Episode 25: Lolita Vibrator Torture

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
You are now listening to the Someone's Favorite Productions podcast Network.

Speaker 2 (00:46):
Hello, y'all, welcome back to episode twenty five of Punk Vacation.
It just it's crazy to see the number twenty five
up there. Feels like it's only been yesterday that we've
been doing this. Thanks everybody for listening to episode twenty four,
the first year special. It's been quite popular and a

(01:07):
lot of people have tuned in, so I really really
appreciate y'all. Episode twenty five. As you all know by now,
this is kind of a podcast where I want to
find the joy in unfettered creativity, which I feel captures
the spirit of Vinegar Syndrome to me. I want to
use this podcast as a space to bring awareness and
context to movies of any budget, from anywhere and during

(01:29):
any time, which is something I think Vinegar Syndrome has
been championing. I am joined today by the guest who's
coming back now for the fourth time, Eli Alsberg. Thank
you so much for making time again. Eli.

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Always always a pleasure to be here, so thank you
again for asking me to do the show. Is such
a blast as a listener, it makes me happy to
be here too.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Awesome, Well, I know people are always very high. I'm
listening to you. So that's mutual Golden age porno movies
that you show at the Pussycat Theater and you have
a monthly stand up at Pleasure Chest, and I have
to ask you a very specific question about that pussy
How it played? So how have you been?

Speaker 3 (02:14):
So everything's good? Yeah, I guess just to expand on
that more. These things for people listening. I'm sure if
you're repeat listeners, but if it's anyone's first time. These
take place in LA. I have my monthly stand up
show called Performance Anxiety at the Pleasure Chest in West Hollywood.
Just had a fourteen year anniversary show for that. Well wow,
fucking insane. Yeah, and then probably would be more appealing

(02:36):
to the listeners of the podcast, of course, is Pussycat
Theater night that is? Yeah, I basically do. It's a
bit more malleable. I always kind of call it like
where I just show kind of Golden age adult stuff,
but I've branched off into like some sexploitation and ruffies
and stuff like that I showed. I've shown another one

(02:58):
that you really helped. You were really really supportive of
was well even supportive of it from the get go.
But what I mean is when I said I was
showing the telephone Book, you were like, holy shit, yes,
get it the fuck out there. That Yeah, that played
like so well, it like truly the whole The next month,
I showed The Tale of Tiffany Lust and the audience
was like two people in the audience were like I

(03:20):
still think about the telephone Book yeah, and and like
I which makes me really really happy. And then Batpussy
I showed. So that was at one venue that I'm
not doing it on anymore at the moment because they
now are technically in all ages of venues, so they
can't show you can't just have like a movie playing

(03:40):
that's like an adult film in the background, because if
they have, like you know, like a fifteen year old
comes in with their parents. And so so I showed
it at a space at a place called one third
Space in Highland Park, I showed a double feature of
bat Pussy and Gums, which was both AGFA leases and
with something weird video and well, at least I know

(04:05):
that Pussy was and they when we so bat Pussy,
I guess just for context. The venue is very small.
It caps at about a little less than twenty people,
and I think there were a total of twelve. And
but in a small room like that, it's like a
full house, and so it melted everybody's brains like it

(04:26):
was a much more lively experience, like discussion afterwards. I'll
just say there was quite a discussion to be had
about it, because I mean, and also just while watching it,
you're just like, is this guy ever gonna get hard?
Will he get a boner? I don't think he he will,
but who knows. Maybe that's what this is all leaning towards.

(04:46):
And it's just and when she started bouncing on the ball,
and that is not a euphemism. She literally got on
a bouncy ball in traffic. The fucking hold the whole
venue at nuts, they just couldn't believe that it would
keep cutting back to that. And yeah, so it played
really well, and I feel like, you know, I kind
of had gums because I just thought, well, it's a

(05:08):
fifty minute movie. I kind of want to give people
their bunnies worth, you know, if they're gonna plunk down
like thirteen fourteen bucks to watch this. And so, you know,
not everybody stayed. I would say about four people Split,
but watching that one, the stamina was flagging a little
more because Gums isn't as it's a fun movie. But
after bat Pussy, what could follow it? I know, right,

(05:30):
you know it's almost like, yeah, it very much was
the was the second movie if you were to watch
it like in the seventies, I feel like this is
exactly how they would be programmed. Actually, the more I
thought about that, I was like, yeah, I think I
nailed it on that part, so pun not intended and
like I just it just was. Yeah, it was a

(05:51):
really fun night. So that's the last one I did.
At the end of June, I'm working on booking it again,
like do I'm not sure if it's going to be
at that venue because they might be switching storefronts, so
just a little behind the scenes. It is coming back,
I just am not sure where yet. Hopefully in the
next month or two it'll be uh it'll it'll be back.

(06:13):
But yeah, it's been a blast I managed to do
at the first venue it managed I managed to show.
I managed to do it for a full year there,
so that felt very accomplished. To be able to show
a year's worth, I means that means I showed twelve
movies that, for the most part, with a few exceptions,
mostly have not screened even in LA. That felt really
really gratifying because not just telephone Book. I showed like

(06:36):
Doris Wichman's The Immortal three. I showed Sex World, the
Farvard broadcast opening a Misty Beethoven, just stuff that like,
you know, never screens around here. So and it just
proves that there's an audience for it. I know that
it's a couple in like Seattle and Chicago and New
York here and there they show stuff. I know, Liz
Purchell really continues to champion that stuff through not just

(07:00):
not just through the distribution like muscle distribution that Liz runs,
but like every you know, in terms of just getting
anything out there wherever she can. It absolutely rocks. She's great.
So I uh, big, big shout out to her. And
so yeah, that's that's pretty much. Uh, that's pretty much it.
Hopefully back soon.

Speaker 2 (07:19):
Okay, Uh you said telephone Book played well, Like how
did the live audience react to that ending animated sequence?

Speaker 3 (07:28):
Oh? Man? I okay, So just for context of the venue,
it's a restaurant, but it's it's pretty well sectioned off
so people can like eat and watch. A few people
in the back were like, there's this area where some
people can kind of just peek in, like while they're eating,
they can kind of see it, and they were so

(07:48):
everybody was just like losing it. But what really made
me happy was there were and this happened twice this year,
but there were three people in the back who were
like kind of passive at the beginning of it, you know,
because it wasn't interrupting anything. They were far enough away,
but when that sequence came up, they were cracking up.

(08:08):
They couldn't believe what they were watching. And they approached
me afterwards and were like, what was this movie? This
was incredible? That also that also happened with the last
movie I showed there, which was Score. There was a
three three top that came in in the in the
very back, and they were kind of just watching it
at first, and then they stopped me as I was
walking by at one point and they're like, what's this

(08:30):
movie called? When was this? Maide? What? This is so funny?
And like they were totally into.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
It and amazing I was.

Speaker 3 (08:38):
I was really happy that I got to show Score
before excuse me before it ended because at that venue
because that was the first thing I wanted to show there,
So it felt very full circle on on Pride month
to because they know bisexual porno. I guess like the
more notorious one would be both ways, but which fingers

(09:00):
and put out. But I feel like score is like
a I think it's like a genuine masterpiece. So I'm
hoping that gets a that gets a four K at
some point.

Speaker 2 (09:08):
Man, that's awesome. Well, you're doing great work, and it
seems like, you know, the fun thing about the way
that you're approaching this, I think is that for those
eight to twelve to twenty people when they come, like
it's kind of a life changing experience, right, Like those
are the things that they're going to go talk to
others about. So you're kind of like planting that seed
in people that would otherwise most likely never see this.

Speaker 3 (09:31):
Right absolutely, that's exactly the goal too, that you you
nailed it through like one hundred percent. That's exactly what
I wanted, like people, because you know, in LA you're
so spoiled with screenings that like it's easy to see
other things. And again not to say that it hasn't
been done at other places, there's definitely times where you know,
everything from the New Beverly to Wayami to I feel

(09:54):
like I'm missing a venue.

Speaker 2 (09:56):
But like.

Speaker 3 (09:58):
They'll show like hardcore stuff. I'll show, you know, like
sex films and stuff like that, but it's it's it's
not very frequent, and I think whenever it does show,
people should go to those because that's supporting, it keeps
it alive. But I, yeah, the goal is if I'm
going to do something like that, especially where it's like
kind of you know, while I'm trying to live my
life and do other things and take care of stuff,

(10:18):
I want it to be something that I would enjoy watching.
But also like, yeah, it's like I'm taking a group
of friends and being like, hey watch this, and I'm
just as excited by their reaction. Yeah yeah, yeah as I,
you know, and I and I and getting to introduce
it and talk to people afterwards. Yeah, that's super fun.
And it's like one hundred percent the goal and exactly
how I approach it amazing.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
Well, we have a lot to talk about tonight because
September is a crazy month. You know, I was trying
to think and we this is just going to be
a quick detour until we get into the titles. But
I was trying to think about, you know, the subscription
versus waiting for sales, because I think one of the
interesting things that I've seen this year is that they've

(11:00):
tended to up the numbers of limited a little bit
to where they usually don't sell out in the first month,
with a few exceptions, especially in the partner titles, which
we can get into, and on the partner titles they've
decreased some to five hundred, but I think for the
most part, these things are not selling out instantly. So
I've been trying to figure out this tension between subscribing

(11:24):
versus just picking what you want at like a sale.
And I'm really I'm really fifty to fifty on it
at the moment, because I like, I know that they
make money off of the subscription, but if you really
think about it, they're probably not making that much more
than people that buy in a sale. The benefit is
probably that they're getting that money up front, which allows

(11:45):
them to kind of fund like licensing and stuff. But
it's a heavily discounted rate, right, So I don't know,
I mean, it's anyways, I just.

Speaker 3 (11:55):
Agree with that, Yeah, I agree with that. I think
it's yeah, I guess you could say I'm fifty fifty two,
but I'm probably more like fifty five forty five, you
know what I mean, like just a little bit. Because
what I do think about is as far as the
subscriber goes, is yeah, you're right, you pay a lot
of and it's a lot upfront. So I don't blame
anybody for not being able to obviously do that. And

(12:17):
but it's it's tax free usually if I remember correctly,
like I did the math, I was like, oh yeah,
because I remember there was like I thought there was
tax to it, but it turned out there wasn't. And
so I mean, you know, that doesn't sound like a lot.
But if you times that tax over every release, that's
that you could buy a few more movies with that,
you know, And and also you know the shipping priority

(12:40):
obviously rocks and then the discount on the partner stuff
and the malousine stuff, and you're right, I mean some
of it ultimately, if you did the math a year
or two later would be cheaper, like, you know, not
even two years now, it's like a year later. I
mean Chinese torture Chamber story you could. I think you
could pick up for twenty bucks right now, and that's
that's definitely cheaper than what it probably costs from the subscriber,

(13:04):
you know. But you know, I also like the idea
of being supportive if I can. Yeah, And you know,
I think you and I, relatively speaking, are more apologists
than most people when there when because I don't know,
I know, it's it's they're growing and there's just gonna
be bumps from going from like something at a smaller

(13:26):
level to you know, what they're turning into. So but
I guess to give you a short because I'm already
kind of rambling a bit. But like, I think that
overall the pros definitely outweighed the cons, especially with more
like limited stuff and like you know, yeah, because if

(13:46):
if I bought the Keep and not as a subscriber,
that would have been like fifty bucks with shipping, and
you know, if I I don't know, but when I
wasn't I will say when I wasn't subscribing, I was
mostly just buying it at retail level. Like I didn't
care about the slips too much. The big benefit for
me is melu scene. Yeah, and you know, getting getting

(14:07):
stuff discounted there, but even there, you know, you can
they had a killer fucking sailor this weekend.

Speaker 2 (14:13):
Yeah, the Labor Day and the and the Valentine's right,
so at least twice a year, they're knocking those off
pretty pretty substantially. Anyways, I don't know, like I said,
I'm we were talking before the show, I'll probably I
don't know, they'll probably get me for another year. But
I do like the convenience of it, of just not
having to think about that, and like not feeling that

(14:33):
intense pressure of having to log in right at eleven
and make sure that I'm grabbing.

Speaker 3 (14:36):
Stuff's Yeah, and also being a returning subscriber you do
get that code, so your subscriptions even cheaper. You know,
you get one hundred one hundred bucks off if you return. Yeah, yeah,
it's true mathematically, so I guess mathematically actually it does
come out to the same difference as probably some of
these mega sales. But like, I don't feel, I don't know,
I think that when people approach it that way, they're

(14:59):
approaching it more like I don't want to say investors,
but I think, like I don't know, I'm okay with
if something's a little cheaper later, Like I'm okay. I
watched intrepidos Punks last year and I liked it then,
and that's that's fine, you know, like like it's that
it's so if someone can get it for five bucks,
lesson enjoy it. A more power to them. I also

(15:22):
wasn't able. I wasn't like as thick into it when
they're supposed to, like Halcyond, you know when they like
it was like champagne and bullets, and like I wasn't
buying yet, and so I already missed some of the
stuff that was really really cheap. I saw what some
of those sales were, man like, like someone posted screen
caps of like really old subscription and like buying shit

(15:43):
during a sale and stuff with like like VSAs like
Evil Town were like sixteen dollars. Yeah, yeah, and you
know if you want to catch up, you want to
catch up to that stuff. Now it's a lot harder
because you know that's like more expensive on the secondary
market and stuff. So I don't know, it's like it's

(16:03):
a pros and cons thing that I think ultimately depends
kind of on the viewer or I guess like I
shouldn't say, I, you're a subscriber, but yeah, I don't.
I don't ever really feel when I see those like
cheap sales. I don't feel like betrayed because a lot
of the times it's stuff I probably wasn't going to
get any ways. And then if I do see stuff
really cheap that I didn't get it first, I'll just

(16:26):
tack it on to, you know, to my subscriber package.

Speaker 2 (16:29):
Look, thanks for going down that tangent, you know, I mean,
I of course it. It's just this ongoing discussion, right
because it's a fascinating model, and my stupid brain like
supporting the underdog, and as soon as something becomes less
of an underdog, I have a tendency to want to
sort of like move on to the next underdog. And

(16:50):
so there's a little bit of this for me that's
just pure like at a base level, I'm just debating
whether or not there's still an underdog. But I think
the thing that keeps me around is in this unique
case of vinegar syndrome. I don't know that I care
because for every release of the keep you were talking
about or whatever, they're still putting out some of the
stuff that we're going to talk about tonight and they

(17:10):
came out in August. I mean, they're still putting out
films that might not get a release otherway. So there's
still their mission.

Speaker 3 (17:17):
That's what I was going to say. I'm like, you
know what, whether it's an underdog or not, at this point,
to me, they're not owned by like a parent company.
They still kind of play by their own rules. And
although they still do not kind of. I mean obviously
they put out stuff, and I'm sure there's stuff in
the licensing where they got to pick up stuff that
otherwise and other places wouldn't touch either, but like you know,

(17:38):
they're still doing it to fund the stuff like Melusine,
and you know, it breaks my heart that that that
stuff they have to they had to move it to
a different site and it might not sell as well.
But I agree wholeheartedly. And look, I think their model
actually has other companies. I don't know that Radiance copied
them or not or anybody, but you know, these other

(18:00):
companies they're doing their own thing, and they're also doing
subscription models now. And I do think it's that thing
of like the rising tide lifting other boats, you know,
whereas like I don't know, cause I still don't think
of VS in the same way as like as I
think of Shout or Arrow, which are totally fine companies,
even if they're like I know, the Arrow's arrows owned

(18:21):
by like a weird parent company that makes them almost
Amazon like and they're packaging to say the least, but
like you know, like you know, but Shouts like obviously
you're gonna find them in retail stores even criteria like,
they're all doing good work, but I still don't put
them in that camp because they're direct to you know.
VS is so direct to the customer, to the subscriber

(18:42):
or the non subscriber, and the way they kind of
do their stuff. I also think their points system is
probably the best points system. Like I every couple of months,
my half my order from the non subscription stuff ends
up being free, you know. So yeah, I don't. I
personally just don't get the the VSMC slips. I get
people wanting to do that, but I'd rather put it

(19:02):
more materially speaking towards it.

Speaker 2 (19:05):
Yeah, you know, towards all the stickers that come out.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah, another another another another mug whatever
dog bowl, But yeah, I I I think it's uh
like we were talking about off air, I'll probably I'll
probably go another year if I can swing it. Of course,
you know it's yeah, So that's that's pretty much where

(19:30):
I'm at.

Speaker 2 (19:31):
Well, we've got, like I said earlier, we've got a
lot of talk about tonight, but just quickly, you know,
it's interesting they I don't know whether to joke or
be serious about this because it kind of it's not
a big deal, but at the same time, it's drives
me insane that Larry festened and came out Spye number

(19:52):
five on nine and then for some reason they put
a movie in between volume one and two, and volume
two is five eleven.

Speaker 3 (20:00):
I knew you were going to bring that up. I
was waiting for it. I was like, because I know
you always when whenever you intro everything, you talk about
spine numbers, you know, And like, I do want to
say one thing actually before because you just reminded me
with the Festens and stuff. I know he's a very divisive. Actually,
I'm surprised to see how divisive he was as a
filmmaker because as far as I know, most people like
his stuff. But what I will say is, in regards

(20:23):
to what we were talking about with the subscription and
particularly this month and August even you know, when July hit,
when the halfway subscriber sale hit, I was thinking, I
was like, you know, I you and I've said this before,
were kind of like more on the apologist side, but
July was like indefensibly bad for me, Like it did

(20:45):
nothing for I was read. I was like, you know what,
as soon as he's get here, I'm going to pass
them on to someone who would rather own them. I've
seen the rage carry too enough for this lifetime and
probably the next. And the card player is like, to
me like bottom of the Barrel or Gento. And I
did watch Young Gary. I'm glad I did, but but like, yeah,

(21:08):
I was like, you know what, I I'm okay that
this month might be the first time where I'm like,
I don't know, I mean, you know, and and I
know there was another month that was a little week two,
but you know what if that's what if that's what
that month had to be so we could get August
and September like fucking banger after banger on the main
line on the fucking sub labels like across the board

(21:31):
these especially this month, Man, this month, the box is
gonna be real fucking big when I get the package.
But like, I think they've been killing it for the
last two months. I'd totally worth it if if I
had to put up with those I mean, they're not again,
It's like that's part of just what the subscription is.
So I don't mind because there's been such a good

(21:54):
hit ratio this year for me. Yeah, and even with
the sub labels, I don't know, man, people, I know
they can get a little overwhelming. I've definitely become a
bit more discerning on that front, but which is actually
especially for this month of VSA when we talk about that,
I have more to say about it then, but like,
you know, not necessarily in a bad way, but like, yeah,

(22:15):
it does make me a little more discerning, and so
I'm very happy with it. But yes, I also thankfully
I don't do spine ordering, and I think that the
festened in boxes for me, I actually want to have
them separate from the movies, kind of sitting in a
you know, almost like in a separate like like on
top of the shelf, if that makes sense. That's kind

(22:37):
of how I would probably line them up. But yeah,
it is strange that they because they were so close
that you know, it'd be different if it was like
released a year apart or.

Speaker 2 (22:46):
Something exactly what I'm saying, like if there was five
nine and then like six three, Like what sure?

Speaker 3 (22:53):
Right? Right?

Speaker 2 (22:54):
But like that just that's going to drive me crazy forever.
Like I almost want to take a sharpie and like
make it, but you should.

Speaker 3 (23:02):
There's nothing to say you can't. That life is meetingless, baby,
Go ahead, fucking live your truth. Get a sticker, get
like like get ahoto, photoshop something and just lightly tape
over it. Figure because I honestly I get it. Man,
if I if I organized that way, I would absolutely
my OCD would be through the fucking roof.

Speaker 2 (23:22):
Or maybe maybe Kevin would initiate a spine number corrections recall.

Speaker 3 (23:28):
Oh boy, imagine that initial what the initial pressing? What
that'll go for once that goes rare? Yeah? Yeah, I mean, hey,
I know collector bring can really take you places, and
there are people will be like I need to own
both both numbers, the recalled number and the the new one.

Speaker 2 (23:48):
No, but it's like, uh, we'll talk about this. Well,
maybe we can just jump into it. Because because Festen
is five eleven, which is the first.

Speaker 3 (23:56):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 (23:57):
So I mean I know that there's a lot of
people that are saying, hey, they just came out on
shot Factory or screen Factory or whatever, and I get that,
but they were out of print with that. And you know,
here's how I've made my piece. I'm not going to
defend anybody who's like pissed at them for just putting
out titles from other labels. I get it. Yeah, but

(24:20):
if I was gonna have a movie that had like
a Forever Home, I'm kind of happy that the fastened
in movies there Forever Home is vinegar syndrome. I mean
in terms of like on my shelf, like that's the
release I'm going to keep.

Speaker 3 (24:32):
You know, agreed. I couldn't agree more same. I think that, Like,
here's the other thing. I think that, especially in the
last in the Blu Ray to four K era, transfers
have been so varied, and I think you know one
place where VS remains unimpeachable, where they are just absolutely

(24:55):
top dogs, is when it comes to transfers. I know
some people gave them shit for a couple of the
four k's running a little hot when they first were
putting out four k's particularly Roadhouse, and I think it
was Texas Chainsaw, but even that's like such minor infractions.
And I think in especially like when Blu Ray was

(25:16):
finally becoming like the new normal, I think that some
transfers like there's only better scanning technology now. Yeah, right,
so like I think that, Yeah, I'm all for it
for that reason. I also don't blame anyone for just
wanting to keep there. Let's scare Jessica to death. I
didn't own it, and I think it's one of their
best releases of the year. So I'm very happy that

(25:37):
it's a four K through them because that transfer is
also fantastic. And visiting the movie, I was so fucking
happy watching it. It's great. I mean to me, I
you know where I start running out of shelf space
is I realized that, like, oh, there's a booklet and
a case over this thing. That's mostly where I get.
I can kind of get like with the but with
the Vestendon ones, you know, it's different that if they

(26:01):
got separate releases in those like slip boxes. Yeah, so
I'm yeah, I'm happy with it. I'm very happy that
they put out his movies because I've seen two of them,
one on each set, and I haven't seen two of them,
so it like it feeds the thing of me wanting
to revisit movies I haven't seen in twenty years, and
also discovering new ones that I've been trying to get

(26:21):
around to for a long time.

Speaker 2 (26:23):
I think most people's entry to festened in his Habit
and whind to Go? Was that your entry point?

Speaker 3 (26:27):
YEP? I saw When to Go on DVD when it
first came out, it was like nobody gave a shit
about it. It didn't It did not open in South
Florida to the best of my knowledge, and which is
where I grew up, and Blockbuster only had like I
think one or two copies. And when I rented it,

(26:48):
it still had a new DVD smell like no one
had clearly rented it. And I loved it and it
made me seek out Habit.

Speaker 2 (26:56):
Yeah, yeah, Habit's great.

Speaker 3 (26:58):
And then last winter I just missed I never I
don't know how I missed it, but it looks great
and and I love that like and same thing with
no telling, I know, I think because I know what
Festendon's about. Like stylistically speaking, I kind of have a
good idea of what what I'm in for. And I
know some people if they just start with no telling,

(27:21):
they seem or even with habits. I also know some
of this stuff's just not for certain people.

Speaker 2 (27:26):
Uh. The interesting thing is if you're talking about just
like starter pack, I think Volume two is the starter
pack because Last Winter was shot on thirty five. It
has a similar vibe to the thing, and uh, it's
just a really cool snowy horror movie. And he actually
shot some of it in Iceland and oh shit, somewhere else,

(27:49):
maybe Alaska or something, so like he like left New
York to go shoot this movie in the snow and
it's cool, Like it's good, Like it's really good. And
I think I'm glad that more. I think that's gonna
end up being a lot of people's face, just in
the same way that you get a director like Mikiliswave
they just naturally gravitate for like Cemetery Man or something.
It's just, yeah, it's just such a big, interesting movie,
like it's it's you know, it's like a more of

(28:10):
a crowd pleaser. So I think Last Winner is gonna
be that for a lot of people.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
Yeah, I'm stoked to watch it. I like, I can't.
I haven't even gotten around watching Habit and I'm telling yet,
but I you're probably right, like I, when I get them,
I'll probably end up watching those first, not for any
other reason than like I just I love When to
Go so much. I love Habit too, But that's a
very specific type of lo fi compared to I think
When to Go was really a great early two thousands

(28:38):
horror movie because at that point horror kind of it
was in a weird spot. You know, it's like post
slashers but pre like, for lack of a better term,
torture porn, like it was in this really specific spot
where it's mostly like PG thirteen ghost movies because they were,
yeah they were, because they were all trying to rip
off the sixth sense, but they were doing it with
like that like MTV editing and you know, like very

(29:00):
that what they used to what they called MTV editing
at the time. It was yeah, that's Roberts and Mechis.
That was like his uh, his rear. He did like
literally beat for beat rear window rips in that and
that movie sucked so bad. It was PG thirteen. But yeah,
there was other you know like I know that. I
think it was Dark Star put out. They did Fear
dot Com, which was in two thousand and two. Yeah,

(29:22):
there was a lot of I worked at a movie
theater during that period, and man, there were so many.
There was one called Wes Craven. The title was actually
Wes Craven Presents They okay, And it was so bad.
It was like a I don't even know if it
was PG thirteen or not, but it was. I think
I built the print for that and the built so
when we I had to do tech check and I

(29:44):
couldn't wait for it to be over. It was like
seventy five minutes or eighty minutes. It just Yeah, it
was just this really bad period where there was very
flat or like like just trying to kind of like
make a cross between the Six Sons and Blade in
terms of styles, and you know, sometimes it worked. Does
not to say they weren't good horror movies during that period,
but yeah, they were definitely rare. And so I remember

(30:07):
watching his and it felt like a real like a
breath of fresh air.

Speaker 2 (30:12):
Yeah, and he's extremely intelligent guy. I mean, I'm excited
for people to get a chance to listen to him.
Talk about movies because he's somebody that's sort of infectious
when he talks about movies.

Speaker 3 (30:21):
Yeah, he has an excitement about him. And also for people,
if people don't know, they might recognize him if they're
big Scorsese fans, because Scorsese clearly really likes him, has
an affection for him. He was in Killers of the
Flower Moon in that final scene he was in. He's
got a great he's he doesn't even say anything, but
he's just got a great cameo in Bringing Out the

(30:41):
Dead where Mary Beth hurt is just like chewing him
out for being a drunk. It's just, yeah, I love him,
and I'm glad that like the whole catalog is with
VS now for Glass Eye picks because like, I still
haven't seem depraved, and I'm sure that'll either. If it's
not going to be a sub label, it'll probably be
through the Partner through Glass Eye at some point.

Speaker 2 (31:03):
Yeah, and I'm excited for this. So there's a guy
in Oh, shoot, I hope I get this right, either
Wales or Scotland. Sorry, Philip. I can't remember where he sits,
but he does all the special features for second Sight.
So he's like a legend. Oh and he writes an
essay and this he loves festened in a lot, and
he has an essay in volume two.

Speaker 3 (31:24):
Oh that's fucking awesome.

Speaker 2 (31:26):
Yeah, so Philip Scott, he's a he's a legend of
modern day stuff that a lot of people don't know
his name because Second Sight is so like secretive about
who's doing all their stuff.

Speaker 3 (31:34):
Yeah, well not anymore. You guys got him out there.
Internet do your not just kidding, I Internet do your thing, baby, No,
that's great, that's awesome because they do. I mean Second
Site especially, you know, as far as imports go, they're
fucking unmatched when they do those. I sometimes don't need
boxes that big, so I'll go with standards. But I'm

(31:56):
glad when they when there's like you know, when the
hitcher got it to do there exactly, you.

Speaker 2 (32:01):
Know, Yeah, yeah, no, no, anyways, but that's there's really
good stuff there they I'm just trying to think if
there's any other special feature to call out. There's a
ton of special features on When to Go. Oh yeah,
hours and hours three, two new commentaries and two archival commentaries,
So you've got a lot you can listen to.

Speaker 3 (32:23):
Oh and in the last Winner. There's literally a feature
length documentary exactly. That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
Yeah, I'm very excited about that because I think for
for Fessenden, he considers this to be something he's very
proud of because he got like you know, if you're
it's almost like it's kind of like the film where
he sort of made it like he got money, he traveled,
like he got actors, like he got Ron Perlman was
in it, like it's yeah, it's a cool like I

(32:51):
don't know, for him, it's just I imagine it feels
very like he's very proud of it.

Speaker 3 (32:55):
So I also wonder how he got like the kid
from Malcolm in the Middle in du waygo, because that
was like, you know, Malcolm in the Middle had already
been on for a while, so it wasn't like that
wasn't a well known shows.

Speaker 2 (33:05):
A New York kid or something. Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, yeah,
but anyways, No, Fessenden's great and I'm excited for this release.
And if you're not, you'll know it. And I mean
there's not you know, we don't have to sell it
to anybody. If you're on the fence. I think Fessenden's
a safe choice, and I'm a little curious about this,
this brand they have of monsters and madness. I know

(33:28):
that that's a Fessenden thing, but at the same time,
like maybe they could put other directors into there, you know,
because there's anyways. I don't know, so we'll see. I
don't know if there's anything in that line beyond volume two.
But so that's two movies for the month. Now moving
on to Spine five twelve, we get three from Italy.

(33:52):
And this is interesting because it'd be I think, if
you're a cynic, it'd be tempting to say this is
them trying to move I've forgotten Jolly set into the
main line. Yeah, and I don't have a strong defense
for that because it's three movies from it, three jolly
movies from Italy. But if you dig into this a
little bit, and we'll talk about it here in just
a second, but these are pretty interesting directors, and like

(34:14):
these are these are movies that would have played to
a larger audience when they came out, So I don't
think they would have been like forgotten in that.

Speaker 3 (34:21):
I agree, Yeah, I I because when people said, like, oh,
bloodstained Lawn, you know, that's the That's It's funny. They
haven't listed as a second movie, but as far as
I can tell, that's just going to be the main,
the biggest one and so. And based on what I've
read on the movies, what little I've read, I try
to go into these as blind as possible, but I
think specifically when it comes to anything that's not American made,

(34:44):
I don't do that as often because I think sometimes
you do need a little bit of context for what
you're gonna watch politically or whatever. So I read up
a little more on these, and yeah, I have to
say that I don't think these because that's what I
thought at first. I'm like, well, why don't think Forgotten Jolly?
I mean, those sets sell out like fucking crazy now,
but I think that, Yeah, I just don't think these

(35:08):
fall under that line as much. And they didn't have
to make a box. It's just like a three it's
like a three disc case. And yeah, two out of
three of them in particular, really sound. Bloodstained Lawn and uh,
Death Falls Lightly both sound really great. Obscene Desire has
a wonderful name. I mean, any movie called that that
almost feels like like like, you know, remember the Wu

(35:30):
Tang generator. Do you remember that meme like you put
your give you your name. I feel like that's what
obscene Desire is. Like here, let's put the name into
the jolly generator and that that's what came up. But
it's still like, I don't know, you know, a lot
of these three packs, it can be you know, one
or two bangers and then the other one's kind of
like they need to put this somewhere, But I think

(35:52):
two out of three is a good ratio.

Speaker 2 (35:54):
Sure, And well, okay, so let's just let's talk about
that quickly. So I guess we should mention the the
set is called blood Stained Italy. Yes, and then so
it's even kind of like not even shy about the
one that they're the most proud of in the study,
and then the first one is Obscene Desire. So here's

(36:16):
the thing that's if you're gonna sell this in like
a sentence or thing that I'm excited about. I have
not seen it. But the director is a guy named
Julio Petroni, and he's probably most famous for a spaghetti
western called Death Rides a Horse with leven amazing, really
really good spaghetti western, and he has another spaghetti western

(36:39):
called Tipepa that stars Thomas Milan and Orson Wells.

Speaker 3 (36:46):
That rocks.

Speaker 2 (36:47):
Yeah. So like this guy was around, you know a
lot of there's this thing called oh should I hope
I don't get this wrong. Is apata Westerns? I'm pretty
sure it's called yeah, And a lot of them have
to do kind of their like maybe anti fascism, where
they're like more left leaning, very political, and he hung
out with that crowd a lot, so that's he's he's
sort of in with all those like Julia and like

(37:10):
a lot of the anyways, a lot of that crowd.

Speaker 3 (37:13):
Yeah, Yeah, it wasn't the the it was the Big
Gun Down. Would I think that falls over that? Because
that's what I've been wanting to see for a long time.
Every time I talk to people wanting to catch up
on westerns, that's always sorry to detour that, but yeah,
I I that's awesome. Okay, cool, I'm really now now
you've sold me on this one because it's the only
one that I was like neutral on.

Speaker 2 (37:33):
Yeah, I mean I'm excited for that, the big one. Yeah,
the Big Gun Down and then a bullet for the
general are the two sort of like go to the
Patta Westerns as far as I think a lot of people,
maybe like a starter pack or something. I don't know, right, Yeah, anyways, okay,
so then yeah, the next one, like you said, bloodstained Lawn,

(37:55):
the thing that's like selling it to me in a sentence.
I've also not seen this, but a basic story about
a group of elite Italians that prey on poor Italians
and bring them into the house and murder them one
by one, or at least it seems that way, with

(38:15):
all the strong elements of sci fi mixed in. Like
I don't even fully know how to comprehend that, but
I'm all in, like I can't wait.

Speaker 3 (38:22):
Right exactly. That's why I'm the same way. I'm like,
you know what I'm gonna just it's it's high concept,
which high concept in like the sixties and seventies and
even into the early eighties is not the high concept
you think of now because you know, the resources for
special effects and stuff just weren't there. So yeah, that
also makes me really excited for that reason. It's definitely
gonna be the first one that I watch on this set,

(38:43):
no no question about it.

Speaker 2 (38:45):
I like to torture myself, so I might save it
till last to make sure that I watch the other ones.

Speaker 3 (38:50):
Oh that's man, that's a that's a form of cinematic
edging right.

Speaker 2 (38:54):
There, exactly exactly exactly. Yeah, that's exactly what it is. Yeah.
Then Death Falls Lightly. I mean it's so I don't
know as much about this guy, the Apollos Savona. I
don't know as much about him. He did very few movies,

(39:17):
and this one I just I don't know. I simply
don't know too much about it. I wasn't able to
discover too much on it when I like look through it.
But the plot seems interesting. I mean, it's a fairly
standard Jolly plot, but it seems interesting. So this one,
to me funny enough, This one, to me is the
one I'm maybe least excited about. But I mean, who knows,
I'm willing to be surprised.

Speaker 3 (39:38):
That's This is actually another one. I hate to say it.
This one also has the title death Falls Lightly. That
feels like another one of those the Jolly Generator titles.
But like, I think, what appealed to me the two
things when I read, and obviously one thing VS is
very good at is selling it in their their write
ups is that, you know, they talk about the similarities

(39:58):
to the Shining, but also they it says at the
end that there's a throbbing prog rock score. So I
was like, yep, okay, I'm in. That automatically puts me
right into like a Okay, I'll watch it.

Speaker 2 (40:12):
It's true. Yeah, that's true. At least it'll be a
good time.

Speaker 3 (40:16):
And it's backed with features.

Speaker 2 (40:18):
Yes, So this is the interesting thing, Like they get
you know, they have Julio Petroni for Scene Desire is
no longer with this, but they get his daughter and
his grandson, which is interesting. And they get a censorship expert,
and I'm kind of intrigued at that because anytime they
get a censorship expert as a contributor, there must have

(40:38):
this film must have had a lot of censorship around it.
So very interested in that angle.

Speaker 3 (40:45):
Yeah, Eugenio is all over this.

Speaker 2 (40:48):
Yeah, I mean, he's the man right for anything Italy. Yeah,
he's he does a commentary for Death Falls Lightly, and
then I'm sure he's all over the He does a
commentary for Obscene Desire too, yeah, which is great. So anyways, Yeah, no,
I mean this I'm very interested in this one. Next

(41:10):
one is five thirteen. Okay, so do you like that
whole crowd of like Stuart Gordon, Dan O'Bannon like that
whole crowd. Yeah, Brian Usna is in there right, Like,
is this is this the crowd that you're kind of
drawn to? Like do you like that stuff?

Speaker 3 (41:28):
Oh? I love it?

Speaker 1 (41:28):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (41:29):
Absolutely. I So this was one thing I was going
to say up top when we were kind of talking
about this month and the excitement around it, is that,
weirdly this year, one thing that VS has done very
well is if it's something that I'm either do for
a rewatch or a blind spot. They did a few
blind spots for me this year that I've been like

(41:49):
stuff I've been really meaning to watch, and this is
one of them. The resurrect that completely passed me by
just most of my life and so all my life,
but like, yeah, it just it's it's so happy that
it got a four K because I know when people
talk about, like when they referenced lovecraft and things being
love crafty and at least on a on a on

(42:11):
a body horror level, right, this one always is like
considered kind of at the top as like a silent,
like kind of one of the ones that people don't
talk about as much. Yeah, so I'm really stoked because
I've actually never seen it, and yeah, I'm totally I
love Brian Yozna. I think that Return of Living Dead
three is really Like, I think his filmography is just great,

(42:32):
you know. I mean, he's got his other stuff, but
I always feel like there's that, you know, his his
his bigger titles obviously, and same thing with Stuart Gordon,
but like, yeah, I think he I think he kills it.

Speaker 2 (42:43):
Yeah, yeah, it's he only had Interestingly enough, he only
made directed three movies, so, like you said, Return of
the Living Dead, The Resurrected, and then early in his
career he made a movie called Bloodbath, which is like
a short. So outside of that, he was a writer.
But some of the movies he was a writer on
are amazing, Like he got famous for being a writer
on Alien obviously.

Speaker 3 (43:05):
But then have your well you're talking sorry, you're talking
about danel that's Dan O'Bannon. Yeah, yeah, I thought you
were talking about No, Brian yasna Is. Yeah, because you
had brought up y Hasna. I'm sorry I conflated the two.
That's on me. Yeah, I kind of detoured with that
because I was just thinking of the stuff that he produced,
but also the stuff he directed, you know, from like

(43:27):
Society and stuff like that. But but yeah, no, oh
Dan O'Bannon, Yeah, he fucking It's just funny because Brian
Yosna also directed Night of the Living Dead three and
then Dan O'Bannon. Sorry, I don't know how he got
into that, but yeah, uh oh yeah, Dan O'Bannon. When
it comes to like him as a director, you're right,

(43:48):
he's more known as a writer and and has had
quite the the uh interesting relationships with people he worked
with on his stuff. But yeah, I mean he goes
back to working with uh fucking John Carpenter and like
apparently even did some work on Star Wars. I think
and wrote like that Buried He's fucking awesome.

Speaker 2 (44:08):
That and Buried is amazing. I love that none of
those people talk about that horror movie. Yeah, I agree.
So anyways, Yeah, no, I'm excited for this one. I
think he's Yeah. I just I feel like this is
another one that some people are saying, well, I already
own it, or like for the people that love the movie,
they already have some release on it. So yeah, I
don't know what to do about that, but I really

(44:29):
put that out.

Speaker 3 (44:30):
Was that like a was that a code red release
or like a scorpion releasing thing.

Speaker 2 (44:34):
Well, it wouldn't have been a four K, right, so
at least it has that. But let me think the
resurrected Blu rays seems like it would have been bigger than.

Speaker 3 (44:42):
That, right, it probably was. It probably was Shout or
or Chino or or one of those.

Speaker 2 (44:48):
Yeah, here it is. I'm just pulling it up right here.
Looks that looks a lot like screen factory. Let me
see if I can get the what that is.

Speaker 3 (44:55):
But yeah, it was Shout. I just pulled it up
to Yeah, twenty I know that that that that kind
of a tourist streak of the art they did in
like twenty seventeen and where it's like unmistakably them exactly.

Speaker 2 (45:11):
But yeah, I mean that's okay, twenty seventeen that came out,
So here we are eight years later, right, like, I mean, yeah,
it's fine, exactly.

Speaker 3 (45:17):
Yeah, I wouldn't be upset if if if I had
the Blu Ray from that era and that got a
four K, I'd be a okay with that as well.

Speaker 2 (45:26):
Yeah, exactly, so it's and it's a really fun movie.
So I'm sorry to confuse it with the usiner thing,
but I just think of all them kind of like
in the same sort of atmosphere, you know, like, yeah, absolutely,
I have the vinegar syndrome. Has an interesting relationship with
him now that we're talking about him, though, I love you.
Do you like the Tics?

Speaker 3 (45:47):
The Ticks? The one, the the movie with Alfonso Roberto,
the one that they put out a few years ago
with what's his name? Tony Randell directed it? Huh oh
love Tics. That is such a fun movie. It's like, uh,
like I can't That's a great discovery for through because
I missed it back when it uh like, I don't
know whatever it got it to do, but like, yeah,

(46:09):
I love they It screened somewhere around here. I think
the New Beverly screened at like one of their all
nighters on on thirty five, and apparently it was like
it killed with that crowd. But yeah, I I fucking
love it. I I own it. Yeah, it's great movie.

Speaker 2 (46:23):
He was he was a producer on that movie. And
oh yeah, my favorite story is he tells or someone
tells about him is he came on set one day.
He wasn't like super hands on. He kind of let
them run with it. But he came on set one
day and he was like, what are these little ticks
doing here? He's like, no, much bigger, much much bigger.
And that was like his note. He's like, these are
these are horror fans man, like make it like, you know,

(46:45):
much much bigger.

Speaker 3 (46:47):
That is a very good note.

Speaker 2 (46:49):
Yeah, I love all right.

Speaker 3 (46:51):
Anyways, Yeah, I'm I'm I'm stoked for it, dude, I'm
like really and again, it's like packed with a lot
of good features and uh like just yeah, you're right,
it's getting a four K. That's like, I mean again,
maybe I'm being selfish because I I've never seen it,
so I'm happy this is the first time I'm seeing it.
And I and I and like, I like, we're talking

(47:12):
about these people who are upset about and again I
totally get it. I I you know, if I was
in their shoes, I probably would feel the same way.
But I also think the ratio of people who have
this issue is not that big, like, like, what are
you gonna do? Not put this out because of I
don't know, five hundred people maybe that want don't want
the upgrade versus you know, they pressed what five thousand,

(47:36):
and they're already down to sixteen hundred.

Speaker 2 (47:37):
I was gonna say, so to your point, they've already dropped,
you know, thirty four hundred of these in like two days.

Speaker 3 (47:44):
So yeah, here's the right call. Absolutely, yeah. And you
know when these things start really dropping, when you can
actually see the counter moving exactly, that that gets the fomo,
the fomo gear in overdrive exactly.

Speaker 2 (47:59):
So that's the slave for September. I'm crying a little
bit because that means I have six movies just in
the main line to watch before read the episode in
mid October. But that's okay because they're all fun watches
and it'll be I'm excited to revisit some of these
again and here are the commentary is and all this stuff.
So I'm pumped for this month.

Speaker 3 (48:18):
I'm saying one between this month and last month, super stoked.
There's literally one movie where I was like, nah, I
could do without that, like personally as much as I like, like, like,
I'm I'm a pretty big trauma fan, but Kabuki Man
was the only one where I was like, I watched
it right away because I was like, let's see, yeah,
it's still not It's just one of the only Trouba

(48:38):
misses for me from that. And I say this as
like someone who grew up a trauma phile, but but
still the other festened in movies and Playroom seems like
a total discovery. I haven't watched it yet, but like,
that's exactly like what feels like when people talk about
like vine used to put out or whatever, you know
that that totally feels like one of those. So I'm like,

(48:59):
really stoked.

Speaker 2 (49:00):
Totally agree. So moving on to the sub labels, then
it's kind of an interesting month because I feel like
I want to save the thing I'm most excited about
to the end. And I'm sure we're on the same
page for this, but yes, sir, before we get there,
they did an interesting thing. So this is the first
time I can remember where they released a trilogy of movies.

(49:24):
It went out of print, and then they came back
and released the whole series of movies. Of course, Vice
Academy they did one through three, and now I should
say this is a Vinegar Syndrome archive released not on mainline,
so but the first ones were also a VSA, right.

Speaker 3 (49:43):
That's correct, Yeah, that was I don't remember if that
was no VSA. One was Savage Harbor and Evil Town
was two. I think this was three or four somewhere
up there. It was a very It was very early on.
I know that, And yeah, I went out of print,
and I know last year they dropped a couple during
the last last year's Labor Day sale. But yeah, they

(50:05):
put out the other three, and personally, I couldn't be
more indifferent to it. I do think it's strange that
there isn't like an option for people to tack on
four through six to their to their original like you know,
if you're a colle this is like one of the
only kind of what we're talking about where like, you know,

(50:26):
people are getting upset of like upgrades. This is one
where I could be like, all right, if you're not
gonna make like the first three four k or something
and then and I don't know, I don't know the deal.
It sounds like they have Rick Sloan's entire filmography. It
sounds like they actually have the rights. But yeah, I
thought that was a little strange that that it got

(50:47):
that drop. I mean it it thankfully makes it if
someone just wants to Here's the other thing though, what
I will say, this is what I uh, where I
was going with this, is that as far as I
know in this, as far as the series goes, four
through six are not super hot commodities for people. I
know people have asked for it, but I think if

(51:09):
they had just dropped them on their own, I don't
know that it would have sold as hot as repackaging
the first three. That's what I'm yesking, because I don't know.
They're thirty two bucks right for this for this well,
if you're a subscriber. If you're a subscriber, it's thirty
two bucks. If you're not a subscriber, it's like closer
to forty I think. But the point being is that
if they released it as a three pack, it really

(51:29):
would have been about the same price. I think maybe
we're talking the difference of five dollars. Yeah, right, because
Iron Angels is about that's a three that's three movies.
That's about five bucks less. So I don't think it's
like a grave injustice so to speak of. But I again,
if someone's really frustrated by that, thankfully, it's something I
have like I Rick Sloan movies really truly are tough

(51:51):
for me. I Blood Theater was a really rough watch,
and I wouldn't be opposed to re visiting Vice Academy, but
I remember trying to watch the first one and I
was kind of I was kind of bored out of
my mind and like, I, you know, So, I don't
know if it's like just the collector mindset or what specifically,

(52:11):
but for people listening, if you want to try before
you buy on these, they are on the Aero Video
Channel Aeroplayer their streaming service. They have all six of
them right now. Oh yeah, so I think it's a
good A lot of VS stuff gets licensed there. That's
actually where I watched Blood Blood Theater. I had the
Blu ray, but I forgot that I had it, and

(52:33):
I just was kind of scrolling through and I was like, well,
this is seventy five minutes and it felt like longer
than JFK. But I got through it. Yeah, And I
remember just trying to watch Vice Squad, and I admit
it was a little passively, but I had a pretty
good idea that it wasn't. I wasn't you know, if

(52:53):
you were, I don't know how you sell it to
someone because you're like, it's a softcore movie by the
guy who made Hobgoblins. I just can't see anyone being like, what,
you know, that's a tough one. But I don't know.
It sounds like I'm I guess I'm shitting on it
a little more than I should be, but like I
ultimately just feel and who knows, I'll probably end up
fucking buying this. I say that now, but if I

(53:14):
sit there and scroll the site long enough, I'll just
be like, well, I'm a subscriber.

Speaker 2 (53:19):
I mean, I think it's there's a certain amount of
nostalgia for the first, you know, couple of movies because
of the late night cable, and I don't know it.
At some point Ginger Lynn left and at some point
Leona Quigley left, and it just sort of it didn't
have the same everything. I don't even know if it's Cannon,
I'd have to find out.

Speaker 3 (53:38):
It is. I think it's I think it's like the
sister of the one of the characters. I will say
one of them, one of those sequels what I was
reading up on, I think it's like part five one
of them kind of turns into like one of the
Emmanuel sequels where it's like I think it's like has
something to do with like a virtual reality or something
like that, which actually makes it more intriguing to watch

(54:00):
those like entries because they're probably so plotless that you
kind of are impressed by how plotless it would be.

Speaker 4 (54:08):
But again that's speculation. So that was the third one
for me. Oh, it was the third one was so thin.
I was like, how is this gonna go for eighty minutes?
Or like this is good?

Speaker 2 (54:19):
But yeah, there was you know they did. I'm not
going to try to compare these two, but one of
my favorite releases has been the what was the movie
the Amittedville four through sixth that they put.

Speaker 3 (54:31):
Up, Oh, the box set the Curse Collection.

Speaker 2 (54:34):
Yeah, because those were awesome.

Speaker 3 (54:38):
Yeah, they're super fun. I actually maybe they didn't know
that they'd put out the box set, Like this is
before I got back into physical media. They ended up
on Shutter and I just and this was, like I
remember correctly, like maybe a year after COVID, like when
we were all vaccinated going back out, but you know,
there were still kind of that back and forth of
staying home and I remember plowing through those movies and

(55:00):
having a fucking blast. And if I know, and I
would have absolutely gotten that box set.

Speaker 2 (55:04):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm sure it's a pretty pinny now
I can't even imagine, but maybe they'll revisit that one day.
But anyways, Vice Academy one through six is the VSA
for the month, and they're up to fifty seven, which
is cool. That's the line where I don't actually mind
if they get to two hundred. I mean, that's great.
I think it's fun to have those.

Speaker 3 (55:26):
Oh. VSA is like my favorite line probably of the subly.
I I go back and forth on it, but they're
probably the one that I like the most because it
it just always has these strange like it. It's it's
so malleable that like I like, you know, Robo Warriors
a fucking blast. That was the first thing I watched
when I got me when I got my August subscription.

(55:48):
And I haven't watched the Nick Millard ones, but I
personally can get really hypnotized here. I am talking about
Vice Academy being plotless. I mean, people were some people
cannot do Nick Millard, and I don't blame them. His
stuff can be real freely. I think there's oh great
that I'm stoked because I thought criminally insane too, even
though it was an hour, just it had that hypnotic

(56:09):
effect where I just was like laughing my ass off
and just I had such a great time with it,
and like, yeah, they've just had a great year. I
liked crack House a lot. I had a blast with
the Iron Angels movies. You know, there's there's some waves
where you know, dial D for Demons and mind Benders
were like, but you know they also put out the

(56:32):
Instructor like it just yeah, it's overall just saying great
fucking year, and and it's just a great It's probably
my favorite label because of how it can kind of
like just move from Hong Kong insanity to something regional.
It's just it's great.

Speaker 2 (56:49):
Yeah, no, I agree. I agree this one. I'm probably
neutral on, but I picked it up because I'm complete
so far on the ESAs. I'll keep going for a while.

Speaker 3 (57:00):
I and like I said, I'm gonna eat my fucking words.
I guarantee you a few days from now, if it's
too slow on the on the orbit or diabolic front
or atomic I'll talk myself into it. And then a
couple months later, probably you'd be like, oh, you know what,
I'm glad I got these. Maybe i'll you know, so, yeah,
I agree, I'm not. I'm not like papooing it as
much as it sounds like I am.

Speaker 2 (57:22):
So there's a One of the other sub labels is
Vineger Syndrome lab speaking of ones that are malleable. That's
a good there. I think by definition, they're designed to be.

Speaker 3 (57:36):
The textbook definition. Absolutely, yeah.

Speaker 2 (57:38):
Yeah. And the very first release by I think it's
the first or second way up in the beginning of
Fun City Editions when they were a partner of FS,
was a movie called I Start Counting. Did you ever
see that?

Speaker 3 (57:51):
No, I have it. I just got a hold of
it somebody. I forget where I picked it up. I
think it was, but somebody sold me like a bundle
and I finally got a hold of that and a
couple like older f C and c IP titles and stuff,
and like, I was so happy to finally get it
because a friend of mine was telling me how good
that movie is, really really good?

Speaker 2 (58:11):
Young you know, Jenny Aguter always found me. She just
found these interesting movies, like she's I don't even know
how to classify her in terms of like comparing to
a modern actor, maybe like a Kate Winslet or something,
but like she just seemed to find these like interesting movies,
and you know, she's She's probably the most famous for
what's that one sci fi Huh?

Speaker 3 (58:34):
Wasn't she? Was she in? Walk About?

Speaker 2 (58:36):
Walk About? Yeah, that's a great one, walk About? Or
the one that I first saw her in was that
sci fi movie which with the palm oh wait.

Speaker 3 (58:46):
What about? Yeah? Why am I? I? Oh?

Speaker 2 (58:47):
Logan's Run, Logan's Run.

Speaker 3 (58:49):
Yeah, and she was also in I think she was
in the American Werewolf in London as well.

Speaker 2 (58:54):
Yeah, one of those I think.

Speaker 3 (58:55):
But it's crazy that I'm drawing blanks on this ship.
But yeah, yeah she yeah, Logan's Run.

Speaker 2 (58:59):
That's right, genre favorite. She always is in interesting movies.
And anyways, I start counting as amazing. The reason I'm
talking about I start counting is this is the director's
named David Green, kind of an interesting guy because he's
if you look at his IMDb, it's like ninety three things,
and you're like, how the hell of an ID heard
of this guy? But a lot of it is TV British,
British TV, so a lot of it is just like

(59:20):
BBC produced. You know, he'll direct like four episodes or something,
some TV show or whatever. So he was a very
hirable and prolific director who only had a handful of
features that really kind of got any sort of attention
at all. But when he's good, he's very good, like
I start counting, is very good. And so I have

(59:42):
not seen Vinegar Syndrome Labs title twenty, which is called
The Strange Affair, but that's the selling point for me.

Speaker 3 (59:50):
Yeah, I just saw. I saw the trailer that they
put and it looked great and it sounded great. And
as soon as I told my friend, I'm like, hey,
have you seen this, he was like no, but I've
seen I start. So there was enough endorsements around it too.
I'm really stoked for this one. And I still haven't
watched Charlie One Eye. I'm a little behind on BSL.
I've heard, yeah, I've heard nothing but good things about it,

(01:00:12):
and but I know for they also had some weird
the last two or like seem to be real duds
that fire Maidens won, And.

Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
Oh, I mean that's not my style, man, That's like
the kind of stuff that would be on Mystery Science
Theater three thousand, right, like this just not my I
mean it was all right, but I mean it was
way longer than it should.

Speaker 3 (01:00:36):
Right, and it's and it's short too, It's like eighty
minutes or something, which is crazy. It's crazy how those
movies can feel like a fucking lifetime.

Speaker 2 (01:00:42):
Yea.

Speaker 3 (01:00:42):
And and like that the other one they put out
last month, I think it was Castle of Something. Yeah,
I haven't seen it either, but yeah, but like that
one also, I could look at it and I'm like, yeah,
I know that I could watch this, but there's also
a thousand other things I could watch that I all alike.
And so I know when I can feel like I

(01:01:03):
want to take a chance on something and it truly
like like I couldn't have. I couldn't have more quickly
bypassed that route. I Yeah, but this this is definitely
I picked it up. It was no question about it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:15):
Yeah. And Michael York is great always. Susan George is
awesome at least she was great in Straw Dogs. So
I can't wait to see her in another movie. Yeah,
I can't. I can't wait. Okay, So, uh, it's so
that it's so tempting, and I think like low hanging
fruit to pick on Cinematograph because every single month they

(01:01:38):
released thirty pieces of merched.

Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
Sure, yeah, that's fair, I get it. But but also
they put out some fucking banger movies. So if that's
the cost of doing business, that's fine with me, because
I'm not being forced to buy the shirt, right.

Speaker 2 (01:01:52):
Exactly exactly, yeah, just I mean, I think I have
Let's see what do I have? I caved on the mug.
I have a mug, maybe that's it. I got a sticker,
I have two things. I didn't get a shit, but.

Speaker 3 (01:02:05):
I'm real close to getting that tote. I'm not gonna
lie I need another I because I have a bunch
of reusable bags, but I need a tote and I'm
very close to getting one, so they might they might
get me on that one. But but hey, yeah, but
they only have one movie this month, so I think
this is the first time in a while that they've
only put out one movie.

Speaker 2 (01:02:23):
That's right, and it's a movie that's kind of an
interesting one. So Jim Belushi and Tupac and Dennis Quaid
and James Earld Jones were in Coolmo. D really interesting
cast in a movie in nineteen ninety seven, so right
at the peak of kind of hip hop culture in

(01:02:45):
when it was still very edgy. I would say like, like,
I don't think America, like white America kind of knew
what to do with hip hop culture, and like.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
Oh, well that was the end of So this is
gang Related we're talking about yeated, it's because this there's
two things that play with this movie. You're right, I think,
like especially I think Gangster Rap. I think it was
very close. I don't think this came out I want
to say in January of ninety seven, because Tupac had

(01:03:12):
three movies that were various forms of in post production
or in the can there was Gridlocked, Gang Related, and
Bullet And if I remember correctly, in the order I
just named them, was kind of the order of their success.
So to speak of it that I could be wrong
about I'm going strictly off memory here, but this was
right before I think, right before Biggie got shot, and

(01:03:35):
so you know that was essentially kind of the end
of Gangster Rap. At that point it kind of turned
into no Limit, you know, master p and like I
don't if you remember all those CD cases that had
those like black kind of like like they were the
equivalent of like the do you remember the Warner Brothers
snapcases that they had with DVDs. It kind of had
the equivalent of that on CDs. But that was when,

(01:03:58):
like when when No Limit and eventually cash money came
around and it became less oriented towards like gangster rap,
and it was more even though that was still kind
of there, it was more like it became more capitalistic.
It felt more like a cross like like between like
what two Life Crew was doing and what gangsterrap was doing.
It's almost like they fused, right. Yeah, I don't know

(01:04:20):
is that a good assessment. I feel like that's how
it's exactly right.

Speaker 2 (01:04:23):
I mean there was there was people were realizing that
on the production side of hip hop and on the
like the ownership side of hip hop, there was a
lot of money to be made, and so yeah, a
lot of people were jumping in and trying to I
think it did naturally peel away some of the edge
from like some of the gangster rap stuff. But I
don't know if that was intentional or just kind of

(01:04:45):
the natural evolution of some of these things that become
more mainstream I don't know, of course, yeah, but but yeah,
gang Related came out and it was a pretty big hit.
I mean, I think a lot of people were really
you know, Tupuc was such a figure that, just like met,
was such a magnet for so many people. He because
you know, he's i mean, I'm sure most people listening

(01:05:07):
know about Tubac, but if there's anybody who's young, like,
he was an interesting guy because he was a gangster
rapper but a true poet. Yeah, and like and like
you could just immediately tell if you listen to him
for thirty seconds, you could tell this man had a
high IQ. And it's just it was just a really
interesting experience going through one of his albums because he

(01:05:27):
just rapped about his life. So he wasn't trying to like,
he wasn't trying to like make a make it seem
worse than it was or make it seem he was
just just kind of telling a story. And it was
just a lot of tragedy in his music because that's
kind of just how he grew up, right, And so
it's it was a yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:05:45):
Yeah, I mean yeah, he always had like this the
stuff you know, with this because he was very close
with his mom and like she obviously really cared about him,
and like he You're right, it was always interesting because
I think that's what was like, you know, both him
and Biggie both rapped about everything from like class struggles too.
But you know, I think obviously Biggie was more known

(01:06:07):
for kind of his style, not just his lyrics, but
kind of you know, his his and so. And I
think that like, you're right, Tupac was a poet and
you know, and just had a charm about him. Man,
when you watch him act in any movie, I mean,
you name it, it doesn't even have to be it doesn't
even have to be like these movies which really show
him how charismatic he was. But like even if you

(01:06:29):
go back to like Juice or Above the Rim, which
were really early on, you know, he hadn't even like
truly blown up yet. Those were like before all eyes
on Me and stuff and like and I think he
always had that. You know, He's in that like class
of like like with like Kurt Cobain, where when you
hear them talk, you're like, holy shit, these guys were

(01:06:50):
in their twenties, in their mid twenties.

Speaker 2 (01:06:53):
Kind of like Bruce Lee, I think in a way
for like the hardcore movie fans if you have, Yeah,
just when Bruce Lee spoke, you just kind of stopped
and listened. You were just like, wait, like this guy's amazing.

Speaker 3 (01:07:04):
I agree, yeah wholeheartedly. Yeah, that's exactly right. It is.
It's like it's like when they talk, it just like
you're like, holy fuck. And and which makes it obviously
it's it's always a tragedy, but it really like amplifies
that tragedy. And then I also feel like when this
came out, it's just you know, all these movies came out,

(01:07:24):
and then he even had Machiavelli the album come right out,
like there was there was still so much there, and
to the point that people thought he faked his death.
Like it created a really weird like people couldn't accept
it because they were like, well, how does he have
all this stuff in the canon, all this ready to go?
And the people were like, oh, he's secretly in Jamaica
recording music, and it's like a right, like just wow,

(01:07:44):
but yeah, I'm I'm glad this got to release on cinematograph.
This is really cool. I think this really fits. You know,
we were talking about things being malleable, but I think,
like I think Justin's variety, and I think this is
where people get hung up on stuff. Is that it?
You know, he'll put out stuff like like you know,
his first month it was Little Darlings in Red Rock West, right,

(01:08:05):
great fucking back to back releases, or like you know,
I know some people had issues with Breathless getting upgraded
so quickly from Fun City, but you know that and
Swimming to Cambodia, like those pairings really, I think are
really like like where the label really shines in one
way in terms of what he's trying to to do

(01:08:25):
with it. But I think also this and Bang the
drums Slowly and actually, no, I take that back, because
that movie was even at the time I think, really
well well loved. But let's throw a joy Ride instead.
Like joy Ride and This are movies that, like, I'm
sure there are people out there who know it and
like it, but I still think that it it it

(01:08:47):
deserves they both deserve reappraisals. And I haven't seen this
since ninety nine. I'm I'm ready to rewatch it, so
I think, you.

Speaker 2 (01:08:57):
Know, I am gonna fully support everything you say, and
I'm very happy I don't like this movie in my memory,
so I'm very curious to rewatch it because I remember
I did not like it when it came out. But
I was seventeen, so I mean, what do I know
I was.

Speaker 3 (01:09:13):
I was even younger, I was fourteen. I was mixed
on it. I do remember that because I think when
you're that young, your brain when when you don't dislike
a movie but you don't necessarily love it, the critical
component of wrestling with things doesn't exist yet, so you
kind of just when you're mixed on it. That's that
can be the same difference as bad. But I remember
just thinking it was okay. I remember liking Gridlocked a

(01:09:36):
little more, and I remember Bullet being very bad. That
was That's how I remember the tears of the three movies. Yeah,
but but I'm excited to revisit it for that reason,
you know, like it's like, yeah, I'm really stoked. I'm
glad I got a release.

Speaker 2 (01:09:52):
And I'm be interesting to hear Jim kof talk because
they actually got him for a commentary, which is great,
and he's the director, so it'd be great. They got
a lot of the producers of this movie to talk,
which I think would be really interesting to hear their
perspective of just managing those egos, Like I mean, yeah,
that's just a fascinating thing, right to have cool Mod
and tubacshicor in a room like yeah, I'm not saying

(01:10:13):
that they were gonna fight or anything, but it's just
like the perception of I had in my time is
that those were very big egos, and like, I don't know,
it would just be interesting to hear them talk.

Speaker 3 (01:10:22):
I agree, Yeah, yeah, I'm I'm stoked for the features
because there's like there's like a few other where they
just have like a guy who does like talks about
like like Tupac's legacy and and I like, what I
really like is that they put the archival features with
a lot of these, everything from the Festenden movies to

(01:10:43):
this has like making ups from back then and a
lot of them. Some of them could just be like
standard boilerplate epks where they just like have five minutes
of like, yeah, we had a great time shooting it.
But sometimes they really have like some you know, because
this is like right when DVDs were starting to develop,
they were really starting to do like like more in
depth featurettes, and that was really exciting, and I'm glad

(01:11:06):
that those features aren't Some of them obviously are going
to be lost the time, but not everything.

Speaker 2 (01:11:11):
Yep, I totally agree. I mean, there's some of the
best features I've ever seen were from the DVD days
because oh yeah, it was just a time where everybody
understood you were going to make a behind the scenes
feature and like it was just a very yeah, very
different time for I don't even know if they were
thinking about it for preservation. I think it was just
more competitive, like if you're going to put a DVD
od it needed to have something there.

Speaker 3 (01:11:32):
Right, yep, yep, because it was considered like laser disc
but more obviously compact, yeah, and more like yeah, absolutely
if it was a big enough movie. I mean even
movies I remember at that point there were movies that
didn't even do that well, they were like flops when
they came out, but they would still like get the
director to do a commentary. But like it became a
huge film school for people because, like you know, Robert

(01:11:55):
Rodriguez became obsessed with those ten minute film schools and
and like putting out as much stuff about I love
that stuff. When I was in college, I couldn't even
if I didn't care for his movies as much, which
I actually did I at the time. I loved a
lot of his stuff. It breaks my heart that the
one thing he doesn't want to get involved in is
the Faculty, because that is a real that was a

(01:12:16):
real crucial movie in developments. No. I even read like
one of the guys from Shout who produced the disc
or something, said that like he gave it his blessing.
He looked at the transfer, he was happy with it,
but he just he wouldn't do any interviews, He wouldn't
do a It sounded like it was a it was
a one for them movie. I suspect because you know,

(01:12:36):
he was known for working so fast. But when he
talks about every other movie, even that one he did
for Showtime road Racers, even when he talks about that,
he talks about it with a certain type of affection
and is really like and brings it up in his
He even did like a book I think it's out
of print about making that movie, and just everything he's
done from from al Mariacci all the way up to

(01:12:58):
I think In City, just about all of it has
like special features, and he even does like cooking schools
and stuff, but that one always bare bones, won't, won't
touch it, and she just bums me out. But yeah,
just to bring it back to what we're talking about,
you always just had these great features and like that,
or like I remember Alien three, there's like a feature
length documentary about it, and you know, and like with

(01:13:19):
the assembly cut and and you know, because I think
back then, even though transfers were a thing that they
were starting to focus on, it was still standard definition,
so you could only do so much with that. So
it was all about just putting all the information you
could put on that disc. And now there's even bigger
discs and you know, more more gigs, so you can
really fucking pack them up.

Speaker 2 (01:13:40):
I mean, this is a whole different tangent we don't
have to get into right now. Sure, but late nineties,
early two thousands, a good chunk of America still had
those old school tube TVs in their house.

Speaker 3 (01:13:50):
They did. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Well HDMI was like HDMI
was so new, and I worked at Best Buy after
I worked at when I quit my movie theater job,
and the big thing was component Do you remember that, Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
component plugs for the for the twenty five year olds listening.
It was the you would instead of an HDMI, you
had three plugs red, green, and blue, and that would
give you better definition picture than standard composite, which is

(01:14:14):
it's crazy. Yeah, and you would buy these gold plated
cables for fifty dollars.

Speaker 2 (01:14:18):
Yeah, exactly. Okay, So I like this month. Even if
the pink line didn't drop this month, I think this
is I think September is going to be a good month,
regardless of what we're about to talk about. But I've
been anticipating this drop for I don't know, I don't

(01:14:38):
know when they first teased it, at least this whole year, right.

Speaker 3 (01:14:42):
Yeah, they yeah, they as soon as as soon as
the subscriber week started in January, they said that down
the line they were gonna have a pink line. And
because they dropped like hints, I don't know if it
got leaked or if they actually dropped, but they put
out like what the slate was going to be for
this year, similar to you know, for Melu scene site
and on the mal you've seen one, it would say
like you know, command Cinema, Command Cinema, Pikarama, and then

(01:15:04):
it said pink line. Okay, that's what everyone's like, pink line,
What the what is it? And of course obviously everyone
deduced it. It was like it was pink us.

Speaker 2 (01:15:11):
Yeah, so there's I don't necessarily know that we need
to get into like a huge history of this, but
I do want to at least mention for anybody that
doesn't know what a Japanese pinku movie is. It's this
fascinating period in Japanese cinema history where they were struggling
against television because television was dominating and taking people away

(01:15:35):
from ticket sales. So major studios, like like the major
studios in Japan that had been producing a lot of
I think the most edgy thing they were producing in
the fifties was a lot of these sort of like
teenagers joining gangs and beating up. There's there's a whole
bunch of these. They called them nikatsu.

Speaker 3 (01:15:55):
Huh oh I know here they were juvenile delinquent films,
but yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:15:59):
That kind of stuff. Yeah, that kind of stuff. But
they built a whole thing around, essentially like a boy band,
and they would get these they would have like casting
calls and get these stars and it was like a
whole thing, right, that's great. So that was where Joshua
Chido came from, at least with there's a few others
that were really popular in that time. But but that
was that got less edgy and and they were showing

(01:16:20):
some of this stuff on TV and it got competitive
with the theaters, so they kept getting edgier and edgier content.
And so I think when people hear that there's an
era of sexploitation stuff from Japan, they a tendency to
maybe assume it's going to be similar to the sexploitation
stuff in the US, where it's so yeah, your laugh
says everything. Man, this is like high budget, well produced, thoughtful,

(01:16:46):
like the best directors working were working on these movies,
and they yeah, they had a lot of sex in them,
but not hardcore sex because that still wasn't really a thing.
Maybe even to this day they still don't.

Speaker 3 (01:16:58):
Sho it's still it's still or as far as I know,
it's even in porn and which I know they call
it jav well that's the acronym, iuh, but that's that's
what that's what porn is referred to, whereas pink ou
it's kind of that thing where like you know, the
horror section is always right right next to the porno
section in the back of the video store. This is

(01:17:19):
a bit essentially the same thing where you have like
j V where it's actually legitimately like, this is pornography,
you're buying. This is real, come, this is real whatever,
but it's still gonna blur certain parts. And then as
opposed to you know, Pinky's or Pinkhu's, where they it's

(01:17:39):
real actors and they're not actually necessarily doing it, but
they're very very close to doing it. So you know,
I guess the best the best. It's kind of almost
like a halfway point between like horror or violence and
soft core films. It's kind of like it's there's like
it's like some kind of merging of that. I love
pink Hu's, but what I've seen so far this is again,

(01:18:01):
well we're kind of still building it up, but this
is a great example of like because between Roman pornos
and this, that's we're talking about blind spots. This is
where like, you know, I kind of arbitrarily find my
way to these and I'm always every time I watch them,
even if I don't like them, I'm always blown away
by them. So I'm and this particular filmmaker, there's a

(01:18:27):
big blind spot for me.

Speaker 2 (01:18:29):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:18:29):
It's funny we're talking about these like bad movies from
like like the fire Maidens movie that's like, you know,
seventy five minutes or you know, Blood Theater. These movies
are also a lot of them clock in at like
fifty minutes to seventy five minutes, but they fucking fly.
Oh you do not feel them at all. They are
You're like, oh, it's over, and it's a and I'll
take I'll take that any day, even if I wanted
more from the movie. I'll take that any day to

(01:18:52):
an overbloated you know, something that like wouldn't work by comparison,
But yeah, it like predates CAT three, and I would
argue they're even more, sometimes more insane than Cat three
because they use those censorship tools against the very people
who are like oppressing them. Just and I guess I'll

(01:19:13):
let you introduced this filmmaker first because I want to
talk there's something really funny about Pinkus that I want
to talk about, but I gotta have to wait until
you've you've you've kind of set this up a little more.

Speaker 2 (01:19:23):
No, it's Okay, I mean we don't. We don't, just
just very quickly, because you know, yeah, one of the
best and most respected and most acclaimed directors in this
pink film genre or subgenre is Hiyasu Sato, and this
set is volume one, which makes me very excited of

(01:19:45):
his movies, and it's the introduction to the pink film
Japanese pink films on the vinegar syndrome pink line.

Speaker 3 (01:19:52):
So that's right.

Speaker 2 (01:19:53):
That's really The interesting thing is one of the most
common comparisons for is David Cronenberg, which I just think
would trip people out based on everything we've said so far.
To now throw Cronenberg's name in the mix. I think
it says a lot for how the approach to these

(01:20:14):
movies is way different than you're expecting if you haven't
seen them.

Speaker 3 (01:20:17):
I'm yeah, Sato big blind spot for me. I've heard
about him multiple times. I believe I first heard about
him on the Important Cinema Cloud podcast, I want to say,
and I know a few but even prior to that,
a few people had told me to see Muscle. I've
been told multiple times see Muscle. Apparently I would respond

(01:20:39):
like I would like the movie a lot and did
he direct Turtle Vision. I mean, he's made so many
fucking movies, but but but yeah, he what's interesting? I
know he also he really like yeah Turtle I believe. Yeah,

(01:21:00):
he did Directortal Vision. And he also made a movie
I don't remember the name it went by now, but
there's like a movie he made called like horse Dog
Man or something like that, or a Horse Dog Woman.
And you know when people say, like, wait till you
see that, that movie's fucking crazy. Okay. A movie I
ended up watching a few like a year ago maybe

(01:21:21):
was called rope Cosmetology. Have you heard of this?

Speaker 2 (01:21:25):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:21:26):
Okay, So I love Naomi Tani. I think she is,
like truly how she hasn't been given like all the
Lifetime Achievement awards across the board from just what little
I've seen of her in Pinkus and the way her
reputation kind of precedes her about like how committed she

(01:21:48):
was to the point that she like wouldn't go to
the beach because she didn't want to get tanned. She
wanted to remain pale so people could see the marks
on her and stuff. I won't spoil rope Cosmetology for anybody,
but it's and it's not necessarily I don't know that
I ended up. There's a review on Letterbox that sums
it up really well that basically says, like the most
shocking act in the movie happens at really early, too

(01:22:11):
early on that the movie really has nowhere to go.
And that's not a Sato film, but the point being,
I think people were ready to be like, got you know,
we got youa with this one. You wait till you
see this, And I already knew just by the name.
I'm like, all right, go watch rope Cosmetology and get
back to me. I mean, they all kind of you know,
it's not a competition obviously, but holy fuck man, that

(01:22:33):
you can't un see those I could say that, and.

Speaker 2 (01:22:36):
There's a whole conversation that I'm absolutely not equipped to
have about the relationship in a lot of these Japanese
exploitation films in rape right, because it's like, I don't
want to say it's celebrated, but it's not really like
look down on as far as I mean, I'm not
saying the good guys in these movies are rape. I'm
just saying a lot of Sato's movies are called serial

(01:22:59):
rapeist with handcuffs, Official Lady rape.

Speaker 3 (01:23:03):
Right, Lolita vibrator torture. I mean that just tells you
everything you need to know about the movie.

Speaker 2 (01:23:08):
Right, Yeah, So, like this is not a starter pack
for like easing into like Japanese exploitation cinema. But here's
the thing that I think is so fascinating that in
typical vinegar syndrome fashion, and this is something that's a
very big positive for them. They put a lot of
context around these movies. So they get Jasper Lord Jasper

(01:23:30):
Sharp excuse me to come in and they yeah on
less more, they get Simon Abrams to come and talk
about Rewind and they get Sam Degan to talk about
love Letter in the Sand. And of all of these,
I'm most interested in hearing Sam Degan's because she's a
champion of transgressive cinema.

Speaker 3 (01:23:46):
Yeah. I love her podcast.

Speaker 2 (01:23:48):
Amazing erasplus Massacre, And there's a one that I specifically
want to call out that I think is a must listen.
Let me see if I can get the name very quickly,
because it's a brand new one for her, well at
least in the last two episodes, and it might not
be able to get it really fast, but it has

(01:24:09):
to do with a She covers a lot of.

Speaker 3 (01:24:13):
Oh no, no, I was trying to pull it up
to but what I wanted to say while you're trying
to pull it up, what I kind of wanted to
piggyback on for a second. You were talking about, like
in regards to rape and like a lot of the
more transgressive elements in it. And I agree, that's what
I like about Sam a lot. Like every time I
hear her talk about that stuff, I'm always like, I
love the context she brings to it, and kind of

(01:24:35):
like what your mission statement is about bringing context and
awareness to all movies of all kinds. You know, she
really does a good job of that and as well.
And but one thing I'll say is, you know, most
if you let's let's flip the tables to the American
side of things, think about exploitation from the sixties all
the way to the eighties. It's it kind of just

(01:24:56):
literalizes a lot of the very icky implications about movie,
you know, from exploitation that came out of here. You know,
it's just the problem. The thing is you have to
like I said, it's stuff you can't unsee. I wasn't
saying that as like a as like a bug. On
the contrary, I was saying it more as like it's
a feature. It's stuff that it really challenges what you see,
and I know a lot of it can be very unpleasant.

(01:25:17):
But you don't how many movies that I can name,
like like from the sixties, seventies and eighties that do
these same like really unpleasant things. Not only that, you'd
be shocked and and I know Celesta's talked about it
on your podcast when doing when she's done the fifteen
Minutes with You segment, you'd be surprised how many Golden

(01:25:38):
age adult films casually bring incest into the equation. Like
I don't even mean that like it's implied off screen.
There's literally scenes that culminate in just a mom and
a son, a brother and a sister, somebody just fucking
that's the climax of the movie. Most often it seems
to be a parent relationship. But just it's like you know,

(01:25:58):
and we're not talking about through the looking glass where
it's doing something as more of a powerful statement, you know,
it's like just casually, I guess what was the Yeah,
the Taboo series which were hits. The first Taboo was
like a legitimate hit. So you know, as quote unquote
fucked up as this stuff is, I don't know what's
going on here. I wouldn't say is any more like

(01:26:21):
what's explicit and implicit is really any more dignified?

Speaker 2 (01:26:28):
Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, it's true. The episode, by
the way, is episode nineteen from aerosplus Massacre about director
Suji Terayama. And I won't really like talk too much
about the podcast. I would say listen to it. It's
a very short Yeah, it's a very easy listen. But
the interesting thing is in his films and he's also

(01:26:49):
a film a theatrical likudis theater as well, but in
his plays and movies he uses rape as the primary
way of having sex and actually doesn't have a lot
of consensual sex. And there's she goes into the whole
theory of why, and it's just a really deep, interesting
conversation with somebody who studies terry AMA's art in general.

(01:27:09):
So she found the right guest for it, but it's
a it's a broader discussion that I hope she brings
into the SATSO films because there's difficult I mean, like
just just call it what it is. There's there's some
difficult content in these movies, right, And if you're if
you get triggered by sexual uh what's it called sexual assault,
then yeah, maybe like read up on it a little

(01:27:30):
bit before you watch it. I will say that it's
not it's not like irreversible. It's not. These movies are
not where it's just gonna like focus on the rape
like repeatedly or and it's not like that. And the
experience of these around that content is beautiful, like beautiful imagery,
beautiful a lot of times painted backdrops. The best cinematographer

(01:27:52):
is working, the best screenwriters working, like it's it's just
a fascinating thing to just sit back and experience. And
so at a minimum, I would say try before you
buy these movies.

Speaker 3 (01:28:05):
Oh yeah, at a minimum absolutely. I mean I think
a lot of mod like like a few things that
Mondo put out over the last few years might be
good entry points, even though they're a little more violence focused.
But like you know, if you go to like Bahachi
Bushido or it Tokugawa Sex Band, those might be those

(01:28:25):
are obviously much lighter too, Like one of them is
just a straight up comedy, and the other one's just
kind of very nihilistic. But the point being like, if
you see the casualness of how they treat that stuff,
it's I think the way they see it more often
than not is that there's two things probably at play
with it. One is, usually they're trying to show you
the remorselessness and kind of the an excuse to sneak

(01:28:50):
in the perversions that they want to put in there
that they need to obviously to sell it. But also
with someone like Sato, what it sounds like to me
is it's someone who's working through his shit. So if
you're what you're getting there isn't And obviously, if you
get actors who are gamed to do it the way
they film things, it's an entirely different system there. But
if you get actors who are gamed to do it,
chances are whatever the what they're doing is, they're dealing

(01:29:13):
with kind of like, for lack of a better example,
like a very Verhoven esque thing about it, where they're
they're dealing with the allure as much as they are
the the criticism of it, or you know, any anything
like that. I mean, David Lynch also comes to mind
with that kind of stuff obviously, where it's it's a
different ballpark in their executions, but like, I think there's
a similar thing there about that where they're they're both

(01:29:37):
you know, kind of interrogating their perversity and saying, I
also there's something here that obviously is clicking with their
lizard brain.

Speaker 2 (01:29:47):
Yeah. Absolutely, And I mean I think that these are
the you know, there's certain movies like Prisoner Female, Prisoner
seven to one was certainly one of these for me.
There's certain Japanese pinku films that would just forget about
genre and forget about classification. They just stand alone as
incredible movies. Like it's just just watching something that is singular.

(01:30:09):
And I think some of Sato's work falls into that category.
I mean, for somebody who's made a hundred movies whatever
he did, of course not everything, but like he has
a lot of movies that really are quite singular. So
I'm so.

Speaker 3 (01:30:20):
Excited great year for Japanese cinema. Man that that V
cinema box set I did a he wasn't even a
try try before you buy. I just was trying to
save a little money, so I watched a couple of
them on arrow and I finally when the Arrows, when
the aerosale happened, I picked it up. But just great
fucking box set and like now we're getting this and

(01:30:42):
Mondo put out some great stuff between the stuff we
just named, and like holy funny man, and like the
eighty eight films has been killing it. Like it's truly
across the board. That's why when people are like it's funny,
you know, VS really has been on top of it
with Hong Kong so I I love that when they
finally go into the J cinema side of things, they

(01:31:05):
fucking went hard on the paint, like right into pink
line with like Sato, which again like for people it's
definitely try before you buy. But also like this is
where letterbox is a great resource because if you follow
anyone who watches who's watched any of this, you'll see
their reviews. And I think even as an entry to

(01:31:26):
this stuff, it sounds like they did kind.

Speaker 2 (01:31:28):
Of you know.

Speaker 3 (01:31:31):
The let me pull up the titles here, particularly Celluloid Nightmare.
From what I read about Celluloid Nightmare is it's it's
kind of a riff on his own most well known film,
which the titles escaping me at the moment. But like
if you go to Letterbox is very top film is
basically this is kind of like a not a kind

(01:31:52):
of like a softer version of it. It sounds like
so I think they're actually making it a volume one
in every sense of the word, where they're obviously putting
some of his well known stuff. But I think also
something that if someone hasn't seen any of his stuff before,
it is a good jumping off point, even for people
who are initiated enough into Japanese cinema.

Speaker 2 (01:32:15):
Yeah. Absolutely, since this is well, actually, before we move on,
I'll just say, like I have saying before, if September
is a good month without this, with this, I mean,
just come on, man.

Speaker 3 (01:32:30):
Like a home run baby.

Speaker 2 (01:32:31):
Yeah, this is a wonderful month. And I have no idea.
I'm just really stressed out thinking about watching all this
stuff before October fifteenth. But please, if you're listening to
a semi package generally so I can get started.

Speaker 3 (01:32:42):
Well, lucky for you. I mean, this entire set totals
less than three hours right there, so you know, I mean,
I don't know if it's if doctors would recommend watching
them all at once. Back to back to back for
brain purposes. Yeah, yeah, I even medical doctors probably have.

(01:33:02):
But like I mean, I think that's aside from the
Festenden movies. Maybe everything else Luckily, well now I take
that back, but all the mainline stuff is pretty normal
running times. But the point being more like luckily with
this you can knock them out pretty quickly. And like,
if you do watch the other Vice Academy movies, they
seem relatively short.

Speaker 2 (01:33:22):
Yeah they are. Yeah, and I know, oh, I'm sorry,
go ahead, great movies to have one in the background
while you're doing other things.

Speaker 3 (01:33:31):
And we're talking about Vice Academy, not SATO that is
not background view.

Speaker 2 (01:33:36):
But since that is kind of adult adjacent, I think
it probably makes sense to talk a little bit about
melicine because it's a relatively short discussion. Anyways, So outside
of the Sauto movies, there's only one thing on the
mel You scene site that's new this month.

Speaker 3 (01:33:49):
Right, yep, Star Angel. It's a Command Cinema release. They
it's which if people don't know, Command Cinema is all
oriented towards cecil. Howard directed quite a few movies and
also produced quite a few through there. In fact, last
month was also Babylon Pink was a Cecil Howard release,

(01:34:11):
and he also I think the other collaborative one he did.
I want to say, Command Cinema might be Fantastics. I'm
mispronouncing that it's the one Robert Finley directed, or I
could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure they worked together.
There's a few titles that always I always mistake Command
Cinema with like Pikarama Quality X. But yeah, Cecil Howard's

(01:34:34):
stuff is like really he rarely misses, like all his
shit's really good, and this was the last thing that
played theatrically that he directed, and it's a downer. The
thing is, like we've always talked about whenever you've had
me on the best you know, Golden age adult stuff
is either they're like these really high concept or they're

(01:34:56):
like really jovial comedies, or they're just these huge fucking
downers that are just like how did people even go
to the theater to fucking get off to this.

Speaker 2 (01:35:04):
To begin with?

Speaker 3 (01:35:05):
You know what I mean? So, like, so you have
either the Bob Chin side, which is like a lot
more fun stuff, or or you know, uh, Henri Pachard
and stuff like that, but like then you have, and
some of Cecil Howard's stuff is upbeat, Fox Trots, super fun,
but this was much more of a downer it. Uh,

(01:35:25):
it was made in like eighty six, and and it
feels like that. It really feels like the like just
watching the trailer feels like the B side to like
you know in Boogie Nights after what's his name blows
his brains out William H. Macon and a tternsity, That's
exactly what this looks like. Yeah, because it was like
it was made in eighty six, and it's about a
rock star, like well, it's about a rock star and

(01:35:49):
his wife, and his wife dies of a drug overdose
and I think he goes down like memory lane of
how he essentially killed her with the drugs. I actually
haven't seen this one, so again it's a blind spot.
I'm like really excited for that. And I don't know
that it's I don't know if it's considered his best,
but I know that it's it's held in a pretty
high regard with a lot of his stuff, And I

(01:36:12):
think everything Command has put out that I've seen from
like this year has been fantastic. I've seen Babylon Pink,
but when I revisited it, I was like, yeah, this
is still a lot of fun. Excuse me. Neon Knights
put out this year was great and yeah I was
right fantastics that was when he did with ROBERTA. Finley,
But like you know, all the stuff he did is

(01:36:34):
just great. So I'm like really excited for for this one.

Speaker 2 (01:36:38):
Okay, awesome. Well, I can't wait to hear you talk
about it in the chat and so let's talk about
it when she sees it. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:36:47):
And by the way, most command stuff they like pack
it with features, like Command ones are never They're not
like Pekorama or even Quality X ones. They're like almost
always packed with stuff. That's why I think they're like
must buys because between like commentaries, interviews, they even have
like some of them, I think it was Fox Trot
had like video from the premiere party, just real great

(01:37:08):
time capsule stuff and real great contextualization. That's up there
with like the Malu scene releases when those get really
because those are always packed with features, so highly recommend
them for that reason.

Speaker 2 (01:37:19):
Always awesome, Okay, okay, man, I feel like this is
a love fest, but in the spirit of being transparent
and honest, like this month was great, and the partner
labels were also great. I mean, there's a lot of
movies in here. I bought more than I do usually same,

(01:37:41):
and I'm becoming actually more and I've been buying less recently,
like I'm becoming more cynical on what I buy or
more cautious on what I buy. But this month I
bought quite a number of them because there's a lot
to get excited about, I think. So I have my
have my list up of what I bought. Do you

(01:38:02):
want to see if we have any crossover?

Speaker 3 (01:38:04):
And then yeah, yeah, yeah, name what you got and
I'll tell you what I I'll tell you what I get.
Chances are I I because I am a little more
conservative on mine, because I have my favorite labels. But
I have a feeling ours. I have a feeling I'm
actually gonna call it. I would say we're either going
to match one ninety.

Speaker 2 (01:38:18):
Okay, let's see. So I'm a slut for Connie yep.
In general, And when a movie called Amico came out
and said it was akin to Louis Mal's Zazi Don
lea Metro that was an instant by Zazi Don Lamentro

(01:38:39):
is a ton of fun. And I would say anybody
who is nervous to go see an art house picture
should just spend sixty minutes or ninety minutes or whatever
with like the Looney Tunes insanity of that.

Speaker 3 (01:38:51):
Yeah, that's a good call. I actually okay, so that
we're at ninety percent. I didn't get this one only
because I needed to get bona from last month. Last month.
I got freezed me last month because I saw how
quick it was going, so I was like, it's not
going as quickly. It's a four K. I thought I
had gotten it, and then I realized I hadn't, so
I was like, okay, I'll do that one this time.
And well, I'll admit I'm also more partial to even

(01:39:14):
though I think Connie's great with even more modern releases,
I really fucking go nuts for anything that they put
out that's like basically pre twenty ten, even though I
know a lot of their shit from like I've heard
the stuff from the twenty tens and even more recently
is like really good. But if it's basically anything from
like two thousand and one, two thousand and five and
then nineties, eighties, seventies, it's catnip. You might as well.

(01:39:37):
You've got They've got my money, no question about it.
So that's the only reason I held off on this one,
the only reason.

Speaker 2 (01:39:43):
So they did a movie. I'll just quickly say, they
did a movie called Sharie or is it Shanny Connie?
Is it Shanne?

Speaker 3 (01:39:56):
Are you talking about Connie as a label or are
you talking about the filmmaker?

Speaker 2 (01:40:00):
Uh no, no, no, Shari movie Connie. They just put out
a movie called Yeah, yeah, Shary s h a r I.

Speaker 3 (01:40:09):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:40:10):
That is a beautiful documentary and super interesting anyways, so
it just is a plug for them since we're talking
about them. But Amko was by. I'm sure that we
both got the act the title Black Panthers.

Speaker 3 (01:40:24):
You better believe it absolutely that fast enough, I know, Yeah,
I was so stoked. I well one of them. One
of them is directed by Matt Simber, who directed The
Candy Tangerine Man. Oh yeah, and uh the I forget
what the B side movie was on that one. No, no, sorry,
I mean the director of The Candy Tangerine Man who
directed that was a Vineger release, A Lady Coco. That

(01:40:46):
was the other movie that was a double Uh. He
also did The Witch Who Came from the Sea. Great
great director, so that he great exploitation director, which if
I know it's out of print from Vinegar Syndrome, but
if anyone hasn't seen Candy Tangerine Man, highly recommend it.
But yeah, this double sounds great. It's like I think
one's like a Filipino martial arts movie or something, and

(01:41:07):
then the other one is is like a black explocitation
martial arts movie. I think that's the one Matt Zimber directed. Yeah,
they just sound great. I love you know, even when AGFA.
You know, I haven't watched the drug comp yet that
they did from last month, the Alice and Acid Land

(01:41:28):
and stuff. Yeah, but even those which are on a
little more of like like they have some misses for
sure in those, I don't know, they just they rarely
fail me when it comes to these, like their releases,
you know, even like like the stuff that's I'm trying
to think of an example as something that's more like
low key, but that I was like, eh, it was fine.

(01:41:49):
But even like I don't know, Satan War was fucking great, man.
I had a blast watching that. It just nothing happens
for sixty minutes, yet it felt like so much happened.

Speaker 2 (01:42:00):
No, they have good Joe and his team have good tastes,
so they typically find some some movies that really do
some interesting things that you don't expect. A big fan
of them and their comps.

Speaker 3 (01:42:12):
Their comps are always great. I have to say that
that their their mixtapes are always fantastic.

Speaker 2 (01:42:16):
Yeah, totally. The Saturn's core for the month is Bloody Creek.

Speaker 3 (01:42:24):
Yes, I have to admit I did skip that one
because it's I even knew its reputation before I knew
it was coming out that like in the Wave canon,
which I don't know how you even judge that, Like
when you're talking about Wave movies, like this seems to
be one of the less well regarded ones, but I

(01:42:44):
don't know. They also put out like Didn't Wave Do
Hung Jury, which is like a two hour that and
Dead North are like these two hours shot on video
endurance trials for people, but they have some kind of
quality to them that you just can't help but be
enamored by. But I think because Bloody Creek is a
little less salacious compared to the other ones that I've heard,
but that doesn't mean I won't buy it at some point.

(01:43:07):
Let me be very clear about that because, like like
I was saying about Vice Academy, if you if there's
a slow enough month where there's other shit I want
to I don't want to buy from one of the
other sub labels. They'll get my twenty bucks.

Speaker 2 (01:43:19):
Absolutely there is another label on Vinegar Syndrome or oce on.
It's quickly becoming Oh yeah good.

Speaker 3 (01:43:29):
I do want to shout out because this is coming
out this month if you have any LA listeners, because
I love Saturns Core, but I just had about about
Bloody Creek. That's like an exception, but I that's one
of my top three labels for OCN partners. But Whammy Analog,
which is a VHS store here in Echo Park in LA,

(01:43:49):
they're doing SOV September, so they're all they're programming is
shot on video related and they're showing five Saturn's Core titles,
including Bone Sickness US. I know they're doing Twisted Issues
with Charles Pinon in person. I saw Twisted Issues there
last year when they did us A v September. But yeah,
they're doing five Saturn's Core titles, which, like I don't know,

(01:44:11):
in my opinion, that's a don't miss event as far
as I'm concerned.

Speaker 2 (01:44:15):
Oh yeah, no, Ross is the best. I love anything
to do to support him.

Speaker 3 (01:44:18):
I hope he comes out here. I don't know if
he I don't think he's an LA native, but he
lives in LA. But I hope that gets him out here.

Speaker 2 (01:44:24):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, hopefully that would be awesome. Another label
that is quickly becoming a very interesting one for me
is kim Stim.

Speaker 3 (01:44:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:44:35):
So they've been around for a while, but they're just
getting a physical media side. So they put out a
movie this month called Fire Will Come Correct. Yeah, and
it's uh uh takes place in Galicia in Spain, and
it's by a relatively newer but well respect you know,
a guy that's getting a lot of attention named Oliver

(01:44:57):
Lax And I don't know this. There are certain genre
of movies that feel like they're very kind of meditative
and just sort of like their slow cinema, and they're
meant to just you're meant to kind of elicit some
thinking or some you know, like contemplation on your life,

(01:45:17):
these kind of things. And like I'm a sucker for
those movies. I actually like them quite a lot, And
this movie seems to fit very well within that. I
don't know if I said the title it's called Fire
Will Come.

Speaker 3 (01:45:27):
Yes, yes you did. Yeah I thought I heard it.
But yeah, yeah, I've heard very good things about this
as well. When I was just kind of in group
chats with on the phone with the releases, this one
came up a couple of times, so I may the
only reason I didn't. I have to admit, like, it's
going back to that thing about like you know, more
recent releases. Sometimes what will talk me out of getting

(01:45:50):
it is just figuring out where I have to spend
my money, and if I know it's like I know,
if it's on Canopy or something, I sometimes will just
opt for that, just out of an abundance of caution,
both financially and just in terms of like keeping space
in my apartment for because it's truly bursting at the
seams right now and like, so that's part of it.

(01:46:14):
But yeah, I am very I actually did put this
on my watch list because I really want to watch it.

Speaker 2 (01:46:20):
One that I kind of went back and forth on
watching on buying. I ultimately pulled the plug on it
because it's sold. The copy on the website sold me.
But it's a I think it's a new label call
or a new partner label call. But the movie is
called Fraud.

Speaker 3 (01:46:37):
Oh yeah that is let me see here. I I
just had it pulled up because it was Yeah, it's Memory,
which has been not too new of a label. They've
been and they I think they were the ones who
did Hippo, which came out last year. But yeah, Memory
has been around a little bit with them. But yeah,
I yeah, tell me more about it. I actually haven't.

Speaker 2 (01:46:55):
The thing that sold me was it's a it's a
narrative that's told through the editing together of clips that
are otherwise unrelated. Oh oh interesting, And it's it just
seems like it seems like a gimmicky kind of movie.
But I it's seems like it's gimmicky in a way

(01:47:17):
that I was interested in watching it. So it's they
they re edit home videos and and it just shows
them like going through and kind of getting into debt
and then how they're trying to figure out creative ways
of of getting rid of this debt. So it's a

(01:47:38):
very like American mid two thousands story that I'm just
it's intriguing the way that it was pitched. David Gordon
Green was a producer on here. So it's just I
don't know like it kind of it scratched a particular
itch that made me want to give it a shot.
I think, yeah, I am not a witch with an

(01:48:00):
absolute instant by that.

Speaker 3 (01:48:03):
Was a film movement, I think, yeah, it was. That's
a film movement. They get it. They get a lot
of releases in a month. Man, I've seen like they get.
They have like three releases this month.

Speaker 2 (01:48:13):
Yeah. Yes, one of my favorite. Well, I say this
about a lot of stuff. A sub genre I really
love is magical realism, and this is a magical realism
movie from Zambia. And so I have not seen it.

(01:48:34):
It's a twenty sixteen or twenty seventeen movie. But yeah,
I think it got a lot of attention at Con
it was a bathto a winner. It was at the
Academy Awards for Best Foreign Language Film. I think I
think it was not maybe I don't know if you
made the final cut or off, but it was up there.

(01:48:54):
But it's just it checks all the boxes for me.
I don't know a lot of Zambia stories. I don't
know a lot of zambient filmmakers, and magical realism like okay,
like I'm in.

Speaker 3 (01:49:06):
Yeah, oh that's awesome. That's another one where like I
just think, I'm like, well, i know Film Movement has
a streaming channel now, so I'm like I'll probably catch
it there because like just again, it's like space, money, time,
the combination. But yeah, it does. That is actually one
of the ones because I also with Film Movement, this
I think might actually be a new I could be

(01:49:27):
wrong about this, but this might be a new release
for them because I know some of their releases on
OCN is just a repackaged version of stuff they put
out back when they were whoever used to put out
their shit before. I know, with like reflecting skin, you know,
they're identical transfers and stuff, so sometimes that also will
deter me a little, you know, But as a discovery, Yeah,

(01:49:49):
that's that's like they I believe did they do. I
think they did well under Film Movement classics. I think
they did Red PIONI Gambler.

Speaker 2 (01:49:58):
Yeah wait a minute, was that the I'm pretty sure
that was them?

Speaker 3 (01:50:01):
Yeah, it is, it is, Yeah, and I'm super stoked.
I still have a watch that I have it sitting
here in my endless watch bile. But like like they
obviously do great stuff. And I think they also did Fukusaku,
right feroshusy Osaka, yeah, which another one I have, and like,
so they definitely like they're a label. I absolutely love

(01:50:24):
what they're doing. But it's crazy how many they drop
per month when we're talking about like sheer volume of drops,
and like when you see there's like nineteen titles, literally
twenty percent of them are film movement, it's.

Speaker 2 (01:50:36):
Like why, yeah, yeah, that's true.

Speaker 3 (01:50:37):
Yeah, well, I'm excited to hear what you think of
this one because that'll that'll probably definitely bump up my
watch of it.

Speaker 2 (01:50:42):
Yeah, okay, yeah, I can't wait to watch it. And
speaking of I guess women directed movies and like movies
about women. So there's another. I think this is a
new label. I think it is a partner several futures,
although they've been a distribution company for a while, but
I think this is new to Ocean and they have
it's a their mission statement is film distribution with the

(01:51:05):
focus on a tourist and anti imperialist work, which like sure,
like yeah, I agree more yeah, like let's go and
the first film tells it's called Leila and the Wolves,
and the thing that sold me was it tells a
lot of like Arab women's stories, and it's through the
lens of a classical piece of literature. And I'm forgetting

(01:51:27):
which one it is right now, but it's a male dominated.

Speaker 3 (01:51:32):
This is also, by the way, I don't think this
is a new movie. I think this is from the eighties.
I think it's like eighty four. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's
it looks like from from what I'm reading. I mean,
this was on the Criteria channel a while back. It
was on my or No. I think it just got
on there maybe, but all of my like when I

(01:51:55):
looked on my letterbox, a few of my mutuals, and
I don't mean just people I follow, I mean like
people I know here in La watched it and fucking
loved it. They had nothing but great things to say
about this movie.

Speaker 2 (01:52:04):
Yeah, I can't wait. I think generally feminist lens movies
from Arab nations are relatively rare. This one is primarily
drawing from Lebanon and Palestine, I believe if I got
that right. But yeah, super in I can't wait.

Speaker 3 (01:52:23):
Yeah, And I think this is a narrative feature because
I know that that filmmaker made a documentary like ten
years before it that I know a lot of people
speak also very highly of because it was the first
like film, like I think the first Arab film by
a female filmmaker. I should say, I'm looking it up

(01:52:44):
right now because I'm like, yeah, the Hour of Liberation
has arrived. That was her first movie. It played, it
can awesome.

Speaker 2 (01:52:52):
Yeah. The director's name is Hannie or Heini Schore. So
she's the best known for being the first female Arab
filmmaker to have a film in con which is cool.

Speaker 3 (01:53:04):
Yeah, I'm stuck to watch this one. This was like
one of the first. When I saw that too, I
was like, oh, I haven't heard of this label. And
then when I read up same thing, the fucking mission
statement hooked me in. And then as soon as I
saw a letterbox, like how effusive the praise was from
people I know that I like trust too, I was like,
all right, yep, instant yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:53:25):
And I don't want to sound like a woke loser here,
but I will.

Speaker 3 (01:53:30):
Say, okay, all right, let me turn on my virtue signal.

Speaker 2 (01:53:38):
One of the things I like about Vinegar Syndrome, and
I will give them credit for, is when they have
an opportunity, they will present films from a feminist lens.
It seems like to be not their core mission statement,
but they do do it when they get a chance.
And Justin is a big champion of women filmmakers, and
so I just think it's worth calling out like that's
something that's important to him, and he's pre pretty consistent

(01:54:00):
in making sure that voice is represented in the movies.
And I do like that about them.

Speaker 3 (01:54:05):
Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. I mean, look, they they did
Hookers on Davy this year with Threw cip. I mean,
I know some of that falls on the on the
actual OCM partners, but he obviously is in charge of
that curation and bringing people in. So yeah, that that rules.

Speaker 2 (01:54:20):
We can end on Bleeding School because I'm sure we
both got Actually we can just say we'm sure we
both got the Bleeding Skull.

Speaker 3 (01:54:25):
Right, Yes, Yeah, that's the last one. That's the last
one I got to. Yeah, Yeah, Phantasma tapes. Which is
funny that we were talking about AGFA mixtapes. This actually
feels like an AGFA mixtape through Bleeding Skull. It's as
soon as I saw the commercial for it, I was
they're the commercial, the trailer that they put on YouTube,

(01:54:45):
I was like, Yep, this is absolutely very eli coded.
I'm super stoked to watch this. And because I don't
I don't know if we've talked about this on previous podcasts,
but the v I think we did talk about it
on the roundtable. But the as much as I love
like shot on video, the actual VHS kind of reappraisal
that's currently happening right now, I'm not as on board

(01:55:09):
with it. I think I would rather something be presented.
I know, sometimes it does feel weird to watch like
something like that should be in like grindhouse mode, like
house at the Edge of the park or excuse me, no, no, no, yeah,
is that the way way I'm thinking, yeah, yeah, that's
the one I'm thinking of. Yeah, you know that just
got a four K from seven, But I watched the
eighty eight Films one from last year, the four K,

(01:55:29):
you know, watching that movie in like a non scratched
like this pristine version of it almost feels weird. You're
almost like, no, this isn't right. This should actually be legal.
There should actually be like laws against this. But at
the same time, I'm glad I can finally because you
really get to see like like and I actually, I
actually I do remember talking about this, so I'll keep

(01:55:51):
it very short, but like you know, rewatching those like
those jungle those like Cannibal Jungle movies from like the
late seventies, like you know, Diadado stuff and Jeior Martino
stuff and all those. Severn just put out a fuck
ton of them, yeah, or four K, And you know,
I saw them when I was in high school. I
didn't think much of them then for the most part.
Not that they're bad, but I don't. I just don't

(01:56:12):
think they're good, you know, even and I don't even
think they're really a good time necessarily, but like, uh
but I watched them. You know, I did my homework,
but I did. I was like, you know what these
are on four K? Fuck it, let's watch them. And
they didn't hold up for me. But what I will
say that did make the revisits for them worthwhile. And

(01:56:33):
I promised this ties to Bleeding Skull, But I just
what I just want to say is that watching them,
you when you get to see them in four K
and not like a like a VHS or like a
or like a transfer from like a beat up fucking
grindhouse print. Is that you actually get to see how
elegant these guys were even in the what we're watching,
you know what I mean, even watching like I don't know,

(01:56:55):
a fucking an actual chicken get gutted open and somebody
actually got paid to eat or whatever. You know what
I mean, like like putting whatever they were doing, watching
a guy get castrated and then they fucking eat his
cock or whatever. You know that all that stuff that
they did in these movies. But there's parts of it
where you watch it you're like, oh, yeah, this is
a filmmaker income that's totally in command of his craft. Yeah,

(01:57:17):
And I know that sounds a little pretentious, but it
really is. That is what I think. These restorations, which
by the way, not all of them are undertaken exclusively
by several or whoever's doing them vinegar syndrome. Sometimes they're
actually mastered at like preservation centers in Italy or wherever,
and then they sometimes they can restore the original, you know,
they get to, but sometimes they're working with what they

(01:57:39):
give them, with studio supplied masters. But it's worth it
just to see how beautiful these shots were framed. Even
if later on, you know, the transfers came from like
a dupe negative or some some fucking you know, there
was like, oh no, we found a print in the
fucking under the toilet that they hit it, you know,
and it so all that to say, Like sometimes I

(01:58:02):
do like watching like these Bleeding Skull mixtapes or these
AGFA mixtapes where they're like, there are these VHS transfers
that you know, they have this like this look of
what it kind of goes back to. I sometimes can
appreciate that a little more. You know. It's not the
same as SOOV to me, but I think what they're
doing here specifically with this that does very much speak

(01:58:23):
to me.

Speaker 2 (01:58:25):
Yeah, no, yeah, I agree. And Joe has a long
history of being able to compile like very interesting things
that are maybe thematically related, but otherwise you wouldn't think
about putting them together. So totally, yeah, I think it's
it's it's spot on for for all the right reasons.
Very quickly, I'll just say, the last thing I got

(01:58:45):
is see fog and I went back and forth on
this because this is written by the director Shim Sungbo,
but it's also written by Bong Juneho.

Speaker 3 (01:58:57):
Oh I did not know that.

Speaker 2 (01:59:00):
Yeah. Yeah, and it's a crime movie, so I mean
he's been proven he can do crime movies, and it's
a movie that is well regarded in a in a
weird way. And I don't mean to sound like a contrarian.
I'm not the biggest Bung Junaho fan. Like I think
his movies are Okay, he did it was Parasite was his, right, Yeah, correct,

(01:59:24):
I mean that was certain.

Speaker 3 (01:59:26):
Parasite memories of Murder the Host and Mother were his
big prior to you know his and and snow Piercer,
and I think we're his other ones.

Speaker 2 (01:59:36):
So like, you know, obviously, I mean Parasite's a wonderful movie.
It's a great movie in every sense, and even if
you don't like it, like it's a it's a perfectly
constructed film. And like, yeah, there's you know, snow Piercer
was actually a lot of fun. Like I think he's
an okay, I think he's good and I enjoy his movies.
I don't know if I put him on the same
level as as some of the other legends as he's referenced, right,

(02:00:00):
I'll give it a shot. I don't know. I was
going back and forth and if I try before you buy,
or just buy it, but I ended up getting it.
I'm curious.

Speaker 3 (02:00:07):
That's also film movement, by the way, for people listening,
that's another one of thos, Like that's I think too,
but like, uh, I agree, I never saw Barking Dogs,
Never Bite his first film. Uh. And actually I was
supposed to see it the weak COVID hit and then
it got the screening got canceled. But uh, you know,
I I'm actually kind of I'm not entirely there with you,

(02:00:30):
but I'm like halfway there. I think I do think
Parasite was like the film he was working towards his
whole his whole career, And but I think Mother is also,
like I rewatched it a couple of years ago, and
I think that movie is probably aged the best, Like
it's really really good. I think when he plays in
a smaller field like that, like with Memories of Murder
and Parasite, where they're much more self contained and in

(02:00:52):
our world, I think there's a lot of the anger
of the stuff that he talks about with like you know,
class stuff and those kinds of things, I think they
hit so much harder. And I think whenever he goes
to Like I thought snow Pierson was entertaining. I thought
Oak Joe was entertaining. But I think they're a little
unwieldy because there's such a big budget and there's so

(02:01:15):
much more reach in the scope. I didn't like Mickey
seventeen I but I you know, I love like Parasite
Mother and even the Host, Like, I know a lot
of people love that movie. I think it's fine. I
have a few friends who are in the same camp
as you where he didn't do much personally. The guy
for me is a Park chown Wook.

Speaker 2 (02:01:36):
As far as Korean directors.

Speaker 3 (02:01:38):
Yeah, yeah, yeah he. I mean, I think like The
Hand the Handmaiden is probably behind Mahall and Drive, like
my favorite movie of the century. Like I think the
dude like just I think he almost always hits. I
thought I saw a decision to leave three times in theaters.
I think he's great. I can't wait for his new
movie to come out this year, Weirdly, The Sympathizer. I

(02:02:02):
haven't finished it yet. I just started watching it. It's
the only thing I haven't been as hot on.

Speaker 2 (02:02:08):
Have you seen Thirst by him?

Speaker 3 (02:02:10):
Oh? Yeah, great movie. I love Thirst, you know, the
Vengeance trilogy. I revisited them all within the last half decade,
since since you know, from twenty twenty two till about
late twenty twenty three, and you know Old Boy, when
I was like in high school, No, not high school.
That came out when I was twenty. I wish I
was in high school, I I but even at twenty,

(02:02:31):
I was like, oh my god, this is the best
fucking thing I've ever seen. And you know, rewatching it,
I still think it holds up pretty well. I like
it quite a bit, but I actually think the rest
of the Vengeance trilogy surpasses it by like a mile now.

Speaker 2 (02:02:44):
I think, yeah, that hammer scene in the hallway is
very iconic. Of course, that's always just going to be
like an amazing piece of filmmaker. Yeah, but Sympathy for
Mister Vengeance has always been my favorite. I just think
the emotional beats in that movie are just like flawless.

Speaker 3 (02:03:00):
I agree, I agree it it. I actually think I well,
I agree that it's like so how flawless it is.
But I think Lady Vengeance is actually at the top
for me because I think it deals with just because
I watched them as a back to back as a
double feature a couple of years ago. And I think
Lady Vengeance just does a great job of dealing with
like not only the same kind of ideas that these

(02:03:22):
other movies deal with with revenge, but like specifically with
things that you couldn't anticipate, like what the cost of
things can be, you know, Whereas, like I think Sympathy
for Mister Vengeance does a great job of mixing like
you know, like class warfare with like you know, with
specifically with like a really specifically this designed plot, whereas

(02:03:45):
Lady Vengeance kind of has that design and then it
just completely pulls the rug from under you with it
and goes a completely different direction. And again we're talking
about this is a Champagne ranking. Like any of them,
I don't think there's a wrong way to rank them,
you know what I mean, because they're also good. But
it's just funny that like Old Boys so far in
the rear view compared to the other two. For me, like,
I think they're all great movies, but I think the

(02:04:06):
other two are like genuine masterpieces by comparison. Yeah, and
I think, but yeah, I think Thurst is even Stoker,
which is probably like lesser Park did you see Stoker?
Oh it was, you know, it was his American film.
It was his English language film. It stars Nicole Kidman
and Matthew Good. I think it is his last name,

(02:04:30):
and uh Mia Vasikalska. I always got her last name wrong.
But she's in. She's the lead. And it's totally even
though it's an American film, completely in English, it's all him,
like it's so coded, all of his stuff. It was
written by Wentworth Miller, the actor from Prison Break. He
wrote it under a pseudonym to see if he can

(02:04:53):
get it made without, like he didn't want people to
associate it with him. And it's it's great. It's but again,
even that when I watched it, I remember I was
watching it thinking like this is lesser Park, and I'm
still having a fucking blast, Like it's still really good.
So yeah, I definitely more partial to him, But but
I am more intrigued by Sea Fog. Now, yeah, let

(02:05:16):
me know what you think, because that'll be the determining
factor because he didn't direct it, so it's not his baby,
but I'm still intrigued.

Speaker 2 (02:05:23):
Yeah, you'll know exactly. Yeah he's a writer and possibly
yeah he's a producer. As well.

Speaker 3 (02:05:28):
So wait, what year is it?

Speaker 2 (02:05:31):
Twenty fourteen? Oh?

Speaker 3 (02:05:33):
Okay, Oh it's more recent. Okay, right on?

Speaker 2 (02:05:35):
Oh all right, another reason for you not to watch it?

Speaker 3 (02:05:38):
Yeah, well, sorry, folks, I'm out. It's not a it's sorry.
I gotta go watch. I gotta go watch you know
something from nineteen seventy five that that's gonna feel twice
its length, but is really punishing.

Speaker 2 (02:05:50):
I'm just kidding, no, man, I mean, look, this is
another you know, longer one episode, but I just like,
I just think this month is awesome, and like, I'll
just say that for the last time. This is you know,
I don't it's going to be tough to do the
year and review episode in a few months because it's
always going to be like recency bias. Yeah, there has

(02:06:13):
been some moments throughout the year where I've been frustrated them.
But August is good and this month is is great. Like,
this is I think probably my favorite month. I have
to go back and double check that, but just I.

Speaker 3 (02:06:27):
Would no, I'd say that's a good call. I think
you're I think you're right on the money.

Speaker 2 (02:06:32):
So thanks for doing this. If anybody you know, if
anybody is in LA, please go check you out. I mean,
is there anything else you want to promote or you.

Speaker 3 (02:06:41):
Know, it's funny. This is like the week where I'm
still putting all the stuff together. But depending when when
does this drop?

Speaker 2 (02:06:46):
Probably most likely Friday or Saturday.

Speaker 3 (02:06:49):
Okay, so if I mean, if if anyone listens right away,
it's second Tuesday of every month. I always have my
show at the Pleasure Chest. The next one September ninth.
But you can follow me at Eli Olsburg on Instagram
and Twitter and all those places, and I always promote
stuff there. So Pussycat Theater will be back. I'm hoping, well,

(02:07:09):
I'll just put it out there so it manifests right
here it's recorded. I'm hoping to show the next ones
I want to show, especially because we're approaching spooky season,
even though they're not necessarily horror. But I'm really hoping
to show Cafe Flesh at some point if depending on
what the rights are with that. I got to reach
out to Mondo and see what the deal is. But
like I really am, and I'm hoping to show Through

(02:07:32):
the looking Glass. And then also the one I was
really hoping to show is Naked came the Stranger, so
those will be those are That's what I'm hoping for,
but depending on on just locking down the venue and
seeing where I could show it, because I still want
to keep it small, but I want to at least
have it in a venue that it has room to
grow and then hopefully, hopefully it keeps building from there.

(02:07:55):
But yeah, always, I can't stress how much of a
pleasure it is to do the show. It's always great.
It's also goes long because it's just really easy to
talk to you. Man, I told you this before, but
what I love about the show is every time you
have a guest on, it's like the highest compliment you
can give a podcast is wanting to jump in on
the conversation. So thanks for letting me just jump in
on the conversations on one.

Speaker 2 (02:08:17):
Thanks man, no, and thanks for being available, you know,
just a few days notice. And it's always really a
pleasure to have you on. So Eli, thanks, and we
will actually speaking of fifteen Minutes with You, which has
been referenced a few times, so last has a few
titles that she'll be talking about, so we'll go over
and listen to what she has to say.

Speaker 5 (02:08:36):
Okay, good evening, everyone, Welcome back. To fifteen minutes with you.
This is the segment where I review all of the
new titles that appear on the Vinegars interrom sister site
mel you've seen, including all the sub labels and all
the partner labels. We've got a bit of a stacked
month this time around. We'll be going over the August

(02:08:57):
twenty twenty five titles. And let's see, we've got one, two, three, four,
five six movies to go over today. So I'm not
sure what fifteen divided by six is, but we're going
to dedicade a few minutes to each. I guess, right, okay,
generally going in the order that I watched these, Let's
go over the distrip Pick's release first. This is a

(02:09:19):
double feature of Satan's Bed and Scare Their Pants Off.
I guess, just right off the bat. I do really
like the artwork on this release. I like the aesthetic
of it.

Speaker 3 (02:09:28):
It's good.

Speaker 5 (02:09:29):
These are two kind of black and white Ruffi films,
the former of which is starring Yoko Ono and the
also is directed by Michael Finley, and then the ladder
of which is directed by Ron Sullivan. So, okay, Satan's
Bed really, it just I think it's notable not just

(02:09:51):
because it's directed by Michael Lin Roberto Finley, but because
it is starring Yoko Ono pre her sort of meteoric
rise fame as you know, life and artistic partner of
John Lennon and the sort of misogynist's target du jour
for a long time, right, and also just like a
really important and incredible avant garde artist in her own right.

(02:10:15):
I guess it's worth watching as like a curiosity. There's
really not much going on here, like she's in it,
that's interesting, I guess, right.

Speaker 3 (02:10:23):
I don't know.

Speaker 5 (02:10:24):
This was like like a sex film that was directed
by some other guy I don't remember who ended up
starring Yoko Ono, and then they couldn't finish it, so
they sold the footage to the Finleys, and they sort
of constructed a b plot to cut around and then
sort of did a little bit of a voiceover to
kind of force a round peg in a square hole,

(02:10:46):
right or is it the opposite?

Speaker 3 (02:10:47):
I'm not sure.

Speaker 5 (02:10:48):
I don't know, man, I'm kind of running the clock here.
I don't remember much about this. There's not much that
happens in it, and it's just kind of there. Yeah,
I think I ended up going with a Oh, I see,
I went with a out of ten. That feels high,
But you know, I guess it was interesting while it
was on, but it really it did not stick with
me in any sense. So moving on to Scare Their

(02:11:11):
Pants Off, this one has a pretty incredible first act,
Like it's got a very Mario Bava esque like torture
dungeon sequence with like this fucking incredible mask and like
candles and this beautiful cinematography, and I was like, Yo,
this is going to be a banger, and it just
kind of falls off a cliff from there. It's just
kind of like a series of vignettes of like women
who are kidnapped and drugged and sort of like forced

(02:11:33):
into sexual fantasies by these dudes. And it sounds way
more salacious than it is, Like it's pretty tame. It's
just not that good.

Speaker 2 (02:11:41):
I don't know.

Speaker 5 (02:11:42):
I landed on a five out of ten for this one.
The early Ron Sullivan stuff continues to not be for me,
but it is continuously like has the seed of an
interesting idea or has sequences that are really beautiful or
fascinating or aesthetically intriguing. Right there, there are a couple

(02:12:02):
short films included in this as well from the Something
Weird archives. One of them I think is just an
old stag loop because there was no title sequence that
I can recall. I couldn't find it anywhere. I wish
they would list them on the Vinegar Syndrome website, but
I guess they couldn't. I will tell you though, that
one of the films included is entitled Jane on a

(02:12:23):
Train from nineteen sixty six. This one was a lot
of fun and I really enjoyed this one. Actually, I
might have to rip it and put it on the
plex server before I sell off the disc. It's just
like a sort of it's a little bit of a
I you wouldn't call it a stag loop, but it
is sort of like a short film like loop sort
of thing. Single real sort of deal, you know, it's
one of these things. It's basically just this guy on

(02:12:45):
a train who stares at a woman and has a
fantasy of her taking all her clothes off in the
middle of the train, and then that's it. You know,
there's not much to it. But I really enjoyed it
for what it was. I thought it was like very
charming and cute and funny and sex and I just
had fun with this one. I liked it, so I
gave that a seven out of ten, and it's honestly
my favorite thing on the set. There's also booklet essays

(02:13:08):
that are not listed on the website, which is annoying.
But there is an essay from Ashley West which is
excellent as always, kind of delving into the history of
the films. And then there's an essay from Lisa Patucci
from Something Weird Video, kind of outlining the history of
the business relationship between Something Weird Video and to Strip Picks.
They're both really good essays. They're both worth reading. If

(02:13:30):
you did spring for the limited edition, make a point
to read it because that's I mean, the artwork is
honestly really good too, but that's like going to be
your main selling point. So overall, I don't know, I
feel like, you know, if this is your kind of
thing or not, or if this is like seems like
something you would love or not. It's not something I'll
be holding on to, but it is something I recommend
for the right person. Next, we have the Pikorama double
features as Tropic of Desire and Fantasy World these are

(02:13:52):
kind of thematically similar films directed by Bob Chin. They
both involve soldiers, kind of on Breake. I guess I
don't know how does the army work. I'm not sure
they're you know, in cities and go to brothels and
such things. Tropic of Desire is apparently the one that
I preferred, because I gave it a six out of ten.
But I have to be so real with you, I

(02:14:14):
cannot remember a single thing about it. Maybe I was
too high when I watched it or something, but straight up,
I don't remember it, so not a lot of staying power.
But I guess it was all right while it was
on Fantasy World. I remember more after refamiliarizing myself with
the trailer. It's sort of about these sailors that go
to a sort of what would you call it, like

(02:14:36):
a sex house, a performance theater something or other where,
like people have their sexual fantasies fulfilled, and people like
the audience watches. It's definitely more memorable. I ended up
giving it a lower score. I gave it a five
out of ten.

Speaker 3 (02:14:47):
But I.

Speaker 5 (02:14:49):
Think in retrospect, this is maybe the one that is
worth getting the set for. But I don't know, if
they're both just kind of there, they're not particularly memorable,
They're not doing a lot that's particularly a interesting. I
will say that Fantasy World has some cool sets and
some cool like smoky lighting and cinematography, and it's got
an interesting premise at least. Right, So again, I think

(02:15:12):
you know, if this is your kind of thing, if
you're a real chin head that sounds like a slur,
I mean, like a real fan of Bob chin Right,
if you're just really into these Peakorama releases or whatever,
they're gonna be fine. They're gonna like get the job done.
I'm not going to be hanging onto these because I
didn't find them to be particularly special, but they are
worth a watch, I think. Okay, next up is going

(02:15:33):
to be my favorite release and film of the whole slate.
This is from Quality Accent. It's called Takeoff. Okay, so
this is actually also licensed by District Picks. So I'm
looking at it right now. And as of right now,
two thousand units were printed to slip Cover and only

(02:15:53):
thirteen well I say, only thirteen hundred or left, so
this isn't selling that well, please go buy this. This
is going to be my main sort of solid recommendation
for the segment.

Speaker 2 (02:16:04):
Right.

Speaker 5 (02:16:05):
Genuinely, I think this is one of the more I mean,
it's certainly one of the most ambitious, but I also
just think it's one of the better adult films that
I've seen. This is going to be your starter pack
type stuff. This is going to be your introductory sort
of thing for people who want to get into this.
This is a really excellent place to start. It's one
of the most expensive adult films ever made, and I'm

(02:16:28):
just looking at the slip cover artwork and it is beautiful.
Go support this release, please, Okay. So it's directed by
Armand Weston and is starring Wade Nichols and many many
other people, which, by the way, the Realta Report just
put out a three part series on Wade Nichols and
it is beautiful and heartbreaking and just I mean, some

(02:16:50):
of the best journalistic storytelling out there right now is
coming from the Realta Report. Fucking seriously, go check that
shit out. We happen to have another Beatles connection here,
which is interesting, or at least John Lennon connection, specifically
yogo On no more specifically because the soundtrack was done
by Elephant's Memory who served as the band for John

(02:17:12):
and Yoko for a few of their records and live performances. So, okay,
what is this. It is a well take off on
Oscar Wild's A Portrait of Dorian Gray, which, by the way,
is an excellent novel if you've never read it, a
sort of queer essential, Like, if you're into queer novels,

(02:17:33):
queer writing, queer history, you have to read the Portrait
of Dory and Gray. It's really excellent, and this might
be my favorite adaptation of it that I've seen. Grants
that I can only think of one other off the
top of my head that I've actually seen, but this
movie's excellent. So the conceit here, the rub, as it were,
is that instead of a portrait that is being held

(02:17:55):
in this dude's okay. So if you've never read the
Portrait of Dorian Gray in adaptation, he'd never heard of it,
you should correct that. But in any case, the premise
is that a sort of young hedonist does not want
to grow old, and he doesn't want his beauty to
wither away. He wants to keep living I lascivious life
full of carnal excess, right, and he feels he needs

(02:18:19):
to retain his youth and his beauty in order for
that to happen. So he makes a deal to sell
his soul, and rather than himself aging, his portrait or
a portrait of him will be hanging out in his
attic and will continue to age, and we'll get uglier
and uglier with every sin or foul deed he commits. Right, So,

(02:18:39):
the way in which this is sort of taken off
or updated for this film is that a man secretly
has a sexual encounter recorded and then he wishes that
the stag film would age while he continues to stay
young forever. So that's what happens. The film gets grainier

(02:19:00):
and scratchier, and the man in the film gets older
and older, and he's sort of hosting a party at
his house and a woman finds the film and starts
asking him about it, and he sort of takes him
or takes her through a journey of his life. So
what we have this is a really fascinating and brilliant
sort of Conceit is he's recounting the story of his

(02:19:24):
life from the twenties all the way to the seventies,
and he's like the same age or whatever throughout all
of these, so Wade Nichols is just portraying the same
character in various situations, sort of stylized after the most
popular films of the time period. So you have like
a sort of silent type era for the twenties, and

(02:19:44):
then the thirties you have more like a screwball thing,
and then the forties you're getting into like the classic
Hollywood stuff, and the fifties are getting into like the
sort of beach movies and the sort of Marlon Brando
esque youth rebellion type shit, you know what I'm saying.
Then into the sixties you get in like drugs and
hippie culture and stuff like that, and then we arrive
in the present day, being the seventies, the time that

(02:20:05):
this was produced. Right, It's really great. It's really really
well made. It's almost two hours long, which is kind
of unheard of for the sort of thing, and I
just really highly recommend it. And the other thing I
highly recommend is the booklet, which is kind of closer
to a short book like Ashley West of the realto
Report goes fucking hard, sort of going into the really

(02:20:26):
granular on the history of this film, and it's just
an incredible essay. It's very long, but it's worth it
for sure. And then doctor Laura Laura Helen Marx of
Tulane University, she has a much shorter essay, but it's
very moving and it's very It goes into the sort
of queer history of this story and how the film

(02:20:48):
actually serves as sort of a send up and an
O skewering and a satirizing of heterosexuality throughout Hollywood's history.
She kind of talks about how the film personally moves
her and it's just really really good. Yeah, I highly
recommend this release. I gave the film a seven out
of ten, but the release gets like a ten for me, Like,
it's fantastic.

Speaker 3 (02:21:07):
Go check this out please.

Speaker 5 (02:21:08):
And then finally we have from brand new label Club
Super eight Anita Swedish nimphet Okay. So this sold out entirely,
so I couldn't order it for a while, but I
did finally get it, and I tried to get through
it as fast as I could so that it could
be still in time for this segment because next month's

(02:21:29):
late is pretty fucking intimidating, so we're going to see
how that goes. But this is a Swedish film starring
Christina Lindberg of thriller fame. So I see why it
took off so quickly, And it's about a teenage and
infomaniac sort of taking that on is more of a
clinical thing where it's genuinely like a uncontrollable impulse. So

(02:21:51):
this is clearly an influence on Lars ron Schuer's Nimfo Maniac.
It even has the same fucking guy in it, like
Stelling scars Gar is playing the same character in this
film that he plays in The Maniac. And yet Lars
von Trier wants to pretend like this wasn't an influence
on that film, like, man, it's okay, it's okay that

(02:22:13):
you wanted to do like a sort of soft remake
because Nifo Maniac. I'll just say I think is a
much much better film than this, But that's not to
say that this is a bad movie at all. Like
I think I gave this a six out of ten,
and I think the release is really good. The restoration
is really beautiful, the performance is really good. A little
bit boring to me, like I don't, I'm not, it didn't.

(02:22:34):
It doesn't hold my interest necessarily for the entirety of
a run time. But it is like a good movie,
and I see why it got so popular and I
see why people want to see it, and it is
a sort of I think, important film in sort of
sexploitation history and sort of Swedish film history and that
sort of thing. So this also contains the French theatrical
version presented in a two K state can as as

(02:22:56):
opposed to a four K scanned the original. Yeah, which
is I guess it is a different edit. I don't
think it's necessarily less explicit or anything. I sort of
skipped around in it and that's it. So I don't
really have anything to say about it, but it is included,
so I'm glad that they did their did their due
diligence and getting everything on here says. There's a documentary
called stellin Sex and Psychotherapy. It's just a ten minute

(02:23:16):
interview with Christina Lindberg, so I don't know about all that.
But there's also like a sort of career spanning interview
with her from twenty twenty four, and there's also an
audio commentary with the guy who runs Club Super eight
and this other person who I think if I remember
correctly said he did his master's thesis on this film,

(02:23:37):
which kudos to him for finding enough information to even
do that. It's a good audio commentary. The interviews are
fine for what they are. And then there is a
gallery of Christina Lindberg centerfolds and articles from nineteen sixty
nine to nineteen eighty four. There's about ten minutes of
nude photographs of Christina Lindberg. So, I mean, you could
do worse in terms of FEATURETTE.

Speaker 2 (02:23:58):
I'll just say that.

Speaker 5 (02:23:59):
Yeah, it's a really solid first release from this new
partner label. I'm glad it is seeing success. And if
that sounds like you're kind of thing, if you're like
a super fan, or if you're just like really into
Swedish cinema, or if you just want to see some
like foreign sexploitation stuff as opposed to all the American
stuff we're getting, like, yeah, check this out for sure,
and I recommend it. Okay, So that's the segment for

(02:24:20):
this month. Thank you all for tuning in and listening.
And I think we're caught up. Yeah, because that's August.
I'm gonna start working on September. We're current.

Speaker 2 (02:24:29):
Well, Celeste I'm proud of you, and I'm sure everybody
else is too. Good job getting caught up well, y'all,
that's it. Episode twenty five is in the books. Thank
you so much, Eli for coming back on. Thank you
again Celeste for being a wonderful co host, being so
thorough with your research. Y'all. We have getting near the

(02:24:54):
end of the year. There is a guest I'm really
excited about. Actually, if can work out, there's two guests
I'm really excited about in November, and we'll have another
roundtable discussion in December. As we look at the end
of the year. With Professor, I'm trying to think of
how we introduced himself when he came on. If you
just said David, he might have just said David. But

(02:25:15):
with the prof and then October, I'm still finalizing a
little bit, but I have some people that I'm excited
about if everything pans out, just to focus on the
horror side and have kind of a fun October and
still trying to pin down a Shaw Brothers and kind
of Hong Kong episodes. So that's all coming up, I

(02:25:37):
hope before the end of the year. Thank you all
for listening so much. See you online, and I can
be found in many spots. I do occasionally post on Instagram,
not as much as I like, but I'm there under
Punk Vacation podcast, I think, and most other places. Most

(02:25:58):
of the socials i'm either view to a thrill or
personal history of film. So that's specifically on letterbox and Reddit.
I'm all over that, So all right, see you later.

Speaker 1 (02:27:06):
Thank you for listening. To hear more shows from the
Someone's Favorite Productions podcast network, please select the link in
the description.

Speaker 6 (02:27:19):
Hey, this is Jason Kleeberg from The Force five podcast,
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a movie themed top five list topic and then we
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(02:27:41):
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