77: Project: POE

The following feature has been rated R by the Motion Picture Association of America. It is intended for mature audiences and parental discretion is advised. Our nuclear reactor pumping out one million kilowatts of power. Provide more cooling in the containment chambers. To your stations, we have a movie meltdown.

Where am I? The pit of despair. Don't even think about. Don't even think about trying to escape. What's up, and welcome to Movie Meltdown.

I am Brian, and with me this week, we're doing sort of a special little offshoot episode here. I have with me Freddie. Freddie, introduce yourself. Hi there. I'm Freddie from notlp.com.

That's Nine to the Living podcast. We're your neighbors to the east in Cincinnati, Ohio. We've been discussing doing some sort of crossover show for a while. And finally, I've actually had this one in mind and wanted to do something with you anyway. So, yeah, I thought I'd throw it out there and see if you were up for it.

Yeah, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it. It's kind of tough when we see each other. We usually see each other at Horror Hound Weekend, and that is a madhouse. Yes.

Yeah, nothing ever gets done that we say we're going to do. Pretty much. Even discussing this last time got completely overshadowed by craziness. 7,000 attendees. Yeah, last time was ridiculous.

Yeah, it was insane. It was out of control. Yeah, that's right, man. So it's a pleasure to be on Movie Meltdown. No problem.

Glad to have you here. And I think, yeah, we'll have fun with our topic of the week here. But before that, I guess just follow our normal dorky procedure here. We'll roll into the geek activities. For me, this past week, this was certainly very geeky.

It may give you a chance to discuss things you usually get stuck with a whole lot of horror. I branch it out and throw a lot of things in there. So I don't know if you had or have seen the new version of Iron Man. You know, I haven't. Right now we're on this crazy shoestring budget around the house where we have cut out new movies at the theater, which is awful for somebody who's a movie fan as hardcore.

So, I mean, it's like somebody taking cocaine away from 1980s era Paul Reubens. Wow. So it's pretty severe. um so i'm i'm i have no idea what's going on iron man 2 and and i don't know if i'm gonna be able to uh to contain myself so i so i take it you've seen it. I well that was the thing i i kind of avoided the first one for a long time like up until last week still hadn't seen the first one i think it was just too much hype too much in on the ads for and i was just kind of like whatever i wasn't that worried about it so I just hadn't had anything to do with it, hadn't watched it on DVD or anything, and then started seeing the ads for two a couple months ago and was like, huh, all right, that looks kind of interesting.

I'm a huge fan of the first film. I was blown away when I saw that. It's just kind of a testosterone-driven manly movie, and I hadn't seen something quite that balls-to-the-wall in a long time. So when I saw they were making a second one, I was really excited. But now it's kind of like, it's going to be one of those things that I have a feeling I won't get to see it until it's out on DVD.

Yeah. You know, I'm more one of those guys. I watch older stuff that I can, you know, get for free streaming on the internet. Well, that was, yeah, that was what I did this week was I ended up realizing I kind of wanted to go see two and was like, well, obviously I need to track down one. And it's funny how many like places didn't have it because, you know, I was like, If I could have found it cheap enough, I probably just would have bought it, but I wasn't really around anywhere that had it.

And then I went to the rental store one time, and of course they were gone because everybody's watching it again before two. Did they have like an asylum version of it where it's like Pots and Pans Man or something? It's like Nickel Man. Yeah, you know, it's like, because, you know, there's got to be something that's a reasonable facsimile of Iron Man that you can watch. I'm sure there is, unfortunately.

But no, I didn't find any knockoffs. eventually by the next time I went back, you know, I guess the, the coolness factor had worn off and, you know, all the kids had moved on to something else. So that was still sitting there then. So I watched the first one this past week and, um, yeah, much like you were saying, although my thing was, I think as I was, I was expecting this big hyped up, you know, cheesy superhero movie, I was surprised how realistic it. Kind of was. Like it really existed in a real world.

I mean, he's like dealing with terrorists and, you know, Up until you get to the crazy science involved in making the suit, I mean, the rest of it is still a pretty real-world scenario that most superhero movies aren't. Yeah, that's true. Well, there's a certain grittiness to it, especially the opening sequence when he is visiting the soldiers. That's when I knew, when I saw the first film, that it was going to be something different. Because, I mean, it did.

It felt like a scene out of something like Three Kings or... It felt like something out of a straight Iraqi war movie. And then all of a sudden, before you know it, there's this insane amount of action that's just not letting up. To me, that's appealing. I'm a rube.

I will go for action over substance. If it's well done, nine times out of ten, I'll go for the flashy, shiny action. wild stuff over the actual substance. But the beauty of it is that movie, you know, it's a superhero movie, but it has action and it does have a layer of substance with the character, which even without really scratching the surface on his problems with addiction and everything, the Tony Stark character, they hint at things just enough. You can kind of see why he's going to become that kind of troubled, dark character later and the evolution of that. So I just thought it was kind of a compelling movie.

For something that was a comic book film, it's really compelling. Yeah, I'd heard pretty good things about it, the first one. And was still kind of surprised on how well it came together. It does have a pretty good story. And it's a pretty decent picture of this character.

And it does do the whole breakdown of a good middle of the movie isn't crazy action scenes. It's him... working it out it's him figuring out how to be this superhero and it's it's kind of an interesting turn too when when you realize this you know he he does kind of have that spoiled rich kid kind of thing going on and find some reason to you know be a better person that's it's kind of a cool character development thing and i guess they are going to sort of continue on taking weird turns in that direction as his character develops but. That also kind of speaks to our mentality in this country right now especially as um we question, one, we question our own government more openly now than, you know, if you look back to, we've come a long way since like McCarthyism, where, you know, it's okay to question your government, despite what a lot of people felt during, you know, the Patriot Act heyday, that this movie kind of expresses that maybe we're not always doing the right thing by by arming ourselves to the teeth and going into these countries and blowing up all these buildings and everything.

So there was kind of an interesting message that it's an action movie that is pro-peace in a lot of ways, you know, and anti-war. And ultimately, he's a weapons manufacturer who becomes an anti-war advocate. Yeah. Which is, that's kind of a deep concept when you really think about it. It is.

It's like it hits that moment where he becomes sort of anti-war. But then it's funny that as the story unfolds, it's like his way of, you know, taking the world to the next level and bringing peace to the world is by kicking people's ass. Of course, yeah. Otherwise, it'd be a really dull movie. Yeah, I know.

But I mean, that's the thing. I love that third act there. But it's funny that then by the beginning of this next movie, he's like, you know, he's kicked everybody's asses, basically. And he's, you know, He's sort of calmed down all the problems in the world. But it's funny that, you know, I'm bringing peace to.

The world, but yet I'm major pain. Yeah, I'm arming myself and blowing shit up to do it. There's nobody left to kill. You've done killed everybody. That's the American way, right?

Right. It's like, we will bring you peace if we have to kill you to do it. Yep. Oh, man. So it is it's an interesting movie.

And I don't think I knew like I really hadn't read any. You know, I was kind of hit and miss on comic books growing up. I had a lot of them, but I there's a lot of big ones I never got to. And Iron Man was one I just really knew very little about. So I think I didn't realize how much he's.

It's sort of the Marvel version of Batman. It really is. He's just a rich guy who makes himself a superhero. Only he's almost way richer than Batman. He's got more swagger than Batman, I think.

Whereas Batman is this tortured soul who almost feels like he has to be this superhero. The beauty of Tony Stark in Iron Man... it's the first movie I've seen in a long time where the hero really revels in the fact that he is a superhero and he enjoys it. It's more like, yeah, that's what most guys watch in the movie. That's how they feel. They're like, if I had that shit, I would be rocking it all over Los Angeles, blowing up. the Hollywood sign, you know?

So that's kind of like his style and his taste, you know, the taste of that character is interesting in how much of a rock star superhero he is. Yeah, and that's kind of what's cool about this movie, you know, the whole, both of them, I guess, is how much they kind of go with that because we've had so much Batman in the last few years and we've got the dark, brooding, you know, angry superhero. So this is like, you know, they take what's basically the same basic idea of a character and then go the entire opposite direction and we really do see like that ego come out and and it's funny that they got robert downey jr because it fits him so perfectly because he really does seem like in the real world he could very well be this exact same guy and kind of is when you see him in interviews he's he's got sort of being a jackass down to a science but almost at the point where you still like him in the process.

Yeah i i feel that way but um Andy from our show cannot stand Robert Downey Jr. I don't know. And I think a lot of it is that arrogance. He says he's so smug that he has a hard time digesting that and enjoying the character. He has a hard time enjoying any parts that the actor plays.

And I just think that's interesting how appealing he is to me and how unappealing he can be. I mean, it works for some and not for others, but I think it's safe to say that the majority really dig Robert Downey Jr. Yeah, it's an interesting mixture because I see both sides. It's like I totally get the smugness and I get the fact that he's really just very pompous and full of himself and the character Tony Stark. But at the same time, it sort of works.

It's like, especially within the movie, and I haven't seen the Sherlock Holmes, but he kind of plays that same character there, too, where it's, you know, I can do whatever I want. I know everything. I'm sort of better than everybody else. But at the same time, He's still likable. You almost have to give Robert Downey Jr. credit for being able to sell that because that's a hard thing to sell as a character.

Well, it's true, yeah. I think that he's got a level of intensity when he plays these characters where he... Well, one, you know he's always having fun. You can tell that. And two, he seems to...

Like you say, he plays characters who have reasons to be confident. So you excuse the smugness When somebody is so good at something, there's a certain point where you excuse a certain amount of arrogance. You know what I mean? It's like they're actually allotted that much. You've sort of earned it for being that good at something.

Right, exactly. So I think that that's where he gets off. If he wasn't so good at what he did, maybe he would be more of an asshole kind of character. Probably. You don't mind that we swear, right?

Oh, no. We swear constantly. Okay, I just want to make sure. Okay. I'm lucky to contain the rest of them.

That's just usually from the movies I pick. It causes massive swearing. I saw that one and then followed it up with going to see Iron Man 2. I won't go too far into it since you haven't seen it. It sort of continues down that road.

It is funny that I brought up the Batman scenario because to me it almost goes in that same direction where Both the last two series of Batman movies have gone. They've taken sort of a very simple idea of the first movie and then really expanded things by the next movie. I'm almost thinking even the Batman Returns with Tim Burton. When all of a sudden we went from having one villain and a very simple superhero structure to having three villains and having all these other stories going on in the background. That's kind of where they go with it.

Not quite as convoluted as that could get, but we've got... several different people working as sort of background story and alternate nemesis. And it becomes a lot more complicated than the first one, I'll say that. So in other words, it follows what happens in comic books more. Pretty much, yeah. They always strip down all the excess.

When these films are made, they always come from these rich universes of comic book characters. And then they test the waters with one or two characters, and then they open the floodgates. It seems to happen with every superhero film. The floodgate opens in film two, and they start saying, okay, if the audience bought that a man can dress up like a bat and fight crime, they're going to buy that somebody was born looking like a penguin. They kind of expand, and they just kind of push the envelope more and more and more and keep adding more characters until they have to reboot... because nobody's buying it anymore and start over with the basics again.

Like, this has happened so quickly with Spider-Man. Yeah, and that's kind of, yeah, they definitely did the Spider-Man, but the Batman one kind of fits so well because one of the characters really reminded me, like in Batman Returns, how they do that switch up where the big villain is supposed to be the penguin, but really, as you watch the movie, like, behind the scenes, by the end of the movie, really, Christopher Walken is kind of like the real villain. Yeah. Right he becomes he becomes the real evil character and you know the penguin's just there to be kind of weird and gross and and it works on that level but uh in this one we kind of get that the the same thing it's like the the main bad guy the very comic booky superhero bad guy is a you know mickey rourke and it's supposed to be you know that's who it's supposed to be and he fits that but then as it goes on sam rockwell comes in and kind of steals the spotlight and becomes this like Much like the Christopher Walken, he's a businessman and he's kind of swarmy.

He definitely falls into that little niche that they create in these movies. And then we get all these other characters thrown in. You get the Scarlett Johansson thrown in as the femme fatale, who can be the Catwoman. You've got all these other little... They just throw in a lot of characters that kind of fall into that trapping of all these superhero movies.

Yeah, kind of like more set dressings. And the villains have a deep bench. The villain always has to have a deep bench. You have to go through a lot of ballplayers before you get to the coach. I think that's a good thing in action movies is that there's always somebody pulling the strings.

There's always a Mr. Big. And then ultimately that gives your hero character the chance to kill more people. Which is what we want. Exactly.

You want them to work their way through the henchmen. You want to see those guys get killed. You want to see somebody who might you might consider could be the big villain, but they can never totally win out. There has to be some mastermind always behind it. Because once the hero has killed everybody, like Major Payne, then you end up with him hanging out and remarrying and having stepkids.

Oh, God. Well, here's the interesting thing with this one is that Marvel, this time around, because now I guess it's entered this new universe of being able to make movies, that they're kind of working that on both ends. They've also got the bigger guns kind of coming in to control things. They're just sort of hinting at it still, like they did with the first Iron Man movie. But we've got this Nick Fury character that keeps coming in, and now they've put the Scarlett Johansson character, which at the time I didn't read the comics.

I didn't know if she was going to be more of a villain or something like that, but she is a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent. So it's like you bring in all these S.H.I.E.L.D. characters that are actually sort of planning somewhere down the line to be pulling the strings on all the superheroes, too. It's just sort of getting into where we have that on both ends now. The villains and the heroes have that coming in. Yeah, and I think that adds an interesting thing.

If it's played right, an ensemble heroic cast allows for some tragedy. You know what I mean? Like, you can kill off a hero character if they're part of a team. And then the audience will be like, no! How is this possible?

And then the rest of the heroes can go about avenging that person, you know? It allows that license to a writer, although I doubt they'll take it with any of these particular characters in the franchise that they're building. But I think that that's kind of the fun part of heroic ensemble pieces is that you never know who's really going to make it to the end. On the heroic side. Yeah, it'll be hard for them to do in the movies because each lead actor is such a big star and they want to be able to keep making movies on their own if they're successful anyway.

So it would be hard to just off one of them unless they felt like they were done with that character or their contract was up or whatever. I have a theory. I have a theory that by the time the Avengers film is ready to be released, Robert Downey Jr. is going to be about done playing Iron Man. They already play a weird card in this one anyway, so I'll let that happen. But yeah, because I was wondering that too.

We were talking about that on our show a couple weeks ago. Tony Stark and Iron Man are such a big deal and so full of themselves and take charge that once you get into the Avengers, he's not really in charge of it. It's pretty much Captain America that takes the control of the whole thing. So how is it that they're going to be even able to have Iron Man, let alone have him be taking orders from somebody else you know it's like that that doesn't seem like it would work especially with with the robert downey jr version of tony stark. So and i'm coming more from the angle that he's not getting any younger yeah there's gonna come a point where iron man the franchise as great an actor and as much as he's brought to the character of Tony Stark, you've got War Machine, I understand, is in the second film.

The suit, they're going to start banking the suit as a star and milk that as long as they can because there's going to come a point where you're not going to buy a 60-year-old Robert Downey Jr., you know, as an action hero necessarily. I could be wrong. I mean, look at what Sly Stallone's doing. Yeah, really. You know, and he's totally still believable in those parts.

As much as he ever was. Yeah, well, no, I totally buy him. I'll tell you, I'm really looking forward to The Expendables. I was looking forward to it. I just don't know what to think of it now.

I really am curious. I still want to see it. but i'm just like it could go one of two ways yeah it could be awesome and really want be the throwback to the 80s that it wants to be or it could just be the biggest train wreck ever either way i kind of want to be there. For exactly that's the way i look at it too it's like i'm not going to be disappointed with that no matter what happens just because uh the concept alone it can't be if you go back and re-watch some of these 80s action flicks it can't be any cornier than they are I mean we hold them in reverence because of nostalgia but if you rewatch them a lot of times they're the corniest shit in the world except for the very first First Blood I.

Thought that's still that's a good yeah. Yeah but as far as you know where Marvel's going with everything it's gonna be interesting to see especially now that Disney owns them and Disney obviously they're the kings of marketing um and it's just gonna be interesting to see how much life they can get out of Iron Man I mean the films are already way more successful than the comic ever was. Yeah That's the thing. It's like I didn't really pay that much attention to Iron Man as a kid. I remember it.

It was out there. But yeah, I wasn't all that into him. And they've definitely pulled him up to almost an A-list superhero now where he really wasn't before. Yeah, he absolutely is an A-list superhero now. Yeah.

But it will be interesting, I guess, if they can pull off this superhero team. Because, at least on film, we've never really had that. We've never really had a successful team, you know, especially with crossover characters. I mean, they've done that in comics for years. Even, you know, TV, we all grew up on the Super Friends.

And we had a show that kind of did that. But as far as, you know, film, they really haven't had anything that's... most of it hasn't even attempted. To do that. So it's, it'll be interesting to see if I can pull it off. Well, the closest thing was the X-Men films were pretty good.

Um, I felt personally, I never had quite the level of enthusiasm that a lot of people I know did about those movies. Um, and I have yet to see X-Men three or Wolverine. Um, I've, I've seen three and it's much like everybody hates it. It's not the best movie ever. I avoided Wolverine too.

My issue with it is, take a movie like Ocean's Eleven. That's a great ensemble piece where you have these characters doing an extraordinary mission together. I think that superhero movies could take a cue from movies like that and movies like Inglourious Bastards where you have an ensemble of heroic characters doing something and it doesn't have to always be super heroic flashy special effects although i love that stuff but i'm thinking uh a heroic a super heroic movie could be more interesting if somebody broke it down on that level where each person had very specific things that were part of a mission you know what i mean where you could follow along and see how clever these characters were and that they didn't just have superpowers but you know blend the two.

They weren't always trying to one-up each other which is what it probably will be it's like in most situations you know well he's really the big hero he's got to come out and do this so if yeah it's like the oceans 11 they all kind of factor in and nobody really you know you know the bigger stars get a little more important roles in it but you know still they all sort of factor in and I think yeah it could definitely benefit from doing something like that. Yeah because the end game in these movies the superhero movies is always the big fight sequence and they're getting more to the point where I think they're tempted to throw every character they can into a huge super battle and where people are destroying their scenery left and right.

Which Iron Man 2 does not disappoint on, by the way. Yeah, so I assume that's something you grow to expect, but there is, I think, going to come a point where some fans are going to crave something that's a little more like kind of an intellectual ending, that has something where they've outwitted the villains more so than just out-clobbered them. Yeah. So I'm kind of curious to see if anybody... takes you know takes a story in that direction that will. Be interesting but yeah that's pretty much what i did this week did you have any uh geeky activities to go into.

The geekiest thing i did all week was um i downloaded this freeware called i think it's called comic book rack or comic rack already it is it's like itunes for your comic book call it your digital. Comics wow that is super geeky i. Highly recommend it and i barely ever read comics anymore i just had a few minutes on my hands and i was like i want to organize my digital comic book collection that was the geekiest thing i did all week. Do you read digital much versus you know the actual hard copies anymore. Let's put it this way um I can't afford the hard copies right now.

I know that, but I fall into that category too. Yeah, so I sometimes will read digital comics if they happen to fall into my lap, but I don't actively seek them out anymore because I just don't have time. What little I've dealt with them yet, I don't know. There's certain things I'm good with sitting in front of the computer and doing, and there's other ones I'm not. I'm usually not big on watching movies on the computer.

If there's any way for me to watch it on my TV... I'd much rather go sit and do that. It's kind of like that with reading, too. It's like as much as I don't really read in the real world anyway, I sit in front of the computer so much working on the show and stuff like that that when it comes down to doing anything else, like even reading a comic book, I almost would want to get away from the computer. Yeah, I agree with you on that.

A lot of people are moving to that as a medium. So it's definitely taken over. It's not the same. It's the closest thing. And this is something I was very excited about, the iPad coming out.

Although I don't want to shell out $ 400 for comic books. Because that's essentially the main reason I was interested in one. The idea of, especially I have the Marvel. Marvel has an app for the iPhone right now. You can download for free and they have some free content.

And it's very comfortable to read comics through the app. It's not like reading them on a laptop or sitting at a computer. You can read them in bed or on the bus or whatever. You kind of flip the whole thing sideways, don't you? Yeah.

It fits the page. Yeah. And it doesn't just fit the pages. It fits the panels to the screen so that you're not having to zoom in on things. You just tap and it naturally will flow with where the story, where the artist intended your eye to be anyway.

They put a lot of care into it. And that, you know, I think that's definitely going to kind of change the game for people with comics, you know, being, I think, more willing to buy a digital comic versus the paper one. Because it's much cheaper. You know, you can get an issue of just about any comic for $ 1 or $ 1. 99 versus paying $ 5 or $ 6 for one in a comic shop.

Yeah, they have gone up exponentially in the last several years. When I started collecting comics, they were $ 0. 75. Yeah i mean i've got old ones that were like 35 yeah you know i can't remember if i bought them new i might have actually so it's kind of scary to look at the prices now it is but yep that is pretty much it for my week so does that round out your geek week. Yeah that my geek week was pretty um pretty i was i can't say a geek week is over extreme or anything but it was pretty timid i mostly worked.

Well, yeah, that's what we've come to realize. We're all such big geeks that pretty much anything we do makes it a geek week. We just pick the geekiest thing. Alright, so with that, we will take a break and be back with this week's feature. Most of us will spend Memorial Day weekend with our families, watching parades, picnicking, golfing, just doing the things we enjoy.

To top off a perfect weekend, may we suggest you see our special holiday show. It's an exceptionally entertaining program. So try to relax and spend a few enjoyable hours with the family at this theater during the Memorial Day weekend. Venom in her veins and lust in her eyes. A woman of flesh becomes a venomous viper.

I've sucked the years out of your body. It was the only way I could be a human and a woman again. Plunging her fangs into warm flesh, she sucks the life from the bodies of men. As long as I'm alive, you'll feed off my venom and stay young. But I don't want to change.

Of course. If you want to escape from me, Only. A human lover could restore her human skin. You made love to another man? I had to.

To stay human. Only the cobra could satisfy her unearthly desires. Fanging a snake is like castrating a man. The most terrifying picture you will ever see. Night of the Cobra Woman.

From New World Pictures. In color, rated R. One minute left to top off the evening with a treat from our snack bar. Still time if you hurry. Last call for refreshments, folks.

Go right this second to get something good to eat and drink to enjoy now or during the rest of the show. Your mission, should you choose to accept it, is project permanent. And at those mere points of time where the confines of the waking world blend with the world of dreams. And so I captured this fancy where all that we see or seem is but a dream within a dream. From childhood's eye, I have not been as others were.

I have not seen as others saw. I had walled the monster. Up within half a tomb. It was many and many a year ago, in a kingdom by the sea, that a maiden there lived whom you may know by the name Annabel Lee. And this maiden, she lived with no other thought than to love and be.

Loved by. Me. That motley drama, I'll be sure it shall not be forgot, with its phantom chased forevermore by a crowd that sees it not. through a circle that ever returneth in to the self-same spot much of madness more of sin and horror the soul of the plot. Once Upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary, over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore. While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, as of someone gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.

To some visitor I muttered, tapping at my chamber door. Only this, nothing more. On the raven! Leave my loneliness unbroken. Put the bust above my door, take thy feet from out my heart, and take thy.

Form from off my door, quoth the raven. No more. And the raven, ever free, still. Is sitting, still is sitting on the pallet bust of the palace just above my chamber door. His eyes have all the.

Seeming, the demons. That he's dreaming. The lamplight toward him streaming floats. His shadow on the floor. And my soul, from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor, shall be lifted.

Nevermore. That's right, it is time to kick off our new project. One that I think I have entitled Project Poe. I had a friend who grew up in a Poe project. Well, I was deciding that, or we could just call ourselves Poe Folks.

Poe Folks? That sort of cheapens the whole process. I like the Poe Project. Oh, man. So, yes, Project Poe.

So, just trying to break down what it will be. It's just sort of a series that we're going to look at the influence of Edgar Allan Poe on cinema. And the more I thought about it, pop culture in general, he's been such an influential person just in the last couple hundred years that he's sort of worked its way into damn near everything, really, the more I thought about it. So just kind of, you know, we'll look at movies each time out, but I've realized how much, you know, there are other things that sort of tie in, so we can go into that as we go along as well. Great.

So this week's Poe feature is The Pitch and the Pendulum. The year is 1991. This would be the Stuart Gordon version. The plot synopsis, I'll give it like the last, or the first half of the IMDb version, which is, it is the time of the Spanish Inquisition. Maria does not like what is going on during the Auditor Fae.

When she speaks out, she is arrested and accused of being a witch. And we'll just leave it at that. See, that should teach her, you don't speak out during the Inquisition. That's right. Or Lance Hendrickson will punish you.

With his hair. Oh. Yeah. This movie. If this movie were any cornier, it would have been a field in Iowa.

Wow. Actually, the first time I saw this movie, I loved it. I watched it over and over again. This and the Waxworks movies. Oh, yeah.

Those three films, I watched them over and over again. And so did my friend Carl and I when we were in. I was 13. So this would have been. Actually, you know what?

I think I'd seen it before then. Anyways. By the time I was 13, this movie came out. And I thought it was one of the best, like, sword and sorcery adventure movies. And then I rewatched it this morning.

Yo, really? And I'm like, this is some corny stuff. Like, here's scenery, and here's every actor in the movie. I mean, like, everybody in the movie, except for the Inquisitor's, like, right-hand man, the one who had also been tortured. Mendoza?

Mendoza. I really... Before we get too far into it, I will throw a... Usually, if we even just start talking about a movie, we'll throw out a general spoiler alert. To me, I never understood talking about a movie if you're not going to fully talk about a movie.

I just like to put it up there in front. Hey, we're discussing Bit in the Bindle. We're going to go into everything that goes on in it and I'm sure ruin anything that, you know, had you not seen it. So if you want to watch it and not have everything ruined for you, you know, stop now and go watch the movie because... I think we both still had a lot of fun with it, so I'd say it's worth watching.

Absolutely worth it. Yeah, so. Okay, so now we can just attack it as we want. But yeah, that's actually one of the high points for me was Mendoza. That guy was really good.

Well, yeah, the thing is, these are good actors in this movie. overacting like it's not that they're bad actors it's just that everyone in the movie has been and you know i'm sure this was done for for comic effect at least i hope it was because stewart gordon has this habit of directing people to with an inch of their lives i think oh yeah you know like when his movies everything has to be delivered and almost like it he's like if case the sound doesn't record i want people to know what you mean you know in case this turns out to be a. Silent movie yeah that's what i was thinking it's like a silent movie acting it's like a stage play i want you delivering to the back of the house right and. Uh the best you know one scene that stands out in my mind in this film is uh our heroic character um what what is his name chris christopher christabel whatever.

Oh, which the husband? The baker, yeah. Yeah, the baker. What is his name? I guess it's neither here nor there.

But he has snuck into the Inquisition's fortress to rescue his falsely accused wife from the evil Inquisitor played by Lance Hendrickson. And he has him at knife point and sword point, surrounded by guards and And he's backing out of this chamber. And the entire time that Lance Henriksen is talking, he's emoting. His hands are all over the place. He's almost like a mime.

And it never registered with me when I was a kid and I saw this movie, how ridiculous some of this was. But his body language throughout this whole movie is so extreme. He really toned it down. If you see Lance Henriksen in any other movie... In anything he's done, he is much more toned down.

This is the most flamboyant role I think he's ever played. Fear God. Fear his wrath. There is one faith, one worship, one church, and all else is sin. And sin will be punished.

But at the same time, I was watching it thinking, this is kind of like the ultimate role for him. Because he's usually thrown into these roles, and it's like he kind of wants to do that. He wants to just be over the top and sort of take over the movie, and he never gets a chance to. Because half the time, he's either a side character, or it's such a low-budget movie that he really has nothing to do in it. There's very little... for him to do.

I just watched the other little crossover show. I watched him in Sasquatch. It's such a terrain wreck of a movie. that it's like he wants to be the star of it, but there's nothing to star in. This role in this movie is such an ordeal that he really has something to chew on in this one. He does.

He's an incredibly conflicted character in this movie. The key to this character is that he believes he is doing God's work, but he also believes that he himself is scum and that he's aroused by the character who they're, the wife of the baker. Maria. Maria, thank you. He's aroused by her and he's attracted to her and he thinks that this is her bewitching his manhood.

So big parts of his character are him hating himself but blaming it on everyone around him. And it's just a fucked up character, man. I mean, he is seriously twisted. But I see a lot of that almost sort of a reality. If there's any little reality in this movie, especially in the weird church scenario.

I mean, there is a lot of that sort of sexual frustration in these characters. Oh, absolutely. Even if they're not part of the church. Just these people that are very pious. Yes.

When they get into these situations and then they realize they're equally as animalistic as, you know, everyone else they look down on, then they have to judge themselves by that same measure. And then they feel like they need to be punished or even worse is then they take it out on the other people. So then you get somebody like, you know, Takamata who basically like, because she made him feel this, this like this lust for her, that he then has to punish her for it basically because she made him feel like you know, as common and lowly as the rest of this scum that he just beats the hell out of. Right. And it was all, this is all a product of them having to strip her of her clothes to look for marks of the devil.

Like, it's not. Like she did nothing to arouse this in him. Yeah. Other than be nude in front of him. And, you know, it also, the supporting cast are no less ridiculous in their performances.

No. Tom Toles is in this, and he is the chief guard, and he is hamming it up. He's a sleazy dirtbag in this. It's like an all-star B-movie cast. It really is.

When you get to him, and Jeffrey Combs, for God's sakes. Jeffrey Combs in the best costume of his career. See, that's the thing. Sometimes Jeffrey Combs is just really over the top and really just doesn't work. As much as everybody kind of likes him, he's sort of beloved in the genre movies.

But in this movie, I think... I mean, you give him this bad beetle wig and these giant glasses that make Harry Potter look cool. And he's almost unrecognizable at first. I knew he was in the movie, but I hadn't seen it in years. And this guy starts talking.

I'm like, who the hell is... Holy shit, that's Jeffrey Cullen! And the funny thing about his performance in this is... Due to everyone else's overacting, his performance, Jeffrey Combs, who is notoriously an overactor himself, looks sedate and measured. It's understated.

Yeah, everything is understated that he's doing compared to everything around him. And it provides a lot of comic relief because he is the ultimate bureaucrat in this movie. He plays by the rules. Torquemada happens to make the rules. It's not that he takes, he's the only character that's part of the inner circle of the Inquisition who does not take joy in what they're doing.

It's just his job. Damn. You idiots. Why did you tear out her tongue? We didn't.

We don't do tongues. Of course not. How can they confess if they don't have tongues? He must have done it. Wonderful.

What are you talking about? She's dead, and we didn't do it, huh? The next prisoner who dies, the one responsible, will be an enemy of the church and torture. Yeah! He killed them too!

And who's going to tell him? Gomez. Oh, no. Get rid of the corpse. I'll tell him.

And he's almost the only one who's not really completely afraid of Tokamata. Everyone else just cowers at anything he says or does, and he's still so busy kind of working the books. He's still making sure everything is done by the letter of how they run things around. He's a bitchy secretary. He is.

He's actually like Mr. Flanders from The Simpsons to Torquemada's Mr. Burns. Oh, but once again, I'm always a big fan of Mr. Burns, so no wonder I like Lance in this movie.

That's right. You could easily do a Simpsons treehouse of horror episode where you just put Montgomery Burns as the Inquisitor and Flanders as the secretary. That would be awesome, except there'd be like six people that would think it was funny because nobody. Knows this movie. It's true.

This movie's not well... It's not like a well-known movie. Although, you know, it is surprising. It is kind of, in some circles, considered like a cult classic. It's one of the better Full Moon movies, I think.

That's what I was going to say. To me, I watched a lot of Full Moon movies growing up. And they were. Little better than some of the other straight to video crap not all of them some of them were really bad but even of all the better stuff that they put out this is possibly the best looking production they ever did yeah. It looks good yeah the set pieces are really well done i mean it looks like it has a lot in common with uh the look of the film takes a lot i think from the princess bride And I think maybe Stuart Gordon had intended this to be kind of that type of film where it was kind of a comical film to a certain extent, but at the same time left a lot of horrific elements in it.

But especially when it comes to Esmeralda, who is the cellmate to Maria, she's a staple of actually of all films. This actress is currently on The Middle, which is a TV series I think on Fox. And she'll be 100 in a couple of years. She's like 90. Oh, my God.

I knew she looked as old then, and this was in 91. Right, yeah. She was in In the Mouth of Madness. She played the innkeeper. And she's been in a number of other movies.

She's been in tons of... Actually, she's a witch sitting in a dungeon, basically. And I still kept asking for her to talk about a marble rye. Yeah. Yeah, she's this very Jewish character, which is really funny.

She's very New York Jew, which is... I feel like it's reminiscent of the Billy Crystal and Carol Kane characters from Princess Bride. That's kind of what I was... Thinking about it, I was like, I wonder if this was his answer to that. Like, if he had been influenced in any way by that film.

Probably. She's great comic relief. Definitely. And, you know, as always, it's funny when an old lady starts cussing. Of course.

She's just cursing up a storm throughout the whole thing. Even more so than that, there's this great kind of almost Mel Brooks-ian moment when they're taking her. Okay, at this point in the story, Torquemada has become so overcome by that he has basically raped Maria, and then he cut her tongue out so that she can't blab. She dies in her cell, quote-unquote dies in her cell, because Esmeralda has cast a spell on her to make it look like she's dead, so they'll take her out of the castle and she can escape. Which, again, is very Princess Bride-like.

Very Princess Bride. Yeah. Well, at this point, they use Esmeralda as a scapegoat, and they're carting her off to have her burned at the stake and And she's just shoveling big handfuls of gunpowder into her mouth. That part is hilarious. That's my favorite scene in the movie.

This whole sequence is. So that she can explode when they burn her. But there's a line delivered that's great. This is what I was talking about. The kind of Mel's Brook style dialogue exchange between her and Jeffrey Combs.

Where Jeffrey Combs' character says, I'm sorry we couldn't get you to confess. We just didn't have time to torture you enough. And she says thanks anyway. That was awesome. It was like History of the World Part 1 or something.

Well, I mean, since we're on that, I mean, I couldn't help doing the lines. I mean, in the middle of it, as soon as they brought up the Art of the Fae, I'm like, what's the Art of the Fae? It's what you ought to not do, but you do anyway. That's right. Inquisition.

What a show. It was so, yeah, so close. Well, every time they would talk to Lance Hendrickson's character, I was still yelling out, you can't talk about anything! I love that. The movie is...

That's one of the issues that I didn't see until... I didn't recognize this as a problem until I was an adult and I'd seen a lot of other movies. It doesn't know if it wants to be a fantasy adventure movie, a comedy, a horror movie. And it teeters around... And it's not that it, it doesn't manage really necessary to blow. those styles together, but it kind of just cobbles all those styles together.

Yeah. But still makes for a very fun movie to watch, especially with friends. So I was going to say in a way, in a way that's very entertaining, it sort of pieces them all together. So it, But yeah, I mean, they probably, I mean, I guess at the time we watched it. But I'm sure they had trouble sort of presenting it to people because I think they build it very much as a horror movie.

It's marketed, you know, it's got a great cover on the old VHS. I mean, it was very much a horror movie in that way. But then you get into it and it's funny because it kind of is set up like a period piece. And it could have very well been, you know, had it been given to a different director, you know, given to a different studio. It could have been a very stuffy period piece kind of movie.

It really could have gotten into the procedures and the process that goes on in the Inquisition. And it kind of does a little bit, but it's so cheesy the way this one does. So as it unfolds, given to these people, it doesn't feel like that kind of movie at all. It feels... sort of cheesy. It ends up feeling like you took a stuffy little period piece and then ran it through a grindhouse projector.

Because in the end, it gets all those, you know, it gets gore and it gets all these horror elements and it gets the cheesy dialogue that sort of makes it fun on all those levels. It's almost kind of like you took a period piece and you gave it to a bunch of vaudevillian actors. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. But again, it could play that way.

I mean, I could see people just flip into it for a minute and And getting to one of the parts that's not so ridiculous and being like, the hell is this? And then just keep on going because there's times when it plays pretty straight. And I think that's the other thing that's really different about this movie is for all the ridiculous things that kind of go on in it, for all the comedic moments that they sort of throw in. takes itself very seriously like you know as much as they're overacting there's not really any winks to the camera short of the the little joke there that don't worry about it you know the torturing you. There was one more but there was the one where the guy makes eye contact with the camera and uh you know what i'm talking about with the guy who whose job it is to cart the dead out of the building that.

Guy well i mean that guy's he's sort of winking at the camera the whole time to the point that it's over the top like he doesn't even need to be i think that's just that because i've seen him in a lot of stuff too and i think that's just his style is very hey look at me look what i'm doing you know. It's but it's kind of it's a great it's another moment of comic relief and another kind of thing where when he's trying to bribe him to get into the castle He's. Like, get inside. That's a new one. And then he's like, I don't know.

I could lose my job. You know, like, what? You lose your job. You're part of the Spanish Inquisition. And it's like those scenes are so just ridiculous.

And that's where the tone just shifts dramatically between scenes like that and scenes where Torquemada is being flogged. That's a heavy scene. Right, and that scene is taken extremely seriously. There's no comedic value to it whatsoever, and it almost feels like they're from two different movies. Yeah, definitely.

It's a weird mixture of stuff that's kind of thrown into this movie. It's strange. It's a salad, a movie salad. It is definitely worth checking out, I think. I think everybody should see it.

Yeah, there's just so much... kind of going on but again it's like they there's so much going on at once that they don't really focus on hardly any one thing there's just these weird and we went into them with the with the Takamata at the beginning but there's just in general there's these very specific sexual overtones and especially that opening scene which first of all let's talk about how silly that opening. Scene is where they go to flog the dead man. They flog a skeleton yeah They give him 20 lashes to the point of completely beating them, shattering them, and he's just a pile on the floor when they're done. But again, they do it completely seriously. They're just like...

And everyone's aghast that, oh my god, they were beating a living human at that point. They're just, oh! But then there is. I do think that... they knew that scene was funny when they filmed it for a couple of reasons. I mean, one, the body begins to swing around the crowd, and they're all ducking so it doesn't hit them, and going, whoa!

And then the one guy's just laughing his ass off. This, again, is the guy who carts the dead away. Yep. And it's just so silly. That's the part.

Again, I had not watched this probably since, you know, one of the first couple of times I watched it on video years ago. So that I came into it again and was like, oh, shit, I forgot all about the level of this movie, the way that it operates. And yeah, that scene is sort of completely over the top. But but yeah, it is funny that then in the middle of that, they keep cutting to these people. And half of them are shocked and appalled by the beading.

But then there's these other half of them that they go to that they're kind of turned on by it. Oh, yeah. The fops and the dandies. Yeah. The ones that are all wearing...

It's guys wearing tons of white makeup and lipstick. What is up with that? They almost all have unibrows, too. Did you notice that? Well, that's the style.

Yeah. The unibrow with the powdered white cake makeup. Yeah. It was just like... They were just like the most bizarre little thing to throw in there just so you know how salacious some of these people can be.

And, you know, something else like we were talking about the serious bent that's here is there's a pastiche going on here of at least three stories that I know from Edgar Allan Poe. And that's, you know, obviously The Pit and the Pendulum. uh, the cask of Amontillado and the live burial, they're all kind of referenced a little bit in the film. It's, it's funny. I had all of that written down. I was like, as it went along, I was like, okay, now he's walling up the Cardinal, like in the cask.

And then she wakes up in the coffin, like premature burial. So it's, yeah, it's, it's kind of funny that they, they sort of roll. And again, why I sort of wanted to go into all these different poem movies, because he hits on so many specific kind of frightening things these like inborn things and people that you know this this being you know walled up alive being buried alive there's sort of these things that are just we're innately afraid of and and he sort of taps into them all so they sort of roll several of them up into this one movie. Now was there any did you catch any other references besides those three Because I didn't. I didn't know if there was anything I missed.

Those were the ones I specifically noted. So, yeah, there might have been other little ones. But, again, there's so much going on. The Amontillado scene is pretty funny. I mean, if you're a fan of Edgar Allan Poe and you've seen this movie, there are certain scenes that you see coming because you know they want to shoehorn something in there.

Well, the Cardinal, played by Oliver Reed, shows up because, according to his character, you should... Was it love your fellow man, not roast them? Not roast them. So he's come from the Pope to deliver this decree that the Inquisition must stop and that Torquemada must come back to Rome to report to the Pope and explain what he's done. And the whole time he's being liquored up by Torquemada with Amontillado.

Yeah. You know, so you know, you're like, well, he's getting walled up. Yeah, here it comes. So, yeah, that was kind of funny. And it is kind of a big deal that they got Oliver Reed.

I'm still not sure who, you know, who they, what deal they had or what blackmail material they had on Oliver Reed. You know, Oliver Reed just wanted to do a ridiculous Italian accent. I guess so. He does almost a bippity boppity boopity beepity. Yeah, he kind of does.

This was sort of the end of his career, but at the same time, he was kind of an A-lister back in the day. He was, yeah. It's a big deal for them to have him in this movie. Granted, it's a very small part, but still. If you look at his pedigree, he's had some lapses in judgment over the years where he's appeared in some B-fantasy movies and sci-fi movies, usually playing some sort of villain or another.

In this movie, though, he has the most... amazing amount of upper lip sweat i've ever seen on an actor like he's clearly uncomfortable. That's acting right there yeah. He acted really hard but uh yeah he he delivered a good performance i mean certain actors can again but he was also you know really pushing it like as far as chewing up the scenery um just because you know you can't you'll disappear in this movie unless you do that you know you'll you'll fade into the background with the bricks and the walls. No matter how terrible the torture, people get used to it. In time, it loses its terror.

I must invent. New and more terrible tortures to strike fear into the heart of sinners. To save their souls. No. No i will tell the pope everything you want i will tell him that you acquiesce he.

Will never know. Of the one that i guess plays it the most straight and never really kind of goes i was just uh what what were your thoughts on on maria herself. I thought maria did a really good job um considering that actress had only been in one other film besides this uh she just, I don't know, she was very convincing. When she was supposed to be tormented and upset, she seemed tormented. When she was nude, she was clearly nude.

Oh yeah she was really really nude they make yeah they make full use of the fact that she was willing to get naked several. Times yeah they do and. I mean she is beautiful so i mean they make use of it rightly so instead of getting really scary people in there so at least they made a good call well yeah. She's nice to look at she's nice to look at but um i think stewart gordon's middle name should be bush stewart bush gordon. He does like that doesn't.

He yeah i haven't seen a movie of his yet where somebody doesn't a female character doesn't get uh completely and totally full frontal nudity on us you know what i mean i can't think of one personally oh man but uh i haven't seen stuck yet i don't know i don't know i'm just assuming some naked woman walks across the screen for no reason probably but i mean it is integral to the story that the character's nude. So I'm not going to say that it was necessarily gratuitous, but, um, you know, because without her being nude and being examined one, it's, it's incredibly degrading to the character and the character is supposed to be degraded as part of this torture. And, um, and two, it's the thing that sends Torquemada over the edge.

So I can see why, you know, that has to be in there, but I have no, there's Gordon has a proclivity for prestigious men who are closet perverts like i mean like think of the doctor in um reanimator who was obsessed with the professor's daughter and the situation you know there uh it's real reminiscent of that i think that that's a recurring theme in his work and um and i don't know where that's coming from you know i don't know a whole lot about stuart gordon but i'd be interested to know what the source all that is why he feels compelled to put that in his movies Well. It definitely takes that road with her character every step of the way, really. It's like, even in the beginning, and they sort of use it to their advantage, it's like, once again, we're presented with, you know, the credits, and we're looking at everything as though it's this, like, you know, old period piece, and then the first time we meet our lead character, this guy grabs her boobs.

That's true, she is being objectified from the get-go. Yeah, right off the bat. So it's like, so right off you know from there you're already like okay we're moving into this salacious area and he's gonna throw this at you and everything's gonna be sort of you know used just for the exploitation kind of you know from that angle but it's funny that within that scene it almost changes and it's like it's not really as shocking as you know you assume it's just some latch and he comes in and he's gonna you know grab on her and then we find out it's her husband and She's equally as into it as he is, if. Not more so. Yeah, and it's an interesting way for them to kind of set up their situation, that they're very passionate and they're newlyweds, you can tell.

But they're also poor because he's very concerned about the bread burning. You know what I mean? Those are things that you can tell there's some skill that, despite how ridiculous most of this movie is, some skill went into it in the storytelling. There is a good story here. It's a classic type of story. um that is told properly i mean like it's not like they veers too far off of the damsel in distress storyline they don't force it to be something it isn't um you know so it hits on all those notes like the villain is a is really a despicable villain you feel for the heroic character even even now you know watching it what is the movie's 19 years old now that's hard to believe but um But watching the movie now, you still kind of pull for your heroic character.

You laugh at your comic relief characters. Things work in this movie. It's not one of those situations where it's so bad that it's good. It's a silly movie that happens. It's funny, but I do think that it's funny where it was meant to be funny.

And there are things about it that do play as very silly just because of the age of the movie, I guess, and what they were working with. I think it's just the way that they put it together, really. I think, yeah, they were... Well, it sort of becomes their running theme in this, is the fact that it changes gears so much. It presents it like the scene with them in the beginning.

It presents it as one thing, and then it quickly becomes something else. And the whole movie seems like that. It's like you get into all these situations, and you think this character's doing this, or they're like this, and it sort of does this 180 as it goes along, and you find out... more about them or it enters into some other ridiculous scenario but it seems like it does a lot of that where it presents it as you know much like you know it presents it as a period piece and then all of a sudden it becomes this like exploitation movie you know and it just goes back and forth from one to the other on all these different notes. Yeah and i think it in a lot of respects this was kind of like um in addition to being obviously a love letter to edgar allen poe i think this was kind of a love letter to some of the later hammer films That were put out, you know, like where, you know what I mean?

Like it's kind of in that style with the way the nudity is handled and the characters, the costuming, the set pieces and all this stuff. It's very much like kind of a child of the 80s interpreting Late Hammer. You know what I mean? It's just kind of trashy. But at the same time, it has that period piece look.

Yeah, because The Lighter Hammer did that. It was like they started off as being sort of stuffy British movies, and then as they went on, they became more exploitation kind of movies. So it does fall into that category. Yeah, it's something that I think, I mean, I wouldn't say it's a classic, but I would say that it's definitely a cult film that if you haven't seen it, I would say it's a must-see for anybody who is a, definitely anybody who is a Stuart Gordon fan. If you haven't already seen it, I think it's one of his better movies.

Yeah, it's kind of hit and miss what I've seen of his. I need to go back and watch some more of his. But yeah, I think it's, again, pretty well done. I mean, there's some basic shots that were kind of impressive coming from, you know, in this movie. There's a few shots here and there.

There's like that cool shot of Lance kind of walking down that little corridor to go to the window. that you just kind of, it's barely lit, and you just kind of get that shot of his face. And there's a few times where he throws in some really creative shots that, you know, again, you wouldn't expect in this level of filmmaking. You know, it's funny you should say it. There was a moment this morning, I was watching this early this morning, and Amy was, my wife Amy was getting ready for work, and she came into the living room where I was watching and said, this is lit weird. I'm like, what do you mean?

She goes, it's lit too brightly, this whole movie, everything, it looks like a set. I'm like, well, it is a set is what I was thinking. Clearly, I don't think they filmed in a real castle or anything. Some of it, maybe. They actually did film in Italy.

So I think all those exterior stuff was actually done there. I don't know. The inside did kind of look like a set. So maybe the rest of it was all soundstage. Yeah, no telling.

But I mean, she was right to a certain extent. Because if somebody made a movie like this now that took place in a tortured dungeon, most of what you see would be obscured in shadow. They would all be dark and be shot through a crazy filter. And yeah, you wouldn't be able to tell what was going on more than likely. So I'll, I'll give her that.

It is pretty, with the exception of the one or two shots there, it is pretty bright and shiny. For the most part, it is bright. I mean, like, and it's one of those things where like they're putting people in the iron maiden, you're going to see them. There's a closeup of somebody being closed up in the iron maiden, you know, when they're, if nothing is left to the background, um, For the most part. There's a couple of choreographed scenes that are interesting when the witch, the first witch is being flogged.

Or I'm sorry, no, she's being burned. And her son is being flogged in the foreground and she's in the background. Yeah. Like that was a really, that shot impressed me. You know what I mean?

I was like, that's really an interesting way to put that shot together. You know, so it just like, there were strokes of, of class and style throughout. But yeah, there was just also parts where it just felt like they put up a dungeon set and said, torture people. That's what I'm saying. It's so back and forth.

It's like, there's moments. There's another one. That's like a really good shot of when, uh, Tokamata walks up to Maria and he's standing there and it's sort of this overhead shot almost of him. Like she's in the melt down below him and he's looking down on her. And it does really work with that perspective and, and, you know, you know, how the character looks at her and what she, you know, it really is kind of a cool artistic shot thrown in the middle of the rest of this exploitation.

You know, it's, there's some fun things that also they do when, uh, the heroic Baker is, he's tied down and waiting on the pendulum to cut him in half. And these rats have all come out of the woodwork. Uh, I assume at the behest of a spell from his, his wife, who's laying in a coffin, uh, they've come to chew his ropes, uh, Yeah, free him. Well, there's like this point where he is, they do manage to create some tension where he is like hanging over this, the pit opens underneath him. That's the part I was thinking of.

Yeah. You know, like, and there's a point where he's hoisting himself out, up and out of it. And it's, they do the trick where the thing is closed and possibly so tight that there's no way he would make it out. Right. And then they cut back and it's open a little more and then it's closed a little more.

Like, you know what I mean? To create that tension, to force, you know, force you to believe that, He's not going to make it. you know like but they did that and it kind of it still kind of plays like i cringed a little still knowing. That was the part that was actually kind of tense like the pendulum itself is cool but it's like it's such a slow paced part of that scene that you just you kind of see it coming and it goes on with the stuff with the rats but when he falls into the pit and he's sort of hanging there And then you realize what opened up the door there is also like big blades. Right. And the blades are cutting the rope as it starts to close.

And the dogs with bees in their mouths. Yeah. It's like there's so many things. And then fire shoots up from the set that I don't know what the hell that is. Yeah, that part was just like that's when it went over the top.

I was actually going to say like when they flip the lever that turns the flames on, it'll come out of the floor. That was really funny. For no reason other than it looks cool. It's like, what purpose would that serve in that situation? He's tied down.

What the hell is that? Yeah, exactly. It's like, you have the pit. You have the pendulum. You don't need the flames.

The flames are superfluous. Your contractor screwed you, Torquemada. He put in flames you didn't need. Well, he sold them on the whole package. He's like, you know what, Mr.

Torquemada? What we can do is put some flamethrowers in here. He's like, Pit and pendulum sounds nice, but pit, pendulum, and flames sounds better. Chicks dig the flames, let me tell you. That's right.

You're trying to pick up the girls, let me tell you. You like motorcycle chicks? They're going to want them flames. They love the flames. So, yeah, as silly as that part is, like, yeah, the moment right before that when he's in the pit, you know, hanging there is actually kind of a tense moment.

It is. Yeah, I think they nailed the tension in that one. You know. That's pretty much, as far as I go, that's about all I have to say about Pit and the Pendulum. I don't know about you, Brian.

Do you have any closing thoughts on that? I guess just, I mean, we're probably not going to go too detailed into the stories themselves because, again, you know, we're dealing more with the movie end of it. And I've always, you know, some people like to bitch about whether a movie's better than a book. And to me, they're very different things. Especially in this case.

Yeah, and that's what I was going to say. It's like we can at least know, you know, and that's what I think we're going to find in, you know, doing more of these movies is very few of them stick close to the stories themselves. I think Poe had such cool ideas, but it's like nobody wanted to do the, you know, the straight script. Everybody took the cool idea of what was in his story. And then just kind of play with it and do whatever the hell they want.

And this definitely falls into that. I mean, what little I remember of the story or what I've checked into it, a lot of the story itself in what he wrote is just this character being, you know, in the pit. That is all it is. It's all the tension of him laying there tied up, watching the pendulum. And it's all kind of like internal monologue, I think.

Right. You don't get all of this, you know, this backstory on the Inquisition. I mean, that is where it's set. That is why he ends up there. But we don't have all this crazy, you know, first 79% of the story, you know, that all we, you know, it actually takes most of the movie before we get to what is the story that Poe wrote.

So just to kind of, you know, note as we go along what, you know, how far it strays from the original storyline. This one strays pretty far from it as most of these movies probably will. Yeah, that's for sure. I can't think of a single Edgar Allen Poe-inspired movie that follows the story closely at all. The only ones that come close are The Black Cat, because it's got such a basic story.

Are you talking about the Masters of Horror episode? Just any of them i mean most of the ones and a lot of things kind of rip off the black cat anyway even if it's not a straight black cat treatment there's a lot of stories that have sort of stolen that gimmick at the end of it he. Borrowed it from himself i mean i mean you look at the raven the raven and the black cat are almost the same type of tale pretty much but i'm sure we'll probably get to that when we do are we gonna do that. Multiple versions somewhere down the line because they've done that one but that's the closest one and maybe that's because it's such a a more basic structured story it is something that's easier to follow whereas trying to film the pit in the pendulum the way that it's written would be very hard to do you know it's it's possible but it's something that's not marketable well.

Yeah it would be a scene it wouldn't be so much a film but maybe a short. A short film I could see them doing, but even then it's going to be, it then becomes more of an art house thing. It's going to be all like, you know, just nothing but monologue in your head. And it's going to be like shots of darkness, you know, most of it, you can't see what's going on. So there'll just be like darkness with a swinging pendulum above you.

So it's, yeah, it's, it's not something that's easy to translate into a movie and it's, written form so yeah there's reason that they stray from it a lot of times but yeah this one strays pretty far from the original. Text yeah definitely otherwise. I guess the only other thing I wanted to mention is you have to like this movie because you have to like any movie that has a credit at the end that's listed as Rat Wrangler that was one of my favorite things. Was it the Rat King? Oh well maybe did he have like seven heads?

That's a good question I don't know rat wrangler. That's something you aspire to be in Hollywood. I think maybe you were a rat wrangler before you got to Hollywood, if you're a rat wrangler. I think you have to have passion for rat wrangling outside of films. Is there a license involved, I guess, to be a professional rat wrangler?

I'm sure there probably is. Could you imagine if you're the guy who licenses rat wranglers, that you have rat wrangled so long that you know what What good rat wrangling is and whether you should be licensed or not. You stand there with a clipboard and watch them wrangle rats and go, oh, that's a good move. All right. Or that was terrible.

You traumatized that rat. Avoiding your license. Avoiding your rat wrangling license. You have failed, sir. Back to mouse wrangling.

Damn it. There's no market for mouse wrangling. Nope. Can't hang with the big boys anymore. Oh, wow.

So, yeah, on the Wrangler note, I guess we will take a break and come back with the rest of the show. Thank you. Welcome to a night of total terror. That's Mickey Mouse's penis. They don't look to be afraid.

They look to be shocked. Here's vagina. Did you see Miley Cyrus' globulous breasts? Night of the living podcast. I found more syrup on my pants.

There's our adventure in fear. There was, however, a guy using. An experience in shock. More shattering than your strangest nightmare. Pain and pleasure.

Night of the Living Podcast. Ass to mouth is fantastic. Holy shit! That just happened. What's that bad man doing to my donkey?

A night of total terror. I can't maintain this level of ridiculousness. They made a song. Night of the Living Podcast. Of The Living Podcast.

My mom wants to do shit! Hello, creeps. It's me, the Crypt Keeper. And you're listening to Movie Meltdown, the greatest movie geek show on Earth. . . It's part of your problem, you know.

You haven't seen enough movies. All of life's riddles are. Answered in the movies. And now, on with the show. The End.

All right, we are back. And I did want to go into an extra little development here. We're actually kicking off this segment with a contest. Contest? Contest.

I have procured a few copies of the new printing of Roman Durgis' Lenore book. So you see the cheesy tie-in there. Uh-huh. Lenore book, you know. Lenore.

If you're a geek, you're probably familiar with her, but if not, you know, she's, she's named after the Poe poem and she's a 10 year old girl who's undead and lives in a mansion with an assortment of creepy friends. So it sounds like a lot of fun. It's pretty cool. Anyway, the artwork is, is very cool. And, and you know, it sort of coming up on a, you know, they're, they're doing a re-release of this and this is actually like a hardback remastered, recolored version.

So it's, it's kind of a nice version of it too, but it's, It's definitely got a cool gothy feel to it. Most of the kids who are into that sort of thing will probably be well familiar with her and already have a backpack with her picture on it or something. But they may not have the book. They may not have the book and definitely not this version of it. it i think this is the first time they put it out in this this hardback remastered format so it's yeah it's actually pretty awesome so uh i was trying to think of a good way to to throw it out there and um you know trivia at this point unless you're sitting there in front of the person it's kind of pointless because it's just you know Who can go to Google first?

Right. It's pointless to throw trivia out there. So I thought maybe just to have people interact with us, it would be kind of cool. Edgar Allan Poe, as we've said, is very influential. And a lot of people have been very interested in his work and probably have taken his work to heart in some way.

So I'd kind of like to find out. just stories from people if you know there's some sort of way and maybe it's not maybe you don't feel he's changed your life in some massive way but maybe just memories of you know of edgar allen poe's kind of stuff i know when i was a kid uh we had like a paperback version of his stories and uh number one i was obsessed with the cover the cover was this awesome painted shot that was sort of a mixture of the the casket of montalado uh it's got him sort of it's the version of the brick wall, but it has sort of a painting of the guy's face in the brick. And then on top of that is a cat, the black cat peeking out over top of the broken wall. It was this awesome artwork that I became sort of obsessed with as a child.

And part of the reason I think I got so into Poe, you know, his stories and the whole sort of thing that he creates, he has a very, you know, general mood that he brings to all his stuff. And I think, That's part of what I got so interested in. But at the same time, to finish out that story, I also remember, and this probably gets my mother in trouble for possibly child abuse, I remember her reading the stories to me as a kid. And I was still pretty young listening to Dr. Tarr and Professor Feather as the insane guy walks around with a knife thinking he's like cheese and asking people if they want a slice of him.

So I remember being sort of scarred as a child by this, and it may explain to a lot of our listeners why I'm so messed up now. It all becomes clear now. Yes, doesn't it though? So it may just be some simple stuff like that, or maybe you really did have some sort of, you know, maybe you really clicked with his work over the years. So I'd actually like to just hear people's thoughts on that, and I think we'll just pick our favorite ones, or if we get a whole lot of them, we can draw stuff out or whatever, but We'll come out with the best way to find the winners and just distribute out the books to the winners.

Nice. That sounds like a great prize and a cool contest. I got to say, you know, for me growing up, Edgar Allan Poe, I always associated with Halloween because in school we were allowed to read, you know, our assignments were usually Edgar Allan Poe related around Halloween time. That's what the, you know, the school board was okay with us reading that. It wasn't too bad, you know.

And the teacher's always kind of got a kick out of having the kids read The Raven in front of the class, that sort of thing. I think it's just that it's old. Yeah, exactly. Once it's old, it's safe. They feel like it's safe, yeah.

If you wrote the same thing now, people would probably be appalled by it. But, you know, it's old. That means it's okay for kids. That's right. If you wrote the same stuff now, he might be with My Chemical Romance.

There you go. But, no, that was something for me. I've always associated him with Halloween. the holiday of Halloween. And, and as a child, I always had a lot of fun with that. So I still do, but, um, that's, I think that's why I still like him.

I mean, I moved in also, I probably never would have read HP Lovecraft had I not, you know, had a springboard from, you know, from Poe to Lovecraft. Yeah. I mean, he is definitely a gateway drug in the literary terms, you know, the literary world. He definitely falls into that where, you know, that's probably the first thing you're exposed to in sort of the, the, dark horror kind of writing so you know it's it's the one that you'll run into in school and then you'll probably you know take that on your own if if you get into that thing which you know a lot of kids kind of definitely in the last you know 15 20 years the darker gothier children have sort of come into their own and. It's true yeah it's much more of a mainstream phenomenon now than it used to be.

Yeah, you were a total freak if you were into them before that, where now you're just like that kid. It's just a category in school now. Oh, you're one of those kids. That's right. You're not the kid in the class.

You're one of the kids in the class now, which is a comfort, and you should not feel bad about that. It's kind of cool because, yeah, I don't think I had that group. No, a lot of us didn't. You know, we pick on our show a lot of times. We'll pick on the goth kids and everything.

But to be quite honest, had that been a phenomenon when we were in school, we probably would have all subscribed to it in some respect or another. Probably. Or at least, and that's the thing, I make fun of them. And I totally make fun of Hot Topic kids all the time. But at the same time, it's like, I like stuff that's there.

You know, I like the same stuff that they're into. It's just, they take the... presentation of it a little too far sometimes but i definitely we're old now brian well but even but even then i never did it even as a kid i was never taking it that far i just liked what i liked and went on about my you know business and was a weirdo when people found out what i liked it but i didn't you know necessarily put on the eyeliner and you know that's right do the cure hair you know it. Wasn't safe for us when we were young to put on eyeliner yeah you would have gotten your ass that's right your physical harm was a surety if you put on eyeliner In any school I went to growing up. But I'm just saying, you know, it turns out that there are a lot of people out there.

Horror fandom has become part of the mainstream. It's kind of an accepted passion now, I think, more so than it used to be. There's still people that kind of turn their nose up to it. But, like, I think that there's, this is, you know, I don't know how we, somehow we got on this topic. But, like, the whole Edgar Allan Poe being the gateway, I guess, was the thing.

And how a lot of us relate Poe with school. Because it was the first acceptable thing from the genre. It was sanctioned horror for us. It is. And I think it's also, it works on both levels.

It's okayed by the administration, if you will. So they let you read it. But at the same time, his stuff is so deep-seated within us. It really does tap into so many things that then got used in every other form of literature and then worked its way into film and music and everything else that it There is something essential about it that's kind of cool and works on that. If you're the kind of person that gets into stuff that's dark and creepy, it hits you on a level that I don't think many other things will.

Yeah, that's true. So obviously, we, with little effort, came up with several stories in this area. So I'm sure other people out there have them. So just wanted to throw that out there and see if anybody else has some good stories. And we will reward you if you do.

Yeah. You can call and leave a message with your story if it's a short story because it'll cut you off after a couple of minutes. But yeah, you can call and leave a message. The number is 502-365-5565. Or if you want a little more time, most people have mics built into their computer now.

So you can actually record your story as a WAV file or an MP3 and attach it to an email. Or you can just do the standard old school email style. Send us an email at geeksatmoviemeltdown.com. Otherwise, if you wanted to see that Lenore book, the one we're giving away, it's actually at titanbooks.com. It's T-I-T-A-N, Titan Books.

And you can find more about it there. But if you'd like to win one of your own, hey, just enter the contest. Don't be shy. Just let your feelings roll on by. Don't be shy.

We'd like to hear from you. So give us a call at 502-365-5565. Or you can email us at geeksatmoviemeltdown.com. And just stop by the website for our frequent updates. That's moviemeltdown.com.

And while you're there, click on the forums link and go to our message boards at Pop Syndicate. Or go to popsyndicate.com and go to the forum sections and look for Movie Meltdown. On by, on by, on by, on by. All right um let's see anything else you wanted to pass on to people this week freddie um. Not much uh if if you're not a listener of our show notlp.com uh we're going to be doing uh an episode on spider baby this coming sunday awesome so that's a fun movie and we'll also be talking about uh the film carnie which is a new straight to video release with blue diamond phillips so.

We've actually planned a version of Spider-Baby for like a year or so now. And I was trying to work in. I was doing a thing with Sid Haig trying to discuss it. And I think part of that interview got lost at this point. It may be.

Yeah, it may be. I've still got some other segment. But I think the Spider-Baby part may be just a loss to the ages at this point. He's great in that film, by the way. Yeah, he's amazing.

So it's really cool. But. But yeah, just to round out here, I did, as I said, you know, Poe sort of crosses into all these different genres. I mean, he definitely has worked his way into all different forms of literature and tons of movies, but it's amazing how much music he's worked his way into too. So I thought, you know, with each episode of this that we do, we'd also, I just rounded out with a specific Poe related song as well.

And there's a lot of bad new metal with, you know, Poe titles, but it's just a whole lot of screaming. So I'm not sure how much of that I'm going to work in. Maybe just because I'm also, one more reason I'm old and that stuff kind of gets on my nerves now. I'm fine with old school cool metal but you know a new metal that's just nothing but screaming gets on my nerves but that's just me maybe we'll throw some in to appease people if they really want it but um i do kind of want i mean there's a lot of interesting versions of it out there and a I kind of want to find different ones and throw them in there and just kind of come up with a good conglomeration of Poe-related music. That having been said, are you familiar with Nightwish?

Nightwish? No. Nightwish. Is that like Nightwish I'd Stop Wetting the Bed? I don't know.

Are you coming clean on something now? No, I stopped years ago. Oh, okay. But no, Nightwish, it's a band. They're a band, all right.

Nightwish. They're actually, well, they refer to themselves as a metal band. Again, it's a very loose term these days. They're from Finland, I believe. Oh, that explains the name.

No, no surprise. But yeah, as I was going through, they've got a song called The Poet and the Pendulum. And it's actually, it obviously is inspired by and specifically relates to Poe. But as I listened to it, I also realized it very much fits our choice of movies today because it doesn't know what it wants to be. It changes mood.

It changes direction. it changes type of music several times within this one song. Does it change its sheets night wish oh. I don't know about that i think we all might need to after we listen but yeah yeah it's it's a very lengthy song i'll tell you now it's in true metal you know opus form it goes on for a very long time so prepare yourself if you're on if you're down with it but um yeah, I just thought it would be interesting to throw in. Cause I, I, what they do is, is, and again, it, it also, it fits today's movie because they take themselves very seriously. I wish, I wish.

Cause they've got this, they, they've got, you know, like heavy metal guitars thrown in, but at the same time, they've almost got this like gothy pop chick doing vocals at some point. And then sometimes it's like a doodle switch out and do vocals. So it, It changes gears very quickly on a dime sometimes. So yeah, it's an interesting mixture. So I thought it'd be fun to throw in in this first session here.

And they won't all be quite so ridiculous, I'm assuming, as we go on. If it turns out that I really like them and my life changes and I start following them around the country, I'll blame you, Brian. You'll thank me. I mean, thank you, yes. For Nightwish.

Nightwish! So, yes, we'll go out with Nightwish and the Poet and the Pendulum. Otherwise, that about does it. We will return next week, or at least one of us here. I'm assuming at some point in the near future we'll have Freddy back to do another segment here.

Thank you. Otherwise, we will return next week. Same geek time, same geek feed. Thanks for listening. Just say it again.

Hello, my friend. Take me into the white clouds. Hello, my friend. Without a ride A widowed rider Torn apart by chains of hell One last perfect verse Is still the same. Old song Oh.

Christ, how I hate. I get it. Home was there and then, those meadows of heaven, adventure filled days, one with every smile and face, please no more words, thoughts from a severed day, no more praise, tell me once my heart. Goes With turquoise. Water fall With beauty underneath The evergreen sky Within the blue Within the blue Within the blue The journey in time sat at home under the same table whose.

God I'm afraid, so afraid. Being raped again and again and again. I know I'm dying, but loved. You live long enough to hear the sound of gulls. Long enough to find yourself screaming every night.

Long enough to see your friends betray you. Years have been strapped onto the salt. Now I only have three minutes left. I just wish the tide would catch me first. Give me a Bye.

Bye. Upon his altar Remains of the dark Passion play Performed by his friends. Today, in the year of our Lord, 2005, Thomas was called from the cares of the world. He stopped crying at the end of each beautiful day. The music he wrote had too long been without silence.

He was found naked and dead, with a smile on his face, a pen, and 1,000 pages of erased text. Be still, my soul. You're alone. Oh, when did you become so cold? The bleed will All you need is to feel my love Search for beauty Find.

Your shore Try to sleep and I'll bleed no more You have. Such a so so Robert Takamata! I'm sorry, mistress, that you weren't able to properly confess. There just wasn't enough time to torture you. Thanks, anyway.

This show is a production of Movie Meltdown, produced and edited by Brian Renfro, with opening music performed by The Empires. To help support the show, email producer at moviemeltdown.com for ways that you can contribute or advertise with us.