Bob presses him in the issue on that issue.
And Eisley's got a great line here that I actually really, really liked.
He says, I supply what you demand.
Meaning the market demands paper and that paper has to come from somewhere.

(41:58):
Whatever happens here, the market and the people who buy the product have someculpability.
Yeah, when he throws it in his face about how many reports are you going to write?
how many pieces of paper for your report, you know, are gonna...
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's interesting.
it's, again, this is where I think, I think, Rob, you hit upon it with this movie is closeto being what it ought to be.

(42:25):
And I think that makes it more frustrating than something that's a complete with.
And this is one of the rare moments where a character isn't necessarily totally sayingwhat they're thinking.
And this is such a, this is a good bad guy moment in this movie where there is some truthto what the bad guy is saying, right?
They're twisting it to their own ends and, know, to absolve themselves of any, you know,culpability or guilt or anything.

(42:51):
maybe that's another reason why I like this, not just the Mr.
Rogers.
As they're leaving, Dr.
Bob notices deposits of mercury on Maggie's boots.
He notices that far quicker than he notices his wife's emotional distress.
And he very quickly comes up with a theory that the area around the mill is being pollutedwith methylmercury, a highly toxic compound.

(43:19):
And the reason it's not detected is because mercury is heavier than water and sinks to thebottom.
And the case that he references in laying out this theory
concerning deaths in Minamata, Japan is a real one that stretched over decades andaffected tens of thousands of people.
And as he mentions, methylmercury can cross the placental barrier into an unborn fetus,which is very worrying because Maggie ate that fish that Dr.

(43:50):
Bob got out of the lake.
And she is clearly distressed by all of this.
comes clean immediately and says I have to leave.
wait no no.
found it very odd that when Dr.
Bob is explaining all of this to Maggie, he plays her the tape that he made rather thanjust telling her.

(44:12):
It's very odd.
It's like, here, listen to this.
Well, it's like couples texting today.
It's like, yeah, there's a more passive way to get this message across.
Yeah, it's, it's, you know, like, and she asks why they use it.
He plays the tape in response rather than just saying it's cheap.

(44:32):
Like it's, hey, listen, she is obviously upset that she might have a mutant baby insideher, but Dr.
Bob, he is not focused on that at all.
He literally turns his back.
Like he literally has his back to her when she is, is trying to communicate to him.
This guy.
Fail.
And he concludes that the creature's description being a mixture of all things in God'screation is due to it retaining aspects of various stages of fetal growth, uh which, you

(45:03):
know, hey.
But this idea of, you know, creatures in mythology that are, you know, are amalgams ofother animals is common throughout mythologies in the world.
So, it's an interesting creature they're building up here.
It's uh
You know, it's funny, after last week and Piranha, it's not enough to have a dangerousanimal.

(45:25):
We need to have a dangerous mutant animal.
And one where the ah the environment is making the animals go crazy, right?
Which even though this is more focused on uh issues also with uh surrounding NativeAmericans at the time, we had another double feature where the environmental stuff was

(45:49):
very much there.
Which I find is interesting because Jaws does not have that really at all.
No.
uh
but that so many that followed in the wake do.
Um, yeah.
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
So then we shift back to that family who we've kind of checked in a couple times.
They've made camp for the night and here we're going to get another wild shift in tonebecause my God, this sequence is amazing.

(46:21):
my God.
So the family is in sleeping bags.
out there, they're sleeping out there.
have sleeping bags.
The sun is zipped up in like all the way with just his face showing.
Hahaha
I'm like, that's, don't think that's how you're supposed to sleep in a sleeping bag, butthat's how he, you know, he's just, it's just his face in this giant yellow sleeping bag.

(46:41):
I think that's for like winter camping or being up in the, you know, high up in some coldclimates.
But yeah, they're clearly not there because everyone else seems comfortable.
It's just normal
I it's to hide the special effect,
Movie is how I can't hear you over the movie.

(47:02):
I know, I know.
Well, the best part is when he's hopping around.
oh
amazing.
like out of nowhere, this mutant bear shows up and goes nuts and the kid is standing, hestands up, he's hopping on like cause he can't move.
Like he's in a sack race people.
my god
And and Katahdin just hits him with such force that he flies into this rock and thissleeping bag explodes.

(47:31):
Which into this, like speaking of three stooges, this like shower of feathers that comeflying out of it.
is great.
This is up there with the grizzly, like punching the head off a horse.
This is right up there with that.
If my favorite scene in Jaws is three men talking at a table, my favorite scene inprophecy is a mutant bear.

(47:58):
Absolutely just punching a sleeping bag so that it flies across the forest like Sarah Monkthrowing Gandalf magically and then exploding.
It's exploding in this cloud of feathers.
is amazing.
We really just stop the discussion there because people who are listening, if you'recurious about seeing this movie, it's worth it for that scene.

(48:21):
It really is.
That scene is incredible.
It's just...
And unfortunately, and I thought this was true of both movies today, both movies have apretty significant attack scene at the middle and never quite reach that height again.
uh the design of Katadin is interesting.

(48:42):
He's a really messed up looking bear.
Half his face looks like he's melted away.
It's very...
It's very unsettling.
Apparently the design, the original design was more of a hybrid, which is what they talkabout.
But John Frankenheimer uh actually just wanted something more bear-like, apparently.

(49:03):
And Katadin, I want to add, is played by Kevin Peter Hall, who later played the Predatorin the first two Predator movies and was on Misfits of Science.
No way.
Yeah, this was his first role.
The predator is our prophecy bear.
Yes.
That's amazing.
So Dr.
Bob, he's taken blood samples from the natives, Native Americans, in order to try andprove his theory, when the sheriff shows up to arrest John Hawks for this family's death,

(49:33):
and I'm like, there's no evidence that this guy killed, it's just like, it's completelylike, yeah, we don't like this guy, we're gonna throw him in jail.
Like, there's nothing to indicate.
Like, we know he didn't do it because we saw the attack, but even still, it's like, oh,it's not like the.
the mutant bear left a piece of his clothing or something there.
It's like, it's, yeah.

(49:54):
And, and, and, and Hawks to his credit just runs like, Hey, make a run for it.
So Dr.
Bob and Maggie and Ramona, they fly up to the campsite to check things out.
but the weather's getting really bad.
So they may not be able to fly back.
And what do they find up at the site where the family was attacked?
find claw marks on trees and two mutant

(50:18):
Baby bear cubs.
One alive, one dead, and now, you know, basically Talia Shire is going to spend the restof this movie taking care of a mutant baby bear.
The rain in this scene is wild.
A lot of movies don't get rain right.
I don't know if this was environmental that they had the assistance or the benefit ofshooting some B cam or something during storm, but it is absolutely torrential as it comes

(50:46):
down and it keeps on going on.
So it's another example of what this movie likes to do, which is put people in a settingthat is ultimately foreign and have this
sort of symphony of elements or sounds around them, lack of light or whatever that arejust bearing down on them.
And it really takes this whole sequence here and makes it something really unique.

(51:10):
It didn't need to be in the rain.
But the fact that they did it the way they did to such an extent is incredible.
In some movies you can see the line where like the rain machine ends.
You can see that off in the distance, but not here.
And then the pro the effects on the babies when they come across like the one in the netand then there's the dead one there.
mean, those are, it's really great effect.

(51:32):
disturbing.
Yeah, very.
mean, like, like it is affecting to see those.
And it takes us back to the very beginning of the movie at the hospital where babies andyeah, and all of that.
it's plain, it does have some notes that it returns to in a pretty effective way.
Yeah.
Isley shows up, uh they go to the campsite, Isley shows up and he's presented with theevidence of contamination, which he admits he turns a blind eye to.

(51:59):
He actually says, you know, do you know about this?
And he says, I didn't want to know.
And, and I mean, honestly, here's the thing.
You know, you think a lot of his own people are probably suffering from the sameafflictions.
mean, they fish in those lakes, they hunt in those woods.
And if the whole area is contaminated and that's
That's what's happening.
That's how birth defects are getting into, not just, you know, getting into people,getting into bears, you know, whatever, that crazy raccoon, like his own people are

(52:29):
probably affected by this contamination.
Katahdin is going to show up again uh and, uh you know, things escalate quickly because,you know, like a drum of gas gets knocked over, truck goes up in flames.
And you know, the bears, it's something.
The entire group takes refuge in these tunnels below the teepees.

(52:52):
They are in those tunnels for a very long time.
Like, we spent a lot of time, like, okay, they're waiting at the bear.
Okay, still waiting.
Yeah, because there are ways that I appreciate the idea behind it.
Like they're going to be there.
We're not going to see what's going on, but you're going to hear it.
And it could be there's the potential for it to tech, you know, to maybe be moreterrifying than if you just saw more, you know, ah more bear.

(53:20):
But it just, you know, it just doesn't get there.
And it feels like we ran out of money.
I don't know if that's true.
Right.
But that's what it feels like.
They do have some great split diopter shots down there.
Yeah.
I mean, that whole seat, like at the end of it, where the bear comes in and grabs thebaby, it's, it looks, I was just complimenting the effects for the previous sequence in

(53:44):
this one.
This looks like a hand puppet coming in and, or like an oven mitt that grabs it and pulls.
They don't dwell on it too long.
Cause I think they realized what they had for that.
Get your Katahdin claw oven mitts in stores by Christmas 1979.
Make that part of your theme part that can be...
I know.

(54:05):
What's up?
Merchandise from movies that did not have nor should have had merchandise.
Oh my God.
mean, you know, the glaives will come with a warning label that we're not responsible foranybody losing their hands.
Hey look, if you don't have magic, you have no business using a glaive.
The glaive is magic!

(54:25):
Magic!
It's ridiculous.
at some point we'll have the...
God, with the glaive.
my God, the glaive and crawler.
The greatest weapon in cinema history.
That's bonkers.
It's absolutely, like, I, no, no, it's not, it's not.

(54:50):
Anyway, so the next morning, you know, or Penton Isley makes his way, you know, he offersto go to the radio tower to call for help.
Like he, he, clearly understands, you know, at least seems to understand the, the, theconsequences of his mistake, but, he's still got to pay for them.
So as he's heading up to the radio tower,
You know, Kadaden shows up and, and, know, he never gets to make that call.

(55:14):
the rest of the group find a truck to try and drive out.
And again, similarly to the tunnels, they're in that truck, they're driving for a verylong time.
And, but in a way that doesn't build suspense at all, like, you know, tons going to showup and there's just a degree of kind of get on.

(55:35):
Well, in hammering the message home as they're making the way up to the tower, it'sthrough all this area that has been deforested where it's just down trees everywhere,
climbing over the folly of man really to get up there.
So it's an interesting way for them to have to make that trek.
But the car scene, it just seems like poor man's process for a lot of it where it's justpeople in a black, like, you know, solid night, no light anywhere.

(56:05):
Which I mean, which may be realistic because you're driving at night through the woods.
There's no, but you know what?
Sometimes realistic has to give way to it's a movie and it's got to be visuallyinteresting somehow.
no problem throwing a raccoon into a fireplace.
It can give me a nice looking process shot.

(56:25):
God damn it.
And Katan does show up, he knocks over the truck.
At the same time, the mutant cub bites Maggie.
This poor woman is just, all she's been left to just, you know, carry this mutant cubaround for the last like third of the movie.

(56:46):
And, you know, everybody runs except for the poor helicopter pilot who they were carryingon a stretcher.
All he can do is just lay there, what let the mutant bear rip his head off.
And then they all retreat to the lake in hopes that Katadin can't swim except for Hectorwho tries to reason with Kaybear and fails.

(57:06):
Yeah.
And that head is not going to be the last thing Katahdin
This scene is a contender for best in the movie as well.
Like if there's an AB for sequences that you really need to put on the highlight reel,this is going to be.
not be mad at calling this the best.
uh
I still think it's that the explosion of the sleeping bag is sublime and out of nowhere.

(57:32):
it's so here it's a more drawn out thing, like, so they make it to the other side of thislake and then they're just sitting on the dock, just watching.
Katadin leisurely made way, making his way across the lake and they're...
They're like hoping it drowns.
Dr.
Bob starts shouting it's drowned.
But then of course it pops up again and just like, you know, attacks them.

(57:56):
That's what's going to happen.
And they barricade themselves in a cabin and
Wait, wait, wait, wait, don't skip over this.
Let's go too fast.
Let's go too fast!
You're going way too fast.
You're excited to get to the cabin.
The shot in this sequence, the shot is a wide shot of the bear flake with someone in itsmouth whipping its head back and forth as this dummy is flailing around.

(58:24):
is absolutely epic.
could be painting an action figure.
Something needs to be made of that moment in this film.
want to play set.
That gives me some options where we have sleeping bag worm kid who gets slammed into arock and becomes feathers.
And we also have the bear with some sort of automated head, like one of those annoyingoffice things that are controlled by solar that drive everyone around you nuts.

(58:51):
One of those where the bear's head's just back and forth lolling with a body and itsteeth.
It is incredible.
is not too late for a line of prophecy action figures.
It's never too late.
I'd buy them, you know, again, we already have the treasure of the four crowns playset.
There's no reason why we can't have a really high quality Katahdin, you know, uh actionfigure and playset.

(59:17):
Absolutely.
If you're listening, NECA, come on.
Absolutely.
But they eventually do make their way into this cabin where they barricade themselves.
But that's not stopping this mutant bear.
Because like the grizzly, in grizzly, it just rips this cabin wide open.

(59:37):
Well, it's very tall.
We haven't talked about the scale of the thing and it is absolutely huge and it'spresented that way the whole film.
mean, they do a good job of its scale in relation to everything and everyone else.
And this, this sequence is just nuts as the cabin's collapsing in and beams are falling onpeople and you get to see full frontal bear.

(59:58):
It is not a bunch of cutaways.
is here.
no, it's like the demon in Night of the Demon.
At the end, they're going to give you the whole thing.
Yeah, there's a big fight.
They're shooting at the bear with arrows and bullets.
It kills Hawks.

(01:00:19):
And then it picks up Dr.
Bob, who's just stabbing the thing with an arrow, and he just keeps going at it and leapsat it like a maniac.
stabbing the bear until, you know, finally it sort of slides into the water.
It's an explosion of violence that you kind of feel Dr.
Bob has just under the surface this entire movie.

(01:00:42):
Like, I will say I buy that he goes psycho at the end.
Yeah.
Absolutely.
100%.
100%.
And then we see the Verne's, they're flying away from Maine in a little plane.
There's no word given on, uh you know, the mutant baby that Maggie is possibly carrying.
sequel.
Yeah.

(01:01:02):
I mean, there you go.
But as they fly off, you see the plane flying off through the air, another mutant bear.
pops up into frame.
It's the male, I think.
The female was the one that they fought through the movie, but here's the male.
again, this movie feels like two bears are battling inside of it for control.

(01:01:25):
One is a serious drama about the plight of indigenous peoples, and the other has a mutantbear tearing people's heads off.
It's...
It's fascinating.
It's a fascinating movie.
I don't think it entirely works, but it is really something.
At least it keeps moving and there's enough action in it to keep you engaged.

(01:01:45):
when it delivers, it does.
If you're here for creature mayhem, if you're here for gigantic mutant bear, mean, itreally does, it gives you that.
There's so many movies that short us on the creature.
And this is not one of them.
It does not commit that crime, which I think is the greatest sin a creature feature couldcommit.
That's what people are here for.
The other things, ideally you don't want just that, you want more.

(01:02:11):
But at the very least, you need that moment where Brody is throwing the chum in the waterand the shark pops up.
Yeah.
And, you know, people often talk about, it's the icing on the cake.
the thing is that sometimes in our next movie does do this.
They serve cake without the icing and that's not good.

(01:02:32):
I want icing on my cake.
it is, uh, yeah, this movie look, it is what it is.
I do find it interesting that a lot of the movies in one fashion or another so far intrying to.
Follow jaws felt the need to inject, you know, uh, something about society, politics,whatever.

(01:02:57):
Um, not Orca or went at different route.
uh I find it very interesting.
And I know at least for some of the films coming up, we will get more of that as well.
because it's, it's something that is not a part of the original that they're, they'refollowing, but it seems to have happened very fast that everyone.

(01:03:18):
you know, grabbed on to, oh, you know, we're in an age with new environmentalism and thatit would fit so perfectly and that a lot of people really are just going that route.
It gives you a reason, it gives you a sort of why now, rather than, you know, mean, infairness, in Jaws, they've done nothing to attract this shark.

(01:03:39):
It's just sort of the randomness of the world, is this shark has showed up and is now kindof, you know, hunting around the area of Amity.
And I think there's the desire to, well, we need to give a reason, and sort of man has tobe the ultimate cause.
That's often a thing in sequels in horror too, where, okay, where do we go now?

(01:04:00):
All right, well now it's she's Michael's sister or whatever it might be.
There's a need to explain, but we always look back at the originals that are moreambiguous and go, thank God that was more ambiguous because it just is, it offers
something more to the audience than giving everything served up to you that way.
in terms of Halloween, I mean, which you referenced there, you know, just evil sort ofshowed up in this child, in this little boy, is somehow, is much more unsettling than he's

(01:04:33):
going after his sibling.
yeah, definitely.
then, cause that movie is, it's like Jaws in the sense that it is a predator entering thespace where you exist.
But the big difference and what made Halloween work so well is that it was a sacred space.
Your home is supposed to be where you are comfortable, safe and free from harm.

(01:04:57):
Right.
And that's exactly where he appeared.
And so in Jaws, like we were talking about on that episode, the best way to avoid gettingeaten by a shark.
Don't go in the water.
way to avoid getting killed, you're punched in your sleeping bag into feathers on amountain by a bear that's like 40 feet tall.
Yeah, don't go to the mountains in the wilderness like this.

(01:05:19):
Just don't.
Our second film today shifts from the forests of Maine to the deserts of New Mexico,trading a mutant bear for a massive flock of vampire bats.
But beyond that is a film with lot of similar elements and similar problems.
Also released in June of 1979, just one week after Prophecy, this is Nightwish.

(01:05:45):
What is it that you fear the most?
Is it the dark?
Or is it something that waits in the dark?
Something so perfect in its evil that it has remained unchanged since the beginning oftime.
Something that has no fear of man.
Something out there waiting for the light to fade.

(01:06:12):
Nightwing.
Let Chief find out what bled your animal to death.
Made bite marks no one's ever seen.
And let the stink of ammonia...
They filled the sky.
It was like the end of the world.
And each species of life gives something in return for its own existence.
All but one, the Freak.

(01:06:33):
The vampire battle owners, that species.
you

(01:07:14):
Nightwing.
Nightwing, not to be confused with the name Dick Grayson took after he quit being Robin,is the rare double get me another project because the film was definitely trying to
capitalize on the success of the movie Jaws, but the novel on which it's based by MartinCruz Smith was attempting to capitalize on the success of the novel Jaws.

(01:07:38):
The film was written by Martin Cruz Smith along with Steve Shagan,
and Bud Schrake.
It was directed by future DGA and Academy president Arthur Hiller, who had a longdirecting career, basically directing every kind of movie except horror.
This was his only horror movie and he's probably best known for 1970s love story, a moviewith one of the stupidest, but nevertheless famous lines in film history.

(01:08:08):
Love means never having to say you're sorry.
That's
Bullshit.
uh Nightwing is set on the reservations of the Southwest, revolving around the smallerMascay tribe and the larger Pahana tribe, fictionalized versions of the Hopi and the
Navajo respectively.

(01:08:28):
Interestingly, the novel used the actual tribe names, but they were changed tofictionalized versions for the film.
Nightwing stars Nick Mancuso, who was the voice of Billy in Black
Christmas amazingly.
And as well as the lead of the NBC series Stingray.
And he plays Maskay tribal deputy Youngman Durant, although Mancuso himself was not nativeAmerican.

(01:08:54):
So again, this is interesting because in, in prophecy, we have a white lead character.
The natives play supporting roles here.
We actually take the step of a native American character as the, as the protagonist,although it's still played by
a person not of Native American descent.

(01:09:14):
Yeah.
And it's, and what, not the only person in this movie who will be, uh, doing that, butit's this one, it's interesting.
And I, again, I'll just say it up top.
So I won't keep repeating myself, obviously that the casting is, is an issue from themodern perspective.
One thing that I find interesting is that because this movie does have many more realcharacters.

(01:09:42):
that are Native American, at least in the world of the story, if not in fact, um itactually winds up presenting a much more varied picture of Native Americans.
They are not a monolith.
There are different viewpoints.
And so from that standpoint, it maybe does slightly better ah in that aspect thanprophecy.

(01:10:05):
um There are other glaring obvious problems though, and, you know, clear
lack of research on some very basic elements ah that really hamper it.
I, you know, I don't know that anything in here is super real, you know.
I did try to look into the mythological underpinnings and could find nothing.

(01:10:29):
Like at least there was some, like they changed names and that sort of thing for prophecy.
And obviously they made a lot of changes, but I felt like there was a basis for it.
Here it seems entirely manufactured whole cloth.
The film also stars Catherine Harald, Steven Mocked, and one of my favorite characteractors of all time, David Warner.

(01:10:51):
Warner was in so many movies from The Omen to Time After Time to Tron, to Teenage MutantNinja Turtles 2 The Secret of the Ooze.
He is my favorite Bob Cratchit opposite George C.
Scott's Ebenezer Scrooge.
ah And if you need an actor to sound credible saying some crazy bullshit, David Warner wasyour guy.

(01:11:14):
The marks come from the incisor teeth of vampire bats.
The blood loss and the ammonia are one in the same.
Vampires consume one and a half times their weight in blood.
They piss the excess out so they can get airborne again.
That excess blood turns into ammonia.

(01:11:34):
Make no mistake.
There's a highly intelligent colony of vampire bats roosting in a great cave somewhere inthese canyons.
Their attacks inevitably will be drawn closer to mass human dwellings.
And with these attacks come the bubonic plague.
That's what you've got to face, Terrific.

(01:11:54):
And Moct is great too.
Moct is...
Everything he's in is...
He's outstanding.
And it's what Rob was mentioning.
He plays basically the tribal leader of the larger tribe.
And you get differing viewpoints on these very real issues, economic issues, issues ofpoverty, issues of access to education and health care.

(01:12:21):
And you do get differing points of view that I think make it a little bit more textured inregards to dealing with those issues.
And I find it interesting that you get this very weird twisted version of Jaws's BrodyHooper Quint, uh you know, Triumvirate or whatever.

(01:12:42):
Yeah.
Where Dr.
Payne, played by David Warner, is the Anglo scientist, right?
Right.
And he's pure science, uh very Hooper in that way.
um Where his loyalties lie, whether they're with Chi or with Duran,
That's up for grabs during the movie and will change at various points.

(01:13:02):
And then you get, uh, you know, Dran, who is our hero, you know, let me go with Walker,Walker Chi first, I guess, you know, he thinks that he's bridging the two worlds, right?
Right.
He can walk in the world of, his tribe, but also knows the Anglo world and went to theircolleges and can kind of navigate that for his and his tribe's benefit.

(01:13:25):
There's kind of a.
Cheesemo about him that, that feels very Quint that he thinks he's the realist, but it's,it's a much different flavor because he's not Quint.
would also say is the traditionalist, which she is not.
then that gets us into Duran who winds up in a way kind of becoming a version of atraditionalist, although different from some that he's presented with, with Abner, right?

(01:13:52):
He chooses a slightly different path.
Right.
It's interesting to see those pieces juggled.
I don't know that they were necessarily totally modeled to be a Brody Hooperquint, youknow, threesome, but it does look, it's interesting that it serves similar functions, but
you know, definitely crafty for this for this story instead.
And pain definitely has elements of both Hooper in sort of the technological, the, the,you know, the educated side, but he also has elements of Quint with his sheer hatred of

(01:14:23):
vampire bats.
Like he hates vampire bats more than anybody has hated anything.
It's amazing.
And I love hearing him talk about how they're just evil.
It's like listening to Donald Pleasance, another one of my favorite characters talk aboutMichael Myers.
But even more, mean, he is so over the top about this as though it is a personal vendettafor him and that sequence where he starts just laying into why it is so big and so kind of

(01:14:52):
ridiculous that you're like, man, how, what in life am I this passionate about?
I can't think of a single thing, not even my son.
There's nothing in this world that means as much to me as his hatred does.
That he really, it's just honestly, it's something to behold.
Just kidding about my son, by the way.

(01:15:13):
I love him dearly, much more than vampire back.
Do you love him more than killing a vampire?
uh
oh So yeah, we're introduced to, oh, I should start.
Like the previous film, we get some absolutely terrific landscapes here of another kind.
They are of the Southwestern desert.

(01:15:35):
And some of the desert photography is absolutely gorgeous.
uh And we see this alone figure standing on this rocky outcropping, his arms outstretched.
We don't know who he is or what's going on.
And then we cut to.
uh Tribal Deputy Duran, who's investigating a call about a rancher's horses that have beenfound dead.

(01:15:58):
And I wanted to mention as he's driving out to this ranch, he's listening to the weatherforecast and it's talking about how it's going to be really hot.
forget, you know, breaking records and how you might want to, you know, you might want tostick to your swimming pools.
But it's interesting because this is clearly just a, this is a radio station.

(01:16:19):
You know, it's not a tribal radio station.
This is just a commercial radio station.
And as we're going to see very soon, the people on the reservations don't have swimmingpools at their homes because the level of poverty is very, you know, there's a lot of it.
And even when Duran arrives at the ranch, the rancher asks him, where have you been?

(01:16:41):
And he says, cleaning swimming pools.
Someone had a fetish.
That's what that is.
There's this immediate sense of the social and economic order and where Native Americansfall into that.
And it's done very well.
And the song on the radio, by the way, Crystal Gale singing, Don't Make My Brown Eyes TurnBlue.

(01:17:05):
No comment.
So at the beginning, we talked about the beautiful scenery.
There's the music there is beautiful too.
I really liked that score at the beginning.
Henry Mancini did the score for this movie.
it's really, really beautiful.
And then when they show up, everyone's wearing cowboy hats.
There's not a cow in sight, in fact.
It's true.
All of them cowboy hats for all.

(01:17:29):
There are more cowboy hats in this movie than bats.
Well, when the bats do show up, they show up.
There are a lot of them when they come in.
Takes a time to get there.
Imagine a swarm of cowboy hats.
Now that would be terrifying.
Well, yeah, that would be terrifying.
So we're introduced to Walker Chi here, who is the tribal councilman of the Naming Pahanatribe.

(01:17:54):
They're much larger.
They have more money.
They can afford whirlybirds.
oh But even in the context of tribal relations, the mask guy appear to be at the bottom ofthe ladder.
We also learn that shale oil has been discovered in the area, and Walker wants to use
you know, the discovery of oil on the reservation land to kind of help raise the standardof living among the Native American people.

(01:18:23):
Well, you forgot something pretty crucial in the cowboy hat scene where they're showing upbecause there's, my notes say, not a cow in sight, just dead horses.
Well, yeah, I was going to get to the dead horses.
That that.
Yes, that I did.
I did.
I changed the order of them.
Yes.
So the horses are all dead and nobody can figure out why.

(01:18:44):
Uh, because, you know, they say, is it a coyote?
No, you want to hurt a coyote.
You know, it's the, these aren't the bite marks that a coyote.
And they also say something that I made note of because it's absolutely puzzling and thisis what indicates, this is like what seals the deal for everyone to understand that it
wasn't coyotes.
About the cow, or I mean about the horse on the ground.

(01:19:05):
It says, or he said, she didn't kick anything, her hooves are smooth.
Does that mean that when a horse kicks something, no matter what that is, like a coyotecomparatively to let's say a rock you throw a kid into in a sleeping bag, pretty soft by
and by?
Right.
would that leave a mark on the hoof of a horse?

(01:19:25):
Why would that be the telling sign of the fact that this wasn't a coyote or something likethat?
I don't understand the marking on the hoof thing and your research, Chris, because you doan amazing job with research.
Did you get into hoof marks?
I did not get into horse hoof research and that is my that is my that is my fault I shouldhave in hindsight because I did note that line and I did note that I didn't know what it

(01:19:49):
meant I just chalked it up to I don't know a lot about
I mean, I've ridden a horse, but it's been a long time and uh I could claim expertise onmany, many things, but horses are not necessarily one of them.
actually did get kicked off a horse once.

(01:20:09):
It was a miniature horse that my aunt and uncle had at some point.
my God.
its name was Star.
I thought because it wasn't a huge horse.
I mean, it's not a tiny, like one of those baby ones you see.
Right.
But it was what they call the miniature horse.
And I was riding it and it kicked me off and it did step on me.
I did not examine the hoof.
There was a mark there.
Yeah.
Yeah.

(01:20:29):
But I guess, I mean, I don't hold a grudge against horses for that.
I mean, it's good.
You shouldn't hold the grudge against all...
when, it was an experience that I had that maybe did something to me.
I don't think I'm helping a lot on this one.
But something else that they discover with this dead horse is Chekhov's ammonia smell.

(01:20:51):
Yes.
Yeah.
The smell of ammonia, the inexplicable smell of ammonia in the air, which nobody canexplain and will be explained later in the movie, but that's sort of, you know, this is
something unusual, you know, and we'll see.
Duran then goes to see Abner, played by George Clutzy from Prophecy, again, in a somewhatsimilar role as the sort of elder of the tribe.

(01:21:16):
And he's a medicine man and a priest.
He's the guy we saw standing on the rock.
at the opening and uh he's a pretty bitter guy, which I can understand given the state ofthings.
ah And he's apparently Duran's uncle, the two clearly have a long history and Abner tellsDuran that he has decided it is time for everyone to die and he has decided to end the

(01:21:43):
world.
So, that's something, you know?
I mean, he's decided to end the world, you know?
And I mean, hey, listen.
the world's a tough place and sometimes it can be frustrating.
I'm not entirely unsympathetic to his viewpoint here.
I mean, I'm not actually gonna do it, but you know, I can imagine the frustration this guymust feel.

(01:22:04):
And to do that, he's called upon Yahweh, the Maskei God of Death, to bring about the endof all things.
um Again, I did a little research.
I couldn't find any...
Hopi or Navajo spirit by that name or anything close to that whatsoever in the mythologiesof the people of Southwestern North America.

(01:22:25):
It's, uh yeah, I think it's just made up.
I also want to mention Duran thinks that his uncle is just high on the psychotropic Daturaroute, which admittedly he is.
This guy's high as a kite.
This is one where I like, it's not like things need to be explained why, you know, someonemight be harboring some ill will in that situation, but it does feel like to get dropped

(01:22:50):
in so quickly to it, I would have appreciated a little bit more with Abner before thispoint.
Like I'm not even going to pitch on what it would be, but it just feels like it feels likethe first time you meet Thanos, he's snapping everyone.
like it's a universal way.
It's very fast.
Also, he drops it in so casually as, decided to end the world, like, I decided to go tothe store, or I decided to buy new shoes.

(01:23:17):
It's, I decided to end the world.
Well, that's a thing.
Yeah, and it, you know, in this scene, it works for me.
But as the, as the story goes on, because spoiler alert, Abner is in many ways the villainof the piece.
I felt that, you know, I would have liked a little bit more with him or, or learning morebeyond just kind of the general that I feel that we get.

(01:23:44):
Yeah, no, I agree.
agree.
Duran then goes visits his girlfriend Annie, who is a white woman who runs a clinic on thereservation and is frustrated by the lack of money and facilities, which I understand
because when we first see her, she's delivering a baby in a room that absolutely does notlook sterile.
I was just like, this is not a place to deliver a baby.

(01:24:06):
my God.
And I think this movie does really well, perhaps even better than prophecy, showcasing
the socioeconomic conditions that Native American tribes face and the continual struggleto improve that situation.
And it's a world that most Americans, including myself, because it's not like I've spent alot of time in that world, it's a world that most Americans never see.

(01:24:31):
for two on babies today.
oh
You're right.
Two for two on babies.
Two for two on helicopters, two for two on babies.
But the flip side to that is while I do think it presents this world in a really, in a waythat I think is really interesting, it also means that this movie is kind of slow off the
tee.

(01:24:53):
it's just a little slow out of the gate for a movie that is promising some vampire bataction.
A little slow?
You mispronounced this.
Actually, you can just remove a little.
It's v- This movie is slow.
Period.
Yes.
Even once we get to the vampire bat action, it slows down again afterwards.

(01:25:14):
It's like the film equivalent of driving across the state of Oklahoma.
It just takes forever and it's flat and there's nothing to look at and no offense toanyone from Oklahoma, but it is such a uh challenge to get through.
And Rob, when I messaged that to both you guys in our chat, uh Rob, you mentioned thatprophecy was the one that you struggled with a little bit more.

(01:25:35):
So with this one here, you felt that it had a little more to it,
Well, I'll put it this way, because even in prophecy where you do get more creature actionand that creature action is bonkers and very fun, right?
The bulk of that movie is not the creature action.
It's everything else.
And while this movie's fault is that it might focus a little too much on the everythingelse, and even with its good intentions, doesn't quite get it right.

(01:26:02):
But the everything else in this movie is a million times better for me.
than everything else in prophecy.
So that's why the long stretches waiting, I was more engaged with the actors in thismovie, uh, than in prophecy.
But if you were going to point blank, say we want to watch a creature feature tonight,which one should we watch prophecy easily?

(01:26:25):
Um, yeah, for sure.
So that I think is my feeling is that, you know, I wish there was more insane vampire bataction in here and that, you know,
uh...
and that maybe some more research happened as well
Yes, yes indeed.
uh So Duran and Annie, they go for a dip in this natural hot tub, which you know, that's anatural hot tub, that's not nothing.

(01:26:51):
And she tells him that she's been accepted to medical school at Baylor University inHouston.
Guys, is he supportive of this?
Oh, his reaction is awful.
Terrible, absolutely terrible.
Like Jesus Christ.
it's like, you know, you just, like, oh, wow, you know, I guess I'm jealous.

(01:27:12):
It's it's really like, honestly, both of the protagonists in today's movies are guys whocannot get it together to be supportive of the women in their lives for a love normal.
In a Jaws related way, a movie that gets this moment better is Jaws 3.
In Jaws 3, the news is delivered that one of the characters got a job somewhere else andthey're both like, okay, well, we'll figure this out.

(01:27:39):
We're going to get this.
know, progress isn't always easy and stuff.
That's in Jaws 3 with that still sharp that makes its way through the glass for theaudience in 3D without moving a fin.
That's Jaws 3 that has the sense to do that.
But here.
This guy just turns into like instant creep, just like one of these internet trolls whotry to hit on girls and then go all anti whatever when they get turned down.

(01:28:03):
mean, that's what this guy is here.
And by the way, how are they not boiling to death in whatever cesspool they're in?
This looks like, uh you know, just like you have the hair thing and we, you whatever elsefor me, is couples in filthy filthy environments being intimate and no, they're not
getting it on here.
Thank God, but it's a romantic scene and they are essentially in boiling mud and I don'tunderstand what this thing is.

(01:28:30):
well, especially after the everything so hot announcement that we had earlier.
Yeah.
I will say Duran does react poorly, but this movie and look, there's a million ways youcan do it.
This movie does at least deal with that.
You know, she calls him out on it.
Yep.
Like Annie or Anne, excuse me.
Anne tells him that he's being a jerk.

(01:28:52):
That's true and unreasonable.
And he then eventually does come clean that he's essentially worried about losing her tosome
you know, some guy at college and you know, he admits to being jealous and he labels it.
And again, I don't always need characters to behave in the best ways or whatever.
here he didn't, but at least I feel this was a way of dealing with it.

(01:29:15):
The movie acknowledged it.
Whereas in prophecy, I
It's still unacknowledged by the end of prophecy.
Like, Dr.
Bob doesn't change.
They just treat him like a hero.
And I feel like I've been watching like Will Ferrell in that movie.
At least like Duran is is flawed and not perfect.
But I think oftentimes the movie will actually knows that that knows that it's creating aflawed character and will somehow, you know, use it or deal with it.

(01:29:44):
Yeah, yeah.
That night, the still unseen flock of bats attack a herd of sheep and its attendantshepherd.
And while we have not seen these things yet, mean, honestly, the sound is horrifying.
Like that is one thing that the movie does very well is the sound of these creatures.

(01:30:06):
It's just like, God, it's terrifying.
It reminded me in effect, if not in it's not the actual sound, but it reminded me a lot ofthat bird sound in the birds.
Oh, sure.
You're getting where you're getting that flock of animals, the higher pitch and it is alittle, you know, it's it's very unsettling.

(01:30:27):
Yeah, no, that's good point.
And the scene ends weird.
It's very abrupt where it shows the person crawling away and then it freezes frame andthen it hard cuts to the next scene.
I was left wondering, did they mean to leave this in there?
Was this a trim that didn't get thrown on the floor?
It is.
Yeah, it's jarring.
The next day, Duran arrives at Abner's place to find him dead, his face covered in bitemarks.

(01:30:53):
ah You know, and that's emotional for him because, you you get the impression that Abnerhad been an important person in his life for a long time.
he does the movie thing where he closes the eyelids.
Yes.
Yeah, well, you know, gotta, you gotta, that way the audience knows, well, he's dead.
You know, that's...
We have interluted a trading post with a former missionary who is now just sort of thelocal asshole?

(01:31:18):
Like this guy.
my god.
Yeah.
Played by Strother Martin.
Yes.
Yes.
Um, my God.
And in this scene, less so in later scenes, but in this scene, when you come in, he istalking loud in this tone of voice that he sounds like David Lynch's FBI agent, Gordon.
It's amazing.

(01:31:39):
Except he's talking about like, please take my daughter.
Yeah.
That's the running gag throughout this movie.
And
don't even care.
Like it doesn't really lead anywhere.
Just give me Strother Martin.
Sure.
My notes in all caps Strother Martin is drunk.
He's slurring all of his words.

(01:32:00):
just tell me he wasn't drinking on set.
uh I can't do that, can't do that, it's possible.
uh Yeah, it's just, and he, this character, but his characters don't really go anywhere.
It's like interesting because he shows up in like one more scene.
My guess is that these might have been characters that had more full arcs in the bookthan, you know, the problem of adaptation where it's cut down in the movie.

(01:32:28):
They didn't want to excise the character completely, but he doesn't really play a roleexcept for.
You know, trying to get Duran to marry one of his daughters.
Yeah, mean, guess thematically there's some stuff where Selwyn's character kind of fits inwith the tensions between the Native American tribes and the Anglo world.
it doesn't really go anywhere, but I'm glad to see him on screen.

(01:32:53):
It's interesting, there's a former missionary and here you have Annie is taking a group ofChristian missionaries out to camp in the desert.
there's also, know, aside from sort of the cultural and economic fault lines in thiscommunity, there's also religious fault lines between, you know, the people that follow

(01:33:16):
the old ways and the Christians who have come in and often proselytize.
And so when is the Christian version of that?
I mean, at one point he has that little uh dialogue about when he first came there,however many years ago, decades ago, that he was full of the word and that now not so
much.
Not so much.

(01:33:37):
Now not so much.
Duran returns to Abner's home to find a stranger there.
Philip Payne, David Warner's character.
And Philip Payne is basically the Van Helsing of vampire bats.
Not vampires, but vampire bats.
And he has been tracking a colony of them up from Mexico.

(01:34:00):
And Duran like thinks he's violating the body.
So he kind of throws them out of their gun point.
And again, this is where David Warner, just think is great because any nonsense soundsgood coming out of him.
he is, he's just messing around with a dead guy.
Yeah, but without any consultation with anyone.
I mean, if he knows, if he's out here doing research and all of that, he can explain thatto someone, get access to the body, ask questions about what happened.

(01:34:27):
But somehow he happened upon the cabin and we're to believe that he just assumes there's adead guy in there.
He, or he's checking every cabin.
says.
saw the buzzards like that's the
That's right.
said, okay, okay.
Well, so then he just takes it upon himself to walk in and just start monkeying aroundwith the corpse.
So I don't, I don't think the reaction to his being there is wrong.

(01:34:49):
Yeah, but he's got vampire bats to kill and he really hates
the- I know.
The whole Southwest could be at risk!
And he doesn't work for anybody.
He's got a grant.
uh Later, Duran buries Abner's body in the desert.

(01:35:13):
He notices wounds bleeding through the burial shroud.
That was a very creepy moment.
We don't see wounds.
We just see blood starting to ooze through the bag, which by the way has two eye holes cutin it.
And they're not even, they wouldn't even be where the eyes are.
It's very, uh.
Weird?
It's weird, it's unsettling.

(01:35:33):
Yeah.
The blood thing, yeah, you're right.
I assume it's from wounds, but we don't see it because it's just through the shroud.
And it's a lot of blood.
my god.
It's a lot.
It is a lot.
And then he later burns Abner's house.
I guess that's what you do.
Which, know, Abner's house is kind of off on its own, so I guess that's okay.
If it's in a more residential neighborhood, it would be a problem.

(01:35:56):
And then Payne visits Walker.
and he warns, we get the whole spiel about the presence of vampire bats in the area.
uh Walker is more concerned about the presence of these creatures undermining his oildeal.
The oil deal is interesting because it comes up a lot.
It seems to be a big part of it, but it also feels very tangential to the plot of thiscolony of vampire bats.

(01:36:23):
Like it's not uninteresting because Walker is determined to secure the deal to benefit
know, his tribe and you know, but it's straight, again, I think it's one of those thingsthat is more, probably more fleshed out in the novel because of it's a novel rather than a
movie.
two stories don't quite connect except in the physical location at the end, where it willturn out that where they would want to mine is where the bats are hanging out.

(01:36:53):
which is the most sacred place for the Mascay people.
And it's interesting because Walker argues that the money for schools and hospitals ismore important than some place that is considered sacred or whatever religious tradition
or which he might see as superstition.
Hey, the well-being of our people is more important than that.

(01:37:16):
And it's an interesting kind of debate that's going on.
Yeah, and interesting too, that Walker, we do get to see his office and clearly Walkerhimself has money.
Right.
It's not just all for the tribe.
he's got a translucent map on his wall that I thought was amazing.
It's it is pretty awesome.

(01:37:37):
But we're never shown anything, you know, even in it to infer that he isn't also actuallydelivering the goods for his tribe.
Right.
Right.
It's not a it's not like Biff impact that you're interested to.
I don't think he's stealing at all.
What is often happens?
He's I'm the one in charge.
So he probably gets paid the big salary, too.

(01:37:59):
But I don't think he's siphoning everything away.
So it's it's interesting that he's not the total
you know, bad guy in that way.
And yet there comes a point where he seems like he's willing to kill Duran to try to makesure that his deep the the oil shale deal arrested.
Yeah, I mean, it's he's going to do harm to Duran in one sense or another.

(01:38:23):
And it is, uh you know, it's it's interesting um that it is like so gray in that way thathe feels so strongly.
uh
That he's not going to let this one man stand in the way of everything that he wants tohave happen.
It's also interesting that the situation here is almost the reverse of prophecy.

(01:38:44):
Like there, industrial activity is presented as a direct threat to the lives of theindigenous people, literally their health and wellbeing.
Whereas here, to some degree, it actually offers a hope, like, and the promise ofimproving the conditions of life on the reservation, even if that improvement

(01:39:10):
And mean, and in the, the, go with that in prophecy, what the, pollution of the white guyscreates the problem of the mutant bear and other, and other animals, the crazy raccoons as
well.
Whereas here it's the reaction to kind of the Anglo world, as they say in the film, uh,that spurs one of the native American characters to, you know, essentially call up.

(01:39:40):
the vampire bat threat.
Yeah.
And, then, you know, and you've got another one of his tribe is the one fighting to stopit.
I also want to mention these vampire bats, now they're not mutants, know, like, you know,Piranha or the aforementioned bear, but they do as a special bonus carry bubonic plague.

(01:40:02):
So they are plague infested vampire bats.
But what I love is pain does say later on in the movie, if you come up against one bat,you might survive their bite.
You you might survive even the plague that they carry.
Right.
But if a whole swarm get you and they're all gnashing you, you'll bleed out in seconds.

(01:40:24):
What?
But here's the thing, guys.
It's about 45 minutes into this movie and we haven't seen one of these bats.
I think we need to see a bat at some point.
Yeah, well, don't get your hopes up.
There's going to be about three minutes of bad action in this.
But it's coming now with Annie and she's out in the desert with her group of Christians.
uh you know, like the family and prophecy, they're going to be the fodders for thesecreatures.

(01:40:50):
again, we talked about total shifts in the last film.
Holy shit, does this movie turn on a dime with this scene that you have the folks sittingaround the campfire, they're singing songs, they're talking about blasphemy and stuff like
that.
And then they hear something in the distance and guys, the bats show up and it iscompletely insane.

(01:41:14):
And I found it highly entertaining.
And why was Bray Bradbury there?
That's a guy who looked like a skinny Ray Bradbury.
my god, yeah, he's got the white hair.
It doesn't look like anyone's really getting hurt so much.
It's more just like inconvenienced.
It's like their gnats flying around them.
But eventually we see some of the damage.
Yeah.

(01:41:34):
I like biting people's faces.
it's, really, it, here's the thing about the bats is that they are both, I thought kind ofcool and also not impressive at the same time, depending on the shot, because there's
moments where you have the closeups of the bat and they were created by creature designer,Carlo Rambaldi, who we've seen his work in movies like Dune and Conan the destroyer and,

(01:42:02):
close up, they're kind of amazing.
Like you have these closeups of them biting the people and the blood is coming out.
But there are other times where it's like the bats are flying overhead and it feels very,very processed.
Well, there's lots of animated bats in this.
Yeah, there's a lot of stop, there's some stop motion back.

(01:42:23):
Yeah, and when you have a wide shot of the entire group and then like 30 bats that areflying in front of them, whether it's optical or animated or some combo, I really expected
some coat hangers to come out.
It's a little birdemic.
It is a little birdemic, my goodness.
mean, but I mean, the scene is incredible for the sheer pandemonium.

(01:42:47):
Like, thankfully, Annie had gone back to the van to get something just before the badattack.
But like the others are running around, their faces are being bit.
One woman falls into a campfire.
Like the others are trying to get into van and they can't.
do it and it's like this comedy of errors where they can't open the door and and one womanhides under the van which is a bad choice because that van's gonna take off with her

(01:43:16):
underneath it like you have this shot where like the wheel is coming right for her faceand it's it is bat pandemonium.
I think you could say it's batshit crazy Chris.
yeah.
Highly entertaining.
ah Even even stuff that may not look the most real.
I don't care.

(01:43:36):
It's fun.
Yeah.
Absolutely, absolutely.
if it was, you know, we are shifting into bat high gear here.
Okay, hey, it's a little slow out of the gate, but the problem is that this scene isalmost kind of an island of bat craziness.
Even the climax doesn't feel as interesting as this scene.
And I should mention, as the van drives off, the guy driving it, think it's Skinny RayBradbury, finds a bat crawling from inside his sweater.

(01:44:07):
could he not know it was there?
Like I, you know, I'm not always the most aware guy, but I'd feel a bat in my shirt.
It is the sneakiest bat ever.
And of course that causes the van to like drive off the road and crash.
But you know, there we go.
the, I will say the film, there's a great scene that follows this.

(01:44:28):
I really liked where we have an authentic rain, what I assume is an authentic rain danceceremony, like filmed on location.
I thought that was cool.
Cause it's not something you often see.
I love the eagle headdresses that the dancers were wearing.
Like it's very, very cool.
ah
And Duran is talking to some of the tribal elders, uh one of whom tells him that Abnerappeared to him to say that they're going to rise up and wipe out all of the Anglos and

(01:44:59):
restore the Mascay civilization, which is interesting.
mean, there is a thing in this movie where how much is real and how much is what peoplebelieve.
Like, did Abner really summon the bats or is it just, hey,
A bat colony happens to show up when Abner's trying to end the world.
It's an open question.

(01:45:20):
Not for me, baby.
is real.
It's all real.
Magic is real.
always more interesting when the magic is real.
And it's interesting later Abner in, in talking with uh Duran after Duran has taken somedetour route.
Yeah.
Abner even says that some of the, I mean, not quite the words he uses, but even some ofthe quote unquote bad tribe members are going to get killed too.

(01:45:43):
And that's just necessary.
So it gets into an ad at the top at that time is kind of a quasi threat almost againstIran as well.
It's so that he will do the right thing.
But I find that interesting too, that you get that.
You know that the mania kind of takes over of once you start doing stuff like this who theenemy is can can expand and expand.
It always happens and it always does.

(01:46:07):
That uh is replete in history.
uh So, we have a sequence where they discover these bodies in a home, like it crawls downinto one of the houses and there's these bodies that are dead.
And that was a confusing scene for me.
was like, don't know who these people are or why.

(01:46:29):
We later learned that they're like tribal elders
who had stolen Abner's body and were therefore infected with the bubonic plague.
uh It is a confusing part of the film as we sort of propel towards the ultimate climax.
Walker tries to have Duran arrested, but Duran gives him the slip and he goes out in thedesert to look for Anne because now the bat threat is at least, people are aware of it.

(01:46:57):
uh And you know.
He eventually meets up with Payne and the two of them find Anne and uh together they'regonna go all destroy the bat colony.
And, you know, we had this amazing speech from Payne about why he hates and hunts thebats.
I mean, it is just, it is David Warner giving a terrific sweet speech about the, about hishatred of the bat.

(01:47:21):
It just doesn't seem natural for a man to spend his life, his entire life, killing bats.
Not just bats.
Vampire bats.
I kill them because they're evil.
There's a mutual grace and violence in all forms of nature.
And each species of life gives something in return for its own existence.

(01:47:43):
All but one, the freak.
The vampire bat alone is that species.
Have you ever seen one of their caves?
No.
I killed over 60,000 of them last year in Mexico.
You really understand the presence of evil when you go into their caves.
The smell of ammonia alone is enough to kill you.

(01:48:05):
The floor of the cave is a foul syrup of digested blood.
The bats.
Up high, hanging upside down, rustling, fighting, mating, sending constant messages,waiting for the light to fade, hungry for blood, coaxing the big females to wake up and
flex their night wings to leave the colony out across the land, homing in on any livingthing.

(01:48:29):
Cattle, sheep, dogs, children.
Anything with warm blood and they feast drinking the blood and pissing ammonia I kill thembecause they're the quintessence of evil to me nothing else exists The destruction of
vampire bats is what I live for
His description of this cave, of like what the cave would look and smell like.

(01:48:51):
Apparently the bats urinate blood that they drink so they can still fly and that turnsinto ammonia and he's still evocative.
you know, he's talking about how you would just like the smell alone would just beoverwhelming.
And it's like he paints a picture that and this is a problem for the movie.
He paints a picture that's incredibly evocative that when we actually reach the cave,

(01:49:16):
The cave doesn't live up to the hype.
Yeah.
And look, I talked about how great Jaws is because that's my favorite scene.
There's three guys talking around a table.
It is a problem that in this movie, my favorite bit is probably this monologue.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But this monologue isn't good enough to be the he's great.
And it don't get me wrong, but it's not.

(01:49:36):
It should never be the best point in anyone's book.
expecting some type of Indianapolis-type story about the bats to explain the hatred!
Yeah, yeah, and you don't get it.
No
Now, that said, um in the novel, apparently, we learn that his father, Payne's father,died from drowning in Batguano.

(01:49:58):
I can see why they didn't want that is the explanation for obvious reasons.
But you could change the death to be a different kind of bat related death.
I'm just saying.
oh So Durand decides there's nothing better before a confrontation with a flock of bubonicplague-invested vampire bats than taking mind-altering substances.

(01:50:27):
So he goes out and he eats some datura root.
uh And that leads him to have this whole conversation with Abner, which you alluded toearlier.
I was expecting it to lead to a moment where he goes to talk to Abner's spirit, and that'show he finds the cave.
Like he goes to talk to the spirit and then
you know, kicks the rock that reveals where the vampire bat cave is, but that doesn'treally happen.

(01:50:52):
They set up netting around Payne's van so that when the bats come, they can tag one with atracker.
And like the campsite scene earlier, the bat attack here is both effective and not.
Like there's closeups of the bats trying to squeeze their way through the netting, andthat's kind of terrifying.
But the shots of them in the air over the band are less.

(01:51:12):
All I could think of is of all the things in your Jaws, you know, inspired movie to takealmost whole hog.
It's like cage go on the ground.
You go into cage.
That's it.
Our bats!
We have our anti bat cage that they're going to do and it's electric and all the stuffthat you think will happen will happen.

(01:51:38):
It's electrified, the electricity doesn't work at first.
And they're like frantically looking around for like, why, what's wrong?
And then it turns out like, oops, the plug fell out.
Well, and the other one, don't give me a million close ups of the bat chewing a couple ofthe leads off the cage that's supposed to be happening right in front of our characters

(01:52:00):
faces and then have them not know what happened.
I know the ones at the bottom fell too, and that's different, but like those ones up topthat bats chewing on those things forever.
Yeah, yeah, those the, the, the, yeah, the bats were making a meal out of it.
Like, like David Warder's monologue.

(01:52:21):
the next day pain locates the bats and he's prepping the gas that's going to kill them.
And he falls into the cave.
So he spends the rest of the movie basically hanging from a rope in this giant cave wherethe bat colony is.
And, uh, and, and I think the cave itself is cool.
Like there's the remains of a Pueblo dwelling inside the cave.

(01:52:43):
This is the sacred spot in Mesquite culture.
You know, and it looks cool, like we were told how like overwhelming and nightmarish thiscave would be.
And it doesn't feel like that at all when we get there.
Eventually Duran and Anne find their way in the cave and it's like through another,through another, like they find another entrance to the cave.

(01:53:06):
I'm like, oh.
Too bad you didn't find that a few minutes earlier.
He wouldn't have to be hanging from the ceiling.
And it's just the problem is this climax does not live up to the bad attack from themiddle.
Like it's it's, I don't know.
Like it's a very, it's a strange scene where Duran has, you know, he's eaten more of thede Toro root.
He's seeing images of the ancestors and is living in the Pueblo.

(01:53:30):
And he's talking to, you know, he's talking to Abner.
He sees Abner's like,
spirit there and you know he starts yelling at him I'm like I'm like what what must youand think she's looking at he's just talking to nobody
why magic is real.
uh it is, I actually, you know, this one is tough.

(01:53:51):
It's not as good as the other bad attack.
you know, the 45 minute one or, or frankly, even the cave, the cage one, right.
But, uh, cause this, it feels like the, tension and the proposiveness keep getting likereleased at various points and
The other big thing is I actually even like the idea of Duran eventually realizing heneeds to close the magic circle, right?

(01:54:14):
Right.
I don't need to go into it more than that, but it's the thing essentially that Abner didat the beginning.
And I love the idea of Duran who really is, while he is somewhat respectful of the oldways, maybe didn't believe in them at the beginning.
I like the idea of him performing old magic, you know, and embracing those traditions, but

(01:54:35):
You needed something more exciting to get to that point.
Right.
You know, and then also maybe that thing could have also been more exciting.
Well, yeah, because he kind of like there's a drawing on the floor of like there's apainting on the floor similar to the one in Abner's uh house, like that he's done, you

(01:54:58):
know, that has been done.
And he takes all these shale oil rocks and puts them around the painting and closes andthen lights them on fire.
And that's kind of
Like that's kind of how, you know, like he's closing the circle.
The cave just goes up in flames.
Like the fire spreads almost comically fast.

(01:55:20):
Like, and all the bats are on fire and they're flying around and you know, it's, yeah,they're biting people.
They're freaking out.
you know, that's really the conclusion is they're setting the cave on fire.
Now, whether it's the magic closing of the circle or the fact that he lit this oil onfire,
One way or another, you're dealing with, you know, this is the conclusion of how you getrid of the vampire bat problem.

(01:55:47):
And they escape to safety.
They even carry Payne to safety.
I thought for sure Payne was gonna die like, you know, the bat equivalent of Quentin Jaws,but no, he gets out.
I don't know, maybe they wanted to save him for Nightwing 2, which didn't happen.
Yes, it was called night wings.
Um, and wing hours didn't happen.

(01:56:11):
Honestly, I love the idea of a Nightwing sequel set in a city.
Like she's at Baylor and then you have tall buildings and the oh vampire bats have takenroot in Houston or something like that.
If it's going to be a city, can we say that the spirits have had to adapt its vampirepigeons?
Ooooo m

(01:56:34):
Of course, of course.
They're flying rats.
But they all get away and, uh you know, mean, honestly though, the truth is there's no wayat least one of them doesn't take away a case of plague as a parting gift from this whole
thing.
And apparently the fire that Duran has started will burn forever, which seems at least asmuch of an environmental hazard as Mercury.

(01:56:57):
Or having the mining happen, whatever.
I the oil is no longer going to be a viable source of income, so I guess there's noschools or hospitals for the tribe, thanks to, you know, what happened.
I guess that's that.
But it will burn forever.
we end with a card saying that in recent years, vampire bats were discovered and destroyedin a cave in Val Verde County near Del Rio, Texas.

(01:57:24):
So that's a piece of information.
And it comes and goes very fast.
Very funny.
pause it.
I had to pause it.
I copied it out for, so I'd have it.
Exactly.
surprised they didn't have something to do with Reagan's Star Wars.
And that's Val Verde County was was the other earth monitoring station for the Star Warsprogram as you know, it's on the opposite side of the world as parmas

(01:57:49):
Well, there is a Val Verde County parmistan oddly enough that the one in Texas is namedafter.
Right!
Well, they're sister counties, yeah.
Yeah.
So again, both of these movies, it's funny because I paired them because they both hadsort Native American themes, but it's also interesting that they both sort of struggle

(01:58:10):
with the same tonal shifts that, know, and I also find it interesting.
think, Rob, you liked Nightwing a little bit more or perhaps Disliked Prophecy a littlebit more, and Justin, it's the reverse, who I think more
gravitated more towards prophecy and less towards Nightwing.
I'm kind of in the middle of where I'm like, they both kind of work, but kind of don't.

(01:58:32):
uh But it's interesting.
It's just an interesting pairing.
And the fact that they came out within a week of each other.
June 79 was, you know, had a very specific trend of, you know, Native American themedanimal attack movies.
And I think this one too, with you said Nightwing, you know, based on the novel.

(01:58:52):
This is another one where Jaws being based on a novel really seems to have been somethingthat they took for a lot of the movies.
Yeah.
Obviously that we've had a few that were not based on a novel also, but I feel that a lothave been.
Yeah.
People thought we need to get ourselves a book, whether it be Tinturera.
Tinturera.
You know, or whatever, you know, Nightwing.

(01:59:14):
Interesting.
Interesting.
Well, I think that that about wraps it up for today.
I think we'll be back next week with a brand new animal to menace people.
In this case, it's that flattest of reptiles, the alligator in 1980s cult classic,Alligator.
And joining us will be Aaron Dawn of the Manic Movie Monday podcast.

(01:59:35):
We're thrilled to have Aaron back on the show.
It's going to be a fantastic time.
I am excited to see Alligators crash and Alligator.
crashing through all manner of things.
I'm so excited to talk about Alligator and it's gonna be great.
So join us next week.
We'll have Aaron back and it'll be terrific.
Again, we are your hosts, Chris Iannicone, Rob Lemorgas and Justin Beam.

(01:59:59):
If you've enjoyed our show, please consider subscribing and following us on Blue Sky,Instagram, threads and Twitter, all at Get Me Another Pod.
In addition, check out the Justin Beam Radio Hour wherever you listen to podcasts.
And Justin's book, Roadside Memory, is available at JustinBeam.com or wherever books aresold.
And if you've liked the show, tell your friends about it.

(02:00:21):
Tell your enemies about it.
Tell that kid zipped up all the way in his sleeping bag about it before he explodes.
And join us next time as we continue to explore what happens when Hollywood says, get meanother.