Episode 17: Fletch Lives (1989)

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:04):
Weird way. Hello everyone, and welcome to the Chasing Chevy

(00:45):
Chase Podcast. I am one of your hosts, Christashu, and
I'm joined by my two good friends all the way
from Cambridge and with Shawn and Wake Up Heavy. He's
your friend and mine step and fetch its own Mark Begley.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Have ever been on a coon hunt?

Speaker 1 (00:59):
That's not the line. I thought you're gonna go h
okay and all the way from the projection booth, your
friend and mine, mister Michael White.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
Folks ain't home Cross rom Burn, Hell Main like it
used to be.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
I thought, Begle, you were gonna go with the line
jump up and down, turn around and pick a balah.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Yeah, that's a little too hard to remember right down.

Speaker 1 (01:19):
So and on this episode of the Chasing Chevy Chase Podcast,
if you click on the link, you know what we're
talking about. We're gonna be talking about nineteen eighty nine
sequel to one of my favorite movies, Fletch Live film
is directed once again by Michael Ritchie, written by Leon Koppetanos.
This film takes it in the pants because of the
writer's strike. Let's just get it out of the way
right here, right now, with the script the written by

(01:41):
credits that was going on during the time. It is
based on characters by Gregory MacDonald, which are technically the
move Verse movies based on the first book. This movie
is not based on any of the books. This is
a whole original story. This film does once again star
mister chevy Chase. It actually stars chevy Chase fucking novel
cons apparently once again as the titular Fletch. This time,

(02:03):
Fletch is tasked with figuring out why the land he
inherited in Louisiana is worth killing for. It is a
little bit of a conceit, a little bit of a
stretch of the conceit, And yeah, I think we're gonna
have an interesting time talking about it. I'm going to
kick it to you first, Mark Begley. We have not
been having the greatest luck with films recently, to the

(02:25):
point of frustration with you. So I am curious. Did
the film Fletch Lives break that curse with the recent
chevy Chase films or are we still low batting percentage
with chevy Chase films.

Speaker 2 (02:39):
I don't know if it broke it, but I wasn't
anticipating to dislike it or anything. Knowing you know, based
on the last two or the prior to films that
we watch Funny Money and Caddy Shack two were horrible
duds that you know, Caddyshak two, he's hardly in. So
I wasn't expecting a big letdown or anything or a

(03:01):
continuation of that. But I my thoughts throughout were just
kind of boring. I was kind of bored. I actually
dozed off for about five minutes during the movie. So, uh,
I think I haven't read any of the books, but
I think I would have preferred if they had gone
with probably one of the other books, because it's a

(03:23):
very over complicated, unnecessarily complicated story and the whole idea
of it being in Luis. This this Southern twang thing
just did not work for me. And I know that
was a big thing in the eighties and the late eighties,
the music, the zydeco, all that crap was going on.
For whatever, I blame it on Paul Simon's Graceland in

(03:45):
part because he there's a couple of zydacoe songs on
his album, and a lot of roots rock was happening then,
and everybody was, you know, getting into this music that
no one had ever really listened to outside of that
area before. But I don't know, I just didn't. I
just kind of was bored throughout.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Mike White, same question to you, my friend.

Speaker 3 (04:06):
I'm surprised you didn't just go right after Buckwheetsidico himself.
I mean, go to the source, dude, you know, come on.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
You know true? But why you know learn'd of that?
Who got interested in that? Because of what you know
what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (04:20):
I hear you.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
He was kind of the entree to like world music
back in the day. As far as the Paul Simon
of it all.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
Yeah, diamonds on the soles of their shoes, baby, that's
what I think when I think, oh yeah, Dimond like
musician Chevy Chase. I mean, one of Paul Simon's most
I think for people my age, people know him from
you can call me al music video which features Chevy
Chase very true.

Speaker 2 (04:42):
Good yeah yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:43):
And it's it's bizarre because I didn't realize that it
was Chevvy Chase singing that. I always thought it was
Paul Simon. But then you watch that video and you're
just like, oh no, Paul Simon's just over here playing
the drums and the.

Speaker 1 (04:53):
Flute so committed to Mike White.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
Yeah, I wasn't that bored with it. I feel like
the choice of villains is a little strange. We'll definitely
get into that, but yeah, I thought it was It
was all right. I like you, Mark. I kind of
wish that they had gone with a McDonald Fletch story.
I would like to see more of those. I did

(05:17):
watch Confess Fletch for this particular episode as well, just
so I could see how John Hamm plays it versus
chevy Chase, and I gotta say, man, chevy Chase is
fucking charming. I like John Hamm as well, but in
this movie, I mean, this feels like a real return
to form for chevy Chase after all of these duds
that we've been watching for the last few months. I

(05:38):
know a lot of people. I actually got some feedback
when we just put out the Spies Like Us episode
and people are like, hey, I really like that movie,
and I'm like, well, that's great. You know, you probably
watched a lot as a kid, and I didn't, so
I don't have that nostalgia tent to it. For me,
it just wasn't that enjoyable. This one. I was like, oh, okay,

(05:59):
I can see where if people like Fletcher probably liked
this movie as well. It feels like a little case
of diminishing returns. As opposed to the first Fletch movie.
I felt like the first Fletch movie had a little
bit more stakes. Like when Fletch in this movie is
accused of being a murderer, it doesn't really feel like
that matters, and it feels like they just kind of

(06:19):
they're like, okay, yeah, you can walk away, and I
guess he's out on bail, but it really just doesn't
feel like danger. They say, yeah, yeah. I just didn't
feel like there was enough there to this movie sometimes.
So I thought it was pretty good and definitely better
than a lot of stuff we've been watching lately, but
I felt like it could have gone a little bit farther.

(06:41):
I do have to say a great cast, though, I mean,
are the Ermi weird casting, Hell Whlebrook fantastic. And then
you know, of course Cleveland little who I think actually,
and you mentioned this before we started recording, you kind
of made a step and Fetcher reference there. I think
he could have played that up even more, and I

(07:02):
think he could have done you know he does that
in blazon saddles, or he's just like ooh, boss, like
that kind of stuff. I think he could have played
the dumb angle even more and maybe started to lose
it whenever he gets around Fletch. And then finally the
reveal at the end, what about you, Chris?

Speaker 1 (07:18):
Uh? Okay, So a couple things to address something that
Mike said that we've kind of alluded to already. We
spent an entire month recently watching effectively ass movies like
bad Robin Williams movies. That was an intent by Mike.
It's not something we do very often to watch again
perceivedly bad movies. I mean again, I you know, the

(07:38):
movies we watched for Robin Williams month. I don't think
they were all broadly terrible. I think that there were
some that were okay. But I understand that being a
problem and it weighing on all of us, especially with
some of the comedies, because bad comedies are I'm not
sure there's anything worse than a bad comedy. Really yeah, yeah,
there's really not. And the last two Chevy Chase movies
we've seen have been some of the best examples of

(08:01):
really poorly done comedies, especially funny Money. But Caddyshack two,
I mean, chevy Chase's involvement in that movie is completely
unnecessary and frankly it makes the film worse. I feel
his involvement in Caddyshack two primarily because it a makes
me think of caddy Shack one, which is a much
better film, even if it's not an amazing film. And again,

(08:23):
some of I mean, our opinions on Caddyshack one kind
of differ. But I love this movie. I know that
this movie is not a film that is I mean,
there's a lot of problems with this movie. I think
going to Louisiana is a fucking stretch. I think it
it It literally said, it literally takes the one of
the things that worked in the first movie of the

(08:44):
setting of la and goes, nah, this is not interesting.
Let's go to Louisiana and look not saying because look,
I did my research for this episode a long time
ago by by reading all the Fletch books before I
did my Fletch episode my show. So I've read all
the Fletch books, including the Fletch prequels, including the Fletch

(09:05):
Sun books. He does go other places Fletch goes to
Boston and confess Fletch. That is where he is both
in the book and in the film with John Hamm.
He goes to Rio de Janeiro. In the books at
the end of the first film there is a book
called Karaoka Fletch where he's in Brazil the entire book.
So Fletch does go other places. Fletch is not totally

(09:27):
bound to the city of La I will say the
chevy Chase version of Fletch seems pretty bound to the
city of la and I think that that is more
a symptom of this character of Fletch less the book
character of Fletch. The book character of Fletch is very
different from the chevy Chase Fletch, and the John ham
Fletch I think is closer to book Fletch than chevy

(09:50):
Chase's because I think we would all agree Fletch of
the movie Fletch and Fletch Lives is really just chevy Chase.
I think it's the best version of chevy Chase we
get in any of his movies. Like I genuinely don't
think chevy Chase has ever been better than as Fletch,
other than maybe Clark Griswold, but again, for me, I
always find Clark Griswold to be I mean, I know

(10:11):
that the intent is it's really hard to see this
guy as a family man, so that's part of the point.
But that like, it's not that it never worked for me,
but Fletch always felt like the embracing of the chevy
Chase of it, all of who he is I think
at his core, and I think you see that as
the person that he is. I think chevy Chase seems
like he's closer to maybe the character of Fletch on

(10:33):
screen than he is to Clark Griswold. He seems kind
of like an abrasive, self centered guy, which I mean, look,
when people are saying you're the next Bob Hope, I'm
not sure I blame you for having an inflated ego.
I just don't think it ever got there. But that's okay.
Chevy Chase is still being talked about in twenty twenty five,
and there are plenty of comedians that can't say that.

(10:53):
All of that to say, I will defend Fletch Lives
vehemently because I think it's a better sequel than it
has any right to be. I do think again, to
both of your points, it does drag. I think the
conceit is to get Fletch out of LA is fine,
but to take him somewhere like the New South in
the late eighties, I mean, I get it. We had
all those, you know, like Southern trial movies. I'm trying

(11:17):
to remember the one with like Matthew McConaughey and Samuel L. Jackson.
You know, ah, yes, they deserve to die and.

Speaker 3 (11:23):
It helps it burn in hell like Time to Kill is.

Speaker 1 (11:26):
You know, like we've got all and again the Pelican
Brief is at the same time, like the South is
kind of being embraced in a big way, and we
see it here with Fletch. I just I do wish
there was more of the La of it all. But
to be fair, and I think y'all might agree with this,
I think this kind of opens up the discussion into
some interesting directions we can go. If it had just
been another LA movie, wouldn't it have just been Caddysheck too?

(11:49):
And then we'd be saying, well, I wish they had
done something different and not just left it in LA.
And I'm like, well, they did about as fucking different
a things humanly possible, because at one point this movie
fletches singing with animated dogs and birds. So I mean again,
like if you were talking about taking a drastic right
turn from the last film, which to Mark's point, has

(12:11):
a fair bit of stakes, or I guess maybe that
was your point, Mike, this movie kind of is a
little bit more lucy goosey and a little bit I
guess sillier in tone in a lot of ways. I think.
I mean, the characters that he portrays are a lot
more like prolonged scenes, especially the faith Healer scene, Like
that's like good twenty minutes, is what it feels like.

(12:32):
That's like a two parted scene. You have the scene
when he's in the booth, then you have the scene
when he's in front of the camera. Like these feel
like a lot more prolonged jokes and a lot Sillier jokes.
And I think that's because again, they just kind of
throw the tone of the books to the wind and
say we're doing our own thing. And I mean again,
I'm curious what y'all's thoughts are on that. But you know,

(12:53):
the idea of it not being in la in my
mind is both a positive and somewhat of a negative.
And again, like if they just done La again, I
think it would have just been us complaining about something
that was like Caddi Shack too, where it's like, what's
the point, You're just doing the same first movie all
over it.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
I don't know that I have a problem with it
being in the other La Louisiana. It's just that why there,
And it leads to a lot of uncomfortable humor in
the film. I mean, the whole Cleveland little thing is.
I just kept waiting. I knew he wasn't gonna be
some dumb house slave.

Speaker 1 (13:30):
I mean, like he's supposed to be a house slave.
They make the emancipation proclamation joke. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (13:35):
I keep waiting for the break and it really doesn't
come until the very end of the film. You know
it's coming, but it takes so long to get there.
I'm like, Oh, he's doing this the whole movie. Okay, Okay.
I mean when he first shows up, I was like
a hey, yeah, yay, what you know? And I and
I get the thing with Blazing Saddles. You know, he
plays that part, but not right off the bat, you know,

(13:55):
in Blazing saddles. He plays the part to dupe, the
dupe the.

Speaker 1 (13:59):
Town folk and whatnot.

Speaker 2 (14:01):
So it's not so much the Louisiana part of it.
It's where that stuff takes some of the humor, which
is dated to say.

Speaker 1 (14:11):
Jeffrey Lewis as a clan member.

Speaker 2 (14:14):
Yeah, and and that's it. He's like in one scene,
I was like, my dude, I want to see more
Jeffrey Lewis.

Speaker 3 (14:20):
But I think jeff Lewis more Jeffrey Lewis more of
Richard Belzer as the Greek gangster that was.

Speaker 1 (14:28):
Barney Miller's own Tito Vandis, Oh yeah, what were George
more George Weiner as is as as Jellette the lawyer,
which I mean, I think they're fuck You could have
a back and forth to just the two of them
for an entire movie. Just Chack Chase.

Speaker 2 (14:47):
That tripped me out that scene where he's in his
I'm like, wait a minute, this is exactly what happens
in the first movie, am I And that tripped me
out for a second there.

Speaker 1 (14:56):
That's what I'm saying, Like that could have been all
Fletched two was was just a retread of the first movie,
but at the same time. The scene in this movie
is funny. It goes in a different direction. He takes
he tasted the sand and he starts watching it.

Speaker 2 (15:07):
Yeah, I's like he's shooting the baskets and I'm like,
oh wow, this is like note for note that the
scene from the first film, which I'm surprised I even remembered.

Speaker 1 (15:16):
But and even has like a hallucination dream like in
the first movie, because in the first movie he hallucinate
dreams that he's Koream made play, he's playing on the Lakers,
and then in this he's hallucinating that he's in I
guess Song of the South. I'm assuming.

Speaker 3 (15:31):
Yeah. What was interesting because I saw this movie years
ago because I think, Chris, You're just such a big
Fletch fan that you would make references to it, and
eventually I was just like, I have to watch these movies.
So I watched the first two back to back and
was like, oh, okay, you know, like I see now
and again it was like, okay, yeah, I think if
I had grown up with this movie, I would have

(15:51):
enjoyed it more kind of thing. And it did make
me want to read the Fletch books, so that was
very nice. But when I was reading the script, so
it'd been many, many years since I saw The Fletch Lives,
so I'm reading the script of it in preparation for
this episode, and I forgot that Cleveland Little played the
Calculus Entropy character. I was thinking of somebody older. I

(16:14):
was thinking of like a Frank McCrae, or you know,
just somebody that would have maybe even like an Assie
Davis was in my head where I was just like, Oh,
this guy had been with the ant and was kind
of her personal slave for the entire like her entire life.
And we don't know this ant. We don't really get

(16:35):
any sort of you know, history of Fletch and her.
And so when the whole thing of him getting this
inheritance came about, I was like, oh, this is the
beginning of running scared. This is you know, when who
is it? I think Gregory Hines pretends that he's the
Billy Crystal character in order to avoid getting a subpoena,

(16:57):
and he hides in the bathroom and then is it
ton Kalfa that comes in and gives him the whole
news about his aunt. And then he was just like,
oh my god, this is fantastic and like kind of
being super happy that the ant is dead, but it's
because he just got an inheritance, and so they're like,
all right, we're going down to Florida and we're going
to have a great time with all this. But you know,

(17:19):
it was like, oh, well, this is kind of the
same thing. But as I'm reading the script, I'm just like, Okay,
I can picture this old guy, and then boom, it's
a big surprise at the end that he's actually an
FBI agent, kind of like we just talked about dumb
and Dumber on the projection booth. And there's the the
guy from RoboCop too that's and RoboCop that's an FBI agent.

(17:40):
And then the one woman who just like was so
annoying at the gas station, she ends up being a
FBI agent as well. So I'm just like, Okay, well,
this is kind of a trope, you know, the unexpected
FBI agent. But I really think that it would have
worked better if he had been an older character. I
think it would have been even more of a surprise,
and it would have been a little different of a

(18:02):
relationship between the Fletched character and the Calculus character, because
in this there. It feels like they really should be
friends by the end of this movie. And the way
that they go back and forth is great, but they're contemporaries,
you know, feels like they're very much of the same age.
I don't know how old Cleveland Little was at this
point in his career, but he actually looks a little

(18:24):
younger than Chevy Chase does. You can start to see
the gray coming into Chevy's hair. But you know, and
again though, I have to say, Chevy Chase, this rule
is just made for him, and the way that he
can throw out those little zingers and never crack and
just you know, he's of course, it's not him necessarily
as a you know, he's not writing this, but he

(18:46):
is delivering these lines like I mean, just the nostrodamus
thing and then the woman right back with the you know, Oh,
I'm a big fan of the fighting Irish. I love
that kind of stuff. The way they go back and forth.
I'm like, Okay, this is really nice. Those little zingers
that they do, I think is fantastic. And he just
gives as good as he gets with that stuff.

Speaker 1 (19:06):
Do you want to take a guess as to how
old Clevon Little was at this point. He's three years
from passing away at this.

Speaker 3 (19:12):
Point forty seven, fifty fifty, Okay, he is fifty.

Speaker 1 (19:17):
Clevon Little passed away at age fifty three in nineteen
ninety two. This came out at eighty nine.

Speaker 3 (19:22):
I just turned fifty three, though, jeez.

Speaker 1 (19:25):
Yah, cleve I mean, I want to say that there
was I want to say this is either one of
the latest things I've seen him in. I know, he's
also in a episode of Tales from the Crypt that
I feel like maybe came like a year or two
after this, and he looks he looks sick in the
TA he doesn't look sick here in the Tales from
the Crypt episode, he's starting to look gaunt because I

(19:45):
believe he passes away of colon cancer, which man knows
obviously the fucking worst. So yeah, actually the last thing
he was in was the Tales from the Crypt episode.
So yeah, I love Clevean Little. I mean, after we
watched Fletch Liz last night, we watched Blazing Saddles, and
I mean, he's just I mean that movie works because

(20:05):
of Clevan Little, really, I mean, it really works because
of him and Gene Wilder. But Clevon Little's delivery is
just it's amazing, and he's amazing, and I like him
in this movie. I see where you're coming from the mic,
because I think it probably would have worked better in
terms of some of the back and forth of the jokes.
And I mean again, like, if you're gonna have a

(20:27):
guy who's already graying at the temples, might as well
just lean into it a little bit more.

Speaker 2 (20:31):
Well, it makes it makes sense rationally that it would
be an older ran that had, like you're saying, had
been with the ant. I mean yeah, but the times
is because of Blazing Saddles. This he's in this because
of Blazing Saddles.

Speaker 1 (20:43):
It's I'm right, like, this is just the character he's
playing in this movie is kind of a an aping
of his character in Blazing Saddles. I mean, we've kind
of already alluded to the idea that he does the
oh yes, sir bullshit in Blazing Saddles. This is just
that version of the character just played up. But it again,
if you watch the movie once and then go watch
it again a second time, you can tell how much

(21:05):
he's fucking with Fletch throughout the entire movie. Like the
I mean, they show it at the beginning where he's like,
can you want to help me with your luggage? And
he's just like, don't fuck up the car now as
he's having Fletch do the entire thing. I mean again,
it seems obvious initially what's going on, but then when
you realize, oh, he is in fact an FBI agent.
He's just putting Fletch through the paces because Fletch is
an asshole and he's being an asshole to Uh. But

(21:27):
I do think I'm kind of with you, though, Mike,
I mean Ozzie Davis, and this would have been would
have been kind of fun. I do think though. And again,
this is for me one of the big successes of
the movie, even though again the southernness of it all
kind of permeates the movie. It'd be like if Fletcher's
in New York and everybody talk like they say, I'm
from New York. It's like, Jesus fuck, Not everybody sounds

(21:48):
like that. Not everybody's eating catfish with the heads on.
How Oolbrook is like one of the best parts of
this movie, without a doubt. And you don't I'm not
saying you don't get that. If you don't set it
in the South, but he seems like the less obvious
villain if it's not set in the South. If it's
set in the South, you can kind of get away
with the movie not having him be the villain for
most of it because he's so charming. I think if

(22:09):
this movie is set anywhere else and you have how
Holbrook is like, Oh, this guy's the villain, like from
like very obviously, but he's I love how Hulbrook in
this movie. I love how Hulbrook overall. But I really
like him in this movie because him is a villain
is kind of it's kind of fun. He's having a
good time with it, hamming it up as it were.

Speaker 3 (22:27):
Oh, you went.

Speaker 1 (22:28):
There, I went there. I had to him. Sorry.

Speaker 3 (22:31):
I was wondering if it was some sort of like
Moses joke or not Moses, no, a joke that his
name was ham and then you've got the Faith Tailor
and all that, and I really so to go back
to what I was saying earlier, and I'll just say
it now. It's odd that the Faith Healer is not
the criminal. It's odd that our Lee Ermie is not
the bad guy, and that it's how Hlebrook, because of

(22:53):
course you like how Hlbrook. I like Ourley Ermie as
a actor and as a person, but I justlike faith
healers a lot and TV preachers, and so I'm just like, Okay,
well he's going to do And of course his intentions
are not good that he wants all of this land
so he can make this crazy Bible Land kind of thing,

(23:15):
which kind of show a little bit of But I
mean they could have gone so much bigger and more
tasteless when it came to what that Bible Land was
going to be. I mean we've seen it in years
since then of how Christians will make these crazy Bible
Land type of things, like the whole Noah's Ark thing

(23:36):
down in Kentucky and the the museum where they're talking
about how dinosaurs and people were living in harm me
with each other and all this kind of you know,
absolute insanity. But they could have gone there. You know,
we've seen, I think all of us might have seen
like those what were the Hell House the documentaries, and

(23:58):
there are a couple of them that all have the
same title, but they're all about these you know, different
like a haunted house of exhibitions that the Christians would
do where it's just like I had an abortion, I'm
going to hell, you know, like that is lunacy, and
I think it's hilarious lunacy. I would have liked to
have seen more of that, Like you see Ryal text

(24:19):
cop being picked up by a demon and his pitchfork
and stuff, and you're like, oh, okay, but like you
can'd of lose it by that point You're like, I
want to see more of Bible Land. I want it
more of this being almost like Beverly Hills Cop three
with like the fake Disneyland. I want this being the
fake you know, Bible Land or like the Bible Land
thing being here, and I want this to be like

(24:42):
his whole thing because we see are the Army at
one point just being like all your donations are going
to Bible Land and we're going to make this thing amazing,
and I just wanted to be the tackiest place on earth.

Speaker 1 (24:51):
Well, it's like it reminds me of The Righteous Gemstones,
which they kind of took that idea and really ran
with it, because that I mean essentially the Righteous Gemstones.
That show is the Arley Ermi character played by John Goodman,
and then what if what if his kids were terrible people,
unlike Julianne Phillips, who plays like a rather seemingly well
adjusted person. Yeah for having him as a dad. The

(25:14):
Heavenly Hilton and Convention Center, by the way, is one
of the great throwaway Arley Ermi lines. And it's just
he's great. I wouldn't. There's no universe where I'm like
Arley Ermie as a faith healer. What the fuck? Fuck?
But but but it does work. It plays so against that.
I don't know it works for me because it plays
very against type for him as an actor, because I
mean when I think of arleymy me personally, I think

(25:36):
of him and again, he's doing kind of a stick
of a stick of a stick in The Frighteners, which
is just a shtick of like all the other characters
he'd seemingly done up until that point, as kind of
you know, the sergeant character that he unny, Yeah, yeah,
Gunny was.

Speaker 2 (25:51):
It's just him in real life, Like, yeah, it's nice
that he's not that character, but yeah, there is this.

Speaker 3 (25:58):
This is what I look at every time we record,
is the the gunnery sergeant. It's not even a character,
it's him, Yeah, pushing back.

Speaker 1 (26:12):
Wasn't there like a show on History Channel where he
was the host? Yeah, he was. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (26:17):
I think it was like weapons, all about different weapons
of war kind of.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
Yeah, and it was like asking him questions or like yeah,
like he Arley, ERMI is a big deal. But like
he's a personality, right, Like he's just he I don't know.
He kind of just seems like himself. So he's playing
really against type here, which I think kind of works
for me. It's the same thing with hal Holbrook. I
guess like he's not playing against type. His character ends

(26:41):
up being a typical of what you expect from a
guy who trays Mark Twain.

Speaker 2 (26:47):
So you know, well he always is the sneaky bastard
or that's what that's what I picture him as.

Speaker 1 (26:54):
Guys.

Speaker 3 (26:54):
I watched this crazy fucking Hal Holbrook movie recently where
oh god, I'll look at whether it's called but basically
you see him through the entire movie going I wish
my family was dead.

Speaker 2 (27:06):
Oh god, that movie is such a downer. You saw
that one too, Yeah, that's another one of those fun
City editions really. Oh and I I think I watched
it on YouTube because they hadn't released their disc yet,
and I was like, I kind of want to check
this one out first. So it's with him and Nurse Ratchet.
I can never remember the actress's name.

Speaker 3 (27:27):
Yeah, I'm trying to remember her name off the top
of my head to Louise, Louise Fletcher, thank you.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
Yes, she plays his wife and he's got what two kids,
They've got two kids or something.

Speaker 3 (27:39):
Yeah, he like dreams of the murdering his family. He
just like Natural Enemies is the name of it from
seventy nine and I interviewed because that was Jeff Canoe,
the guy that did the Nerds movies and he directed
and co wrote that, and I was just like that
movie was dark, and he was like, well he thought
it was dark. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Jeff, it was really dark, man.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
What was dark about it?

Speaker 1 (28:04):
Oh geez?

Speaker 2 (28:05):
It's like he gets all those prostitutes and they, oh god,
he hasn't he telling them his fantasy?

Speaker 1 (28:12):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (28:12):
And you seem fantasy. You see him just like come
downstairs for breakfast and he just takes out a shotgun
and starts killing people and then he like, you know,
cut and it's like so it's like him, you know,
doing like the fletch fantasies, but it's all about murdering
his family.

Speaker 1 (28:25):
Oh god, yeah, I think I need to watch this movie.
I love hell Holbrook. This is the first thing I
ever saw him in, which always makes so Father Malone
and I have a very interesting history with this movie,
and I'm kind of bummed we didn't ask him to
be on this episode because I used to troll the
shit out of him about Fletch Lives because I think
he hates this movie. So at one point, for his birthday,
which also happens to be the same day as my birthday,

(28:47):
I sent him a Fletch Lives poster for his birthday
and I had him on the phone. I was like,
I want you to call me when you start opening
the package and the mail, and he was like, you
fucking said up a bitch, why did you send me
this Fletch Lives poster? I don't think you ever displayed it.
But I also like, when I've gone and read since
this movie's come out, this movie does kind of have
a reputation as being not a great movie, and I

(29:11):
do I would kind of ask y'all, like the perception
of this movie being bad stems from what the Southern
stereotypes of it all the poor like the plot, Like
I can't figure out why everybody had an issue with
this movie other than I mean, like the thing the
thing I was reading was chevy Chase seems fine, but
everything else is the problem. It's like, Okay, I guess

(29:31):
I would agree with that, but I mean, I think
chevy Chase still carries the movie well enough to get
it over the finish line.

Speaker 2 (29:37):
Yeah, it's it's over complicated, like I said at the beginning.
To me, that's the main thing and probably why I
kind of got a little bit disinterested in the film, Like, Okay,
you know, I don't need an I don't need a
fourth twist or something here. I don't need another new
villain to introduced or anything like that.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
You don't need them to go to the Universal back
lot clearly.

Speaker 2 (29:58):
Yeah, going around on the Universe studios. And that's why
Bible that's why Bible Land isn't as interesting as it
could be, because it's Universal studios.

Speaker 1 (30:08):
I've been on the tran tour and seen that flood,
the damn flood thing they've I've seen.

Speaker 2 (30:12):
Yeah, I've seen that. Yeah, me too. The thing I
will say, what did you ask for Babs right. Oh yes,
I don't think i'd seen any John Lannis movies when
I had been there. I will say this about the film,
Chevy Chase is not phoning it in, and so that
that for me was like, oh, okay, he's actually acting

(30:34):
in the personas. I enjoyed a great deal, especially the
Ed Harley character that he played that was nicking me
no end. That was probably my favorite scene actually, for
one thing, Dennis Berkeley is one of the bikers who
I love seeing and always, like everybody else on the planet,

(30:54):
confuses with the other heavyweight biker guy, Mickey Jones, and
I'm like, which one is this because I couldn't remember.

Speaker 1 (31:01):
Dennis Berkeley was the one who was in Suburban Commando
who says this is the nineties, We'll see you.

Speaker 2 (31:08):
I mean, I love it when either one of them
show up. I never remember which one it is in
the movie that I'm watching, so I always have to
look it up. But interestingly enough, they were both Dennis
Berkeley and Mickey Jones in a film called the called
Texas Taliban that was released in two thousand. I think
it's called something. It has a different title than I'MDB.

Speaker 3 (31:27):
It's a shame. Also, that's a pretty good title.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Yeah, what a shame.

Speaker 2 (31:32):
And I think the conceit is that the terrorists that
that do nine to eleven, like we're discussing it in
a Texas bar the night before or something like that,
or months before, something that makes no sense.

Speaker 3 (31:43):
They must have been friends with George W. Bush.

Speaker 2 (31:46):
Nobody, Uh yeah, nobody ratted them out. But another person
in that film is Randall tech Cobb.

Speaker 3 (31:53):
Oh nice sole Tex.

Speaker 1 (31:55):
Cobs was a rough dude in real life apparently. Yeah,
sounds like a real what's the term asshole? Major asshole,
kind of like the guy who played the on screen
persona he didn't voice him a Vigo from Ghostbusters two.
That guy is supposedly a giant asshole as well in
real life. But yeah, if you do any research on

(32:17):
Randall Textcap apparently he was a little bit much to
be with, but physically imposing fella. So when you want
someone to m Cheavy Chase with sexual assault, you get
a guy who's like six foot eight, yeah and.

Speaker 3 (32:28):
Over, because there's nothing funnier than sexual assault.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yes, we love a good jail rape joke, No boy, Yes.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
Do you remember dirty work? The other thing? Flattered the most. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (32:41):
I mean, I guess for me, the the you know
you're talking about one twist too far. I think it's
one female character too far, because like we've got the
woman who just comes on screen in order to be killed,
which is a surprise, and then we've got like the
the real estate agent who I think he sends packing

(33:03):
pretty quickly. Or is that or is that the same
character as are Ermie's daughter? Is she's character name character? Okay?
Which is confusing for me because I was like, Okay,
how Hulbrook's daughter is in the in No, No, she's
not hal Holbrook's daughter. She's Ermie's daughter. And I'm just like, oh, okay,
is there a there's not a hal Holbrook daughter right.

Speaker 2 (33:25):
No, As you're saying that, though, it sort of makes
more sense that she would be to me.

Speaker 1 (33:31):
There's a woman on the plane. Does that count? Yes?
Oh my god, I hate to fly. Yeah, the mister
notre Day. There's the lines of back and forth are yeah,
are really the best part of this movie? I think
you Begley, I think you pointed out the worst. Best
part of this movie is that chevy Chase is not
phoning it in. But the movie is the script is

(33:53):
like the phoning in of phoning in. Uh and again
I go back to and I mentioned it in the intro.
This movie is a product of the writer's strike, which
was taking place, I believe, either this year or the
year before. And so this movie in a lot of
ways feels like cobbled together ideas because it kind of
is cobbled together ideas. And yeah, that they're being two twists,

(34:16):
I guess three twists. I guess is it two or three?
Or are we landing on two? Yeah? They by the
end of it, I'm just like, I don't know if
I necessarily care that Cleveland Little is an FBI agent
because that, I mean, that's great and all. But and yeah,
like how Hulburk being the villain? Okay, sure, like all right,
I believe that he seems like a scub bag, But yeah,

(34:37):
that Arley Ermi's not in on it feels like, I
don't know, kind of surprising in a way, but I
guess it is kind of That's the twist of the
movie is that, oh, you expect it to be the
faith Healer and it's not. He's just kind of like
a fucking dope. He's just you know, like, I guess
he's genuine in his intentions. I don't. I guess that's
the movie. That's why I can never figure out what
the movie is like. The movie is essentially saying that

(34:58):
he's a genuine care character, which is which is strange
for especially in eighty nine, I mean post you know,
Tammy fay Baker and all that, Like, I don't understand.
It's it's weird, but I can't. I guess, yeah that
I feel like that's the maybe that's part of the
movie's point, is like, well, we're gonna I don't know.
I mean, I guess in a way that's not a

(35:19):
bad thing. I guess it is again defying what one
would consider to be expectations. This is whether or not
it's interesting, I guess, is the question.

Speaker 3 (35:26):
He leads his life deceiving people. And they even show
that moment where he's got the guy feeding him who
guys is and like, yeah, always missing a limb, you know, oh,
raise your right hand. It's like oh no, no, no,
he's missing his right hand. Or raise your left hand.

Speaker 1 (35:42):
Okay, Ted Marshall, yep, yeah, And it's.

Speaker 3 (35:45):
Like, okay, like I just saw this in this movie
Red Lights where it was just like, oh, he's pretending
that he's he's actually gifted, and it's like, yeah, we
all know, you know. So it's when they have that whist.
It's not a twist at all because that's the first
time I think we really see him. Well we see
him once, and then it's so bizarre that they actually

(36:05):
call Fletch up to the stage and so you're like, oh,
he's going to be outed right here, and this is
the big bad guy and it's going to be this
cat and mouse thing between Arlei, Ermi and and Fletch
and you're just like, oh, boy, this is you know, like, oh,
he's already outed. They've already figured out who he is,
and so this is kind of like the warning thing,
you know, like you better get off the stage and

(36:27):
you better get out of Louisiana, buddy, you know that
kind of thing. But no, no, and just the way
that Ham comes in, he's there to rescue the random
tech Cob characters. You're like, well, that's kind of odd.
But then it's like it feels like he's rescuing I
guess it feels like he's rescuing Fletch by taking the
random tech cop character out of the equation for a

(36:48):
little bit.

Speaker 1 (36:48):
But he also gets Fletch out of jail as well.
He does straight up, which like that was unnecessary though,
because like you said that the threat is gone, Like
Fletch could have just stayed in jail for a while
and they could have played that of more. It's yeah, yeah,
the movie is really I will agree the movie is
a little complicated. I mean, we haven't even mentioned the
fact that Phil Hartman is in this movie because he
goes toly Bio Kim where he's ir pissed I think

(37:13):
is the name of his character. I'm assuming that's what
his character is probably you know, pissing blood I think,
And they talk about pissing blood at one point, Like
that scene reminds me a lot of the Kenneth Is
Kenneth Walker scene from the first movie where he's playing
mister Poone and he goes into the office and he's
talking about you know, the pediastus and stuff like that.
There are a lot of echoing scenes in this movie,

(37:35):
but there's nothing that once they get to Louisiana, it
doesn't feel like they ever really rip off the first movie.
But maybe again, like maybe they should have leaned a
little bit more into what worked in the first movie,
because they know, they understand clearly that chevy Chase's comedy
worked in the first movie, and his like line delivery
and his ability to really get into the character of
Fletch was a success. But I think it's like, let's

(37:58):
put him in this wacky situation. It's like that wasn't
really what made the first movie work, because the first
movie's wacky situation was more like I would say, it
was like, Noira Jason, You've got dirty cops and then
dirty like businessmen working together to bring drugs to the
to the beaches of like La, to sell cheap drugs

(38:18):
to like to drug addicts on the beach. That's not
a fucking faith healer with you know, a microphone in
his ear, having a guy drop trou and exposes butthole
the people like that's this is like a much wackier
like the Conceit and Him is just so much wackier
and all over the top. And I think for me,
it's less the script that fails for this movie and

(38:38):
more the tone just seems a little silly. And I
like cause you mentioned Mike the John Ham Fletch movie.
That movie is even I would say less funny than
the original Fletch. It's like it's more kind of dry
rye humor, which I think is more akin to the book.
And this is more just like almost Beverly Hill Cops three,
Like we're taking this character that started out in a

(38:59):
serious movie and we're pushing him to like a really
like silly direction. I mean that that fourth Beverly Hills
Cop movie was such a good movie because it was
a return to form. It was like, there's some stakes,
it's kind of serious, there are some real threats, and
this movie is just like silly. They're literally at the
Universal Studios tram backlot at one point, and how Olbrook

(39:22):
get gets washed away by the Mexican flood set I
believe is what it is now. It just I don't know.
It's tonally inconsistent and tonally against the first movie. And
I don't like that about it now as an adult,
because we never get a third Fletched movie with Chevy Chase,
and so it's kind of a bummer that this movie

(39:42):
is so goofy, and it's it's more worried about being
goofy than it is telling kind of a compelling story,
is what it feels. I agree.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
And then even when it comes to the hell Wholebrook character,
the whole thing of like my mother was killed by
these chemicals and this whole like you know, the environmental
disa aster that they have going on at these particular plantations,
I was thinking, Okay, well, he's probably you know, how
did the ant die? Like would he assume, oh, your

(40:11):
poor aunt died of the same thing that my mother died.
Because when Fletch goes in and he sees the picture
of the mother and the ashes, and when he breaks
the picture, al Hulbert goes fucking crazy and it's just
like what what And it just doesn't feel motivated correctly
because it's like, you know, when you know, the whole

(40:31):
thing with the ashes becomes like the major thing and stuff,
And I'm like, okay, yeah, I can see him being
very upset about the ashes. I can't see him being
upset about the picture because it's just a picture. You know,
you could reframe it. It's not that big of a deal.
I guess in the days before digital stuff, it's you know,
a lot harder to recreate a photo and everything, where

(40:51):
like if a photo gets ruined. There's no second copy
unless you have the negatives laying around. But yeah, I
just I and see I wanted him to be like
more empathetic and almost like, oh, well, you know, like
you should be with me in this and you should
be with me against these Bible people because they want

(41:12):
to snatch up this land or even like who is
who's putting the the bad chemicals in the land work?

Speaker 1 (41:20):
I believe it is.

Speaker 3 (41:21):
Okay, So why did his mother die then? Was it
the chemicals or was it something else?

Speaker 1 (41:26):
No, his mother, his mother just died, but she gave
away she gave away his land, hermie, And so he's like,
fuck this, I'm just going to poison all the land
around are around it. So Arley Ermie can no longer
get any more land because he gave his mom in
a quote confused mental state, like donated most of her

(41:47):
land to the Farmsworth Ministry. So that's why he hated him.

Speaker 2 (41:51):
So really he should complicated.

Speaker 1 (41:54):
Yeah, it's very it's way too complicated. Like and here's
the thing, go back to the first movie. So what
I feel like what they're trying to do is like
what they did in the first movie with the.

Speaker 3 (42:04):
The two cases, the case of the beach stuff versus
the case with the lawyer.

Speaker 1 (42:08):
And the well in the land. And remember then there's
the thing with the land in Utah. And he goes
to Utah. He go, this is mister Eagle or Stravinsky
and all that like. And he goes to William, oh god,
the guy from Blade Runner, William F. Sanderson's house. He
goes because he's the real estate agent. Then he goes
and visits Stanwick's parents. So that's what it feels like

(42:29):
they're trying to do. But man, it is done so
much better in the first film, like the Andrew Bergman
script is so like, so much more well written. And again,
Andrew Bergman wrote the script for Blazing Saddles with mel
Brooks like, I mean, we have we were quoting Blazing
Saddles before we turned on the recorder. Blazing Saddles is

(42:51):
a damn near perfect film with a perfect performance by
Cleveland Little, And it's hard to not think about how
good the first fletch is with a script from the
writer of that film, when this film has Clevond Little
in it and is just kind of spinning its wheels
with Chevy Chase's performance, because, like you said, Mike, the
overly complicated nature of this movie gets in the way

(43:11):
of a a of the investigative journalism stuff that we
got in the first movie that this movie doesn't even
really seem to bother with. For the most part. It
kind of shows up a couple times sparingly, but the
first movie it's like he's a journalist looking around for
things that looking around for clues and investigating for clues,
and in this movie it's more like, Hey, here's this

(43:33):
funny outfit and let's watch him walk around in it
for thirties and it just doesn't work as well.

Speaker 3 (43:39):
You know. I mean, this was written by Leon Capatanos,
who we actually talked a little bit about him when
we talked about the Gumball Rally a few years ago,
and he really didn't write that many great things like
I you know, we mentioned Moscow and the Hudson several
times while we're talking about Bad Robber William films. He's

(44:01):
kind of the reason why I really dislike Richard woman
blinking on the Gentleman from Jaws, Richard Ryfus. Yes, he's
kind of the reason why I don't like Richard Dreyfus.
Because of those movies that he was making with Paul Mazerski,
Moon Over Parce and Down and Out in Beverly Hills,

(44:21):
where it's just like, these are bad, bad films, and
those were what he was doing in the eighties was
all of that stuff. So yeah, it's it's very strange that, Yeah,
they didn't go back to Bergman or get a better
writer for this, or just adapt another McDonald book. But yeah,
because you're right, and so I'm sorry for all of

(44:41):
the confusion around the female characters, the toxic waste, you know,
because it's like, you know, why are you putting that
toxic waste onto Belle Isle, the property that Fletch now owns.
Why don't you go to him and be like, hey,
don't sell because you're going to be selling to these
pieces of shit, you know, spiritual people. And they ripped

(45:03):
off my mother and they were about to rip off
your aunt too.

Speaker 1 (45:06):
Is what it looks like, literally, like you haven't changed
your heart. Yes, it's over complicated, well and too And
here's the question, though, to what end? Because the reveals
don't really work that well. The reveals aren't that shocking
that Let's talk about the reveal in Fletch because there's
the big reveal in Fletch. There's a couple big reveals

(45:26):
in Fletch. There's one big reveal that the cops are
in on it, and then the other big reveal is
that Stanwick is going to kill Fletch and replace Fletch's
his own body with Fletch's body in his car and
then blow his car up. That's like, that ends up
being like the big reveal of the of the.

Speaker 3 (45:40):
Classic noir twist.

Speaker 1 (45:42):
Yes, what is the reveal of this movie? That hal
Oldbrook's the bad guy with a bizarre, like you mentioned mark,
hyper convoluted backstory that makes no sense, Like that's it,
And and that the faith Healer is a con man,
which again at this point in nineteen eighty, that's not
a surprising thing. That's feels again it feels like a

(46:04):
lazy stereotype. But again they like at the last second,
they're like, oh, but he's actually not a terrible person.
It's like, but what he does for a living makes
him a terrible person, and you cannot there's no counteracting
that the guy is still taking hundreds of thousands of
millions of dollars from people and using it for shitty
reasons that cannot be explained away. No amount of land,

(46:25):
no amount of any of hal Holbrook pointing a gun
at him is going to change the fact that Arlie
Ermy is kind of the villain of the movie, even
if he's portrayed otherwise, and Chevy Chase is just like, oh,
his daughter's hot, so that's fine by the end, and
by the end of the movie, they're back a villain.

Speaker 2 (46:39):
He he's a villain. He's not the villain of this movie.
He is a villain his character. He's just not the
bad guy here necessarily. But he's played empathetically. There's not
even like a shred of there's not like the way
you would expect him to be played. He's not even
gradingly obnoxious in a lot of ways, like you're meant
to empathize with him and meant to find him as

(47:00):
kind of like charismatic. And it's kind of bizarre to
me because again it's like, these real life people aren't
even that charismatic. None of them are as charismatic as
Arlie Ermie is. I mean, you know, Cheeze Louise.

Speaker 3 (47:12):
Yeah, they really could have done for somebody better as
the sheriff and the deputy characters as well. Like I
know they had just used Joe John Baker in the
first one, but Joe Don Baker as the sheriff or
a Joe Don Baker type would have been so much.
But even get that mffort from the James Bond movies,
get the mister Pepper out here and have him play

(47:34):
the sheriff, because the sheriff he's okay, but he's not
very menacing. And if you just had a heavy for
that role, I think it would have been a lot better.
Actually would have been more of a threat as opposed
to like, oh, here's just this kind of you know,
hick air director type of guy where I'm like, no, no,
make him somebody physically imposing, somebody that you don't want

(47:56):
to mess with, and that anytime you see him you
want to avoid. Same thing with this deputy. I mean,
give us the deputy from you know, Sheriff Lobo or
from uh, you know, any of the any of the
Yahoo's from Dukes of Hazzard or something like, give me
somebody good that I can be like, oh, yeah, I
want to see this guy humiliated with the whole bug
in the ear thing like I want I wanted those

(48:18):
roles to be bigger parts than the random Greek dude
that beltzer Belser is playing, or yeah, like the head
of the KKK, the Jeffrey Lewis just shows up for
with like one scene. I mean, damn, Jeffrey Lewis is
so freaking good and just to kind of waste them
in that role, that's really unfair.

Speaker 1 (48:38):
Guys.

Speaker 2 (48:39):
I was just say I saw him on the cast
list and I got excited. I was like, oh, I
love Jeffrey Lewis and didn't pay off.

Speaker 3 (48:45):
Yeah, and like there's no real like they don't figure
out what happened, they come back and then actually do
some more damage. I'm like, no, no, it's not that good.
It's it's a text cob that does all of the
heavy lifting in this movie. Sometimes you don't even see them.

Speaker 1 (49:01):
I think. And again, this is me just speculating here
because I couldn't find it in the research. But I'm
assuming again just based on the way that this film
feels compared to the first one. It feels like they
avoided doing the cop thing intentionally because they'd already done
it in the first movie, so they don't even have
the I mean, you would expect in a film like this,
with this kind of setup, that the cops might be

(49:23):
in on oh yeah, And yet we don't ever see
the police after the first scene. I mean, we see
that cop come back and fletch Fox with him, but like,
we never see them as a threat. They show up
again at the party later, but again not as we
see them in that first scene where they kind of
seem like a threat and they're kind of menacing. It
feels like the movie's like, oh wait, but we already

(49:44):
did that in the first movie. Look, in this kind
of noir mystery story, it's okay to retread some old ground.
We don't have to take a one to eighty completely.
But it does feel like, again almost a response to
the first movie going, well, the cops are in on it.
In this one, it's like, not only are the cops
not in on it, the cops aren't even part of
the story. Which again, why is there not a scene

(50:05):
of Chevy Chase going to the cops and being like, hey,
this is what's going on? Like, there's none there is
none of that. Even it's weird that it's almost lacking
in that story entirely because it feels again kind of
like almost in a lot of ways, not to be
mister Cinemonson's, but almost a plot hole. You're gonna introduce
the cops, they're going to put fletch and jail, and
then he's going to start putting pieces together that there's

(50:27):
a conspiracy here, and there's not going to be a
scene of him going to the cops and trying to
convince them of that going on. Seems like a missed opportunity,
given that we've already had this antagonistic why doesn't that
ever happen to me? You know? Back and forth it's like, well,
you know, because you're not Chevy Chase, like they feels
like just missed opportunity after missed opportunity.

Speaker 3 (50:46):
Really no, I totally agree, and just the you know again,
when he goes to them, that doesn't have to be
the scene of oh, by the way, we're bad cops here,
you know, we're on the take, or anything. It could
just be that thing that we were talking about before,
the Northern Southern thing or here it's the la versus
la type of thing where it's you know, what are
you doing, mister city slicker coming in here? You accusing

(51:10):
you this Jimmy Lee Farnsworth or Ham, you know, this
well respected lawyer who's been a pillar of our community
for forty years. How dare you do this kind of thing?
We don't believe you give us something like that, you know?
And then the direction. I mean, I love Michael Ritchie.
We've talked about Michael Ritchie on my show a bunch
of times, and I just really enjoy the stuff that

(51:30):
he does. Does a pretty good job directing both though.
There's one scene in this movie where I was watching
it now was just like, what the hell's happening here?
And it was when the daughter is driving Fletch and
I'm trying to remember who he's I think it's to
the big faith healing thing, is it. There's one part
later on in the movie where she's driving him someplace

(51:51):
and he is not in disguise, and he keeps like
he's putting on his disguise while she's driving. I think
it's been there, going to the bar, it's been okay,
going to be ed Harley, And it's just a bizarre,
like you can tell that they just said make goofy faces,
and she just keeps making these faces and looking over

(52:11):
look at these faces looking over and I'm like, there
are way too many reaction shots of her doing this
and like what is going on? Like, of course we
know the car is not moving, you know, the rain
is all just somebody with a sprinkler outside or a
hose outside. Like it just brought the artifice of everything
really to the four and I was like, this just

(52:32):
isn't very well handled. The other stuff, Yeah great, you know,
I think some of this stuff is very well directed.
I really, especially like anytime that they are in the
studio for the faith ailing stuff, I think some of
that looks really good, and especially how ridiculous it is
where it's like, oh and this guy and his monkey
and you're like what the hell, Like just all of
these weirdo's coming out and being introduced and you're like, okay, yeah,

(52:55):
this is gonna be one hell of a show you're
putting on for people and somehow tying it all back to.

Speaker 2 (52:59):
G's and somehow it never ends. Every time they go
to the studio he's on. So is it twenty is
it a twenty four hour a day show?

Speaker 1 (53:07):
It still feels like, yeah.

Speaker 2 (53:09):
They go I believe every time they go to the
studio he's on and it's packed, and oh yeah, I was.
I was impressed by the size of the I don't
want to say stadium, but the venue is is full
and it's real people, and I'm like, yeah, I miss
those days where it's not cardboard cutouts or AI generated crowds.

Speaker 3 (53:31):
Or digy doubles, those weird Asian characters at the basketball
game and that Disney show where they were like sorrow robots.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
Yeah, very strange, very strange.

Speaker 3 (53:44):
And they still have my nightmares.

Speaker 1 (53:46):
Don't you love that? At one point, they cut to
Richard Libertini watching TV with Fletch on the TV. Yeah, yeah, sure,
whatever movie. And by the way, if you notice in
that scene, because again I've seen this movie so many times,
at this point you have to notice some of you
have to find new things to notice. Richard Libertini is
casually just eating what looks to be a piece of lettuce,
holding a piece of lettuce in his handling, just a

(54:07):
piece of lettuce.

Speaker 2 (54:08):
This was years before a veggie wrap, like a protein burger.
You know, he wasn't eat in and out protein burger.

Speaker 1 (54:16):
Just eating a piece of lettuce. How West Coast de
lete of him.

Speaker 2 (54:19):
I thought, that's what it was, and I'm like, okay,
all right, that's what.

Speaker 1 (54:23):
They eat in La just pieces of lettuce solad.

Speaker 2 (54:27):
Dressing is two spy.

Speaker 1 (54:29):
It's too much pepper in it. Don't put so much
prepper in my sees are dressing.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
And he's kind of wasted in this.

Speaker 1 (54:35):
Yeah I told you, yes, Yeah, are you being hidnapped? Yeah? Yeah?

Speaker 3 (54:39):
Where is Geena Davis? By this time she was so
much bigger than.

Speaker 1 (54:43):
Ding. I do use the line if you're in trouble
is Louisiana the Pelican state. I do use that line
fairly often. But because of this movie I love. I
love when Richard Libertini shows up, but he's not in
it enough because they're back and forth in the first
movie is some the best back and forth. In the
first movie, they're like interplay. You know, I'll buy a

(55:04):
new stick a deodorant, you know all that.

Speaker 2 (55:06):
Everything's kind of truncated in this that whole deal with
him like getting or getting in trouble and you know,
all the money he's been spending on his account or whatever.
And then it's like, okay, well I just got an inheritance,
so I'm out of here. And it's the same thing
with the cops sort of disappearing from the story and
maybe coming back, which may or may not be a

(55:30):
good thing. I don't know if that would overcomplicate it
more that the cops are directly involved, But yeah, I
wanted more of Libertini, and I understand why it's not.
And it kind of goes to what you said earlier, Chris,
where he's sort of investigating but not really. He keeps
sending him stuff and it's like, well, do you really
need to play a journalist in this because that can

(55:51):
see it is gone when you leave the newspaper, right,
You're just some dude that's inherited a dump.

Speaker 1 (55:58):
Right. But it feels like him being a journalist is
not a thing in this movie. And I'll tell you
any heavy and in every single one of the books. Though,
to go back to the book of it All and
to the John Hamm of it All, Mike, I think
you would agree in confess Fletch, he feels like a journalist.
He feels like an investigative journalist. This is the only
Fletch thing that he doesn't feel like a journalist because

(56:18):
it's so kind of like, well, well, Fletch is going
to Louise, it's I could you know what if it
had been me, I would have been like this time,
Fletch is in la but not where you And it's
like you a whoa fish out of water story? Yeah, exactly.
There's a moment in this movie where there's a moment

(56:38):
in this movie where I'm pretty sure they're referencing a
track from the first movie's soundtrack, Are they not where?
He's like, I should get out of town before sundown,
which I believe is just a reference to a song
from the first movie, which is a weird meta moment
in a film that, again is completely uninterested in. You
can watch this movie without anything to do with the

(56:59):
first movie, and I think there's like two references to
the first movie, the Underhills, and I think.

Speaker 3 (57:04):
Yeah, I think it's so easy to miss miss but
a credit card, right, Yeah he does have the credit card.

Speaker 1 (57:12):
But yeah, the underhouse dancing in the background is something
that's like they don't even make any note of it.
It's just like there they are, just dancing in the background.

Speaker 2 (57:19):
The credit cards scene totally went over my head because
I was like, what, he didn't steal their credit card
in the first makes put stuff on their on their tab, Yeah,
on the tab at the the U.

Speaker 3 (57:32):
And charge it to the other Hills.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
Yeah, yeah, he didn't.

Speaker 3 (57:35):
Didn't hand over the credit card and say he did
charge it to the Underhills.

Speaker 1 (57:41):
The subtlety of the first movie is lost in this film.
It really yes, yeah, but at least Chevy isn't phoning
it in, and we will see a return with him
and Michael Richie working together again before this podcast is done.
So isn't that a shame or a shame?

Speaker 2 (57:58):
We'll see. We'll see how that goes.

Speaker 1 (58:00):
Cops and Roberson's huh is it that the final time
they worked together?

Speaker 2 (58:05):
Michael Ritchie had an interesting career.

Speaker 3 (58:07):
He sure did. Man, Yeah, I forgot about some of
the awful things that he did. I forgot he was
behind The Golden Boy or the Golden Child.

Speaker 2 (58:16):
I have a soft spot for that film.

Speaker 3 (58:18):
I have a soft spot for it as well. Somebody
the other day asked if at work that said do
you have a does anybody here have a knife? And
I said, well, you have to ask correctly and said, well.

Speaker 1 (58:33):
Yeah, is fun. I'm not I think though, you know.

Speaker 2 (58:38):
I mean The Bad Newsparers is one of my oh yeah,
favorite films.

Speaker 3 (58:42):
I mean, really, I love Smile of what he did
with that one, and yeah, there's a lot of good
stuff that he did, but yeah, a lot of garbage shoe.
I think. Now I haven't seen Digs Down, but I
can only assume that it's bad.

Speaker 2 (58:54):
And if I recall, you don't like the movie The
Survivors either.

Speaker 3 (58:58):
I don't. But then I also saw it at the
drive in when it was first out, so maybe I
should give it another look.

Speaker 2 (59:05):
I saw it on cable when we finally got cable,
and I played a lot, and I just I got
You know, we talked about Robin Williams recently and that
was one of the ones that I liked him in.

Speaker 1 (59:16):
M Oh god, it's a Robin Williams movie directed by.

Speaker 2 (59:18):
Mike Williams and Walter Mathow.

Speaker 1 (59:20):
Why Mike, why didn't we watch this last month? Man?
What the fuck? We were watching that Mandy Moore movie instead?
That's on me. I feel, man, I would have rather
watched a Walter Mathow movie with Robin Williams. I feel
like the ceilings much is weird and the floor is
much I feel like the ceiling and floor are much
higher than something like Licensed to Wed which is its
floor was fucking Subterraney.

Speaker 2 (59:43):
God, I'm not saying it's a good movie. It's it's
another one of those.

Speaker 1 (59:47):
It was definitely a bad movie.

Speaker 3 (59:49):
Yeah, and don't forget Couch Trip, that one, oh my god. Yeah,
with another Walter Mathow, dan ackroy and Donna Dixon and
then you got Charles Groden in there.

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
Oh dear god, dan Man, dan Ackroyd. You know, when
we're done with this show, we could do a dan Ackroid.
I've hitched that, but man, it would be it would
be like this, but we at least we get to
watch Evolution, which is pretty much just Ghostbusters for the
two thousands, so you know, I mean it is last

(01:00:22):
That would be.

Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
That would be interesting. There would be some real there
would be some real highs and some real lows.

Speaker 1 (01:00:29):
With best scenario, I think we've seen some of the lows.
I mean, we've seen some of them already.

Speaker 2 (01:00:35):
We're not watching them again. Just insert that episode, Just
insert that episode with a different title.

Speaker 1 (01:00:41):
Yeah, what trouble is that's that would be. Those are
some shared points of reference like Caddy Shack too as well.

Speaker 2 (01:00:48):
My god, yeah, spies like us Caddy Shack two and
and nothing but trouble would all be on the dan Acroid.
Start thinking of a title.

Speaker 1 (01:01:00):
The Arcoid cast God the Akroid A Kroyd Dan.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
How do you getoid out of that last name?

Speaker 3 (01:01:09):
Is what I was. I know, some weird Canadian spelling.

Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
Isn't it weird that we don't get like a Dan
Akrod in this movie? Though, like a kind of cameo.
It is kind of surprising that because they.

Speaker 2 (01:01:21):
Had worked him specifically.

Speaker 1 (01:01:23):
Or Akward kind of in a I mean dan Ackroyd,
known for doing weird voices caddyshack to known for over
committing to character dragnet. Yeah, you gotta do it, Mike,
Come on.

Speaker 3 (01:01:37):
I could have played the guy that thinks about the
coon hunt.

Speaker 1 (01:01:40):
Oh yeah, who enjoyed juice? Everybody? Good word?

Speaker 2 (01:01:45):
Yeah, it's I did like that. I did like in
that line though, his him looking at Cleveland little like one.
Oh yeah, I just say that was even though I've
been kind of casually raisist this whole time with you.

Speaker 3 (01:01:59):
Oh well yeah, since I've met you. That's kind of
what I enjoy So why.

Speaker 1 (01:02:04):
Is Fletcher racist all of a sudden? Anyone else? Like
he wasn't calling Sam the guy on the beach who
was black in the last movie, Like he wasn't calling
him like any sort of like racial slur or even
like an attempt at a Racials are like, is it
because they're in the South, But Fletch isn't from the South,
He's from l n Oh. Is it He's supposed to
be like, Hey, these white people are a bunch of assholes.

(01:02:26):
And I'm like, I don't know, Yeah, I guess, I
guess to your point, And I do wonder this, Why
is Fletch being mean to him? It actually makes no sense?
Is it? Is it? Is it because the movie is
expecting us to realize that Cleveland Little is not a slave,
like a house slave from the jump, I don't get it,

(01:02:47):
but the movie.

Speaker 2 (01:02:48):
Plays it is straight, Yes, totally off.

Speaker 1 (01:02:52):
Yeah, it doesn't. It's bizarre. It'd be like if Fletch
went to Atlanta and was like, hey, what's up all
you n words? Like what the fuck? Fletch Like it
doesn't make any since because he's being racist to him immediately,
which is again, his character seems pretty dialed in in
the first movie, like he seems pretty hip, and all
of a sudden, it's like he's kind of like, yeah,
that is odd. I guess. I mean, it's funny, but

(01:03:14):
I don't understand why he's doing it.

Speaker 3 (01:03:17):
Fletch is very anti DEI. You know, it's just like
if you are woke, youo go broke.

Speaker 1 (01:03:23):
And yeah, Fletch doesn't. Fletch supports tariffs, is what I've heard.
That's true. Thank Yeah, yeah, okay, understood I I I guess, Yeah,
there are parts of this movie that just don't make sense.
And sitting here and watching it for a podcast because
I'm this is the first time I've ever done this,
this movie on a podcast on its own. I had

(01:03:43):
only ever done Fletch and then referenced this movie again,
especially with Father Malone, because he and I kind of
have a little bit of a shared history. I never
really sat and like sat with the movie like this
and watched it the way we have to watch it
for something like this. And it is a movie that again,
like I enjoy it, and I I can completely one
hundred percent sit here and go nostalgia one hundred percent.

(01:04:04):
It's a nostalgia thing. I defend this movie with nostalgia.
But at the same time, and I think we've already
three alluded to this or said it outright. There's no
other time that chevy Chase plays Fletch. And I think
in a lot of ways, chevy Chase's best character that
he ever played in anything is Fletch, other than essentially
playing himself on SNL, which is I think like the
second best thing he ever did. And then I think

(01:04:25):
the third best thing is either, depending on your cup
of tea, foul Play or Clark Griswold. And but I
think Fletch is chevy Chase's best character because I think
it is again as close to just being what I
think chevy Chase probably is in real life as any
of the characters he ever plays is. And this movie
just kind of feels like Fletch hasn't gotten really hip

(01:04:48):
with the times. Fletch is kind of stuck in a
time and a place where the character never evolved into
nineteen eighty nine, And if he did evolve into nineteen
eighty nine, I don't know what they put on screen
because that's not the reality of the character that we're
seeing in the movie. And look, there's no Fletch three.
There's Confess Fletch, which is a completely different interpretation a
completely different director. I think a director who feels uniquely

(01:05:11):
suited to making Fletch movies, Greg Matola. I think the
tone of his movies and the things that he's worked
on really works with a comedicly mystery tone. I mean again,
like Greg Mottola's tone. You can put this kind of
sense of humor on top of another genre and it
kind of works, just because I think he has an
interesting way of doing things and writing, because he wrote

(01:05:32):
the script for Confess Fletch. But there's not a Fletch
three with Chevy Chase, so we don't get any more.
It's kind of like what I say about The X Files.
Even a bad episode of The X Files is still
pretty good because it's David d'covney and Jillian Anderson. This
movie still is kind of okay because it's Chevy Chase
playing the best character he ever plays for a second time.
It's just it doesn't have it's like a note being

(01:05:55):
played just a little out of tune. It's a little
discordant that first movie, which I'm gonna just say this now,
I don't think we're gonna watch a better movie on
this podcast than Fletch in my opinion, and I know
that that might seem a little biased because it's one
of my favorite comedies, if not my favorite comedy, But
I think I might make the case to both of
y'all that that is in fact the case for Chevy Chase,

(01:06:15):
that it is his funniest movie that first movie, especially
when you compare it against this, because this doesn't succeed
nearly as well as that first movie, and I think
this movie, this movie's failures show how well that first
movie navigates something that maybe felt pedestrian at the time.
But watching this, it's like, Wow, somebody was really definitely
writing a mystery script with comedy beats on top, because

(01:06:39):
this movie misses effectively the plot of the movie outright.
We've been complaining about the plot of the movie, but
not the comedic bits, because the comedy in this movie
still pretty much works because it's Chevy Chase. The plot
is off. The plot and the first movie actually are
bits of the movie that are rather memorable. Here, it's
just a complete waste, and that's because the script writing
talents are just not there.

Speaker 2 (01:06:59):
Bus soun go on record and say the next movie
we watch is actually for me personally, I enjoy more
than either Fletch film. Oh, I can tell you that interesting.
Just putting that out there, you know, for next time,
I may eat my words. I haven't watched it in
a while, but I like the Christmas Vacation film.

Speaker 3 (01:07:18):
I mean, I know a lot of people love it,
and I'm excited to see it because I've never seen
it before.

Speaker 1 (01:07:23):
That is the fucking wildest part for me. I'm excited
for you to see it because you've never seen it before.
I don't know how you've ever seen it. It's like referenced.
It's like part of the zeitgeist at this point, to
the point of like it's like, how did I avoid
Home Alone for so long? Oh?

Speaker 3 (01:07:36):
I avoided it Home Alone until two years ago, I
think so. And I still haven't seen Home Alone too
all the way through, even though from what I understand,
the Star is one of the best people who has
ever lived in the entire universe.

Speaker 1 (01:07:50):
So smart, economic man. Yes, if you're listening to the
future and the wasteland is being roamed by mutin animals,
do we have a future?

Speaker 2 (01:08:03):
Is there going to be a future for anyone to
listen to this?

Speaker 1 (01:08:06):
And I don't know, Mark sounds like Sarah Kahn or
all of a sudden put that voice over over the
fucking nuken terminator too, and I'd watched that. Is there
a future.

Speaker 3 (01:08:17):
My four oh one k got nuked? I can tell
you that. Think about, you know, the whole idea of
the comedy versus the mystery kind of stuff. Like the
stuff with him having that fantasy about the Lakers is
kind of like it's almost distracting. You know, it works
for him, works for his character, and works to show
us how much he loves the Lakers, but at the

(01:08:39):
same time, it's like, Okay, this adds nothing to the film,
whereas with this one, you know, like it's like, all right,
the fantasy about the plantation is really actually pretty good,
and I don't know, it doesn't feel like there's that
many distracting bits to it. Though this tries to red
herring us several times. There are a few times where

(01:09:01):
you're like, oh, is it the real estate agent? Oh
is it cleve On Little because there's even the moment
where like, after Fletch gets attacked in the forest, he
doesn't see who it is, but yeah, he sees the
Laker watch, So I'm just like, well, okay, it's Randall
Tech's cup you know when he took your Laker watch.
But then he comes back to Clevelan Little's like shack

(01:09:23):
and feels the TV to feel if it's warm, like
had he been out kind of thing. And there's like
some suspicious glances, especially around the shotgun and stuff, the
shoe prints on the ground, France.

Speaker 2 (01:09:36):
Mud on his boots right.

Speaker 3 (01:09:37):
Right, yeah, the same mud.

Speaker 2 (01:09:39):
Yeah, so it's yeah, then I didn't go anywhere ill. Yeah, no,
is that what they were leading me to?

Speaker 1 (01:09:44):
Yeah, they were trying to say Clevon Little was possibly
in on it. Yeah, it's spinning its wee. The movie
to your point, Mark, movie is overly complicated and fucking
spins its wheels, and I'm on it. Like as much
as I like this movie, it is a frustration point
now because that first movie is is so good and
you just wonder what this, what could this what could
this movie even have been if it had just been

(01:10:05):
written by Andrew Bergman, Just if they want to stick
the same kind of ridiculous conceit of their you know,
going to Louisiana and the Bayou and Faith Healers and
all this wild again kind of like elevated stereotype nonsense.
If We're gonna go there. Like, I wonder what that
would have been written by Andrew Bergman. Would that have worked?

(01:10:27):
Probably a little bit better. Maybe. I feel like this
movie hamstrings itself with the plot immediately. I don't know,
I get the fish out of water. But put Fletch
in another city and that's enough, like Boston or New York. Like,
I don't need that much of a culture shock with
his character. This feels too much. It would have been
better if it had just been the West Coast guy

(01:10:48):
on the East Coast, which Confess Fletch kind of does
a little bit, it doesn't. I mean again, he's not
as played up La in Confess Confess Fletch as he
is in these two movies, especially the first Fletch, where
it's like we get it. It's La, we get it,
Los Angeles Lakers, we get like fucking they're gonna like
beat me over the head with it. Why don't you

(01:11:08):
like this movie? Kind of it has it, but not
as much. But yeah, I don't know. Putting him in
at the other La Louisiana just the movie. I don't know.
The movie is like, well, the conceit alone will carry
us through. It's like no, no, not quite, which is
a shame because I guess it could have there's a
possibility that it could have.

Speaker 3 (01:11:29):
I just well, yeah, we just saw him as a
fish out of water in Funny Farm a couple of
films ago, and like, where's the lamb balls in this one?
You know, they do eat strange things in Louisiana, and
he could have been very turned off by that, like
just even play that stuff up. They don't. It doesn't
feel like they really know what to do with the

(01:11:50):
fish out of water nests of it.

Speaker 1 (01:11:52):
Oh well, it's like we'll go on a coon hunt.
He'll go eat that fish at one point, but you know,
and then they have the bosure lay thing where it's like,
well kind of you know, we'll bring it in wine
bowser leg made with grapes. But yeah, it's I don't know,
it just we we kind of beaten it to death.
But the stereotypes of this movie are just a bit much.
But I think, you know, we've seen worse sequels already. Literally,

(01:12:14):
I would say this movie is better than European Vacation.

Speaker 3 (01:12:16):
Oh my god, Yes, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:12:18):
No, I was a sequel already, Like we've already seen
a sequel and that wasn't that compared to this, Like,
this is a much better.

Speaker 3 (01:12:24):
Film even Oh yeah, I honestly don't think this is
a bad film. I think they made a couple of
missteps along the way that could have been a little
bit better. But no, God, compared to you know, a
month of bad Rob Williams films, but compared to the
last few things that we've seen for this, yeah, no,
this is like a real movie, whereas some of the
things that we watched didn't even feel like they were

(01:12:44):
real movies.

Speaker 1 (01:12:45):
Well, funny Money was not a real.

Speaker 2 (01:12:47):
I've got a really off topic question for you guys,
because it kind of has been bugging me since this
scene in Fletch Libs. Is the bar that he goes to,
the biker bar that he goes to. The interior, but
the exterior isn't the same as the one in Peewee's
Big Adventure.

Speaker 3 (01:13:04):
Sure looks like it. I mean when he took off
our last motorcycle, I was expecting him to run right
into the billboard. I mean, if it's not the same one,
it's like they're filming it from the same angles or something.

Speaker 2 (01:13:17):
Yeah, they're definitely filming it from the same angle because
the moment they pulled up, I'm like, oh my god,
they're at the Peewee Bar. And I started to sort
of search online and all I can find is shots
of the inside when he's doing the dance. But I mean,
the bikers. It's maybe it's just too reminiscent of that scene.

Speaker 1 (01:13:37):
Wow. The character that Chevy Chase is playing is very
uh what's the word an obvious gay.

Speaker 2 (01:13:42):
Stereotype, right, yeah, And there's that and.

Speaker 1 (01:13:46):
Like offended or anything. But it's just like he's doing
a lisp. He has like a like asies.

Speaker 3 (01:13:51):
Oh yeah, I wasn't hearing a list. I was hearing
a Minnesota accent, so I was just hearing this.

Speaker 1 (01:13:55):
Oh you bet, you kind of. I mean it's a
little bit of boil.

Speaker 2 (01:13:58):
He's kind of like this.

Speaker 1 (01:14:01):
Harley Harley Davidson motor Harley david You know, maybe it's
not a lisp as much as he's like doing the
thing where you like kind of keep your tongue forward
in your mouth here, Yeah, like this and Harley Harley
Davidson Motorcycles. Yeah, yeah, but no, you could see the
tongue in the scene like fucking moving like like forward

(01:14:22):
all the time. Like a snake.

Speaker 3 (01:14:23):
Mm hmmm, yeah, I was definitely thinking of that scene
from Pewe as well.

Speaker 2 (01:14:27):
You know the bikes there, yeah, exactly, and they're you know,
it's like Nazi Nazi bikers. I mean, they're all dressed
the same way. It's just I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:14:40):
It's struck let me have them, I sorry, would let
him go. I do think the most inspired I will say,
of the of the again to kind of put a
to put a pin in it, like of the scenes
in the movie where he is in disguise, which I
think again, like if you I want to talk about

(01:15:00):
just Fletch and the Fletch movie versions Fletch character in
the book a little bit different, but the Fletch movie
really is being sold on like Chevy Chase is doing
wacky bullshit as characters if you look at that and
this movie alone. Just from that standpoint, I think for me,
that character, that whole scene I think is the best
part of the movie for me in terms of like

(01:15:21):
it being a fully realized character, him really settling into it,
it having some interesting directions that it goes. And then
I think also like the motorcycle scene where he's like
yo mustache looks funny, like all of that, Like, I
think it all works, even when they get out of
the bar and they're kind of doing something else, and
I think the scene where he's playing the faith Healer

(01:15:42):
comes close, but it feels like such a retread from
earlier in the movie where he's already on stage and
it's like, wait, like I don't think we need to
either do one or the other, but not both. And
then that scene where he's a faith healer goes on.
I mean, there are some funny lines in that scene,
like god damn it, Tibou, put your pants back on
because he's like a guy has a guy exposing his
asshole people literally because he's because the guy has hemorrhoids,

(01:16:04):
because that's the joke obviously, Haha, guy's exposing himself in
front of people. Sure, but like that goes on for
so long and it's so prolonged that it's like, well,
they already did this earlier on in the movie, and
that scene was pretty prolonged as well, so it feels
like they're spending a lot of time doing this for
essentially two jokes. When in that Ed Harley scene they

(01:16:26):
get a lot of mileage out of the way he's
interacting with the characters, and a lot of the lines
and the line delivery and his outfit just it feels
so much more fully realized than anything else in the movie,
which is a shame because I would say in the
first movie, all of those disguises work. In this movie,
I would say almost none of them are as memorable
as even some of the ones in the first movie

(01:16:46):
that don't work that well.

Speaker 2 (01:16:48):
Well, when he's the I think I was trying to
remember he plays the same kind of character in the
first film around the airplane.

Speaker 1 (01:16:58):
Yeah, Willy Jean, thing bug, Budster, flat top guy.

Speaker 3 (01:17:01):
Yeah. Another and then another good character from Blazon saddles
in there.

Speaker 1 (01:17:07):
Yeah, oh yeah, the oh.

Speaker 3 (01:17:09):
Yeah, but the guy with the huge teeth.

Speaker 1 (01:17:11):
Yeah yeah, Bert Gilliam Right, oh yes, right, right right, yes, yes,
you know swing low sweet chariot. Yeah, tell him, I said, ow.

Speaker 3 (01:17:23):
Take whire main Off was telling him. I said, that
got you.

Speaker 1 (01:17:28):
Yeah, that guy. He plays the same character in this,
but he's not he's doing in that. In Fletch, he
doesn't do the southern accent. It's kind of not yeah.
In this movie, he's doing.

Speaker 2 (01:17:37):
Like the southern Oh that's the same disguise, right, and
they're kind of threw me off, like the lawyer scene
in his his apartment going on, right, Well, I'm seeing
this before. That's why I enjoyed the Ed Harley and
the Faith Healer. But I think, to your point, Chris,
that's unnecessary because he has already been there and even
though he's trying to suss out if this guy is

(01:17:58):
the culprit, I guess is the point of that scene.
But yeah, I still go back to our my I
think my final thought on it is I thank god
he wasn't phoned in in this tie. That's when that's
when we have problems with our.

Speaker 1 (01:18:13):
Episode, well, with Chevy Chase at least, because yeah, didn't
he I.

Speaker 2 (01:18:17):
Mean phoning it in literally an O, heavenly dog. I
think he fucking actually phoned in his voiceover. Wasn't even watching.

Speaker 1 (01:18:27):
Poorly quality done, that's for sure.

Speaker 2 (01:18:29):
Yeah, And he was not even watching the movie when
he was phoning it in. It's like, Okay, you guys
are recording this right, Okay, you squeeze it in somewhere
where it works, Okay, Yeah, send me that check.

Speaker 3 (01:18:41):
And last month with his reprisal of Ty Webb.

Speaker 2 (01:18:44):
Just yeah, yeah, Yeah, there's been too many phone in
Orange County. I'm in here for all of a minute
and a half.

Speaker 1 (01:18:55):
Yeah, that was fun. This is the first time in
a while where it's like Chevy's really he's here.

Speaker 3 (01:19:01):
He's in almost every single scene and every single shot. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:19:05):
Yeah, and yes there are pratt falls and slapstick, but
it's natural as Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:19:12):
It feels very very natural. Like him with his sword
when he bends over and knocks all the tomatoes off
of the thing. I'm like, okay, yeah, that's kind of funny,
like I understand.

Speaker 2 (01:19:22):
Yeah, and even you know, stepping into the porch when
it falls out from under him and falling off the porch.
We're done in a naturalistic way. I bought it, you know,
I didn't buy it.

Speaker 1 (01:19:37):
My favorite bit of physical comedy is and we kind
of mentioned it a little bit. I think you guys
were more frustrated at the scene than I am, ever,
because I think it's one of the funniest scenes in
the movie. There's a scene of Jeffrey Lewis with the
megaphone screaming at Chevy Chase and Cleveland Little and hit
the background. You could see Chevy Chase in the sheet
like that, why, which is a it's a really funny,

(01:19:59):
like small moment. But I actually the ways lifted.

Speaker 3 (01:20:02):
Up his legs really big and uh yeah, very well. Yeah,
you should go back and watch it. It's very funny.

Speaker 1 (01:20:09):
Him and the him in the clan costume and that
whole thing with the clan. You know what, Clavern claims
you Clavern Cucamonga and they're calling him Klukyes and he's
whacking him upside the head.

Speaker 3 (01:20:19):
You got him what?

Speaker 1 (01:20:22):
It's a California.

Speaker 2 (01:20:24):
I loved it that they couldn't light there, They couldn't
light anything on fire.

Speaker 1 (01:20:27):
That.

Speaker 2 (01:20:27):
Yeah, that's a guy in.

Speaker 1 (01:20:31):
A contract job rent.

Speaker 3 (01:20:33):
Out down here when Cleveland Little's there and he just goes,
where'd all the white women at?

Speaker 1 (01:20:40):
Yeah? I was waiting for guine why Hey, buys, those
hands are a little dirty after that crossburning last night.
It's see it's coming off. Yeah, it's it's reminiscent of that.
I I do like that's him, And yet I wish
Jeffrey Lewis was in the movie more. But I do
like that we get, you know, Fletched going up against
the moron racist in the movie, which is fun I

(01:21:01):
do like that we get you know, we have you know,
I'm surprised there aren't more and more on racist in
the movie, frankly, given we have Cleveland little in the movie,
a black man in the quote New South unquote. But
you know, I mean again, we do get the you know,
coon hunt side eye, so at least, you know, the
movie is the movie acknowledges that.

Speaker 2 (01:21:19):
But yeah, it's just kind of weird that he is
sort of racy racist at the beginning when he pulls
up you know, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:21:28):
You know, jump up and down, turn around, pick a
bally Cotton, Like, yeah, that's what the fuck? What?

Speaker 3 (01:21:34):
Yeah, it's all white people in this fantasy sequence.

Speaker 2 (01:21:38):
Yeah, yeah, exactly. I was like, okay, but they're still
kind of doing the voice like the lawyer and stuffy.
Yeah yeah, yeah, I do ventation. Yeah, they're all white.
We're playing it safe here. Thank god.

Speaker 1 (01:21:57):
I also that I also didn't realize again, Mark, you're
mentioning the bugs scene. This is the first time I've
apparently ever watched Fletch Lives with the subtitles on, because
I did not realize he says reticularious mary A Cuomos, Yes, yes,
which I had never put one in one together. That's
what he was saying up until watching it as a

(01:22:18):
thirty five year old adult. So there's that boy.

Speaker 2 (01:22:22):
Whoa the Cuomos, Oh the Quomos.

Speaker 1 (01:22:24):
Yeah, Maryo Cuomos man making references to him his boys.

Speaker 2 (01:22:28):
Maybe Nat and his boys are doing great stuff these days.

Speaker 1 (01:22:32):
Oh boy, whatever hear. I'm just Italian folks. I don't
know any better. He too, Bell And yet I can
keep my fucking hands to myself. But whatever, anything else
we want to talk about with Fletched lives all right?

Speaker 3 (01:22:46):
Good?

Speaker 2 (01:22:46):
Oh you know what, one weird thing this is pulling
a Colombo on it totally totally irrelevant. But the very
beginning of the movie, the Richard bells Aer scene, who
I was hoping to see more of, and that has
nothing to do with the main plot, but he likes
there is directly into the camera when it's panning in
to him. I was like, that was weird. Why did
they not do in a second take for that, because

(01:23:07):
it wasn't supposed to happen. He like notices something in
the going on and looks at the camera waiting for
Michael Richard you'll cut or something, and it just kind
of threw me off.

Speaker 1 (01:23:18):
I hate the assumption of Greek stereotypes that they like
to break plates on the ground. Seventy five thousand dollars breakage,
a lot of breakage.

Speaker 2 (01:23:30):
At least it's not Japanese people with the fucking camera,
which we've also had in Chevy Chase movies that we've
talked about.

Speaker 1 (01:23:37):
That's that's true. That's true. So starting with you, Mark
and then Mike final thoughts on flesh lips.

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):
Hey, we're back. We're back to ship Chevy Chevy. We're
back to Chevy doing something, putting in some effort, thank god.
And when we've got a good we've got a good
lineup coming up. I like Christmas Vacation. We've got nothing
but trouble, which I'm really intensely curious about. And then
I think our special episode after that is the recent

(01:24:07):
vacation movie. I like those guys movies. You're going to
also discuss that, so I'm looking forward to that. I've
been wanting to see it forever.

Speaker 1 (01:24:15):
So your intense curiosity is not going to be well founded.

Speaker 2 (01:24:19):
After that, it might be just a shit sandwich. But
at least we have three movies that I'm optimistic about this.

Speaker 3 (01:24:29):
I hope to finally be able to make sense of
all the references to Eddie and the ship house and
all that kind of stuff that my family, my in laws,
they just oh my.

Speaker 1 (01:24:42):
God, they was Mike's misquoting the movie. This shit happened.
Oh sorry, sorry, it's fucking hilario. It's more, I think
it's funnier that you misquoted it. I thought that was
part of the bit.

Speaker 3 (01:24:54):
Wow, no, not part of the bit, that part of
me being stupid.

Speaker 1 (01:24:57):
So yeah, oh no, it's funny, is it. I was like,
this is part of the bit. I think this is hilarious.

Speaker 3 (01:25:03):
So yeah, I'm excited to check those out. And yeah,
I hope we didn't come down too hard on fletch libs.
I think it can stand it. You know, it's some
people consider this a classic, and yeah, I've found a
lot of good things around this film. There are a
couple of things that it could have done better, but yeah,
just nice to see your really solid you have a
chase performance again. It feels like a long time since

(01:25:25):
we've seen one of those.

Speaker 1 (01:25:26):
Yeah no, that was Mike. You and I had recorded
earlier in the week, and that was kind of the
one thing I had said to you, was like, man,
doesn't it feel nice that we're actually watching like a
real movie for the first time in a while, Like
an actual fucking film that has a even if the
plot's a mess, like it is still a attempt at
a plot. And yeah, it's I don't know how people
sit and watch bad movies all the time other than

(01:25:49):
going and being like we're gonna make fucking dumb jokes
all time and farting poopoo jokes. Like I mean, if
that's all you're doing, fine, but I will tell you
sitting and watching like mediocre to bad movie after mediocre
to bad movie is not great? Is yeah? And it's
and like again like, oh fucking I hear I hear

(01:26:09):
someone in the distance going first world problems, you three
white assphas. But at the same time, if we only
have a certain amount of time every day to spend
on watching things, and then if we have to sit
and watch them critically, and you expect to listen to
us talk about them with any amount of knowledge, then
we're gonna have to watch these movies once, if not twice.
And man, watching Patch Adams three times was a bit much.

(01:26:33):
Watching License to Wed three times was a bit much,
and like that's the thing, like when when we watch
this after watching those Robin Williams movies for a month,
this feels like kind of a refreshing, like palette cleanser,
like ah, the tingle of lemon on my palette all
of a sudden, because it's like it's a plot. It's
a movie that's not completely at odds with itself. I mean, again,

(01:26:54):
it has its problems, but at the end of the day,
chevy Chase's performance carries it through. But just particularly in
respect to this podcast, this feels like the first time
in months, literally, because it has been three months that
we have watched a good chevy Chase film, or at
least a middling Chevy Chase. And yeah, if you go
and listen to How Did This Get Made or some

(01:27:14):
of these other shows where all they do is shit
all over movies, they're not I don't know how they
can do it other than than shitting all over it,
because otherwise it's like this movie is not great, and
it's like, well, what do we talk about critically with
a not great movie? There's you gotta do a lot
to talk about a movie that's bad without just sitting
and taking the piss out of it constantly because it's

(01:27:35):
again these sometimes the like Funny Money or oh God,
the movie before Funny Money, Spies Money Money Like, or
even Spies Like Us Like. There were things to like
in it, but overall like not not overtly great movies,
but we have to find something worth talking about. And
you know, same with those Robin Williams movies, and same

(01:27:57):
with Fletch Lives. Like Fletch Lives at times is not
a great movie, especially in comparison to a movie that
I consider to be one of my favorite movies. But
to Mike's point, it's a better movie than a lot
of the things we've watched recently. And at the end
of the day, I'd sit down and rewatch it. Before
I would sit down and rewatch pretty much anything we
watched for Mike White March over at the Culture Cast,
and I would rewatch it over most everything we've watched

(01:28:20):
for this podcast, especially something like Spies Like Us or
Deal of the Century, a movie that I swear to God,
I couldn't tell you a single fucking thing about at
this point other than it had Gregory Hines and Sigourney
Weaver and Chevy chasin so. But to both of your points,
I think the next episode is going to be one
that I'm excited to do because Mike, you've never seen it,
and Mark, it's a movie that I honestly never thought

(01:28:41):
I would do an episode on because I'm so I
think the interesting part is that Mike has never seen it,
and that for me is kind of what I'm most
excited about and getting to talk about it with you, Mark,
But like, it's a movie that I've never contemplated talking
about because it's a movie I watched once a year
and it's like, it's like, would I ever watch talk
about the Santa Claus another movie that I've seen a

(01:29:01):
million times at this point, Like.

Speaker 2 (01:29:03):
And it's and it's an oddity too because is it
is it a griz Does it need to be a
Grizzwold movie? It could have just been any fan, you know,
right exactly. Again, they're not going on vacation. We've got
the whole weird thing with the kids again, and you know,
different kids every movie, blah blah blah. But yeah, it's
just got to I think it just has a lot
more going for it than even the original, which I

(01:29:24):
am a big fan of them.

Speaker 1 (01:29:26):
But I again, like I never I also never thought
I would talk on a podcast about Fletch Lives, because
for the most part, I don't program my own months.
Uh and if I do well, I'm not saying I
don't program my own months, but I don't program months
for movies that I like because I don't want to talk.
I mean, Mike, you and I have talked about doing
a Good Fellow's episode Forever, which is the movie that
when someone asks me, that's normally my answer because it's

(01:29:47):
a movie that most people can at least have some
frame of reference for. But we've never done that either,
and I wonder what that episode's going to be like.
And I never thought I would do a Fletch Lives episode,
or do Fletch twice at this point, because I've done
Fletch episode two times, but I never thought I would
do an episode on Fletch Lives. So I'm glad that
you guys enjoyed it. I was a little trepidacious, but

(01:30:07):
I'm glad that the reason I ultimately enjoyed the movie,
which is Chevy Chase's performance, is the reason that y'all
weren't super put off by it the way some of
the last couple things we've watched for this show have
put all of us off. And again, if you're watching
these movies with us, I don't think there's any way
you like twenty Money any more than we did. So
but you were probably glad to at least enjoy listening

(01:30:29):
to us talk about it. But I'm not sure you
enjoyed it. And if you did, wow.

Speaker 2 (01:30:33):
Why aren't we doing the couch trip? Chevy's in the
couch Trip too?

Speaker 3 (01:30:36):
It's a cameo, even though I know, I know that
was pretty much. That was pretty much his role in
Orange County was cameo.

Speaker 1 (01:30:43):
Yeah, yeah, but Orange County there's a different reason we
watched Orange County. I know, yeah, yeah, yep, and I
Mike wrote it.

Speaker 2 (01:30:49):
Yeah, and Mike, Mike's the reason. Thanks a lot.

Speaker 3 (01:30:53):
All my fault, I know.

Speaker 1 (01:30:54):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:30:55):
And I'm also the guy that told the guy who
was writing my music for White Lotus to just fuck
right off.

Speaker 1 (01:31:00):
So true, I heard it.

Speaker 3 (01:31:01):
I don't even watch that show, but I know that
Mike White's a bastard around that.

Speaker 1 (01:31:05):
So speaking of Mike White, Mike White, where can people
find you when they want to hear you? Talk about
things that you work on.

Speaker 3 (01:31:13):
Well, yeah, I don't really talk about a whole lot
of Mike White movies over at the Protection Booth. But
I definitely maybe I should maybe get get Mike over
on the show. That'd be interesting, Mike White.

Speaker 1 (01:31:25):
I wouldn't be I would fuck I would listen to
how has that not happened already? Much? I mean interesting.
I thought you tried to make it happen and it
just hadn't.

Speaker 3 (01:31:34):
Yeah, I mean personally, I would love to do a
print interview and so just it would be so confusing.

Speaker 1 (01:31:41):
Who is this Mike. I think it would be honestly
kind of funny if you on your show did Mike
White march and did it on Mike White, Mike White,
the other Mike White boy. I think, I mean, wow,
that's horrifuingly, that's a that's that's a boy. That's a
meta joke for like only the people that listen to

(01:32:01):
your show and my show. But I think he's I
mean you could, I mean, there's enough Mike White stuff
at this point. I mean, and you could just use
the episode we did for Orange County. There you got me,
There you go one in the bag.

Speaker 2 (01:32:13):
You got a weird interview.

Speaker 1 (01:32:14):
Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:32:17):
But yeah, you can find everything that I do over
at Weirdingwaymedia dot com, except for the one thing that
Chris and I do with our dear friend Richard HadAM,
which is called Mike and on Bond. You can get
that at our patreons, which is patreon dot com slash
Projection Booth and patreon dot com slash Culture, Castle's Culture
with k Be sure to check those out. And yeah,
it's a lot of good fun over at Wordingway Media,

(01:32:39):
including some stuff by mister Mark Benkley.

Speaker 2 (01:32:42):
Hey that's me, and you can catch my shows We
Wake Up Heavy and Cambridge and with Sean over on
Wordingwaymedia dot com. I have a note, my wife has
been watching The White Lotus. I kind of pretty much
missed the whole first season, but I caught a little
bit of it. But's season two and three I'm pretty
much sticking with, and I kind of like it.

Speaker 3 (01:33:00):
All right, you're welcome.

Speaker 2 (01:33:02):
Season three has the Big Guy, and I have no
idea what the music controversy is about because I'm not
bothered by the music in the new in the new
season at all, So I'm like, what the fuck are
people talking about.

Speaker 1 (01:33:13):
Doesn't Season three have Walton Goggins in it? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (01:33:15):
It does have big dogs and Arnie Arney's son.

Speaker 1 (01:33:23):
Arney is in Bell Warzenegger's son.

Speaker 3 (01:33:26):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:33:26):
Yeah, he's actually a decent actor.

Speaker 1 (01:33:30):
Hey, you know what they say, just because you're a
NEPO baby doesn't mean you don't have talent.

Speaker 2 (01:33:35):
It's very true. I mean, you know, family business isn't
family business a thang in America? Shouldn't we be saluting
that a sons? I don't have a son, but.

Speaker 1 (01:33:48):
I don't know if we should be supporting it failing.
I think at this time injuncture in our history, maybe
we don't support family business as well, or maybe we
support certain family business. Is it not? Others?

Speaker 2 (01:34:01):
Speaking of Michael Ritchie, go listen to the Projecting Booth
episode on Smile. It is a fascinating episode on a
fascinating film that I have not seen. But it has
also been put out by Fun City Editions. Speaking of them,
let's bring everything full circle on this.

Speaker 3 (01:34:17):
Yeah, really kind of wish they had talked to me
about that one. That would have been fun. I've got
a lot of good interviews on that episode. But whatever,
you know, I'm not mov.

Speaker 2 (01:34:25):
Yeah, yeah, I think they have. I think they had
people they go with. Oh yeah, extra stuff, that's for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:34:32):
Speaking of extras, I'm extra as fuck. And you can
find all the things that I work on at weirdingwaymedia
dot com as well, or I shoot my mouth off
on the Culture Cast, which I talked about Fletch on
there like God a couple of years ago with Father
Malone when we did I think we did an episode
in Fletch and then we did an episode on Confess Fletch.
I believe, so if it wasn't the same episode, there
were two episodes, but I think they may have been

(01:34:53):
even the same episode. Yeah, it was like a Fletch
full Fletch episode, I think.

Speaker 3 (01:34:59):
And there's a pledg Fleah, Well.

Speaker 1 (01:35:00):
There's a whole there's a whole show just about Fletch.
And I forget what the guy's name is, but he
left a comment on the Fletch episode was a good
job from something Jim He's like he has his it's
like a Fletch podcast where it's just about Fletch. Like
that might awesome. That rules. But yeah, that's where you
can find all the stuff that I work on. Mike
mentioned at ranking on bond is on our patreons support

(01:35:22):
any of the content creators for weirding Way Media, be
it Eighties TV ladies, be it Cambridge and with Sean,
be it uh wake Up Heavy, be it you know,
Twisted and Uncorked, be at Midnight viewing, anything and everything.
There's a lot to support, and there's a lot of
people making a lot of great content. Uh yeah, but
the next time you hear us, we're gonna be talking
about Christmas vacation and until I don't know, just I'm

(01:35:47):
v Yeah, I was a gonna say I'm Christatus chevat

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Episode 17: Fletch Lives (1989)

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