Ep. #316 - Between Worlds, w/ Erin Foley-Chan

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss Between Worlds.

[0:03] The number one search result for

[0:06] Stop, you're my stepdaughter.

[0:08] And you're a ghost.

[0:30] hey welcome to the flop house i'm dan mccoy wow dan mccoy coming in hot coming in a little colder

[0:44] me stewart wellington and here coming in as cold as possible oh it's old elliot calen blow it in

[0:54] from the North Wind.

[0:55] Ooh.

[0:56] Ooh.

[0:58] Am I a ghost now?

[1:00] I was wind before,

[1:02] but now I appear to be a ghost.

[1:03] Chain rattles, chain rattles.

[1:05] Is the wind blowing the chains

[1:06] or is it a ghost rattling the chains?

[1:08] Perhaps our guest today can tell us.

[1:10] Dan, who's our guest?

[1:11] Our guest is my friend Erin Foley-Chan.

[1:15] You may know her as the head writer

[1:18] for the big fantasy debate on Facebook

[1:21] or perhaps supervising producer

[1:23] for the Big Fib on Disney+.

[1:25] She's done comedy stuff for years and years and years,

[1:29] except for the parts where she wasn't doing comedy stuff.

[1:31] And I'm glad that we have her on, Erin Fooley-Chan.

[1:36] Hello!

[1:37] Yay!

[1:38] I am running in here at 98.6, nice and comfy.

[1:43] Not too hot, not too cold, just regular average.

[1:47] Middle porridge.

[1:48] Although I did tell Sammy yesterday,

[1:51] But I did inform him that the inside of your mouth is a blistering 98.6 degrees.

[1:56] But that a.

[1:56] My mouth?

[1:59] No, what was the product where your mouth is much, much cooler?

[2:02] Why was he asking about my mouth?

[2:04] I was talking about Stuart's.

[2:05] I also like the notion that it is blisteringly hot in your mouth.

[2:11] That the heat inside your mouth is, I assume, causing blisters within your own mouth.

[2:15] This was some kind of cold mint.

[2:18] I forgot what it was now.

[2:19] But they would say, and it would show someone with fire all around them,

[2:22] and they would go, bleh, bleh,

[2:24] as if 98.6 degrees in your mouth was the same as a boiling pot of water.

[2:28] Yeah, and not your body temperature.

[2:30] I've never gone around and been like, healthy body temperature.

[2:33] Did he see a picture of my mouth, or did you tell him a story about it?

[2:38] He has a lot of questions about your mouth, Stuart.

[2:40] Papa, what temperature is Stuart's mouth?

[2:43] You met him.

[2:45] Yeah, that's what he sounds like.

[2:47] Now, I know Erin because she actually was the coach for my bad improv group, practice group, back in the old days when I was first in New York and doing that UCB grind.

[3:04] You guys were great.

[3:07] You don't have to say that anymore.

[3:09] Oh, that's right.

[3:12] That's an interesting coaching technique if all you do is tell them they're great.

[3:17] Everything is perfect.

[3:18] Don't change.

[3:19] Don't learn or grow.

[3:21] You're there.

[3:21] Yeah.

[3:22] And then we reconnected years later when she was going to school at Columbia and I was working there in a closet.

[3:33] And we had some good times having meals and complaining about the comedy world.

[3:42] Now, to explain to the listeners, Dan was working in a closet because you were working as a mop at the time, right?

[3:47] Yeah.

[3:47] I wish I was a mop.

[3:51] I aspired to be one.

[3:52] I started out as a Swiffer.

[3:54] I mean, I feel like a Swiffer is kind of an upgrade against a mop.

[3:58] A mop was invented by, what, Mickey Mouse?

[4:01] Yeah, a mop was invented by Mickey Mouse with a magic spell, whereas the Swiffer was invented by J.R. Swiffer,

[4:07] who went on to be the father of J.R.R. Tolkien,

[4:11] who in turn was the father of J.K. Rowling.

[4:13] No, Stuart, I think I can...

[4:14] Who is trash, so it.

[4:16] Yeah, thanks for bringing up trash, Elliot.

[4:19] We'll just pick up the trash you brought up,

[4:22] I'll take it outside and throw it in a fucking garbage can.

[4:25] Why don't you throw it in my...

[4:27] Why don't you throw it in the broken garbage cans I have

[4:29] that the city of Los Angeles will be replacing on Wednesday

[4:32] and I'm so excited about it.

[4:33] Oh, nice brag.

[4:35] I don't know why I feel compelled to push back against this,

[4:38] but maybe it's because I feel that I can teach Stuart a lesson

[4:41] about how the new ways aren't necessarily the best ways.

[4:44] Like, a Swiffer is a much less effective method

[4:47] of getting one's floor clean than a mop.

[4:51] Is it more convenient? Yes.

[4:53] Do I want to use a mop? No.

[4:55] But when it comes to doing its job, a mop is tops.

[4:59] So that's a boss's perspective, though.

[5:02] From the actual device, would you rather be sweeping up dry garbage or wet garbage?

[5:07] Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

[5:09] Yes, let's look at it from the artificial labor point of view.

[5:13] The thing with the object.

[5:15] What's the object thing?

[5:16] Well, that's why on today's Everything is Alive, we'll be talking to a mop and a Swiffer.

[5:20] Uh-huh, my name's Marty, I'm a mop.

[5:23] I guess I've always been a mop.

[5:25] I didn't apply for the job.

[5:27] Oh, wow.

[5:28] Yeah, and it's me, Jimmy Swiffer.

[5:31] You know, Swampas are newer than mops, but I still think we do a good job.

[5:35] Thank you.

[5:36] That was Everything is Alive.

[5:37] By Jonathan Satterthwaite.

[5:41] Some episodes are really horrifying.

[5:43] Yeah, they are.

[5:44] Did they ever do one about an egg?

[5:47] I can't remember.

[5:48] Because I would like to do an episode where it's an egg and it's like, just don't break me.

[5:52] Every day I live in fear that someone's going to smash me.

[5:55] Hold on.

[5:55] Did they ever do one about an egg?

[5:57] Are you talking about the – is this a real show or –

[6:00] Yeah, everything is alive.

[6:01] It's a real podcast.

[6:02] What?

[6:02] Yeah, it's a real podcast where items are alive.

[6:05] You've got to listen to it sometime.

[6:06] Did they do a toilet one?

[6:09] I don't think they've done a toilet.

[6:11] They did do soap at one point.

[6:12] Look, you go listen to it.

[6:13] They do a great job.

[6:14] Now, who is this podcast geared to?

[6:16] People who want to anthropomorphize their objects so that they feel bad about using them for the jobs that they are meant to be used for.

[6:24] That's what I was wondering, because I could sort of see this for a child, but for an adult, I'm like,

[6:29] Well, you're just lying to me and making me feel bad about the things I'm using these things for.

[6:33] No, no, it makes you think about the world from a different perspective.

[6:35] It's well worth it.

[6:36] Okay, so this is a podcast called The Flop House.

[6:39] We review other podcasts that some of the co-hosts are not sure are real podcasts.

[6:43] Dan, that's what we do on this podcast, right?

[6:45] Incorrect.

[6:45] This is a podcast where we watch a movie that we have been led to believe is a flop either critically or commercially.

[6:52] Not a mop.

[6:54] Then we watch it, and then we get on the inner tubes to talk about it in your ears.

[7:01] Oh, yeah, actually, that's good.

[7:02] People don't really realize that we're actually all recording while in inner tubes on lazy rivers at different parts of the country.

[7:07] Yep, yep.

[7:08] So.

[7:11] We lose more microphones this way.

[7:14] Okay, well, you know, I think this has been the best opening to a show maybe ever.

[7:20] Not just our show, but in the world.

[7:22] So we can't do any better.

[7:24] So let's just get on to the thing that we do.

[7:26] Yeah.

[7:28] Which is?

[7:29] Let's talk about this movie.

[7:30] Now, this movie is Between Worlds.

[7:33] It stars Nicolas Cage and, of course...

[7:36] Wait a minute.

[7:37] What season is it, Dan?

[7:39] What special time of year would make us watch this movie?

[7:42] Yeah, well, normally...

[7:43] That's right.

[7:44] Is that Saint Nick flying across the sky?

[7:47] Oh, yeah.

[7:48] It's Cagemas in July.

[7:51] St. Nick is flying across the sky wearing a T-shirt and shorts because it is July time.

[7:57] I mean, I feel like he's pretty sure he's wearing leather everything and a crazy alligator T-shirt.

[8:03] That's true.

[8:04] And his face is painted like a skull.

[8:05] Is that noise the jingling of jingle bells or is it the jingling of chains of a ghost?

[8:11] Oh, we turn to you, expert, Aaron Foley-Chang, to tell us.

[8:17] Now, you're a chain audio expert, and chains are often used to keep people in cages.

[8:23] So that's why we have you on today for Cages in July.

[8:25] Now, how did you become an expert on the sounds chains make and what is causing the chains to make those sounds?

[8:30] Well, you know, I was born into it.

[8:32] I didn't ask for it to happen to me.

[8:35] I certainly would have chosen it for myself, but I come from a long line of chain audio experts.

[8:41] My mama was a chain expert.

[8:43] My papa was a chain expert.

[8:45] Chain experts all the way down.

[8:47] yeah um yeah and the name chan sounds like chain yeah and i am trapped in this life

[8:55] of chains yeah uh what was i gonna say now speaking of chains and cages nicholas cage

[9:02] we do this thing in december called uh cagemas where we as stewart indicated celebrate the life

[9:08] and teachings of saint nicholas cage and uh we also do cagemas in july which is a thing that i

[9:14] believe i've forgotten about for the last couple of years so and it's named after everyone's second

[9:19] least favorite preston sturgis movie christmas in july uh i'd have to go to the go to the list to

[9:27] make that judgment everyone's least favorite is the one about the invention of uh ether gas

[9:33] for dentistry okay and the second least favorite is christmas in july is that a drama and not one

[9:39] of his comedies the it is a drama i think yeah it's called what the the great moment or something

[9:46] like that the beat the uh um oh boy never been kissed is what you're thinking yeah never been

[9:54] kissed yeah uh yeah the great moment i both remember liking christmas in july and also that

[10:01] i remember nothing about it other than i liked it so now a lot of the christmas in july uh uh

[10:09] twists on whether or not coffee makes you sleepy or helps you wake up that's right there's something

[10:14] it's it's it's the bunk something about that if it's if you can't sleep it's not the coffee it's

[10:19] the bunk yeah that's the slogan that the guy anyway we're not here to review christmas in

[10:23] july is that the movie we're talking about yeah we're here to talk about christmas in july between

[10:27] worlds a really fun thing about this is um trying to guess in the moment what's going to get cut and

[10:33] what's going to make it in oh nothing gets cut until i say something that someone might take

[10:39] the wrong way in which case we cut that stuff and then i do a little and then we cut it out yeah

[10:44] so between worlds this was a big budget summer tentpole release uh no uh actually that uh uh

[10:52] links right directly into what i have in my notes here which is the first thing you see in this film

[10:56] is of course oh we should mention dan's doing the summary this this this episode so it's gonna be

[11:01] a bumpy ride let's take it down fasten your ear belts we are off-roading wait till i do something

[11:08] wrong before saying that elliot don't fair point fair point okay so the first thing we see setting

[11:13] me up for failure we see a couple of production companies you've uh likely never heard of i i do

[11:19] believe i have seen these before but probably just because we do this podcast and we have become a

[11:23] connoisseur of little known production companies i mean the first one is saban films which of course

[11:29] is high on saban yeah he's a big name i missed that one but there was like voltage and uh something

[11:35] else i don't like voltage pictures uh you may know uh they for the movie don john i think was

[11:40] one of theirs okay yeah that's the one where uh it's bad to jack off that's the movie yes that's

[11:46] the one where internet porn almost ruins uh uh joseph gordon levitt's ability to interact with

[11:52] human women the thing i remember about that movie is they spent a lot of time uh the one thing that

[11:58] movie really gets right is fellows taking off their button-down shirts to eat their italian

[12:03] Meals just wearing their

[12:05] Their sleeveless underarm shirts

[12:07] Yeah

[12:08] I mean Voltage also made the Hurt Locker

[12:10] They made Dallas Buyers Club

[12:12] But then they haven't done anything

[12:14] At that level for a little while

[12:16] Okay well now that we've

[12:19] Finished that trip down Voltage Lane

[12:21] We are introduced

[12:23] You brought it up

[12:24] We are introduced to Nicolas Cage

[12:26] Who in this film plays

[12:29] Joe

[12:29] Now Joe this guy is a trucker

[12:33] with world-class

[12:35] greasy long hair and

[12:37] beard and he wears

[12:39] several rings on his hands

[12:41] and he has a hat that says Turkey and the Wolf

[12:43] and

[12:44] the first... Is that available for

[12:47] purchase anywhere? Maybe at the Voltage Pictures

[12:49] website? Between Worlds merch.

[12:51] Yeah.

[12:52] The first we hear Joe

[12:55] saying something is he owes some money

[12:57] to someone that he's

[12:59] talking to on the phone. So right away we get the

[13:01] sense that Joe is living the

[13:03] high life he's at the top of his game as if you couldn't tell by as if you couldn't tell by looking

[13:07] at him and seeing his kind of like homeless man meets caveman aesthetic uh joe is not in a good

[13:13] place yes yeah it's tough to tell whether or not he's a sleazebag or he's just a guy in a difficult

[13:20] position and we'll find out that uh the former is the case um so then oh i don't know about that

[13:26] he's got a little bit of both he's a scoundrel

[13:28] i would i think he starts off as less of a scoundrel than he ends up

[13:34] that's true he's his performance really ramps up he the first half of the movie nicholas i'm like

[13:41] oh okay nicholas cage is playing one of his nice guy roles and the second half of the movie i'm

[13:44] like he's insane he's he is he has completely gone off around the band yeah and right from

[13:51] right from the jump we see this is going to be a high energy performance like he is he is in in

[13:56] this movie there's no question oh yeah this this is not one of his one of his like euro thriller

[14:01] roles where he's just kind of sleepwalking through it like he's really throwing himself yeah this

[14:04] isn't kill chain and i would yeah yes i would say thank you exactly thank you yes i would say that

[14:11] um this character would be a man who has been uh you know driven around the bend by circumstance

[14:18] and a sympathetic figure but for one big factor that i think that we shall get to uh later uh

[14:28] yeah probably i can't do it um so cut to uh a big butt crack on the screen and this is this is a uh

[14:39] a gentleman who is uh working at the gas station in the 7-eleven and joe comes in paying for food

[14:46] He says some wacky Nicolas Cage stuff before hearing something in the restroom, a disturbance.

[14:53] And he goes in and he sees this woman who is played by Franca Patente, who you may know from Run, Lola, Run or The Bourne Identity.

[15:05] She's the titular run of Run, Lola, Run.

[15:09] And the identity in Bourne Identity.

[15:12] In a way.

[15:14] She is one of the runs.

[15:16] The other one is Ron DMC, plays Ron number two.

[15:18] Right, right in front, yeah.

[15:21] It's Franco Patente, Ron DMC, and Lola Montez.

[15:25] Finally, together in one film.

[15:27] And so he sees this woman being choked by a large man in the restroom.

[15:35] And, you know, rightfully assumes that she is being attacked.

[15:42] And he intervenes.

[15:44] He chases the man off, beats him up a little bit.

[15:47] I think you mean understandably assumes.

[15:49] Understandably assumes.

[15:51] Because he turns out not to be right.

[15:52] Well, yeah, I was.

[15:54] I was.

[15:54] In fact, thank you, Elliot.

[15:56] You saw that I could not think of the word and you corrected me, even though we had passed that point.

[16:02] But, you know, I mean, but not very, but not by very much.

[16:06] Yeah.

[16:07] Well, anyway, she is instead mad that this choking has been interrupted.

[16:13] and she starts yelling that Nick Cage has ruined it.

[16:18] And I want to say, right off the bat,

[16:21] I want to say that the style of the movie is weird.

[16:24] The style is weird, and as the movie went on,

[16:28] I got more on its wavelength and vibe

[16:32] and started to enjoy the style,

[16:34] but I can't tell whether it's just making that adjustment

[16:38] or that the early scenes are done a lot worse.

[16:42] It's hard to say in my mind because in these early scenes, I was like, everyone's talking so strangely and talking past each other.

[16:50] And nothing they're saying seems to connect with anything.

[16:52] And the framings are strange.

[16:54] And then it all kind of resolved for me as it went along.

[16:58] But I don't know whether you had this experience or not.

[17:01] I think the tone felt off the whole time for me.

[17:04] I mean, I got what the movie was going for as we got into the second act.

[17:11] But I really, I was taking this movie more seriously than it wanted me to, I think.

[17:17] Yeah, there's, on Wikipedia, they mentioned that the director, Maria Pallera, that says she initially wrote the film as a standard thriller, but later made it, quote, a much more surreal drama in the vein of David Lynch.

[17:29] And that kind of explains a lot of it to me, which is someone being like.

[17:32] Are you talking about the Angelo Badalamente, like, music?

[17:38] Well, and also the fact that, like, Leader of the Pack will start playing.

[17:41] It feels like someone looked at a David Lynch movie and was like, what does he do?

[17:46] Okay, it's, like, kind of weird, and there's a lot of, like, 50s music.

[17:50] Okay, got it.

[17:51] And instead of it coming naturally from them, and, like, even in a David Lynch movie,

[17:56] he'll start off the movie with something that tells you this is going to be a weird movie.

[18:00] Like, the best example of that is probably in Blue Velvet where, like, everything looks fine,

[18:05] and then there's that ear with all the ants on it.

[18:06] And it's like, OK, I'm going to tell you exactly what this movie is right at the beginning.

[18:10] And she doesn't do that.

[18:12] And it feels like someone trying to do that kind of thing, but it's not coming naturally to them.

[18:17] Yeah, it feels like it feels like if this that this movie was made by somebody who wanted to capture the feeling of Twin Peaks, but only the James Hurley riding around on a motorcycle stuff.

[18:27] I mean, everyone's favorite parts of Twin Peaks.

[18:31] Elliot, it somewhat surprises me that the that Wikipedia line unlocked the mystery for you and not the scene where they were sitting and the Angelo Baldomenti score sounded exactly like his theme for Audrey, like just slightly tweaked.

[18:45] So as not to, I guess, infringe upon his own copyright, like it could not have been more Twin Peaks-y the music.

[18:52] Yeah, I mean, I wasn't it wasn't until I read that that I was like, well, I mean, I didn't I read that relatively early because I was also like, what's going on with this?

[19:01] movie hold on i'm gonna have to take a look and see because unlike you guys i didn't get to watch

[19:05] it all in one sitting dad life hashtag dad hashtag dad life gotta watch your movies in pieces uh yeah

[19:12] but i will say that up top that the yeah there's a theme by angelo badalamenti that sounds like he

[19:19] just picked it out of his b-sides for twin peaks and then the there's a lot of uh uh score that

[19:26] sounds like people trying to do other uh lynch scores but anyway um so he saves this woman now

[19:33] why was why was she so mad that he interrupted her choking well well before i get exactly to

[19:40] that i will i want to say that like she says she says that he's ruined it uh they have like a lot

[19:46] of shouting out in the in the uh parking lot where at one point she like asked him whether he has uh

[19:52] kids and he he goes yeah i got a wife and kids oops they're dead and i'm like wow this is a lot

[19:59] for you to be loading on this woman right away nicholas cage um that moment that moment was

[20:05] great for me though because i from the trailer i thought this was going to be a more understated

[20:10] performance from cage and very early on he just went full gonzo and i appreciated it because then

[20:19] i just buckled up and i was ready for this movie to go off the rails oh and like i feel like i was

[20:26] like that's a that's a big moment from him and then there's scenes later on where i was like

[20:29] this is one of the understated moments during that scene i can almost see franca potenta like

[20:36] watching nicholas cage like okay i gotta figure out how to match this guy for this scene because

[20:41] she is she's really like underplaying things if in the beginning at least in a way that i really

[20:47] liked franco patente like she feels so much more real in this movie than anybody else which it

[20:51] turns out is not the way the movie wants anything to happen but uh there's uh but i actually liked

[20:57] her a lot in this yeah i mean i she's always great and one of those people where you're like

[21:02] okay well i wish that past a certain point her career had kept going the way it did at its peak

[21:09] but um anyway she now we're all now we're all bummed who's someone whose career went past went

[21:15] the way at their peak that it kept going you didn't want it to happen wait they kept having

[21:20] a peak someone who kept having successes and you were like oh why could this person's career just

[21:24] go downhill uh our president boom let's move on anyway wow topical relevant let's keep going

[21:30] uh i'm making a stand um so she asked for a ride to the hospital because her daughter

[21:37] uh has been in an accident while uh racing her motorcycle and when when uh she asked for this

[21:44] hospital ride cage hears some sirens and he seems spooked by them even though like the thing he said

[21:51] was he earlier was like 9-1-1's already been called like when rescuing her so i don't know

[21:56] whether he was lying about that it seems like a weird incongruity that he suddenly is like oh

[22:02] the fuzz i gotta get out of here but um somebody filed that one under goofs uh so her daughter is

[22:11] in a coma at the hospital at that moment

[22:12] and Franca

[22:14] goes into this monologue about how she almost died

[22:17] as a kid and

[22:18] I believe this is what we saw over the credits

[22:20] where she's in like a frozen lake

[22:23] over the credits we see

[22:25] kind of two young girls like adolescent

[22:26] girls floating in a frozen lake and one

[22:28] of them seems awake and the other one

[22:31] seems not yeah so

[22:32] what this has given her is the

[22:35] ability to go over

[22:37] to the other side but only

[22:39] when she cannot breathe only

[22:41] when she is say being choked um and you know nicholas cage accepts this pretty well i think

[22:48] he seems on board with it um and so we go to the hospital and uh franca's daughter

[22:55] starts to code and the mom says hey nicholas cage my new friend you gotta choke me you gotta

[23:03] choke me so i can go fix this and i kind of i'm not sure what exactly she was supposed to have

[23:09] on the other side but it saves her daughter it's it's never clear yeah she like i think she like

[23:15] ushers the spirit back into the body like that's kind of her goal she just points and yeah and uh

[23:22] and so of course nicholas cage chokes her in a stairwell and every it feels like every time

[23:28] somebody gets choked they have to get lifted up off the ground which is i don't know weird

[23:33] it's like they're all being choked by superheroes yeah that is uh yeah um so they have uh do you

[23:41] think do you think she's pulling she's pulling that move or she gets choked and then she ends

[23:44] up in the afterlife and she's like where's a supervisor i can talk to excuse me excuse me

[23:49] like charon is about to row her daughter across the river six and she's like where's your manager

[23:53] can i talk to your manager please and he's like hades is pretty busy right now he's got

[23:58] this marriage problem actually i'm the manager sure you are can i let me talk to you um yeah

[24:05] hades is like hades is like charon can you not deal with this i only get so much time with

[24:10] with persephone can you just like take care of this uh so as uh franca is going out of the room

[24:17] the nurse is talking to her and says like it worked but be careful she's been to the other

[24:22] side now and i'm like does everyone understand the rules of this like what is this nurse coming out

[24:28] i mean this is this is the kind of common thing where non-white people have a have a have a

[24:34] stronger connection to the mystical realms than white people and this nurse kind of had a no it's

[24:40] it's a real it's in the south so there's like maybe a voodoo component i don't know she did

[24:45] she had an accent we're not really sure what this nurse's deal is why she knows that that's what

[24:50] franca left the room and she's like well she obviously went to get choked

[24:54] like we don't know how she knows what's going on but she does it's she is it is a it is a fairly

[25:03] racist stereotype way to use the character she's she's like a she's like a caribbean possibly nurse

[25:09] and so of course she's all up on voodoo i guess and like can can sense what's going on with souls

[25:16] and it's a uh and when she comes back later i was uh she comes back later and i was like oh so i

[25:22] didn't dream that moment where a random nurse was just keeping tabs on i guess has a cb radio

[25:27] tuned into the spirit police band but it's a yeah it's a it's a there's a long line of those things

[25:34] it does seem later on when she comes back and she's like okay well gotta go to the local miss

[25:39] cleo i have to fix this i guess um yeah it was it was weird uh so during this time uh nicholas

[25:47] cage is like a weird interaction with the daughter as she comes out of her coma does that happen

[25:51] around now or is that later i yeah well he has some he has some visions of his uh of his dead

[25:56] wife right yeah well there's he has dreams that seem to mix the wife and daughter together

[26:01] foreshadowing and um and the daughter wakes up and immediately like takes a nick cage like you know

[26:09] a duck imprinting on her mother like uh but with like a sex a sex thing not like a you know what

[26:15] that was a terrible terrible metaphor point is she loves she loves this guy right off the bat

[26:21] and did anyone else think that nicholas cage was psychic because the way that the cuts happened

[26:27] throughout the film there would be a kind of sneak peek of something else that happens later

[26:32] flashing in front of him where he'd be like oh yeah let's do that thing and then it would

[26:39] actually happen i thought that he was psychic too that there was some kind of a connection

[26:43] but then um it was just the movie that was psychic and knew what was going to happen yeah

[26:48] i got the feeling it was one of those situations where he wasn't like psychic in general but

[26:53] he had been found himself like caught up in this supernatural scenario where he was bound by

[26:59] destiny yeah do you think there was a moment where he sat down with the filmmaker and was like

[27:04] so i was in this movie next where i saw what happened next i could just do that in this one

[27:11] too right why don't i just like would it make wouldn't make my character more interesting if

[27:15] he knew what was going to happen and then it's like he's guilty of everything because he could

[27:19] have kind of stopped it or whatever anyway you only have me for five days not kind of running

[27:24] out the clock with this conversation so we are you going to shoot some scenes you're going to let me

[27:28] just kind of use up all the time you booked me for because then you got to pay for more time and the

[27:32] director's like i can't believe i'm talking to nicholas cage this is amazing yes and so franca

[27:38] uh gets a ride home from nick cage and invite oh yeah that's yeah it gets a ride well nick cage is

[27:45] right well yeah she invites him in and he is a quick flash maybe he is psychic of them having

[27:52] sex and like it's like a really quick flash and then he's like yeah sure why not uh so i guess

[27:57] that's a joke um and uh while she's getting stuff uh nicholas cage keeps falling asleep and having

[28:05] these little visions which i guess is because he's a trucker and he's tired all the time as a

[28:09] trucker he's a crossroad trucker who is constantly popping caffeine pills and drinking from a flask

[28:16] yes it was a very i think even i think he the first thing he does after he saves franca patenta

[28:22] from being choked is he offers her like no dose or something yeah yeah which is a normal way to

[28:29] interact with other people guys she's also a trucker so like i get that's just trucker etiquette

[28:34] oh right right yeah well it is a yeah i don't know the culture alarming portrait of uh long

[28:40] haul truckers probably accurate due to the forces that make them do those long hauls and have to

[28:46] drive so much but frightening i love i want that to be the quote on the dvd box now from between

[28:52] worlds probably accurate dan mccoy the flop house i just know that there's a lot of pressure on them

[28:57] to do like uh anyway um so she gives him whiskey uh and suddenly he doesn't want to have sex for

[29:06] a moment but then they have very aggressive sex right away like this is uh you know you

[29:11] gotta work up to that it's out of practice you know zero percent chance that she enjoyed a second

[29:16] of it this is this is by far the most graphic sex movie i think nicholas cage has ever made

[29:26] right uh just in terms oh well is there one you can think of where he is where he is in

[29:32] his sex is more intense and vigorous and also it is so clear that in some of the scenes he's

[29:38] not wearing clothes uh what about leaving las vegas yeah leaving las vegas he i remember there

[29:44] was a hj scene there's a handjob that's what hj is um i do remember the hj i don't the handy but

[29:54] i don't remember anything else from that movie at all i just he is he is so he is so like either

[30:00] covering a woman's body or covered by a woman's body in the scenes in this movie in a way i'm not

[30:05] used to seeing what about zandali elliot zandali i've never seen zandali the erotic thriller that

[30:11] also has uh judge reinhold in it um i've only seen the clips on youtube that say worst accent ever

[30:18] zandali uh what's his face zach galligan um now here's now here's the thing about this movie

[30:24] Here's where I started thinking, hey, movie, there's a good movie here about Nicolas Cage and Franco Patonte as like two people who have been really beaten down by life and are kind of grudgingly and kind of reluctantly finding love with each other and aren't quite sure what to make of it and aren't quite sure what to make of each other and are fearful of getting close with someone again.

[30:45] That is not what this movie is, though.

[30:48] This movie kind of teased me with a character study that I would have really liked and which I think the two of them could have handled really beautifully.

[30:54] And then it went back into supernatural shenanigans.

[30:56] But for this brief moment, I was like, movie, you showed me what might have been.

[31:00] I mean, they even addressed that Franca Potenta is a German national who moved to the south, Mobile, Alabama, after marrying a Marine.

[31:12] And that her ex-husband's trauma drove them apart, especially when he found out that she could bring dead people back to life.

[31:21] Yeah, that really threw him off.

[31:22] Yeah, I got a counterpoint to what you just said, Elliot, which is the movie you just described sounds really boring, and there's no ghosts in it.

[31:31] Okay, interesting.

[31:34] I mean, the movie you've described, there are many good movies about two people who have been hurt by life who are trying to find love.

[31:40] They might be haunted, but there are no ghosts.

[31:43] Exactly.

[31:44] Exactly.

[31:45] Thank you.

[31:46] They're haunted by their pasts as opposed to haunted by a ghost that it's weird.

[31:52] it feels like it doesn't feel like so so uh penelope mitchell is plays the daughter who as

[31:56] we'll find out is has has has joe's wife inside her but it was almost like the ghost was doing

[32:02] a bad impression of joe's wife that was like i it felt really weird it was like does does this

[32:07] ghost really know who she's talking to or any of those things okay well before we move on though i

[32:13] do want to say it's been a while since you brought it up but with regard to the uh number of sex

[32:19] scenes in this involving nicholas cage i found this uh from the director there's an interview

[32:24] with the director it's not that illuminating because um dan everything is illuminating though

[32:29] yes uh i know it's called everything is illuminated but come on okay anyway the

[32:34] oh yeah it's a reach you get i do have this one quote i wanted to read which goes we kept adding

[32:39] sex scenes like we had nicholas cage with three different ladies in the movie and we just had

[32:43] eight or nine sex scenes we just kept adding them and adding them it works pretty well but when you

[32:48] see the end result of the movie it works but when you're telling everyone wait wait we have two more

[32:52] sex scenes here they're going what i wonder how many of those sex scenes were added day of shooting

[33:02] where they were like can we actually just do a reset and do another one of these they're like

[33:07] it's raining and we don't have any we only have outdoor scenes to shoot i guess strip them off

[33:12] nick time for you to time for you to have some love you got a dynamo like nick cage on set you

[33:16] got to get as many sex scenes taped as you can and figure it out later especially when nicholas

[33:22] cage is in let's just say it perfect shape well okay i don't want to on the one hand i look he's

[33:28] got a perfectly fine like middle-aged man's body like a normal middle-aged man's body i don't want

[33:34] to shame anyone but there is like a funny part later on where like uh cage is like flirting with

[33:41] franca patente and he's like oh you know i sleep in the nude and he's like taking a shirt on he's

[33:45] like that is that a problem and she's like giggling and she's like waving her hand over

[33:49] his entire torso it's like yeah this is a problem and it's impossible not to take it as like yeah

[33:55] nick cage you don't look great in this movie compared to like the way we have seen you at

[33:59] times like and also he's and he's so he's also just so like kind of greasy and oily in the movie

[34:06] he looks like he has never showered in i think he does take a shower in one scene he comes out

[34:10] still looking like he has never been he does get hosed down yes that's true that's that scene

[34:19] well when we get to it i'll talk about it but it reminded me of a scene in the nicholas cage

[34:22] elijah wood movie what the pact is that what it's called and where he is just doing you just see him

[34:29] doing a dance to entertain his co-workers and i'm like this is when i like nicholas cage the most

[34:33] when he's like just doing silly stuff to fill out a montage okay well anyway getting back to we left

[34:39] off stuart was right uh franca patente gave for the whole story about her life um and then there's

[34:46] a title card that says three days later and cage has stuck around it's a little weird that there's

[34:52] this one title card in the movie by the way for such a short short span of time uh i hope it is

[34:58] done for effect because otherwise it's a strange choice but uh he still feels like it was added

[35:03] later when they were watching it and they were like would she really be coming home the next

[35:08] day from the hospital yeah let's make it and also he was on his way to deliver his truckload to

[35:15] biloxi and is now three days late to deliver which is gonna be a problem which i did a little i did

[35:23] a little research that's an under hour drive that drive from mobile to biloxi is under an hour he

[35:31] could have gone and come back easily there's no reason he couldn't have said okay you have lunch

[35:36] I'll be back in a little bit after I drop this off.

[35:38] Oh, that is amazing.

[35:39] Stuart, I'm glad you did some geographic detecting there.

[35:43] That was some real Carmen Sandiego stuff.

[35:45] So, okay, the daughter...

[35:47] So earlier when Dan called him a long-haul trucker,

[35:49] I don't know if that's actually...

[35:51] You should say haul trucker.

[35:52] I think that's more of a courier.

[35:54] I was relying on the movie's missing scene.

[35:57] I didn't go to the external source of a map.

[36:00] It's so funny if he stops and they're like,

[36:04] we ordered this pizza three days ago how are you just delivering it now uh so okay the daughter's

[36:11] come back from the hospital nick has stunk around stuck around uh he's putting her to and stunk

[36:16] around you have to assume based on yeah but uh he's putting her to bed he says the more the you

[36:23] rest the better you'll feel and the better you feel the more you'll heal and uh i think the line

[36:29] is both meant to be funny and it is still dumb um and uh she lunges at him saying that he's always

[36:37] leaving her and she wants a kiss goodbye and there's some uh driving guitar in the background

[36:43] that hard rock suddenly jumps in and uh you know franca has a little soul searching she blames

[36:50] herself for her daughter falling in with a bad crowd that wants to street race and they don't

[36:54] even want to like you know rob banks or anything to finance it um and i mean they are drug dealers

[37:02] oh really is that why they're robbing him later on i i missed that part of it yeah yeah that was

[37:06] i mean you might have missed one of the several times when when franco referred to them as drug

[37:10] dealers well they seem like steal drugs from him too they are the most likable characters though

[37:15] they just seem like a couple of well-meaning goofballs uh franco patente is clearly the

[37:20] most likable character in the movie she's just a mom trying to trying to get the job done even

[37:24] if that means being strangled i guess i guess i am reacting to the degree to which um their actual

[37:31] attitude seems to clash with what like danger they are the rosencrantz and gildenstern of this movie

[37:37] yeah yeah that's true and you like that that punk music that they're listening to in their house

[37:41] some black black flag there yeah yeah that's what teenagers do is they listen to black flag and

[37:47] smoke weed and then dance to it yeah a little bit with a woman who is there for a second and then

[37:52] walks away and we never see her again and maybe they imagined her yeah i i love all of it i would

[37:57] if anything she chose the right time to leave maybe she was a plant maybe she was like the

[38:01] lookout she's like okay they're good and high and all worked up from their black flag music

[38:05] i'm gonna sneak out and you can go bust them in the head maybe she was there to buy weed and they

[38:10] were like well first we gotta dance she's like oh god i always have to dance with rick before i

[38:14] leave.

[38:15] So

[38:18] Cage is leaving.

[38:20] He's comforting Franca. He takes

[38:23] a swig of the prescription medicine

[38:25] behind her back,

[38:26] which was a little funny moment. And

[38:28] his boss is, in my opinion,

[38:30] extremely reasonably mad

[38:33] that he's three days

[38:34] late delivering this shit. I think

[38:37] he is very reasonably mad.

[38:38] Does not want to pay.

[38:39] He's docking

[38:43] him for his time and nicholas cage is acting like this is a huge injustice well he in fact says

[38:46] that's dog shit it's not even bullshit it's dog shit um and to compound the problems uh repo men

[38:55] come and take his truck that has all his personal stuff from his dead wife and daughter in there

[39:01] um anyway so cage returns um to the uh the house with the the ladies uh because he's got no place

[39:12] else to go in the words of an officer and a gentleman and uh he's walking around now who's

[39:19] who said it the officer or the gentleman uh check your notes you're allowed to use notes for this

[39:27] part of the test yeah this is not from memory did you put it on did you actually program it into

[39:32] your ti82 calculator sorry no sorry no just i was looking at my notes and i like skipped it

[39:36] I skipped ahead, but I didn't really skip ahead of anything that important.

[39:42] Like, just the daughter acting weird around the house and the friends wanting to come in and see her.

[39:48] Although, it's funny, there's a line that I like, which endeared these two doofus drug dealers to me, where...

[39:56] Most likable characters in the movie, says Dan.

[39:59] franca is like blaming them for you know everything that happened and saying that like they suck and

[40:06] and the one guy doesn't realize they're talking about him and then and the other guy explains

[40:10] like no she means us and he goes we kind of suck but we're not that influential and i love that

[40:15] oh wow that's kind of that's kind of me oh wow looking into a mirror that's rough

[40:23] yeah so this is the moment where like it seems like the movie that you guys were looking for

[40:27] the idea uh that you were looking for elliot where like he it looks like nicholas cage has

[40:32] burned burned through his last uh bridge he has nowhere else to go he convinces franco patente's

[40:39] character to let him stay there they have like a kind of fun scene of them sitting around uh

[40:44] smoking weed and being weird and laughing about the concept of goo goo eyes and then uh the whole

[40:51] time uh the daughter billy is watching it uh making kind of weird faces and uh and then they

[40:58] start uh nicholas cage and franco patente start having a very strange lovemaking session on the

[41:04] couch this is i have to assume this is all nicholas cage ad lib i have to assume and and the daughter

[41:10] is uh billy is still watching the scene and i feel like at this point she's the audience surrogate

[41:14] like she's like what am i watching what is nicholas cage requesting specifically from

[41:20] franco patente in this scene i don't have my notes elliot that he talked to that he she talked

[41:25] to him like linda blair in the exorcist right oh he's saying he's saying say say fuck me fuck me

[41:32] like linda blair come on say it like in the exorcist you know like in the exorcist and it's

[41:35] such a weird request and again i don't want to kink shame anybody if your thing is pretending

[41:40] that i guess you're max von seidel and your partner is linda blair and she is a possessed

[41:44] girl and you're actually doing it with the devil that's totally okay but it is a strange thing to

[41:50] suddenly be brought in as an interest for

[41:52] Nicolas Cage's character. No, I think that what you're saying

[41:54] is, Elliot, is it's beyond

[41:56] specific into

[41:58] like obscure

[42:00] and strange and

[42:02] the...

[42:04] And oddly foreshadowing what happens

[42:06] in the movie. Yeah, well that too. I was not

[42:08] surprised to learn that about half of this movie

[42:10] was improvised

[42:11] dialogue-wise. It seems

[42:14] yeah, Nicolas Cage I think was just

[42:16] they did the thing like

[42:18] they covered the camera he didn't know when it was running and when it wasn't and he just like

[42:22] went wild oh i bet he would have loved that yeah so he doesn't know what they're capturing and what

[42:27] they're not now this is when billy enters what i would refer to as her underpants portion of the

[42:32] movie i do want to i want to read what i i have in my notes which is that uh she spies on them as

[42:37] they're fixing the truck and then she walks aggressively brawlessly down the hall looking

[42:42] at her family photos as if she doesn't recognize them like look i mean i i understand if you're at

[42:48] home you don't want to wear a bra i i get it i do like it's pandemic times like nobody's wearing

[42:53] bras yeah i will say this though about that scene specifically i had a strong reaction to that

[42:58] because um the actress who plays billy she's she's not perfectly symmetrical and i really

[43:08] appreciated that they just kind of let her be asymmetrical and because that's many many women's

[43:16] bodies are asymmetrical in that way their breasts are different sizes hang different lengths

[43:20] and um and it was like oddly really affirming and felt very body positive

[43:24] is that is the line they're sisters not twins i can't remember what comedian said

[43:30] i like i i you know i find it heartwarming uh by extension that you are finding something

[43:37] heartwarming in the movie i liked it it was nice i was really this is like a really feminist movie

[43:46] i mean oh yeah oh yeah right up there with mustang and yeah sure yeah so billy is behaving strangely

[43:52] she's clearly not behaving like a teenage girl would or maybe not i don't know i'm i'm you know

[43:58] uh but there's something up like teenage girls i think don't don't so much routinely trick drifters

[44:05] into seeing them new well right that's the very next thing is that nicholas cage goes to pee

[44:09] uh uh and sees the dot his this daughter's uh butt as she looks at herself nude in the mirror

[44:15] and you know she kind of like

[44:17] looks around at him and acknowledges

[44:19] that he's seen her and

[44:21] it's disturbing

[44:23] and this is probably around when I

[44:26] started saying stop it to my TV

[44:28] over and over

[44:28] the first half of this

[44:31] movie really feels like it's

[44:34] just the daughter staring

[44:36] kind of menacingly but we

[44:38] don't really know why and nobody's saying

[44:40] specifically what's happening they're just kind of dancing

[44:42] around it and it's just her kind of given

[44:43] looks yeah and what's what's interesting about the movie is there's no slow drip of information

[44:49] really it's like what's this mystery and then it seems like everybody in the movie suddenly knows

[44:54] oh yeah yeah his wife's ghost is in her body like there's no everyone just is kind of on board

[44:58] suddenly at some moment the switch is flipped you know uh and directly after the spoiler alert

[45:04] directly after this is uh one of the key scenes in the films where uh nick cage and the daughter

[45:11] are watching TV

[45:12] where

[45:13] Franca Potente is like, it looks like she's

[45:17] got like a piglet that she's cooking. I couldn't

[45:18] even see. It seems like it was

[45:20] some kind of, maybe it was a whole rabbit.

[45:23] I thought it was a rabbit or a squirrel.

[45:24] I thought it was a rabbit. Some beast

[45:26] with the head on that has been plucked clean

[45:28] of skin and fur that's just on a big

[45:30] pan that she's sticking in the oven.

[45:32] She's dealing with this

[45:34] while they're watching television

[45:36] and the daughter is

[45:38] inappropriately stroking

[45:40] nick cage's uh jeans and then throws like a a blanket over his lap to disguise the hand job

[45:49] that we are so we must only assume that he is receiving at that point and he makes the world's

[45:55] uh least strong effort to get up and avoid this happening by saying oh i could help you in the

[46:02] kitchen and she's like no no it's fine i don't need it and he stays there and it happens and

[46:06] this is the scene that i was he's like well i tried uh earlier where he's like one one could

[46:13] deposit a film where nicholas cage is a sympathetic man who is uh is brought low by the fact that

[46:22] his dead wife appears to them in the form of the daughter of the woman he has gotten involved with

[46:28] and there's conflict over that and like missing her and guilt over her and then like there's a

[46:34] horrifying reveal that we'll get to later at the end of this movie except for the fact that nicholas

[46:39] cage even before he knows that this uh is his wife is like oh i guess i'll accept this handjob

[46:46] dan if you had ever seen there's a there's a series of short documentaries online uh that

[46:53] in that posit this very scenario and if you had ever seen those you would be impressed at his

[46:59] restraint and that it does not go all the way to full intercourse while she's while his ostensible

[47:05] new girlfriend is cooking in the other room you would think within clear sight and yet in these

[47:10] documentaries the other person in the room in the kitchen area never seems to notice what's happening

[47:15] on just behind the couch and so these documentaries are available all over the internet i can't

[47:20] remember exactly uh who produced them just now but those documentaries i feel like are more an

[47:25] ad for kitchen islands

[47:27] and their ability to cover an entire

[47:29] person's body.

[47:30] But yeah, I mean, you'd be amazed

[47:33] at how common this apparently is, this same scenario

[47:35] because I've seen so many of these little short documentaries

[47:37] online. They're on lots of different hubs.

[47:39] Lots of different hubs, yeah.

[47:41] Many hubs

[47:43] in which you can find these, yeah.

[47:44] Yeah, I feel like this is also

[47:47] a point when I think it really strikes home

[47:49] that

[47:50] no blankets on laps

[47:53] should be a more common rule.

[47:55] i mean there is get that off of there fdr what are you doing down there

[48:01] so that's what was going on in his wheelchair i see dan okay sure that you would think even if

[48:08] nothing was actually going on there it would be weird if nicholas cage and uh and billy were

[48:12] sharing a blanket it's just a weird thing yeah you gotta you gotta warm up on a on a cool alabama

[48:18] a knife um yeah so you're right this is this his his uh lack of resistance to this is is skeevy

[48:27] yeah i mean and again it could be that could be the point that the movie is making that this guy

[48:34] is like not a nice guy full stop despite the fact that he's had all these hardships in the world but

[48:41] that's there's it just feels like a weird choice but there's a version again there's a version of

[48:45] this movie that has no supernatural stuff in it where he is a guy who is not a bad guy but he has

[48:50] no impulse control and he makes bad decisions all the time and he's start trying to start a

[48:55] relationship and he keeps screwing it up basically because he can't get out of his own way because

[48:58] he's his own worst enemy like there's like there are movies like that and they're very good movies

[49:02] i know you think they're boring because they don't have ghosts in them but you know they happen

[49:06] although in a way that's not a ghost just uh trauma like a cycle of trauma repeating itself

[49:11] over and over yeah but even the movie you're describing elliot his behavior wouldn't be

[49:16] sympathetic is what i'm saying oh no no it would be it'd be the overall assault of a man who

[49:22] cannot stop himself from doing the wrong thing would be sympathetic but the in the moment you'd

[49:26] be like come on what are you doing come on don't do that come on which is here i was like movie

[49:31] don't do this come on movie movie don't do this yeah stop it yeah i do think this was a turning

[49:39] point where i stopped trying to root for him as a character that's fair i think that's very fair

[49:46] yeah um okay well so this is this is this is kind of like the cheddar goblin moment of mandy

[49:52] where you're like dude i know something terrible happened to you but look at the commercials that

[49:56] air on tv in this crazy world you live in like go for it this is um how can you be mad when there's

[50:03] a cheddar goblin on your tv i don't understand that analogy so nick fixes neither do i dan and

[50:09] i made it the daughter's motorcycle and meanwhile the daughter's being mean to franca about her dad

[50:15] leaving um and nick is uh we cut to him swinging jack daniels directly out of the bottle and he's

[50:22] yelling on the phone because they will not give his personal possessions back the photos of his

[50:27] wife and daughter and such because they're in the truck and this is where we learned the backstory

[50:32] of their death uh he went away on a job and the wife uh we presume at this point accidentally

[50:41] set the house on fire uh with her cigarette and uh killing his five-year-old daughter as well as

[50:49] the wife and i gotta say like throughout this movie i like cage's performance and uh this is

[50:56] legitimately affecting acting from him like the character is nutty and ill thought out and the

[51:04] movie is is is wacky but i think he is doing his best with that material to make it uh you know

[51:12] have some some pathos um oh i would always rather see nick cage going for it wholeheartedly than see

[51:19] him holding back and like the the thing that makes this movie like watchable to me is the fact that

[51:26] he is he is just letting himself loose uh rather than i think the two leads are pretty good like

[51:33] they put effort in on some level yeah i think it probably helps that like you're saying dan if a

[51:40] lot of it was ad-libbed then he was probably like okay good then i get to be the author of this to

[51:43] a certain extent yeah and that means i actually have to put energy into it uh he's not playing

[51:48] ghost rider which is ironic because he has sex with a ghost in this movie it is ironic uh aaron

[51:55] did you want to say something sorry i feel like you know i have no memory of what i was going to

[52:00] say but let's assume it was great i just didn't want to skip over it um oh you know i think it's

[52:05] wiped out of your head by i think i was gonna say that franca patente was um putting real x real

[52:10] energy into creating a character and grounding that character in this kind of wacko world that

[52:16] she was coming at it from a real place of a mother whose daughter almost died and then nicholas cage

[52:21] took that same amount of energy and put it into his facial expressions and his voice modulations

[52:27] they both were at a hundred percent in different ways yeah uh that's true um so franca goes and she

[52:35] uh pays the guy to get these memories of of nick cage meanwhile he is not uh uh upholding his end

[52:45] of the bargain of the social contract the contract he is not repaying her kindness well because he is

[52:52] uh continues to lust over uh franco's daughter uh who is lounging at home in her underwear

[52:58] coming on to him and she calls him majors and he's like like how do you know my last name i'm like

[53:04] have you not told these people your last name what yeah he's been with them for weeks yeah

[53:10] um but like she he's freaked out because uh she says that she is mary his his dead wife

[53:19] you know confirming what we already all suspected at this point and um i don't know like i guess

[53:27] the nurse sort of talks about it being like oh you know spirits just hang out around people

[53:32] and that's how this happens but it did it did kind of i don't know i thought it was funny that like

[53:38] yeah okay uh you know nicholas cage happens to like walk into this girl's hospital room and

[53:45] because i guess his dead wife has just been walking behind him for years however long she's

[53:50] been dead like she's like now's my chance and jumps in i don't know it seems like a crazy way

[53:55] for this yeah i mean it it pretty clearly is a situation where franco patente's character

[54:00] uh just botched her summoning role and instead of summoning her daughter's ghost back she

[54:06] summon the wrong ghost like sometimes that happens like sometimes if you fuck it up bad enough you'll

[54:11] summon like a minor demon or something that demon will pretend to be your daughter for a little bit

[54:15] luckily i don't think that's the case here unless you think mary his wife was a demon demon a demon

[54:20] that would be crazy uh you may have to figure out what that is yeah then you'll have to hire like

[54:25] angel to take care of it and you know it's tough there was so many moments where i think for a

[54:32] little bit more time and yes a little bit more budget uh they could have blown this world out

[54:37] in a really interesting way where every time she goes into this kind of summoning strangling

[54:43] kind of state to see all the spirits that are around like you're in a hospital why would there

[54:50] just be mary majors there i feel like that room would be packed with people and to make it seem

[54:56] like oh well i have to be sure that i'm concentrating enough to get billy specifically to

[55:01] come into the body or something it just seemed real and also the wife looked to me a lot like

[55:07] billy and i had trouble like they just seemed they both had blonde curly hair it just you know i feel

[55:15] like it could have been a more interesting thing to know more about franca patente's gifts and what

[55:21] exactly she does and how she does it well i have two things to say to that one i imagine it is

[55:27] because they look so similar that franco patente just shoved the first blonde ghost that she saw

[55:31] back in her daughter's body and it turned out to be lydia hurst that's right in her second flop

[55:35] house movie the first being the haunting of sharon tate uh and two it would have been really cool i

[55:41] guess to see like yeah what the afterlife is like and maybe there's like a waiting room and like

[55:45] sylvia sydney is there and she's smoking up a lot of cigarettes and she's got to talk to like a guy

[55:50] with a little shrunken head and like maybe alec baldwin and gina davis and has to like kind of

[55:55] help them to get back into the person world and just like you know i've never seen that in a movie

[56:00] before if only if mary had had better like guidelines of what to do after she died if

[56:05] there were some kind of book that could guide her to what to do yeah and maybe in the time that they

[56:12] were away joe's truck had been bought by some like yuppies from the city and they really like

[56:17] art housed it up you know and they're having like a party for their friends and their daughter is

[56:22] there and their daughter's like real goth and maybe michael keaton shows up in his famous role

[56:27] of clean and sober that's right he's trying to kick the drugs from his system but first he's

[56:32] got to help these ghosts oh yeah i you know i i both agree with what you have to say aaron but

[56:38] i also am kind of charmed by the degree to which this movie is like okay in a normal if like if

[56:44] this was a horror thriller that's what would happen but we are only interested in this ghost

[56:50] thing in so much as it is an engine to drive our like tawdry family melodrama like and it reminded

[56:59] me of uh before everything went to hell we saw um uh color out of space at um almo draft house

[57:07] they did like a simulcast of or probably a rebroadcast actually i don't know of like

[57:12] uh nick cage and richard stanley talking about that movie which is like a crazy

[57:17] H.P. Lovecraft movie, and

[57:19] Nicolas Cage was talking about how much he loves

[57:21] family. Hosted by the two normalest

[57:23] guys ever. Yeah. But the

[57:25] funny thing to me was, like, they're like, what attracts

[57:27] you to this? And he goes, well, I always have loved

[57:29] family dramas, or something like

[57:31] that. And I'm like, oh, Nicolas Cage just

[57:33] thinks of all these crazy things as family

[57:35] dramas. Like, that's

[57:36] what he loves. This is normal

[57:39] to him. Yeah.

[57:40] He lives a very

[57:43] interesting life.

[57:45] anyway he did he did he did own pet snakes that he had to get rid of because they tried to

[57:50] hypnotize him so so uh so she's being she's all i'm your wife i'm your wife and whereas a normal

[57:59] person would be like what no that's impossible he's like i'm with you 100 let's do it right now

[58:05] he was looking for permission and she gave it to him yeah he's like you know what i think people

[58:09] will buy that i believe that so okay sure and there's a certain amount of like she's she's it

[58:14] Feels like she's trying to seduce him.

[58:16] I mean, she's in her underpants, except for his denim shirt.

[58:19] And she just keeps talking about his dead child and his abusive father.

[58:25] And I'm like, is that what gets him going?

[58:28] That's crazy.

[58:28] I mean, he's really into exorcist play, so possibly.

[58:31] Yeah, yeah.

[58:32] I mean, look, if you think he should have put up more resistance to the idea that he should have sex with the daughter of his girlfriend,

[58:42] You will not get an objection from me.

[58:44] I think he should have put up all the resistance.

[58:47] But I do think that there is an interesting moment of, like, she convinces him, and, like, I think he, as a performance, has this moment of, like, fear and emotional confusion and, like, just, like, not understanding how this could be possible, but knowing that it is, that would be really affecting if, again, he hadn't already accepted a handjob from this person in a previous scene.

[59:12] i mean he even says he even says i don't deserve this and i'm like yeah i don't think you do

[59:19] i think uh maybe it's a slippery slope he didn't realize he was going down when he accepted the

[59:26] the first job that uh but it just shows he hasn't seen enough of these little short documentaries

[59:31] that are online and it's like i kind of can't avoid them they seem to be everywhere but they

[59:36] pop up they're always popping literally pop up yeah and it's like it'll be like a dollar only

[59:41] and i'm like all right i have a dollar for the finest in new reality non-fiction filmmaking okay

[59:47] sure okay well anyway they hear the mom returning uh franca takes a little moment to sit in the

[59:54] driveway looking through the personal stuff and then she comes in and cage is understandably

[1:00:00] acting very weird um and then there's more than more than normal uh and then there's the great

[1:00:08] scene where now i am not entirely sure whether this is meant to have actually happened or as

[1:00:13] part of the dream sequence that follows but franca is watching uh nick cage and her daughter spray

[1:00:21] one another with a hose and nicholas cage this is a hundred percent happening okay well nicholas

[1:00:27] cage has a leather leather pants on and a big belt buckle and sunglasses and he's like thrusting his

[1:00:33] pelvis out while she sprays water on him like it's like a like a 1980s like playboy video

[1:00:39] ad or like i like it is crazy these two are having some fun in the sun splashing around

[1:00:46] with his hose now when you say playboy video you mean you mean playboy documentary documentary

[1:00:51] about and he talks about uh he suggests it's a he suggests it's a golden shower which is you

[1:00:57] know a fun thing to do when he's spraying you with water to assume that he in his head he's

[1:01:01] thinking about urine it is there's so much urine so refreshing i i kind of wonder it's like is this

[1:01:11] is this what he thinks the character would say or is it the kind of thing that nicholas cage

[1:01:15] would say while he's spraying you with a hose and i'll unfortunately i'll go to my grave never

[1:01:19] knowing the answer to that question but but i i take this as something that's happening and he is

[1:01:25] so they've just totally stopped pretending around franco patente that yeah that they are not in a

[1:01:31] relationship because he's so over he's so out of his mind with bliss because he's finally found his

[1:01:36] wife again and maybe when his wife was alive before she wasn't into being sprayed with a hose

[1:01:42] but now she's like i died once what's the worst that can happen sure let's spray each other with

[1:01:45] a hose she was all burned up in a fire she probably wants to get sprayed with water all the time right

[1:01:51] very good point yeah that's very distressing to me for reasons i can't quite uh understand um

[1:01:58] no i i this if there's any reason to see the movie um like if there's any single single reason it's

[1:02:06] the scene yes look look it up on youtube if it if it's out there in the world it's got to be um

[1:02:12] anyway so after this it's very gifable somebody should gif it yeah it was super fun to watch it

[1:02:20] was very enjoyable to watch well that's this is the scene i was talking about where so there's

[1:02:23] is in that in that nicholas cage elijah wood movie he has to go undercover as a casino worker

[1:02:28] so that they can like rob this casino and there's this montage where it's just him ingratiating

[1:02:33] himself with his new co-workers and he's telling them some story at lunch and they're all laughing

[1:02:37] and he's getting up and dancing for them to make them laugh and it just looks like nicholas cage

[1:02:41] is having so much fun being like a real goofball and it's like i wish he played more goofballs

[1:02:46] that are not tormented or tortured goofballs but are just like goofballs it's also like it feels

[1:02:50] like this scene feels like if uh like one of those like gross hardy's commercials with models like

[1:02:58] suddenly turned into an ad for crocodile mile like the water like spraying all over the place

[1:03:02] anyway uh so franca dreams that she comes upon them having sex uh but wakes up clutching her

[1:03:11] chest in fear and uh mom and daughter have uncomfortable conversation where they are

[1:03:16] not very subtly fighting over joe and uh the daughter calls her dad her mom's husband

[1:03:23] um you know a tip off there and franca tries to rekindle the fire by sucking on nicholas

[1:03:31] cage's finger a little bit in bed but his mind is uh down the hall and like a lot of these like

[1:03:38] i'm reading my my notes that are you know obviously uh arranged chronologically the

[1:03:44] traditional way to arrange notes on a story and you mean you didn't cut up your notes and throw

[1:03:49] them in the air and then tape them together however they felt the point is i will read like

[1:03:53] a scene that comes after another scene i'm like surely that scene didn't happen that quickly after

[1:03:58] the past scene like it feels so disjointed reading them as like individual scenes i'm like because

[1:04:03] the next scene is the daughter picking up a knife and starting acting like she's gonna kill her mom

[1:04:09] and like and she's saying she's going to come between us you know like and it's like wow that

[1:04:14] is that comes right in the heels of this like sex dream fake out like it seems like there's just

[1:04:20] no connective tissue to this movie yeah it seems like that okay so like she has a franco patente

[1:04:26] has a dream where her new boyfriend is having sex with her daughter and then it the movie kind of

[1:04:32] just rolls into it like a weird series of sex montages right yes uh well that's and the mom

[1:04:38] she goes to talk to the nurse yeah that's what i first what happens is franca goes and meets with

[1:04:42] the nurse who as we said knows everything about soul transference and i guess franca has just

[1:04:47] decided that she like has realized what's going on that someone else's soul is in the daughter

[1:04:51] and meanwhile uh at home uh the daughter and nick cage are fucking in several different rooms as

[1:04:58] stewart says it's clipped up in a montage that makes it clear that this is just like it's

[1:05:02] happening all over the place and nick cage is reading to her from a book uh that is called

[1:05:09] memories by nicholas cage and i'm trying to the way i remember her request which might she goes

[1:05:15] she goes read me memories and now what i i remember the name on the front of the cover being misspelled

[1:05:21] that nicholas is spelled with an h but maybe i'm misremembering that so maybe that's his

[1:05:26] nom de plume nicholas cage with an h but dan you said you did some research on this and and this

[1:05:31] this montage is him having sex with billy and him having sex with mary okay in the birth of his

[1:05:36] truck in the back of his truck yeah they had so it's a little bit him and billy in the house and

[1:05:41] a little bit him and mary in the truck and it is this is the other reason to watch this movie is

[1:05:47] just the the the sheer manic energy that nicholas cage is pouring into these scenes and there's a

[1:05:52] part where they're having sex and he just goes whoa like someone does in a movie when they've

[1:05:57] just had a really powerful line of cocaine and you're and it's like is that what he's like in

[1:06:01] bed like and he's reading these things that i i you know it says memories so i assumed that this

[1:06:06] was supposed to be a memoir in the world of the movie but i it's referred to as poetry in the

[1:06:11] behind the scenes stuff that i've read so uh he's at first i thought it was a uh i thought it was a

[1:06:16] screenplay for uh katsuhiro otomo's memories yeah uh but he doesn't at any point mention about four

[1:06:23] space guys finding a weird ghost

[1:06:25] space station or another guy

[1:06:26] becoming a living biological weapon

[1:06:28] or a city that's entirely built

[1:06:31] around just feeding ammunition into

[1:06:33] guns. No, none of that.

[1:06:35] But no, but what is happening? Stuart, as someone

[1:06:36] who is currently three and a half volumes into rereading

[1:06:39] Akira, I understand exactly what you're talking

[1:06:41] about. What is

[1:06:43] happening in the world of the film is merely that

[1:06:45] Joe is having sex

[1:06:47] while reading aloud

[1:06:48] erotic poetry by

[1:06:51] the actor Nicolas Cage, who

[1:06:53] also exists and we see him having sex with mary in the birth of the truck also reading it that

[1:06:58] that is her kink that she has carried over into the land of the dead and back again i mean the

[1:07:05] thing is that like that is kind of every guy's fantasy is a woman who wants to hear the poetry

[1:07:10] that he's written yeah because often it is not the case uh so anyway yeah the well the little

[1:07:17] research i did dan and stewart do some deep soul searching after elliot mentions i mean not poetry

[1:07:23] specifically but i know what he's talking about um well no and i know dan would rather have a have

[1:07:28] a woman who likes to listen to his his mysteries where he and his two best friends that's right

[1:07:32] archie the cat and the ghost of his previous cat lulu solve mysteries no i just and mine is want

[1:07:38] to like you know i want my uh male ego flattered by someone pretending to give a shit when i talk

[1:07:45] about how return of the living dead uh relates to uh night of the living dead because of the

[1:07:52] copyright uh problems that john russo had with george romero and uh but i know in my heart

[1:07:59] that this is all bullshit nonsense that no one should care about and it is wrong to expect

[1:08:05] my partner to care about it either just because i'm an idiot and for me it's i just want to be

[1:08:12] able to explain the intricately crafted dungeon that i've built for four unlucky adventurers and

[1:08:18] all the devious traps i've set before so i think that we are laying our uh our like male ego

[1:08:25] monstrousness bear on this podcast in a way that we never have before but uh anyway i mean from

[1:08:31] the female ego perspective i also often give my husband things i've written to read and tell him

[1:08:38] at the outset just tell me it's great um that's the note that i want from you yeah i mean that's

[1:08:45] the best look speaking uh uh from the other side i love instruction if i'm told to tell you it's

[1:08:51] great i will tell you it's great um nicholas cage uh this is about the uh memories and uh this is

[1:09:00] what i found online he was asked about reading uh the nicholas cage book memories in the in this

[1:09:07] movie and he said well i thought it was extremely funny and anytime you can break the fourth wall

[1:09:12] pushing the envelope in terms of traditional or narrative is experiment worthy of trying

[1:09:16] i'd never done anything like that to read a book by the actor who's playing the character

[1:09:20] i was inspired by the novels of henry miller tropic of cancer tropic of capricorn i always

[1:09:26] thought they were not only sensual but hilarious in terms of the braggadocio of henry miller that

[1:09:32] he would go into great detail about his adventures in the sensual realm and i wanted to bring a

[1:09:36] little of that kind of humor to between worlds with that concept so that was the thinking success

[1:09:42] of nick cage who wrote those success he wrote those out of the park uh looking looking at that

[1:09:49] same interview dan just reading slightly ahead they asked him if that was a real memoir what

[1:09:52] anecdote would be in it and he tells a long story about how much he loves prince

[1:09:55] which is not something i ever knew about him that's great um okay so getting back to the

[1:10:04] the actual plot of the story so this is that this is after the the very long uh sex montage which

[1:10:11] again is something i never expected to see in a nicholas cage movie and i got i don't know if it

[1:10:16] was the enjoyment that i was supposed to get from it but i did get genuine some kind of enjoyment

[1:10:20] from it uh yeah and so okay but it but it comes to a tragic end right yes they hear uh franca

[1:10:27] pulling up into the driveway nick cage uh as joe he goes what was that and billy says it was the

[1:10:33] cat and he goes you don't have a cat you don't have a cat and franca gets mad finding them uh

[1:10:40] having sex with one another and things in the movie and the term is understandably understandably

[1:10:46] bad um and the movie uh the movie rapidly escalates from here this is when it shifts

[1:10:53] into a different gear uh nick cage she also she just spent five hundred dollars getting him his

[1:11:00] box of memories because that was what the truck boss wouldn't let him have it unless he gave five

[1:11:04] hundred dollars of the debt he owed and i get the sense that five hundred dollars is a lot of money

[1:11:09] to these people to this family they are not they are not podcasters five hundred dollars is is a

[1:11:14] real chunk of change it's not super easy to come like it is to us and so yeah i i feel like the

[1:11:19] insult to injury that she also just spent five hundred dollars of her hard-earned money uh while

[1:11:25] he was boning her daughter yes no she is the only truly sympathetic person on screen let us

[1:11:30] yes stipulate that except for except for the two except for those two goofy drug dealers that you

[1:11:35] like so i mean they provide a needed service to the community elliot um and so they are essential

[1:11:43] workers and that's why that their illicit underground drug deal ring keeps is allowed

[1:11:47] to keep running during the quarantine uh so uh nicholas cage uh franco's mad nick cage comes

[1:11:53] out to try and explain in the tiniest banana hammock underwear that is like this patterned

[1:11:58] thing i was not able to catch the pattern stewart do you know what it was you're nodding i mean it

[1:12:03] looked like it looked like some kind of a like a jungle cat print it looked very cool it fit

[1:12:08] perfectly with his uh black t-shirt many bracelets and rings and a black t-shirt with a shiny

[1:12:14] alligator face emblazoned upon it uh and well anyway he's trying to explain to franco why he's

[1:12:21] done this and he says the line at one point i'm sorry to say this billy is dead that is mary

[1:12:28] and so i guess everything's cleared up so they'll live happily ever after once he's i mean if

[1:12:35] anything you kind of gotta applaud his uh his effort i mean he's very direct uh and she she

[1:12:42] says you gotta fix this and he says what do you expect me to do kill my wife that's more of a

[1:12:48] jimmy stewart but uh you get the idea and right then billy comes out and bludgeons franca in the

[1:12:55] head and knocks her out cold um uh yeah it's moments after franca patente looks at nicholas

[1:13:02] cage and says put your fucking pants on you're gross and he says like why would you say that

[1:13:07] what makes you say that and then the camera pulls back to give you a full view and you're like yeah

[1:13:13] That's cool.

[1:13:14] That's an intentional joke.

[1:13:16] Yeah.

[1:13:17] I think there's more, looking at, in retrospect,

[1:13:20] I think there's more actual meant jokes in this movie

[1:13:24] than I thought first watching it.

[1:13:25] Oh, no, I think a lot of it's intentional.

[1:13:27] Whether you can say it's successful is another thing, but...

[1:13:31] I mean, the fact that I wasn't sure whether they meant it or not

[1:13:33] maybe means it's less than successful.

[1:13:35] So anyway, we cut to Billy's doofus friends

[1:13:39] being stoned and listening to Black Flag

[1:13:40] and dancing around, as we said earlier.

[1:13:42] Billy knocks on the door to rob them.

[1:13:44] I kind of zoned out for half a second.

[1:13:47] I'm not sure what went wrong,

[1:13:49] but Nicolas Cage storms in

[1:13:51] and beats the dudes with a bat.

[1:13:52] There's a struggle with one of the friends

[1:13:55] and that friend is shot and killed accidentally.

[1:13:57] Hopper pen.

[1:13:58] Yeah, I just missed the part

[1:14:00] where like why Nick Cage jumped in with his bat.

[1:14:03] Oh, because they never say it outright.

[1:14:06] We're supposed to just know

[1:14:07] that they're going to rob them.

[1:14:08] Yeah, at this point,

[1:14:09] I think they're at the phase of the adventure

[1:14:12] where they just go around bonking people on the head

[1:14:14] to knock them out.

[1:14:14] Almost like a bonks adventure.

[1:14:16] Unfortunately, the graphics are less than turbo.

[1:14:22] So one of the doofuses gets killed,

[1:14:27] the one who says they're not that influential,

[1:14:28] and the other guy shows up with a gun to threaten Franca,

[1:14:33] like asking, like, hey, what the fuck's up

[1:14:36] with your boyfriend coming in with your daughter

[1:14:38] and robbing our drug stash?

[1:14:40] Which is, you know, a fair question.

[1:14:42] and killing killing someone in the in the mix um yep not just not just someone his best friend

[1:14:47] yeah and business partner meanwhile uh billy possessed by mary uh mary's taking

[1:14:53] nick cage back to their old house where he has visions of his dead daughter and burned bodies

[1:15:00] and such and it was very confusing to me as to what part our visions are not or whether like

[1:15:05] half the house is burnt and half got rebuilt or half never got burnt like there's like a part of

[1:15:10] the house that seems totally fine that he's in except for there's like a smoke damaged jack in

[1:15:15] the box that he picks up and he focuses a lot of emotional energy on this jack it becomes yes now

[1:15:22] when you rent a location to film uh you have to return it to the state it was in before you arrived

[1:15:29] okay when you leave and so i think it's just a lot easier to just burn the inter like the

[1:15:35] hallway when you first walk in you just treat the foyer make that look burned and then just put some

[1:15:42] trash on the ground in the other room so you say well this is general fire

[1:15:46] fire trash i thought you were gonna say that when you raise a debris from the fire it's easier to

[1:15:51] just burn half of it because then you just burn half of it you have to rebuild half the house

[1:15:56] save half your money yeah sure yeah and i think even they even find the bed that his wife supposedly

[1:16:02] burned up in or something and it's just like pushed slightly like the like the bed's made

[1:16:08] better than the one in my apartment oh nice um i don't know i said so maybe well i mean maybe

[1:16:14] maybe yeah i don't know who is what is nice in that situation maybe all of our friendly

[1:16:21] maybe he put the truck up as collateral for a loan to get the best bed on the market yeah yeah

[1:16:30] the unburnable bed so yeah the between z's bed it's called i wasn't sure if he was having visions

[1:16:36] of his daughter or if that was just again the movie doing these cuts because it was never it

[1:16:41] was never clear to me when like is it a vision or is it just the movie trying to be weird yeah

[1:16:48] yeah i was like the true mission of madness it was hard to tell her if whether it was real or

[1:16:54] maxell it was hard to tell if she was born with her maybe it's maybelline it was just very it was

[1:16:58] it was very confusing elliot i told you about uh accepting money under the table and then trying

[1:17:03] to slip these ads into the podcast i don't know what i know what you're talking about it make it

[1:17:09] your way a burger king is that what they say yeah um so meanwhile back at the ranch uh living drug

[1:17:18] dealer is talking to franca and he's like a ghost is taking over billy's body how do we find them

[1:17:25] and she says you gotta choke me okay he's like i'll allow it so uh back at the burnt house cage

[1:17:34] in in the burned wing of the burnt house cages started up a generator and puts a string of

[1:17:40] lights on to create a romantic atmosphere and cage is drunkenly talking about how he didn't

[1:17:45] feel he deserved her ever he doesn't deserve anyone he was he's a mess he's a real he's an

[1:17:50] emotional mess by this point and uh the ghostbusters which to be fair put yourself in his

[1:17:56] situation you're a grieving widower you're already in trouble with the guys who who you have a loan

[1:18:01] on to buy your truck and now you finally found a friend maybe even a lover and suddenly your wife's

[1:18:08] ghost is taken over that lover's daughter and forcing you into a life of crime and now she's

[1:18:14] taking you back to your old house and you're like uh this is not the way i wanted her to see the

[1:18:18] house i was supposed to clean it up when she came back to life and you know it's just it's a lot to

[1:18:23] carry this is a man who has been emotionally destroyed understandably again a little easier

[1:18:29] to synthesize if but for that hand job that he accepted uh um anyway so so dan far be it far be

[1:18:40] it from me to defend that action i would not but you know what you got to find your small joys

[1:18:46] where you can in this life you know so even villains are the heroes of their own story right

[1:18:51] i mean you got to imagine some of the villains know that they're the villains right like when

[1:18:55] a villain is like i'm going to destroy the world you have to know that they have to be like well

[1:19:00] this doesn't really benefit anyone including me maybe i am the villain uh so anyway franca like

[1:19:05] ultron i guess ultron must think he's the hero right for robots uh but what about like uh what

[1:19:11] about like uh like and thanos thinks he's the hero yeah okay sure yeah you gotta find you gotta find

[1:19:18] one there's got to be some like mephisto must know that he's not the hero right uh yeah he's not like

[1:19:23] uh yeah check the comic book cover dude it says mephisto tales right anyway uh franca and the

[1:19:33] like you got to assume the penguin knows that he's a bad guy right the penguin isn't like

[1:19:37] from another point of view batman's the villain and i'm the hero they try to make him really

[1:19:41] sympathetic and batman returns i mean to a point but nothing really nothing really forgives him

[1:19:47] just biting someone's nose off you're right and no one bad can run for mayor politics is a dirty

[1:19:52] game no matter how you slice it why would you slice politics though like why are you slicing

[1:19:57] up politics um i even as a kid even as a kid i remember being thrown by how quickly they dropped

[1:20:05] the mayoral mayoral race storyline in that movie well also it was like when he's like we're not

[1:20:09] even gonna see whether he won i like i you gotta admit i i ride the city like uh what was it a hawk

[1:20:15] from hell hound from hell i don't even remember what he says but i don't remember what it seems

[1:20:19] like i mean especially now in the days of of trump but like even at the time i always felt like well

[1:20:24] this is a weird like cryptically phrased like one sentence that that he has caught the penguin

[1:20:31] saying and batman broadcasting it to the people of gotham immediately turns them against the penguin

[1:20:36] who they had loved moments before.

[1:20:38] Oh, yeah, I think it's great, yeah.

[1:20:40] Anyway, so.

[1:20:42] You know what Batman is in that moment?

[1:20:44] A troll.

[1:20:45] Oh, wow, yeah.

[1:20:46] Like he lives under a bridge?

[1:20:48] He lives under a bridge, his hair is all spiky,

[1:20:50] and he's going on a world tour.

[1:20:51] And if he spends too much time out in the sun,

[1:20:54] he'll turn to rock entirely,

[1:20:55] but that's great, because then Bilbo can sneak away.

[1:20:57] There's a lot of different trolls

[1:21:00] that were thrown into this mix right now.

[1:21:02] So, Franca and the drug dealer show up,

[1:21:05] or as I now like to call them, the real Ghostbusters.

[1:21:07] And they have a plan at this burnt house.

[1:21:11] We don't know what it is yet.

[1:21:12] Turns out the plan is just coming in and pulling a gun on Nick Cage.

[1:21:16] But then Billy has a gun too, and she pulls it on Franca and says,

[1:21:22] nobody's shooting that sad bastard but me.

[1:21:25] And this is the big reveal of something that I'm sure we all kind of suspected was true

[1:21:31] since this ghost seems like a real cavalcade of red flags,

[1:21:37] this ghost, the way this ghost behaves.

[1:21:40] But it turns out that the reason she was worried

[1:21:44] about Nicolas Cage leaving for work all the time

[1:21:47] was that she knew that she couldn't trust herself alone

[1:21:50] and she deliberately killed her daughter to hurt him.

[1:21:54] And I think she meant to kill herself too,

[1:21:58] but not burn the place down.

[1:21:59] but like meant to kill herself but not ruin the equity they had built up in the house

[1:22:04] so the place burned down on accident after this murder suicide and uh cage is totally broken at

[1:22:12] this point he hears the voice of his dead daughter wanders off which provides enough distraction that

[1:22:17] uh like i think franca tries to go for the gun and billy shoots her but now uh-oh big mistake

[1:22:23] huge you've activated her supernatural power on commissions now that franca is uh betwixt life and

[1:22:32] death she's uh between worlds if you will she will uh pull the wife out of billy i won't and

[1:22:37] trap her in another world much like obi-wan kenobi now that she's struck down she'll be more powerful

[1:22:43] than billy could ever imagine or mary i should say it turns out she has the ability to take people

[1:22:49] out of bodies as well as ushering people into them yeah yeah yeah oh yeah i didn't even think

[1:22:56] about it she didn't even have to throw her through the ghost door in the lock and key comics

[1:23:00] nope just says hey get out of here and then suddenly she's gone ghost door way of the samurai

[1:23:06] um yeah ghost door entryway of the samurai nicholas cage's brain is broken at this point

[1:23:13] he's clutching onto the jack-in-the-box yelling uh sarah uh billy wakes up cries about her mom

[1:23:20] who uh is is too far gone to save it seems um the leader of the pack by i think the shangri-la's is

[1:23:28] that who did leader of the pack i believe so yes i don't know if it's their version of it or if it's

[1:23:33] a cover okay well it starts playing and cage pours gas all over himself lights a cigarette

[1:23:40] setting himself aflame and stubs the cigarette

[1:23:42] out on his own burning body

[1:23:44] over his heart

[1:23:45] this seems like a point where

[1:23:47] I think they put on the flame effects a little

[1:23:50] too soon I think he was supposed to light

[1:23:52] himself by putting the cigarette out on his

[1:23:54] body but instead he's already engulfed

[1:23:56] in flame when he does that so it's

[1:23:58] I think they added the flames a little early

[1:24:00] I think it's a great joke where he's like

[1:24:01] well I'm literally engulfed in flames

[1:24:04] but I gotta put this cigarette out

[1:24:05] I wouldn't want to burn the house down

[1:24:08] he has zero reaction to being engulfed in flames yeah yeah oh it does not hurt him at all he doesn't

[1:24:15] it seems to be if anything at least that makes him feel better he's glad he can feel something

[1:24:19] yeah yeah i think maybe maybe this is a guy this is a guy who learns from his mistakes and he's

[1:24:24] like okay what can i pick up from this experience one do not trust my wife because she does not have

[1:24:31] my best interest at heart let's keep that clear number two if i'm ever in the situation again do

[1:24:36] not accept that hand job under the blanket and number three i can't let lit cigarettes just lie

[1:24:41] around because that caused the problem the first place so i better put it out right now ironically

[1:24:45] he's on fire so i guess the cigarette just burns up faster but it's a uh yeah the the fire effects

[1:24:51] it's just very funny to see how nonchalant he is with all this fire all over him um so obviously

[1:24:56] what should have happened is he should have then jumped into the body of the happy-go-lucky drug

[1:25:01] healer that he had killed and then he would get to go on an adventure later right oh sure sure

[1:25:07] yeah no nobody likes my idea uh i mean i was just i just thought i'd throw it out there i mean

[1:25:12] yeah i'm not a professional writer so i thought maybe you guys could give me some notes i mean

[1:25:17] what what's this adventure what adventure is that is the is he going on in this new body

[1:25:20] i mean i hadn't really thought that far ahead uh because there's four different types of

[1:25:25] primordial story let's go through them man versus man man versus nature goes bananas or goes to

[1:25:31] monte carlo okay so it's gotta be one of those four okay i mean man versus man i think we've

[1:25:38] already covered and ghost bananas i think already happened too right but he hasn't been to monte

[1:25:44] carlo yet he hasn't been to monte carlo but could he also be fighting nature in monte carlo i have

[1:25:51] to assume they have some nature there yeah maybe even if it's just a plant in the lobby of a casino

[1:25:56] So, Dan, Billy and Mike, they drive away, and then what happens?

[1:26:00] Then we got a short pan over some burnt dolls, child's dolls, and a family photo with more of that Twin Peaks-y music, and there's a fade to black, and then we hear it's either Joe's dad or maybe it's supposed to be his mom's boyfriend.

[1:26:19] I don't know.

[1:26:20] I believe it's supposed to be his dad because they mentioned earlier that his dad used to hit him.

[1:26:25] Okay, well, we hear his dad yelling at his mom about Joe and how shitty Joe is and threatening to burn the whole house down.

[1:26:35] And Joe comes out and shoots his dad with a shotgun.

[1:26:39] And now here's something I want to point out here is that this is clearly a flashback.

[1:26:44] It's Joe's youth, and yet they're in an exceedingly modern kitchen.

[1:26:47] That's created a lot of problems for me, honestly, because I didn't know when it was supposed to be happening.

[1:26:52] I assumed it was a flashback, but I'm like, it doesn't really look – I mean, like, he's got a Walkman headphone, so I guess it's a long time ago.

[1:27:00] But at the same time, the house doesn't look old at all.

[1:27:03] No, and having just – my wife and I finally watched the last episode of this season of The Marvelous Miss Maisel after a long break between episodes.

[1:27:12] And there are so many scenes where they have period cars and costumes and things for no reason.

[1:27:17] I found it very refreshing that the makers of this film did not bother to make it a period-specific kitchen, and were just like, where's the kitchen of the house that we are already staying in? Let's just shoot this there. Come on.

[1:27:28] I got a question for you three, and that is this.

[1:27:32] Is this scene in the movie so we're like, oh, that's why Joe hates when family members burn down houses, potentially killing other family members.

[1:27:42] Did the movie think that we needed a motivation for his youth for him to be upset about his wife burning down his house?

[1:27:49] I think probably it was to show that Joe's life has been a nonstop cycle of violent trauma.

[1:27:55] but maybe they're setting it up for the prequel between worlds to the rise of joe i think that

[1:28:03] when this scene was all finished up they the they sent it over to the movie maker they're like

[1:28:08] and they got epilogue and prologue confused and they're like is this i think it goes at the end

[1:28:16] that's what happened i mean yeah i do get the sense that it was supposed to be in a different

[1:28:21] part of the movie and they ended up cutting it and then they were like well this is too good to

[1:28:26] waste let's throw it in at the end instead of a blooper the thing is like it doesn't really

[1:28:31] illuminate anything about anything but it's it has like this place of importance so you're like

[1:28:37] okay this must mean something but it's so opaque what it means like we were watching it and audrey

[1:28:43] was like does this mean that like his dad spirit has been following him around like i'm like oh i

[1:28:49] never thought of that like there's nothing in the movie what if his dad had been pulled into billy

[1:28:54] i don't know oh boy well i think because they also they filmed the young franco patente scene

[1:29:01] where she's the little girl underneath the ice of the lake and that also didn't offer anything

[1:29:08] except kind of a moody opening credit sequence it was it was a striking visual sure you know yeah

[1:29:15] It didn't advance the plot. I feel like that they probably just filmed scenes of both of the leads as kids and then figured out where to put them later.

[1:29:23] Yeah, I think that's probably true. Unless maybe Nicolas Cage saw the first cut of the movie and was like, wait, so Franca gets a kid flashback and I don't get a kid flashback? Can I get a kid flashback? I'm going to pull my support of the movie.

[1:29:36] I was supposed to go on all the talk shows to promote this movie, but I don't have a kid flashback, and Franca gets a kid flashback?

[1:29:43] Like, that's not fair.

[1:29:44] I'm a bigger star.

[1:29:45] I should get the bigger kid flashback.

[1:29:47] Why don't I get a kid flashback?

[1:29:49] Because I want a kid flashback.

[1:29:51] And they're like, Nick, you saw the script.

[1:29:53] Yeah, but there were no kid flashbacks in the script.

[1:29:57] But we didn't think we should write out the title sequence in the script.

[1:30:00] Yeah, but that's a kid flashback.

[1:30:02] Like, that's an official kid flashback.

[1:30:04] Ask anybody.

[1:30:05] Ask a professional.

[1:30:06] Ask someone off the street.

[1:30:07] They'll tell you it's a kid flashback, and I want a kid flashback.

[1:30:11] Why don't I get a kid flashback?

[1:30:12] Nicolas Cage, kid flashback.

[1:30:15] Where's my kid flashback?

[1:30:16] Because I haven't gotten a kid flashback, and Franca got a kid flashback.

[1:30:20] That's not fair.

[1:30:21] Kid flashbacks, everyone should get kid flashbacks, or no one gets kid flashbacks.

[1:30:26] So you either give me a kid flashback, or you take out Franca's kid flashback.

[1:30:30] I assume that's exactly what happens.

[1:30:32] I've never gone so far from, like, finding something actively unfunny and irritating to not be able to stop laughing.

[1:30:40] Greatest triumph.

[1:30:44] Okay.

[1:30:46] The greatest trick the devil ever pulled.

[1:30:48] Final judgments is this section of the podcast where we talk about whether we thought it was a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie we kind of liked.

[1:30:58] Does anyone raring to go with a hot take on Between Worlds or whatever it's called?

[1:31:03] I do not have a hot take.

[1:31:06] I think this movie is for sure good bad.

[1:31:10] It's very silly.

[1:31:12] I rewound several parts to watch them again.

[1:31:16] There were several moments where my husband and I just turned at the exact same moment

[1:31:22] and made eye contact with each other,

[1:31:24] which is always, I think, a good sign that something is very ridiculous.

[1:31:28] It's so much fun to watch.

[1:31:31] I would rewatch this movie.

[1:31:32] I agree.

[1:31:35] I'm going to also say that it was a good, bad movie.

[1:31:37] There's a lot of potential red flags for viewership, and the movie avoids them

[1:31:43] and ends up being—if there can be a silly, laugh-out-loud movie about a ghost

[1:31:50] that wants to seal someone's life

[1:31:52] and also a murder-suicide,

[1:31:54] then this is that movie.

[1:31:56] It's, it's, I think there's some,

[1:31:58] and also, if you have any,

[1:31:59] if you're, if you've got a teenager

[1:32:01] and it's hard to talk to them

[1:32:02] about the act of physical lovemaking,

[1:32:04] just show them this movie

[1:32:06] and they'll finally understand

[1:32:07] what it's all about.

[1:32:08] I, yeah, here's the,

[1:32:09] to that point,

[1:32:12] to that end, Elliot,

[1:32:13] like, this is a difficult movie

[1:32:14] to, like, unreservedly, like,

[1:32:16] recommend that anyone see

[1:32:17] because it does have a lot of things

[1:32:19] that could potentially upset people

[1:32:21] depending on, you know, what upsets you personally.

[1:32:26] I mean, like, there is, yeah, suicide.

[1:32:29] There is child death.

[1:32:30] There is murder, child murder and suicide.

[1:32:34] There is, like, this quasi-almost incestuous relationship,

[1:32:39] even though, like, he's not with Franca Potenti.

[1:32:42] It has that structure.

[1:32:43] And even though the actress who is playing Billy is 28,

[1:32:47] He is, I believe, kind of playing younger, and Nicolas Cage is the age he is, so that is, like, unpleasant, too.

[1:32:54] You mean ageless and eternal?

[1:32:56] Yeah, exactly.

[1:32:56] May he live forever in his New Orleans crypt.

[1:32:59] But if you can't accept all of those things in the space of, like, an overheated melodrama, which is what this is, like, I almost even, like, I'm between good, bad, and kind of liked.

[1:33:16] and the reason i i even skew almost towards that is it feels like it gives you the feel for me of

[1:33:23] when i was a kid and i'd stay up late watching these like late 80s early 90s thrillers uh and

[1:33:30] like not even necessarily being into them because they were even too sleazy but like wondering like

[1:33:38] what is this world like why did someone make something so like sweaty and sleazy and being

[1:33:44] fascinated what's zolman king thinking yes and having like one of those movies get into like

[1:33:49] the fly transporter and get mixed with wild at heart like yeah i respond to it i i think i'm

[1:33:55] probably responding to it i mean all the language i'm using i'm responding to it as someone who

[1:33:59] likes movies and it's like approaching it through almost the window of other movies so i don't know

[1:34:04] how it would work for someone who doesn't care as much about that stuff but um yeah if you don't

[1:34:10] like movies you might not like this movie yeah that's true i feel like there's already a certain

[1:34:15] get safe there's a certain filter for watching a movie on purpose because it's bad that weeds out

[1:34:21] a lot of the people who would not be into this movie probably stewart what do you have to say

[1:34:24] about it yeah i'm gonna go on the side of good bad i feel like a lot of the i did spend a large

[1:34:30] chunk of the movie telling my tv to stop it but i feel like if if it was in like a group setting

[1:34:36] where you're with a bunch of friends all excited to watch a bad movie some of the creepier sex

[1:34:40] stuff might would come off as funnier uh as opposed to as creepy as it is uh with just me

[1:34:47] sitting in my apartment alone sweaty from a hot workout what are you wearing story

[1:34:53] uh you know a nice pair of slacks and a sweatshirt

[1:34:58] it's business casual workout i'm a grown-up grown-ups wear slacks

[1:35:05] uh and there's points when like i feel like i feel like there's i feel like if this movie

[1:35:12] if you had swapped the daughter character with like franco patente's like elderly mother that

[1:35:19] she had to save i feel like that might have been a more interesting movie uh and maybe less gross

[1:35:25] well definitely less gross but i don't know that's you know that's for between worlds too i guess

[1:35:35] i started listening to oh no ross and carrie shortly after i broke my arm and the doctor

[1:35:42] had told me i'd never walk again i couldn't get my book started i was lost honestly i knew it was

[1:35:49] time to make a change there's something about oh no ross and carrie that you just can't get

[1:35:54] anywhere else they're thought leaders discoverers founders i'd call them heroes ross and carrie

[1:36:01] don't just report on French science, spirituality, and claims of the paranormal. They take part

[1:36:05] themselves. They show up so you don't have to. But you might find that you want to. My arm is

[1:36:12] better. I can walk again. I wrote an entire book this weekend. It's terrible, but I did it. Just

[1:36:19] go to MaximumFun.org. Thank you, Ross and Carrie. Ona Ross and Carrie is just a podcast. It doesn't

[1:36:26] do anything. It's just sound you listen to in your ears. All these people are made up. Goodbye.

[1:36:29] Hey, if you like your podcast to be focused and well-researched and your podcast host to be uncharismatic, unhorny strangers who have no interest in horses, then this is not the podcast for you.

[1:36:38] Yeah, and what's your deal?

[1:36:39] I'm Emily.

[1:36:41] I'm Lisa.

[1:36:42] Our show's called Baby Geniuses.

[1:36:44] And its hosts are horny adult idiots.

[1:36:45] We discover weird Wikipedia pages every episode.

[1:36:49] We discuss institutional misogyny.

[1:36:51] We ask each other the dumbest questions, and our listeners won't stop sending us pictures of their butts.

[1:36:56] We haven't asked them to stop, but they also aren't stopping.

[1:36:59] Join us on Baby Geniuses every other week on MaximumFun.org.

[1:37:03] Okay, well, let's move into the next segment.

[1:37:10] Quickly do some sponsors for the show.

[1:37:13] The Flophouse is sponsored in part by ExpressVPN.

[1:37:16] And not only can ExpressVPN protect your privacy and security online,

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[1:38:30] So that was me reading an ad.

[1:38:35] Oh, wow, you did a great job.

[1:38:38] And here's another one.

[1:38:39] You did a really good job.

[1:38:40] Is that what you wanted was praise?

[1:38:41] Please, almost constantly.

[1:38:44] So here's an ad for Squarespace, which I know Elliot loves.

[1:38:51] It's a great way to—

[1:38:52] I just have a lot of ideas.

[1:38:53] You talk about Squarespace, and then I'll tell you what my great idea is this time.

[1:38:57] Sure.

[1:38:57] You can create a beautiful website to promote or display your cool idea, blog or publish content, sell products and services of all kinds, and much, much more.

[1:39:09] Whatever you might want to do on the internet, Squarespace does this by giving you beautiful, customizable templates created by world-class designers, everything optimized for mobile right out of the box,

[1:39:20] A new way to buy domains and choose from over 200 extensions, free and secure hosting.

[1:39:27] Hey, go to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial, and when you're ready to launch,

[1:39:35] use the offer code flop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

[1:39:42] I bungled a lot of that, but the important thing is to remember offer code flop.

[1:39:48] Now, Dan, leaving the bungling aside, I had an idea, and I was wondering if Squarespace might be able to help me make it into a real website and a real business.

[1:39:56] Almost certainly, Elliot, but indulge us.

[1:39:58] Because I don't know if they're going to want to touch this one, but I'd really appreciate it if they did.

[1:40:01] Okay, it's all happened to us.

[1:40:04] We've all been in this situation.

[1:40:05] You're dead.

[1:40:06] You're a ghost.

[1:40:07] You find yourself in some young lady's body, and you just want to find love with the greasy trucker that you used to be in love with when you were alive.

[1:40:16] But now it's a little awkward.

[1:40:18] what do you do? Well, that's where adultghostfinder.com comes in. Adult Ghost Finder

[1:40:23] is the place where a ghost looking for love can match up with people who are looking for love

[1:40:28] with ghosts. It's all right there in our slogan, where ghosts looking for love find people looking

[1:40:34] for love with ghosts. Adultghostfinder.com. Here's the thing. You don't have to be a ghost

[1:40:39] to love a ghost, and you don't have to be a person to love a person. You could be a ghost

[1:40:43] or a person or maybe you're the ghost of a person or maybe you're the person of a ghost such as in

[1:40:49] this film it doesn't matter we don't judge we're just here to help ghosts find people and ghosts

[1:40:54] find ghosts and people find ghosts but not people find people that's gross at adultghostfinder.com

[1:41:00] you're not interested in ghosts we're not interested in you you know what get out of here

[1:41:04] fleshling with your anti-ghost prejudices not interested you can take that elsewhere this is

[1:41:09] for ghosts and the people who are interested in ghosts and ghosts that are interested in people

[1:41:13] and ghosts that are interested in ghosts.

[1:41:15] So that's adultghostfinder.com.

[1:41:17] Dan, you think that Squarespace could help me?

[1:41:18] I think it's great, and I think that that is the product or service

[1:41:23] that people will remember coming out of this ad break

[1:41:25] and not either of the people who are paying us.

[1:41:28] So thank you for that.

[1:41:29] Well, ExpressVPN and Squarespace, please go use them.

[1:41:33] Stuart, you got a jumbo trying to read, right?

[1:41:35] Hell yeah, I do.

[1:41:37] It goes like this.

[1:41:40] On the Discord and Rhyme podcast, a motley crew of music nerds, or perhaps a deaf leopard,

[1:41:48] that's a reference to the English band Deaf Leopard,

[1:41:51] discusses an album per episode, no track left out,

[1:41:57] fighting the forces of chaos in today's era of buffet listening.

[1:42:01] Our eclectic lineup of more than 50 albums includes The Kinks, Captain Beefheart,

[1:42:09] The Mountain Goats, Kate Bush, Janet Jackson,

[1:42:13] Ween, a 70s disco musical version of The War of the Worlds,

[1:42:18] and the Mega Man 2 soundtrack, because why not?

[1:42:23] Subscribe to Discord and Rhyme wherever podcasts are found.

[1:42:27] Available on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, or anywhere else.

[1:42:31] Discord and Rhyme.

[1:42:33] I am definitely going to listen to their Mega Man 2 episode

[1:42:35] because that is my favorite video game soundtrack of all time.

[1:42:39] But I've also got a Jumbotron.

[1:42:41] And it goes like this.

[1:42:43] Somewhere in middle America, a redheaded boy lives in a town called Riverdale.

[1:42:49] On the Riverdale High AV Club, sibling hosts Megan and Ezra chronicle his life, friends, family, pets, and exploits.

[1:42:56] In weekly episodes full of goofs and a few facts, they dive into the background of all things Archie.

[1:43:02] Join them as they explore such hidden corners of the Archiverse as Cosmo the Merry Martian, Katie Keene, CW's Riverdale, and more.

[1:43:09] Tune in to the Riverdale High AV Club on all your favorite podcatchers.

[1:43:13] That's right, listen to their podcast, the Riverdale High AV Club, about all things Archie.

[1:43:17] I was going to say, that sounds like my version of a Riverdale podcast.

[1:43:23] Like, I'm like, just talk to me about, like, the weird obscure comics characters.

[1:43:27] I don't care about the sexy CW Riverdales.

[1:43:30] Give me the sexy comic characters.

[1:43:34] I wonder if they've done an episode about that series

[1:43:37] where Jughead's dog was a superhero.

[1:43:38] Probably not yet.

[1:43:41] You've got to save something for season 10.

[1:43:44] We'll get to it.

[1:43:48] I've got good news, everyone.

[1:43:49] We can announce our contest winners,

[1:43:52] the winners of the prize packs for the raffle we did,

[1:43:56] the charity raffle during the charity livestream.

[1:43:59] Stuart is getting out his notepad because he's the one who's going to be sending these things out, although I can just email this information.

[1:44:05] No, no, make sure he gets the information this way, Dan.

[1:44:08] Don't spoon-feed it to him.

[1:44:09] Okay, I'll give him the full address of everyone who won.

[1:44:11] No, the contest winners are Robert Bain, which sounds like a mystery writer.

[1:44:20] Robert Bain.

[1:44:21] Congratulations.

[1:44:22] Tyler Moore.

[1:44:23] There's no Mary in front of it, just Tyler Moore.

[1:44:26] Congratulations.

[1:44:27] I didn't realize they were also winning the chance to be razzed live on the show by Dan Rickles over here.

[1:44:35] Stuart, this will be a familiar name for you.

[1:44:37] Casey Crow.

[1:44:39] Oh, shit.

[1:44:41] Your old buddy from college.

[1:44:42] My college roommate and oldest friend, Casey Crow.

[1:44:45] It was chosen at random.

[1:44:46] We could possibly, you know.

[1:44:48] Sure.

[1:44:49] We could possibly do another drawing if you like, Stuart, so we can send out four so it's not just your friend.

[1:44:56] Well, I'm glad that you have revealed evidence of my corruption on the podcast.

[1:45:02] No, I was amazed.

[1:45:03] I was like, oh, out of the thousands of people, I recognize that name.

[1:45:07] But, yeah, maybe we'll draw another one as a bonus just to make sure everyone knows we're on the up and up.

[1:45:14] But those are the congratulations.

[1:45:15] I guess Casey won fair and square, but we'll throw one.

[1:45:18] I like that.

[1:45:19] Instead of Dan just discarding that one and choosing another one without telling anybody, he instead put it out on the airwaves.

[1:45:25] I mean, it seems unfair to Casey in that situation, right?

[1:45:28] It's not like Casey's never going to know.

[1:45:30] Casey had the tip of his finger bitten off by a dog recently, Elliot.

[1:45:33] You don't think he deserves a prize?

[1:45:35] I mean, not having known that, I'm going to have to say yes.

[1:45:38] Okay.

[1:45:39] Hey, Casey, you're all right.

[1:45:43] Congratulations, Casey.

[1:45:45] Yeah, congrats to all of our winners,

[1:45:47] and thank you again to everybody who donated during our big live show.

[1:45:50] And we are still working on putting together the reading of The Boy Next Door,

[1:45:55] That was the prize to everybody for massively exceeding the number of donations that we expected.

[1:46:01] Thank you very much, everybody, for using your heart to show your best.

[1:46:05] Yeah.

[1:46:05] We do have, I'm not going to, I can't reveal anything just yet.

[1:46:09] I think people will be happy.

[1:46:10] We do have a lot of the cast in place.

[1:46:13] And it's, you know, many beloved figures from Flophouse land will be involved.

[1:46:20] So, but let's move on to letters.

[1:46:23] Right, guys?

[1:46:24] Right?

[1:46:24] Why not?

[1:46:25] yeah we need them to make our words and yet we've never celebrated them letters thanks for everything

[1:46:30] you do from a to z and in between thank you for being there to spell out our words to be in our

[1:46:36] cereals and soups and also just for making us laugh on rainy days letters here this one's for

[1:46:44] you wait hold on so are they are we laughing because the letters are have spelled out jokes

[1:46:49] Or are we just sort of observing letters and, you know, finding joy in that?

[1:46:54] Dan, whatever floats your boat when you need a lift, sometimes it's just looking at a lowercase q and being like, hey, what are you up to, buddy?

[1:47:01] And sometimes it's reading some Robert Benchley and knowing that without letters, those ideas would have just died in his head, never communicated, except maybe verbally to one person right next to him.

[1:47:13] Letters, hey, you're the best.

[1:47:15] Or a whole round table of people.

[1:47:19] So let's do letters then.

[1:47:21] These are in the form of emails.

[1:47:22] Dan, hold on, Dan.

[1:47:24] What?

[1:47:24] Let's celebrate these letters and let's treat them to a good time.

[1:47:29] But I don't know if we need to do them.

[1:47:30] Unless if there's chemistry between you and one of the letters, Dan, then go for it.

[1:47:34] Oh, damn it.

[1:47:35] Florian.

[1:47:36] Florian, last name withheld, is the first person writing.

[1:47:39] Florian writes, hi, Dan and Elliot and Stu.

[1:47:42] The three investigators were a huge part of my childhood in Germany.

[1:47:46] Now, this was brought up on the last episode with Hodgman and David Reese.

[1:47:52] When we talked about detectives, I talked about how I liked the three investigators.

[1:47:55] Really ripped from the headlines.

[1:47:56] It is.

[1:47:58] This is one of the more new emails you'll ever hear, but I thought it was interesting.

[1:48:02] One of the more new, or as other people might say, newer letters.

[1:48:04] Yeah, okay.

[1:48:05] Well, anyway, the point is I'm giving a little backstory.

[1:48:08] I read The Three Investigators as a kid.

[1:48:10] None of the others knew about this particular series of mysteries.

[1:48:16] And if you don't listen to the minis, I have seen, you know, like fewer people do.

[1:48:20] They're really good guys.

[1:48:22] They're a lot of fun.

[1:48:22] And they have less nonsense in them in the sense of boring stuff

[1:48:27] and more nonsense in them in the sense of nonsense.

[1:48:30] Don't be a mini-misser.

[1:48:32] Hey, it's the worst thing you can be is a mini-misser.

[1:48:35] Don't miss those minis.

[1:48:36] Catch them today at the Flophouse.

[1:48:38] Okay, well, he says they're a huge part of his childhood in Germany.

[1:48:41] The books were popular here, but the three boys from Palm Beach reached iconic status

[1:48:46] in the form of radio plays.

[1:48:48] All German kids from my generation

[1:48:50] had at least a couple of

[1:48:52] Die Drei

[1:48:53] Fratzenzeigen.

[1:48:56] Fratzenzeigen.

[1:48:57] Perfect pronunciation.

[1:48:58] That's really good.

[1:48:59] Yeah, that's great.

[1:49:00] Are you from Berlin?

[1:49:02] Tapes.

[1:49:03] No, how is that?

[1:49:04] How would you say that, Stuart?

[1:49:05] You speak German, right?

[1:49:06] I don't speak it well enough

[1:49:09] to repeat what I just kind of heard you say.

[1:49:12] What's the word for investigators?

[1:49:12] Does it sound anything like fratzenzeigen?

[1:49:15] Well, you know how to say three.

[1:49:16] Yep.

[1:49:18] D-dry.

[1:49:19] Dry.

[1:49:19] Franz is something.

[1:49:22] Rather than Dre, as Dan said.

[1:49:24] Okay.

[1:49:25] Well, anyway.

[1:49:25] Had at least a couple of D-dry,

[1:49:29] Frostenzeigen tapes or LPs to listen to on repeat.

[1:49:33] I am the same age as you.

[1:49:35] In 1997, a group of fans even started a playback theater show

[1:49:39] where they would have one of the tapes running

[1:49:41] and would lip sync and move to it in front of an audience.

[1:49:44] This was a huge success and prompted the makers of the radio plays to go on extended tours of the German-speaking countries.

[1:49:51] They are still touring to this day.

[1:49:53] Too long, didn't read, you didn't make up the three investigators.

[1:49:56] But they're probably considered weird or off as evidenced by the fact that they were and are loved in Germany.

[1:50:02] Love the floor, love the floor.

[1:50:04] Love the show, Florian.

[1:50:06] I'm sure Florian would love the floor, too, if he could see it.

[1:50:08] I've got a nice rug in here.

[1:50:09] It's that old Gearbook quote.

[1:50:13] A thanks to the floor for holding me up.

[1:50:15] Or a thanks to the floor for always supporting me.

[1:50:19] That's another way I've seen it.

[1:50:20] Stuart, I'm sorry that I put you on the spot as my translator.

[1:50:25] No, it's okay.

[1:50:25] I was just trying to Google what investigator is in German,

[1:50:30] and it's not what you said, so I'm very confused.

[1:50:33] Well, it's probably an idiomatic translation.

[1:50:35] That's not...

[1:50:36] Yeah, that's fair.

[1:50:37] I'm surprised I've...

[1:50:39] There's probably a very specific German word for, like, three brothers who solve mysteries and are loosely related to Hitchcock.

[1:50:48] Yeah, yeah.

[1:50:48] Bruder, Frager, Hitchcock, and, you know, that kind of thing, you know.

[1:50:51] It's, like, I'm surprised I never heard of the idea of people lip-syncing on stage to radio shows or, like, drama LPs.

[1:50:59] And that's a great idea.

[1:51:00] That's a really good idea.

[1:51:01] Let's bring it over here.

[1:51:03] Let's lip-sync to our own podcast on the road.

[1:51:05] Okay.

[1:51:06] Interesting.

[1:51:08] That seems easier than us just coming up with this highly original bullshit, right?

[1:51:12] Ironically, that would require so much more preparation than what we currently do.

[1:51:18] But you could switch roles, which would be very interesting.

[1:51:22] Oh, yeah.

[1:51:23] I mean, they are doing transcripts.

[1:51:26] We could do readings where we all switch parts.

[1:51:29] It's our own version of True West.

[1:51:33] Okay, this one says this.

[1:51:36] mr mccoy feel free to relax on this letter because you've already done your part elliot and stewart

[1:51:43] you've got some splaining to do what are your erotica author aliases the great dane has already

[1:51:50] unmasked himself in front of the world press and subsequently been taken into police custody

[1:51:55] you can all split this prison sentence three ways so it won't be so hard on any one of you

[1:52:01] all you have to do is to state your full name and erotic alias into this microphone then come out

[1:52:07] with your hands up it's over big fan detective jack last name with health now i mean this seems

[1:52:13] like the opposite of the prisoner's dilemma you know that i will just do the time if you keep your

[1:52:18] mouth shut and so there's no you know you don't have to make any calculations like the self-interested

[1:52:24] thing would be to just not say anything so the premise of this bit is that we are moonlighting

[1:52:34] as erotic authors and we have to reveal what our nom de plume clarifying and returning to first

[1:52:41] principles sure thank you thank you i just want to make sure i'm up to speed you know i like playing

[1:52:47] games i mean also we could just ignore it and pretend it never happened we're we we are the

[1:52:51] judge you know we we do you have a do you have a nom de plume do you have an erotic uh author name

[1:52:57] jr throbbing sure okay oh wow you were quick with that one well i spent the time dan was reading the

[1:53:05] letter thinking of it i feel like i i want to pick a name that no one else in the world would pick

[1:53:13] so i think maybe like jackson galaxy okay okay and uh and aaron let's say you were involved in

[1:53:23] this highly questionable shenanigan certainly i have been thinking the entire time of what my

[1:53:30] erotica nom de plume would be i think i would probably be uh smolder divine

[1:53:38] Oh yeah, I like it

[1:53:41] That's significantly better than ours

[1:53:43] Nom de Plume is a pretty good erotica

[1:53:45] Nom de Plume

[1:53:46] Guys, that's it for letters

[1:53:53] Put it behind you, it's gone

[1:53:55] It's dead now, you never had any letters

[1:53:57] Don't look back

[1:53:58] If you look back, it'll turn into salt

[1:54:01] Just keep moving forward

[1:54:02] Now we gotta talk about good movies

[1:54:06] That you should watch

[1:54:07] Or, I mean, they don't have to be good.

[1:54:08] The thing I'm thinking about recommending is not, but it is fun.

[1:54:12] So let's go with that.

[1:54:14] Let's say movies you would recommend.

[1:54:16] Let's just call them movies we'd recommend, yeah.

[1:54:18] Yeah, don't make it complex, Dan.

[1:54:20] It's fine.

[1:54:20] I mean, you've already oversold yours quite a bit by calling it not good.

[1:54:24] Well, I guess I'm already in it.

[1:54:27] I'm going to say, I'm going to, see, the only thing worse than my German is my Brazilian.

[1:54:35] So, or I guess Portuguese, right?

[1:54:38] Is that correct?

[1:54:39] Well, Portuguese is the language, but Brazilian, I think, is the wax that you're talking about.

[1:54:42] Yes.

[1:54:42] Because they did not do a good job.

[1:54:43] That's true.

[1:54:44] That made me sad.

[1:54:50] Well, don't go to budget Brazilian next time, Dan.

[1:54:54] That was your mistake.

[1:54:55] Some things are worth paying full price for.

[1:54:59] Okay, so my Portuguese is not good, but the movie I'm recommending is Super Xuxa Contra o Bio Astral.

[1:55:10] Perfect.

[1:55:11] Which is, you know, it translates basically to Xuxa Against the Down Mood.

[1:55:18] And this is the Brazilian children's host, Xuxa, who had, or Xuxa, again, my accent is not good,

[1:55:27] but she was huge in Brazil.

[1:55:29] This movie that she made

[1:55:30] was the number three most profitable Brazilian film in Brazil.

[1:55:36] Oh, sorry, the most profitable Brazilian film in Brazil

[1:55:40] and the third most popular movie in Brazil that year overall,

[1:55:44] like above things like Robocop.

[1:55:45] So it was a huge hit there.

[1:55:48] And the best way to describe it is

[1:55:52] if Labyrinth was done with puppets you found in, say, a lost and found box,

[1:56:01] and instead of a baby being stolen, it was a dog puppet,

[1:56:07] and instead of it being kind of about the coming of age of a young girl,

[1:56:12] it's about this Brazilian lady in hot pants singing songs

[1:56:16] about how we need to treat the earth better and not be sad.

[1:56:20] And it's less coherent than that makes it sound, if that's possible.

[1:56:27] She's basically fighting the Satan, and it has this, as I alluded to before,

[1:56:33] the biggest crime in this world seems to be that you can't feel sad,

[1:56:36] like don't have a down mood, which is like a completely misguided thing

[1:56:41] for people's emotional development, certainly if this is for children,

[1:56:45] and very weird right now in the world as it is.

[1:56:49] But if you enjoy things that are just sort of colorful and weird and go off in directions you cannot comprehend and fathom and just let it wash over you, like, it is a good, bizarre time.

[1:57:06] It's hard to find.

[1:57:07] You probably might have to do it in an illegal fashion, but it's fun.

[1:57:12] Which is an adventure in itself.

[1:57:15] Sounds like something to use your ExpressVPN for.

[1:57:19] cover up your tracks do either you guys have a recommendation uh i do erin would you like to go

[1:57:27] next sure uh so this so between worlds felt to me like a horror comedy that was how i experienced it

[1:57:38] um and so another scary comedy that's more funny than scary uh is what we do in the shadows which

[1:57:48] is a movie that it's a movie that i really really enjoyed and now i started watching the series on

[1:57:54] effects that i'm also really enjoying um so i would recommend that for people who want to laugh

[1:58:00] at something that should be scary and isn't um also reese darby is in what we do in the shadows

[1:58:07] and he's also on the big fib streaming on disney plus headwritten by me oh snuck a little plug in

[1:58:15] um also so great he's so great also if you want to if you love nicholas cage's huge performance

[1:58:22] in this um then get in the way back machine and watch or re-watch vampire's kiss uh because that

[1:58:30] is a huge nick cage performance that just reinforces the fact that um this isn't new

[1:58:38] he's always been this way like he's always been so big he's always made such huge choices and

[1:58:43] committed a hundred percent um so those are my two recommendations always swinging for the fences

[1:58:49] that guy he really does uh i'm gonna recommend a movie unless you would like to go next to it

[1:58:55] oh let me think uh no ellie you can go okay thank you but certainly you should drag it out either

[1:59:01] way this movie ties into between worlds because it is also about a man who has very serious and

[1:59:06] at times traumatic memories tied up in a house that is not being well taken care of and that's

[1:59:11] the last black man in san francisco directed by joe talbot and uh written by him and uh jimmy

[1:59:17] fails and starring jimmy fails and uh it's about a man in san francisco who uh when he was a kid

[1:59:24] his family lived in one of these like big fancy painted lady houses in san francisco and for years

[1:59:30] he's been stopping by and taking care of it against the wishes of the current owners who

[1:59:34] think it's very strange. And when he gets the opportunity to kind of take semi-lawful possession

[1:59:41] of the house, he goes for it. But there's a lot more going on in the movie than that. And it's a

[1:59:46] lot about San Francisco as a changing city and black lives and white lives and friendship and

[1:59:52] all sorts of things. I found it to be a really beautiful movie and very lyrical and enjoyed a

[1:59:57] lot. My wife, who's from the Bay Area and spent a lot of time in San Francisco, said it showed her

[2:00:01] a side of san francisco she was not really familiar with so she really enjoyed it too so

[2:00:05] the last black man in san francisco i'd recommend currently streaming on amazon prime so if you have

[2:00:10] amazon prime just go watch it for free you already paid for it yeah it's it's it's gorgeous yeah it's

[2:00:16] a beautiful movie uh and i'm gonna recommend uh a japanese zombie movie called one cut of the dead

[2:00:23] i don't think i've recommended this before but it is a movie about a movie um and it's about a

[2:00:32] bunch of filmmakers making a zombie movie or are they trapped in a zombie movie it's a lot of fun

[2:00:37] it plays with uh like it plays with ideas of low budget filmmaking and uh like found footage stuff

[2:00:47] uh it's a lot of it's it's just great it's fun it's a hard movie not to like i've been wanting

[2:00:52] going to watch that one cut of the time a lot of really good things about it and uh speaking of

[2:00:56] stewart recommendations just occurs to me we should mention this you were on uh movie crush

[2:01:01] uh recently yeah chuck bryant's podcast about uh people and their favorite movies talking about

[2:01:08] and i got to talk about the greatest movie of all time ricky oh the story of ricky the greatest

[2:01:12] movie ever made and i was on it recently too talking about aliens and elliot will be on it

[2:01:18] soon i believe yes talking about my favorite the taking appellant one two three and uh i didn't know

[2:01:24] it just occurred to me like we don't often plug these other appearances other than on social media

[2:01:29] and you know would it kill us to tell people once in a while huh no it doesn't kill anyone but uh

[2:01:35] speaking of plugs i'd like to throw out a plug uh now that new york is slowly and carefully

[2:01:42] reopening uh at least carefully in our case i just wanted to mention that my wife and i have a new bar

[2:01:48] in sunset park that has a very expansive backyard and also is currently doing to-go service it's

[2:01:54] called minnie's bar uh and it's lovely and if you get a chance and you're in sunset park brooklyn

[2:01:59] come by for a to-go uh to-go cocktail they just got a frozen drink machine uh which i'm very

[2:02:06] excited about because i don't have to clean um other people clean it's not like we just let it

[2:02:11] get gross that'd be crazy um so if you get a chance uh check out minnie's bar and sunset now

[2:02:15] aaron are you offering to go cocktails um if you can find me okay and if you can afford me

[2:02:24] then i will make you a to-go cocktail okay well if in lieu of that are there other things you

[2:02:31] would like to plug thank you so much for asking daniel yes um so as i mentioned before i was

[2:02:41] head writer for the big fib on disney plus which is a game show for kids it is basically we have a

[2:02:48] 10 year old contestant thereabouts who interviews two adults who both claim to be an expert in a

[2:02:54] given field and then that child at the end of it has to guess who is the expert and who has been

[2:02:59] lying to them the entire time so it's teaching critical thinking it's fun it's very silly reese

[2:03:05] Darby plays a robot.

[2:03:06] So for younger kids, I think it's really fun.

[2:03:11] For older kids, i.e. adults,

[2:03:14] I also was head writer for the Great Fantasy Debate on Facebook

[2:03:18] where teams of fantasy authors and comedians

[2:03:23] square off to debate issues within the fantasy world,

[2:03:27] like which fantasy world would be the best place to go on vacation

[2:03:31] or which fantasy character would be the worst roommate.

[2:03:35] Things like that.

[2:03:36] That's really fun.

[2:03:36] We had Jim Butcher on.

[2:03:38] We had Naomi Novik on, Tochi Onyebuchi, Marie Lu, Pierce Brown,

[2:03:45] and then a bunch of really talented comedians.

[2:03:48] That's really fun.

[2:03:49] And it's 10-minute episodes on Facebook.

[2:03:51] So it's like, you're already on Facebook for 10 minutes.

[2:03:53] Watch my show.

[2:03:55] It's easier to watch it than not to watch it.

[2:03:57] It's harder to avoid it.

[2:03:58] And, Elliot, you have children, and Stuart, you like fantasy.

[2:04:03] So it seems like there's something here for everyone.

[2:04:05] There's something for everyone.

[2:04:06] Yeah.

[2:04:06] And for people who like podcasts, my scripted podcast, Ellie and the Wave, is available wherever you get your podcasts.

[2:04:13] That's a funny scripted dystopian with Natalie Morales.

[2:04:19] Not the Today Show host, but the very talented comedic actor, Natalie Morales, is our lead on it.

[2:04:27] So where do we go to get the Today Show host, Natalie Morales?

[2:04:32] I wish I had her number for you, but I think you just go to the Today Show.

[2:04:39] Yeah, you go to the Today Show.

[2:04:40] I mean, I guess I could just stand outside the window.

[2:04:42] I think you stand outside with a sign, yeah, and just wait.

[2:04:44] With a sign that says, Natalie, I have something very important to tell you.

[2:04:46] Come outside.

[2:04:47] That always works.

[2:04:49] That'll work.

[2:04:50] That'll work.

[2:04:50] Yeah, I mean, I usually would just walk around until I get some kind of an indicator on one of the NPCs I'm passing that I can start a conversation.

[2:05:01] And then I scroll down my conversation options and see if one of them might lead me to finding this Today Show host.

[2:05:08] Now we know what Stuart's Terminator readout looks like.

[2:05:11] Okay, well, we've dithered enough.

[2:05:16] Let's thank Jordan Cowling for producing this show and editing, and thank Maximum Fun for being our network.

[2:05:25] You can see, or listen to, rather, other great shows at MaximumFun.org.

[2:05:31] and we always appreciate you listening.

[2:05:34] Thank you for being with us.

[2:05:36] You especially.

[2:05:37] You, right now, hearing this, you're our favorite,

[2:05:39] and we're so glad that you're listening.

[2:05:41] And if there's more than one person in the room,

[2:05:43] both of you are our favorites.

[2:05:45] And if there's more than two, I'm sorry,

[2:05:48] only two of you are our favorites.

[2:05:49] If there's more than two,

[2:05:50] a broken pool cue will appear in front of you,

[2:05:53] and you have to fight for it.

[2:05:56] Okay.

[2:05:57] Well, that didn't go well for an ending.

[2:06:00] Hey, thanks, Erin, for being here.

[2:06:02] Thanks for having me, you guys.

[2:06:05] Yeah, thank you.

[2:06:06] Let's end on, we'll kill death, for the Flophouse.

[2:06:10] I've been Dan McCoy.

[2:06:12] Yeah, so I guess I'm Stuart Wellington.

[2:06:15] And I'm Elliot Kalin.

[2:06:16] Not sure exactly what Dan was getting at, but, you know, that's okay.

[2:06:21] I don't always know.

[2:06:22] Bye.

[2:06:30] I feel like talking about the movie was more fun

[2:06:37] I had more fun talking about it

[2:06:39] than I kind of did watching it

[2:06:41] because as I said I was watching it by myself

[2:06:43] and I'm like no no don't do this

[2:06:46] I think watching it with a group would be

[2:06:47] a little better yeah with the right group

[2:06:50] like not with your parents

[2:06:50] MaximumFun.org

[2:06:54] Comedy and Culture

[2:06:55] Artist Owned

[2:06:57] Audience Supported

Ep. #316 - Between Worlds, w/ Erin Foley-Chan

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