Ep.#405 - The Legend of the Roller Blade Seven

Dan McCoy

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss the legend of the rollerball.

[0:04] I can't even say the title that way.

[0:07] Okay.

[0:30] Hey, everyone, and welcome to The Flophouse.

[0:35] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:36] I'm Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[0:38] I'm Elliot Kalin, and I can't wait to tell you later in the show about how you can see our online live shows

[0:43] and our in-person live show in Los Angeles on October 19th at vidiotsfoundation.org.

[0:49] But I'll tell you about that later in the show.

Dan McCoy

[0:51] Yeah, do that later.

[0:52] Right now, let me explain what this is that you're listening to.

[0:55] This is a podcast.

[0:57] Oh, wow.

[0:58] Are you really starting with first principles?

[1:00] Yeah.

[1:01] Have you heard of a thing called Really Simple Syndication?

[1:05] It's abbreviated as RSS.

[1:07] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08] That's what they say.

[1:09] Keep it Really Simple Syndication, stupid.

Dan McCoy

[1:13] Normally, and today, we talk about a bad movie.

[1:17] That's what we do.

[1:19] Old Dan Qualifications McCoy.

[1:23] This is the month of September, which means that in Flophouse lore,

[1:28] it is Small Timber or Small Vember.

[1:30] Small Vember.

[1:31] Thank you.

[1:31] Depending on which sect you belong to, where you worship.

[1:37] And we are in the midst of our 90s flashback, even though these films are in no way, I'm sure,

[1:45] big enough to be affected by strike stuff.

[1:49] We are going back in time.

[1:51] And in this case, we're talking about a film called The Legend of the Rollerblade 7,

[1:57] part of the Rollerblade 7 series of films.

Stuart Wellington

[2:01] Dan is being charitable by calling it a film.

Dan McCoy

[2:04] Yes.

[2:04] We'll allow it.

[2:05] As Stu pointed out, we watched The Legend of the Titanic.

[2:09] This is The Legend of the Rollerblade 7.

[2:11] We're going through all of the important legend in mythology.

[2:16] Legend of the Lost Dinosaurs.

[2:17] We all know the tale of The Rollerblade 7 and how they –

[2:21] Now, which are the seven in this movie?

Elliott Kalan

[2:24] So that's the thing.

[2:25] This movie implies that we do know The Legend of the Rollerblade 7 because they don't explain anything.

[2:30] And – well, Stuart, we'll get into summary.

[2:32] But, Stu, first, let's talk about the production history of this film.

[2:35] What is – so this is the third in a series, correct?

[2:38] Now, often the third in a movie series is an original new movie.

[2:41] But in this case, what did they do?

Stuart Wellington

[2:43] It's a mishmash of the first two, right?

[2:45] It combines the content in the first two.

[2:47] Oh, is that what it is?

[2:48] Almost like the way that Shogun Assassin combines various Lone Wolf and Cub movies to a single movie that is then dubbed into English.

Elliott Kalan

[2:56] Yes, they combined footage from The Rollerblade 7 and Return of the Rollerblade 7 into Legend of the Rollerblade 7.

Dan McCoy

[3:02] One would – now, I was not aware of this.

[3:04] One would think that if you're taking sort of that kind of like best of approach with a lot of material to choose from,

[3:11] you would end up with a more sort of fleet and focused movie.

Elliott Kalan

[3:15] I think you're overestimating how much material, how much great material they had to choose from.

Stuart Wellington

[3:22] No, I think the easiest way – I think the – before we really get into this movie,

[3:26] we really have to address the fact that it is the creation of what screenwriter, star – screenwriter is in quotes, I guess.

[3:35] What, Scott Shaw? Is that his name?

Elliott Kalan

[3:36] So, star and martial artist Scott Shaw and director Donald G. Jackson, best known probably for Hell Comes to Frogtown.

Dan McCoy

[3:47] Yes, which is a movie that I recall basically enjoying and having a comprehensible plot.

Elliott Kalan

[3:54] I'd go as far as to call it Rowdy Roddy Piper's second best movie.

[3:58] It's very far behind his first best movie, They Live, which is great.

[4:02] But, you know, it's a movie that has a story.

[4:06] It looks like it was made using money to pay for things.

[4:09] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[4:10] So – but the key to this – to Legend of the Rollerblight 7 is that it uses – it implements zen filmmaking.

[4:19] Yes.

[4:19] Which zen filmmaking, at least according to Wikipedia, is that it is a method of filmmaking where you just film whatever you want, and I don't think you have a script.

[4:29] You do not have a script, no.

Dan McCoy

[4:30] Yeah, the film is built as it goes, I guess.

Stuart Wellington

[4:33] So, when we make fun of a movie, and you're listening to the episode with your grandma, and your grandma's like,

[4:40] oh, but everybody works so hard on this.

[4:43] In this case, you can say, well, they didn't even have a script, and they just did whatever they wanted.

[4:47] So, I guess they didn't work that hard.

[4:48] You didn't work that hard.

[4:49] I got – I also – that's what you tell your grandma when she's getting mad.

Elliott Kalan

[4:54] Yeah, because I do often discuss zen filmmaking with my grandma, and especially the Rollerblade 7 films.

[5:00] She's a diehard.

Dan McCoy

[5:01] I presume, and I may be wrong.

[5:03] Wait, your grandma was in Diehard?

Elliott Kalan

[5:05] Yeah, yeah.

[5:06] My grandma is Alan Rickman.

[5:08] Oh, I'm so sorry.

[5:10] Yeah, no, no.

[5:11] She passed so recently.

[5:11] No, she actually faked her death so that she could go back to being my grandma full time.

[5:15] Oh, okay.

[5:16] That makes sense.

[5:16] That's very sweet of her.

[5:17] Yeah.

[5:19] She's like Rick Moranis.

[5:20] She's like, it's time for me to take care of my family and not be a movie star anymore.

[5:24] I may be wrong in making this presumption.

[5:26] Alan Rick Moranis is the person I'm talking to, the combination of Alan Rickman and Rick Moranis.

[5:29] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[5:30] But like a Boba Hotep version.

[5:32] Exactly.

[5:33] Yup.

Dan McCoy

[5:34] I may be wrong in presuming this, but I kind of presume that if this is the way the movie was made, it was probably, maybe I'm wrong, shot in sequence.

[5:44] Which is not a movie star.

[5:48] You know, like occasionally a film will be shot in sequence if the director's like, I think it's very important to like go through this journey.

[5:55] Like it'll help the actors.

[5:56] Well, apparently only E.T. was shot in sequence, Dan.

[5:59] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[6:00] Weirdly enough, boyhood not shot in sequence.

[6:02] No, boyhood was shot out of sequence.

[6:04] No, E.T.

[6:04] E.T., my understanding is that because Spielberg wanted the relationship between the child actors and E.T. to be as real as possible.

[6:12] Okay.

[6:13] He kind of replicated that.

Dan McCoy

[6:14] Well, I bring it up only to say that there are some shots towards the beginning of this movie where I'm like, oh, these are like, I have no idea what's going on.

[6:21] But individually, these are some very like pretty shots like that look good for the budget, like are sort of cleverly in that low budget way using abandoned spaces or weird looking buildings or whatever to create a world.

[6:37] And then as the movie went on, I just felt like it got lazier.

Elliott Kalan

[6:41] So I think it's hard.

[6:42] I think my guess is that some of that is probably the result of it being literally constructed out of the footage from two other movies.

[6:49] And that maybe the better stuff might be from the first movie and the worse stuff from the second movie, but I'm not sure.

[6:55] Also, even in that – the movie does it like – characters don't make sense from one scene to the next.

[7:01] And they do – there's a good – there's an interesting use of Los Angeles area locations.

[7:08] They're very much at – using at least an establishing shot of the Griffith Park Observatory at one point.

[7:13] And they're in another place that I think might be Vasquez Rocks, which is a really cool kind of desert area, but could be any –

Dan McCoy

[7:23] The L.A. River that you see in a lot of films, that concrete drainage thing you'd recognize.

Elliott Kalan

[7:29] Yeah, the thing about in Breakfast at Tiffany's, L.A. River, drier than a mile.

Dan McCoy

[7:35] So, Stuart, you have the unenviable task of trying to synopsize this film.

[7:41] Let's see how it goes.

Stuart Wellington

[7:41] I'm going to do my fucking best.

[7:44] But it was a challenge.

[7:46] The challenges presented me were the fact that this movie was only available on YouTube and the sound mix is bad.

[7:54] You can say bad, right?

[7:55] Bad.

Dan McCoy

[7:55] Well, the other challenge is that this is not – I think that we have talked about it but not maybe made it express.

[8:03] This is not a normal movie.

Elliott Kalan

[8:05] This is probably the least linearly told film we've ever done on the Flophouse.

[8:10] And it is one that is – I feel like Neil Breen watches this and he's like, have these guys never seen a movie?

[8:17] Like what's going on in this thing?

[8:19] But are you going to talk about the cavalcade of celebrity brothers that appear or do you want to introduce them as they show up in the film?

Stuart Wellington

[8:25] Yeah, we'll get to all of them.

[8:26] Okay.

[8:27] And by cavalcade I mean two.

[8:28] Yeah.

[8:29] The movie opens with a woman in a gymnastics bodysuit named Stella Speed.

[8:37] Okay, thank you.

Dan McCoy

[8:38] Which, by the way, I may fuck up some of these names.

[8:40] You guys, please correct me.

[8:41] I had trouble following.

[8:42] I cannot.

[8:43] I don't know who any of the characters in this movie were.

Stuart Wellington

[8:45] So, we have Stella Speed and she is given a samurai sword by Father Donaldo played by director, the director of the movie.

[8:54] And he gives her the sword before she goes into the dangerous wheel zone, which we'll later learn the wheel zone is a place where people can only skateboard and ride around on roller skates.

[9:06] Yes, by law.

[9:06] It's dangerous.

[9:08] You will obviously learn more about it.

Elliott Kalan

[9:10] Even though later the police officer character that we see enforcing this rule is herself not on wheels.

Dan McCoy

[9:15] I mean, you got to admit, though, that this movie predicted the future.

[9:20] You know, rollerblading is the major, the only way we can get around these days.

Elliott Kalan

[9:24] What's so funny is, so later on, and Stuart will get to this, the villain is talking about how he invented a skateboard.

[9:29] Maybe.

[9:29] He invented a skateboard and it ruined society as if he was like a nuclear scientist or something like that.

[9:34] And anyway, we'll get to it.

[9:36] So, Father Donaldo, he's from, he's like, it's like the Institute of Light or something like that.

[9:39] The Institute of the Master of Light.

Stuart Wellington

[9:40] And he is, he's like, imagine a post-apocalyptic priest character who's like part cowboy, part samurai.

[9:47] That's kind of the whole aesthetic.

[9:49] Yeah, part hippie.

[9:49] But by post-apocalyptic, I mean like they're just wearing like pads and stuff.

[9:52] It's not like they actually aged any of their clothing.

Elliott Kalan

[9:56] Okay.

[9:56] No, it all looks new and they're in the desert a lot.

[9:58] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[9:58] Yeah, a lot of it looks like a, like a, like a, like a Tom Petty music video.

[10:02] And I think that's probably intentional.

[10:05] So we then have, we have like an evil guy.

[10:08] I think this is, is this Joe Estevez at this point?

[10:11] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[10:12] This is Joe Estevez as Saint Offender.

[10:14] Yep.

[10:14] Saint Offender, who's some kind of a bad guy.

[10:17] And he, yeah, he, you, you would recognize him because he looks like.

[10:20] An Estevez.

[10:21] An Estevez.

[10:22] He looks like Martin Sheen.

[10:23] Yeah.

[10:23] Was not living life as well as he is being Martin Sheen.

Elliott Kalan

[10:28] I mean, he looks like what he is, which is Martin Sheen's less successful brother.

[10:32] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[10:34] So he sends his henchmen outside of the wheel zone to kidnap a psychic named Sister Sparrow.

[10:44] So his, his reasoning is so he can get revenge.

[10:47] Again, that's not a hundred percent clear at this point.

Elliott Kalan

[10:50] He is one of, he is one of three villains in the movie whose relationship to each other

[10:53] and goals are not never entirely clear.

[10:55] Yes.

Stuart Wellington

[10:56] So then we see Father Tonato speaking with Sister Sparrow.

[11:01] She's a psychic.

[11:03] She wears like a weird little Pope's miter type thing and a pair of sunglasses.

[11:07] It's like a Pope's miter with a German cross on the top.

[11:10] Yes.

[11:10] Yep.

[11:12] And she sees a vision of, of a samurai, a pacifist, and a clown.

[11:21] Quite, quite a trinity.

[11:23] Yeah.

[11:23] And this also sees a plane crash and a naked bride covered in serpents.

[11:30] Wow.

[11:30] My notes early on were much more defined than later on.

[11:33] You'll see.

Elliott Kalan

[11:33] Well, no, but when the movie starts, you're like, okay, this is a weird movie, but like

[11:38] there is some sort of plot that you can almost follow.

[11:41] Like there are things that are being explained and said and that all, it's like the movie

[11:45] dissolves away.

Stuart Wellington

[11:46] Someone has been given a mission.

[11:49] Yes.

[11:49] Yeah.

[11:50] So she, after, after this vision, she goes for a walk and is then kidnapped by a ninja.

[11:55] This happens multiple times.

[11:57] There's a lot of generic ninjas in this.

[11:59] Father Donaldo summons Hawk Goodman, played by Scott Shaw, who shows up to the Griffith Park

[12:06] Observatory and then walks around for a while.

[12:09] A long time.

[12:10] He, as to describe him, he looks again, like, like some weird fantasy where Tom Petty is

[12:16] in a, in a post-apocalyptic movie.

[12:18] But that would never happen in the real world.

[12:20] Right.

[12:22] So he is a, Hawk Goodman is a samurai warrior who rides around on a motorcycle, like a real

[12:30] street samurai.

[12:31] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[12:31] And so the trivia for this movie claims that this actor is like one of the only like rated

[12:40] people to know this Korean martial art or whatever.

[12:44] It feels like trivia written by him because I will say that throughout the movie, he does

[12:48] not seem to be particularly adept at martial arts necessarily.

[12:53] I mean, he kicks higher than I could.

[12:55] That's for sure.

[12:56] I mean, you can't really judge him.

[12:56] But that's the best I'll say for him.

Elliott Kalan

[12:57] The people challenging him, I feel like, are not, are not really testing any skills.

[13:01] But he has written a number of books about Taekwondo.

Stuart Wellington

[13:04] Oh, cool.

[13:05] Okay.

[13:06] So he, Father Donaldo wants him to go rescue Sister Sparrow, who is Hawk's actual sister.

[13:16] Her name is Sparrow Goodman.

Elliott Kalan

[13:19] They almost make a joke about that.

[13:21] They kind of make a joke about how she's both his sister and a sister, like a nun.

Stuart Wellington

[13:24] For his trouble, Hawk is promised a bride for doing this.

[13:31] And then Hawk rides his motorcycle to the wheel zone, where he then has to leave his motorcycle

[13:37] because though it's a wheel zone, the motorcycle's doing it.

[13:40] Not that kind of wheel.

[13:41] Not that kind of wheel.

[13:41] No, no.

[13:42] Not at all.

[13:43] And then he leaves his motorcycle, and then it just disappears.

Elliott Kalan

[13:46] Yeah.

[13:47] Motorcycle disappears.

[13:48] Magic motorcycle.

[13:49] It's kind of like the ZZ Top car.

Stuart Wellington

[13:51] Yeah.

[13:52] Oh, man.

[13:53] See, I could have watched an hour and a half of ZZ Top videos.

[13:57] And you can do that on YouTube.

[13:59] Yeah, you have the option.

[13:59] Yeah, I could just do that whenever.

[14:01] We do live in the best of all possible worlds on that one rubric.

[14:06] Now we have kind of a series of character introductions with their credit, like who the actor is.

[14:14] The first one, of course, was I thought of Dan McCoy immediately because it is Rhonda Shearer.

Dan McCoy

[14:21] I was so excited.

[14:25] I had no idea that Rhonda Shearer was in this movie before starting it.

[14:29] And I was like, what?

[14:31] I mean, like the funny thing about this movie, like as Stuart suggests, and I think we should go into more detail, is like as various characters are introduced, they get a big like credits.

[14:43] Title card.

Elliott Kalan

[14:44] They get a full screen title card that says the name of the character.

[14:48] Or just the actor, actually, right?

[14:49] Just the actor.

[14:50] It's something they kind of did in old silent films where they would have the character name and the actor's name when the character was introduced.

[14:57] But here they just show the actor's name.

Dan McCoy

[14:59] Right.

[14:59] And this continues through like most of the movie.

[15:03] And it's funny.

[15:04] I really feel like it comes across like they're like, can you believe we got someone with a name you would recognize?

[15:11] Not like a star.

[15:13] None of these people are big.

[15:14] But like, hey, look, we got Rhonda Shearer to be in this movie.

[15:18] And here she is.

Stuart Wellington

[15:20] And her presence also meant that this movie was shown on USA up all night, right?

[15:26] I don't.

[15:27] Yes, I believe so.

Elliott Kalan

[15:28] So, I mean, let's explain for the audience, for anyone.

[15:30] It's hard to imagine anyone in the audience doesn't know who Rhonda Shearer is.

[15:33] But Dan, can you explain for anyone who's not as up on 90s late night softcore with the nudity cutout broadcasting as we are?

Dan McCoy

[15:41] For anyone who was not a pubescent boy in the late 80s, early 90s.

[15:49] Yes.

[15:50] Rhonda Shearer, best known for hosting USA up all night, which one of the two hosts, Gilbert Gottfried, also hosted it.

[15:58] I believe he was on Fridays and she was on Saturdays or something.

[16:03] But this was a way of—

Stuart Wellington

[16:06] Very similar energy from the two of them.

Dan McCoy

[16:08] Yeah.

[16:08] This was a way of repackaging trashy movies for late night viewing in the same way that like you would have like Vampyra or something do like horror movies.

[16:20] But this would be Rhonda Shearer, you know, lounging about in lingerie or something, introducing—

[16:27] Loungeer.

[16:28] You know, bikini car wash.

[16:29] Yes, lingerie is designed for lounging.

[16:30] Or whatever.

[16:31] I feel like a lot of it is.

[16:33] So she would show these like sex comedies with all the actual nudity cutout.

[16:38] But there would still be, you know, risque content.

[16:40] But yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[16:41] It was a lot of thongs.

[16:42] It would be a lot of thongs and bikinis.

[16:44] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[16:45] And this obviously made a huge impression on me.

[16:49] And last I checked in on Rhonda Shearer, she was running a lingerie company.

[16:55] Right.

[16:55] And that was her late career turn.

[16:58] So—

Stuart Wellington

[16:58] Well, in this movie, she plays Officer Skates, a police officer in the wheel zone.

[17:03] Officer Daryl Skates.

[17:05] Officer Daryl Skates.

[17:07] And she is shaking down a—like a guy who looks kind of like a greaser type character.

[17:12] Like a Tex Avery cartoon.

Elliott Kalan

[17:14] It's heavily hinted that he is the big bopper.

[17:17] Yeah.

[17:17] That's the plane crash.

[17:18] Because later he's looking for Buddy Holly.

[17:20] Oh.

[17:21] And someone warns him, don't get on a plane because of a coin flip.

[17:25] So he's supposed—at first I was like, oh, this is one of the millions of men who think

[17:29] Elvis is super cool and wants to be Elvis.

[17:31] And then I was like, oh, no, wait.

[17:32] He's supposed to be the big bopper.

[17:34] What a weird choice.

[17:35] He's there to bring some six-string samurai flavor to everything.

[17:38] I guess so.

[17:39] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[17:40] Okay, so Hawk is then—is traveling through the wheel zone.

[17:45] He is on foot.

[17:45] He does not have roller skates.

[17:47] And he is surrounded by a roller blade gang, but he kills them all quite easily with his

[17:52] samurai sword.

[17:53] He tracks down Sister Sparrow and her—she has a group of, like, gang, like, wasteland warrior

[18:01] captors.

[18:03] And they have, like, a brief fight that is stretched out because almost every, like, kick or knife

[18:10] throw or knife trick is repeated, like, four times, four to five times.

[18:15] Literally the exact footage is shown.

[18:16] Slow motion, yeah.

[18:17] Or different takes of the same thing.

[18:18] Yeah.

[18:19] At one point, Hawk throws his sister a knife, which she catches in her teeth, and then she

[18:25] catches the butt of the knife in her teeth and then uses that knife to slash one of her

[18:29] captor's throats.

Dan McCoy

[18:30] But in context—I mean, like, it looks like she's just kind of, like, vaguely jabbing towards

[18:35] someone's—

[18:36] Yes.

[18:37] Yeah.

[18:38] And, yeah, I think sometimes these things are repeated up to six times.

[18:43] Up to six times.

[18:43] I would not be surprised if you took out all of the reused footage in this movie.

[18:48] The movie was one-third as long.

Elliott Kalan

[18:51] Oh, for sure.

[18:52] And, I mean, the fact is the whole movie is reused footage, too.

[18:54] I don't know if there's any new footage in it.

[18:56] But, yeah, you're right.

[18:56] There's a lot—let's do it or get to it.

[18:58] There's a sequence at the very end where you see characters get into a car several different

[19:02] times over and over again.

Stuart Wellington

[19:05] Yep.

[19:06] So he—but then Hawk—before he can save Sister Sparrow, Hawk is knocked down by a rollerblading

[19:14] metal minotaur ninja guy who will be introduced later as—

[19:18] Sounds awesome.

[19:19] The—

[19:20] Wish I could have seen.

[19:21] We are later introduced to this character as the Fukusai ninja.

[19:27] And he gets knocked out, and then the bad guys just take the sister away.

[19:31] Mm-hmm.

[19:33] Hawk visits a psychic played by Karen Black named Taro.

[19:38] Yeah.

[19:39] Who—he does psychedelics with her, and they have a romantic vision quest, and he learns

[19:45] how to rollerblade.

Dan McCoy

[19:46] Yeah, she gets one of the big—

Elliott Kalan

[19:48] Oh, so that's when he's learning how to rollerblade.

[19:49] I see.

[19:50] Yeah.

[19:50] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[19:50] He gets one of the big credits, and she's the—you know, like, look, I love Rhonda Shearer,

[19:57] but Karen Black is the one actual, like, actor of note in this—

[20:03] Well, she's the only Academy Award nominee in the entire movie.

[20:06] Yeah.

[20:06] And I don't know, you know, like, she must have gotten, you know, a nice little payday

[20:12] to spend one day feeding mushrooms to this man.

Elliott Kalan

[20:16] I'm not so sure if it was such a nice little—I think Karen Black is kind of a—I mean, she's

[20:20] since passed, but was kind of an out-of-the-ordinary person.

Stuart Wellington

[20:24] Oh, you were saying that she's the only Academy Award nominee.

[20:27] I was wondering if John Cazale was in this, John.

Dan McCoy

[20:31] I don't think that was one of his, what, five movies?

Elliott Kalan

[20:34] No, and he was only in movies that were nominated for Best Picture, so I don't know if—

[20:38] Wait, wait, wait.

[20:39] Was this nominated for Best Picture?

[20:41] Hold on.

[20:41] Let me check.

[20:42] Let me look at the Academy website.

[20:43] Let me start at the first year of the Academy Awards and move forward.

[20:45] No, just do a fine.

[20:46] I'm not seeing it.

[20:47] For—

[20:47] No.

[20:48] 1928.

[20:49] No.

[20:49] 1929.

[20:50] No.

[20:51] 19—what if a movie about rollerblades from, like, the 50s won?

[20:54] Yeah, that's actually a really good point.

[20:55] No.

[20:56] No.

[20:56] Legend of the Rollerblade 7 was not nominated for Best Picture, it turns out.

Stuart Wellington

[20:59] Okay, that's weird.

[21:00] Okay.

[21:01] So, wait, let me double-check where I'm at.

[21:03] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[21:05] Doesn't matter.

Stuart Wellington

[21:06] Meanwhile, Sister Sparrow is been—is captured.

[21:10] She is being tormented and forced to dance.

[21:13] Uh-huh.

[21:14] Okay.

[21:15] The Big Bopper character who we saw earlier

[21:18] has a chat with a—like, this Oracle character

[21:22] who's sitting out on a, like, a beach chair in the desert,

[21:25] played by—we get another credit—like, Dan Shroud?

[21:31] Is this Don Stroud?

[21:32] Don Stroud.

[21:33] My mistake.

[21:33] Yeah, yeah.

[21:34] I don't know this actor's work, I don't think, so maybe I wasn't as excited to see his name.

[21:40] I—

Elliott Kalan

[21:40] I mean, he's been in lots and lots of things, you know.

[21:43] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[21:44] I love this convention, by the way, of sort of dystopian action movies where, like,

[21:53] there'd just be, like, vast expanses of desert all around,

[21:57] and then there's just, like, people sort of just standing around,

[22:01] and I'm like, like, where do you live?

[22:04] How did you get here?

[22:05] Are you just waiting here for the protagonist to wander by?

[22:08] What's going on?

Stuart Wellington

[22:09] Later, he gets a lifeguard chair, right?

[22:11] Yeah, he gets a lifeguard chair.

[22:13] And a lot of these sequences are shot kind of like the, like, love montage from Cool as Ice

[22:19] where Vanilla Ice is running around the, like, partially built home with that girl

[22:25] or, like, riding his motorcycle out in the desert.

[22:28] That's what it reminded me of.

[22:29] Yeah.

[22:29] I'm just talking about cinema here, guys.

[22:30] Yeah.

[22:31] I mean, I saw it one time.

[22:32] I'm not as intimately familiar.

Dan McCoy

[22:33] You only saw it one time.

[22:34] Okay, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[22:35] I guess I'm more of a cinephile.

[22:37] Yeah.

[22:37] So, okay, now we got another big star coming up.

[22:40] We have Frank Stallone playing the Black Knight.

[22:43] Yeah, this is the other celebrity brother, Frank Stallone.

[22:45] Now, the Black Knight is one of the villain characters.

[22:48] He seems to exist in this weird world where he can, like, draw people into his realm.

Elliott Kalan

[22:55] Yeah, there's something kind of like David Lynch about this where he's like an evil force

[23:00] that inhabits some other underworld but can, yeah, people can end up there.

[23:05] But we never see him anywhere else.

[23:06] I'm sure that has nothing to do with the fact that a lot of these people are probably available

[23:09] for a day.

[23:10] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[23:11] So—

Elliott Kalan

[23:12] I think Joe Estevez is the only one of these kind of middle-named people that appears in

[23:17] more than one location in the film.

[23:19] Oh, interesting.

[23:19] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[23:20] So, yeah.

[23:21] The Black Knight has a face-off with Hawk.

[23:28] It's unclear to me whether or not this takes place currently or in the past.

[23:32] I don't think it matters.

[23:34] Yeah, I thought it was a flashback, but I'm not sure.

[23:36] The Black Knight offers Hawk power, but Hawk rejects him, saying that he'll, you know,

[23:41] he'll, what, like, side with the forces of, like, heart and light or something.

Dan McCoy

[23:46] Yeah.

[23:47] Classic legend of the Rollerblade 7 stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[23:49] This is—well, yeah, the hero of the Rollerblade 7 is always tempted and then rejects that

[23:53] temptation.

[23:54] That's what Joseph Campbell said.

[23:56] There's some—so this movie has an interesting relationship with time and continuity because

[24:00] throughout we're seeing Hawk—

[24:02] That's one way to put it, yeah.

[24:03] Yeah.

[24:03] We're seeing Hawk as if he's never been to the Wheel Zone before.

[24:06] But the first time we meet him in the movie, isn't he like, oh, the last time I went to

[24:10] the Wheel Zone, I got—it was no good.

[24:12] So it's—

[24:13] It was a big payday, yeah.

[24:14] I was very confused about what was happening when in this movie.

[24:16] Luckily, it doesn't matter.

[24:18] None of it matters.

Stuart Wellington

[24:19] So Hawk is now traveling on one of those barren L.A. rivers and comes across a clown warrior

[24:27] in kabuki makeup.

[24:28] Yep.

[24:29] They have this kind of, like, long, like, not really a fight, but, like, a lot of posturing.

[24:34] All the fights mainly seem like a lot of, like, slow movement and posturing.

[24:40] Yes.

[24:40] And they—the camera, like, whips around them.

[24:44] And then they are attacked by, like, a gang.

[24:47] And then they team up and fight together, where at first you thought they were fighting

[24:50] each other.

Elliott Kalan

[24:51] This was also confusing to me because there's no dialogue during any of this.

[24:54] So I was like, wait, so now they're friends?

[24:56] I don't—I don't—yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[24:58] And then they team up with Stella Speed, the girl in the gymnastics outfit from earlier.

Elliott Kalan

[25:05] Now, when you say gymnastics outfit, we should make it clear.

[25:08] This is a red leotard with a thong back.

[25:10] And much of the movie is made up of shots from behind, slightly below of her butt as she

[25:14] is rollerblading around.

Stuart Wellington

[25:15] Yes.

[25:16] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[25:16] That was the part Dan said he thought was shot well.

[25:19] Yeah, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[25:21] I mean, it certainly is a point of interest in the movie that has few to—

[25:25] Yep, no, you're right.

Elliott Kalan

[25:26] But it hints at—it hints at the movie gets, like, gross at a certain point.

[25:31] Like, it becomes, you know—

[25:32] Oh, when she's getting her little bottom whipped?

[25:35] Yeah, when she's getting whipped by another thong-wearing female warrior.

[25:39] And it's a—there was something about—

Stuart Wellington

[25:42] Elliot, just because that's what it's like in the post-apocalyptic future and it's being

[25:46] presented plainly doesn't mean that the director agrees with what's happening on screen.

[25:51] That's very true.

[25:52] I shouldn't confuse the message of the film with the action of the film.

Dan McCoy

[25:57] Yeah, the message is clearly anti-whipping a butt in a thong.

Stuart Wellington

[26:01] Just because it's happening doesn't mean the director endorses it.

Elliott Kalan

[26:04] It's just like Wolf of Wall Street.

[26:06] It's not approving of all this.

[26:08] Yeah, yeah, sure.

[26:09] Okay, so our—

[26:10] Or E.T.

[26:11] Steven Spielberg was like, I don't want aliens to get kidnapped by the government.

[26:14] Hey, hey.

Dan McCoy

[26:15] Or for E.T.'s butt to be whipped.

[26:17] I mean, that was a deleted scene, but he didn't want that.

Stuart Wellington

[26:20] The reality is built to prevent his butt to be whipped.

Elliott Kalan

[26:22] I mean, if there's lack of—

[26:23] He doesn't really have much of a butt.

[26:24] His lack of an evident butt really helps that, yeah.

[26:27] If humans have evolved—

Stuart Wellington

[26:28] Yeah, if you want to battle that thing, you need like a hockey stick or something.

Elliott Kalan

[26:31] I mean, you'd have to get it from below is the other thing, and the feet are right there.

[26:34] Yeah.

[26:35] I think you have to assume that as humans evolve to a point to make it easier to defend against

[26:39] butt whipping, we will appear more and more like E.T. with a kind of—with an actual bottom,

[26:44] a flat actual bottom, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[26:46] Yeah, yeah, like a elder thing or something.

Elliott Kalan

[26:49] Guys, how does E.T. poop?

[26:51] Dan?

Dan McCoy

[26:53] Well, he's not that regular, but I mean, as he's gotten older.

[26:57] But, you know, the actual bowel movements are, you know, pretty firm and well-shaped.

[27:03] Okay, not exactly what I was asking, but okay, good enough.

Stuart Wellington

[27:05] He shoots out—he has two cloacas, one under each arm.

[27:08] Oh.

Dan McCoy

[27:11] Which he expels when he's frightened, like a squid.

Elliott Kalan

[27:15] What an amazing way to ruin that movie as if it was like so heartbreaking and so touching,

[27:20] but unfortunately, every time he's surprised, he just shoots shit out of his armpits.

[27:27] It's like, Stephen, we got to talk to you.

[27:29] The movie is nearly perfect.

[27:30] We think this has the potential to be the highest grossing film of all time.

[27:35] Stephen goes, yeah, because of the poop pits.

[27:36] And they're like, that's the one thing we wanted to talk to you about.

Dan McCoy

[27:39] He's like, just because—

[27:39] Are you sure?

[27:40] Because that tested really well with me.

Stuart Wellington

[27:43] He's like, just because I'm presenting an alien life form scientifically correctly

[27:48] doesn't mean I endorse what is happening on screen.

Elliott Kalan

[27:51] Look, I talked to all the xenobiologists, and they said,

[27:54] if he's going to have that flat bottom, which you were okay with,

[27:57] he's going to need a place to expel his feces,

[27:59] and it's going to happen when he's scared.

[28:01] Many life forms do this.

[28:03] You know what, you convinced the Stephen.

[28:05] And then when Stephen stopped, they were like,

[28:06] let's just cut those parts.

[28:08] Let's just cut those while he's napping.

[28:11] And he was taking a nap in the edit bay, and they tiptoed in.

[28:14] Like, ding, ding, ding, ding.

[28:16] And just manually cut that stuff.

[28:18] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[28:19] Sad.

[28:20] So speaking of cutting, we have Hawk and the Kabuki Clown and Stella Speed,

[28:27] and they are traveling together.

[28:28] Our Holy Trinity has finally traveled together.

[28:30] And they get in a fight with some bondage people.

[28:33] That's just what I wrote down.

[28:34] It looks like they're like a weird bondage.

[28:36] Like a weird bondage.

Dan McCoy

[28:36] I will forgive you if this gets pretty vague, Stuart.

[28:40] Don't worry.

Stuart Wellington

[28:41] And then we are, once again, the Fukusai ninja shows up,

[28:44] this time with a title card.

[28:46] And that is an all-metal rollerblading ninja that looks kind of like a minotaur.

[28:50] Uh-huh.

[28:51] The fetish couple run away.

[28:55] Hawk knocks out—

Elliott Kalan

[28:56] Something I want to mention.

[28:56] Stella Speed, she turned out—

[28:58] She did okay for herself.

[28:59] She's a multiple Emmy winner as a producer for The Amazing Race.

[29:02] So don't worry.

[29:03] Oh, that's great.

[29:03] She escaped the world of Zen filmmaking at some point.

Stuart Wellington

[29:07] So Hawk knocks out the Metal Ninja pretty easily, and they all escape.

[29:11] And after they leave, the Fukusai ninja, the Metal Ninja,

[29:14] is reanimated by the henchman of Pharaoh,

[29:17] who is a villain we haven't really talked about.

[29:20] Pharaoh is like an older man who is pushed around in a wheelchair.

[29:27] He has to be in a wheelchair because he had some kind of a skateboarding accident,

[29:31] and he has to wear a mask.

[29:33] Which he takes off other times.

[29:35] He has to wear the mask when he's outside.

Elliott Kalan

[29:37] He has to wear it whenever he's outside because it's too sunny.

[29:40] Yeah, it's like a leather face mask.

[29:43] His mishap with a skateboard has left him vulnerable to the harsh rays of the sun

[29:47] in a way that I can only imagine.

[29:49] I don't—

[29:50] And this is this character where he has these long monologues about,

[29:53] I just wanted people to enjoy the skateboard.

[29:56] I never knew what would happen.

[29:57] As if the downfall of society is because of the invention of the skateboard.

[30:00] Yeah, it's pretty great.

Dan McCoy

[30:01] And I would like to take a moment to—

Elliott Kalan

[30:03] And also to point out, Marty McFly invented the skateboard when he went back in time.

[30:07] That's true.

[30:07] We all know that.

[30:07] That's true.

[30:08] It's in the books.

[30:09] Just like he invented rock and roll.

Dan McCoy

[30:10] I just wanted to reassure the audience that this is a movie that exists

[30:15] and not sort of a late April Fool's prank we're playing or a collective hallucination we had.

[30:23] Yeah, it's all on YouTube.

[30:24] It's proof.

[30:25] It's all there.

[30:25] Don't watch it.

Elliott Kalan

[30:26] It's a waste of your time, but it's there.

Stuart Wellington

[30:28] Okay.

[30:29] So they are now—our heroes are also joined by this rollerblading banjo player who wears a mask and a top hat and goggles.

Elliott Kalan

[30:38] This was the most amazing part of the movie to me where I was like,

[30:40] this movie invented the doof warrior before George Miller invented the Fury Road.

[30:45] Because he's on wheels.

[30:46] He's got a mask on.

[30:48] He's playing a strained instrument.

[30:49] I was like, this movie is ahead of its time.

[30:51] You know what?

[30:51] It's actually great.

Dan McCoy

[30:52] I had the same thought.

Stuart Wellington

[30:53] Yeah, if it inspired the greatest character in the history of cinema, then, you know.

[30:58] I mean, for me, I was like, I hate this guy and I hate his banjo.

Dan McCoy

[31:02] It reminds you of what derailed Steve Martin from being funny.

Stuart Wellington

[31:09] And luckily, he's not around for long because a different ninja shows up.

[31:12] No, Steve Martin's still here.

[31:13] He's the only murderer in the building.

[31:14] It's a huge show.

[31:15] I mean, he's, you know, he's got a late career.

Dan McCoy

[31:17] Meryl Streep is on this season.

[31:19] He's funny in the Martin Short show that not only murders in the building,

[31:24] which could also be called a Martin Short.

[31:26] No, the little, the touring thing that they did together.

[31:28] Oh, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[31:29] The touring test they took to see if they were computers or not.

[31:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[31:32] Turns out Martin Short is, Steve Martin isn't.

[31:35] Yeah.

[31:35] Interesting.

Stuart Wellington

[31:36] Okay.

[31:37] So a different ninja surprised them.

[31:39] He kills the banjo player and injures the clown.

[31:43] And then Stella Speed tries to run for it, but is chased.

[31:49] Hawk has a samurai duel with one of the ninjas that's really boring and slow.

[31:55] And then he gets in a fight with Sister Sparrow's captors and leaves, like, ends up killing them.

[32:04] And it seems like she dies.

[32:06] Is this a vision?

[32:07] Is it a dream?

[32:07] I can't really tell.

[32:09] And then Hawk teaches Stella Speed how to use a sword, which is at odds with her being a pacifist.

[32:17] So we have a long sequence of them doing kata with their samurai swords.

[32:22] Then we get a, then they, like, start running around.

[32:25] We get a title card that says, back on the road.

[32:29] They ride around and battle some more ninjas.

[32:31] This all takes a long time.

[32:33] This is a lot of long.

[32:34] And in between this stuff, there's, like, Pharaoh is being pushed around and will do, like, monologues that I couldn't really hear because the sound was bad.

[32:43] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[32:43] It's hard to make out some of what he's saying.

[32:45] It's all more stuff about the world he created, for the most part, and him asking things of his sidekick, whose name is Stealth.

[32:51] And he'll always be like, Stealth.

[32:53] That's cool.

Elliott Kalan

[32:53] That's actually a cool character.

[32:54] Stealth, take me for a push.

[32:55] Stealth, is it sunny outside?

[32:57] But it's a funny thing to call somebody.

Stuart Wellington

[32:58] Yeah, he looks like a variant Storm Shadow action figure.

[33:03] Yeah.

[33:04] Which is cool because that's, like, an evil version of Snake Eyes, who is also cool.

Elliott Kalan

[33:09] But this movie, for this whole chunk, vast swathes of it, for someone who was raised in England might say, if they're on a podcast America now, that are, it's just them either riding around on rollerblades through the same stretches of desert

[33:22] or them having these slow motion kind of not really choreographed fights.

[33:27] And, oh, wow.

[33:29] It is, it really feels trying.

[33:31] It's really difficult to get through.

Dan McCoy

[33:33] At a certain point, I'm sure we'll get to it, or maybe we're into it right now.

[33:36] I can't really place anything that happens.

[33:40] Yes.

[33:40] Like, characters just start dying one by one.

[33:45] Mm-hmm.

[33:45] Like, a lot of characters just, and the movie needs it.

[33:47] Or appearing in new locations.

[33:49] And it's like, I don't know how they got there.

[33:50] The movie needs to call its list of characters that I don't know who they are or what they're doing.

Stuart Wellington

[33:57] The problem is they're all important.

[33:58] Yeah.

[33:59] So they ride around, they confront Pharaoh in his wheelchair, but then his goon Stealth shows up carrying an Uzi, which, I mean, that's better than a samurai sword.

[34:10] Yeah.

[34:11] Kabuki runs off.

[34:12] But it has less honor.

[34:13] That's true, it does.

[34:14] Yeah.

[34:14] Kabuki runs off and is chased by a new warrior who carries two axes.

[34:21] And they get in a fight, and the axe warrior wins, leaving Kabuki dead.

[34:25] Oh, no.

[34:26] Then a shaman-type character shows up and tries to revive Kabuki, but then is whisked away through, I'm guessing, magic to have a conversation with the Black Knight, who is telling her that, you know, I don't know something about darkness.

[34:41] And she's talking about lightness.

[34:45] Then Stella's speed is captured by Pharaoh's goons, and her bottom gets whipped at this point by another thong-clad evil character.

Elliott Kalan

[34:57] This was, for me, this was very much the nadir of the film.

[34:59] This was the one part where it went from, I'm not enjoying this because it's boring, to I'm not enjoying this really because I'm just, this is unpleasant to me.

[35:07] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[35:08] Hawk is also captured, and he is put on trial by Pharaoh in front of Pharaoh's United Skates of America, which I kind of like that.

[35:18] I'm like, it took us a while, but we got there.

Elliott Kalan

[35:21] It's such a shaggy dog story of a movie to get to that one play on words.

[35:25] And I'm like, you should have started with this.

[35:27] Like, if this was more in the spirit of a future where it was called the United Skates of America and everything was rollerblade-based, I'd be like, you know what movie?

[35:34] Yes, make that movie.

[35:36] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[35:36] Okay, so there's a lot of flashing lights.

[35:38] Hawk and Stella are put in a-

[35:40] Yeah, that's the movie.

[35:41] Yeah.

[35:41] Hawk and Stella are put in a cage together, and then we see a lot of shots of, like, threatening-looking villains and more flashing lights.

[35:53] And Father Donaldo and the Black Knight have some kind of interaction.

[35:59] Everybody's trying to, like, threaten them.

[36:02] And then, all of a sudden, we cut to a wedding where Father Donaldo is giving us a wild sermon about how time is different and, like, you shouldn't let time control you.

[36:15] You should control time.

Elliott Kalan

[36:16] Everyone admits time exists, but it's not a real thing, and it's not physical.

[36:19] Wait, did you-

[36:20] Did you- I may have gone into a zen trance while doing the summary.

[36:23] Sure.

[36:24] Did you talk about the part where-

[36:25] Sure.

Elliott Kalan

[36:25] Is it Stella Speed, or is it the sister Sparrow who's sitting in a chair as snakes are being dropped on her?

[36:32] It's sister Sparrow, yeah.

[36:33] Like, because it actually- because we saw a vision of it earlier, but now we see it happening, I guess, for real.

[36:38] But it's- again, it feels like the movie at some point- it's like the movie was like, I'm loving this stuff with the rollerblading, and then checked its watch and was like, oh, shit, we got to wrap this up.

[36:48] Like, hurry, get through the plot, get through these things, and so they're just throwing events at you, you know?

Stuart Wellington

[36:52] So he's- the priest is marrying Hawk and Alice, I think is the name- is her name.

Dan McCoy

[36:59] You could tell me that any of the characters are named anything, and I would believe you.

Stuart Wellington

[37:04] And then they get onto a motorcycle.

[37:09] Uh-huh.

[37:10] Many times.

[37:11] Many times, like a hundred times.

[37:14] And this is also-

Elliott Kalan

[37:15] And when I say many times, it's literally, like, many takes of them getting on a motorcycle, one after the other.

Stuart Wellington

[37:20] Different angles, it's the same, yeah.

[37:23] So they kind of like ride off into the sunset on his motorcycle, but then Stella Speed is in a car being driven by Saint Offender, played by Joe Estevez.

[37:36] And-

[37:37] We see that car pull out multiple times.

[37:39] We see the car pull out multiple times, and they pull up next to them on the highway.

[37:45] Stella pulls out a Uzi or a pistol or something, and then we see Hawk and his bride have crashed, and they're in the dirt.

[37:55] We don't actually see anyone get shot.

[37:57] No.

Dan McCoy

[37:58] And then-

[38:00] But the bride is apparently dead, based on-

[38:04] Seems to be dead.

[38:05] Hawk's reaction upon regaining consciousness.

Elliott Kalan

[38:10] And what's your best guess as to why Stella Speed did this?

Stuart Wellington

[38:14] Uh, she was, uh, her brain was corrupted by, uh, a skateboard.

Dan McCoy

[38:20] Uh, she was like, if I can't have you, Hawk, no one can.

Elliott Kalan

[38:25] Because this is, I-

[38:26] I don't know.

[38:27] I wasn't sure which list, I was like, is she jealous, or is that she's been turned to the dark side by these villains?

[38:34] But, uh, it was, it was all very, like, I-

[38:37] Yeah.

[38:37] Anyway, it was at the point where I was starting to question if I had understood which characters were which.

[38:43] Because it's, it's Hawk, it's a bunch of dudes, and except for-

[38:47] And it's mostly just blonde women who look pretty similar, playing each of-

[38:50] Most of the other parts.

[38:51] Uh-huh.

[38:51] And so I was like, wait, did I-

Stuart Wellington

[38:53] Is this a character that I thought was a different character?

Elliott Kalan

[38:55] Yeah.

[38:55] It's very hard to tell them apart.

Stuart Wellington

[38:56] Well, because the bride character, I think, is a new, completely new character.

[39:00] That confused me.

Elliott Kalan

[39:01] I thought at first that he was marrying Stella Speed or possibly his sister.

Stuart Wellington

[39:05] Yes, that's what I was assuming.

[39:06] And so Hawk stands up, he, like, does, like, a little, I think he does, like, a little kata thing with his samurai sword.

[39:13] Uh-huh.

[39:13] And then he, then he wanders off, and then his bride, her body disappears, and then I think his motorcycle disappears, and then that's the movie.

[39:21] That's the end of the movie.

[39:23] Guys, who were the Rollerblade 7?

[39:27] That's a very complicated question that I don't know if we can answer.

[39:30] I'm guessing Hawk is one of them.

[39:32] Okay.

[39:32] So we have Hawk, Stella Speed.

[39:34] Uh-huh.

[39:35] We have Kabuki.

[39:36] So that's three.

Dan McCoy

[39:38] Yeah.

[39:38] There's Jimbo and Kearney.

[39:43] Jimbo and Kearney.

[39:44] Yeah, maybe the Fukuzai Ninja.

[39:45] And Nelson.

[39:46] And Grumpy.

[39:50] Grumpy.

[39:50] Yeah, Dopey.

[39:51] Sleepy.

[39:52] Sneezy.

[39:53] Uh-huh.

Dan McCoy

[39:53] Sloth.

Stuart Wellington

[39:54] Brad Pitt.

[39:56] Brad Pitt?

[39:57] Brad Pitt's in 7, dude.

[39:59] Yeah, yeah, of course.

Dan McCoy

[40:00] Oh, that's the Sloth you're talking about.

[40:02] I thought you were doing Goonies.

[40:04] Oh, that would be awesome.

[40:05] He thought you meant the animal.

Elliott Kalan

[40:08] Yeah.

[40:09] So on the poster for the Rollerblade 7, it shows Hawk, and then on either side of him are three women with Rollerblades.

[40:17] And I only recognize Stella Speed and the Kabuki clown lady.

[40:23] And maybe in the first movie, there's seven good guy warriors.

Dan McCoy

[40:29] So this is the Rollerblade 4 in this case is what you're saying.

Elliott Kalan

[40:33] I mean, if anything, it's the Rollerblade 3 because I don't know – because it's not like – because Sister Sparrow is not really on Rollerblades, right?

Stuart Wellington

[40:40] Yeah, and they specifically only mention a trio of heroes, but it's okay.

[40:46] It's fine.

Elliott Kalan

[40:47] I mean, they're trying to cash in on the very valuable Rollerblade 7 franchise name.

Dan McCoy

[40:51] Yeah.

[40:51] Well, they're trying to cash in on Return of the Secaucus 7, of course.

[40:55] Uh-huh.

[40:56] John Sayles' picture.

[40:58] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[40:59] In his original script, they were all on Rollerblades.

[41:03] Yeah.

[41:03] It's true.

[41:04] Yeah.

[41:05] John, we can't afford these Rollerblades.

[41:07] Yeah.

[41:07] Because he was inspired by how when they made the Magnificent 7, they're like, you know what?

[41:14] Kurosawa couldn't afford Rollerblades for his samurai.

[41:18] So in the Western version, we're going to do Rollerblades.

[41:21] We have a Hollywood budget.

Elliott Kalan

[41:22] We can do the Rollerblades.

Stuart Wellington

[41:23] So they did the Rollerblades, and then it just didn't go over well with Tess's audience.

[41:27] So they had to digitally remove the Rollerblades and all the scenes and add horses under them.

Elliott Kalan

[41:30] Exactly.

[41:31] And then there was the Return of the Magnificent 7, in which they had to digitally remove that poop shot out of the armpits of each of the cowboys when they got surprised.

[41:38] But it's the only thing that made sense.

[41:40] At calling back to our earlier bit.

Dan McCoy

[41:40] It's the only thing that made sense.

[41:42] Yeah.

[41:42] I'm glad that you explained the way it called backwards.

[41:45] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[41:46] They had to – just in case this section is cut out for, say, as a clip, I want to make sure people know that that is not a random reference.

[41:53] But that was the earliest digital technology was removing those Rollerblades and then inserting horses in the Magnificent 7.

[41:59] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[42:00] So that was the whole movie.

[42:02] Stuart.

[42:03] I thought I did an okay job.

[42:05] Thank God.

[42:05] You did a great job.

[42:07] I kept it tight because you know what?

[42:09] Honestly, so much of this movie is just reused footage and there's almost no dialogue and lots of – like the music that you'd probably hear in a coffee shop that was near Scott Shaw's house.

Elliott Kalan

[42:23] Well, that last sequence, after they get married, there's a long rock song about whatever happened to America.

[42:30] Whatever happened to the – it's the pride of the Yankees.

[42:33] Oh, I didn't even hear that part.

[42:35] Oh, you didn't hear that?

[42:35] It's this long song.

[42:37] Maybe – I wonder if we saw different YouTube videos with different soundtracks possibly.

Stuart Wellington

[42:40] Man, that's awesome.

[42:41] That's like how Spider-Verse is different.

Elliott Kalan

[42:43] It's a long song that feels like it's being performed by like a band that would play at a local bar.

[42:49] Yeah.

[42:49] But it's all about whatever happened to America.

[42:52] A guy went to war.

[42:53] He came home and raised a family.

[42:55] And now what happened to that promise?

[42:56] And it's a very –

[42:57] Like Born in the USA.

[42:59] Yeah, kind of.

[43:00] I mean it was like a – not rip off of Born in the USA.

[43:02] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[43:04] It's like Born in the USA if it doesn't actually – is not actually taking a harsh look at, you know, like patriotism.

[43:10] It felt like it was the opposite.

Elliott Kalan

[43:12] It was like – it feels like it is the – maybe it's the conservative response to Born in the USA.

[43:16] Yeah.

[43:16] Where it's like why don't we love this country anymore?

[43:18] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[43:19] It's like the song version of the Easy Rider sequel.

Elliott Kalan

[43:22] Yes, exactly.

[43:22] And so I'm curious you guys didn't hear that song because that played over the entire ending of the movie.

[43:27] Oh, I heard that.

[43:27] Oh, you did.

[43:28] I probably heard it.

[43:28] I just wasn't paying close attention.

[43:30] You were just – you were so busy trying to figure out the movie for the notes that – whereas I, who, free of having to take notes on the summary of this movie, I felt very free to experience it in my own way.

[43:42] Here's the – okay, guys.

Stuart Wellington

[43:43] Yeah, I had a big whiteboard that had all the different characters and plot threads drawn out like I was watching Primer and trying to understand it.

[43:50] Yeah.

[43:51] So, guys, here's my question.

Elliott Kalan

[43:53] The same director without Scott Shaw, he also made a movie called Rollerblade Warriors Taken by Force from 1989.

[44:00] Here's the description IMDb.

[44:01] He also made Roller Gator.

[44:03] In the future, a warrior nun on roller skates must rescue a seer who is to be sacrificed by a band of mutants.

[44:09] And it makes me wonder, is that the like coherent version of this movie?

[44:15] Maybe.

[44:15] Because that sounds like this movie, but were they able to do it in a way where the story made any sense at all?

[44:20] It wasn't Zen filmmaking?

Dan McCoy

[44:22] I thought you were going to be like, is that this guy's fetish?

[44:25] People on Rollerblade?

Elliott Kalan

[44:26] That's very possible.

[44:27] That's very possible.

[44:28] I mean, he heard the song Sex on Wheels and he was like, yeah, yes, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[44:33] He saw Boogie Nights and he's like, oh, I could have just put this in a normal movie.

Dan McCoy

[44:40] Let's do our final judgments whether this is a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, a movie we kind of like.

[44:48] Like I said, I have –

Elliott Kalan

[44:49] I always love Dan's like troubled sigh after he announces what the ratings are.

Dan McCoy

[44:55] Well, like I said, early in the movie I had a certain amount of like –

[44:59] you know, I had hopes that it would have at least –

[45:05] Rondashier-sized hopes.

[45:06] Rondashier-sized – but also like the way that it was kind of making good use of its no budget in a way that I appreciate with these kind of like post-apocalyptic weird movies, low-budget films that you see.

[45:24] I – then hope was dashed as it went along and nothing made any sense at all.

[45:30] I'd say it's a bad, bad movie with the caveat that like if this was a video installation that ran on loop and it was just like a fantasia on the idea of low-budget post-apocalyptic movies,

[45:44] I would enjoy stopping by watching a little bit of it and moving on to the next exhibit.

Stuart Wellington

[45:51] Yeah.

[45:51] This is – well, this is the kind of movie that they would play – like I could see them playing this at the bar Freddy's in Brooklyn where one of the owners would like cut together these weird little video reels.

[46:06] And this is – like this feels like that, like the sort of thing where you're like, oh, it doesn't make sense, but it, you know, it looks weird and I'm drinking.

[46:13] Yeah.

[46:14] I would say, yeah, it's – I can't say it's necessarily a good, bad movie because I don't think it's fun to watch.

[46:21] And it wouldn't necessarily be fun to watch with other people.

[46:26] It – like you could put it on in the background at a party.

[46:29] Yes.

[46:30] But not something like you would want to watch to get any pleasure out of.

[46:35] So I guess I'll say bad, bad.

Elliott Kalan

[46:37] Yeah, I think I'm also going to say bad, bad.

[46:38] And I had not thought of the idea of using it as kind of like atmospheric wallpaper at an event.

[46:49] But I think that's the best way to use it.

[46:50] Dan, I appreciate that you thought of like a silver lining way to use what is objectively a piece of garbage.

[46:57] Just like objectively something that is barely a movie.

[47:01] And the idea – I feel like if anything maybe disproves the philosophy or concept of Zen filmmaking, it is this product of that.

[47:10] Although maybe the original Rollerblade 7 is really good.

[47:13] Maybe it really holds together.

[47:14] Maybe it's really fun.

[47:15] Maybe it's exciting.

[47:16] Maybe it has a kind of trippy, weird vibe that really takes you to an interesting place.

[47:21] Probably not.

[47:22] Judging by this, probably not.

[47:23] But yeah.

Dan McCoy

[47:25] You know what?

[47:26] Let us move on now.

[47:28] Please.

[47:28] Out of the wasteland.

Elliott Kalan

[47:31] But Stuart, you did a great job.

[47:32] I want to give you a medal of surprise for that.

[47:35] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[47:35] Everybody write your local congressman and tell him that Stuart did a great job.

Elliott Kalan

[47:39] Did a great job summarizing the Legend of the Rollerblade 7.

[47:41] And they should drop all other business until then.

Dan McCoy

[47:45] Mm-hmm.

[47:45] You know what might help you enjoy something like Legend of the Rollerblade 7 if, I don't know, a judge sentences you to watch it as, you know, for littering or something?

[47:57] I don't know.

[47:58] It's microdosing.

[48:01] Our show today is sponsored by microdose gummies.

[48:03] Microdose gummies deliver perfect entry-level doses of THC that help you feel just the right amount of good.

[48:09] If you want to, you know, if you're interested in maybe having some THC but you don't want to be zonked out, you just want to feel, as they say, just the right amount of good.

[48:19] I've had good experiences with these LumiLab gummies.

[48:24] They don't taste bad like some THC products do.

[48:31] They, you know, allow a little more mental flexibility in my life.

[48:37] I've enjoyed them.

[48:38] If you want to try them, microdose is available nationwide.

[48:43] To learn more about microdosing THC, go to microdose.com and use code FLOP.

[48:47] That's F-L-O-P to get free shipping and 30% off your first order.

[48:52] Links can be found in the show description.

[48:54] But, again, that is microdose.com, code FLOP.

Stuart Wellington

[48:58] We're also today sponsored by Squarespace.

[49:01] You know, these days everybody is online and you should be online and you should have a place for people to go visit you online.

[49:10] And Squarespace is where you can do that.

[49:13] Squarespace is your all-in-one platform for building your brand and growing your business online.

[49:18] You, you're a brand and you've got to build that thing.

[49:21] You can stand out with a beautiful website, engage with your audience, and sell anything.

[49:25] If you're not necessarily the most adept person at coding, Squarespace is going to help you out.

[49:31] Squarespace allows you to gain some insights into who's visiting your website and how they're interacting with your content.

[49:37] Squarespace has the tools you need to get your business off the ground.

[49:40] So if you want to go to the next step and go from brand to business,

[49:44] Squarespace has you covered with things like e-commerce templates, inventory management,

[49:50] a simple checkout process, and secure payments.

[49:55] Also, Squarespace has, is, uses the Fluid Engine, which is a next generation website design system

[50:02] with best-in-class website templates.

[50:07] Custom, you can customize every design detail with reimagined drag and drop technology.

[50:13] You know I love the drag and drops for desktop or for mobile.

[50:17] That's important because everybody's on their phone these days.

[50:20] So why don't you go to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial.

[50:25] And when you're ready to launch, use offer code flop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain.

Elliott Kalan

[50:33] And we also have a Jumbotron to read today.

[50:37] And this message is for Mickey and it's from Rob.

[50:41] And it says,

[50:41] Happy birthday, Mickey.

[50:42] Congratulations on your upcoming gender-affirming surgery.

[50:46] I and the entire family love and support you in everything you do.

[50:49] Thank you for the amazing conversations about all things movies,

[50:52] as well as your moving role play in everything IDM.

[50:56] It is a joy being your brother and sharing passions like the Flophouse.

[50:59] Thank you.

[51:00] Oh, what a sweet message.

[51:01] That was very sweet.

[51:02] That was very nice.

[51:03] Now to a slightly less sweet message because it's all about our own mercantile economic stuff.

[51:11] Sweet to us.

[51:12] Hey, we do this monthly thing.

[51:14] It's called Flop TV.

[51:16] It's usually, oh, hey, Dan.

[51:17] We do this monthly thing.

[51:19] It's usually the first Saturday of each month.

[51:21] In fact, I think each of the upcoming episodes is the first Saturday of each month.

Dan McCoy

[51:24] We don't have to disclaim anything.

Elliott Kalan

[51:25] No cap passed the one that is not the first.

[51:27] We passed the one that it wasn't.

[51:28] And where we do a roughly one-hour TV version of the Flophouse podcast

[51:33] where we're talking about movies that we have never covered on the podcast before.

[51:37] We have two great episodes so far, Beastmaster 2 and Cool World.

[51:40] All great movies.

[51:41] We've got another one coming up on October 7th.

[51:44] That's right, October 7th at 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Pacific.

[51:46] It's an all-American meat double feature, I'm calling it.

[51:51] Hot Dog the movie and Hamburger the motion picture.

[51:53] Two movies that I'm going to find out they're not just about making those things.

[51:57] I'm going to be real disappointed, but we'll see.

Dan McCoy

[51:59] Well, I know for a fact that one of them is not about that.

Elliott Kalan

[52:01] One of them I think is a skiing movie, right?

[52:03] Yeah.

[52:03] Which is-

Dan McCoy

[52:04] The other is legit about the food item.

[52:07] Let's see which.

Elliott Kalan

[52:08] Let's find out which one it is.

[52:10] So if you want to see those shows, they're really fun.

[52:13] They're super great.

[52:14] It's like watching a TV show.

[52:15] It usually fits into like a normal programming schedule time slot in case you have other things you want to do around those times.

Stuart Wellington

[52:20] If you want to see the inside of our homes.

Elliott Kalan

[52:23] Yeah.

[52:24] Well, I mean-

Dan McCoy

[52:26] Except for mine.

[52:26] Two of ours.

[52:27] Elliot puts up a virtual background.

[52:30] Just because the-

[52:30] He remains a man of mystery.

Elliott Kalan

[52:31] I don't really have a good home background.

[52:33] But you want to see it?

[52:34] Go to theflophouse.simpletix.com.

[52:37] Again, that's theflophouse.simpletix.com where you can buy tickets.

[52:41] You can buy individual tickets.

[52:42] You can buy a season pass.

[52:43] And you're like, hey, it's a six-episode season.

[52:46] Two episodes have gone by.

[52:47] Why should I get the season pass?

[52:48] Uh-uh-uh.

[52:49] Because the recordings of those episodes will stay up through the length of the series.

[52:53] So if you missed one of our episodes, that's totally great.

[52:56] You can still watch them.

[52:57] If you can't watch the show live, that's totally great.

[53:00] You can watch the recording later.

[53:01] So that's thefloptv at theflophouse.simpletix.com.

[53:05] You get your tickets and you get instructions on how to watch the show.

[53:08] But hey, guys, there's another show we're doing.

[53:10] What?

[53:10] It's not just on your computer.

[53:11] No.

[53:12] In fact, it's not on your computer at all.

[53:14] It's in a real room in real life with real people.

[53:17] Meat space.

[53:18] Yeah.

[53:19] Ironically, because it's not about Hot Dog the Movie or Hamburger the motion picture.

[53:22] This is the actual meat space on October 19th.

[53:25] That's a Thursday night here in Los Angeles at Vidiots, the Vidiots Movie Theater.

[53:29] We're going to be doing two original shows.

[53:32] That's right, two all-new shows at 6 p.m.

[53:34] We're going to be talking about Speed 2, Cruise Control.

[53:37] And at 8.45 p.m., we're going to be talking about Three Men and a Baby.

[53:40] And Three Men and a Baby is going to feature a certain special someone who's going to join us as a special guest.

Stuart Wellington

[53:47] Is it Willem Dafoe covered in leeches?

[53:50] You ruined the surprise yet again, Stuart.

Dan McCoy

[53:52] I don't even know what that's referencing.

[53:54] It just seems like an odd thing to say.

Elliott Kalan

[53:57] A favorite Flophouse guest is going to be joining us again.

[54:00] A guest, but you could also say a Flophouse star of the show.

[54:04] Wink, wink, wink.

Dan McCoy

[54:05] I am so excited to do these shows because, you know, we're not – I'm not writing for TV right now.

[54:12] I got no excuse to go to L.A.

[54:14] I'm going to get to go to L.A.

[54:15] I'm going to see my friend Elliot Kalin.

[54:18] I'm going to see my friend unnamed special guest.

[54:21] And it's going to be great.

Elliott Kalan

[54:23] So that's all – and Stuart's going to be there too.

[54:25] October 19th, tickets are available at vidiotsfoundation.org.

[54:32] Again, that's vidiotsfoundation.org.

[54:35] Two different shows.

[54:36] We're going to be doing presentations.

[54:37] We're going to talk about the movie.

[54:38] We'll take questions from the audience.

[54:39] An old-fashioned, classic, traditional Flophouse live show.

[54:42] And it's a double feature, you know, two in one.

[54:45] You need separate tickets for each one though.

[54:47] So it's going to be really fun.

[54:48] I'm looking forward to it too.

[54:49] Vidiots is a great space.

[54:50] It's got a great video store attached to it.

[54:53] And I'm so excited to be doing something through them.

[54:55] And with them.

[54:56] And that's the extent of our promotions for this episode.

Dan McCoy

[55:03] If you need a laugh and you're on the go, try S-T-O-P-P-O-D-C-A-S-T-I-A.

[55:09] Hmm.

[55:09] Were you trying to put the name of the podcast there?

[55:11] Yeah, I'm trying to spell it, but it's tricky.

Stuart Wellington

[55:14] Let me give it a try.

[55:15] Okay.

[55:16] If you need a laugh and you're on the go, call S-T-O-P-P-A-D-I.

Dan McCoy

[55:21] It'll never fit.

[55:22] No, it will.

[55:23] Let me try.

[55:25] If you need a laugh and you're on the go, try S-T-O-P-P-P-D-C-O-O.

[55:31] Ah, we are so close.

[55:33] Stop podcasting yourself.

[55:35] A podcast from MaximumFun.org.

Stuart Wellington

[55:38] If you need a laugh and you're on the go.

[55:42] I'm Iffy Whiteyway, the host of Maximum Film.

[55:44] I'm Alonzo Duralde, also the host of Maximum Film.

Dan McCoy

[55:47] And I'm Drea Clark, yet another host of Maximum Film.

[55:51] Every week we hosts Huddle Up.

Stuart Wellington

[55:53] Usually with an illustrious guest.

[55:55] And we talk about films.

[55:57] We have film news.

[55:58] We have film quizzes.

Dan McCoy

[55:59] We answer your film questions.

[56:03] It's like the maximum amount of film talk.

[56:06] That's why we call it Maximum Film.

Elliott Kalan

[56:09] Film.

[56:10] Maximum Film.

[56:11] The movie podcast that's not just a bunch of straight white guys.

[56:14] New episodes weekly on MaximumFun.org.

[56:18] Dan, what do we do next?

[56:19] We just rollerblade off into the wasteland?

Dan McCoy

[56:21] Well, not quite yet.

[56:22] What we're going to do is we're going to answer some letters from listeners.

[56:27] Like you?

[56:28] Like you.

[56:29] Especially if you wrote these letters.

[56:30] The first one.

[56:32] Pardon me.

[56:32] I'm burping up a storm.

[56:34] The first one is from Manhattan.

[56:35] What if that was.

[56:35] What if, Dan.

Elliott Kalan

[56:37] You can't pitch movies during the strike.

[56:38] But afterwards, burp storm is a pretty good concept to pitch.

[56:42] Ah, there's a storm of burps hitting the city.

Dan McCoy

[56:45] At the same time that a prisoner is being transferred.

[56:47] A decade or two back, sci-fi would have snapped that up right.

[56:51] Oh, for sure, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[56:52] There goes my knee again.

[56:54] It must be a burp storm coming.

[56:56] A general yelling at a scientist, how far away is the burp storm?

Dan McCoy

[57:00] Did that storm eat some barbecue?

Elliott Kalan

[57:03] The only way to defeat it is with a countervailing burp storm operating at opposite speeds in the opposite direction.

Dan McCoy

[57:10] Throw some Alka-Saltz here into that storm.

Elliott Kalan

[57:13] Get me eating competition champion Joey Chestnut.

Dan McCoy

[57:17] He's the only man who knows how to counter this level of burp.

Elliott Kalan

[57:22] He's the only man who can ingest enough beans to counteract the storm.

Dan McCoy

[57:27] This first letter is from Hansel from Chicago who writes,

[57:33] While listening to your episode on The Santa Claus 3, I realized that mental health care treatment in Christmas movies is often maligned for reasons.

[57:43] Not just Christmas movies, but anyway.

[57:45] Lots of reasons, yeah.

[57:46] In the Santa Claus trilogy, Judge Reinhold's therapist character is the original movie's primary antagonist.

Elliott Kalan

[57:55] Do you guys know Santa Claus is a Christmas movie?

[57:58] A lot of people don't know that.

Dan McCoy

[57:59] Oh.

[58:00] Like Die Hard.

[58:01] Yeah, like Die Hard.

[58:01] Santa Claus also.

Stuart Wellington

[58:02] Is that listed in the trivia section of IMDb?

Dan McCoy

[58:04] Yeah, it is.

[58:06] In 2019's Noel, Anna Kendrick, spoilers, is arrested in Phoenix, then detained in a mental health ward for saying she's from the North Pole.

[58:15] And that sounds kind of reasonable.

[58:17] But anyway.

[58:17] In Elf, Buddy is called certifiably insane by James Caan is a repeated trope of the genre, which adds little value to the story.

[58:25] This reminded me of comments Elliot has made about how many movies portray conspiracy theories as real and valid, which is at best lazy and at worst a troubling validation of conspiracy thinking in real life.

[58:41] Beyond real conspiracy theories and inaccurate mental health portrayals, are there any other alarming movie portrayals you want to complain about?

[58:49] What really grinds your gears?

[58:51] Keep on flopping.

[58:52] Hansel from Chicago.

[58:54] We talked about USA Up All Night earlier.

[58:57] The thing that sprung to my mind is—

[58:58] I will not have a word said against it, Daniel.

[59:02] A lot of the sex comedies I enjoyed as a youth, you know, upon closer—not that close examination, are filled with bad messages.

[59:12] Upon a cursory glance.

[59:14] Including that coercive sex is okay.

[59:19] Yeah.

[59:19] Peeping is okay.

[59:22] It is amazing how—

Elliott Kalan

[59:22] Just general harassment.

[59:24] Peeping—this was not what I was going to bring up, but you're right that peeping for many years in movies was considered like,

[59:30] Oh, what a lovably scampish thing to do.

[59:33] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[59:34] If anything, this is a hero for spying on these women while they're changing clothes or whatever.

[59:38] And it's—that's horrifying.

[59:39] That's terrible.

[59:40] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[59:40] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[59:40] And even on a lesser, like, level, like, romantic comedies just had, like, a bunch of bad messages about not taking no for an answer.

[59:51] Well, that's what I actually wanted to talk about.

Elliott Kalan

[59:53] Yeah.

[59:53] I feel like one of the most dangerous messages that, I guess, the movies we grew up with presented—and it's not just the movies we grew up with,

[1:00:00] but it was—I feel like it was especially prevalent because there were so many kind of romantic comedies of this type when we were going on—

[1:00:05] Yeah.

[1:00:06] is the idea of a kind of fairly depressing guy who has a crush on someone, and the movie insists that the only just thing in the universe is for that crush to blossom into love,

[1:00:25] which went with the other person returning their feelings.

[1:00:27] But also that idea that if you don't take no, you can wear someone down into romance.

[1:00:33] Or if you do something big enough or crazy enough or persistent enough that eventually they will give in in a way that is a legitimate form of romance.

[1:00:42] I think that's a genuinely emotionally damaging message both to women who would become, I assume, the targets of this and also to men who don't learn how to mature into emotionally adult human beings, you know, who understand what love and romance are.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:56] Traditionally, their fathers don't teach them how to be emotionally mature human beings.

[1:01:03] That's weird.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:03] No, not at all.

[1:01:04] Not at all.

[1:01:05] In some cases, it's the other way around often.

[1:01:09] So, yeah, that was what I wanted to bring up.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:11] I feel like—oh, wow, it's raining outside.

[1:01:13] Not over here in sunny L.A.

[1:01:15] Must be God crying.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:15] So I hope you enjoyed that report of what the weather was like in Brooklyn about two weeks before you were hearing this.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:25] It's less of a weather forecast and more of a weather flashback, yeah.

[1:01:29] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:31] Here we are in this two weeks ago weather flashback weekend.

[1:01:36] And what are we playing?

[1:01:38] We're playing some rain is coming down.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:41] I'm Sam Flashback, the only weather forecaster who's always right because I say it after the fact.

[1:01:47] I'll tell you down to the minute when the rain started and stopped so you can plan your past.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:53] Yeah, I think—I mean, I think you guys kind of touched on the first thing that popped into my head.

[1:01:57] But obviously, there's a variety of other things like, I don't know, portraying police as heroes.

[1:02:03] Sure.

[1:02:05] Or, like, jokes about, like, obese people, like, stuff like that.

[1:02:11] Gross, stuff like that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:12] Yeah.

[1:02:12] I just rewatched—

[1:02:13] I mean, there's also huge, you know, and also racism in all forms.

[1:02:17] Yeah, of course.

Dan McCoy

[1:02:18] Certainly the elevation of the idea of, like, the cop who doesn't play by the rules.

[1:02:22] Yeah, that's bad.

[1:02:23] No, thank you.

[1:02:24] I would like a cop that plays by all the rules, please.

[1:02:27] Maybe give him more rules.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:28] I mean, when a police officer is on the side of the actual just thing that would happen in the world, the universe, like, that can be a heroic story.

[1:02:40] But yeah, the valorization of cops who are—that what makes them heroic is that they refuse to follow even the most basic laws and rely on violent force to get things done.

[1:02:51] Like, that's a bad message to send.

[1:02:53] Yeah.

[1:02:54] And that eventually leads you to things like cops being like, yeah, that's why I have a Punisher skull on my stuff.

[1:03:01] And it's like, well, you know that he's a murderer.

[1:03:03] You know that maniac cop is the bad guy in the movie.

[1:03:08] But yeah, that's a—I feel like this is something I see a little bit less of, but I feel like the—there was a period when, for a lot of times in movies, you'd see this kind of implicit idea that there's something romantic about being kind of depressed.

[1:03:22] And that to be creative requires a certain amount of depression and emotional alienation and social isolation, which is also not a healthy message, you know?

[1:03:31] No.

[1:03:31] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:33] So this next letter, this is from Michael, last name without—or perhaps Michel, depending on what—

[1:03:43] Imperioli.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:45] Michel Imperioli, yep, the French version.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:48] Dear Flophouse, something that has been bugging me lately about movies and TV is the apparent lack of dialect diversity, as in there don't seem to be any regional or even foreign accent these days.

[1:04:00] There's a single standard American accent, in quotes, that everyone seems to share.

[1:04:06] And then at most, you might get some people who speak with an extra Californian voice, but not much more than that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:11] Every now and then someone Southern.

[1:04:13] Every now and then.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:14] Yes.

[1:04:15] Have you noticed this at all?

[1:04:16] Am I just not watching enough?

[1:04:18] Does it even really matter?

[1:04:19] It might make me sad that no one on TV sounds like my grandparents from upstate New York and Oklahoma, but it's not like they're ethnic minorities.

[1:04:25] While modern Hollywood does more work at representing people than ever before, even if they mostly just all sound the same.

[1:04:32] It just bugs me personally that this is a whole dimension to the human experience that isn't seeming to be used.

[1:04:38] This also seems to be in contrast with media from England, where there's a lot more regional or socioeconomic accents, as well as things from Japan that often have trouble translating their own dialect diversity into American media.

[1:04:50] So translators sometimes use English accents to bulk out their tool set.

[1:04:55] Or even older American media, which seems to freely use a lot more accents than the current stuff.

[1:05:00] So there's not really a direct question there, but it was an interesting topic.

[1:05:04] I wanted to bring it up.

[1:05:06] Is this something you've noticed yourselves?

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:08] Well, older media featured a lot of like old-timey New York accents, right?

[1:05:11] Like, hey, see?

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:12] Well, I feel like there is a kind of New York, Boston mishmash accent that gets used a lot by guys who are supposed to be like in crime movies or if they're, say, Tom Hardy playing Venom.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:25] Well, I mean, that's a case where I hear those accents in movies and TV more often than I do in my actual life in New York most of the time.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:33] I think there's – I think what the letter writer is talking about is probably a real – I think there's a – there's an effort being made for racial diversity in casting.

[1:05:44] But there's not really an effort being made in diverse types of viewpoint or – and especially not socioeconomic diversity in film.

[1:05:53] At a certain point, almost every movie seemed to be about a rich person unless it was, you know, fucking Hillbilly Junction.

[1:06:01] What was the movie?

[1:06:01] Hillbillyology?

[1:06:02] Hillbilly Junction.

[1:06:03] Unless it's about –

[1:06:05] Welcome to Hillbilly Junction.

[1:06:08] Sure is good to have you here.

[1:06:09] It's not what you think.

[1:06:10] It was named after Thaddeus Hillbilly.

[1:06:13] It was named after Duke Thaddeus Hillbilly who founded this – who sponsored the exploration that led to this colony.

[1:06:21] But the – so I think there is a – at a certain point, Hollywood or rather mainstream American film and television stopped making as much stuff about people who are not rich because –

[1:06:33] I think there's a fantasy of affluence.

[1:06:35] It's just easier.

[1:06:36] And this – and it's – it just is prettier to look at on screen.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:40] I mean also, I think a lot of the people who are the money people behind movies, greenlighting movies – yes.

[1:06:46] You know, are rich.

[1:06:48] So they don't –

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:48] Not necessarily the creative people involved.

[1:06:49] But yes, the money people want something that they can understand and relate to.

[1:06:53] And I think that does involve a flattening of accents, a flattening of types of character personality.

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:59] So why is this character not driving a Tesla?

[1:07:01] I would also –

[1:07:03] He seems like a reasonable person.

[1:07:04] Why would he be driving a Tesla?

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:06] And there is a – and in America for – I'm the thousand millionth person to say this.

[1:07:11] There is a blindness to the existence of class in many ways.

[1:07:15] And it's something that we used to pride ourselves on that we don't have fixed classes.

[1:07:18] And that turned into this idea that America has no classes and we don't need to talk about it.

[1:07:21] Whereas in England, they're super – they're still super in a class system and like you can still – they still kind of take this perverse pride in being able to judge and pigeonhole somebody by what neighborhood they came from based on how they pronounce different words and things like that.

[1:07:35] So I think when they're comparing it to British stuff, it's just still such a fact of British culture.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:40] Also like –

[1:07:41] It's my take on it.

[1:07:42] England has so many different accents.

[1:07:45] In such a small space.

[1:07:46] For such a small space, yeah.

[1:07:48] I also – one thing I would like to posit is that a lot of it has to do with, you know, obviously most movies are shot in Hollywood.

[1:07:57] And for financial reasons, they don't like to shoot on location.

[1:08:01] And now that so many things are just CGI'd in any way, like there's even less reason for people to shoot on location.

[1:08:09] Even when that adds so much in terms of like character and if you're like hiring local actors.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:16] Well, I mean the fact that like so much is shot in Atlanta now.

[1:08:19] Yeah.

[1:08:20] But it's not like things have an Atlanta flavor to them or anything like that.

[1:08:23] Because it is all on digital sound stages and stuff like that.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:25] And I feel like also even with like animated work, there's such a push for like known non-animation actors to do all the voices.

[1:08:35] And you're like, but they all have boring sounding voices.

[1:08:37] I want voice actors who have cool weird sounding voices.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:40] I feel like this – it's kind of like one consequence of that larger kind of cultural flattening that people have been complaining about in America for many decades.

[1:08:51] That like the idea of regional things is not quite the same because everyone goes to the same chain stores and goes to – and has – watches the same shows on TV, listens to the same songs.

[1:09:00] I mean ironically –

[1:09:01] Except for like how to with John Wilson.

[1:09:04] Well, the thing is –

[1:09:05] The most New York thing in the world.

[1:09:07] Yes, that's true.

[1:09:07] Well, there's obviously lots of exceptions.

[1:09:10] It's funny because people are always like our culture is too fractured.

[1:09:13] Nobody shares a common thing.

[1:09:15] But at the same time, the general flavor of culture has kind of become this – for the most part a tepid mishmash.

[1:09:21] Whereas in the past like you also would see like regional filmmaking where it was like this movie is for this particular market.

[1:09:28] Like we know we can make this much money in this market.

[1:09:30] So we're going to make a movie that is aimed at that market.

[1:09:32] And now it's much more of a like, well, every movie is going to cost us $200 to $700 million.

[1:09:39] So we can't –

[1:09:39] So it has to have the widest possible appeal.

[1:09:41] And the most you can get towards a dialect is like there's the immigrant shopkeeper who goes like, yeah, Spidey, as Spider-Man swings by, you know.

[1:09:48] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:50] Okay.

[1:09:50] Well, let's move on to the final segment, which is recommendations, things that would be a better use of your time than The Legend of the Rollerblade 7.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:01] I mean, it's hard to imagine something that would be a worse use of your time than The Legend of Rollerblade 7.

[1:10:05] Yeah.

[1:10:05] Like taking – just taking a club and hitting yourself over the head with it.

[1:10:10] That would, I guess, be a worse use of your time, you know.

[1:10:12] Jeez Louise.

[1:10:13] So –

[1:10:14] Like just like just locking yourself in a bank vault for a year, like that would be a worse use of your time, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:19] Well, the Writers Guild is on strike.

[1:10:23] SAG after us, well, of course, but we're – Elliot and I are members of the Writers Guild.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:27] You're behind camera talent is what you're saying.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:29] Yes, we are not pretty enough to be featured.

[1:10:31] I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:31] Dan played Santa Claus once in that Daily Show episode, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:10:35] That's true.

[1:10:36] And Stuart and I were, of course, in the major motion picture snatchers.

[1:10:40] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:10:40] We were in the major motion picture snatchers.

[1:10:42] And I think there was a little guy in the tube man.

[1:10:45] But we're not talking about me.

[1:10:47] We're talking about you guys.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:48] And that was a voice only.

[1:10:49] So you were not in front of the camera for that.

[1:10:51] But you did look very pretty.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:52] But that's why I'm saying we need more great voice actors like me.

[1:10:55] No, we're trying to recommend things that aren't current media at the very least.

[1:11:01] And, boy, am I recommending something that, you know, people probably don't watch in general that frequently.

[1:11:11] It's called The Dark Backward.

[1:11:12] Dogfighting?

[1:11:13] Daniel.

[1:11:13] No.

[1:11:14] No, it's a movie called The Dark Backward from 1991 directed by Adam Rifkin of Invisible Maniac fame.

[1:11:22] It is a movie set, like, talk about low-budget dystopias.

[1:11:26] It is set in this weird garbage world that feels like sort of a Pee-wee's Playhouse version of Delicatessen by way of, like, the grossest Monty Python sketch you would see.

[1:11:37] And it has Judd Nelson playing an extremely sweaty, introverted, bad stand-up comic.

[1:11:46] And it has Bill Paxton playing his best friend who's, like, if you think Bill Paxton is giving it his all in Aliens, like, ten times that amount.

[1:11:58] It is, like, full-on, like, over-the-top but beautiful Bill Paxton.

[1:12:02] And he, like, moves from being sort of all, like, chummy, like, best friend to, like, chillingly unfeeling from scene to scene.

[1:12:14] What a talent.

[1:12:15] Yeah.

[1:12:16] R.I.P.

[1:12:16] Have you seen this, Stuart?

[1:12:17] You were nodding along.

[1:12:18] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:12:19] It is a film that is, like, about, it is, like, really trying to make things as unpleasant for you as possible but in a weirdly sweet kind of way.

[1:12:28] Like, there's something about it that doesn't just feel like edgelord unpleasantness.

[1:12:33] It just feels like, I don't know, like, what if we put a bunch of trash in your eyes but made you enjoy it somehow?

[1:12:42] I had a lot of fun watching it.

[1:12:44] Like, there's stuff in it that, like, I really, really laughed at.

[1:12:46] I think it repeats itself a little, maybe.

[1:12:48] It's a little long.

[1:12:49] Like, Adam Rifkin wrote the screenplay when he was, like, 19.

[1:12:52] So I think we can forgive him for maybe hammering a few things a little too much.

[1:12:58] But if you're a fan of weird movies, if me talking about how unpleasant a lot of it is intrigues you rather than put you off, you might like this movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13:11] As Dan said, we're trying not to recommend new stuff.

[1:13:14] And, in fact, I'm not going to recommend a movie at all today.

[1:13:17] I'm going to recommend my favorite board game from the last couple years.

[1:13:21] I'm going to recommend a game called Root.

[1:13:24] It's put out by, published by Later Games.

[1:13:27] It's created by Cole Worley, one of my favorite game designers.

[1:13:31] I try to play all of his games.

[1:13:33] Root is a asymmetric war game with very cute little animal creatures that are fighting for control over a woodland.

[1:13:42] And all the various factions play completely differently.

[1:13:46] As a fan of game systems, I find it kind of fascinating.

[1:13:50] But as a gameplay experience, it is one where you are kind of constantly – there's constant player interaction, which I like.

[1:14:01] I like a game where everybody at the table is – in order to do something, you are getting in somebody else's way, and it forces interaction between players as opposed to a complicated solitaire-type game.

[1:14:16] Root is very cute.

[1:14:17] You can get it at specialty game shops.

[1:14:19] If you like a challenging game experience, why don't you check it out?

[1:14:22] And I think it also – it just started being sold at Target, so it's available out there.

[1:14:28] R-O-O-T, Root.

[1:14:30] Check it out.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:31] And I'm going to recommend also a movie.

[1:14:34] I'm not going to recommend a game, but I recommend a movie that I guess you could make a game out of if you wanted to.

[1:14:39] Well, probably not, actually.

[1:14:41] It's okay, Elliot.

[1:14:42] It's a clue, right?

[1:14:43] For not recommending a game.

[1:14:44] I can't figure it out.

[1:14:45] Well, maybe – it's called Rubik's Cube.

[1:14:47] It's a cube, and you Rubik, and you just Rubik around.

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:51] I made a show about it.

[1:14:52] Elliot's recommending Escape Room Tournament of Champions.

[1:14:56] That's odd for Elliot, but I'll go along with it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:58] So this movie I want to recommend is a short documentary that Martin Scorsese directed in 1978 called American Boy.

[1:15:06] And this is a series of stories being told by Stephen Prince, who is best known to me as the man who played the gun dealer in Taxi Driver, who is handing off all that stuff.

[1:15:18] But you want a new Cadillac with pink slip, I'll get it for you, that kind of stuff.

[1:15:23] He was someone who worked in kind of stage management and live performance tech, and he tells a series of stories about growing up in the United States in the 50s and his experiences working that become increasingly dark as they become more and more about his experiences as a drug addict and with violence.

[1:15:45] And he's an entertaining storyteller, but the stories themselves kind of like get harsher and harsher in a way that I never found disturbing.

[1:15:55] But instead, it feels like you are seeing both sides of kind of the American story because this is interspersed with home movie footage of him as a little kid where you're hearing about his family, his upbringing, being – you know, growing up in the time that our parents grew up in.

[1:16:12] And then you're hearing about these kind of underworld tales and sometimes just frightening things and sometimes just decadent things.

[1:16:20] And among the stories he tells, one involves him having to stab a woman undergoing an overdose with an adrenaline needle, and it was that story that inspired that scene in Pulp Fiction.

[1:16:30] So if you want to know the, I guess, true life event that inspired that famous scene, he's talking about it.

[1:16:37] And it's – yeah, it's a movie I had been wanting to see for a long time, and I recently was able to.

[1:16:44] And it is – I found it very entertaining and riveting considering it's just a guy sitting down telling these stories.

[1:16:49] Although it opens with – it's one of the few interview documentaries that somehow opens with a fight scene.

[1:16:54] And you'll see how that happens if you watch it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:58] And it's called The Boy and His Blob.

[1:16:59] What's it called?

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:01] It's called The Boy and His Blob.

[1:17:02] It's called The Boy and His Blob.

[1:17:03] It's called Toe Jam and Earl.

[1:17:05] Yep.

[1:17:05] No, it's called American Boy.

[1:17:07] And Earl in this economy?

[1:17:09] It's called Cocker's Bad Fur Day.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:14] And those are the names of some video games from our past.

[1:17:17] They are.

[1:17:18] Yeah, I mean, we can mention more if you want.

[1:17:19] Marble Madness, Bubble Bobble.

[1:17:21] Yeah.

[1:17:23] It's all true.

[1:17:23] Kid Icarus.

[1:17:25] And so, Rue and Hallie was like, I played Kid Icarus too.

[1:17:31] Hey, everyone.

[1:17:33] Before I go, one more plug.

[1:17:36] If you go to theflophouse.simpletix.com, you can buy tickets for Flop TV if that's a thing that interests you.

[1:17:42] If you are in the L.A. area, we have shows coming up at Vidiot's in October.

[1:17:49] You can buy through their website.

[1:17:51] Go to vidiot'sfoundation.org.

[1:17:53] Yeah, I will hopefully remember to put a website link on our site as well by then.

[1:18:01] And I would like to thank our producer, Alex Smith, who goes by the name Howell Dottie on various internet sites.

[1:18:12] Look up his work, including his own podcast, Fast Track.

[1:18:15] Go to maximumfund.org, our podcasting network, to find other great shows.

[1:18:23] If you like this show, we are supported entirely.

[1:18:28] Well, not entirely.

[1:18:28] We get a little advertising.

[1:18:30] But in overwhelming amount by listeners through memberships of MaxFun, if you cannot afford at this point to support us that way, you can spread the word about the Flophouse.

[1:18:42] If you have a good review on iTunes, if you have a good review on iTunes.

[1:18:52] A good one, please.

[1:18:53] If you have a bad review, you can write it down.

[1:18:55] Put it in an envelope and slip it down the sewers for Michelangelo and Contello.

[1:19:02] No, because then the Ninja Turtles might not listen to the podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:05] If you have a bad review, write it on paper.

[1:19:07] Just put it in an envelope.

[1:19:08] Shove it up your butt.

[1:19:09] You don't need to hear it.

[1:19:10] But if you do leave us a negative review, please be clear if it's because you don't enjoy our politics so that we can then dismiss your negative review out of hand.

[1:19:18] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:19:20] But I guess that's all I have to say about that.

[1:19:22] For the Flophouse, I've been Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:25] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[1:19:27] And I'm Elliot Kalin saying, hey, guys, let's roll.

[1:19:32] On wheels.

[1:19:32] On rollerblade wheels.

[1:19:33] That's cool.

[1:19:33] No, I like it.

[1:19:34] That's cool.

[1:19:35] Yeah, yeah.

[1:19:36] Wait, hold on.

[1:19:36] Let me try again.

[1:19:37] Guys, let's rollerblade.

[1:19:39] Does that work?

[1:19:40] That's not as cool.

[1:19:41] Okay, how about this?

[1:19:42] Guys, let's seven.

[1:19:46] One more.

[1:19:47] Hey, guys.

[1:19:49] Let's end the show.

[1:19:51] Bye.

[1:19:51] Banger.

Dan McCoy

[1:19:59] Hey, everyone, and welcome to...

[1:20:02] No, that's not how it starts.

[1:20:03] We've got to do an intro first.

[1:20:05] No, not at all.

[1:20:05] Not at all.

[1:20:07] Okay.

[1:20:08] And it goes like this.

[1:20:10] On this episode, we discuss the legend of the Rollerblade 7.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20:14] Part two in our Legends series.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:19] A legendary small member.

[1:20:22] Okay, let's go.

[1:20:24] Maximum Fun.

[1:20:25] A worker-owned network.

[1:20:27] Of artists-owned shows.

[1:20:29] Supported.

[1:20:29] Directly.

[1:20:30] By you.

Ep.#405 - The Legend of the Roller Blade Seven

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