Flop House Classics - Fateful Findings

[0:00] Greetings Flop House listeners new and old. A note of explanation as the 400th

[0:07] episode of the show approaches we thought we would put out some favorite

[0:12] episodes just a few in the week leading up to the 400th. We each picked one. I

[0:20] picked this one in part because it was the one that came up the most when

[0:24] talking to listeners. So you guys really enjoyed this one. I understand why. This

[0:30] is our first encounter with Mr. Neil Breen. A very interesting fellow. If

[0:40] you've never heard this episode you will understand why. And coming across this

[0:45] was on the level of, I don't know, seeing the room for the first time. Another

[0:50] similar vanity project from another unusual person behind the camera. When we

[0:58] encountered it, it was much like the movie says, a magical day. I want to take

[1:05] a brief note to say that up top I addressed some kind of serious personal

[1:10] business, which is kind of an odd thing to have on one of these best episodes.

[1:17] This was right when I was getting a divorce. Long time listeners at the time

[1:23] will have been surprised by it. But I just want to assure everyone, you know,

[1:29] many years on it was for the best for me. It was for the best for my ex. And we're

[1:38] both happy where we are now. And also to say that because this is an older

[1:44] episode, I don't know, maybe we say something dumb on here. Maybe the sound

[1:49] isn't quite as good as it's gotten since we got a dedicated producer. Apologies

[1:55] for that. We got better. But I hope you enjoy this episode. Fateful Findings.

[2:04] On tonight's episode we watched Indy Darling. Fateful Frightenings. No,

[2:09] Fateful Findings. Fateful Findings. No, Fateful Findings. Fateful Findings.

[2:17] Five O'Clock Goes West. What?

[2:39] Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy. As always, I am

[2:50] Stuart Wellington. And sometimes I'm not me. But today I am. I'm Ellie Kalin.

[2:55] Great. So if you're tuning in for the first time, this is a podcast where we

[3:02] watch a bad movie. Hey, thanks for tuning in. And then we talk about it.

[3:06] It's a weird time to interject that, Stuart. Yeah. Hey, friends, and new

[3:11] friends, old friends, and you friends. Thanks, Theodore Geisel. Poet Laureate of

[3:19] the Flophouse, Stuart Wellington. Hey, for new listeners, maybe you can shut off

[3:24] your brains for a moment. But for old listeners, so much is directed to new

[3:30] listeners. Were you just encouraging them to commit suicide? Yeah. Well, we'll

[3:34] get back to that later on in Fateful Findings. Spoiler alert. Spoiler, you

[3:40] heard it already in the intro. But yeah, for old listeners, I have a little thing

[3:47] I want to address off the top. I wanted to take a moment to say one personal

[3:52] thing. And that's that my wife and I are separating. And I only share this with

[3:59] you guys briefly so I don't have to talk around the changes in my life and

[4:02] pretend they haven't happened, which I think would be weird. But otherwise, this

[4:07] is obviously a very private thing, and I like to keep it that way. But just

[4:12] because the Internet has a tendency to be a cruel place where people take sides

[4:16] on things, I just want to reiterate that there are no sides to be taken

[4:20] here. My wife, soon to be ex, but my wife, Sarah, is the best person I know, and we

[4:28] remain great friends. And we always will. And so I just wanted to say that off the

[4:34] top before we get back to being funny. And also, we've had a lot of

[4:39] people write in and say that the podcast has helped them through bad

[4:42] times. And I want to say that the podcast is helping me through bad times, too. So I

[4:48] appreciate it. But that's that. I think I speak for everyone here at Flophouse Co.

[4:54] when I say that we love you very much, and we're here for you. And what

[5:04] that means in practical terms is, if people want to go on the Facebook page

[5:07] and make jokes about this being because Dan's boring or something, then we'll

[5:12] probably blow up your house and kill your pets. So maybe don't do that, okay?

[5:16] You're gonna kill Dan's pets? No, not Dan's pets. Although I don't like his cat. The people

[5:21] who say those things. But that's just because you're allergic. Let's keep it clean, yeah.

[5:25] Let's keep it clean, Facebook friends. Above the belt. Keep it above the belt.

[5:29] Maybe be human beings on this one. It's not for everybody on the page, just for a

[5:33] few people who are jerks. But we don't need to dwell on that.

[5:38] Dan, we didn't watch a movie tonight. What? This is all we're gonna talk about.

[5:41] Oh boy. Now we can get back to being funny. I wanted to address that off the top so

[5:48] we can take the bad taste of it out of our mouths by then doing our regular

[5:52] show. Kind of a lot of pressure. Let's take the top off. Much like this movie

[5:57] threatens to do many times. No, it takes up plenty of tops off. You just don't see

[6:01] what's underneath it. It drops them on the ground outside of frame. Because Dan, look, let's just

[6:08] say one thing. Yeah. I'm just gonna kill the suspense on this one

[6:12] about whether I like this movie. The movie we watched tonight was Faithful

[6:16] Findings. Faithful Findings. Faithful Findings. It was a Faithful Findings movie I've wanted to see for over a year now, I think, since I first saw it advertised online. And it was amazing. Look, you can have your roomses and your burdemics. Now I'm a Faithful Findings man.

[6:33] Welcome to Smallvember, everybody. Yeah, that's the thing. This is definitely a Smalltember movie.

[6:37] No, it's a Smallvember movie because Smalltember doesn't exist.

[6:41] This is a movie that I have to tell a little story, which is that...

[6:46] So gather round the hearth, Kinder.

[6:48] Another one of Dan McCoy's movie tales.

[6:52] Actually, hold on for a second. Sorry, I had to briefly pause the recording to grab a letter, which was...

[6:59] Way to pull back the curtain, wizard.

[7:03] I had planned to...

[7:04] Wizards and their curtains.

[7:06] I really wanted to watch this movie for Smalltember after seeing the trailer, and I tried buying it from the person who made it.

[7:17] What's his name?

[7:18] Mr. Neil Breen. It was written, directed, produced by and stars Neil Breen, who in his spare time is an architect.

[7:25] And a handsome hard body.

[7:27] All the time.

[7:28] The movie would have you believe a handsome hard body who is catnip to the ladies.

[7:32] Even though the ladies in the movie kiss him as kind of chastely and with as little pleasure on their faces as possible.

[7:38] That's the thing. They're worried that they might cut themselves on his diamond-like chiseled features.

[7:43] But I went on the Fateful Findings website and tried to purchase it direct from the source.

[7:48] And I paid the money and the DVD never showed up, which is very appropriate to the movie Fateful Findings.

[7:56] But, as if by magic, Flophouse fan Josh Hollis, the guy who's done a bunch of great Flophouse Photoshop.

[8:08] He did copies of the Flophouse Inquirer with a bunch of great Flophouse in-jokes.

[8:14] But he mailed a copy of the DVD for Fateful Findings to us unbeknownst...

[8:20] Like he did not know that it was something that we wanted to watch and it just magically appeared right before.

[8:26] Hey, so in a way, didn't you get the DVD you bought?

[8:28] Yeah, as if by kismet.

[8:30] Yep, it's almost like a mushroom magically morphed into that DVD.

[8:34] Yeah, which leads us into, I guess, the...

[8:36] Well, let's just say this was a case of serendipity when fate has a sense of humor.

[8:41] Just trying junkies out.

[8:44] So, Neil Brain is an independent filmmaker and also an architect.

[8:47] The most independent.

[8:49] Independent from logic, skill, talent, storytelling ability.

[8:54] And let me...

[8:54] Often alone in the shots that he shoots.

[8:57] Let me just say that the subtitle on the poster for Fateful Findings is...

[9:01] This is the subtitle on the poster.

[9:03] A paranormal thriller where a computer hacker exposes worldwide secrets.

[9:07] That...

[9:08] That is much more succinct than the movie.

[9:10] It describes about two or three of the six or so plots that are going on in this movie, which include...

[9:15] It's going to be so hard to talk about this movie in chronological order, but let's...

[9:19] So, I'm just going to mention off the top.

[9:20] We're going to try.

[9:21] Just mention off the top that there's a novelist computer hacker who exposes secret government and corporate secrets, as he calls them.

[9:29] His drug-addicted, pill-popping wife.

[9:32] His drunk neighbor, whose wife does not want to have sex with him.

[9:36] He's crazy.

[9:37] Teen neighbor...

[9:38] The teen daughter of his neighbors who is trying to seduce him.

[9:40] Also, there's a ghost and also magic stone powers.

[9:46] And disappearing people.

[9:47] Just a bunch of random disappearing people who we don't quite understand.

[9:51] Two psychotherapists.

[9:52] Two psychotherapists, one of whom is some sort of paranormal ghost spirit.

[9:56] Yeah, like an old gypsy woman.

[9:58] Not very good at his job.

[9:59] Yep.

[10:00] And so let's start from the beginning, shall we?

[10:02] We begin sometime in the past.

[10:04] There are two kids who are tromping through the woods,

[10:06] as kids do, and they find a mushroom

[10:08] on the ground which dissolves into a magic box of stones.

[10:12] So we're in like Russo-Finnish folktale territory already.

[10:16] It doesn't do the normal thing that a mushroom does,

[10:18] which is either make someone larger or smaller

[10:21] or make Super Mario more super.

[10:23] That's what makes him bigger.

[10:24] Yeah, that's just science.

[10:26] Yeah.

[10:27] Well, the thing is you want to get the right mushroom.

[10:29] Some mushrooms make you bigger and smaller.

[10:31] Some turn you super.

[10:32] One gives you like an extra guy or something, right?

[10:35] Yeah.

[10:35] Yeah, yeah.

[10:36] There's a one-up mushroom.

[10:37] Mm-hmm.

[10:37] And some of them just make you real nice.

[10:40] I don't know what that means.

[10:41] Make you real nice.

[10:44] I don't understand.

[10:45] You know.

[10:46] Like a mushroom that teaches you etiquette and politeness.

[10:49] Wink.

[10:51] How's your eye making that sound every time you wink, man?

[10:53] That's really annoying.

[10:54] I've got a disease.

[10:56] So they find this magic mushroom, which is not a drug.

[10:59] It's an actual mushroom that's magic.

[11:00] Yeah.

[11:01] They take stones from it, and the girl writes in her diary.

[11:04] It turns into a little box in a bag,

[11:06] and they just keep pushing the rope that ties the bag over.

[11:09] And then they cover it up with grass,

[11:11] and it turns back into a mushroom.

[11:12] And oh, by the way, there was a cattle skull that kind of like

[11:16] just kind of nodded towards it.

[11:17] And after finding this magical box mushroom,

[11:19] the young girl writes in her diary, it's a wonderful day.

[11:23] It's the magic mushroom.

[11:24] It's a magical day.

[11:25] Oh, shit.

[11:26] She writes it like a whole.

[11:28] I watch a different movie.

[11:28] That's the one thing she writes on the page, like diagonally.

[11:32] Across the lines.

[11:34] It's a magical day.

[11:35] Unfortunately, she and her family are moving away,

[11:38] and a voiceover tells us that she has a bracelet.

[11:43] That's important for later.

[11:44] A voiceover from the boy, now a grown man,

[11:46] played by Neil Breen, tells us that he never

[11:48] heard from her again, and he never saw her again

[11:50] at the end of that magical summer.

[11:52] And there's like eight shots of the car driving away,

[11:55] and the kid running after waving at it.

[11:58] And the distance that the kid is from the car

[12:01] keeps shifting from shot to shot.

[12:04] And the car is moving at three miles an hour as it drives away.

[12:08] Let's just.

[12:09] And it's as if he found two children who have never

[12:12] waved before in their life.

[12:14] And then he had a dog teach them how to do it.

[12:16] Yeah.

[12:20] Let's just, right at the top, mention

[12:22] that everything in this movie is done at the lowest

[12:24] level of competency possible.

[12:26] Everything this movie does is wrong.

[12:28] But it's like in a great way.

[12:31] If I was trying desperately hard to make a movie that

[12:35] was poorly made and was terrible in no sense,

[12:38] I would never be able to achieve it.

[12:40] I would have to unlearn so much basic film grammar.

[12:43] No, Tim and Eric could only dream of making this movie.

[12:46] They hope one day to sit at the feet

[12:48] of this Buddha of filmmaking.

[12:50] Like, compared to this guy, Tommy Wiseau

[12:52] is like Hitchcock, you know, basically.

[12:54] And that is not an exaggeration.

[12:56] The room is much more competently

[12:58] made than this film.

[12:59] So we flash forward to the present.

[13:01] A guy is walking down a sidewalk.

[13:04] It cuts to a woman.

[13:05] And this is intercut with shots of just random shit that

[13:08] doesn't seem to make any sense.

[13:09] There's a long panning shot, or a long tracking shot,

[13:13] down the hallway of a storage locker facility.

[13:16] Apology accepted.

[13:17] To a magic book on a pedestal of some kind

[13:20] that gold dust is falling on.

[13:22] OK, cut away from that.

[13:23] We're not interested anymore.

[13:25] The guy's walking down the street.

[13:26] Turns out he's on the phone with his wife,

[13:28] even though we don't hear him talking or see him talking.

[13:32] And she is glad that he's coming home soon.

[13:35] She is at her kitchen sink, which

[13:37] is beautifully decorated with a potted plant and three bananas.

[13:39] A giant outdoor potted plant.

[13:43] They wanted the room to look lived in,

[13:45] so they just added the kind of potted plant

[13:47] you would put outside a back door.

[13:49] Three bananas on a plate.

[13:50] They're like, what kind of clip art

[13:51] can I drag over into this shot?

[13:55] He is hit by a car, a Rolls Royce,

[13:59] driven by a very busty lady whose face we never see.

[14:03] But she is certainly nipply.

[14:06] That's all I know about her.

[14:07] And that's what the APB for the police put up for her.

[14:10] Suspect is nipply.

[14:12] I repeat, headlights are on.

[14:15] This begins the major theme of the movie, which

[14:17] is teasing the viewer with the idea

[14:19] that they might get to see breasts

[14:20] and then not showing them.

[14:21] There are like four at least busty women in this movie

[14:25] that they keep.

[14:26] Four at least busty.

[14:29] Like they keep showing scenes where they are topless, but.

[14:33] They're lying on their chest so you see their side

[14:35] or their back is to you.

[14:36] Or there's two different scenes where a woman's shirt comes off

[14:39] and you just see her feet and the shirt falls down.

[14:42] And in one of them, the shirt makes a thump sound.

[14:44] Like a thump.

[14:46] Like there's some hilarious sound effects in here.

[14:49] So he's hit by a car.

[14:50] There's blood everywhere on his face.

[14:53] And he's lying perfectly still on his back,

[14:56] desperately trying to reach his flip phone.

[15:00] But it's one of those razor phones

[15:01] where like it's open sideways.

[15:03] Yeah, because he's a famous novelist, dude.

[15:07] He goes to the hospital.

[15:09] He has a magic stone in his hand.

[15:10] I don't remember if he's given it or not.

[15:12] They take him to the hospital very slowly.

[15:15] They spend so much time putting an oxygen mask on his face.

[15:18] Like if this was an instructional film

[15:20] about applying oxygen masks to the faces of coma victims,

[15:23] like they would do it with more speed.

[15:26] Well, there are also just like five people

[15:27] standing in a line saying,

[15:29] is he dead, is he breathing?

[15:31] And each time that someone says something,

[15:33] it's intercut with a slow panning shot of their feet

[15:35] as they stand there.

[15:37] And there's a shot of a guy going,

[15:39] he was hit by that Rolls Royce.

[15:40] I'm a witness.

[15:41] I saw it.

[15:42] And the Rolls Royce is right there.

[15:43] It's still there and it's still got blood

[15:44] all over the front of it.

[15:45] So thanks, you're a great witness.

[15:46] Great.

[15:48] There's so many shot scenes where it's a cut,

[15:51] it's a closeup of someone saying a line.

[15:53] Then either a cutaway to a panning shot

[15:55] of something unrelated,

[15:56] or a closeup of another person

[15:58] having a totally unrelated conversation.

[16:00] Like it's like waiting for Goodell level,

[16:05] like ambiguous dialogue at times.

[16:07] Anyway, so he goes to the hospital.

[16:09] He's got a phantom of the opera of gauze

[16:12] all over his face, just like covering half his face.

[16:15] Some people who we figure out are his wife and a friend,

[16:18] because the guy says, I'm his closest friend.

[16:21] I can't believe this has happened to him.

[16:23] There, the doctor takes a long time

[16:26] before he says anything.

[16:28] There's literally a long shot of the doctor,

[16:30] the wife and the friend,

[16:31] and the doctor is just looking around.

[16:34] And I guess the idea is supposed to be

[16:35] that he's examining the patient,

[16:37] but he's just kind of looking at all the stuff in the room,

[16:39] and he tells them there's nothing he can do.

[16:45] There's very little brain activity.

[16:46] The neurologist comes over.

[16:48] She says, he's not my client, but I'll take a look.

[16:50] She feels his pulse, and then says he suffered

[16:53] severe brain neuropathy.

[16:54] He's comatose.

[16:55] She's as good a doctor as Sean Connery was

[16:57] in Guardians of the Highlands.

[16:59] What, Guardian of the Highlands?

[17:02] There's just one guardian.

[17:03] Oh, yeah.

[17:03] But you're right.

[17:05] Maybe she studied under him,

[17:07] like Lorraine Bracco in Medicine Man.

[17:09] And so she took his philosophy of,

[17:10] I'm gonna stand next to people

[17:12] and talk about how bad it could possibly be

[17:13] and hope that that shocks them into getting better.

[17:18] He, fortunately though, has a magic rock in his hand,

[17:22] and that heals him, I guess.

[17:23] He gets up and walks away on his own.

[17:26] Although maybe he's a ghost,

[17:27] based on later things that happen in the movie.

[17:29] Could be.

[17:30] Yeah, a magic wind blows by,

[17:31] like the wind in the willows or something.

[17:33] Cut to his hallway at home where his,

[17:36] he gets up and we see his butt through his hospital gown.

[17:38] Yeah, this is the only nudity you see in the movie,

[17:40] despite all the tease.

[17:41] Is his hospital gown open in the back,

[17:43] because like Tommy Wiseau,

[17:45] low-budget auteurs believe they have

[17:47] the greatest hinders in the universe,

[17:49] and you've gotta see him.

[17:50] I mean, when a guy spends this much time in his body,

[17:52] you gotta, he should show it off.

[17:54] It's a waste of, you don't wanna cover up that treasure.

[17:58] He's a little bit like a guy who,

[18:00] he's just a normal guy who doesn't really

[18:02] take great care of himself, but jogs every now and then.

[18:05] And someone once said to him,

[18:06] hey, if you squint a little,

[18:07] you look kind of like David Duchovny.

[18:09] And he's like, I should be a movie star.

[18:11] Like, if you squint a little,

[18:12] you look like Bob Shay from New Lines.

[18:15] Squint a little.

[18:16] I'm just gonna say, like.

[18:17] If you, you know, if I don't,

[18:19] if I look like a little bit,

[18:20] you could be, you know, the lead singer from Rush.

[18:24] He's kind of a, he's kind of an Alan Rickman

[18:27] without the dangerous, like, sexiness

[18:29] that Alan Rickman brings, like more puffiness.

[18:32] Except he's got a very sharp cheekbones.

[18:35] Yeah.

[18:36] And his eyes glow with an inner animation

[18:39] that gets more and more as the movie goes on.

[18:40] Anyway, cut to his hallway at home

[18:43] where his hospital gown and his bloody bandages

[18:45] are just littered the floor and he's in the shower,

[18:47] which implies that he walked home in his hospital gown.

[18:50] Like, nobody stopped him.

[18:52] His wife is like, oh, you're home.

[18:54] And they embrace in the shower.

[18:56] Yeah, out of concern, she gets in the shower with him.

[18:59] And they slow dance, they just kind of

[19:00] slowly turn each other's arms.

[19:01] While he wears that, like, half-mask bandage thing.

[19:03] He still has the bandage on his face.

[19:05] He's otherwise naked.

[19:06] She is in a shift that's becoming see-through

[19:08] with the water.

[19:09] With bloody pink water.

[19:11] And they just kind of hold each other

[19:13] and turn slightly from side to side.

[19:15] And that begins another theme in the movie,

[19:16] which is the romantic, the lead actor's

[19:21] romantic interest in the movie

[19:22] not wanting to touch him very much.

[19:25] Yeah.

[19:25] And wanting to kind of keep their distance in the love scene.

[19:26] That's another similarity between him and Tommy Wiseau.

[19:30] I think it's pretty clear that the romantic leads

[19:33] do not want to get involved with him.

[19:35] No.

[19:36] Well, they're sexually intimidated.

[19:38] Now, you're gonna have to help me.

[19:39] I believe that then cut to the scene where

[19:42] the neighbor, their best friend,

[19:44] their neighbor is having a drunken argument with his wife

[19:46] who does not care for wearing bras.

[19:49] She likes to wear loose halter tops

[19:50] that she can just kind of, you know, bounce around in.

[19:54] She lounges around talking about how bad her job

[19:57] is at the bank, in the office at the bank.

[20:00] Oh, I just got that relationship now he complains that he doesn't they haven't had sex in a long time

[20:07] Their daughter over his daughter who's her stepdaughter over. Here's this and she is just despondent over it cut to

[20:16] Again, I'm now there's so many cars. Here's where I'm not sure where the order of things happens now

[20:20] We find out that the middle business movie for a movie. That's ostensibly about secret government secrets and ghosts

[20:29] Doing our actual things like most of it is interpersonal relationships and people hitting on the main character

[20:36] It kind of feels like there's a guy who saw Donnie Darko. Yeah, and he also saw

[20:41] like

[20:43] Like a John Cassavetes film marathon and he's like, why can't I do it all?

[20:48] Why can't I have some kind of supernatural conspiracy thriller and also, you know what throw in these real relationship?

[20:55] Oh, yeah, and at times it also feels like a David Lynch movie the way that like there's something seedy and creepy going on

[21:01] But it's mostly like soap opera stuff, but it's not intentionally that I don't think yeah

[21:06] I mean it feels like he directly lifts Angelo Badalamente's Twin Peaks score for most of these scenes well crossed with like weird like Irish

[21:15] flute

[21:18] He does has dream sequences reason like a

[21:20] Uzi black room

[21:22] That's never really explain which like like we were talking about it

[21:26] There's something about incredibly inept filmmaking that can be inadvertently super creepy because nobody acts like humans at that

[21:34] Yeah, they all act like weird

[21:36] Mannequins or reptile people that are wearing the skin of humans

[21:40] It feels like we eavesdropped on a suburb where everyone's an undercover alien, but they're all from different alien species

[21:47] None of them know how humanity operates, but they don't want to blow their cover even to each other. Yeah

[21:52] So here I'm just gonna talk about what happens in the movie in a general sense

[21:55] I don't remember the order so a lot of the next like half hour the movie roughly seems to take place in his weird

[22:00] office

[22:01] Which is we only see the corner of and it's just a desk covered in

[22:05] Four or five of the same book and five open laptops that are never turned on

[22:11] The same Sony laptop, but he breaks them and then he uses them again later. They're great laptops

[22:18] You don't even have to be turned on and you can write so you can do some hack

[22:21] You don't even have to type normally you can just bang at the now randomly

[22:25] We learn he's a computer scientist who somehow became a best-selling novelist. He's tired of writing novels

[22:30] He's hacked into government and corporate something when he's realized that he has no more worlds to conquer at the novel game

[22:38] Yeah, he becomes a super hacker

[22:40] He mentions these hacked into these secrets to his wife

[22:43] Then he mentions it to her again, and she's shocked by it the second time then and she says oh you're in trouble

[22:49] Then we forget about that plot for a long time as we get involved with the wife's addiction to the husband's pills

[22:56] That at this site this at his psychoanalyst has been prescribed

[22:59] Yeah, there's some kind of pain addictive pain pills that his psychoanalyst prescribes

[23:03] We get into that we get into the alcohol problem of the new psychoanalysts who meets him in

[23:11] Walks up a stairway in a mansion and ends up in a conference room

[23:15] It's a weird mansion though, because if you look down the hall, there's clearly like an exit sign

[23:19] So maybe it's not a man. So it I feel like it's like a massage parlor

[23:24] It certainly doesn't look like up an office. No, it's not like it could be a hotel or spa maybe yeah, and

[23:31] He goes even the sign on the on the second-hand store says sweet one one one one doctor so-and-so

[23:38] It's like you couldn't even think of an interesting number for the room. It's just one after it just yeah ones

[23:43] But also he does his therapy like there's a long conference table

[23:47] There's like eight chairs in between them and they each sit on the opposite end of the table like that scene in Citizen Kane

[23:53] That's supposed to indicate how far Kane and his wife

[23:56] He it's like if in Network Peter Finch was going to his therapist when he went to see Ned Beatty and Ned Beatty

[24:04] Yelled at him about the order of the universe like that's what this room is

[24:09] Like maybe it's a new radical form of therapy where you pretend you're at a meeting

[24:14] But the distance you sit from each other represents is a physical representation of the emotional distance between sure or like each chair is filled

[24:21] With one of the monkeys that's on your back

[24:24] Yes

[24:26] Come in the room now. Let's populate this room with all the people you have issues with in your life

[24:30] We're gonna have a meeting right here. I call it

[24:34] terrible therapy

[24:36] So the doctors really pushing these pills

[24:38] I think because the wife is asking him to so she can get to them

[24:42] That's never really clear or not he says no more pills and throws him in the toilet, but she pulls him out again

[24:47] Yeah, she scoops him out. They have some they have some conversations that are like

[24:53] eight conversations

[24:55] condensed into one conversation

[24:56] What they keep going back and forth about like how she can't take it anymore

[25:01] And then they were they were they reconcile, and then she can't take it

[25:06] But he

[25:07] Hilarious scene he starts throwing his computers on the floor and then his papers super slowly

[25:13] Like it's not like he like sweeps everything off his desk

[25:16] He does it in a bit of passion at a time and she thinks that yeah never breaking eye contact with her

[25:22] He sweeps the shit off

[25:25] It's like that

[25:27] Laptops off his computer like he's breaking his things

[25:30] It reminded me more of that scene in dirty rotten scoundrels where Steve Martin is playing Ruprecht

[25:35] And he's like upset and he slowly drops one thing after the other after off the mantle

[25:40] But then that's how he's doing it once he's done clearing the desk

[25:43] I guess he still has efforts they start tearing at each other's shirts as if they're trying to take them off

[25:47] But they're just kind of ripping them, and that's when the when we make a full monkey

[25:53] It well it certainly feels like she didn't realize that this was gonna be a love scene

[25:58] She thought at first she thinks it's a scene where he's trying to attack her and she's just fighting back

[26:04] And then she's like oh no no wait. Okay. This is your idea of making love because you're a weirdo

[26:08] So we're going to do these super awkward kisses because she couldn't handle the raw masculinity that Neil Breen is bringing to the scene

[26:14] I like that kissing like both on like the side of their mouths ramming them together

[26:18] Maybe it's a situation where like the time Jackie Chan had a love interest in a movie and all these women killed themselves

[26:24] Maybe Neil Breen wanted to spare the rest of except he has three to four love interests in this movie

[26:29] That's true, but all those kisses seem very forced

[26:32] They are didn't they couldn't think there's actual passion there

[26:34] they are the kisses are done with all all the realistic passion of a

[26:39] reluctant first-time lesbian porn actress

[26:42] Who is not interested in being in this lesbian scene, but you got to pay the bills?

[26:46] No, she's gonna kiss the tarps on the ground. You better do something with it

[26:59] What are you gonna do rake some leaves on do it no

[27:03] It's on the ground. We can't put it over a pool

[27:08] So the

[27:10] Make sweet love

[27:13] The daughter from next door comes over. Oh, so there's a big barbecue

[27:19] It's so big because I think that several shots are repeated as if the director doesn't think that we'll notice that they just did the same

[27:27] Shot they have a beach umbrella with a sponsor company name on it set up at the head of the stairs of the pool

[27:34] Which it makes no sense when you have an umbrella every scene of the party has like six people in it

[27:39] But the background sound effect sounds like Final Fantasy 7 where cloud is that like a fucking bar or something if they are like

[27:47] Like the sound effects from the Beatles, you know, my name look up the number like the party

[27:53] The the he wants you to think there's at least well more than five people at the party

[27:58] Yeah, when it doesn't make sense. Well, I mean, I don't even know what why he wants you to think that like what he's attempting

[28:05] So the party scene that's when the movie starts getting interesting

[28:10] So the the drunk neighbor hits on the wife she doesn't want anything to do with it and to show how drunk he is

[28:15] She was you're drunk. He's like no, I'm not and then he knocks over a plate full of corn

[28:19] This is after the wife has taken

[28:22] the main characters

[28:24] Whole ear of corn from his plate. So that's the ruin. The stealing of corn is really a big

[28:29] It's one of those great shots where normally the director would be like that was super awkward. Let's do it again

[28:35] But instead he's like no, let's just keep it

[28:37] It's weird the way she takes an entire ear of corn off my plate and I awkwardly adjust it

[28:42] So all the chicken doesn't fly off

[28:44] When he when the drunk guy knocks the plate of corn over you don't see his face

[28:48] it's like a shot from the neck down from an

[28:50] Angle extreme close-up like the rest of this movie of the of the corn and then he he knocks it over to knocks nothing over

[28:55] And they just waves his hands around

[28:58] a little shimmy like he's dancing

[29:01] Like

[29:02] Like he was supposed to have more of a drunk like bedlam scene, but they only had two plates to knock over

[29:07] So he's just kind of waving his hand. You don't notice. He's not knocking anything

[29:11] Oh, they only had two two plates and he had to stay in frame the whole time

[29:15] So like be drunk within a very specific set of confines more importantly the neurologist that saw him in the hospital shows up

[29:22] The one who he wasn't her patient, but she would see him anyway

[29:25] Yes, and I think we find out why she's wearing the bracelet that the girl she killed Leah and took the bracelet

[29:31] No, that is not the inference. You're supposed to have she is Leah

[29:35] She looks so much younger than our lead. Well, and here's that this is okay

[29:39] So this is my theory about that in addition to be she was a neurologist on the International Space Station

[29:44] She's had some time in space. Maybe works flying at light speed. Okay, because of the laws relativity

[29:49] She is aged at a slower rate than our hero who is clearly

[29:52] 15 to 20 years older than her. I would think it might be exposure the magical energies of the black rock that he holds

[30:00] in his hand. That it's aged him somehow? Yeah, it's absorbing his life energy. I see, it's

[30:04] like Elric's sword. Uh, Stormbringer? Yeah. Yeah, it's exactly like that. Where she found

[30:10] the bracelet of life, which gives her eternal youth. Yeah, like the weird gem bracelet she

[30:15] wears? Yeah, yeah. So he realizes her... In one of the holograms? Uh, maybe, I don't know,

[30:20] does she ever, I'm assuming she has a bracelet. She wears a ton of bracelets, it's the 80s,

[30:24] everyone was wearing bracelets. Or the Misfits, their songs are better, that's what I know.

[30:27] Yeah, especially when Danzig was still with them. Yeah. Afterwards, not so much. I never

[30:31] understood why Gem in the Holograms, the cartoon would pick a name for their villain band that

[30:36] is a real band's name. That's true. It's not like the Misfits named themselves after the

[30:40] Gem in the Holograms band. Been around since like, 79. I don't know. I don't know, I can't

[30:46] answer that. It's like she... Let's get the creator, get him on the phone. Look, I was

[30:49] just gonna say, the creator of Gem in the Holograms, I'm disappointed in your lack of

[30:52] knowledge about the horror punk genre. Yeah, why don't you pick a brand new name that nobody's

[30:56] used, like the Riverbottom Nightmare Band. Nobody's ever used that. Or Spin Doctors. Oh, yeah,

[31:05] yeah. If you wanna be, you know, super great. So, he recognizes her, and immediately is so happy,

[31:15] and is holding hands with her constantly throughout the party, right in front of his wife.

[31:19] There's a great part where he's holding her hand, and it cuts to the wife noticing,

[31:23] and then it cuts back to their hands, pulling away from each other real fast. But the timing

[31:27] is just bad enough that everything is super unnatural. Yeah. So, he's found her. They will

[31:34] eventually go frolicking in the woods, and have another one of these weird lovemaking things where

[31:39] a shirt falls on the ground, while his wife... Well, I'm getting ahead of myself, because his

[31:44] wife dies of a painkiller overdose, knocking over a glass of water on the bed. Yeah, which we're

[31:49] supposed to read, I guess, as white wine, but it is clearly just water. But this is only after. So,

[31:55] his best friend is always tooling around on his Ferrari, by which I mean polishing the mirror,

[32:01] because that's all he knows how to do with his car. Yep. His wife comes in, and they argue. Then

[32:06] the wife leaves, and then comes back with a gun. She says, I'm gonna shoot holes all through that

[32:10] car, but then shoots her husband. The daughter runs in, and sees that she did it, and the mother

[32:16] is like, don't go in there. You didn't see anything, and then the daughter goes, you killed

[32:22] him really calmly, and she says, you didn't see anything, and then the daughter goes, dad, dad,

[32:26] and is running towards him, and it's like, did you reverse the order of those shots when you were

[32:32] editing? Because she seems to get... She goes from calm to super... Yeah. Elliot, have you ever been

[32:37] in that fucking situation, dude? That is a good point. I cannot judge. Where your stepmom shoots

[32:41] your dad while your dad was, I guess, massaging his Ferrari, Testarossa? You know what, I don't

[32:47] have... I have a stepmom, but my dad doesn't have a Ferrari, so I don't think I'll ever... And then

[32:50] the mom lays the gun down near the dead husband. The perfect crime. Without wiping it for prints

[32:58] or anything. Or putting the gun in his hand or anything like that. And says, oh, he committed

[33:03] suicide. She already burned her fingerprints off in an accident years ago. And other than the

[33:07] daughter telling our hero, oh, my mom killed him. It wasn't a suicide. This is not revisited at all.

[33:15] There's no resolution. Never again. Oh, I should mention about the daughter. We forgot to mention

[33:20] that. She appears in one of the many almost topless scenes, when she just shows up at their

[33:24] pool after the barbecue, and is just standing at the top of the pool stairs with, like, kind of

[33:30] knee deep in the water, just splashing water at nothing. Then she takes her top off and... From

[33:35] the back. We see her from the back. And calls for Dylan, the hero, and he goes, oh, no, you can't do

[33:40] this. Stop it. And then she takes... And she puts her top immediately back on. Puts her top on and

[33:45] then goes to take a bubble bath. I mean, he's a grown, handsome man. There's no way this teenage

[33:50] girl could handle that. No, no. That's why he says no to her, because she's just not ready. He would

[33:55] destroy her. He would ruin her. She wouldn't be able to walk for a month. Nor would she ever be

[33:58] satisfied with another man. No, she'd never find that sort of joy again. I don't think that's the

[34:02] moral of what happened. It's one of the... It's like the movie that the guy mentions to

[34:07] Woody Allen in Manhattan, where the woman is so satisfied by her orgasm that she dies

[34:13] instantly. That's what would have happened. Okay. Anyway, what Elliot said. He says no, no. She

[34:21] tries to take a bubble bath. Classic Poison Ivy new seduction move. He's not falling for it.

[34:27] And his wife... And then he's cut to... He's on the couch with his laptop working. His wife's like, oh,

[34:31] was Ali here? He's like, I can't talk. I'm too busy working. Slap, slap, slap. You know what she

[34:38] did? She was swimming in the pool, topless. And then she tried to take a bath. And the wife goes,

[34:44] I'll call my friend. And the neighbor gets on the phone and goes, thank you for telling me about

[34:49] that. She shouldn't do that. I'll talk to her about it. Cut to the daughter in her room, grounded,

[34:53] crying. But also our hero said, I told her that she couldn't come back here again without

[34:59] permission. Without calling first. It's like, what? I don't understand how that would have

[35:03] changed the situation. This is after we've had... Or before the scene, I don't remember,

[35:10] where he's arguing with his wife and he's on the laptop. And she's like, I'm having a hard time at

[35:15] work. And he's like, I'm busy. And then cut to her talking. Cut back to him. The laptop's gone.

[35:19] And he's cross-legged on the couch with bare feet, just kind of rapping with her, you know?

[35:25] I like girlfriends. Anyway, so he reconnects with his...

[35:31] You're doing a great job, by the way. This is a hard movie.

[35:33] This is a tough one. I've forgotten...

[35:35] This movie is a real collage.

[35:36] You've forgotten more about this movie than you remember.

[35:39] They took a bunch of scenes, put them in a sack, and just shook it up and just

[35:43] emptied that onto some film.

[35:45] So many shots will have a character, like a close-up of a character saying something super

[35:49] weird. And then it will immediately cut to a close-up of that character wearing different

[35:53] clothes, doing something different. And you're like, how much time passed? I don't know what's

[35:57] going on. Is this the same scene?

[35:59] There's a scene where they have dinner with their friends.

[36:03] Yeah, it's all shot in one shot.

[36:05] It's all one shots.

[36:05] I don't think it's dinner, because at no point do we see food.

[36:10] She says, I'll go get the food now.

[36:14] But yeah, that's the cheapest way to get around a big dinner.

[36:18] But they are having so many different conversations with each other.

[36:22] Each line is completely unrelated to the next.

[36:24] That teenage daughter wants to talk about her fucking stupid elephants class.

[36:29] She's almost done with school.

[36:30] They're doing a great project about elephants.

[36:32] It's like, are you in elementary school?

[36:36] Anyway, so let's skip ahead to he's reconnected with his childhood girlfriend, Leah, who they

[36:43] go out to the forest to find their magic mushroom place again.

[36:46] And they find it, and it turns into a box with some strings or tassels or something.

[36:51] His wife kills herself with pills while they're making love.

[36:57] Their shirts hit the floor again with a thump.

[36:59] Well, yeah, he's out patting her face.

[37:01] He's got to move, dude.

[37:02] Patting her face with his lips as if checking it for lice in some way.

[37:08] It's like her face is a minefield.

[37:11] And he's worried that if he kisses too hard, she's going to explode.

[37:13] Sure.

[37:15] For her, it's almost she's worried that if she touches too much of his face,

[37:19] she'll be reduced to cinders and ashes from the sheer heat of his passion.

[37:24] And he pushes her shirt down in a weird way.

[37:29] And then it falls just over his shoulder, just over the shoulders for a little while.

[37:33] And you're like, do they do they think that we can't see the top of her shirt peeking

[37:38] out of the bottom of the frame?

[37:39] Are we supposed to think that she's nude?

[37:41] I don't understand.

[37:42] And instead of thinking she's nude, they're going to have sex.

[37:44] What you think is or they're in love.

[37:47] What you think is before this shot, they negotiated how far he could pull her shirt

[37:51] down.

[37:51] And the great thing about it is right after that, it'll immediately cut over to a shot

[37:55] of him with his shirt pushed most of the way down.

[37:58] So the girls in the audience, I want to reiterate Han Solo for the crowd.

[38:03] I want to reiterate that, like, we may seem super pervy for, like, focusing on this so

[38:09] much, but the movie drove us to it.

[38:11] There is a movie is constantly like it was trolling.

[38:15] It was like the movie was playing a joke.

[38:18] Where it's like, let's see how close we can get to having someone be naked without

[38:22] it being naked.

[38:22] The only way this movie could be more entrapment is if Catherine Zeta-Jones slid under some

[38:26] lasers with a pair of pants on.

[38:28] Yeah, with leather pants on.

[38:31] Because if she did it in like a skirt, that's not entrapment.

[38:34] No, that's not the same movie.

[38:38] OK, so this is around the time we get back to the storyline of the secret government

[38:42] and corporate secrets that he hacked into.

[38:44] He has a lot of loud arguments with, I guess, his publisher on the phone about how they're

[38:49] not respecting him and they keep asking for deadlines.

[38:51] And he throws around the same three copies of his book in the same way that he throws

[38:55] around his laptop.

[38:57] He has three laptops and four copies of his book, and he's just always throwing them or

[39:02] tapping them on things.

[39:04] Anyway, there's definitely a scene where he accidentally throws the book at his laptop

[39:09] and it flips over to reveal a spine.

[39:11] And you know that wasn't in the plan, because it doesn't say his name on it.

[39:18] Sometime before this.

[39:20] What about the scene where he passes out and spills coffee on his face?

[39:24] We forgot that.

[39:25] He starts making a face like he loves it and he can't get enough.

[39:29] He's having headaches because, of course, he would.

[39:31] He was hit by a car.

[39:32] Sure.

[39:33] And yet he's like, oh, and he's got coffee precariously placed on the keyboard of his

[39:38] laptop and he knocks it over.

[39:40] And he like he he falls.

[39:41] It's like his head falls on the paper and then he knocks the coffee.

[39:44] No, well, his head falls down and then he's like regaining consciousness and he sees his

[39:49] coffee and it's like, oh, that's what I want coffee.

[39:51] And he tries to drink it and tips it all over and it just spills over everything.

[39:55] But yeah, instead of being like a hot coffee on my face, his look is like.

[40:00] He's like, my skin is absorbing this precious caffeine, I love it.

[40:04] I needed one of my patented facial caffeine baths.

[40:07] That's what will make me feel better.

[40:09] He's also begun seeing another therapist by this point.

[40:12] A woman who sits on folding chairs so close to him, their knees are interlaced.

[40:17] Yeah, it seems like they're going to start making out at any second.

[40:20] It's supposed to be different than his other psychotherapist, who's all about medication.

[40:25] She's all about being magic.

[40:27] In that she fades away at the end of it as if she was a ghost or alien or whatever.

[40:31] But she tells him he has a special power, the things he's learned are very important, it's up to him.

[40:36] It's all super vague.

[40:38] It's like if Yoda never really explained anything to Luke,

[40:41] and never taught him how to do flips and balance rocks,

[40:44] and just died and disappeared at the end, but it was all vague mumbo-jumbo,

[40:48] that's what this character is like.

[40:50] Okay.

[40:51] Exactly like Yoda, says Ellie.

[40:55] This woman's performance is just like Frank Oz.

[40:58] I didn't even see that.

[41:00] He must say, I'm going to show how far apart he is from this other therapist

[41:04] by having him sit on opposite ends of a room.

[41:06] I'm going to show how in tune these people are

[41:08] by having them sit with their crotches almost touching.

[41:11] Yeah, that's the closest to a smart directorial choice he made.

[41:14] I was thinking about this earlier today,

[41:16] that you read readings of films and you're like,

[41:20] by showing him from below, they emphasize how powerful he is as he looms over,

[41:25] and you're like, yeah, that's kind of obvious,

[41:27] I don't know if you needed to state that in words,

[41:29] but it just shows you how like,

[41:31] symbology in a movie can be either simple and strong,

[41:35] and simple and incredibly stupid.

[41:37] In this case, it's incredibly stupid.

[41:39] Look, I'm no semiotician, okay?

[41:41] This is just how it gets me.

[41:43] Anyway, so, he decides to reveal these government secrets.

[41:47] There's a ghost that's floating around every now and then.

[41:50] There's a dream sequence where like, a weird, like, ghost,

[41:54] or like a transparent man walks into the house,

[41:58] and then blood falls on the floor, and then he fades away.

[42:00] I don't know what that's all about.

[42:01] We've seen this character a couple times where he's just a pair of black shoes and black pants

[42:04] who fades away and dissolves.

[42:06] I don't know what it represents exactly.

[42:08] And the mirrors and pictures shake a bunch.

[42:10] A mirror that's shaking.

[42:11] There's a bunch of scenes where the director, star, writer, producer is nude in that black room.

[42:16] Yeah, and that's the most, like, Twin Peaks-y part of it.

[42:18] And he's hugging a nude woman whose hair is covering her face,

[42:20] and it seems pretty clear that that woman represents Leah, the girl he's reconnected with,

[42:26] but that Leah did not want to do a nude scene,

[42:28] and so he hired someone else, like, Ed Wood, Bela Lugosi, Plan 9 style,

[42:32] hired someone else and then covered their face with something.

[42:35] That's my guess.

[42:36] Yeah.

[42:37] Anyway, he's, even though his wife just died.

[42:39] Like Scott McCloud always says,

[42:42] he expects that the audience is going to be able to fill in the blanks between the two shots.

[42:46] Yeah, that's just filling in the gutters.

[42:49] His wife died.

[42:50] He comes home, and he has two great grappling with someone's death scenes,

[42:54] one with his friend where he's holding his friend's bloody head,

[42:57] and he wipes the blood on his face for no reason,

[43:00] and he's like, I'm not going to be able to help you out of this one.

[43:04] He's like, yeah, dude, he's dead.

[43:08] Do you really think he's going to make a deal with, like, he's going to, like, Daniel Webster Satan about this?

[43:13] He knows he cradles his dead wife's body, and he just was saying, like, what, it was you?

[43:18] It was you or something like that.

[43:20] And then the music swells, and he seems to be saying something, but they cut the audio track out.

[43:25] Well, at one point he's clearly yelling, no, no, Darth Vader, Episode 3 style.

[43:30] I want to talk a little bit about how this movie makes a lot of weird cuts to people's close-ups of face while they're talking,

[43:37] and in a lot of those cuts they don't try and match up the background sounds that well.

[43:42] So in some shots you'll be like, oh, wow, they turned the air conditioning on for this shot,

[43:47] but then a second later you're like, oh, they turned it off.

[43:50] It must have gotten too chilly in that room.

[43:52] It's kind of like any room tone.

[43:54] It's like the opposite of the movie Hustle and Flow where they make a big deal about, like,

[44:00] turning off the fan before they record their rap songs.

[44:04] In this case they turned nothing off.

[44:06] It's like they bring in a couple extra refrigerators to have running in the background.

[44:10] This movie feels like someone who wants to be David Lynch and is really bad at it at times.

[44:15] It also feels like someone who wants to be making Enemy of the State and is bad at it.

[44:19] But, like, when you look at David Lynch's movies—

[44:21] I would love to see David Lynch make Enemy of the State.

[44:25] When you look at David Lynch's movies, like, his sound design is so important.

[44:29] Like, so much of the power of Eraserhead is in the sounds that you're hearing

[44:33] and how consistent and how, you know, just, like, overwhelming they are.

[44:38] And this is the exact opposite of that where he was like, sound?

[44:42] Yeah, we're recording the dialogue. Move it along, people.

[44:45] We'll cover up all that other stuff with this Irish flute music.

[44:48] So his wife is dead. He's taken up with Leah.

[44:51] She's already sleeping in his bed, face down, so you can see the side of her boobs but not the front.

[44:56] There's a scene where his neighbor gets killed.

[44:59] There's a scene where his neighbor wakes up in bed with his wife

[45:02] and they're awkwardly not talking to each other, but they're both asleep,

[45:05] lying face down with their arms up on the pillow in the same pose as, like—

[45:09] Like they're getting couples massages, yeah.

[45:11] Like a married couple slept in the exact same pose.

[45:14] I feel like it was the director being like,

[45:16] all right, you be in this position so we can see most of your boob but not all of it,

[45:21] and I guess you be in the same position so it's not obvious what you're doing.

[45:26] You be in the same position because I don't want to show the audience that you have better pecs than I do.

[45:31] Now I want to get back to how there's a ghost in this movie.

[45:34] When I say ghost, I mean kind of an animated plastic bag that floats through the air

[45:38] that's composed on scenes while a—

[45:40] A ghost is nothing but a memory, Elliot.

[45:42] Yes.

[45:44] There's just ghosts.

[45:47] This thing just pops up and pops out and doesn't signify very much.

[45:50] It shakes a mirror at one point, and that gives him the inspiration to finally reveal these secrets.

[45:55] He sneaks out of bed so as not to wake up Leah in maybe the funniest shot in the movie

[46:00] where it looks like he is escaping a one-night stand or something like that.

[46:05] He goes to the desert.

[46:08] Oh, she's been kidnapped too.

[46:10] Did I forget to mention that at one point?

[46:12] She's kidnapped.

[46:14] I forgot that that even happened.

[46:15] She is chloroformed and kidnapped and taken to a van at a storage locker place.

[46:19] She's not even in one of the storage lockers.

[46:21] Luckily during her struggle, she knocks loose a business card from her assailant's pocket

[46:27] that has the directions of where to take her to this place.

[46:31] Which makes me realize that the assailant probably spent a lot of time on the phone with the guy who hired him,

[46:35] being like, I lost the card.

[46:36] Tell me where I'm supposed to take her again.

[46:38] I can't put an address into MapQuest.

[46:40] I don't have—no, he uses MapQuest.

[46:42] And then the hero, Dylan, shows up, and he sees her bag on the ground,

[46:47] and he calls her and leaves a long message on her voicemail.

[46:50] It's like, where are you? I'm worried.

[46:52] I see your bag.

[46:53] It's lying on the walk to the house.

[46:55] I looked in the house.

[46:56] You're not in the house.

[46:58] Where are you?

[46:59] Why is your bag on the walkway from the front of the house to the rear of the house?

[47:03] And then he sees—and it's only after he leaves this long message that he looks three millimeters over

[47:08] and sees the card that says, take her to da-da-da-da-da.

[47:11] Immediate cut to a shot that's night for day or day for night.

[47:16] He goes, and what is he like, kill a guy there or something?

[47:18] He has magic powers now.

[47:20] He helps her escape with his ability to walk through doors and walk through walls.

[47:24] Well, he runs up and hits the guy in the head with a bottle, right?

[47:26] Oh, that's right. He hits him with a bottle.

[47:28] But then he teleports—

[47:30] Some street justice.

[47:31] He teleports her out of, like, a fucking trailer.

[47:34] Court is adjourned.

[47:36] It would not have been hard to get her out of that trailer without using his magic walk-through-walls powers.

[47:40] It's locked. He doesn't know how to get in there.

[47:42] Yeah, he has the black rock. If you have the black rock, you use it.

[47:45] That's right. He's got that black rock.

[47:47] He's the chosen one.

[47:48] Later on, it's a flash drive or something.

[47:51] Skipping ahead a little bit, he goes out to the desert.

[47:54] He talks to some ghosts and a magic book, and they tell him nothing.

[47:59] So he decides he's going to reveal these secrets.

[48:01] These fateful findings, if you will.

[48:03] To coin a phrase.

[48:05] He's standing in front of the worst green screen of the Supreme Court you have ever seen, ever.

[48:12] In front with a microphone stand.

[48:14] You guys both work for The Daily Show and use a lot of green screen and shit.

[48:19] I don't work for The Daily Show.

[48:20] But you have worked for The Daily Show.

[48:22] Super true.

[48:23] And The Daily Show backdrops are so much more believable than this bullshit fake was.

[48:30] Yes, because we put just the most minimum effort into it.

[48:33] A comedy show.

[48:36] He announces, well, this movie's pretty funny.

[48:39] This is the funniest comedy I've seen in a long time.

[48:43] I think, Dan, you said it's the funniest comedy movie in years.

[48:46] But he's announcing his findings in the most vague way possible.

[48:53] All these secrets.

[48:54] Governments have committed secrets.

[48:56] There's been hypocrisy and crime and corruption.

[48:58] All these companies.

[48:59] We've got to hold them to justice.

[49:00] The justice system has failed.

[49:02] We've cut to a lot of shots of cameras set up to watch him with crowd noise laid over it.

[49:08] Yeah, but no visible people.

[49:09] So it seems like the microphones are making all these noises.

[49:13] They're cheering and clapping.

[49:15] At one point he goes, I have all the documents.

[49:17] And you hear applause.

[49:19] And he says, I have the documents here.

[49:22] And he holds up that black stone.

[49:24] I'm going to release them.

[49:25] So he seems like a crazy person.

[49:27] But you cut to reaction shots of, I guess, like bankers.

[49:33] Well, we don't even know that.

[49:34] They're just a bunch of people in suits for nodding, and they've looked on their face like, yeah, this guy knows what he's talking about.

[49:38] But unless I'm wrong, it's the same backdrop.

[49:41] Yes, it's the same Supreme Court background.

[49:43] The reverse shot is the same as the front shot.

[49:46] He is clearly standing in some place where two alternate dimension Supreme Court buildings stare at each other across a portal of some kind.

[49:55] Someone's opened up a viewing screen between alternate screens.

[50:00] notices and uh... they now this cuts to okay this is my new favorite part of the

[50:05] movie and so in their parts is really

[50:06] where each of the people that we've seen not in reveals that they work at

[50:10] there either senators or the head of a corporation they work at the bank

[50:14] or this was a literally what they say i i i work at and i'm designing is

[50:18] president of the bank and that one guy literally says

[50:21] i and other insurance companies

[50:23] have been cheating people so your insurance company i guess

[50:27] each of them admits they're wrongdoing

[50:28] and then we'll have a look at the public

[50:31] two of them to separate of them just pull out a gun and shoot themselves on

[50:35] the supreme court steps and you think that something like a good let's let's

[50:39] broom sweep them off their okay next person come on up to the rush in and

[50:43] stuff and you know the second guy was like

[50:45] i was going to shoot myself now look like a copycat

[50:48] you cut the other the rest of the money i hangs himself

[50:51] one slashes his wrists in a hilarious scene

[50:53] one guy

[50:54] to keep one of those lessons versus the only one they actually show getting

[50:58] this is a bit of a party that had

[51:00] because he was he's fighting back from copacabana

[51:03] uh... literally

[51:04] put in a body that i hope that's

[51:06] it wait is that going to get him disqualified i think so yeah uh... one

[51:10] guy takes pills in his car and then smiles as if dreaming the sleep of

[51:15] sleeping at the having the dream of a reason they don't see his head slowly

[51:19] falls the stream we all

[51:22] if it's like in the godfather the baptism slash massacre scene

[51:27] if that was

[51:29] so super crappy

[51:30] like that's the way this is that it's so funny

[51:33] anyway

[51:34] that having been accomplished that was hilarious we were uh... fucking great

[51:38] laughing so hard that being accomplished here we are returned to the woods

[51:43] and uh... remember their childhood selves and that's it everyone's saved

[51:47] evil has been wiped out of the world a bunch of innocent people died

[51:51] uh... that they would like to walk to valhalla or something

[51:54] yeah yeah they crossed the rainbow bridge

[51:56] yeah boromir was uh... boromir's not asgardian i mean boromir should be in

[52:00] fucking valhalla dude he killed all those orcs

[52:04] but he admitted his wrongdoing i just want to say this episode of the flophouse has had

[52:09] the fewest tangents i think of any because this movie was so big

[52:13] we should try to wrap our brains around it like we should have watched this movie at

[52:17] christmas

[52:19] or any other gift-giving holidays because like i cannot advise you enough

[52:23] to turn off this podcast right now and go watch this movie yeah i think we need to go straight to

[52:27] final judgment good good good movie like a bad movie a bad bad movie a movie kind of like

[52:33] i say that this is

[52:34] yeah move over the room and birdemic and like i like

[52:38] this is a good bad movie i was while i was watching it i'm just like i was all i was

[52:42] thinking about was like

[52:43] the people i want to introduce this movie to yeah i can't wait to show this

[52:48] movie to my parents like my parents who will have no understanding of what they're watching

[52:55] it is the the goodest bad movie i think maybe i've ever seen like it's

[52:59] there were

[53:00] uh... i can't even like i feel like we've gone through the whole movie and we've barely

[53:03] scratched the surface of how it's like

[53:05] i've never thought i'd say to someone in describing a movie it's like the room if

[53:09] Tommy Wiseau was bad at making movies like that's what it feels like to me

[53:13] like it lacks the polish of birdemic watching this movie was like that moment when

[53:18] baby houseman gets picked up by johnny castle at the end of dirty dancing

[53:23] and she's flying for but a moment and she thinks maybe in her head maybe i'll fly

[53:27] off into outer space i think you're reading a lot into that movie

[53:31] like while i was watching this movie i was thinking about like what makes the difference between a bad bad movie and a good bad movie

[53:36] and the thing about a truly like great good bad movie is

[53:40] if a movie is really bad

[53:42] you have no idea what's going to happen next yeah that's true like a mediocre movie you always know what's going to happen next

[53:49] here like this is done by a madman only in a truly great movie or a truly bad movie are you constantly surprised

[53:57] there's such a thin line the two sides of the same coin really

[54:00] there's

[54:01] if you had told me halfway through

[54:03] that the movie was going to end with him on the steps of the supreme court building

[54:08] demolishing the government and big business and then a montage of them killing themselves

[54:15] many of them with smiles on their face as they greet the grim reaper

[54:21] i wouldn't believe you

[54:22] it's like the only way to explain it is if he literally was trying to he's like

[54:26] one of those guys who makes new languages in his spare time and he's like

[54:30] i'm going to invent a new way of making films and maybe i'm going to have to grope in the dark for a time

[54:35] as i reinvent the primitive history of filmmaking to create a new type of storytelling grammar

[54:42] but i think you know what i'll do it as long as it takes and this was his first try

[54:47] oh boy

[54:49] it really i feel like we've said this about other movies but it feels like a guy who had a movie described to him

[54:56] and was like yeah okay i can make that and then just tried to do it

[54:59] i feel like you're my hero now

[55:30] we also talk about dogs that we met this week

[55:33] join us every Tuesday on MaximumFun.org for new episodes of Can I Pet Your Dog?

[55:40] i want to say that tonight the Flophouse is brought to you by Squarespace

[55:45] the all-in-one website platform

[55:48] Squarespace's sites look professionally designed regardless of your skill level

[55:53] with no coding required

[55:55] Dan, can i ask you a question?

[55:57] as we've established in previous episodes and trying to get some websites off the ground

[56:00] i haven't had the chance to use Squarespace yet

[56:04] and i'm having trouble with other companies trying to get my Christopher Lee fan site penguinfarts.com

[56:11] again, i think that's a weird name for it

[56:14] i'm having trouble with that project, i'm setting it aside

[56:18] i've got a new website, it's called monkeypenis.com

[56:23] it's an exploration of the work of Guy de Maupassant

[56:26] oh wow

[56:27] the necklace?

[56:29] i think you're right

[56:30] sure, yeah

[56:31] anyway, what i really like about him most is that his name is Guy, but it's pronounced Guy

[56:35] like a karate guy

[56:36] yep, it's the alphabetic karate guy

[56:39] that's used in indian food

[56:41] sure, i don't know

[56:42] anyway

[56:43] so is Squarespace the place i want to

[56:45] i need a simple all-in-one solution

[56:47] i want my website to look the same on

[56:49] phones and laptops and iPads without me having to recode it

[56:52] you were just telling me the other day you really want responsive design

[56:55] incredibly responsive design

[56:57] i want it to be as responsive as a lover

[57:00] who knows every inch of your body almost better than you know

[57:03] well you're in luck because that is Squarespace

[57:05] and you can start your free trial today with no credit card required at squarespace.com

[57:11] that's another thing i wanted to ask you

[57:12] my credit cards were taken away from me

[57:14] eventually you're going to be in trouble

[57:17] at some point you're going to need to pay for this

[57:19] but i want to start it up without a credit card

[57:22] can i do that?

[57:23] you can

[57:24] because as i said

[57:25] what happened was i went to a snooty restaurant

[57:26] and when i went to pay

[57:28] i must have overdrawn on my account

[57:30] because they literally cut up the card in front of me with scissors

[57:32] what was crazy was that they were charting so much

[57:35] and there were like three sprouts on that plate

[57:37] and it was the evening of force friday

[57:39] where elliot spent all his fun bucks

[57:41] on star wars dudes

[57:43] i had to buy every one of the lego star wars sets

[57:46] or some shit

[57:47] take it easy

[57:48] it's all that some people have in their lives

[57:50] anyway

[57:51] calm down

[57:53] sorry i read an article about force friday

[57:55] that got me really mad

[57:56] so dan, squarespace can help me with that

[57:59] i can get it easy and see if it's the right thing for me

[58:01] it sounds like it's really great

[58:02] is there some kind of code that i could use for discounts?

[58:04] indeed

[58:05] you can use the offer code FLOP

[58:07] that's F L O P

[58:09] to get 10% off your first purchase

[58:12] now i want to start a website

[58:14] that's a tribute to neil breen

[58:16] writer, director, producer of fateful findings

[58:18] that's called almosttopless.com

[58:20] do you think squarespace is a place i could do that?

[58:23] you can do that easily with squarespace

[58:25] responsive design?

[58:26] yep

[58:27] and i don't need to know coding?

[58:28] no

[58:29] you don't need a credit card

[58:30] how's their tech support?

[58:31] it's excellent

[58:32] and you can use the offer code FLOP

[58:34] to get 10% off your first purchase

[58:36] but i don't need a credit card, right?

[58:37] no

[58:38] squarespace

[58:39] can i pay by money order?

[58:40] you can

[58:41] i don't know if that's true

[58:42] it seems like a promise

[58:43] that you should be making

[58:44] that's a

[58:45] i'm trying to get you to shut up

[58:46] i'm trying to get you to shut up

[58:48] so squarespace.com

[58:49] offer code FLOP

[58:50] yeah

[58:51] build it beautiful

[58:52] but

[58:53] moving on

[58:54] no no you should say

[58:57] like you're a detective

[58:59] so

[59:00] we should move on

[59:01] to letters from

[59:02] guys i just want to say

[59:03] this has been great so far

[59:04] oh thanks

[59:05] i think dan

[59:06] that's what i would have said

[59:07] to elizabeth warren roebling

[59:08] the woman who was really responsible

[59:10] for making sure the brooklyn bridge

[59:11] happened

[59:12] she'd be like

[59:13] ah my husband

[59:14] he's he's in

[59:15] stuck in bed now

[59:16] and he won't leave bed

[59:17] for years

[59:18] after his nervous collapse

[59:19] and the bends probably

[59:20] and i have to oversee

[59:21] this major construction project

[59:22] uh what should i do

[59:23] and i'd say

[59:25] okay

[59:26] so dan

[59:27] what do we do now

[59:28] we uh

[59:29] read letters

[59:30] from listeners

[59:31] in a little segment

[59:32] we call

[59:33] the flop house

[59:34] movie mailbag

[59:35] i mean we haven't called

[59:36] that

[59:37] do we really call it that

[59:38] i think

[59:39] you can call

[59:40] what call

[59:41] whatever you want

[59:42] whatever you want

[59:43] just don't

[59:44] just trust your body

[59:45] why would you call

[59:46] it late for dinner

[59:47] it doesn't tell the audience

[59:48] what it is

[59:49] this is some kind of

[59:50] cooking segment

[59:51] for people with

[59:52] busy schedules

[59:53] i don't understand

[59:54] why are you so touchy

[59:55] about being late

[59:56] for dinner

[59:57] and look

[59:58] the letters are very hungry

[1:00:00] So hungry, wow.

[1:00:02] Hungry for a song?

[1:00:03] Hungry for souls.

[1:00:06] You mean songs, right?

[1:00:07] Yeah.

[1:00:08] Open that mail bag, open it wide, and dive inside.

[1:00:12] There's letters inside.

[1:00:14] Hey, don't hide from the letters inside.

[1:00:17] There's letters inside the mail bag.

[1:00:20] Who are these letters for?

[1:00:22] Let's take a look.

[1:00:23] It's my neighbor's mail.

[1:00:25] Open it up.

[1:00:26] I'm a nosy guy.

[1:00:28] Huh.

[1:00:29] They're in arrears.

[1:00:30] They're losing their house.

[1:00:31] This is sad news, and I wish I didn't know it.

[1:00:35] Glue that letter back shut.

[1:00:37] Slide it under their door.

[1:00:40] When the house goes up for auction,

[1:00:42] buy it up, and then sell it for more.

[1:00:45] Flippin' houses, that's where the money is.

[1:00:49] Flippin' houses in today's market.

[1:00:52] Buy a house cheap, fix it on up, sell it for more.

[1:00:56] The business runs itself.

[1:00:59] If you know how to fix a house.

[1:01:02] With letters.

[1:01:04] Brought to you by Property Brothers and HGTV.

[1:01:07] That was one of the songs that sounded mostly a TV theme.

[1:01:10] I was going to say that, but even before.

[1:01:11] I was going to say, they all seem to have the same tempo.

[1:01:14] They're all pretty much the same tempo.

[1:01:15] Da, da, da, da, da, da, da.

[1:01:21] So this letter goes, I'm a big fan of your show.

[1:01:24] My favorite flopper is Elliot.

[1:01:26] Thank you.

[1:01:26] I'm hesitant to say this because I'm

[1:01:28] afraid it will lead to this letter not being read because

[1:01:31] of Dan's jealousy.

[1:01:32] If I say that I'm a wife and that I have a butt,

[1:01:35] will that win me over in the eyes of Purposeoid number one?

[1:01:38] I hope so.

[1:01:39] Anywho, I'm not sure about Dan and Stuart,

[1:01:42] but I've heard Elliot say he's not a fan of.

[1:01:46] I've heard Elliot say he's not a fan of Seth Rogen, Jonah Hill,

[1:01:49] and Judd Apatow.

[1:01:50] They're OK.

[1:01:51] I mean, I'm not.

[1:01:52] They don't float my personal boat.

[1:01:54] I feel that between those three people.

[1:01:55] Which floats on the waters of Lake Champlain.

[1:01:57] You get a majority of the comedies

[1:01:59] that are released in theaters today.

[1:02:00] What are some of your favorite comedies

[1:02:02] that have come out in recent years?

[1:02:04] And what current comedians are you fans of?

[1:02:06] Thanks, Mallory, last name withheld.

[1:02:08] P.S. Thank you for continuously mentioning the film

[1:02:10] Baby, Secret of the Lost Legend.

[1:02:12] I completely forgot about that film

[1:02:14] and was glad to be reminded of the movie for my youth

[1:02:16] about a baby dinosaur.

[1:02:18] A lost legend.

[1:02:20] Now found.

[1:02:22] Monitor your local videos, Stuart.

[1:02:24] Comedy is other than fateful findings that we enjoyed.

[1:02:28] Are there any?

[1:02:29] I mean, I like the trip movies.

[1:02:31] Yeah, I think that we've mentioned before

[1:02:34] that we all enjoy the Edgar Wright.

[1:02:37] Yeah, the Cornetto trilogy stuff.

[1:02:38] Sure.

[1:02:39] Those are good ones.

[1:02:41] I guess recently, like I am tuned to reference Judd Apatow.

[1:02:45] I liked Trainwreck quite a bit.

[1:02:46] I still haven't seen that yet.

[1:02:47] And I like Spy a lot, too.

[1:02:49] I've heard I thought that was like the people

[1:02:51] involves probably best best work.

[1:02:54] I yeah, when I watched that movie, I sort of thought like at the beginning,

[1:02:58] like, OK, well, this is not as good as it was advertised.

[1:03:00] Like, it felt very rote.

[1:03:02] And then as it went on, they wrote it.

[1:03:04] I how many times have I done that joke now?

[1:03:06] Like I have at least once before.

[1:03:09] But as it went on, I appreciated it.

[1:03:12] But Jason Statham makes a face off joke.

[1:03:13] No, she's she's terrific.

[1:03:15] I like the Rose.

[1:03:17] Rose Burney.

[1:03:18] Rose Burney gallon burn.

[1:03:20] Bernie, I have to admit Bernie starring Jack Black

[1:03:24] and Alice and Alice and Janice in it.

[1:03:26] She's great.

[1:03:27] I have to admit that I don't see a lot of modern comedies these days,

[1:03:31] partly because I've had so many experiences of not enjoying them.

[1:03:34] And that keeps me from going to new ones.

[1:03:36] And I should break that habit.

[1:03:38] I should be willing to risk my time on a modern comedy.

[1:03:41] You just stick with old timey comedies like Revenge of the Nerds.

[1:03:44] Yes.

[1:03:45] Starring at Nerds.

[1:03:46] Old starring the nerds and featuring Revenge

[1:03:51] also starring Camille Beers by of

[1:03:55] the life like I'm trying to think of.

[1:03:57] There's like a recent comedy that I thought was really, really funny.

[1:04:01] And there's I mean, what we do in the shadows was fucking great.

[1:04:04] I haven't seen that yet.

[1:04:05] But you should. It's great.

[1:04:07] I want to see it.

[1:04:10] My team is full of check new wave films.

[1:04:12] I got to watch those first.

[1:04:13] It's not comedies that some of them are very funny.

[1:04:17] Just like CBS.

[1:04:18] Do you like me?

[1:04:19] Check new wave.

[1:04:23] So this letters goes like this.

[1:04:25] It says, listen, you know, I think it's a little something like this.

[1:04:30] Well, listen here, Kalen.

[1:04:32] What is it that you turn around for the last one?

[1:04:35] You said your dream was to be a Popeye spokesman.

[1:04:37] Well, buddy, here's your chance.

[1:04:39] I'll make this quick spokesman.

[1:04:42] I woke up on the day of my wedding and I was running late.

[1:04:44] I want to know how these sentences connect.

[1:04:46] My groomsmen and I had to stop somewhere to get breakfast,

[1:04:48] but it was pouring rain.

[1:04:50] We ended up at Burger King.

[1:04:51] It was 1030 a.m.

[1:04:53] And they were like, no, we don't have breakfast anymore.

[1:04:55] And you'll have to wait a million years before we're ready for lunch.

[1:04:58] So I dashed across the busy street to Popeye's Popeye's.

[1:05:02] I asked if they were serving breakfast still.

[1:05:04] They said no. I said, OK, then I'll take the most breakfasty thing

[1:05:07] you have for lunch.

[1:05:08] So they made me a Cajun pool boy.

[1:05:10] I ate it quickly and then ran off to get married.

[1:05:13] During the entire ceremony, reception and night,

[1:05:17] my stomach was tumultuous.

[1:05:19] Cajun boy was begging to be released.

[1:05:22] My question is for you, Kalin.

[1:05:24] One, how dare you?

[1:05:25] And two, what is Popeye's stance on Cajun boys for breakfast?

[1:05:29] Alex, last name withheld.

[1:05:31] Well, Alex, one, I had Popeye's on my wedding day, too,

[1:05:34] and it was delightful and sat in my stomach like a beautiful cat

[1:05:39] on a taffeta pillow.

[1:05:41] Did you eat that in the movie theater when we were watching Piranha 3D?

[1:05:44] No, it was after we went to Piranha 3D.

[1:05:47] I think you were in the car, Dan, with my brother.

[1:05:48] Yeah, David was like, I know where there's a Popeye's near here.

[1:05:52] Or somehow he like searched for one.

[1:05:54] Yep, like Monterey Jack's seeking out cheese.

[1:05:57] He closed his eyes and floated along the sense.

[1:06:00] And so after that, before I got changed for the wedding into my suit,

[1:06:04] we sat outside his hotel room and ate Popeye's for lunch.

[1:06:07] Just one of many reasons that that was the best day of my life.

[1:06:10] Number one, the wedding.

[1:06:12] Number two, it was great seeing Piranha 3D with my pals.

[1:06:15] Three, Popeye's for lunch, like greatest day of my life.

[1:06:20] The let's OK, let's get a few things straight.

[1:06:22] One, I just want to say I do not endorse anything at Popeye's

[1:06:26] other than the chicken.

[1:06:27] I don't know any I don't order anything other than the chicken.

[1:06:29] I don't care for their other stuff.

[1:06:31] What about their Nolan style red beans and rice?

[1:06:33] Well, that I eat as a side dish every time. Yes.

[1:06:35] But that is to quiet your tumultuous stomach filled with chicken.

[1:06:39] Yeah. I don't know what the deal is with your tender tummy

[1:06:42] that you couldn't handle that food.

[1:06:44] But also, dude, where are you getting married?

[1:06:45] That there were fast food restaurants and no bathrooms.

[1:06:49] Deal with it before the ceremony, you guy. Come on.

[1:06:53] Or at any point during the reception, step aside and use the toilet.

[1:06:57] It's your day. No one can tell, you know.

[1:07:00] Yeah, maybe you didn't want to have to unlimber

[1:07:02] all of his wedding equipment that he was wearing.

[1:07:05] Yeah, yeah. And do as well.

[1:07:06] When he was with me.

[1:07:08] Yeah. Yeah. Why not?

[1:07:10] You know, like one of those proton packs that you wear.

[1:07:15] Yeah. Some kind of steampunk gizmo.

[1:07:18] I got a death lock armor.

[1:07:20] Yeah. The so I your experience was not a good one.

[1:07:25] I take it. Try Popeye's again.

[1:07:27] Get the fried chicken and deal with it.

[1:07:30] And as a breakfast food, fried chicken is great.

[1:07:33] I mean, I've eaten cold Popeye's fried chicken for breakfast.

[1:07:36] Many times. I mean, you mean the waffles?

[1:07:39] Because you should just go up and order the Kaelin special,

[1:07:42] which is a four piece mild.

[1:07:43] Thank you for the rice and beans.

[1:07:45] No dry red beans and rice on the side.

[1:07:47] No drink biscuit.

[1:07:49] And then also again, as a man who is often picked up, Popeye's really

[1:07:54] it's on the way over to record.

[1:07:55] This actually is funny.

[1:07:57] A guy stopped me on the street and said, are you Elliot Kaelin?

[1:08:00] And I was like, yeah.

[1:08:01] And he says, a flap house listener.

[1:08:02] And I go, oh, thanks.

[1:08:04] He goes, yeah, the Popeye's was a giveaway.

[1:08:06] A bag of Popeye's in my hand.

[1:08:09] Here's the thing. When I was young.

[1:08:10] And they're like, goody, goody.

[1:08:12] Look at your face where you're so excited that I was licking my chops

[1:08:15] and rubbing my hands together like a cartoon wolf

[1:08:19] staring at Red Hot Riding Hood.

[1:08:21] The when I was a young man before there was a lady in my life,

[1:08:25] I would frequently on weekends get a box of fried chicken on Friday night.

[1:08:30] That's my food for the weekend.

[1:08:32] So I'm having breakfast two days in a row, and it was fantastic.

[1:08:35] Am I alive today to tell the tale?

[1:08:37] Somehow. Yeah.

[1:08:38] So continue that malcontent has been disposed of.

[1:08:41] Yeah. This next letter is forever goes.

[1:08:45] Help me be better at being dumped.

[1:08:47] Obi-Wan Kenobi.

[1:08:48] Dear flop house, I recently got dumped and I'm grateful to your podcast

[1:08:51] for helping me not act like an insane person.

[1:08:54] Whenever I want to call my ex-boyfriend, I instead make myself

[1:08:57] listen to a flop house episode.

[1:08:59] Soon, I'm laughing and don't care about my ex-boyfriend anymore

[1:09:02] because he was not as fun as you are, especially Dan, who is my favorite.

[1:09:06] And Elliot, who is my other favorite?

[1:09:08] Sorry, Stuart.

[1:09:09] And it's OK. I'm the garbage one.

[1:09:11] Unfortunately, the ladies love cool, Stuart.

[1:09:14] She says the recent Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episode

[1:09:17] was not up to standard.

[1:09:18] In my opinion, I got distracted and end up calling my ex-boyfriend

[1:09:21] who now thinks I am crazy.

[1:09:23] This is too much pressure to put on us.

[1:09:25] Please help me be better at being dumped by having only having a plus

[1:09:29] plus plus episodes.

[1:09:30] For example, the Transformers episode or the That's My Boy episode.

[1:09:34] Thank you in advance.

[1:09:35] Maggie, last name withheld.

[1:09:36] Maggie, you're too good for that guy.

[1:09:38] You kick him to the curb and forget about him

[1:09:40] because there's plenty of fish in the sea.

[1:09:42] I don't even know why you're listening to this episode.

[1:09:44] You should be watching Fateful Findings.

[1:09:46] You watch Fateful Findings.

[1:09:47] You'll be laughing so hard.

[1:09:48] You'll be like, boyfriend, who doesn't exist?

[1:09:51] Boyfriend, what?

[1:09:52] I want to be with that Neil Breen.

[1:09:54] You all the ladies want to lightly peck.

[1:09:56] And you should only be dating boyfriends from the Boyfriend Academy.

[1:10:00] I mean, as taught by Shelley Long, aka don't tell her it's me, University.

[1:10:06] Yeah, I guess she is the teacher.

[1:10:09] I always kind of viewed her as like a sensei type.

[1:10:12] I mean, that's another way to see me, teacher,

[1:10:19] a teacher, huh? I always thought of her as more of a professor,

[1:10:24] more of an adjunct professor,

[1:10:27] an instructor sort of position,

[1:10:32] some sort of instruction provider.

[1:10:35] Glad we were able to help you, I guess.

[1:10:37] I assume we were.

[1:10:39] I don't know. This episode's super great, right?

[1:10:42] We'll do our best to try to be funny so that you laugh and don't think about them.

[1:10:45] But hey, I hope by the time you listen to this episode,

[1:10:47] you're already awash on a sea of dudes.

[1:10:52] Gross. Are you gross?

[1:10:55] So last letter goes like this.

[1:10:58] Dear Radio Zork, apply grease to door hinge.

[1:11:01] Push open door.

[1:11:03] Throw dynamite at Gru.

[1:11:05] Matt, last name with L.

[1:11:07] That's a lot of motions for one turn.

[1:11:09] I don't know if you can make that many.

[1:11:10] I think it kind of disqualifies it.

[1:11:13] Yep. You become unstuck in time because you're moving too fast.

[1:11:17] You are dead.

[1:11:20] You are a harsh game master.

[1:11:22] A nice try.

[1:11:26] But thanks for playing.

[1:11:27] You cheat a good game, boy.

[1:11:29] But now you Zork.

[1:11:31] Thanks for playing the most popular radio adventure.

[1:11:34] Radio Zork brought to you by Dan.

[1:11:38] Brought to you by what?

[1:11:39] And Elliot.

[1:11:41] What was it actually brought to you by?

[1:11:42] Delicious penises?

[1:11:43] I can't remember.

[1:11:44] Yeah, I forgot what it was.

[1:11:46] I forgot what old timey vulgar product it was.

[1:11:50] Greasy penises.

[1:11:51] Yeah. Is there any other kind?

[1:11:53] Yeah, that's it's time for our genital health corner, right?

[1:11:56] Every episode, we have a new tip about genital health.

[1:11:59] And check your penis. Is it greasy?

[1:12:01] Well, that's the thing.

[1:12:01] Stewart has has reminded me that always keep your penis well greased.

[1:12:05] Yeah. If you don't have a penis, grease someone else.

[1:12:07] Oil can. They'll appreciate it.

[1:12:10] Oil can. That squeaking isn't, they aren't your hip hinges.

[1:12:14] No, it's your penis asking for oil.

[1:12:16] Oil can.

[1:12:19] You want to get a smooth erection?

[1:12:21] You gotta grease that thing up.

[1:12:23] OK, so I think the next.

[1:12:24] Super spiky.

[1:12:25] Yeah, it's got a crickets way up.

[1:12:27] Or gritty. Yeah.

[1:12:29] So the next step of this podcast is not talking about gross stuff.

[1:12:32] That was super.

[1:12:33] It's talking about fun stuff.

[1:12:35] Movies we actually liked.

[1:12:36] Boing. Dan's going to start.

[1:12:38] Oh, I am. All right.

[1:12:40] I was watching.

[1:12:41] Bounce Pass.

[1:12:42] We just went to Coup d'etat.

[1:12:44] Stewart is now the host.

[1:12:45] A coup de gras.

[1:12:46] I was watching.

[1:12:48] Hanging with Mr. Coup d'etat.

[1:12:50] I was watching a thing called television the other day and I was flipping.

[1:12:54] Tell me more.

[1:12:56] I was flipping past the channels, which is what the kids are doing.

[1:13:00] The story gets even better.

[1:13:02] And I came across the second, well, the last third, actually, of a little movie

[1:13:07] called Death Trap, which I watched several times growing up.

[1:13:11] Because it was on HBO all the time.

[1:13:13] As you waited for, what, Sheena to be on?

[1:13:15] Yeah. But I like that movie quite a bit.

[1:13:19] It stars Michael Caine, Christopher Reeve, and Diane Cannon in the three major roles.

[1:13:26] There's about five major roles.

[1:13:29] There's like five roles in the whole movie, basically.

[1:13:31] Yeah. And it's just a twisty, like it was based on a play by Ira Levin.

[1:13:40] It's directed by Sidney Lumet.

[1:13:41] He does not open up the play particularly.

[1:13:44] He just directs it well.

[1:13:47] And when you've got people like Michael Caine and Christopher Reeve and Diane Cannon,

[1:13:52] like they are able to play the thriller elements of the story,

[1:13:55] but they're also able to play the light comedy elements of it.

[1:13:58] Because it is a silly movie at its heart.

[1:14:01] It's full of twists and turns that kind of take advantage of the thriller plotting

[1:14:07] while sort of also making fun of it at the same time.

[1:14:11] And it's a very enjoyable movie.

[1:14:13] It's about a failed writer of thriller plays who engages in a plot to try and get rid of his wife.

[1:14:24] And then many twists and turns come afterwards.

[1:14:28] And so if you're looking for just a fun time, I recommend Death Trap.

[1:14:32] More than Fateful Findings?

[1:14:35] I mean, maybe equally in different ways.

[1:14:40] Others?

[1:14:41] That sounds great.

[1:14:42] You know, guys, the other day I popped on a movie on the old digital video player.

[1:14:46] Am I the only one who's not going to explain the circumstances in which you watched his movie?

[1:14:52] I fired it up.

[1:14:53] And boy, did I have the time of my life.

[1:14:57] Now I cracked a couple of beers.

[1:15:01] I never felt that way before.

[1:15:06] You know, I looked through every open door.

[1:15:11] And I watched Spike Lee's Inside Man.

[1:15:14] Not what I expected.

[1:15:16] Which is a great little thriller.

[1:15:18] It's got an amazing show-stopping performance from my man, Clive Owen.

[1:15:26] Clive the Chive.

[1:15:28] Clive Owen.

[1:15:30] Hello, is it me?

[1:15:31] It's me, Clive Owen, today, governor.

[1:15:33] It shows a path for Spike Lee's career that he decided not to take.

[1:15:37] It is.

[1:15:38] I mean, it's super impressive that the guy turns out what is basically a Hollywood thriller.

[1:15:43] And it's just super great, competent, and fun to watch.

[1:15:47] I mean, it's not as good as...

[1:15:48] Denzel Washington is draped in the best Steve Harvey suits.

[1:15:55] I want to say it's not as good as, obviously, as the taking of film 1, 2, 3.

[1:15:59] But it's got...

[1:15:59] The remake.

[1:16:00] Certain...

[1:16:01] It's got some of the same flavor in that it's really like a New York thriller.

[1:16:05] I would say Inside Man is the closest to a remake in terms of spirit of the taking of film 1, 2, 3.

[1:16:11] Because it is a crime movie that has a really good thriller plot.

[1:16:15] And it's really suspenseful.

[1:16:16] But it does give you a picture of what life in New York at a certain time is like.

[1:16:20] Like, it captures little things about kind of post-September 11th New York

[1:16:26] in a way that no other movies, I feel like, really have.

[1:16:30] Except what, like The 25th Hour?

[1:16:31] Which is all about post-September 11th New York.

[1:16:33] Yeah, also Spike Lee.

[1:16:35] And it's also Spike Lee.

[1:16:36] And it's got a great cast.

[1:16:37] Clive Owen.

[1:16:38] I don't know if I mentioned it has Clive Owen in it.

[1:16:40] Denzel.

[1:16:41] Jodie Foster.

[1:16:43] Christopher, my man, Plummer.

[1:16:48] She was just raw dogging it.

[1:16:50] She would tell...

[1:16:51] C to the P.

[1:16:53] She would tell...

[1:16:54] G4 is also in it.

[1:16:55] He is totally in it.

[1:16:57] People say ICP means Insane Clown Posse.

[1:16:59] But for me there's only I, Christopher Plummer.

[1:17:04] So Jodie Foster's in it doing a really weird performance that's

[1:17:10] better than her weird performance in Elysium.

[1:17:12] Yep.

[1:17:13] So...

[1:17:13] I think Jodie Foster's really good in it.

[1:17:15] I know, but she's like, it's her manner.

[1:17:18] She is borderline omniscient mystical being in some ways.

[1:17:22] She's like a wind elemental like Dame Judi Dench in that Riddick movie.

[1:17:26] It's like Jodie Foster is playing a non-crazy version of

[1:17:29] Gillian Anderson's character in Hannibal.

[1:17:31] Yeah.

[1:17:32] Where there's just something off about her.

[1:17:35] So to summarize, I'm going to recommend Dirty Dancing.

[1:17:41] I'm going to recommend a different movie.

[1:17:43] This is a movie that we started talking about at the beginning of Fateful Findings

[1:17:46] because there's a long shot of the storage locker area, and that's Primer.

[1:17:51] Primer.

[1:17:52] I feel like Fateful Findings is an example of how one man can write,

[1:17:56] direct, star, and produce in a movie on a very low budget, and it is terrible.

[1:18:01] But it's possible for one man to...

[1:18:02] It's terrible for anyone to try and imitate such a great movie.

[1:18:05] Yeah, yeah.

[1:18:06] It's inimitable.

[1:18:07] It's inimitable.

[1:18:08] There's a...

[1:18:09] It is possible for one man to write, direct, star, and produce a very low budget movie

[1:18:13] and have it come out really good.

[1:18:15] Like Bad Taste.

[1:18:18] Yeah, sure.

[1:18:19] I mean, that's an example too.

[1:18:19] It's not the one I'm going to talk about.

[1:18:20] I'm going to talk about Primer,

[1:18:23] which came up because a lot of it takes place in the storage,

[1:18:25] in like a rental storage space.

[1:18:27] But it's for people who are not aware of it,

[1:18:29] and probably most of our listeners are at this point.

[1:18:32] It's a time travel movie that was made for a very minimal budget.

[1:18:36] It's like $7,000 or something like that.

[1:18:38] Like, it's El Mariachi level budget.

[1:18:40] But it's...

[1:18:41] And the one main way you can tell that is that the sound recording in some scenes is not ideal,

[1:18:46] but it's a really good time travel paradox science fiction movie

[1:18:51] that does not rely on special effects and just relies on...

[1:18:54] I mean, it's arguably the best time travel movie.

[1:18:57] Yeah, I think you could make a really good case that it's the best time travel movie there is.

[1:19:01] And I was not a fan that much of Shane Carruth,

[1:19:04] the writer-director, stars other movie Upstream Color.

[1:19:06] I found that a little too abstract for me.

[1:19:08] But Primer, I feel like, is just in that right place of being mysterious,

[1:19:15] but also a movie with a plot that you can...

[1:19:18] Maybe you have to puzzle out some of it later, but you can follow it.

[1:19:21] Whereas Upstream Color, it felt like he wrote a movie

[1:19:23] and then he decided to like remove random pages of dialogue.

[1:19:27] And that I didn't love so much.

[1:19:29] I like Upstream Color.

[1:19:31] There are things I like about it.

[1:19:33] Upstream Color, what I like about it,

[1:19:35] are the parts that have to do with their relationship only.

[1:19:38] And I don't like any of the stuff that has to do with the conspiracy to get that chemical

[1:19:42] that makes people experience the same thing or whatever it is.

[1:19:46] But Primer, I recommend.

[1:19:47] Low budget dreams.

[1:19:48] Live them.

[1:19:49] Make the movie.

[1:19:50] I think Upstream Color is definitely a movie that you want to let wash over you

[1:19:55] and not think about it too hard.

[1:19:57] Whereas Primer...

[1:19:58] Real check your brain at the door thrill ride.

[1:20:00] real Valhalla rising like it's so moody and like you get a sense of what it's

[1:20:05] about without like trying to need to puzzle it out whereas I think yeah

[1:20:09] primer like actually rewards a little more engagement with what's going on I

[1:20:15] can see that even though you don't necessarily need to understand

[1:20:17] everything that happens to enjoy it you don't have to say go on the internet and

[1:20:21] find those like crazy really diagrams mm-hmm which I'd like to really see a

[1:20:26] crazy diagram about the movie watch night fateful findings oh man there's

[1:20:30] you can make a Venn diagram of the plots of this movie and none of the circles

[1:20:34] would touch like we're so disconnected from each other but thank you again for

[1:20:42] listening are we done now what's going on shade I don't appreciate you enough

[1:20:47] the listener we read their letters yeah what's the least we can do look I know

[1:20:52] you're in a vulnerable place right now he's a like a raw wound soaking in

[1:20:58] delicious salt thank you real great well thanks to listeners and thanks to

[1:21:08] you Stuart and thanks to you Dan Elliot thanks I had the time of my life and I

[1:21:16] owe it all to you that song is forever linked in my mind with Chuck E. Cheese

[1:21:25] because I guess I went to Chuck E. Cheese a lot as a kid when that song was

[1:21:28] big and you love fucking pizza bro you're crazy for it look if I can have

[1:21:32] pizza served to me by a guy in a mouse costume well the same mouse character is

[1:21:35] a robot on stage in front of me that's insane which leads me to ask the

[1:21:39] question are these brothers or clones or is this are they moving so are they

[1:21:45] moving so quickly that they appear to be in two places at once Chuck E. Cheese is a real mindfuck

[1:21:49] anyway Dan take it away for the flop house I've been Dan McCoy and one of them

[1:21:55] is moving super jerky like he's a robot the other one clearly seems to be a

[1:21:58] college kid in a suit that guy's Stuart Wellington and who am I hey he's Elliot

[1:22:04] Kaelin the lovable scamp America's favorite trace amigos for the flop house

[1:22:09] it's us I'm Dan McCoy I've been Elliot Kaelin Wellington and that's a weird guy

[1:22:16] all right good night everyone

[1:22:29] it's okay how are our levels fine to me I'm on the wood level whoa that's dope

[1:22:37] with leaf man yeah leaf man I suggest that you use the whatever fire thing on

[1:22:42] the wood thing yeah thanks dude anyway if I could beat the fire level I would

[1:22:53] have done that first level is the one you beat before that it's easier

[1:22:58] maximumfun.org comedy and culture artist owned listener supported hi this is Dave

[1:23:05] Hill from Dave Hill's podcasting incident on the maximum fun network I'm

[1:23:09] here with my lovely and talented secretary miss Shana Feinberg Shana I

[1:23:14] understand you've been doing a bit of research to find out what listeners

[1:23:17] think of the show yes I have Dave and what have you found well people that

[1:23:22] love it say they love it cuz it's just Dave hanging out with someone in his

[1:23:25] apartment awesome what are people that hate it say they hate it because it's

[1:23:30] just Dave hanging out with someone in his apartment oh listen to Dave Hill's

[1:23:34] podcast incident on the maximum fun network mother was that too much no I

[1:23:40] think it was perfect

Flop House Classics - Fateful Findings

Transcript

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