Ep. #251 - Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

Elliott Kalan

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[0:05] Not to be confused with Valerian Root, the cure for a thousand ailments. Available at your drugstore.

[0:30] Hey everyone, and welcome to the Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:40] Je m'appelle Stuart Wellington.

[0:43] And me, Elliot Kalin. And I want to start by just saying, hey everybody.

[0:48] Merry whatever holiday it is when you're listening to this.

[0:51] Because I don't know when you're going to listen to it.

[0:54] Maybe it's Christmas time. Maybe it's New Year's. Maybe it's Valentine's Day, which is coming up as we're recording now.

[1:01] Maybe it's Passover, which is also coming up in a little bit.

[1:04] So whatever holiday you're listening to it during, I hope you're having a good one.

Stuart Wellington

[1:09] Good night.

[1:09] Yeah, that's the thing we do every episode.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15] Just to be safe. I just want to cover our bases.

[1:18] I realize we've never done that.

[1:20] And what if someone's listening to this during a holiday?

[1:22] And they're going to feel weird that we didn't wish them a merry one.

[1:25] They're going to think we're like anti-their religion.

[1:27] And I don't want to cause that to happen.

[1:29] That's why I named Valentine's Day a religious holiday.

Stuart Wellington

[1:33] Yeah, it's named after Zane Valentine.

Elliott Kalan

[1:36] Zane Valentine.

[1:38] Zane Valentine.

[1:39] When Billy Zane.

Stuart Wellington

[1:42] It's the time that St. Billy Zane.

Elliott Kalan

[1:48] Billy Zane Valentine sounds like if you did a blaxploitation version of Billy Zane.

[1:55] And it's like, this is the story of Billy Zane Valentine, star of Black Titanic and Black Phantom.

[2:01] So what do we do on this podcast?

[2:03] You mean the star of Titanic?

[2:06] Name a bigger star of Titanic.

[2:11] Okay, the boat.

[2:12] Sure.

[2:13] Bill Paxton.

[2:14] Okay, he's on screen earlier than Billy Zane.

[2:17] Yes, he's the star.

[2:18] You're right.

[2:18] And he's a way bigger star.

[2:20] Than Billy Zane?

[2:21] Yeah.

[2:22] Bill Paxton?

[2:23] Yeah.

[2:25] Did Bill Paxton ever play The Phantom?

Stuart Wellington

[2:27] That's true.

[2:29] Yeah, did he smash evil?

[2:30] He wasn't the lead in The Phantom.

Elliott Kalan

[2:31] You're right.

[2:32] Yeah, maybe.

[2:32] You know what?

[2:33] Pre-Big Love, I'm right.

[2:35] Post-Big Love, you're right.

Stuart Wellington

[2:37] What about Victor Garber?

[2:40] He's in Titanic, and he's the captain of the ship.

[2:42] He's more important than that.

Dan McCoy

[2:44] I just saw Victor Garber on Broadway in Hello Dolly.

[2:47] God damn it.

Elliott Kalan

[2:48] Hey, Dan, you're doing me now.

[2:50] Wait, who's playing Dolly?

[2:51] You saw that with Bette Midler?

Dan McCoy

[2:53] I saw it with Bernadette Peters.

[2:55] Oh, even better.

[2:55] And she was fantastic.

[2:57] Yeah, that sounds great.

[2:58] Yeah.

[2:58] She's a national treasure.

Elliott Kalan

[3:00] Wait.

[3:01] That's why Nicolas Cage has to find a treasure map to her.

Dan McCoy

[3:05] It's not a very hard treasure map.

[3:07] I can tell him that she's appearing on Broadway six nights a week.

Elliott Kalan

[3:11] Well, Dan, he's really in it for the chase, not the goal.

[3:15] Oh, okay.

[3:15] I'll have to unearth this podcast to find out that information.

[3:20] The true treasure was the friends he made along the way.

[3:23] Oh, okay.

[3:24] Isn't that what he says at the end of National Treasure?

[3:26] You know, guys, the true treasure was the friends we made along the way.

Dan McCoy

[3:30] And this goal.

[3:31] And this goal that I used to buy this sports car at the end of the movie.

Stuart Wellington

[3:36] He bought a sports car at the end of the movie?

[3:38] Yeah.

[3:39] I hope it was an American-made sports car.

[3:42] That's true.

[3:43] Is there such a thing?

[3:45] Yeah.

[3:45] Like a Dodge Charger?

[3:47] Dodge is an American company, right?

[3:49] I mean, if he's using national, like if he's using American gold to buy something.

[3:54] I'm just saying keep it in the country.

Elliott Kalan

[3:57] Well, now it's time for Stu's America First Populism podcast.

[4:01] The Pop House.

Dan McCoy

[4:04] So what do we do on this podcast, Dan?

[4:06] This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[4:09] Uh-huh.

[4:10] And tonight, or whenever we watched it, we watched Valerian.

Elliott Kalan

[4:15] Look, I want to apologize for Dan, too, everybody.

[4:17] Whatever holiday is that you're celebrating, let's say it's Christmas.

[4:21] Maybe Dan's had a little too much eggnog or a little too much turkey.

[4:23] He's feeling a little sleepy.

[4:25] So everybody, Dan is having a sleepy holiday.

Stuart Wellington

[4:28] I think Dan's doing a great job, Elliot.

[4:30] Why are you hassling him?

[4:31] Why are you riding him?

Dan McCoy

[4:32] I have a cold, one of my frequent colds.

[4:35] I feel like this is a returning theme on the podcast that Dan is sick.

[4:41] I don't know what it is about me that my, like, that I was...

[4:45] Well, your immune system.

[4:46] Yeah, I guess so.

Elliott Kalan

[4:47] I mean, that's what it is about you, literally, is your immune system is bad.

Stuart Wellington

[4:50] Yeah.

[4:51] Well, what happened was Dan was feeling sick, so he went into his kitchen to get some Dayquil,

[4:56] and he poured himself a hearty glass of Dayquil, and then he looked at the bottle and it

[5:00] says NyQuil, and he goes, uh-oh.

Elliott Kalan

[5:06] Yeah, a hearty glass.

[5:07] He filled himself a solo cup of Dayquil.

[5:11] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[5:12] He's got a power through the podcast.

[5:14] So what did we watch tonight?

Dan McCoy

[5:17] Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[5:20] That is a mouthful.

Elliott Kalan

[5:21] Yeah.

[5:22] Now, this is a movie.

[5:23] Let me just tell you...

[5:24] It is.

Elliott Kalan

[5:24] That's not a lie.

[5:25] Okay.

[5:26] So facts number one.

[5:27] Pull it a fact.

[5:28] Check it.

[5:28] Look it up.

[5:29] I'm not lying.

[5:30] It's a movie.

[5:31] Don't give me a Pinocchio or a Pants on Fire.

[5:33] Yeah.

[5:33] No.

[5:34] Pants remain uninflamed.

[5:37] So this is a movie that when it came out, it was like they were going out of their way

[5:44] to tell the audience nothing about what this movie was about or what watching it was like.

[5:49] All I knew from the commercials and the posters was there's something called a Valerian.

[5:54] I didn't know if it was a person, a place, a thing.

[5:57] I knew there was a thousand planets in the city.

[5:59] What does that mean?

[6:00] And I knew that Dane DeHaan was in it.

[6:02] But otherwise...

[6:03] The raw star power of Dane DeHaan.

[6:06] And I knew that he flew a spaceship at some point.

[6:09] And otherwise, it was like they were going out of their way.

[6:12] It was to tell you what this movie was about.

[6:13] And I think more people might have seen it if they had known this movie was like a big space opera type adventure.

Dan McCoy

[6:19] I got that from the ads.

[6:21] Like, you know, you see people flying spaceships.

[6:23] You think it's a space opera?

[6:24] Like, I just...

Elliott Kalan

[6:25] For all I knew, it was about people test driving spaceships all day.

Stuart Wellington

[6:28] All right.

[6:29] I mean, that's...

[6:30] Before they bought one.

[6:31] Well, like a used cars, but in outer space?

[6:34] Exactly.

[6:35] Pitch it.

Dan McCoy

[6:36] I feel like the plot to this movie is so bonkers that it's really hard to sum up in a trailer.

Elliott Kalan

[6:42] That's true.

[6:43] But then what they could have expressed in the trailer was how bonkers the movie is.

[6:47] Yeah.

[6:47] I feel like they were trying to hide how bonkers crazy it was.

[6:50] Because this is essentially the fifth element times a million.

[6:53] This is like a million elements.

[6:55] What?

[6:57] Like, remember how the fifth...

[6:58] Remember how the fifth element came out and we were like, this is bonkers.

[7:01] Yeah.

[7:02] We all...

[7:02] All the only snack that they would serve at the theaters if you were watching it was bonkers.

[7:06] That was the only candy you could buy.

[7:08] Yeah.

[7:08] Because that's how bonkers it was.

Dan McCoy

[7:10] Yeah.

[7:10] They gave out free copies of Bonk's Revenge as you left the theater.

[7:13] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[7:13] That was the only video game you were allowed to play for the rest of your life after watching the movie.

[7:18] Oh, wow.

Stuart Wellington

[7:19] Yeah.

[7:19] That's a rough contract you signed.

Elliott Kalan

[7:22] No, you gotta read the fine print when you sign a movie contract for when you're watching a movie.

[7:27] Yeah.

[7:28] Yeah.

[7:29] Still, I can tell you anything you want to know about Bonk's Revenge.

[7:31] Uh-huh.

[7:32] Except I don't know what he's getting...

[7:33] What, is he a caveman?

[7:34] He's a caveman and his head gets really big and he bonks people with it.

[7:37] Wait, what's he getting revenge for?

[7:40] That's the only thing I don't know is what he's getting revenge for.

[7:42] I assume the mob killed his family?

[7:44] I'm just sick of these heroes with tragic pasts.

Stuart Wellington

[7:48] Probably his fucking girlfriend got stuffed in a refrigerator.

[7:52] Oh, boy.

[7:54] I'm looking it up.

Elliott Kalan

[7:56] You look at what Bonk wanted revenge about.

[7:59] Okay, so I'll talk about Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[8:02] Let's get into the plot now.

Stuart Wellington

[8:02] So it's based on a comic book that would have been seen in France.

[8:06] Yes.

[8:07] And Belgium.

[8:08] Yeah, it would have been the sort of thing you would have seen on the pages of Metal Urlant.

Elliott Kalan

[8:13] Right?

[8:14] That's the other thing is when it came out, I assumed it was based on like a series of YA novels.

[8:18] Uh-huh.

[8:19] It looked like a real Hunger Games Maze Runner type thing.

[8:22] Yeah.

[8:22] And it was the fault in our Star Wars, let's call it.

Dan McCoy

[8:26] So two things.

[8:30] But it's not based on that.

[8:31] Yes?

[8:31] Two things.

[8:32] Bonk was trying to get, like, someone stole the moon.

[8:35] And so he was getting revenge, I guess, for someone stealing part of the moon.

[8:39] I didn't remember that.

Stuart Wellington

[8:40] Okay.

[8:41] I mean, those are some pretty big stakes.

Dan McCoy

[8:43] And, uh, yeah.

[8:46] And the other thing is when this movie came out, people pointed out that it was-

Elliott Kalan

[8:49] Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

[8:50] The other thing you're going to say is not about Bonk?

[8:52] No.

[8:53] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[8:54] Let me put my notebook away.

[8:55] No, you're talking about the title of this film and, like, and what it's about and, like,

[9:00] what it's based on.

[9:01] People were mad, uh, rightfully so, I think, that it was not just-

[9:05] That it was called Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets rather than Valerian and

[9:09] Laureline, which is what the thing is called.

[9:12] And the fact that-

Elliott Kalan

[9:13] And Laureline is an equal character in the movie.

Dan McCoy

[9:15] She's an equal character in the movie.

[9:16] So it's weird that they just have the guy as the name of the film.

Elliott Kalan

[9:20] I will say that Valerian and Laureline-

[9:23] Valerian and Laureline sounds like Jules and Jim.

[9:26] Like, it sounds like a French movie about a couple or a friend.

[9:29] That's true.

[9:29] They should have just called it City of a Thousand Planets or something like that.

[9:33] Yeah.

[9:33] You know, just call it, like, Space Adventure Craziness.

[9:36] Crazy Space.

[9:37] They should have called it.

[9:37] Mm-hmm.

[9:37] It's a mad, mad, mad, mad world.

[9:40] It's a mad, mad, mad, mad universe is what they should have called it.

[9:42] Oh, yeah.

[9:44] That's a better name.

[9:46] Yeah, so-

[9:47] But you're right.

[9:47] It should have been called Valerian and Laureline.

[9:49] And so this-

[9:50] Or Laureline and Valerian.

[9:53] Oh.

[9:53] Yeah, it just blew my mind.

[9:55] Or Laureline and the City of a Thousand Planets.

Stuart Wellington

[9:58] Sure.

[9:59] I mean, either of those would have been just as good, right?

[10:01] I mean, were they worried it was going to-

[10:03] I mean, I guess they were worried it was going to be, like, a John Carter situation.

[10:08] And then they just had the same situation.

Elliott Kalan

[10:10] The exact same situation.

[10:11] Well, the other problem is that it's-

[10:13] This is another one of those-

[10:14] Like John Carter, it seems like this is a movie playing off of the filmmaker's love of a specific property

[10:19] that is not known of by most of the people in the United States of America.

[10:24] Let alone, I don't know, the rest of the world.

[10:26] I mean, Europe, it's-

[10:27] I assume it's fairly well known.

[10:28] But, like, that Luc Besson apparently for years wanted to make a movie of these characters.

[10:34] But, like, I'd never heard of them before.

[10:37] You know?

[10:37] And I consider myself fairly in the know about Euro science fiction comic books.

[10:43] And I mean, they're-

Stuart Wellington

[10:43] They were popular.

[10:45] I mean, they're fairly popular.

[10:46] And they were apparently a pretty big influence on George Lucas for the Star Wars-

[10:52] The original Star Wars trilogy.

[10:53] Huh.

[10:54] Apparently a number of the plot lines echo sequences you would see

[10:58] in the original Star Wars trilogy.

Elliott Kalan

[11:01] I'm gonna have to-

[11:02] I'm gonna have to see proof that George Lucas saw those comics.

[11:05] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[11:06] Uh, I don't have it in front of me, so I'll check.

Elliott Kalan

[11:09] I guess catch up with me next year.

[11:11] Pull out your dossier, I guess, Stuart.

[11:14] Get-

[11:15] Put-

[11:15] Put Agent Steel on the case.

[11:17] Yeah.

[11:18] Okay.

[11:19] Let's talk about what happens in this movie, huh?

[11:21] So, this is a totally crazy movie about our space.

[11:24] So what do they do?

[11:25] They open the movie with a montage of real space missions.

[11:29] And the craziest song you could have in a movie about space, David Bowie's Space Oddity.

Stuart Wellington

[11:34] Yeah.

[11:34] Hey, that's never been done before.

[11:37] Yeah.

[11:37] This is a pretty good-

[11:38] I still like the opening a lot.

[11:40] I like it.

[11:41] I think the opening's pretty great.

Elliott Kalan

[11:42] I think it's-

[11:43] I wish they had-

[11:43] I wish other people had not used the song as much, because it actually works very well

[11:47] for the opening of this movie.

[11:49] Specifically, I wish they had not used it in The Martian, where I was like, a little on

[11:52] the nose, The Martian.

[11:56] Yeah.

[11:56] But, uh, so we see, uh, we see this montage of real space footage that turns into future

[12:01] space missions, as over, you know, decades and decades, the International Space Station

[12:07] becomes Alpha Station.

[12:09] This enormous space station with thousands of alien species on it.

[12:13] And, uh, it's too big for Earth orbit, and they launch it into the unknowns of outer

[12:18] space.

[12:19] And then, uh, and this is a really cool montage where it's like, you keep seeing the director

[12:25] of the space station greeting people from different countries, and then aliens from different

[12:29] planets, and-

Stuart Wellington

[12:30] And they make a point to, like, change the director, like, it's not the same people greeting

[12:35] people every time.

Elliott Kalan

[12:36] No, they, like, get older, and then they get replaced, and, yeah.

[12:39] It's a really cool, it's the, it's the, uh, it's more of a inspiring version of the opening

[12:44] from Up, where time passes very elegantly.

[12:48] Sure, yeah, yeah.

[12:49] Except it's, instead of being about a wife learning that she, a woman learning she cannot bear children

[12:55] and then dying, it's about people reaching out into the stars.

Stuart Wellington

[12:59] And the, it has, it reminds me of, it reminds me of the opening credits of Watchmen, where

[13:05] watching it, I was like, wow, I'm kind of excited for the rest of this movie.

[13:09] Like, this is a pretty artfully done thing set to a appropriate popular song.

[13:16] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[13:16] Now, cut to 400 years later, and this is what we get into serious European comic book science

[13:22] fiction, like, Mobius, Codex Serafinianus type stuff.

[13:25] Because we're on, we're with a bald alien lady with shimmery skin on a kind of tropical

[13:30] planet, where they, they fish pearl, everyone's bald and, uh, supermodel thin, and all stretched

[13:36] out.

[13:37] And they're on a world where they fish pearls out of the ocean.

[13:40] Yeah, they have a, they have a pearl-based economy.

[13:42] They even wash their faces in pearls.

[13:45] Yes, they, everything's pearls.

[13:46] Then they feed the pearls to a little armadillo type creature, and it shakes its booty around,

[13:51] and then pearls fly out of it.

Stuart Wellington

[13:53] I mean, it shits, it shits out pearls, right?

Elliott Kalan

[13:56] Yeah, but they fly, they don't just fly out of the butt.

[13:58] It flies out of, like, all the pores in his skin, it seems like.

[14:00] Oh, okay.

[14:01] Unless it, unless it was just a very classily shot scene of an armadillo shitting pearls out

Stuart Wellington

[14:07] of its butt.

[14:07] And Elliot has experience with non-classily shot versions of that scene.

[14:12] Oh, boy, do I ever.

Elliott Kalan

[14:14] That's what working on The Daily Show is all about.

[14:17] It's just trying to get an armadillo to shit pearls in a way that it looks elegant.

[14:21] Yeah.

[14:21] So you can show it on broadcast television.

[14:23] Anyway, but then there's explosions in the sky.

[14:26] Uh-oh, alien spaceships are all crashing around them.

[14:29] Ah, it leads to explosions.

[14:31] And the bald lady that we followed from the very beginning, from her waking up in the morning

[14:34] and washing her face with pearls, to her feeding pearls to an armadillo.

[14:38] She gets killed in the explosion as her family watches through the shield of a spaceship that

[14:43] they, you know, are hiding in.

[14:45] And she unleashes a blue light wave that flies across the universe and through space and time.

[14:50] And where does it land?

[14:52] In a beach simulation where Dane DeHaan is just kind of kicking around, lying down.

[14:57] And it wakes him up from tanning on a fake beach.

[14:59] And then he argues with Loreline.

[15:02] We're introduced to these two characters, Valerian and Loreline, who are essentially space military

[15:06] spies.

[15:08] But they don't do espionage.

[15:10] They just do the kind of, they do movie spy missions where you go in and you blow up a

[15:13] bunch of stuff or you shoot a bunch of people.

Stuart Wellington

[15:16] Yeah.

[15:18] And they, we have a, we have a scene of, let's say, artless flirtation.

Elliott Kalan

[15:26] Yes.

[15:27] They, they do a lot of, it's this kind of argument flirting that in the best movies is like witty

[15:33] banter that shows that they're putting effort into trying to one up each other.

[15:37] And that's how they express their kind of feelings for each other.

[15:39] But they genuinely don't, she genuinely doesn't seem to like him very much.

[15:43] Like Loreline genuinely seems to find Dane DeHaan's pawing at her and like, and proposing

[15:49] to her, like to be like going too far to be offensive.

Stuart Wellington

[15:53] Yeah.

[15:54] I think they were shooting for, uh, like out of sight and they ended up with my memories

[16:02] of being on a subway platform in Germany, uh, from when I was in college and me having to

[16:10] pretend I was the boyfriend of the girls I was hanging out with so that they would feel

[16:14] less threatened.

Elliott Kalan

[16:16] Yeah.

[16:17] It's a, they don't, they don't really seem to like each other, but, uh, look, they're

[16:21] partners.

[16:21] They've got to work together.

[16:22] And he's like, Hey, I really love you.

[16:25] And she's like, did you say that to all your other conquests and all these pictures of these

[16:28] women he slept with come up?

[16:29] And this is what I was trying to get.

[16:31] So should I be, should I think it's cool that they cast a guy who is not what I would

[16:36] call movie star handsome in this role?

[16:39] Okay.

[16:40] Or as much as he's not an ugly guy, he's not a, he's not a terrible looking guy.

[16:43] He's got a certain like, uh, geek attractiveness to him, I think.

[16:48] But, uh, the fact that he is not a guy who looks like he bagged a million conquests.

[16:52] I was like, movie, come on.

[16:54] But maybe I should be happy that a guy who looks kind of nerdy is doing all this.

[16:57] How should I feel about it?

[16:58] Guys, you're, you're too woke hashtag me too type of people.

[17:02] How should I feel about it?

[17:04] Um, I mean, like, I'm glad that you read my t-shirt by the way.

Dan McCoy

[17:11] The, I mean, the big problem with this movie, let's just say it off the top is that the

[17:18] leads are not that charismatic.

[17:20] Uh, I find Lauren Lee and a little more charismatic than Valerian.

Stuart Wellington

[17:24] Yeah.

[17:25] Because her eyebrow game is on point.

[17:28] Yeah.

[17:28] I think we can all agree to that, right?

[17:30] She is Isabella Rossellini is rolling in her grave.

[17:34] I would say not, I mean, she's not dead.

Elliott Kalan

[17:38] She's still alive, but she sleeps in a grave because she's a vampire.

[17:40] So, okay.

[17:41] I would say not since Kim Novak have we seen dark, bushy eyebrows used so well on an actress's

[17:48] face.

[17:49] Uh, but yeah, she, I find her more charismatic, but the two of them are both kind of assholes.

[17:53] Like, they're both kind of dicks.

[17:55] They don't like each other.

[17:56] They don't like anybody else.

[17:57] They don't seem to give a shit about the lives of the people who get caught in the crossfire

[18:01] of their missions.

[18:02] There's a real, like, um, like diabolic thing where the comic and the movie diabolic, where

[18:08] these are supposed to be the heroes, but they just kill people with impunity.

[18:11] And you're like, I don't like these people.

[18:13] Uh, this, but, uh.

Stuart Wellington

[18:15] Do you think the casting was like, my guess is that they cast what Cara Delevingne?

[18:21] Or how do you pronounce her name?

[18:22] I've got no idea.

Dan McCoy

[18:23] Uh, it's Cara Delevingne.

Stuart Wellington

[18:26] Oh, okay.

[18:26] Do they, they, they, do they cast her first and then they're like, well, we need a lead

[18:30] who is roughly the same height.

[18:34] Am I guessing someone who's equally willowy?

[18:38] Yeah.

[18:38] Like, I feel like just looking at the covers of the comics, they probably were shooting

[18:45] for like a, I mean, I could be totally wrong, but they were shooting for like a Harrison

[18:49] Ford Han Solo type.

[18:51] Yes.

[18:52] Um, and then maybe they decide to go more of a YA route because they do look like they

[18:58] could pass for teenagers.

Elliott Kalan

[19:00] They look young for people, for a guy who's supposed to be what, a major in the army.

[19:03] He looks like he's like 15 years old.

Stuart Wellington

[19:06] And there's a scene later on where he punches Clive Owen and knocks him out.

[19:10] And I'm like, there is no way Clive Owen is a huge slab of man.

Elliott Kalan

[19:16] Clive Owen would take that guy apart.

[19:18] Yeah.

[19:18] But that, you mentioned Clive Owen, which, which leads me to say, hello, hello.

[19:23] But also the, uh, that's the weird thing.

[19:25] So my guess behind the casting is they said the effects for this movie are going to cost

[19:28] about $179 million.

[19:30] So we can't get the biggest stars in the front roles, in the leading roles.

[19:34] And we'll get bigger stars for later on.

[19:36] Cause like Clive Owen's in it.

[19:38] Rihanna's in it.

[19:38] Ethan Hawke's in it.

[19:40] Herbie Hancock, for some reason has a prominent role.

[19:42] He's not even an actor.

[19:44] Rutger Hauer appears for less than a minute in it as like the president of space.

Stuart Wellington

[19:48] And you know, Rutger Hauer pulls down those big paychecks.

[19:51] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[19:52] In Europe, he probably does.

[19:56] Rutger Hauer is one of those guys where it's like, where in America, he like the best he

[20:00] can do is kind of like an HBO made for HBO science fiction movie.

[20:04] But in Europe, I'm sure he does.

[20:05] He can pull big numbers.

[20:07] You know, I'm talking Alan Moore, Bill Sienkiewicz, big numbers.

[20:11] That's right.

[20:13] The comic book series.

[20:14] They never finished.

[20:15] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[20:16] The only way I think, I mean, I feel like it reminds me of like how Yodorowsky was trying

[20:23] to cast Salvador.

[20:24] Wait a minute.

[20:24] Hold on a second.

Elliott Kalan

[20:25] How have I never heard thought of before the fact that Yodorowsky has Yoda in his name?

[20:32] I think that's where George Lucas got the idea.

[20:34] Oh, he's always stealing stuff from everybody.

[20:36] Yeah.

[20:37] Anyway, that makes sense.

[20:38] That's then why there's that scene in Empire Strikes Back where Yoda has his son train in

[20:42] karate for two years to star in a movie that never gets made.

[20:45] Yeah.

[20:47] You were saying about Yodorowsky, though.

Stuart Wellington

[20:48] But it reminds me of how he was trying to cast Salvador Dali as the emperor of the universe.

[20:54] As the emperor of space.

[20:56] Yeah.

[20:56] There's such a weird, like, it's a weird thing of like, well, I could get an actor, but why

[21:02] don't I get a famous musician to learn how to act and be in this role?

Elliott Kalan

[21:06] Or not learn how to act.

[21:07] He's not bad in it.

[21:08] I mean, he's not terrible in it, but all he does is basically appear on a VISA screen

[21:11] and give exposition.

Stuart Wellington

[21:13] No, but then they also got Rihanna, who I guess has, you know, she's been in Battleship

[21:18] and other things.

Dan McCoy

[21:20] She did an okay job in this movie, I thought.

[21:22] I mean.

Elliott Kalan

[21:22] She did fine.

[21:23] I mean, her job, she's mostly voice acting, and there's the one dance scene where she spends

[21:28] half the time being a body double.

[21:30] So, you know, she didn't have so much to do.

[21:33] And of course, Ethan Hawke is a flamboyant fireball in his scenes.

Stuart Wellington

[21:39] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[21:39] He wanted to eat up all the scenery.

Elliott Kalan

[21:42] He's like, what?

[21:44] Can someone feed this man a hamburger?

[21:46] Because he's eating all the scenery.

[21:48] In his role as a brothel-owning space cowboy.

[21:53] But anyway, we'll get into that part.

Dan McCoy

[21:57] But I do think that if anything sums up the spirit of this movie, it's the fact that there's

[22:02] a brothel-owning space cowboy in it.

Elliott Kalan

[22:04] Yeah.

[22:05] Who has imprisoned a shape-shifting alien lady named Bubble.

[22:10] So, we're still in the beginning of this.

[22:13] So, this is another thing about the movie.

[22:15] A very weird thing will happen.

[22:16] We've just seen these bald aliens who do not speak English.

[22:19] It's all in an alien language up to that point after that early montage.

[22:23] They live in a culture where they use pearls.

[22:26] They stick them inside of armadillos.

[22:27] The armadillos poop out more pearls.

[22:29] There's a huge space battle.

[22:31] Thanks for clarifying.

[22:32] This woman dies and a blue beam of light bursts out of her body and wakes up Dane DeHaan.

[22:37] And then, so all this crazy stuff has happened.

[22:39] And Dane DeHaan goes, computer, can you analyze that?

[22:42] And the computer goes, it seems someone put memories in your head of an alien culture.

[22:46] And it's like, whoa, so that's how we're going to unravel it?

[22:48] Is the computer just going to tell him?

[22:50] Like, the movie sets up crazy, like, crazy things happen.

[22:54] Bonkers things.

[22:55] And then somebody's just like, oh, yeah, that's the thing that does such and such.

[22:58] Moving along, like, there's a problem integrating.

[23:02] Yeah, he seems very unconcerned.

Elliott Kalan

[23:02] Yeah, yeah.

[23:04] So, they go to, but anyway, they go on their first mission of the movie.

[23:07] They're special agents.

[23:08] They're picking up a rare animal called a converter, which, of course, is the armadillo that poops pearls we saw earlier.

[23:13] You feed it anything, and it poops out copies of that thing.

[23:17] It's the last one of its kind in the universe.

[23:20] And, of course, they land on a desert planet and ride a hover school bus to, like, a space mosque where there's an interdimensional kind of market bazaar where you have to wear VR goggles.

[23:32] There's tourists wearing VR goggles to see this market bazaar world.

[23:36] And he has to – he has a box.

[23:37] And, like, special gloves to interact with the market.

[23:41] So, Dandahan is, like, a box.

[23:43] He has a box he can stick his hand in so that he can point guns at people in this other dimension.

[23:48] And he basically – he stops an alien who's like a, you know, like a Jabba the Hutt type, but not really, who sounded like he was voiced by John Goodman.

[23:57] Was it?

[23:57] Yeah.

[23:58] I think so.

[23:59] But he's like a fixer type.

[24:01] And he's – the fixer type is giving the converter or selling the converter to some bald aliens that look like the ones we saw earlier in the movie.

[24:10] And they're giving him –

Stuart Wellington

[24:10] I mean, they're very clearly those same – that same race of aliens.

Elliott Kalan

[24:14] Yeah.

[24:14] I'm just trying to create the mystery.

[24:16] And they give him, in exchange, one pearl, which apparently is super valuable and full of energy.

[24:20] But Valerian's disembodied hand sticking out of a portal with a gun stops them.

[24:26] And he takes the converter and the pearl.

[24:29] And there's a big – a chase through the bazaar ensues.

[24:33] And then eventually they have to fight off a big dog lizard as they escape off the planet.

[24:38] And him and Valerian are like, it's your basic lots of crazy things happening and little jokes along the way.

[24:43] And like running into people and going, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

[24:46] And then explosions.

[24:47] And it's just – your imagination of what this thing is is basically what it is.

[24:52] It goes on for a long time.

[24:53] And it's not a bad science fiction chase comedy action sequence.

[24:58] But it certainly – let's just say it outstays its welcome.

[25:01] I was ready for them to get away from this place long before they were out of there.

[25:05] And also, the bad guy sticks this –

[25:08] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[25:08] The bad guy sticks this big lizard monster on them.

[25:11] And the lizard monster is just doing what it's been trained to do.

[25:14] And they get rid of it by – it climbs onto the back of their spaceship.

[25:18] They take off the spaceship.

[25:19] And it falls thousands of miles to the surface of the planet.

[25:23] So it's like –

Dan McCoy

[25:23] Probably, yeah, presumably to its death.

Elliott Kalan

[25:26] Yeah.

[25:26] It has to be.

Dan McCoy

[25:27] I would have liked it better if it had like a little cartoon puff of smoke at the bottom of it.

[25:31] Like if it was a Roadrunner cartoon.

Elliott Kalan

[25:33] And then it just went, ow.

[25:35] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[25:37] Or if it – even more so if it like held up like one of those little signs.

[25:41] Held up a little sign, yep.

Elliott Kalan

[25:42] Okay, so guys, let me tell you my honest opinion of the movie at this point in the film.

[25:46] Uh-huh.

[25:47] Yeah.

[25:47] I was like, this is exactly what I want this movie to be.

[25:51] Yeah, exactly.

[25:52] It is like a nonstop crazy science fiction cartoon where I don't think there was one moment where I cared about the plot or the characters.

[26:00] But it was like, Luc Besson, just start – keep throwing crazy things at me.

[26:03] And it wasn't until the last like 20 or so minutes when the plot kind of kicks in and they're trying to tie things up.

[26:09] And they stopped throwing crazy stuff at you that I was like, movie, should have ended before the movie ended.

[26:15] But I got to say, this was – by this point, I'm like, movie, you've cast a spell on me.

[26:21] Yeah.

[26:21] Well, agreed.

Stuart Wellington

[26:23] I mean, so much of it is the leads at this point and throughout the rest of the movie are so over it and unimpressed with everything they see.

[26:32] It's kind of difficult for you, the viewer, to enjoy it because you're like, should I also think it's dumb?

[26:39] Should I also be annoyed that there's aliens running around?

Elliott Kalan

[26:43] The characters go over the edge from being cool and cynical to being just, yeah, just like assholes who are like, ugh, this again.

[26:52] And yeah, it's like movie, if you can't be enthusiastic about your movie, then like, what am I supposed to do?

[26:57] Yeah.

[26:57] You know.

[26:58] But okay.

[26:59] So, Valerian escapes.

[27:01] They took – and Loreline.

[27:02] But I'm going to say Valerian because he's the one with the name and the title.

[27:05] He must be the important character.

[27:06] So, Valerian and Loreline escaped.

[27:09] They have that converter and they've got that magic pearl.

[27:13] Valerian examines the pearl and the computer again is like, oh, this is full of energy.

[27:17] It's from a vanished planet.

[27:19] And he goes, look up that planet.

[27:20] And they say, access denied.

[27:21] Information on this planet is only for generals.

[27:26] What is it?

Stuart Wellington

[27:26] Fucking Kamino or something?

[27:28] And frankly, it is a lot like Kamino.

Elliott Kalan

[27:31] Yes.

[27:32] It is very similar to Kamino, except Kamino always had bad weather.

Stuart Wellington

[27:36] Yeah, and it looks like this planet has only good weather.

[27:39] So, my intellectual property lawyers have no grounds to stand on.

Elliott Kalan

[27:43] Yep.

[27:44] Much as in Star Wars all the planets have one environment, this environment is beautiful beaches all the time.

[27:51] Never a rain cloud.

Dan McCoy

[27:53] We're getting to the point where Valerian and Loreline are coming back to the city of a thousand planets.

[27:59] And speaking of which, what you're saying, like the computer gives them a recap about the city of a thousand planets.

[28:08] And it's like all stuff that they should have known already.

[28:10] But it's just because we in the audience can get an information about it.

[28:14] And likewise to planets all being the same, in this place, all aliens just seem to do one thing.

[28:25] Yes.

[28:25] They've got the one job for each alien.

Elliott Kalan

[28:28] There's some aliens that handle computers.

[28:32] Some aliens that handle, I guess, janitorial.

[28:35] There's the aliens in human resources.

[28:37] There's the one alien race that just fixes the printer and the copier, makes sure there's enough toner in it.

[28:42] There's the one alien race that organizes the birthday parties in the office.

[28:47] There's the alien race that's just receptionists.

[28:50] There's the alien race that does a lot of data entry.

[28:53] There's the alien race that is like, you're not really sure what they do around there, but they've been working there longer than you.

[29:00] So you assume that they have a job that you just don't know about.

[29:03] There's the alien race that's all middle management that don't really need to be there.

[29:06] And they kind of understand that in a way.

[29:07] So they're real dicks so that they can feel important.

[29:10] There's the alien race that's the boss's son who like, he doesn't even show up half the time.

[29:15] But you know he's going to inherit the company.

[29:17] Or sorry, inherit Alpha, the city of a thousand planets.

[29:19] And you're like, oh, come on.

[29:21] He's going to run into a ground.

[29:22] There's that one alien race that's always getting caught faxing its resume to other space stations.

[29:27] They all just do the one thing, each race.

[29:30] And here's another thing.

[29:31] That's a good summary, Elliot.

[29:33] Thank you.

[29:34] Thanks.

[29:34] But it is true, Dan.

[29:36] Supposedly they live on Alpha.

[29:38] So it's like if you were driving home to New York from out of town and your car was like,

[29:44] welcome to New York City population.

[29:46] Seven or eight million.

[29:48] Founded in 1890 whatever.

[29:50] When New York and Brooklyn combined to make the five boroughs.

[29:54] And you'd be like, okay, I get it.

[29:56] You're like, the East Village is where the cool college students hang out.

[30:00] But also in Williamsburg.

[30:02] You're like, okay, I get it.

[30:03] Thank you.

Stuart Wellington

[30:04] Papaya King serves hot dogs with papaya juice.

Elliott Kalan

[30:08] Who'd have thought it?

[30:12] So they go there.

[30:13] They report in.

[30:15] And they find that from their immediate superior, there's a secret radioactive thing in the center of Alpha.

[30:21] This field of deadly radiation that keeps getting bigger.

[30:24] And everyone they send into it has disappeared.

[30:27] But that's when Commander Clive Owen walks in.

[30:30] Uh-oh.

[30:30] Hello, hello.

[30:32] And yeah, Stuart, what does he say when he walks in?

Stuart Wellington

[30:34] Says, pip, pip, cheerio.

[30:36] It's me, Clive Owen.

Elliott Kalan

[30:38] And he's got a chimney sweep outfit on, I think.

Stuart Wellington

[30:42] No, his outfit looks more like, I was, uh, it looks more like, like if, uh, Sheriff David Clark merged with, like, one of the bots or bats from G.I. Joe.

[30:52] Because it looks like he's got a big, like, circuit board strapped to his chest.

[30:56] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[30:57] Yeah, he is a very, he is Sheriff Clark character.

[30:59] Yeah.

[31:00] And, uh, so they're, they've been, so there's this big meeting that's going to go on so that the Commander can figure out what's happening with this thing in the center of Alpha.

[31:08] And Val, Valerian and Loreline are going to protect him.

[31:11] They've been assigned to.

[31:12] And he's like, it's okay, I've got these K-10s.

[31:14] They're these super boss-looking robot assassin soldiers that follow me everywhere, and they don't have faces.

[31:21] And he's like, and they're like, no, we're still going to send Valerian and Loreline with you, because they need someone to watch the Commander.

[31:27] Uh, I assume because he's going to, like, run off and have a Ferris Bueller's Day Off type adventure if he doesn't have chaperones.

[31:34] And they're like, where's the Commander? He's supposed to be at this meeting.

[31:37] And then you hear, Donka Shane.

[31:39] Except it would be like, Astro Donka Shane.

Stuart Wellington

[31:43] I don't know.

[31:43] I feel like the way this movie uses pop music, it would just be Donka Shane.

[31:47] Yeah, I guess so.

Elliott Kalan

[31:49] It'd be like a remixed.

[31:52] Yeah, it would be like a techno Euro club DJ version of Donka Shane.

[31:56] Uh, anyway.

[31:58] Uh, and Loreline, she's befriending the converter who poops out energy pearls for her.

[32:02] Uh, but Commander Clive Owen goes off on his own.

[32:06] He's torturing one of these bald aliens.

[32:08] Uh-oh.

[32:09] He wants the converter.

[32:10] But Loreline won't let it go.

Stuart Wellington

[32:12] And is this, does this follow the rule of, like, the most, like, the second most famous person is probably the bad guy rule?

[32:20] Yeah.

[32:20] Oh, very much the second most famous person?

[32:22] Or the most Clive Owen-y person is probably the bad guy.

[32:24] Yeah, you're right.

[32:24] I mean, I would say that Rihanna's probably the most famous person in the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[32:28] Okay, very fair.

[32:29] That's true.

[32:30] I'll give you that.

[32:31] I think as soon as someone shows up in a position of authority, or someone who the hero is supposed to trust, who is played by a bigger actor than is needed for a role of that size, you know they're the bad guy.

Stuart Wellington

[32:43] And is probably English.

[32:45] So, like, if David Thewlis were to show up in Wonder Woman, per se, you would assume that maybe he might be the baddie.

Elliott Kalan

[32:54] If David Thewlis shows up, look.

Dan McCoy

[32:57] You're doing, like, your weird Jeff Fox with the routine now.

Elliott Kalan

[33:00] He might be a baddie.

Dan McCoy

[33:01] If you're David Thewlis, and you're appearing in Wonder Woman, you might be a bad guy.

Elliott Kalan

[33:08] If you're Colin Firth, and the next most famous person in your group is Toby Young, you might be the baddie.

[33:17] If you're Max von Sydow, and Tom Cruise is supposed to trust you, but you seem really creepy, you might be the baddie.

[33:24] If you're Benicio Del Toro, and you meet the heroes in a prison cell on an alien planet, you might be the baddie.

Dan McCoy

[33:33] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[33:34] Come on, do another one.

[33:35] Yeah, Dan, do another one.

[33:36] There's gotta be more of them.

Dan McCoy

[33:37] If you're James Woods in just about anything, you might be the baddie.

Elliott Kalan

[33:43] Except vampires.

[33:45] Yeah.

[33:46] Yeah, he's a goodie in that.

[33:48] If you're Breathless Mahoney, and there's another character who talks with, like, a weird voice and has no face, you might be the baddie.

Stuart Wellington

[34:00] I'm glad you used that cultural touchstone from Dick Tracy.

[34:04] Of Dick Tracy?

[34:05] It was huge.

[34:06] It was enormous.

[34:07] Yeah.

[34:08] Not a critical hit, though.

Elliott Kalan

[34:12] Not a...

[34:13] Critics didn't like it.

[34:13] Nominated for a couple Academy Awards for art direction and costumes and stuff and makeup.

[34:17] Oh, sure.

[34:18] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[34:19] Best performance by Dustin Hoffman as Mumbles.

[34:22] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[34:25] On Gilbert Gottfried's podcast, he's told the story a couple times about how he was up for that role of Mumbles and auditioned for Warren Beatty.

[34:33] And Warren Beatty was like, it's great.

[34:35] I want you for it.

[34:36] And, you know, let's do this.

[34:37] And then he didn't hear anything from a while.

[34:39] And then his agent was like, oh, they hired Dustin Hoffman to do it.

[34:43] And I wonder if it's like Warren Beatty was like, Dustin Hoffman was like, Warren, I want to play Mumbles.

[34:48] It's the part I've wanted to play since I was a kid.

[34:51] I've always loved Mumbles.

[34:52] And Warren Beatty was like, but I promised it to Gilbert Gottfried.

[34:55] And Dustin Hoffman was like, it's me, Dusty, your Ishtar buddy.

[34:59] Come on.

[35:00] You've got to let me play Mumbles.

[35:01] Come on.

[35:02] And he's like, oh, all right.

[35:03] And Warren Beatty was like, I'll make it up to you someday, Gilbert.

[35:06] And Warren Beatty started a little company called Affleck.

[35:09] And now, you know, the rest of the story.

Stuart Wellington

[35:11] Oh, wow.

[35:13] Thanks for filling in the backstory there.

[35:15] So in this movie.

[35:17] So anyway.

[35:17] Clive Owens is a bad guy.

Elliott Kalan

[35:19] So, you know, Clive Owens is a bad guy because he's also he might as well be rubbing his hands and shifting his eyes from one side to the other.

[35:25] The entire time he's on screen.

[35:27] And also, let's remember that he was in Croupier, which is kind of a sinister movie in a lot of ways.

[35:32] Yeah.

[35:32] So there's a council meeting.

[35:35] Valerian goes in.

[35:36] Loreline has to wait out in the hallway.

[35:38] And she has a conversation with these three kind of like these three or Watto.

[35:43] They look kind of like Watto from episode one.

[35:45] Yeah.

[35:45] It's like little little gargoyle long nose things were information brokers and always want money because if it's a science fiction movie and there's no reason for this in a science fiction movie, the characters who are always interested in money have to have long snouts.

[35:58] I don't know why.

[36:00] I don't know what that means.

[36:01] That it's always the long snouted things that want money.

[36:04] It's always characters or aliens with big noses that for some reason are obsessed with money and putting prices on things.

[36:11] And work the kind of merchant.

Stuart Wellington

[36:12] I couldn't guess what the coding would be for that, though.

[36:17] Like, is there a real world equivalent?

Elliott Kalan

[36:19] I can't think of one.

[36:20] Elephants, maybe?

[36:21] That part where she said, yeah, they never forget where their money is or if you owe them anything.

[36:29] The part where she said, can I take out a loan?

[36:31] And they said, yes, with interest, because our religion allows us to charge interest, whereas yours does not.

[36:37] That's why we've been pushed into this economic sphere.

[36:40] I mean, I don't know what it could possibly mean, that all these long-nosed aliens in science fiction movies love money.

[36:45] But anyway.

Stuart Wellington

[36:46] Yeah, and they got into an elevator together, and she had to push the button because it was the Shabbos, they said.

Elliott Kalan

[36:52] Because it was Astro Shabbos.

[36:56] Anyway, so they sell her some information about a major who was murdered recently, who seems to have known something about that planet.

[37:04] But uh-oh, an alarm goes off.

[37:06] There's an attack by the bald aliens, and they shoot everyone with this goop.

[37:09] That doesn't kill them, it just incapacitates them.

[37:11] But Valerian escapes using a mouth-mounted spider bot that comes out and cuts a hole for them.

[37:18] Because this movie is constantly showing you inventions that nobody uses ever again, which is something I kind of like about it.

[37:24] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[37:25] And so this is the same aliens from the beginning of the movie, and they show up and they shoot their jizz cannons all over everybody.

[37:32] Yeah.

[37:34] And they seem to have some kind of technology that blocks normal guns from shooting them back.

Elliott Kalan

[37:40] Yeah, something like that.

[37:42] They kidnap the commander.

[37:44] And Valerian chases them a while.

[37:45] So we get another amazing chase.

[37:48] Or it's just a chase through Alpha.

[37:50] And this one was a little too video gamey for me.

[37:52] What do you guys think?

Dan McCoy

[37:54] Well, the thing that we noted was that Valerian is just sort of shooting randomly around in a giant city.

[38:02] Like in the space station city.

[38:04] And we also didn't know kind of what his endgame was if he was like shooting at the spaceship that contained the commander that he was trying to get back.

Stuart Wellington

[38:13] Yeah.

[38:13] Is the commander immune to laser blasts?

Elliott Kalan

[38:15] I think when you become a commander, they give you a special pill that makes you immune to laser blasts.

[38:20] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[38:21] But he loses them.

[38:23] It was pretty.

[38:24] I mean, I don't know.

[38:25] Like I feel like video gamey is too often used as a catch-all term for just like action movie with special effects.

[38:31] But it did fit.

[38:33] And it also felt like he was running through the habitats or the biospheres for each of the alien races that were introduced to us by the computer when they were pulling into Alpha.

[38:45] Yes.

[38:45] So it's like, did they only put that in earlier so we would get the areas he was running around in?

Elliott Kalan

[38:54] I mean, maybe so that when he starts swimming through an underwater area, we're not like, wait a minute, there's an ocean on this space station?

Stuart Wellington

[39:00] Yeah.

[39:01] Were they worried we would choke on our gushers that we're eating or bonkers?

[39:06] Which one were we allowed to eat?

[39:07] Gushers?

Elliott Kalan

[39:08] Do they serve gushers in movie theaters anymore, guys?

[39:13] Oh, yeah.

[39:14] On silver trays.

[39:15] You have to order it only in Alamo.

[39:17] You put your card up and then a French waiter comes by with a silver tray and says, your gusher, monsieur.

Stuart Wellington

[39:23] And then you take it.

[39:24] Then he opens an umbrella because your head turns into a piece of fruit that then squirts juice all over everybody.

Elliott Kalan

[39:30] Yeah.

[39:30] And they call in the mortician to clean it up because your head has exploded and you're dead now.

[39:35] Yeah.

[39:35] And they're like, another kid with his brain transmuted into gusher juice.

[39:39] Yeah.

[39:39] Why do they keep him on the market?

Dan McCoy

[39:41] Yeah.

[39:41] We should probably stop selling these things.

Elliott Kalan

[39:43] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[39:44] And RoboCop's going to crush it under his boot.

Elliott Kalan

[39:47] And the theatrical agent goes, what a great trick.

[39:50] And the kid who's now dead from the gusher goes, yeah, but I can only do it once.

[39:53] And their ghost goes to hell.

[39:55] Oh, wow.

[39:57] It was for other reasons, though.

[39:59] Okay.

[39:59] Oh, yeah, because they did bad things in their life.

[40:01] It's not because it's not like God is not like gusher death, instant hell.

[40:05] No, no, no.

[40:06] People, there's some people go to heaven after gushers makes their head explode.

[40:09] The Dalai Lama, that's how the last Dalai Lama before this one died.

[40:13] Also, I think that's how Rosa Parks died was a gusher explosion.

[40:17] Okay, well, we're getting into a weird area here.

[40:20] Well, do you think the Parks family is going to sue us for libel?

Stuart Wellington

[40:23] Now, in Who Framed Roger Rabbit?

[40:27] When the weasels turned into ghosts, did they fly up to heaven?

[40:31] I think they did.

[40:31] They were shown with harps.

[40:33] That makes me question a lot of things about Christianity, guys.

Elliott Kalan

[40:37] Stuart, it's called the mystery of God's grace.

[40:40] Yeah.

[40:40] Okay.

[40:41] We don't decide who gets to heaven.

[40:43] He does.

[40:44] And it's unfathomable.

Dan McCoy

[40:45] The question is, would a loving God allow a hell to exist in the first place?

[40:49] Oh, wow.

Elliott Kalan

[40:50] You know, Who Framed Roger Rabbit brings up a lot of questions, guys.

[40:54] Dan, if there's a world where Judge Doom is not going to cartoon hell, then I don't even

[40:59] want to live in it.

[40:59] Oh, come on.

[41:01] He killed that innocent boot just to show them how the goop works.

[41:05] Come on.

Stuart Wellington

[41:06] All right.

[41:07] I think he calls it dip, right?

[41:08] Sorry, the dip.

[41:09] Yeah.

[41:09] Goop is a different branded property.

Elliott Kalan

[41:12] Yeah, yeah.

[41:13] Originally, in the original version, the boot had to buy some questionable medical products

[41:18] from Gwyneth Paltrow, and that's how it died.

[41:20] It had a vaginal egg put in it.

[41:22] Yeah.

[41:22] And Robert Zemeckis was like, this is an unwieldy way to threaten the characters.

[41:29] This is too horrifying.

[41:30] Can't we make it like some kind of a dip?

[41:33] And he just made it up on the set, and they had to rewrite a lot of the film to fit that.

Stuart Wellington

[41:38] Yeah, he was looking around, and there was a sick spinach dip on the per diem table.

Elliott Kalan

[41:44] They're like, just use this.

[41:46] And Christopher Lloyd was like, I didn't rehearse using a dip.

[41:48] I'm going back to my trailer.

[41:50] And they had to talk him back onto the set.

[41:52] Christopher Lloyd does not like last-minute changes.

[41:54] You've got to believe that.

[41:55] I heard on the set of Piranha 3D that he was like, nothing about this movie has to change,

[42:03] or else I'm out.

Stuart Wellington

[42:04] Yeah, and he kept saying stuff like, well, on the set of Suburban Commando, Hulk Hogan did this.

[42:10] And they're like, we got it, dude.

[42:12] Yeah, he kept flexing and talking about his 24-inch pythons running wild on you.

Elliott Kalan

[42:18] He was like, I was just afraid of those snakes.

[42:20] I didn't want those snakes to run wild on me.

[42:22] And they were like, oh, Christopher.

[42:24] Oh, Lloyd.

[42:25] Like, should we tell him?

[42:27] And Hulk Hogan was in the back going, don't tell him.

[42:30] He thinks they're real snakes.

Stuart Wellington

[42:34] Yeah, I don't know what kind of game he's playing to make sure that he needs Christopher Lloyd to think that he's got a couple of snakes.

Elliott Kalan

[42:41] Hulk Hogan's like, I forced him to put me in his will by telling him my arms can turn into snakes like that one He-Man character.

Dan McCoy

[42:50] This is a weird place we've gotten to.

Elliott Kalan

[42:53] Well, no weirder than the movie Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets, Dan.

[42:57] Because let me tell you what happens next in it.

[43:00] Valerian has entered some kind of zone and he can't get out of.

[43:02] Loreline is taken into custody, but she escapes.

[43:05] She's going to go after him.

[43:06] And the general, who's the commanding officer, says, I want to find out more about this planet where the Baldi's come from.

[43:11] And finds he's been locked out of the file, too.

[43:14] Only the commander can get in.

[43:16] Loreline does what anyone else would do to find their missing partner.

[43:18] She uses her three information gargoyles to hire a pirate in a submarine to steal a brain jellyfish off of an underwater dinosaur and then stick her head in its butt so it can read her memories and then tell her where Valerian is.

Stuart Wellington

[43:31] And basically show her images from the movie that we just saw five minutes ago.

[43:37] Yeah.

[43:37] I don't know if that's her memories or that's the image the brain jellyfish projects, which means did the brain jellyfish make the movie we're watching?

[43:48] My guess is that the brain...

Elliott Kalan

[43:49] Are our heads all stuffed up brain jellyfish butts?

[43:52] I mean, that's what Descartes was really asking about.

[43:55] It's possible that our heads are just stuffed up brain jellyfish butts and we're just being fed a movie that we think is our life.

[44:01] That's the basis of philosophy.

Dan McCoy

[44:03] I also like the idea that Luc Besson was writing this and he's like, all right, I need to figure out a way that Loreline can find out where Valerian is.

[44:12] What is the simplest A to P way that...

[44:16] What is the logical connection that I can make?

Elliott Kalan

[44:19] Arkham, lend me your razor so I can cut a path through this narrative thicket.

[44:25] I have to believe that the jellyfish is a movie bootlegger, already saw Valerian and is just showing her what he filmed in the theater.

[44:35] Long story short, she finds Valerian, she revives him.

[44:38] And the general frees the alien that the commander had been torturing who lets out a blue flash of his own.

[44:46] Valerian and Loreline, they get caught by some big tubby alien fishermen who kidnap Loreline to, we find out later, have her brain eaten by their king.

[44:56] Although she gets to wear...

Stuart Wellington

[44:58] So they get caught by these fishing aliens.

[45:01] Yeah.

[45:01] And so Loreline first gets caught and then Valerian gets caught intentionally and immediately just shoots the guy who caught him.

[45:10] Which makes me question, why didn't Loreline just shoot the guy who caught her?

[45:14] That's a very good point.

[45:15] I mean, I guess it speaks to the difference in character between our two leads.

Elliott Kalan

[45:19] I mean, Valerian is more of a shoot first, ask questions, never character.

[45:23] And Loreline is more of a get stuck inside of a wicker basket and somehow not be able to find her way out character.

[45:29] Yeah.

[45:30] Yeah.

[45:30] And of course, this is after they had another conversation about whether they should get married or not.

[45:35] But, uh, so Valerian has to...

[45:37] It's weird.

[45:38] Instead of shooting...

[45:39] So she's been taken to a place that is kind of like a barbarian no-go zone.

[45:43] And the only way to get in there without starting a diplomatic incident, he says, is to go in disguise.

[45:48] How are you going to do that?

[45:50] You gotta go to the kind of Sin Alley area, which is called Paradise Alley, where it's full of outer space hookers, including one dressed as Jessica Rabbit from Who Framed Roger Rabbit.

[45:59] Yeah.

[45:59] And he needs a lamp.

[46:00] That's called an Easter egg, Elliot, for the true fans.

[46:03] Yeah.

[46:03] Because he's a rabbit.

Stuart Wellington

[46:05] And also, to kind of validate our arguments earlier about Judge Doom...

Elliott Kalan

[46:09] Yeah, see, Dan, it made sense that we went down that rabbit hole.

[46:14] Because there's a Roger Rabbit reference in this movie.

[46:17] And also, I have to admit, it makes me wonder why I haven't seen more Jessica Rabbit-themed cosplay pornography.

[46:25] Maybe I'm just not seeing it.

[46:26] I think you're just not looking, dude.

[46:28] Oh, you think it's there?

Stuart Wellington

[46:30] Yeah, I'm gonna guess it's there.

[46:34] I don't know for sure.

[46:36] Why is Dan looking at me?

[46:38] Because Stuart is saying I don't know for sure.

Dan McCoy

[46:40] I'm starting to sweat.

[46:41] With a, like, face that makes me suggest that he does know for sure.

Elliott Kalan

[46:46] I mean, I guess, maybe I'm just being too vanilla heteronormative when I'm like,

[46:51] why is there so much porn about, like, a Transformer having sex with Sonic?

[46:56] Yeah.

[46:56] Or, like, Sonic being pregnant with Knuckles' baby?

[46:58] And very little about Jessica Rabbit.

[47:00] But maybe it's because the itch that Jessica Rabbit scratches is easily scratched by your mainstream heteronormative pornography.

[47:08] Whereas, you gotta go to the internet to find your Sonic carrying Knuckles' baby pornography.

[47:13] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[47:14] Yeah, I mean, that's...

[47:15] Is that the case?

[47:15] If we were to, like, make one of those memes where the brain gets filled with more and more electricity...

[47:22] Oh, yeah, classic.

[47:22] Jessica Rabbit pornography is way on top.

Elliott Kalan

[47:25] We're talking about...

[47:25] It's when there's very little electricity.

Stuart Wellington

[47:28] And then, bottom, it's like, Bart Simpson has eaten Mario, who is pregnant with Sonic's baby or something.

Elliott Kalan

[47:37] So what would be in the middle of that?

Stuart Wellington

[47:40] Uh...

[47:40] Wow, I don't know.

[47:42] I'm not interested in that sort of thing, so I can't even bring my brain to think about it.

Elliott Kalan

[47:46] Okay.

[47:47] Well, so he's gotta go to Paradise Alley to get a Glamopod to disguise himself.

[47:51] We never find out, I think, what a Glamopod is.

[47:54] Unless it is what he manages to get.

[47:55] I think it's...

[47:56] Does Ethan...

[47:56] Isn't it what he's looking for?

[47:59] Is it what?

[48:00] Isn't it what he gets?

[48:03] Because I thought it was like a piece of technology.

[48:05] But what happens is Ethan Hawke, space cowboy, brings him in to watch Rihanna slash Rihanna's body double do a pole dance for a while.

[48:13] Where she keeps shapeshifting into different fetish-based costumes.

[48:18] She's a schoolgirl, she's a nurse, all that kind of stuff.

[48:23] And he says to her, I'm gonna free you in exchange for your help.

[48:26] And he uses a hidden gun to zap Ethan Hawke.

[48:29] And they escape with him wearing the shapeshifter, who it turns out is a kind of globular being named Bubble, who still sounds like Rihanna.

[48:36] So maybe she's a Glamopod.

[48:37] Maybe that's what that is.

[48:40] This is about the...

[48:40] They go in...

Dan McCoy

[48:42] This whole adventure where Lorelai is captured by these monsters and he has to find this Glamopod to go get her.

[48:51] Like, this is the point in the movie where I'm like,

[48:53] I wish all the people who saw The Last Jedi and were angry about the casino scene,

[48:59] thinking that it had no bearing on the rest of the plot, watched Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[49:05] There's so many side adventures that just, like, serve to prolong the movie.

[49:09] And they're fun.

[49:10] They're all fun side adventures.

[49:12] It's one of those movies where the plot only exists to give us a reason to leave the plot to go on side adventures.

Elliott Kalan

[49:17] Yeah.

[49:17] Because you're right.

[49:18] This whole sequence, which I thought, which is pretty fun, and she gets...

[49:22] And Lorelai, who's been trying on dresses this whole time because an alien is forcing her to try on dresses,

[49:27] gets to wear a huge white hat that we only realize at the last minute is a platform so that the top of her head sticks out so that they can cut the top of her head off so that this alien emperor can eat her brain.

[49:38] It just looks like a huge sun hat.

[49:41] This whole sequence, yeah, it has no bearing on the rest of the movie.

[49:44] It's totally unnecessary.

[49:46] And the diplomatic incident they were referring to does not happen.

[49:49] Even after they kill everyone there.

Stuart Wellington

[49:52] Yeah, it's this, like, state-sanctioned assassination where these agents show up and just murder the leader of this.

Dan McCoy

[49:57] Yeah.

[49:58] He goes to all this trouble of sneaking in there with this glamopod, and then he eventually just shucks her off of him and, like, goes around as Valerian himself, killing everybody.

[50:08] He's killing everyone.

Stuart Wellington

[50:09] Yeah.

[50:09] And then Rihanna's glamopod dies, and she's like, thanks so much.

[50:15] And it's like, why, dude?

Elliott Kalan

[50:18] She's like, you gave me a taste of freedom.

[50:20] You're the best.

[50:21] And you should, she should marry you.

[50:23] Ugh.

[50:24] And it's, she turns into an Egyptian pharaoh and then crumbles into dust.

[50:28] And you're like, yeah, you're like, wait a minute.

[50:31] So this character, like, that was the one moment, one of the moments of the movie where I was like, these heroes are jerks.

[50:36] Like, just basically hired this, basically, if the hero of the movie went to a strip club, told a stripper, I'm going to wear you as a costume.

[50:47] You have to help me save somebody, and then you're going to die.

[50:50] That's not a heroic thing to do.

Stuart Wellington

[50:52] Yeah, I mean, when you make it, when you lay it out like that, I guess it doesn't sound heroic.

[50:57] That's why you've got to change words to glamopod and diplomatic incident, et cetera, et cetera.

Elliott Kalan

[51:04] Now, Valerian tells Loreline this alien bald princess that put a dream in his head has been guiding him this whole time.

[51:10] Have we seen any evidence of that happening?

[51:13] No.

[51:13] No, I don't think we have.

[51:15] They go into the dead zone, which it turns out is totally livable.

[51:19] There's no radiation there.

[51:20] There's just a portal to some kind of alien place where the baldy aliens are.

[51:24] And they find that they, that's where they're, and so they've kidnapped the commander.

[51:30] The bald emperor, who is a male character but has a female voice, says that when they die, they can release their souls into other people that they choose as their guardians.

[51:40] And the princess, when she died, chose Valerian as her sole guardian.

[51:44] I don't know why they haven't met each other before.

[51:46] I mean, it's kind of like a random Tinder hookup, to be honest.

Stuart Wellington

[51:51] In a movie with a lot of stuff, this seems unnecessary.

[51:55] The whole, like, sending her spirit out to guide him.

[51:59] Yeah.

[51:59] Right?

[52:00] Like, they were already on a mission.

[52:02] Their mission was, they were already set on the path to where they end up.

[52:06] Yeah.

[52:06] They didn't also need to have memories implanted in his head.

Elliott Kalan

[52:10] No.

[52:10] It's, it's completely superfluous and unnecessary, and it adds another layer of, like, chosen one to this.

[52:16] Yes.

[52:17] Which, as you guys know, is my favorite type of plot device.

[52:20] Mm-hmm.

[52:20] Someone being a chosen one and there being a prophecy of some kind.

[52:24] Anyway, they tell their backstory, which we all could have guessed by now.

[52:27] They lived in peace on this planet.

[52:29] There was a big battle.

[52:30] Somebody gave the command to fight above the planet and kill everybody there.

[52:34] Guess what?

[52:34] It was Commander Clive Owen.

[52:35] What a surprise.

[52:36] What a big secret.

[52:37] And he's, and he erased all the information about this planet from the database.

[52:41] He killed the major who was there when he gave the command and told him that the planet was inhabited to cover up his crimes in destroying this inhabited planet.

[52:50] It's the kind of stuff that, if I can get political for a moment.

[52:53] Sure, yeah.

[52:54] It's the kind of stuff that our leaders do with the military kind of, like, every other day.

[53:00] Where it's like, there's terrorists in this building.

[53:02] Blow it up.

[53:03] Boom.

[53:03] Oh, it turns out it was a wedding.

[53:05] We killed a lot of children.

[53:06] Well, let's go.

[53:07] So I don't know that it would be such a scandal in real life.

[53:11] People would be like, fog of war, man.

[53:12] He did what he had to do.

[53:13] Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[53:14] Anyway.

[53:15] It was a whole planet.

[53:15] Not to sound like that.

[53:16] I mean, they do.

[53:17] Yeah, but a whole planet.

[53:18] What were they doing?

[53:18] Making pearls out of Armadillo's butts?

[53:20] They sound weird.

Stuart Wellington

[53:21] It was kind of hard for me to wrap my brain around the exact stakes involved.

[53:25] Because it was a little bit like, well, they're already having a space battle and he just blew up that ship.

[53:31] It doesn't seem that crazy.

[53:34] Wow.

Dan McCoy

[53:34] You guys are apologists for genocide.

Elliott Kalan

[53:38] No, just the opposite, Dan.

[53:39] We're saying that we live in a cynical, fallen world where, unfortunately, that kind of stuff happens all the time and nobody cares about it.

[53:46] And, Dan, maybe your liberal guilt makes you feel like, oh, well, I read about this in the New Yorker.

[53:51] I feel so bad for a moment.

[53:53] Ooh, where's my avocado toast?

[53:54] Blah, nom, nom, nom, nom.

[53:55] Let me pet my cat as people are being killed by our government and our name overseas.

[54:00] But you know what?

[54:01] They're not Americans.

[54:02] I'm never going to meet them, so they might as well not exist.

[54:04] They're shadows.

[54:05] They're not even full human beings.

[54:06] Why don't I sit here and watch fucking Tales from the Crypt or whatever with all the electricity and clean water and food that I want?

[54:12] And all the pearls you would ever need to wash your face with.

[54:16] Yeah, I ordered too much food.

[54:17] I'll throw away half of it because I don't care.

[54:20] I live in first world luxury, even though my government's destabilizing countries on the other side of the world.

[54:25] Wake up, Dan.

[54:26] Wake up.

[54:27] That's fair.

[54:27] That does sound like me.

[54:29] That's a pretty good impression.

[54:31] Also, wake up San Francisco with your host, Danny Tanner.

Dan McCoy

[54:35] Yeah, but at this point in the movie, like you said, they explain what we already kind of guessed, and they do it like five times.

Elliott Kalan

[54:43] Yes.

[54:44] Yeah.

[54:45] They really think that either whoever's watching this is super dumb or that you have been so pummeled into bonkersness by all the things you've been seeing that you can't hold information in your head anymore.

[54:55] Yeah.

[54:56] They have to keep repeating it to you.

[54:57] Like you've been mementoized by this movie, and you can't remember more than a couple seconds in the past.

Stuart Wellington

[55:04] Anyway.

[55:04] So there then exists a standoff.

[55:07] Clive Owen gets to chew a little bit of scenery, show those acting chops of his.

[55:13] They knock him out with a single punch because Valyrian's super tough, and the aliens explain like, oh, we just need the magic stuff that you just brought us so that we can live in harmony and peace forever.

[55:28] See you later.

Elliott Kalan

[55:29] We'll find another planet with a spaceship we built.

[55:31] We need a converter and a pearl.

[55:33] Valyrian gives him the pearl, and Lorelai's about to give him the converter.

[55:36] And he's like, whoa, whoa, whoa.

[55:37] We're under orders to deliver that converter to Alpha.

[55:40] I follow the rules.

[55:41] I'm a soldier.

[55:42] And it's like, dude, you just punched out the commander-in-chief of the army.

[55:46] Like, now you're going to balk at breaking the rules?

[55:49] Like, come on.

[55:50] Come on.

Stuart Wellington

[55:51] He doesn't seem to follow the rules much up until this point.

[55:55] He's never been a rule.

[55:56] He barely seems to follow the rules for consent.

Elliott Kalan

[56:02] But in the end, she says to him, you've got to trust people.

[56:06] And they give the converter.

[56:07] But then there's an even bigger standoff.

[56:10] She kisses him when he gives the converter over.

[56:12] Shouldn't even have been his decision to make, frankly.

[56:16] But at that point, human troops who went to go save Valyrian show up.

[56:20] They show up with those robo-droids.

[56:22] And the commander gives the command for the robo-droids to start shooting everybody.

[56:26] How the droids heard him, I don't know.

[56:29] He's behind a portal.

Stuart Wellington

[56:30] Yeah, but his voice, I mean, he's got one of those voices that just carries, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[56:36] That's why everyone was telling him, hush, keep it down now.

[56:41] Clive Owen carries.

[56:43] Remember that song?

Dan McCoy

[56:44] Yeah, I'm familiar with it.

[56:45] That's great.

[56:45] You nailed it.

[56:46] Tell Tuesday.

Elliott Kalan

[56:50] Anyway, but then the fight goes crazy.

[56:54] The robo-troops are shooting everybody.

[56:55] They set their bombs with a timer everywhere.

[56:59] And there's going to be explosives that go off.

[57:03] The general, who up to this point has just kind of stood in the same place on the same set barking orders at people.

[57:09] His assistant, a character that we've barely gotten to know up to this point, risks his life in the crossfire to turn the bombs off and manages to do it with one second left in the countdown.

[57:20] Uh-oh!

[57:20] And these robo-soldiers who have been mowing down the regular troops, Valerian single-handedly takes down all of them using like a pistol.

[57:30] Yeah.

[57:30] And a lot of jumps.

[57:33] Yeah, a lot of flips and jumps.

[57:35] Yodo Rowski really taught him his Jedi training to do a lot of flips when he was on Digabob Rowski.

Stuart Wellington

[57:41] Yep.

Elliott Kalan

[57:42] In Star Wars Rowski.

[57:44] No.

[57:45] It's just like Star Wars, but everyone just has Rowski at the end of their name.

[57:47] Yeah, yeah, I got it.

[57:49] Do you get it, Dan?

[57:50] A little behind on this one?

[57:51] Yeah, I'm a little slow on this one.

Dan McCoy

[57:52] I don't know if I follow.

Elliott Kalan

[57:54] Well, it wasn't very good, so that's okay.

[57:56] Okay.

[57:58] In the end, everything turns out fine.

[58:01] They arrest the commander.

[58:03] The aliens take off in their spaceship to another planet because all they need is pearls to make their planet live again.

[58:10] Just like in the original version of the Beatles song, all you need is pearls.

[58:13] And then people were like, that's not really a universal message.

[58:17] It's hard for some people to get pearls.

[58:19] And John Lennon was like, I don't give a shit.

[58:20] Just change it to love or something.

[58:22] And it turned into all you need is love.

[58:24] Now you know the rest of the story.

[58:26] And Valerian and Loreline are off in a space capsule floating somewhere.

[58:31] And he proposes again.

[58:34] And she starts kissing him.

[58:35] And he says, is that a yes?

[58:36] And she says, call it a maybe.

[58:38] And in classic James Bond style, it is implied that they will now have sex while they wait to be rescued.

[58:43] Yeah.

[58:45] We have left.

[58:45] You are now leaving the city of a thousand planets.

Stuart Wellington

[58:48] And then we get some bloopers, right?

[58:51] Yeah, some sweet bloops.

[58:53] No, there were any bloopers, guys.

[58:55] I'm just fucking with you.

Elliott Kalan

[58:56] I was like, you made me so excited.

[58:57] I was like, wait, did I miss the bloops?

Stuart Wellington

[58:59] So guys, this is the most expensive non-American movie ever made.

[59:06] Yes.

[59:07] And also the most expensive independently financed movie since it was made between, seems to have been made by Luc Besson and then all the banks who got producer credits that were early in the movie.

[59:20] When banks get listed as producers before the stars of your movie are listed, that's not a good sign.

[59:27] They may be the baddies.

[59:28] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[59:29] Oh, kitty, don't go over there.

[59:31] Sorry, the cat's on the table.

Stuart Wellington

[59:34] That's not a euphemism.

Dan McCoy

[59:35] Yeah.

[59:37] It means there's literally a cat on the door.

Elliott Kalan

[59:40] I feel like Dan is testing on his new catchphrase.

[59:48] Dan, uh-oh.

[59:49] I invited my boss over the same night we were going to have your wild bachelor party.

S4

Elliott Kalan

[59:57] It's like it's your kind of like talk to the hand, I guess, or like ay caramba.

[1:00:01] But yeah, this is a hugely expensive movie.

[1:00:03] I mean, it looks hugely expensive.

[1:00:05] Yeah.

[1:00:06] There are, I don't know that there are any shots in the entire movie that are not effects shots.

[1:00:11] Yeah.

[1:00:11] Like there's everything, there's always stuff flying around.

[1:00:14] There's always CGI monsters.

[1:00:16] The sheer variety of CGI monsters is, it's crazy.

[1:00:19] They're all over the place.

[1:00:20] Yeah, I love, I love all the wacky alien design.

[1:00:22] That shit's great.

[1:00:24] And I'm just going to be honest with you guys.

[1:00:26] Yeah.

[1:00:26] Like I was saying earlier, except for the last 20 minutes or so, I really enjoyed this movie.

[1:00:31] Because it was just a nonstop parade of side quests and wacky aliens.

[1:00:35] Yeah.

[1:00:35] It was just like colorful explosions and monsters.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:38] As always, we've jumped into Final Judgments without actually saying they were doing Final Judgments.

[1:00:43] Final Judgments.

[1:00:43] Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do.

[1:00:44] Whether it's a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or movie you kind of like, Elliot says it's a movie you kind of liked.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:50] I would say it's a movie I kind of liked.

[1:00:51] And like on Twitter, Stuart hinted we were doing this movie and someone tweeted back and was like, oh, it's so bad.

[1:00:56] And I wanted to be like, sir, I think you may be a little disappointed in my rating.

[1:01:01] Because aside from the fact that, one, the leads are not particularly charismatic and the characters they're playing are real pieces of junk, real mean.

[1:01:09] Two, the plot is I never cared about.

[1:01:12] Three, the last 20 minutes are repetitive because it's Mexican standoff, Mexican standoff.

[1:01:17] And then we got to stop this detonation and shoot, shoot, shoot.

[1:01:20] Other than those things.

[1:01:22] And also the fact that the whole time I was watching it, I felt a little bit like I was in a sort of dream haze state.

[1:01:29] Because I was having trouble following all the colorful things flying around at all the times.

[1:01:34] Other than those things, this was exactly what I wanted out of a kind of Euro space opera crazy film.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:41] Yeah.

[1:01:42] I feel like if I had started the movie, gone over to settings, gone over to language, chosen French, subtitles, English, I would have liked the movie a little more.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:57] So how did you feel about it?

[1:01:58] You didn't like it so much.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:59] I would say I'm kind of in between between a movie I kind of liked and a bad, bad movie.

[1:02:06] Because it's not like it's not really a good, bad movie.

[1:02:09] But like any time, any time the movie pauses for breath to like explain the plot, the whole thing, whole operation grinds to a halt.

[1:02:17] That's true.

[1:02:18] It looks gorgeous.

[1:02:19] And I like a lot of the stuff about it.

[1:02:25] But yeah, you know.

Dan McCoy

[1:02:28] I think I probably liked it the most of the three of us.

[1:02:32] Did I get bored?

[1:02:33] Yes, I got bored at times.

[1:02:35] I feel like because you don't have a lot of investment in the major characters and the plot of the movie is so convoluted that you don't have like the stakes are a little weird.

[1:02:47] It's easy to get a little distracted after a while, even though beautiful things are happening on the screen.

[1:02:55] But for the most part, again, other than the things that Elliot said, I really had a great time.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:01] I mean, I really enjoyed it in a way that I didn't think I was going to.

[1:03:05] And you got to give points to any movie where you hire a pirate in a mini sub to steal a jellyfish off a dinosaur so you can stick your head in its butt so it can give you information.

[1:03:17] I feel like.

[1:03:18] I'm just saying give that movie all the Academy Awards right now.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:20] Yeah, I feel like if I feel like if they just made the central plot simpler, it would have been better.

[1:03:28] Like you could have just as many.

[1:03:30] Oh, yeah.

[1:03:31] It's one of the things that makes Mad Max Fury Road so great is that the basic plot is very straightforward, but there's plenty of room for crazy shit to happen in the edges.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:41] What this movie gives us is the best and the worst of Luc Besson.

[1:03:45] The best is that from a visual standpoint, he's super, he's always got super imagination.

[1:03:51] He knows how to do like crazy fast paced action sequences and there's lots of style.

[1:03:55] But the bad weaknesses is he's never been great with plot.

[1:03:59] He overcomplicates everything and he confuses kind of he confuses a cool character for a an unfeeling character.

[1:04:09] Yeah.

[1:04:10] And especially when one of the subplots is that Valerian really wants to marry Loreline and the whole time you're like, why?

[1:04:16] You don't seem to like her very much.

[1:04:18] She doesn't seem to like you very much.

[1:04:20] Like, what's the deal?

[1:04:21] You're both too cool.

[1:04:24] TCFS, too cool for school, you know?

[1:04:27] Yeah.

[1:04:28] Okay.

[1:04:29] Let's move on.

[1:04:30] Okay, so that, so we gave Valerian a, I say movie I kind of liked.

[1:04:33] Stuart says he's not sure.

[1:04:34] And Dan says favorite movie of all time.

[1:04:39] Um, moving on.

[1:04:40] Dan's confirming that.

[1:04:42] It's confirmed.

[1:04:43] He didn't say no.

[1:04:44] Better than stop making sense.

[1:04:45] Raves, Dan McCoy.

[1:04:47] That's right.

S4

[1:04:50] Hey, this is Griffin McElroy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:53] Hi, this is Rachel McElroy.

S4

[1:04:54] And we've got a new podcast on Maximum Fun called Wonderful.

[1:04:57] Wonderful.

[1:04:57] It's an enthusiast podcast where we talk about things that we're excited about and things that you're excited about.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:01] Things like overalls.

[1:05:04] 24 hours suda-fed.

[1:05:05] The grand prize game.

S4

[1:05:06] The fact that wombats use their butts to kill predators.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:09] The soundtrack to the movie Dick Tracy.

S4

[1:05:11] The beach potion we call Bud Light Line.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:13] All these things and more every Wednesday.

[1:05:15] And we'll also talk about things that you're excited about.

S4

[1:05:18] You can find us on MaximumFun.org or iTunes or wherever.

[1:05:21] I don't know.

[1:05:21] Just search Wonderful.

[1:05:22] Google it.

[1:05:22] You'll probably get there.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:27] Hey, you.

[1:05:28] With the headphones.

[1:05:30] Just between you and me, the MaxFun store just got some of that sweet, sweet new merchant stock.

[1:05:34] You know, that merch from your favorite MaxFun shows?

[1:05:37] Could be posters, tote bags, shirts, stickers, patches, aprons.

[1:05:40] We got it all.

[1:05:42] Well, we got a lot.

[1:05:44] Point is, there's some new stuff.

[1:05:46] Go to MaxFunStore.com.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:48] So we've got a few sponsors for the show.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:53] Whoa!

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:56] Yeah.

[1:05:56] Are you sure you want to do this with us here?

[1:05:58] Or would you prefer one of your now classic solo ad reads?

Dan McCoy

[1:06:02] No, I would love to do it with you here.

[1:06:06] But I'm scrolling through my phone.

[1:06:08] I'm sorry that I'm taking a delay here.

[1:06:10] Okay.

[1:06:11] Trying to find the...

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:12] It's just a sign for L.A. at night of vamp a little bit.

[1:06:14] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:15] Now, in a situation like this, normally Dan would ask us a question.

[1:06:18] And we would answer it while he looks up the stuff on his phone.

[1:06:21] Seamless.

[1:06:22] Nobody knows that he's just covering up, that he's not prepared and doesn't know what he's doing.

[1:06:25] But instead, he blurted it out loud and left it to me to call attention to that even more so as a way to fill the time.

[1:06:32] Stuart, what's your play-by-play on this?

[1:06:34] How do you feel about it?

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:37] Well, I'm trying to think.

[1:06:40] Has there been a movie made of a European cartoon that's been good?

[1:06:46] Like a European comic book that's been any good?

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:49] I mean, I never saw that Tin Tan movie that Spielberg made.

[1:06:53] Was that one good?

[1:06:54] Tin Tan.

[1:06:54] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:54] I like the Tin Tan movie a lot, actually.

[1:06:58] I haven't seen it yet.

[1:06:59] And let's not forget...

[1:07:01] Oh, you thought what?

[1:07:01] I thought it was the Indiana Jones movie that Crystal Skull should have been.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:05] Uh-huh.

[1:07:06] And what about the Asterix and Obelisk movie with Jared Depardieu?

[1:07:12] That's what I was going to say.

[1:07:14] What about the one where Roberto Benigni plays the Emperor of Rome?

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:17] Yeah, yeah.

[1:07:18] What about that one?

[1:07:19] Yeah, you love those Asterix movies, right, Dan?

[1:07:21] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:23] I wasn't even aware that they existed.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:26] They're huge movies.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:28] Yeah, they're huge deals.

[1:07:30] I mean, I like the comics.

[1:07:32] That's not what we're talking about, though.

[1:07:34] Let's talk about Blue Apron instead.

[1:07:37] Okay.

[1:07:38] The Flophouse.

[1:07:39] The bluest of aprons.

[1:07:40] The Flophouse is supported by Blue Apron.

[1:07:45] Blue Apron partners with sustainable farms, fisheries, and ranchers to bring you all of the ingredients you need to create incredible home-cooked meals.

[1:07:55] Ingredients.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:56] Yeah.

[1:07:56] You know what's the best thing about those ranchers?

[1:07:59] Because they're sustainable and because they're giving great food to you, they're happy.

[1:08:03] You might even call them Jolly Ranchers.

[1:08:05] I was waiting for it, and I was not disappointed.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:09] You left that money on the table.

[1:08:10] You know Elliot's going to snatch that dollar.

[1:08:12] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:13] Yeah, come on.

[1:08:13] You say ranchers.

[1:08:14] I'm going to add Jolly to it.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:16] Ingredients come paired with an easy-to-follow recipe card delivered to your door weekly in a refrigerated box.

[1:08:23] How do they refrigerate that box?

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:24] Wait, Dan, that was the part that shocked me the most, that it's a box?

[1:08:30] That was the part you could...

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:32] Most refrigerators are boxes.

[1:08:35] Yeah, all right.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:36] That was the most childlike I've ever seen you in the way that kids get really excited when they see a box because they can play with it.

[1:08:43] A box?

Dan McCoy

[1:08:44] Well, look, you should rediscover how fun cooking can be while enjoying specialty ingredients and exploring new flavors and cuisines.

[1:08:53] And you can get $30 off your first order by visiting blueapron.com slash flophouse.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:00] Blueapron.com slash flophouse and you get $30 off your first order?

[1:09:04] That's right.

[1:09:04] That's great.

[1:09:05] What a deal.

[1:09:06] Yeah.

[1:09:06] And hey, you don't have to order it for yourself.

[1:09:08] You can get it for someone else.

[1:09:09] We used to talk about this, and it's still a good idea.

[1:09:12] Do you know a friend who recently had a child?

[1:09:14] Do you have a friend who's recovering from a surgery?

[1:09:17] Do you know a friend who, for whatever reason, is having trouble taking care of themselves right now?

[1:09:21] Get them a Blue Apron membership, and that food gets delivered right to their door, and it saves them time, saves you the effort of having to go there in person.

[1:09:30] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:31] You don't have to make any sort of convalescent calls.

Stuart Wellington

[1:09:34] And it's going to be a little bit healthier than just getting takeout all the time.

[1:09:39] Yeah.

[1:09:39] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:40] Our other sponsor for this episode is ZipRecruiter.

[1:09:44] Are you hiring?

[1:09:45] Yeah.

[1:09:46] Yes.

[1:09:48] Really, Elliot?

[1:09:49] What are you hiring for?

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:50] I've got a new company.

[1:09:52] Okay.

[1:09:52] Maybe you're going to like it.

[1:09:53] Okay.

[1:09:53] So I was inspired by this movie that I don't know if you've seen it.

[1:09:56] It's called Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[1:09:58] And I was thinking about, okay, how many planets are there out there?

[1:10:03] Nobody knows.

[1:10:04] It's time for us to find out.

[1:10:05] So I figured I would hire somebody to count all the planets.

[1:10:09] And not, you know what, and to really do it right.

[1:10:11] Not to just be like, Earth, Mars, Mercury, there's three.

[1:10:15] No.

[1:10:15] I want you to count all the planets.

[1:10:17] And I don't care how many kids place mats with pictures of the solar system on it.

[1:10:20] You need to go through to make sure you've got an accurate count of all the planets.

[1:10:25] Because there's got to be what, Dan?

[1:10:26] How many planets do you think?

[1:10:27] Like 10 at least?

Dan McCoy

[1:10:28] Yeah.

[1:10:28] Like, yeah, like 12?

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:32] Well, in the whole universe, there's got to be like at least 12.

[1:10:34] So I want to hire someone to count these planets.

[1:10:37] And it's, you know what?

[1:10:38] I'm not making money off this.

[1:10:40] I just want to have it done so that humanity has the science.

[1:10:42] And we know in the future how many planets there are.

[1:10:45] But I need to hire somebody.

[1:10:46] I can't just walk out of my house and yell, somebody count some planets for me.

[1:10:50] And hope someone's going to hear it and show up.

[1:10:52] If I take a bottle, put a message in it, throw it up in the air,

[1:10:56] it's just going to fall back down and smash on the ground.

[1:10:58] That's not going to help me.

[1:10:59] If I put a note on a carrier pigeon, someone's going to catch that pigeon and eat it,

[1:11:04] throw the note away after wiping their face on it.

[1:11:06] Now, how am I going to find someone to hire for this stuff?

Dan McCoy

[1:11:08] Now, what is this hobo universe you're living in?

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:11] I live, you know how there's all these different Earths in the DC universe?

[1:11:15] I live on Earth Hobo.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:16] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:16] In Earth Hobo, there's lots of empty bottles lying around,

[1:11:20] and people are always catching pigeons and eating them.

[1:11:22] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:23] All right.

[1:11:24] Well, here, this will help you.

[1:11:26] Posting your position to job sites and waiting and waiting for the right people to see it,

[1:11:31] that's no good.

[1:11:32] That's what I was saying.

[1:11:34] ZipRecruiter has revolutionized hiring.

[1:11:36] Their technology finds great candidates for you.

[1:11:39] It learns what you're looking for, identifies people with the right experience,

[1:11:43] and invites them to apply to your job.

[1:11:46] And right now, our listeners can try it for free at ziprecruiter.com slash flophouse.

[1:11:51] That's ziprecruiter.com slash flophouse.

[1:11:55] ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire.

[1:11:58] I think, you know what?

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:59] I think I've figured out who I'm going to hire for this job.

[1:12:02] Yeah?

[1:12:03] I need someone with counting experience, and I need someone who's okay being up all night.

[1:12:07] I'm going to need either Count Von Count or USA Up All Night host Rhonda Shearer.

[1:12:14] She can count stuff, right?

[1:12:16] I've never seen any evidence that she can't count.

[1:12:20] Okay.

[1:12:20] And she's been up all night.

[1:12:23] Yeah.

[1:12:24] And Count Von Count is a vampire, so he's out all night anyway.

[1:12:28] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:29] These are all good points.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:31] Okay, so ZipRecruiter.

[1:12:32] Does he dictate all his counting?

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:35] Do you think Count Von Count would do, it's all dictation?

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:39] He certainly says it aloud while he's doing it.

[1:12:42] Yeah.

[1:12:42] And he loves his work because he laughs between every number.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:49] So we should move on to letters.

[1:12:51] Okay.

[1:12:52] From listeners.

[1:12:52] Hey, wait, Dan, I have a-

[1:12:53] Oh, you've got Jumbotrons.

[1:12:55] Sorry.

[1:12:55] Dan, I have a Jumbotron message.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:56] It's okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:58] Stuart, do you have a Jumbotron?

[1:13:00] Or should I go first?

[1:13:00] I got a fucking Jumbotron.

[1:13:03] Okay.

[1:13:03] You seem really excited about it.

[1:13:05] You go first, then I'll go.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13:07] Okay.

[1:13:08] This message is for Jacob, last name withheld, and it is from Jacob, last name withheld.

[1:13:17] Five years ago, you were diagnosed with liver cancer.

[1:13:19] And somehow you still haven't died.

[1:13:22] Congrats.

[1:13:22] I hope grad school is treating you well, and that the next time you're involved in a testicular ultrasound, it's not as the patient.

[1:13:32] Also, with the improving prognosis, we really should be more budget conscious.

[1:13:38] Stop buying yourself Jumbotrons.

[1:13:42] Well, Jacob, congratulations, dude.

[1:13:45] That's awesome.

[1:13:45] Yeah, congratulations.

[1:13:45] It's good to hear.

[1:13:47] I'm glad that I could partially mangle that message that you gave me to read.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:54] You reminded me.

[1:13:55] I wanted to give a shout out of my own before I get to my Jumbotron to my friend Sasha, who recently had kidney surgery and is a Flophouse listener and Flophouse Facebook group member.

[1:14:07] And I just wanted to say congratulations on getting rid of that bad kidney.

[1:14:13] Thanks for getting it out of your body.

[1:14:15] You don't need it.

[1:14:16] It's weighing you down, and now you're ready to shoot for the stars with the only kidney you need, the one that's left.

[1:14:21] Catch that kidney.

[1:14:23] Catch that kidney is what the doctor said as it was flung out of her body.

[1:14:30] Anyway, so Sasha, I hope you're feeling better.

[1:14:33] Okay, and I have a Jumbotron message.

[1:14:35] This is one of a more capitalist mercantile nature, and it's from Nominee Coffee Roasters.

[1:14:41] And the message goes like this.

[1:14:43] Founded in 2017, Nominee Coffee Roasters is an ultra-traditionalist, DYI-focused micro-roaster based in North Seattle, impassioned by the highest quality single-origin coffees.

[1:14:54] Nominee as a roasting effort exists synonymous with paramount care and quality garnered through a hands-on, nostalgia-driven approach and remaining small batch to an idyllic fault.

[1:15:05] Listers know the Flophouse will also receive 15% off their order with code FLOP.

[1:15:10] So they're on Instagram at Nominee Coffee, and visit NomineeCoffee.com.

[1:15:14] Try for yourself, 15% off their order with the code FLOP.

[1:15:18] I just love that coffee, man.

[1:15:20] I'm a sucker for that hot brown bean water, baby.

[1:15:24] People love it.

[1:15:24] Ever since it was first introduced to Europe in the coffee houses of Spain and England and France, it's become a part of so many people's everyday life.

[1:15:34] So, yeah, go try that.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:38] Now, after that aborted attempt earlier because I was stupid and forgot Jumbotrons, now it's time for letters from listeners.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:48] And, Dan, you know how you know when it's really time for letters?

[1:15:51] How's that, Elliot?

[1:15:53] Because the music starts to play.

[1:15:55] And every day when the music plays, you know I'm gonna say it's a letters day.

[1:16:05] Letters day.

[1:16:08] Sometimes you don't hear a letters song.

[1:16:11] And that's because it's time for the Jumbotron.

[1:16:14] But Dan mixed it up because Dan's feeling a little sick.

[1:16:18] Dan's got a cold.

[1:16:21] And he's feeling old.

[1:16:23] He's full of mold.

[1:16:25] Dan's got a cold.

[1:16:26] But it's not time to disparage Dan's immune system right now.

[1:16:34] Because, holy cow, it's a letters day.

[1:16:37] A day for letters.

[1:16:39] And I hope it stays a letters day.

[1:16:42] Today and tomorrow and every day.

[1:16:45] Because a letters day is a better day for you and me.

[1:16:50] And everyone in that city of a thousand planets.

[1:16:56] Valerian.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:57] Okay.

[1:16:58] Well, that was a very exciting song.

[1:17:01] This first letter is from Elizabeth's last name withheld.

[1:17:05] Who writes?

[1:17:06] Montgomery.

[1:17:07] I got a 50-pack of New York Times Wednesday crossword puzzles for Christmas.

[1:17:12] Of which I managed to complete one and only one.

[1:17:15] Movie trivia is a special weakness of mine and a constant source of frustration.

[1:17:20] I find myself wondering, are the floppers any good at crosswords?

[1:17:23] More often than you think.

[1:17:25] I was toying with the idea of sending you a letter about it.

[1:17:27] But recently, while working my way through your archives, I listened to your All About Steve episode.

[1:17:33] Ironically, while you did briefly discuss crossword puzzles, the one flopper I most wanted to hear from was not present that episode.

[1:17:40] So now I have to ask.

[1:17:41] Elliot, do you like crossword puzzles?

[1:17:44] Are you any good at them?

[1:17:45] Can you do the New York Times puzzle on a Wednesday?

[1:17:47] Have you and your brother ever teamed up to do a crossword puzzle?

[1:17:51] Thank you for your time.

[1:17:51] I love your podcast.

[1:17:53] Thanks to Dan for the work he puts in behind the scenes.

[1:17:57] Yeah, Elliot.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:59] I'll try to do more work behind the scenes.

[1:18:02] I should say, for all the ragging we do on Dan, Dan is the guiding force and engine of the podcast, and it would not exist without him.

[1:18:08] And he does all the work.

[1:18:09] So thank you, Dan, for making that possible.

Stuart Wellington

[1:18:12] Every time an hour or so before we record, Dan wanders down the streets and knocks on all the bar's doors to see if I've passed out in one of them.

[1:18:21] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:23] I have my rolling ping with me.

[1:18:27] Yeah, your rolling ping.

[1:18:28] Okay.

[1:18:29] Sorry, I know I said that wrong.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:31] Usually the G only goes at the end of the first part of rolling pin.

[1:18:34] Rolling ping.

[1:18:35] But rolling ping, yeah, that's an interesting way to say it.

[1:18:39] I like this handicap scenario that you're building up, but just had to say that.

[1:18:45] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:18:46] And then Dan rubs some hot fries under my nose to wake me up.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:50] So, crossword puzzles.

[1:18:55] Here's the thing.

[1:18:56] As much as I love certain things about crossword puzzles, such as how they remind me of the existence of Isai Morales, commonly used clue, crossword puzzles are like chess for me, where I'm like, I should be better at this.

[1:19:11] I'm a smart person, but I'm not particularly good at it.

[1:19:14] So, there's so many half-finished crossword puzzles I've left in my wake, mainly because I didn't really care enough to finish them, but in a big way because they'd just be like, I don't know this thing.

[1:19:24] My brain is not set up to solve a problem oriented in this fashion.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:30] I was kind of that way with trivia for a while, where I took a, after a particularly disastrous performance at MaxFunCon, at a Chuck Bryan and John Hodgman organized trivia, after I felt particularly dumb for not getting a single question right, I was like, never again.

[1:19:50] I'm never doing trivia again.

[1:19:52] But then my bar started doing trivia, so I'm like, fuck it, I guess I'll do it here.

Dan McCoy

[1:19:57] Yeah, and you win several times.

[1:19:59] You've won the whole thing.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20:01] Yeah, yeah, you know, I guess I'm pretty great.

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:05] Yeah.

[1:20:05] Thanks, Dan.

[1:20:06] I mean, with trivia, I'm the opposite.

[1:20:08] My brain is set up for trivia stuff, and I get way too into it and start getting irritated if my team is not listening to me or if things go the wrong way or if I miss something I should have known.

[1:20:20] It's not good for me.

[1:20:21] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:23] I probably shouldn't draw the curtain back so much on my work life because it may sound like we don't work.

[1:20:31] But on Thursdays, there's no show the next day.

[1:20:36] So because we're not prepping for a Friday show, there's often kind of a bit of downtime at the office.

[1:20:44] And a bunch of the Daily Show writers often go in on a crossword together.

[1:20:50] Oh, that's nice.

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:51] It's like a family.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:51] Yeah, we project it up on the wall and do it online.

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:56] Oh, that's like a team building exercise.

[1:20:58] That's a good idea.

[1:20:59] Yeah.

[1:20:59] So it's fun.

[1:21:01] Who introduced that?

[1:21:02] Whose idea was that?

[1:21:04] I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:04] I think Zach might have started it because he has a subscription to the crosswords.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:12] Zach Pozen from Project Runway?

Dan McCoy

[1:21:15] Yeah, that's them.

[1:21:16] Okay.

[1:21:18] So moving on.

[1:21:20] This is from Nick, last name withheld, who writes...

[1:21:23] Hornby.

[1:21:25] You've said before the podcast a couple of times that three movies with the same theme make a film festival.

[1:21:30] Which means that a festival can also fill each of the flophouse categories of a good-bad movie, bad-bad movie, a movie you kind of like.

[1:21:38] I have talked with my friends about doing a festival of movies where music contracts are literal deals with the devil featuring the apple, good-bad, rock and roll, bad-bad, and phantom of the paradise, actually like.

[1:21:53] Can you think of any other trios of films where this works for you?

[1:21:55] Now, this is a tough question, so I don't expect us to necessarily be able to come up with these things on the spur of the moment.

[1:22:05] Good, because I can't.

[1:22:07] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:07] I mean, well, you could do zombie movies, or is that too broad a category?

[1:22:12] No, that's a good category.

[1:22:14] So what's a zombie movie you kind of like, Elliot?

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:19] A zombie movie I kind of like, but it's not that good?

[1:22:22] Uh-huh.

[1:22:24] Uh-huh.

[1:22:24] No, like, what's a good zombie movie?

[1:22:27] A good zombie movie.

[1:22:29] Oh, just an out-and-out good zombie movie.

[1:22:30] Yeah.

[1:22:31] Okay, Return of the Living Dead.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:32] Okay, what's a good-bad zombie movie?

[1:22:36] Uh-huh.

[1:22:37] Maybe Return of the Living Dead Part 2?

[1:22:41] Or like, uh, Zombie Lake, maybe?

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:45] Where half the movie is just women stopping to adjust their stockings, and then zombies coming out of a lake and eating them?

[1:22:50] Okay, and what's a bad-bad zombie movie?

Dan McCoy

[1:22:53] Uh-huh.

[1:22:54] Probably the new remake of Day of the Dead.

[1:22:59] Pretty bad.

[1:23:00] Okay.

[1:23:01] I haven't even seen it.

[1:23:01] I didn't know they did a remake of Day of the Dead.

[1:23:03] Yeah.

[1:23:03] Is Bub in it?

[1:23:05] Oh, I'm pretty sure Bub would have to be in it, right?

[1:23:09] I don't know.

[1:23:09] I haven't seen it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:10] Well, wait, wait, you're...

[1:23:11] Wait, so maybe it's good.

[1:23:12] How do you know if it's bad or not?

[1:23:14] I've just gotten so many bad reviews.

[1:23:15] Oh, okay.

[1:23:16] Hey, you know what else got bad reviews?

[1:23:18] Valerian and the City of a Thousand Worlds.

[1:23:20] That's true.

[1:23:20] And I kind of liked it.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:21] I shouldn't assume.

[1:23:22] Because what I assume, I take an ass and I'm me and you're you and we should be free to be you and me.

Stuart Wellington

[1:23:32] I was talking...

[1:23:33] Exactly.

[1:23:33] That's the message.

[1:23:35] I was talking to, what is it, New York Magazine's David Adelstein and he was making a very strong case for Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets.

[1:23:45] So I don't think all critics hated it.

[1:23:48] Oh, okay.

[1:23:49] That's fair.

[1:23:50] And I was like, stop yelling at me, David.

[1:23:52] Stop yelling.

[1:23:52] And he wouldn't stop.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:56] Wow.

[1:23:56] That was a little glimpse of how dangerous your work life can be.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:59] Yeah, these are the big celebs that stop into Stuart's bar.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:04] Dan McCoy.

[1:24:05] Yeah.

[1:24:07] And others.

[1:24:08] Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:10] Let's not forget Stuart Wellington is often hanging out there.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:13] Yeah.

[1:24:14] Not as much since I hurt my hand, but you know.

[1:24:16] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:17] This last letter is from Alvin, last name withheld.

[1:24:21] And the chipmunks.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:22] Yeah, you didn't say it right, Dan.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:24] Alvin!

Dan McCoy

[1:24:28] Alvin Ailey.

[1:24:29] He writes, nothing important.

[1:24:30] Oh, wow.

[1:24:31] Really?

[1:24:31] Dance pioneer Alvin Ailey?

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:33] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:24:34] Weren't expecting me to make that poll, huh?

Dan McCoy

[1:24:36] No.

[1:24:37] He says, nothing important.

[1:24:39] I recently watched Double Take, a forgettable Orlando Jones slash Eddie Griffith vehicle.

[1:24:45] And while there was no...

[1:24:46] Eddie, Eddie.

[1:24:47] Is it Griffith or Griffin?

[1:24:49] He writes Griffith.

[1:24:50] Maybe it's Griffin.

[1:24:50] Oh, maybe I'm wrong.

[1:24:51] I could be wrong.

[1:24:53] And whilst there was no feasible way I could have expected anything good or enjoyable from the film,

[1:24:59] I was still really depressed by how mediocre it was.

[1:25:02] By which I mean I was sad after watching it rather than angry.

[1:25:06] Given how many bad, bad, boring films you watch, knowing full well that there will probably be that way,

[1:25:12] what films can you remember that depressed you because they were precisely as meh as they promised to be?

[1:25:18] Big sweaty hugs and sloppy kisses on the bottom to all.

[1:25:22] Now...

[1:25:23] The kisses are on the bottom?

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:24] Yeah, apparently.

[1:25:25] I don't know if I like that.

[1:25:27] Now, him saying that, it made me think that there should be an emotion called sangry,

[1:25:31] where you're sad about how angry or not angry you are,

[1:25:35] and that that's what the movie Santa Sangre should be about.

[1:25:38] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:25:39] Also known as Drive Sangre.

Dan McCoy

[1:25:47] Yeah, Dan?

[1:25:48] No, I'm just looking back on my...

[1:25:50] On your life?

[1:25:52] Yeah.

[1:25:52] And regrets, I've got a few.

[1:25:57] No, I was looking back on my list of movies that I watch.

[1:26:01] I keep a record of this shit.

[1:26:04] And...

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:04] I feel like...

[1:26:06] I'm trying to remember.

[1:26:07] I feel like there are movies that I saw this past year that were like,

[1:26:10] okay.

[1:26:11] And yeah, they left me feeling a little...

[1:26:13] I don't know if sad is the right word,

[1:26:14] but like a little depressed at how like there was nothing to...

[1:26:18] Nothing to get excited about either one way or the other.

[1:26:21] Yeah.

[1:26:21] I'm trying to remember what the movies were though.

Dan McCoy

[1:26:22] Well, one that I have on my list here is Murder on the Orient Express,

[1:26:26] which I watched and I expected it to be meh,

[1:26:29] and it was meh,

[1:26:30] and I'm like, why did I do that?

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:33] Well, and also like,

[1:26:33] if you're not excited by a Murder on the Orient Express movie,

[1:26:38] who is going to?

[1:26:39] I feel like that's right up your alley.

[1:26:40] Yeah.

[1:26:40] You're like patient zero

[1:26:43] of being interested in a Murder on the Orient Express movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:26:47] I remember watching Death Note recently,

[1:26:52] the Adam Wingard American adaptation of the Japanese manga movies,

[1:26:58] et cetera.

[1:26:59] And I was like,

[1:27:02] you know, it started off okay,

[1:27:03] and I liked Willem Dafoe as the death god,

[1:27:07] but it was just really not...

[1:27:08] And like, I like Shea Wiggum.

[1:27:10] Like, that guy's great.

[1:27:12] But yeah, it's not good.

[1:27:17] kind of hoping to be like,

[1:27:18] when I first started watching,

[1:27:19] I'm like,

[1:27:20] I can't wait to recommend this,

[1:27:21] so everybody gets mad at me.

[1:27:24] But no, it's not very good,

[1:27:26] and it just bummed me out.

[1:27:27] And I'm like,

[1:27:28] why did I waste my limited time

[1:27:29] after I get,

[1:27:30] you know,

[1:27:31] spread out over the course of a couple of night shifts

[1:27:33] where I'd get home at like five in the morning,

[1:27:35] and I'm like,

[1:27:36] I'm going to watch something for 30 minutes

[1:27:37] before I pass out from a sandwich and beer.

[1:27:41] Why did I waste those nights on Death Note, Dan?

[1:27:44] Tell me.

[1:27:45] Uh, I mean,

[1:27:46] Adam Wingert,

[1:27:48] you know,

[1:27:49] he fooled you.

[1:27:51] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:52] Fooled you again.

[1:27:53] Fooled me again.

[1:27:55] To be honest,

[1:27:56] that's how I felt about,

[1:27:57] these are not movies,

[1:27:58] but a few of the episodes

[1:27:58] of this newest season of Black Mirror.

[1:28:01] Uh-huh.

[1:28:01] I'll be watching an episode,

[1:28:03] and I'll be like,

[1:28:04] eh,

[1:28:04] all right,

[1:28:06] okay.

[1:28:06] it kind of,

[1:28:07] it depresses me that like,

[1:28:09] they went ahead and made a season

[1:28:11] where they didn't seem to have that many ideas,

[1:28:12] you know?

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:13] Yeah,

[1:28:13] and I feel like the season as a whole

[1:28:16] had a more even baseline.

[1:28:18] Like,

[1:28:19] there were fewer like,

[1:28:21] great episodes,

[1:28:22] but there were also fewer episodes

[1:28:23] where I was like,

[1:28:24] super annoyed that I watched it.

[1:28:27] Uh-huh.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:28] Everything was just kind of like,

[1:28:30] fine.

[1:28:31] Yeah,

[1:28:31] just fine.

[1:28:32] To be honest,

[1:28:32] this is going to earn me a lot of ire

[1:28:34] on the internet.

[1:28:35] So watch out,

[1:28:36] everybody.

[1:28:36] Hold back.

[1:28:36] This is kind of a hot take.

[1:28:38] Yeah,

[1:28:38] yeah,

[1:28:38] get your hot pads

[1:28:40] to handle this take.

[1:28:42] Yeah,

[1:28:42] maybe wrap some asbestos around you,

[1:28:44] the miracle fiber of the future

[1:28:46] that can keep fire back.

[1:28:49] but this,

[1:28:50] in a way,

[1:28:50] it's kind of how I felt

[1:28:51] when I finally saw Wonder Woman.

[1:28:53] Uh-huh.

[1:28:54] I was like,

[1:28:55] okay,

[1:28:55] this is fine.

[1:28:56] Like,

[1:28:57] this is,

[1:28:57] I like,

[1:28:58] I was,

[1:28:58] I wanted to see something

[1:28:59] that really blew me away.

[1:29:01] And when I saw it,

[1:29:01] I was like,

[1:29:02] this is all right.

[1:29:03] Like,

[1:29:03] it's not bad,

[1:29:03] but it's just not,

[1:29:04] I was,

[1:29:05] it was like,

[1:29:06] more disappointing

[1:29:06] than it would have been

[1:29:07] if it was terrible.

[1:29:09] Because then if I,

[1:29:10] if I was terrible,

[1:29:10] I would have been like,

[1:29:11] those people were crazy.

[1:29:12] But I'm like,

[1:29:12] okay,

[1:29:13] this just isn't doing it for me.

[1:29:14] I mean,

[1:29:14] I'm disappointed in myself.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:16] I mean,

[1:29:17] I could see,

[1:29:18] I did,

[1:29:18] I mean,

[1:29:19] I disagree with,

[1:29:19] with that sentiment.

[1:29:21] I could see arguing that like,

[1:29:23] the movie.

[1:29:23] You can't disagree,

[1:29:24] you can't disagree with my feelings.

[1:29:26] I can disagree that,

[1:29:27] I don't care.

[1:29:29] I mean,

[1:29:30] what I'm saying is,

[1:29:30] I didn't feel that way.

[1:29:31] Although I can understand

[1:29:32] feeling like,

[1:29:34] it should have ended

[1:29:35] after the,

[1:29:36] the,

[1:29:37] the trench sequence.

[1:29:39] because that's such like,

[1:29:40] the high point of the movie.

[1:29:42] Um,

[1:29:43] but I don't like,

[1:29:44] I didn't think anything up until that point was,

[1:29:46] blah,

[1:29:47] for me.

[1:29:48] I thought it was all pretty good.

[1:29:49] But I thought it kind of ends.

[1:29:50] Oh,

[1:29:50] I mean,

[1:29:50] it was,

[1:29:51] it ends lower than it,

[1:29:53] the,

[1:29:53] the heights it reaches early on in the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:56] I see.

[1:29:56] It just,

[1:29:57] it felt more by the numbers than I was expecting.

[1:29:59] okay,

[1:30:00] this is a fine version of,

[1:30:01] it's a good version of this.

[1:30:02] But I wasn't looking,

[1:30:03] I wanted something with a little more,

[1:30:05] you know,

[1:30:05] like,

[1:30:05] a little more new,

[1:30:07] you know,

[1:30:07] more of something I hadn't seen before.

[1:30:09] And as soon as David Thulis walks out,

[1:30:11] I'm like,

[1:30:11] oh,

[1:30:12] the bad guy.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:13] Yeah.

[1:30:13] I just,

[1:30:14] I mean,

[1:30:14] I just,

[1:30:15] I just kind of accept,

[1:30:16] I liked the movie.

[1:30:17] I just kind of accept though,

[1:30:19] too,

[1:30:19] that like,

[1:30:19] it's not necessarily for me.

[1:30:21] Like,

[1:30:22] like it is true that it's much more exciting for like women to have like a great woman superhero

[1:30:29] directed by a woman.

[1:30:30] Like it's,

[1:30:31] you know,

[1:30:32] I can understand the passion about it.

[1:30:34] Certainly.

[1:30:35] So that was kind of my feeling.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:37] that part's great.

[1:30:38] I just,

[1:30:38] I like it's,

[1:30:39] I guess it,

[1:30:40] I wanted it to,

[1:30:41] I wanted to have that experience with it.

[1:30:42] And maybe because I can't get out of my own head,

[1:30:45] I wasn't able to.

[1:30:46] I'm not blaming you,

[1:30:47] Wonder Woman.

[1:30:48] I'm blaming me.

[1:30:49] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:50] Um,

[1:30:51] so now turning for movies that we feel mediocre about.

[1:30:55] Also,

[1:30:55] I will say,

[1:30:57] I will say,

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:58] maybe if they hadn't given David Thulis that mustache,

[1:31:00] it would have seemed less so obviously evil.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:03] That's in his contract now,

[1:31:04] boy.

[1:31:05] Oh,

Dan McCoy

[1:31:08] he's so gross.

[1:31:08] He's awesome.

[1:31:11] Uh,

[1:31:12] moving from films that were mixed on to films that we like recommendations.

[1:31:18] That's what we're doing now.

[1:31:19] Uh-huh.

[1:31:20] How's that segue?

[1:31:21] Huh?

[1:31:21] Oh,

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:21] it's amazing.

[1:31:22] Flawless.

[1:31:23] Wonderful.

[1:31:23] Oh,

[1:31:24] it's like,

[1:31:25] who is,

[1:31:25] is Ryan Seacrest hosting the show?

[1:31:28] Um,

Dan McCoy

[1:31:29] I'll give a recommendation.

[1:31:31] And having said that,

[1:31:32] this is kind of a qualified recommendation.

[1:31:35] Like,

[1:31:35] uh,

[1:31:36] it's a movie I enjoyed,

[1:31:37] but maybe not as much as I had hoped I would.

[1:31:40] And it's a movie that's probably,

[1:31:42] it's called screwballs.

[1:31:43] It's probably,

[1:31:44] it's a movie that I imagine will be near and dear to the Flophouse nation because it stars

[1:31:50] Nicolas Cage.

[1:31:51] It's a little movie called Mom and Dad.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:54] Oh,

[1:31:54] you mean I can go see that?

[1:31:55] I was waiting to see that because I thought we might do it for the podcast.

[1:31:58] No,

[1:31:59] you can see it.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:00] Go ahead.

[1:32:00] Okay.

[1:32:01] Uh,

[1:32:01] okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:02] I'll go right now.

[1:32:03] Hold on a sec.

[1:32:03] Go on.

[1:32:04] Let me go see it.

[1:32:04] I'll be right back.

[1:32:05] Yeah,

[1:32:05] I'm going to throw a rock at you like you're hairy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:09] We don't even want you around.

[1:32:10] Get out of here.

[1:32:12] Um,

[1:32:12] you're all good.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:14] My,

[1:32:14] my marginal disappointment with this film was because it was directed by Brian Taylor,

[1:32:18] who along with Neveldine,

[1:32:20] uh,

[1:32:21] the other half of Neveldine and Taylor,

[1:32:22] uh,

[1:32:23] did the crank movies.

[1:32:24] And so I wanted it to be as crazy as the crank movies,

[1:32:28] which is not,

[1:32:29] but it's,

[1:32:30] uh,

[1:32:30] it's crazy enough to make it a nice little cult film.

[1:32:33] I think that,

[1:32:34] uh,

[1:32:36] people,

[1:32:36] uh,

[1:32:37] of the flop might already be familiar with the plot,

[1:32:39] but I'll summarize it.

[1:32:41] It's,

[1:32:41] uh,

[1:32:41] all of a sudden,

[1:32:42] uh,

[1:32:43] moms and dads across the land,

[1:32:46] uh,

[1:32:47] have this urge to kill their children and they don't have the urge to kill like

[1:32:51] all kids,

[1:32:52] just specifically their own offsets.

[1:32:54] And so it's kind of a,

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:57] you know,

[1:32:58] provocative.

[1:32:59] Yeah.

[1:33:00] It's,

[1:33:00] it's called being a parent.

[1:33:02] Yeah.

[1:33:03] Oh,

[1:33:03] anyway,

[1:33:04] guys,

[1:33:04] let me tell you what's been going on in my life.

[1:33:06] You can't see,

[1:33:07] but I'm miming holding a microphone because it's time for my type five on fatherhood.

[1:33:10] Yeah.

[1:33:11] So I'm in the shower and I hear a knock on the door and I think maybe it's some hot babe coming

[1:33:17] into doing because that's all I think about,

[1:33:21] but no,

[1:33:22] it's my son who needs to use the potty.

[1:33:24] He says,

[1:33:25] and I'm like,

[1:33:25] Hey,

[1:33:26] I'm in here.

[1:33:27] Can I not even have these moments?

[1:33:30] Yeah.

[1:33:30] Pause for applause.

[1:33:31] Pause for knowing laughter and applause as the audience relates to the moment,

[1:33:35] even if it's not particularly funny.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:37] Yeah.

[1:33:38] Well,

[1:33:38] that's the subtext of the film.

[1:33:40] I mean,

[1:33:40] it's not even really the subtext.

[1:33:42] It's,

[1:33:42] it's pretty much the text of the movie that,

[1:33:44] uh,

[1:33:45] you know,

[1:33:45] parents want to kill their kids sometimes anyway.

[1:33:48] So that's kind of the joke of the,

[1:33:50] of the film.

[1:33:51] I mean,

Stuart Wellington

[1:33:52] millennials are so fucking lazy.

[1:33:54] Of course they want to get,

[1:33:55] of course they should die,

[1:33:57] right?

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:59] What a bunch of morons.

[1:34:01] Oh,

[1:34:01] they don't even have the energy to prop up the Applebee's industry.

[1:34:06] Like they're supposed to.

[1:34:07] I mean,

[1:34:08] they just don't appreciate everything their parents do for them.

[1:34:11] Yeah.

[1:34:12] And they're always using the phones that,

[1:34:14] that their parents invented and made them use.

[1:34:16] Uh,

[1:34:17] uh,

[1:34:18] anyway,

[1:34:19] Nicholas,

[1:34:19] let me just let,

[1:34:20] now I'm going to give my hot take on a millennials.

[1:34:22] Hey,

[1:34:22] millennials,

[1:34:23] it's not your fault.

[1:34:24] You got handed a steaming pile of shit in this world.

[1:34:27] And everyone's like,

[1:34:27] why are these millennials love eating shit so much?

Stuart Wellington

[1:34:31] Yeah.

[1:34:31] It's not fair.

[1:34:32] Not fair.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:33] You know what?

[1:34:33] Parents don't,

[1:34:34] just don't understand.

Stuart Wellington

[1:34:35] I'm just fucking mad that the millennials haven't,

[1:34:37] uh,

[1:34:38] re-embraced.

[1:34:39] You know how millennials have a tendency to,

[1:34:40] uh,

[1:34:41] embrace,

[1:34:41] uh,

[1:34:42] pop culture like Frasier and shit.

[1:34:44] Why haven't they brought back millennium?

[1:34:46] I mean,

[1:34:47] it's right there on the fucking table,

[1:34:48] guys.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:51] It's got all the millennials favorite star,

[1:34:54] Lance Henriksen,

[1:34:55] the man who was always old,

[1:34:56] even when he was a baby.

[1:34:59] Uh,

[1:35:00] just,

[1:35:01] you know,

[1:35:01] when,

[1:35:01] when they shot aliens,

[1:35:02] Lance Henriksen was 14 years old.

[1:35:05] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:06] They were trying to make an Akira movie where he played all the wrinkled kids.

Elliott Kalan

[1:35:16] There's a Venn diagram for that joke.

[1:35:18] And it's just got Stuart and me in the middle.

Dan McCoy

[1:35:21] Um,

[1:35:22] I just,

[1:35:23] I'm almost done with my recommendation.

[1:35:25] So just,

[1:35:25] I just want to say Nicholas Cage gives a fun,

[1:35:28] crazy cage performance.

[1:35:29] Selma Blair is also very good.

[1:35:31] And the movie runs like 87 minutes long or something like that.

[1:35:35] So it's the perfect length for a film does not overstay its welcome.

[1:35:40] Uh,

[1:35:41] nice.

[1:35:42] Yeah.

[1:35:42] So mom and dad.

[1:35:44] Save the world.

[1:35:45] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:47] Uh,

[1:35:48] I'm going to recommend a movie.

[1:35:49] So I've been,

[1:35:50] uh,

[1:35:50] I've been trying to catch up on horror movies from the last year that I missed out on.

[1:35:55] And,

[1:35:56] uh,

[1:35:56] one of my favorites is the movie raw that you can watch on Netflix.

[1:36:02] So you know what that means,

[1:36:03] guys,

[1:36:04] you pull up your browser,

[1:36:05] you grab your fucking mouse,

[1:36:08] you get that,

[1:36:09] you get that left click button already.

[1:36:11] Okay.

[1:36:12] However,

[1:36:13] you got to hover that over the,

[1:36:14] the,

[1:36:15] the thumbnail of raw.

[1:36:17] Okay.

[1:36:18] You got to press that left click button,

[1:36:20] drag it over into your movie player.

[1:36:23] Uh,

[1:36:23] and then you,

[1:36:25] you,

[1:36:25] you dump it in there.

[1:36:26] Yeah.

[1:36:27] Empty trash.

[1:36:28] Okay.

[1:36:28] Then what?

[1:36:28] Okay.

[1:36:30] Because you don't want your fucking trash box cluttering up your hard drive,

[1:36:33] right?

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:33] That slows down your computer.

[1:36:35] Are there any settings that we have to make sure set?

[1:36:38] Well,

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:38] I mean,

[1:36:39] there's not a lot of options,

[1:36:40] but you want to make sure that you,

[1:36:41] you have Gore cranked all the way up,

[1:36:44] baby.

[1:36:45] Uh,

[1:36:46] so raw,

[1:36:47] you want to turn on motion smoothening.

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:48] Cause you want those motions to be smooth as silk.

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:51] Yeah.

[1:36:51] You want it to look just like that time.

[1:36:53] I saw the first Hobbit movie and got an eye strain and stuff started leaking out of the corner of my eye for a day.

[1:37:00] Um,

[1:37:01] so raw is a French movie about a,

[1:37:06] uh,

[1:37:07] young woman who goes to,

[1:37:09] I guess like veterinary college.

[1:37:12] And,

[1:37:12] uh,

[1:37:13] along the way she develops,

[1:37:15] let's say certain appetites for stuff.

[1:37:21] Okay.

[1:37:22] Uh,

[1:37:22] but it's this great little movie.

[1:37:24] Um,

[1:37:24] well,

[1:37:25] like wrestling,

Elliott Kalan

[1:37:25] like WWF raw.

Stuart Wellington

[1:37:27] Kinda.

[1:37:29] And it,

[1:37:30] uh,

[1:37:30] no,

[1:37:31] it's great.

[1:37:31] And it,

[1:37:32] um,

[1:37:33] it,

[1:37:34] it's nice to see this kind of a,

[1:37:36] a horror movie told from this perspective.

[1:37:39] And it also touches on a lot of things that kind of everybody can identify with.

[1:37:43] And it is a very,

[1:37:44] uh,

[1:37:45] female perspective.

[1:37:46] So maybe I missed some of the,

[1:37:49] I don't know.

[1:37:49] I'm just fucking around.

[1:37:50] Uh,

[1:37:51] but it's,

[1:37:51] uh,

[1:37:51] yeah,

[1:37:52] it's great.

[1:37:52] It's gory.

[1:37:53] Uh,

[1:37:54] it's fun.

[1:37:55] Uh,

[1:37:55] check it out.

[1:37:57] Raw.

[1:37:59] Raw.

[1:38:00] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:38:02] You got it.

[1:38:03] Raw.

[1:38:05] Okay.

[1:38:06] Yeah.

[1:38:07] You got any more in your.

[1:38:10] Okay.

[1:38:10] I'll go on and,

[1:38:11] and,

[1:38:12] uh,

[1:38:12] and recommend my movie now.

[1:38:14] Pause for one last raw.

[1:38:18] Oh,

[1:38:19] okay.

[1:38:20] There you go.

[1:38:21] Uh,

[1:38:22] so I'm going to recommend a movie.

[1:38:23] It's an old one guys.

[1:38:24] It's a classic melodrama weepy,

[1:38:27] uh,

[1:38:28] that I've been meaning to watch for years and I finally got around to watching it.

[1:38:32] And that's now Voyager starring Betty Davis and Paul Henry and Claude Rains.

[1:38:37] And Betty Davis is playing character who is,

[1:38:39] he's a grown woman who's still living kind of under the thumb of her old,

[1:38:44] her elderly mother.

[1:38:45] And it means she's grown up as this very unhappy,

[1:38:47] what you would call at the time,

[1:38:48] a spinster,

[1:38:49] but that's not a term people care for anymore.

[1:38:51] Uh,

[1:38:52] just an unhappy woman who cannot,

[1:38:55] cannot feel life basically.

[1:38:57] And first under the care of Claude Rains as a psychiatrist.

[1:39:01] And then later through a relationship,

[1:39:04] she forms with Paul Henry,

[1:39:05] who's a man that she falls in love with,

[1:39:08] but she can't have because he has a,

[1:39:11] he already has a family.

[1:39:12] Uh,

[1:39:13] she manages to discover herself and figure out a way to live that is more true to

[1:39:19] herself and more satisfying.

[1:39:21] Even if it can never be,

[1:39:22] even if she can never live the fully satisfying life she always wanted because of the way she

[1:39:27] was raised.

[1:39:28] And it's one of these movies that is,

[1:39:31] it's based on a book and it feels more like a book in that the plot is not a straight line from A to Z.

[1:39:37] It's,

[1:39:38] you kind of are not quite sure where it's going at certain times.

[1:39:41] It's,

[1:39:41] it follows its own path and it's very much like a classic melodrama.

[1:39:45] Like there are times when things happen.

[1:39:46] It sounds like Valerian.

[1:39:48] It's just like Valerian.

[1:39:50] Uh,

[1:39:50] there are times when things happen when you're like,

[1:39:53] that seems a little coincidental movie,

[1:39:56] but it's one of,

[1:39:57] uh,

[1:39:57] like Betty Davis is big famous performances and one where she gets to show her full range.

[1:40:02] Everyone in is really good.

[1:40:03] It's like classic,

[1:40:05] uh,

[1:40:05] classic filmmaking,

[1:40:07] just like textbook one-on-one,

[1:40:09] you know,

[1:40:10] glossy stuff and just really,

[1:40:12] really good.

[1:40:12] And I'm a big Betty Davis fan.

[1:40:14] So I'm surprised it took me this long to watch it since I think she is,

[1:40:17] she was the greatest of the film actresses at that time.

[1:40:20] And this is a real chance for her to show her full range.

[1:40:23] So aside her full range,

[1:40:24] aside from when she plays characters who are,

[1:40:26] crazy or evil,

[1:40:27] but in this case,

[1:40:28] not so much.

[1:40:28] So now Voyager,

[1:40:29] I'd recommend it.

[1:40:30] It's really good.

[1:40:31] Great.

Stuart Wellington

[1:40:32] Bunch of recommendations.

[1:40:34] You got your homework,

[1:40:35] everybody.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:37] You got to watch those three movies.

[1:40:38] We'll test you next episode.

Dan McCoy

[1:40:40] Mm-hmm.

[1:40:41] Uh,

[1:40:42] so now we should just sign off,

[1:40:44] uh,

[1:40:44] from the flop house and,

[1:40:46] uh,

[1:40:46] thank you for listening.

[1:40:47] Uh,

[1:40:48] there's a lot of great podcasts over at maximum fun.org.

[1:40:50] Go listen to those.

[1:40:52] Um,

[1:40:53] and,

[1:40:53] uh,

[1:40:54] it's been great talking to you.

[1:40:56] It's been.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:57] And hey,

[1:40:57] whatever,

[1:40:58] whatever holiday you're celebrating,

[1:41:00] I hope you're having a good one.

Dan McCoy

[1:41:02] For the flop house,

[1:41:03] I've been Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:04] Hey,

[1:41:05] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[1:41:07] And I'm Elliot Kalin,

[1:41:08] all year round,

[1:41:09] 24 seven.

[1:41:10] Cool.

Stuart Wellington

[1:41:14] How are my levels,

[1:41:15] Dan?

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:16] You know,

[1:41:17] you know,

[1:41:17] if you could just switch the channel within the mic,

[1:41:19] you'd need some sort of magic mic.

[1:41:22] XL.

[1:41:22] Oh,

Stuart Wellington

[1:41:24] wow.

[1:41:24] Is that before XXL?

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:26] Yeah.

[1:41:27] It's in the middle one.

[1:41:28] Okay.

[1:41:28] That they'll release later.

Dan McCoy

[1:41:30] Yeah.

[1:41:30] I'm very glad I caught that because that could have been a bad scene.

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:33] Yeah.

[1:41:34] A real bad scene.

[1:41:35] Uh-huh.

[1:41:36] Just like that scene in,

[1:41:37] uh,

[1:41:38] in,

[1:41:39] uh,

[1:41:40] in Ghostbusters where Dan Aykroyd gets the ghost blowjob.

[1:41:42] It's a bad scene.

Stuart Wellington

[1:41:43] Okay.

[1:41:44] Dan,

[1:41:44] do you have any bad scenes you'd like to add?

[1:41:50] Maximumfun.org.

[1:41:52] Comedy and culture.

[1:41:53] Artist owned.

[1:41:54] Listener supported.

Ep. #251 - Valerian and the City of a Thousand Planets

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