Ep. #218 - Nine Lives

Elliott Kalan

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss nine lives.

[0:05] It's like a big budget ripoff of a talking cat.

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

Dan McCoy

[0:38] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:40] Hey, guys, I'm Stuart Willington.

Elliott Kalan

[0:42] And I'm Elliot Kalin.

[0:43] Glad Stuart popped his cap during his name thing and not once again during my name thing.

[0:49] Upstaging me with the opening of a bottle yet again, I feared.

[0:52] They're like, who's that cool character?

[0:54] Who's that new guy who just showed up?

[0:56] Who's the original party animal that just wandered in while nerdy Kalin was talking?

Dan McCoy

[1:00] Brewski.

[1:00] Woo-hoo.

[1:02] That's you.

[1:03] Kids don't say brewski anymore.

[1:04] Yeah.

[1:05] Yeah, because they think that you're the one who loves beer.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09] Oh, yeah, because by context, yeah, it's a real Kuleshov experiment.

[1:12] Yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13] So every time people hear your voice, they're thinking beer, beer, popping a beer.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19] When they should be thinking chicken, chicken, tearing into some sweet fried chicken.

[1:23] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[1:23] So what do we do here on this here podcast, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:27] Why, thank you, sir.

[1:29] This here podcast is a bad movie podcast.

[1:32] Nothing to thank him for.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34] Where?

[1:34] Let's ask you a question.

[1:35] If anything, you made your life a little harder.

Dan McCoy

[1:38] This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[1:43] And tonight, we watched a movie called Nine Lives.

[1:48] Hey, guys, what's been going on in your nine lives?

Elliott Kalan

[1:51] Well, I've been helping my mom move.

[1:53] Mm-hmm.

[1:53] So I've spent a few days this week moving boxes, pouring kitty litter into paint so it'll dry

[1:58] up and we can toss it out of the dump.

[2:00] Yep.

[2:01] Bringing things to a storage facility.

Stuart Wellington

[2:03] Did you have a situation where you needed to carry a box to somewhere else and you're

[2:07] like, nobody's going to let me go into that place with this box?

[2:09] So you put a headband on and some Mentos?

Elliott Kalan

[2:12] Not really, because we rented the storage space.

[2:15] While carrying the kitty litter box, I did think to myself, wow, I'm finally just like Glenn

[2:20] Danzig, famously in a photograph carrying a box of kitty litter that he just bought.

[2:25] And I've had a lot of this conversation with my mom.

[2:28] Mom, you can throw this out.

[2:29] But you loved that when you were a kid.

[2:32] Yeah, but I don't want it anymore.

[2:33] I have no use for this.

[2:34] Well, we'll put it in storage and you can make that decision later.

[2:37] Thanks, Mom.

Stuart Wellington

[2:38] You have to put away those childish things.

[2:41] Yeah.

[2:41] It's right in there in the Bible.

[2:42] Mm-hmm.

[2:43] Or that John Cougar Mellencamp song.

Elliott Kalan

[2:45] Yeah.

[2:46] The Bible.

Stuart Wellington

[2:47] Isn't the Bible just the best John Cougar Mellencamp song?

[2:50] Have you seen pictures of John Cougar Mellencamp lately?

[2:53] It's like the top of his head is trying to escape.

[2:56] He's more Cougar than Mellencamp now.

[2:58] It's like he is living his life, hoping to get some stunt casting in a Dick Tracy reason

[3:04] where he plays Flattop.

[3:05] The Green Lantern villain.

[3:08] Yeah.

[3:08] His head is bursting out of the seams.

[3:10] Sinestro?

Elliott Kalan

[3:10] Yeah.

[3:10] No, no, no.

[3:11] The other one with the big head from the movie.

[3:13] Who's in the wheelchair?

[3:15] Brainiac?

[3:15] No, that's Superman Mellencamp.

[3:16] I can't remember his name.

[3:17] He doesn't have a code name.

[3:18] It's just a human name.

Dan McCoy

[3:19] Oh, that's lame.

[3:20] Okay.

[3:21] James.

[3:22] So maybe he could...

[3:22] James the big head guy.

Elliott Kalan

[3:23] He could be a modern Dick Tracy villain like Bruce Willis who would be called Low Lip

[3:29] because his upper lip because his upper lip is a crazy distance from his nose.

[3:32] Look at Bruce Willis and don't see...

[3:34] And try not to think about how far away his upper lip is from his nose.

[3:38] Yeah.

[3:38] It's insane.

Stuart Wellington

[3:39] Like you would think he would rent himself out for like life drawing classes.

Elliott Kalan

[3:45] You'd think people are like, oh, what would it look like if someone, if a Simpsons character

[3:49] existed in real life?

[3:50] Oh, Bruce Willis.

[3:50] There you go.

Dan McCoy

[3:51] Take that Hollywood superstar Bruce Willis.

Elliott Kalan

[3:54] Hey, he can take it.

[3:55] Come on.

[3:56] This is the guy.

[3:56] He's still living on that North money.

[3:58] He's living on that Bruno money.

[4:00] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[4:01] The return of Bruno.

[4:03] Bruno's returns.

[4:04] And he's got a lot of harmonica to play at Planet Hollywood's around the world.

[4:09] You kind of feel like he co-founded Planet Hollywood just so he'd always have a venue

[4:13] for performing as Bruno wherever he went.

[4:16] What is it like?

Stuart Wellington

[4:17] Jump up there and play like Mactonite songs on a piano?

[4:20] Yeah, Mactonite songs.

Dan McCoy

[4:22] You know, blues travel notwithstanding, there's not a lot of harmonica fronted band venues

[4:28] out there.

[4:29] Wherever Bob Dylan's playing.

Elliott Kalan

[4:32] All right, I guess you got me there.

[4:34] Nobel Prize winner for chemistry.

[4:38] Because he finally learned what the answer was that was blowing in the wind, and that

[4:44] was a huge win for meteorology.

[4:47] How that affects chemistry and not physics, I don't know.

[4:49] I'm not a scientist.

[4:50] I'm just a guy who's making it up as he goes along.

[4:53] But aren't we all?

Stuart Wellington

[4:54] So Elliot was carrying boxes.

[4:55] Dan, what have you been up to?

Elliott Kalan

[4:57] You know, man, just the daily grind.

[4:59] The daily show grind, that is, on Comedy Central.

[5:02] Weeknights at 11 p.m.

[5:03] Monday through Thursday.

[5:04] Now hosted by Trevor Noah.

Stuart Wellington

[5:06] Okay, so we normally watch a movie, and tonight was no different.

[5:09] Stuart, what have you been up to?

[5:10] You really derailed it.

Elliott Kalan

[5:12] I love how you're not trying to get it back on track as if we're the problem.

[5:16] Settle down, guys.

Stuart Wellington

[5:17] Settle down.

Elliott Kalan

[5:18] That's what's known as an attractive nuisance.

Stuart Wellington

[5:24] You know, I just got back from the Midwest.

[5:27] Went on an adventure.

[5:27] How is our old stomping grounds?

[5:30] Oh, man.

[5:32] Birthplace of Hallie Haglund.

[5:33] Flat as always.

[5:34] Well, I was in the kind of southern Midwest, or the south, depending on who you ask.

[5:40] Well, what state were you in?

[5:41] I spent a little time in West Virginia.

[5:44] Okay, I'd call it the south, yeah.

[5:45] And then a little bit in old Kentucky.

[5:47] South of the south.

[5:50] Kentucky.

[5:51] Yep.

[5:52] Went to a wedding.

[5:53] Spent some time in malls.

[5:55] Yeah, it was pretty exciting.

[5:57] And I spent some time with children, which, I don't know if you know this, they're covered

[6:01] in germs.

[6:02] Yeah, I own one.

[6:03] And they have given me those germs.

[6:04] I own one.

[6:05] It's making me sick all the time.

[6:06] I'm operating at like 30% tonight, guys.

[6:09] Really?

[6:09] Because you've been talking more than usual.

Dan McCoy

[6:12] You've been yammering like a yam.

[6:14] Maybe that's...

[6:14] Big old yam.

Elliott Kalan

[6:17] Dan, are you okay?

[6:18] I just got Thanksgiving on the mind.

[6:19] Take it fucking easy, dude.

[6:21] Dan, when you see yams, do they talk to you?

[6:23] Do they ever tell you to burn things?

Dan McCoy

[6:26] They tell me to put marshmallows on top of everything.

Elliott Kalan

[6:29] Okay, that's fair.

Dan McCoy

[6:32] What are we doing?

Elliott Kalan

[6:33] So, we watched a bad movie.

[6:34] I don't even know what we're doing anymore.

[6:35] And we watched a bad movie tonight called...

[6:37] Nine Lives.

[6:38] We've been over this the third time.

[6:40] Nine Erotic Lives.

[6:42] Now, Nine Lives is the next in an unending series, I assume, of stories about talking cats

[6:48] that we'll cover on the show.

[6:49] And that is the second one.

[6:51] And this...

[6:52] A Talking Cat?

[6:53] Nine Lives.

[6:54] Whereas A Talking Cat was a very low budget, very, let's say, resourceless film.

[7:03] Well, that was a passion project.

[7:05] It was a passion project in which...

Dan McCoy

[7:06] Someone needed to tell the story.

[7:09] It was burning up their brain of what would happen if a cat could talk.

Elliott Kalan

[7:12] And had magic powers.

[7:13] Now, in that one, Eric Roberts phoned in his performance as the cat, literally.

[7:18] It sounded like he was on a phone.

[7:19] Yep.

[7:20] In this movie, Kevin Spacey plays the cat.

[7:23] And the audio quality is better, but the performance quality...

[7:26] Oh, boy.

[7:28] Oh, boy.

[7:29] Not so much better.

[7:30] So you're saying they're about the same level of actor.

[7:34] I'm not saying that.

[7:35] Although, Eric Roberts is an underrated actor.

[7:38] And Kevin Spacey has not been playing to his total strengths in film.

[7:41] Although, having seen him on stage in Richard III, he was fantastic.

Stuart Wellington

[7:47] Did he do his fucking Foghorn Leghorn impression he does on House of Cards?

Elliott Kalan

[7:52] I mean, he played Richard III in kind of a similar way.

[7:54] I suppose I'll be a villain.

[7:57] A villain I shall be.

Dan McCoy

[7:59] I've always depended on the kindness of villains.

[8:02] That's a different play.

Elliott Kalan

[8:04] Boy, boy, I'll say, boy, that's a joke, son.

[8:06] Winner of our discontent, son.

[8:08] That's Foghorn III.

[8:13] Horse boy.

[8:15] Horse son.

[8:16] Kingdom for my whole horse son.

[8:17] Trying to remember.

Dan McCoy

[8:18] One of the things happened in Richard III.

[8:20] Now all the clouds are glowered upon our houses.

[8:24] On the deeper belly of the ocean buried.

[8:27] Et cetera.

[8:28] Wait, is that?

[8:29] Those are actual lines.

Elliott Kalan

[8:30] Oh, good job.

[8:30] No, no, he's your genius.

[8:31] Anyway, so this movie.

[8:34] It's like when someone takes a little indie film and makes a big budget version of it

[8:39] and loses the soul.

[8:40] Like a tiny Indiana Jones movie where he's a little indie.

[8:44] A little indie film.

[8:46] Tiny Eyes shrunk the indie.

[8:47] Would that have been any worse than Kingdom of the Crystal Skull?

[8:50] That would be much better.

[8:51] Indiana Jones and the Incredible Tiny Adventure.

[8:53] Yeah, would it be a lot more.

[8:54] Incredible shrinking indie.

Stuart Wellington

[8:55] Would it be standing next to things and being like, look at that thing there.

[8:58] It's huge.

[8:59] Yeah, that arc of the government.

[9:01] That's huge.

[9:02] That's just the little Elvis sketch for sure.

Elliott Kalan

[9:04] Little Amnots.

[9:05] These are huge.

[9:07] Why do you sound like Elvis in the 30s?

[9:11] He's just a kid now.

[9:12] Elvis learned it from me.

[9:14] That would be amazing.

[9:15] And then he learned how to dance from Forrest Gump.

[9:18] Did Elvis come up with anything original?

[9:20] And he stole his music from black people?

[9:22] Yeah.

[9:22] And they call him the king.

[9:24] More like the king of thieves.

Stuart Wellington

[9:26] I thought Marty McFly invented it.

Elliott Kalan

[9:28] No, that's the prince of thieves.

[9:29] Oh, okay.

[9:29] The son of the king of thieves.

[9:31] I thought Marty McFly invented rock and roll.

[9:33] No, but Elvis didn't invent it.

[9:36] He just stole it.

[9:36] Oh, okay.

[9:37] From Marty McFly.

[9:38] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[9:40] And your kids are going to love it.

[9:43] Maybe.

Elliott Kalan

[9:43] That's funny about rock and roll.

[9:44] I mean, my kids are going to love some kind of weird electro drop music.

[9:50] Yeah.

[9:50] Dub trance.

[9:51] I mean, right now my kid loves the Muppet song Nightlife, which is the least memorable Muppet

[9:58] song.

[9:58] Although today he wanted me to sing him.

[10:00] He calls it the Muppet baby song, but he means the song from Muppets Take Manhattan with

[10:05] their babies.

[10:07] Gonna be a movie star.

[10:09] Yeah.

[10:09] That one.

Stuart Wellington

[10:09] The only thing that keeps me going late at night when I'm lying in bed with my covers

[10:15] pulled up to my throat and I'm staring into the blackness, the only thing that lets me

[10:20] fall asleep and consider waking up for the next day is assuming that Elliot's child will

[10:26] love the band Wild Stallions when he gets older.

[10:29] I mean, not just my child, the universe.

[10:32] Yeah, the universe that somehow Wild Stallions will unite humanity.

[10:36] Yeah.

[10:37] Put all this, you know, all these political.

[10:39] The veil of tears.

[10:41] Yeah, yeah.

[10:42] The veil of tears will be washed away in shimmering guitar solos.

Elliott Kalan

[10:47] I mean, I did successfully get him to listen to and headbang to Master of Puppets the other

[10:51] morning after my wife had gone to work.

[10:53] Of course she loves Master of Puppets.

[10:54] She loves the Muppets.

[10:55] I figured that would be the bridge that would get him through.

[10:58] But I would show, I was like, this is how daddy dances.

[11:01] And I would headbang.

[11:02] And he was like, I like to do it like this.

[11:04] And he was just shaking his head from side to side.

[11:06] And I'm like, all right, so I got a sideways headbanging.

[11:08] We'll try it.

[11:09] Sure.

[11:10] Horizontal bang.

[11:11] Anyway, they have taken, so A Talking Cat was the soulful indie version of A Talking

[11:16] Cat movie.

[11:17] Nine Lives is kind of like the big budget soulless version of A Talking Cat.

[11:21] What's weird is that as low ambition as A Talking Cat was, Nine Lives seems to have even

[11:29] less ambition than that, which is crazy because this is a Barry Sonnenfeld movie.

[11:33] And there's tons of swooping camera movements, the kind you would expect from the guy who

[11:38] shot Raising Arizona.

Stuart Wellington

[11:38] So really, I've never seen a Barry Sonnenfeld movie or movies in general.

[11:42] What?

[11:43] What other movies has this got made?

[11:44] Barry Sonnenfeld, he made.

Elliott Kalan

[11:45] I know that to be a lie, sir.

[11:47] You were lying to us, but I'll buy the premise.

[11:50] Allow me to explain.

[11:51] Barry Sonnenfeld started out as a director of photography for, well, for porn, but also for

[11:55] the Coen Brothers.

[11:57] He had worked on some porn movie at one point in his early days.

Dan McCoy

[12:00] I was just imagining like a swooping shot into a vagina.

Elliott Kalan

[12:04] They were like, oh, you gotta stop.

Dan McCoy

[12:07] It's just so disorienting.

[12:10] He just mounts the camera to a penis as it thrusts in and out.

[12:15] Well, then it'd just be dark.

[12:16] That's the thing.

[12:17] Actually, now that sounds like a pretty good idea to get a GoPro, strap it on.

[12:20] What?

[12:20] No.

[12:21] No one would enjoy that.

Stuart Wellington

[12:22] I'm not saying that would be good porn.

Elliott Kalan

[12:24] I think it would be interesting.

[12:24] Yeah, it's like the hardcore Henry of porno movies.

[12:28] I mean, there is hardcore Henry of porno movies.

Stuart Wellington

[12:30] It's called POV porn.

[12:32] It's just that.

[12:33] Anyway.

[12:34] But like, are there guns and stuff?

[12:35] And does he throw grenades at people?

[12:38] Probably.

[12:38] I don't know.

[12:40] Can you see it in a theater is what I'm asking.

Elliott Kalan

[12:42] No.

[12:43] Only Show World and what's the other one near Show World in New York?

[12:46] Playpen?

[12:47] Anyway.

[12:50] I only know Show World because it's where I got my comedy.

[12:51] We're talking about Barry Sonnenfeld.

[12:53] Barry Sonnenfeld.

[12:53] He directed Adam's Family and Adam's Family Values.

[12:56] He directed Get Shorty.

[12:57] Oh, I like those movies.

[12:58] He directed Men in Black.

[12:59] He's directed a ton of fun movies.

[13:01] And that's why they call him Ton of Fun Sonnenfeld.

[13:03] Lately, he's been on a little bit of a downslide.

[13:05] He did RV with Robin Williams.

[13:08] He did.

[13:09] Did he do.

Dan McCoy

[13:10] What else did he did recently?

[13:11] Did he do the good shorty?

[13:13] He didn't do Be Cool, did he?

[13:14] I don't think he did Be Cool, which I haven't seen.

Elliott Kalan

[13:17] But Get Shorty is a movie that I haven't seen in years, but I love.

[13:20] When it first came out, I loved it.

[13:22] Still like it.

[13:23] I think it's a movie that would probably hold up really well.

Stuart Wellington

[13:25] Feels like the kind of movie that if you got your dad the DVD, you'd be like, he's going

[13:30] to like this.

Elliott Kalan

[13:31] Oh, yeah.

[13:31] Sure.

[13:32] And being a dad, I love that stuff.

[13:34] Yeah.

[13:34] You're like, Dennis Farina, sign me up.

[13:36] Once my son was born, it was like, oh, I love bad jokes and Get Shorty and talking about

[13:40] military history.

Dan McCoy

[13:42] You're like any World War II film all of a sudden.

Elliott Kalan

[13:45] Suddenly, I'm buying tickets to Steely Dan concerts.

[13:47] What's this all about?

[13:48] Yeah, any World War II.

[13:49] Since my dad.

[13:50] It's because they don't play live that often.

[13:52] That's why you're buying those tickets.

[13:53] That's a good point.

[13:54] Just to tell people I saw it.

[13:56] My dad rates a lot of movies based on how accurate the battle scenes are.

[14:01] My dad is the exact same way.

[14:03] It could be the worst movie, but if the battle scene uniforms are fairly accurate, give it

[14:10] the Oscar.

[14:10] He loves it.

Stuart Wellington

[14:11] I remember talking to my dad about Lord of the Rings, The Two Towers, and he was like,

[14:16] their approach to siege warfare was a little inaccurate.

[14:21] I'm like, shut up, dude.

[14:23] They also had wizards and Nazguls riding dragons.

[14:26] Come on.

[14:27] I mean, I'm glad he wasn't complaining that the Ents didn't look accurate to

[14:33] Tolkien's writing or some other bullshit.

[14:36] Yeah, yeah.

[14:36] Or the horns were not in it or whatever those more tree-like version events.

[14:42] He lost me.

[14:42] Yeah, his complaint was, where was Tom Bombadil in the first movie?

Elliott Kalan

[14:47] That doesn't even apply to The Two Towers, dude.

[14:50] Look, I couldn't accept any of the movies after I knew Tom wasn't showing up.

[14:54] Where were his delightful songs?

[14:56] Where was T-Bomb?

[14:57] That's what I call Tom Bombadil.

[14:59] That's what Goldberry calls him.

[15:00] I love Tom Bombadil is my favorite character because he doesn't give a shit about anything.

[15:06] He's all powerful.

Dan McCoy

[15:07] It's like that famous internet video, Tom Bombadil don't give a shit.

[15:10] You know?

Elliott Kalan

[15:12] And there's the part where they're like, well, Tom Bombadil could imagine Sauron didn't exist

[15:18] and he'd be gone.

[15:18] Why don't we just give him the ring?

[15:19] And they'd be like, eh, he'd probably forget it somewhere.

[15:23] I love the idea of this absent-minded adorable god who just wanders around the woods.

Stuart Wellington

[15:29] I like that almost as much as fans of Tom Bombadil explaining why he couldn't just save the entire universe.

Dan McCoy

[15:38] Like, the people are like, well, you know, he only has control over this part of the woods.

Stuart Wellington

[15:43] They're like, come on, dude.

[15:45] It's not too far off from the argument about why they don't just give the fucking eagles,

[15:51] give Gwaihir and his buddies the ring and tell them to drop it off on their way by Mount Doom.

Elliott Kalan

[15:56] Who would give the eagles the ring so that they can record more shitty rock music?

Stuart Wellington

[16:01] They can create a world where people like Smuggler's Cove?

[16:05] Wait, so are you saying that if you give the members of the eagles, like, collectively,

[16:11] like, wrap it around them like a giant hula?

Elliott Kalan

[16:12] No, no, they each get it one day of the week.

[16:14] They have to share it, like a hockey trophy.

Stuart Wellington

[16:16] Joe Walsh wouldn't give it up.

[16:17] No, that's true.

[16:17] He would just hold on to it.

[16:19] But, so wait, if you gave the eagles the ring, it wouldn't just turn them invisible,

[16:23] it would give them additional powers, like if they're Sauron himself?

Elliott Kalan

[16:27] Yeah, exactly.

[16:28] Okay.

[16:28] Because they tap into the evil of music I don't like.

[16:32] Okay, wow.

[16:33] Even the one, even Hotel California, which is not a terrible song.

[16:36] It's not a good song.

[16:36] It's not a good song, but it's not the worst song.

[16:38] They then acousticized it and made it the worst song.

[16:42] Yeah.

[16:44] The Eagles.

[16:44] Okay.

[16:45] Anyway, let's talk about the Beagles.

[16:47] This is our music cast.

[16:48] Let's talk about the Beagles, a band that doesn't exist, but it does dog versions of Eagle songs.

[16:52] The Beagle Boys.

[16:53] Such as Hotel for Dogs, California.

[16:55] That is a mashup t-shirt just waiting to fucking happen.

[16:58] Okay, let's go back to this movie, Nine Lives.

[17:01] So, it follows the track of a lot of movies, which is the story of a businessman who doesn't make enough time for his family,

[17:09] and so magical X, Y, and Z happens, and he learns to spend time with his family.

[17:14] In this case, Kevin Spacey plays Brand, who is a-

[17:20] Tom Brand.

[17:21] Tom Brand.

[17:21] We decided to take a break from the politics of the day.

Stuart Wellington

[17:24] He's not Brand, the older brother from the fucking Goonies.

[17:27] Good point.

Elliott Kalan

[17:28] So, we decided, hey, let's take a break from the politics of the day and this presidential election we're not crazy about,

[17:34] and let's watch a movie about, oh, a rich businessman who's trying to build the tallest building,

[17:40] and he has a complicated relationship with his son.

Dan McCoy

[17:43] Oh, man, there's no way to escape it.

Elliott Kalan

[17:47] Oh, man.

[17:49] But anyway, and he puts his name on everything.

[17:51] So, he plays Tom Brand, who's a big businessman.

[17:55] What does his business do?

[17:56] A little bit of everything.

[17:57] But right now, what it's doing is building the tallest building in the Northern Hemisphere.

Stuart Wellington

[18:01] We're introduced to him as he jumps out of a plane while talking to his son, played by Robbie Amol.

Elliott Kalan

[18:07] Now, the movie opens with a swooshing camera movement, which literally goes from cats.

[18:13] He has a voiceover about how cats are shitty.

[18:15] Nobody likes cats.

[18:16] They suck.

Stuart Wellington

[18:16] We get to watch some YouTube videos of cats, and we're like, oh, that's great.

[18:19] And then-

[18:20] This is a fun thing I like to do.

Elliott Kalan

[18:22] We see cats playing with New York in the background.

[18:24] The camera zooms over the entire river under the Brooklyn Bridge or over it, straight up to a plane into the plane where Tom Brand is about to jump out as a promotional stunt.

[18:36] And to be honest, I got to applaud the audacity of a camera move that huge and that stupid.

[18:43] It's all done with CGI.

[18:44] Oh, wow.

[18:45] You're really going out on a limb here, Elliot.

[18:46] What?

[18:47] Sticking up for this camera move.

[18:49] Look, I like crazy camera moves sometimes.

[18:51] And when the movie started, the camera zooms all the way across into the city.

[18:57] Then we're introduced to a guy who then jumps out of an airplane to land on the top of his own building to talk about how he's going to make the tallest building.

[19:05] And this company in Chicago that's trying to make a taller building, forget about it.

[19:09] And everything looks super CGI, super green screen.

[19:12] And I was like, you know what?

[19:13] If they can keep up this style of forced, over-the-top artificiality throughout, at least it's going to be like a fun-looking movie.

[19:21] Yeah, it's going to be a real live-action cartoon of a film.

[19:23] Alas, it did not live up to that.

Stuart Wellington

[19:24] So Chicago's trying to beat New York again?

[19:28] And they're not going to win.

[19:28] What do they think?

[19:29] It's the fucking World's Fair in Chicago all over again?

Elliott Kalan

[19:32] I mean, well, the Chicago, you mean the Columbian Exposition?

[19:35] Because that was before the New York World's Fairs.

[19:37] That was 1893.

[19:39] The New York World's Fairs were in 1939 and 1964.

Stuart Wellington

[19:44] Well, which one was better and which one had more murders?

Elliott Kalan

[19:47] Well, there were way more murders at the 93 Columbian Exposition, as explained in Eric Larson's The Devil in the White City.

[19:54] Not the creator of the Savage Dragon, Eric Larson.

[19:58] And not the Eric Larson who was an animator for Disney roughly around the time of Robin Hood.

[20:02] Not Robin Hood, the actual person, but the movie Robin Hood from Disney.

[20:06] The Prince of Thieves.

[20:07] Yeah, no, not Prince of Thieves.

[20:08] The cartoon with the fox that all the girls had a crush on and they became furries when they grow up.

Stuart Wellington

[20:12] But Robin Hood was the Prince of Thieves.

[20:14] So you're partially right.

Elliott Kalan

[20:16] He was not the Prince of Thebes.

[20:18] No.

[20:19] Which was a different guy.

[20:20] What?

[20:21] Theseus?

[20:23] Or was it, was, where, Oedipus was it?

[20:25] Was he in Thebes?

[20:27] Dan?

[20:28] What?

[20:28] Who was in Thebes?

Dan McCoy

[20:31] Just a bunch of dudes.

[20:32] You're right.

[20:33] Bunch of dudes.

[20:33] Just a bunch of dudes.

Elliott Kalan

[20:34] Just a bunch of, like, real chill dudes.

[20:35] The 39 World's Fair did have a couple of killings.

[20:39] The 64, as far as I know, had nothing.

Stuart Wellington

[20:42] But the 64 was-

Elliott Kalan

[20:43] That's garbage.

[20:43] Losers.

[20:44] The 64 lacked the audacity of vision of the 39 and the 93.

[20:49] The 39, of course, is my favorite of all time.

[20:51] Truly the world of tomorrow.

[20:53] The 93, the White City, also beautiful.

[20:56] The 64 is kind of more like an amusement park than anything else.

[21:00] It did introduce Disney's animatronics with their Meet Mr. Lincoln attraction, which is now the Hall of Presidents.

Stuart Wellington

[21:06] Okay.

[21:07] Was that like one of them Chuck E. Cheese's?

Elliott Kalan

[21:10] Yes, it was a proto Chuck E. Cheese.

[21:12] Okay.

[21:12] Now imagine alternate worlds where instead of Nolan Bushnell using a robot mouse for his Chuck E. Cheese franchise.

[21:19] Because it was Nolan Bushnell, right, from Atari?

[21:21] Geez, I don't know.

[21:22] Why are you looking at me like that?

[21:24] Instead, Walt Disney started a pizza family restaurant that was called A.B. Link's Pizza.

[21:30] And it's Abraham Lincoln serving pizza.

Stuart Wellington

[21:31] Gonna have to take that name back out of the drawing board, I think.

[21:34] I know.

Dan McCoy

[21:35] I like that it was called Meet Mr. Lincoln.

[21:37] It was just like the animatronic was just a Mr. Lincoln who was like he had to sign autographs and pose for pictures.

[21:45] And for some reason, the robot was really annoyed about it.

Elliott Kalan

[21:48] He'd be like, can I get a picture with you, Mr. President?

[21:52] Ten bucks.

[21:53] Beep, boop, four score and ten bucks, please.

[21:57] Oh, wow.

[21:58] Actually, that would be a lot of money.

[21:59] That would be like ninety bucks.

[22:01] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[22:02] And it's just what, for the rest of that quote?

[22:04] What are you giving him ten bucks for?

[22:05] No, to take a picture with him.

[22:07] Oh, okay.

[22:08] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[22:09] For that cliffhanger to be resolved.

[22:12] It's like just a little bit of teaser.

Elliott Kalan

[22:13] It's like putting money in on a long distance call.

[22:16] Four score and ten dollars to continue.

[22:19] Okay, here's ten dollars.

[22:20] Seven years ago, hour, ten dollars.

[22:22] Oh, man.

[22:23] It's a short speech, but it's going to cost me so much.

Stuart Wellington

[22:26] Now, I think I want to check the tape because I think LA just said long discants instead of long distance.

[22:33] All right.

[22:33] Readers, readers, right in.

[22:35] Yeah.

[22:35] Right in.

[22:36] Readers of the transcript.

[22:37] Let us know.

Elliott Kalan

[22:39] Anyone who's looking at the closed captioning, let us know.

[22:42] So, he's obsessed with building the tallest building in the world.

[22:46] It's putting his control of his company on the line because the board of directors don't like it.

[22:50] And to be fair, the board of directors have a very strong case in that their company seems to be suffering under his obsession with building the tallest building in North America.

[22:59] Yeah.

[23:00] His son is trying to support him.

[23:02] And meanwhile, his vice president or second in command or whatever, Ian, is trying to undermine him.

[23:07] But all this construction talk, well, one, it points out that this is one of many children's films in which the creators of the film seem to be under the belief that kids love to watch corporate intrigue and doings.

[23:18] Yeah.

[23:18] That, like, kids have any understanding of what it means to lose control of a corporation or interest, to be honest.

Stuart Wellington

[23:25] Well, maybe this is some of the stuff that they slip into the movie for the adults to keep the adults interested.

[23:31] Yeah, because adults are very important.

Elliott Kalan

[23:32] I'm interested in the idea that someone has a controlling stock share of a company.

[23:37] But all this business is keeping away from his daughter.

[23:39] Now, he has two, possibly three children, Kevin Spacey.

[23:45] He has his son, who is a grown man who works at his company.

Stuart Wellington

[23:48] Robbie Amell, one half of Firestorm briefly on CW's The Flash.

[23:53] I think, yeah, it was just on The Flash TV show.

[23:55] Now, the-

[23:55] The other half being Victor Garber, of course.

Elliott Kalan

[23:57] Now, the ex-wife, his ex-wife Cheryl Hines has a daughter.

[24:00] It is never quite explained whether this is his daughter or not.

Stuart Wellington

[24:02] And we've talked about how Cheryl Hines is basically a professional ex-wife on TV and movie shows, right?

[24:06] Have we talked about that?

[24:08] I don't know, but that seems to be her job.

[24:10] Like, Judy Greer and her are going out for the same roles, I imagine.

Elliott Kalan

[24:15] Possibly, except they're very different.

[24:17] Well, I've said it before.

Stuart Wellington

[24:18] Judy Greer is the version of that role that's sympathetic.

Elliott Kalan

[24:21] Judy Greer has been so mistreated by Hollywood.

[24:24] She should be, like, the star of romantic comedies.

[24:27] And instead, she's always like-

[24:29] And by life, she should be my wife.

Dan McCoy

[24:32] Wow, this is Judy Greer.

Elliott Kalan

[24:33] This is an odd place to do a proposal.

Dan McCoy

[24:35] Judy Greer, if you're out there, look me up.

Elliott Kalan

[24:37] Any Greer.

[24:38] You'd take Pam Greer for sure.

[24:40] She's beautiful.

Dan McCoy

[24:41] I'd take Greer Garson.

[24:42] I don't even know who that is.

[24:43] She's dead.

Elliott Kalan

[24:44] She's been dead for years.

[24:45] Academy Award winner, I believe.

[24:47] She's long dead, but you'll take her.

[24:49] Yeah.

[24:50] You'll just take that sound.

[24:53] It's like a sexy cat.

[24:55] Is there any other kind?

[24:56] Yes.

[24:56] And it's in this movie.

[24:58] So anyway, what his daughter-

[24:59] But he also has-

[25:00] He's married to Jennifer Garner, and they have a young daughter.

[25:02] That daughter wants a cat more than anything else for her birthday.

[25:05] But Kevin Spacey hates cats.

[25:07] He doesn't want to buy her a damn cat.

[25:09] And he can buy anything in the world.

[25:11] He could buy her the rights to Garfield.

[25:13] He's so rich.

[25:13] And say, here's your cat.

[25:15] It's beloved by millions every day.

[25:17] Feed it lasagna.

[25:18] There you go.

Stuart Wellington

[25:19] He could certainly buy Jim Davis for a while.

Elliott Kalan

[25:22] At the very least, he could buy the rights to Heathcliff.

[25:25] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[25:25] It's super cheap.

[25:26] Oh, crazy cat.

[25:27] Although, whoever makes Heathcliff is some kind of mad genius who keeps turning in the strangest crap.

Elliott Kalan

[25:35] There's the part in the end of a lot of Heathcliff's where they're like, Nancy Gru from Kalamazoo, Michigan has a cat that likes to watch TV while eating crackers.

[25:45] Yeah.

[25:45] And it took me a long time to start thinking, wait a minute.

[25:48] I don't think these are real people with real cats.

[25:51] These might just be made up cats.

Stuart Wellington

[25:53] It was your loss of innocence?

[25:55] Yeah.

[25:56] Because you were masturbating in front of your parents.

Elliott Kalan

[25:59] Wait, what was I doing?

[26:01] That really sounds like it was more my parents' loss of innocence at that point.

[26:04] That I just walked out stroking it going, check this out.

[26:07] I'm doing this.

[26:07] I'm a big boy now.

[26:08] Hey, do you guys know about this?

[26:10] Have you heard of this?

[26:11] Have you seen this?

[26:12] It's pretty great.

[26:13] It feels great.

[26:13] Do you guys do this?

[26:15] How come no one's talking about this?

[26:17] You haven't done it.

[26:18] You should try this.

[26:19] This is amazing.

[26:21] Oh, boy.

[26:21] I gotta talk about this at school.

[26:23] I'm gonna patent this thing.

[26:26] I'm like the guy who discovered fire.

[26:28] Like, this is amazing.

[26:29] This is crazy.

Dan McCoy

[26:31] It's crazy.

[26:32] It's amazing.

[26:33] It's other Aerosmith songs.

Elliott Kalan

[26:34] Yeah, crying.

[26:36] Sweet emotions.

[26:40] Janie's got a gun.

[26:41] I got this.

[26:44] Anyway, so he says, fine, I'll buy her a cat.

[26:50] And due to a mix-up with his phone, he ends up being directed to a kind of a magical cat place called...

[26:57] A real Mr. McGoriam's Wonder Emporium of Cats.

[26:59] It's Mr. Feline-Oriam's Cat Emporium.

Stuart Wellington

[27:02] It's the kind of cool, caretiful store you could find in New York before Giuliani.

Elliott Kalan

[27:08] Before Giuliani ran out all the magic cat stores.

[27:12] Now, this was the moment when he's about to go to Perkins where I'm like, wait a minute.

[27:16] Christopher Walken's in this movie.

Stuart Wellington

[27:17] Why are you saying the name of the restaurant Perkins weird?

Elliott Kalan

[27:20] No, it's not the restaurant Perkins.

[27:22] It's Perkins.

[27:24] P-U-R-R-K-I-N-S.

[27:26] Which is, I assume, named after the cat version of Anthony Perkins.

Stuart Wellington

[27:29] How many people do you think go there and they're like, I can't wait to eat their chicken fried steak.

[27:34] And then get there and they're like, there's just cats here.

[27:37] I guess I'll have chicken fried cat.

Elliott Kalan

[27:43] Now, this is the moment where I was like, oh, Christopher Walken's in this movie.

[27:46] He's either going to be the crazy, mystical owner of this magic store, or he's the voice of the street smart cat who's going to teach Kevin Spacey the business once Kevin Spacey becomes a cat.

[27:55] No, he's the mystical owner of the toys of the cat store.

[27:58] Basically playing the same role he played in that Adam Sandler movie where he has the magic remote.

Stuart Wellington

[28:02] So wait, but the other version is the one that destroys scale models of country bears arenas, right?

[28:11] Yeah, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[28:12] Or is always mad at his money getting stolen by kangaroo jacks.

[28:16] Yeah.

[28:17] And I'll say this for Christopher Walken.

[28:20] He brings a sense of delight and fun to his role of magic cat store owner in this otherwise pretty lifeless movie.

[28:29] So he says, hey, I've got some, you don't find a cat.

[28:31] A cat finds you.

[28:32] Here's a cat.

[28:33] Say it like Christopher Walken.

[28:34] You don't find a cat.

[28:37] A cat finds you.

[28:42] Ooh.

[28:44] Period.

[28:46] End quote.

Stuart Wellington

[28:48] Yeah, so he runs a magic cat shop filled with a ton of cats.

Elliott Kalan

[28:51] There's three of every kind of cat.

Stuart Wellington

[28:54] Mm-hmm.

[28:54] Which.

[28:55] Just like Noah's cat art.

Elliott Kalan

[28:56] Well, it's kind of a thematic thing because later on there's a thing about a song called Three Cool Cats.

[29:00] Mm.

[29:01] Now, he goes, okay, I'll take this cat.

[29:04] I'll take this bowl.

[29:05] It says Mr. Fuzzy Pants on it.

[29:06] I guess that's my cat's slave name that I'm just going to thrust on it.

[29:10] He's known among his people he is Whiskers Clawbringer, but now he is Mr. Fuzzy Pants.

Stuart Wellington

[29:16] Yeah, it's that kind of innocuous choice you might make in a role-playing game only to find out later on that that will dictate the entire path of your life.

[29:24] Yeah.

[29:24] And you're going to be playing Mr. Fuzzy Pants for ten years.

Dan McCoy

[29:26] Like you come up with a stupid name like Lucian Buttwatcher.

[29:30] And you're like, that seemed funny in the moment, but overall, maybe I should have chosen something else.

Elliott Kalan

[29:35] Yeah, or you come up with a great name like Jeremy Scales Fang Battle and you're happy about it every day of your life.

[29:39] Mm-hmm.

[29:41] So, he gets a-

[29:42] Two paths, diversion, a forest.

[29:45] Yellow wood.

[29:46] Oh, sorry.

[29:46] And I took the road less traveled by and I got lost.

[29:51] Less traveled butt.

Stuart Wellington

[29:51] Please, save me.

[29:52] Someone save me.

[29:54] I'm lost in the woods.

[29:55] I see why nobody takes this path.

Elliott Kalan

[29:58] That's from Robert died of frost.

[30:00] Oh, boy.

[30:02] Sad, really.

[30:03] I mean, he did die eventually.

[30:04] Of frost.

[30:06] Don't we all.

[30:06] Frost, but.

[30:08] So, he gets this cat and then he's racing to the, he's racing to get to his daughter's birthday.

[30:13] Uh-oh.

[30:14] Ian, his second in command, calls him.

[30:16] They've got to meet now at the top of their new building.

[30:20] He rushes their cat in hand and-

Stuart Wellington

[30:22] Yeah, because he doesn't want to leave the cat in his sports car.

Elliott Kalan

[30:25] Only to be told, yeah, because someone might steal it.

[30:27] Yeah.

[30:27] Only to be told, I mean, you shouldn't leave a cat in a closed car.

Stuart Wellington

[30:30] Yeah, but you don't, like, he doesn't like cats.

[30:32] It is kind of weird that he takes it with him.

[30:34] Yeah.

[30:35] Maybe he wants to show the cat where he works.

Dan McCoy

[30:39] It's like, it's like a moment of male dominance.

[30:42] Here's the Nespresso machine cat.

Elliott Kalan

[30:44] Wait, what is that, coffee?

[30:46] Who's the, there's a stand-up who has a joke about, I mean, a long time ago, a stand-up

[30:51] who had a joke about the only time his cat has ever left the apartment is to go to the

[30:55] vet and get a thermometer put up his butt.

[30:58] And he realizes his cat sees him leave the, leave the apartment every day.

[31:02] Is that where his cat thinks he's going?

[31:04] And I don't remember who the, please write in if you remember what comic that is.

[31:08] Or if you are that comic.

[31:09] Or if you are that comedian, write in.

[31:10] And you're going to sue us.

[31:11] And tell, and no, I just like that, I didn't take credit for it.

[31:13] I like that joke.

[31:14] I love to give proper credit for it.

[31:15] I'm not the fat Jew.

[31:16] I'm a very skinny Jew.

[31:17] I give credit for jokes that I've stolen.

[31:20] Anyway.

Dan McCoy

[31:22] He goes to the top.

[31:23] I really thought you were going to say, I give credit where credit is due.

[31:25] Which I'm happy you didn't do.

Elliott Kalan

[31:27] That would have been so much better.

[31:28] That would have been so much better.

[31:31] He goes up to the top.

[31:33] A storm begins.

[31:34] And Ian's telling him, hey, look, the company is not going to build these buildings anymore.

[31:39] I'm going to fight you for control of the company.

[31:41] Blah, blah, blah.

[31:41] It starts to rain.

[31:43] Lightning.

[31:43] He gets knocked off the building, Kevin Spacey.

[31:46] And Ian chooses not to save him.

Stuart Wellington

[31:48] There's a moment where he's like, save me.

[31:51] He doesn't offer to not fire him.

[31:55] Which I think was a mistake.

Elliott Kalan

[31:55] That's a tactical error.

[31:56] He did say, I think you're fired, right?

[31:58] Yeah.

[31:58] He says, you're fired.

[32:00] Again, Trump.

[32:00] He says, it says you're fired.

[32:02] And he gets knocked off the roof.

[32:04] And the guy says, you know, he's about to save him, I guess, because Kevin Spacey's seen things you couldn't imagine.

[32:11] Z-beams glittering off whatever.

[32:13] And attack ships on fire.

Stuart Wellington

[32:15] That's that moment of fantasy, you know, that we all go through where, like, we're presented with that moment where the boss that fired us is dangling from the top of a building.

[32:23] And we can be like, we got the power now, boss.

[32:26] Like, you shouldn't have fired me from that brickwork job I had.

[32:30] I could have been the best Mason's assistant you've ever seen in this town.

[32:34] This seems very specific.

[32:35] Yeah, this seems like it's based on a real experience.

[32:37] I could have shoveled sand into that thing and made masonry junk for you whenever you wanted.

[32:42] I began to see why you were a bad Mason's assistant.

[32:44] I think I would have fired you, too.

Elliott Kalan

[32:46] Can I fire you now from this job?

Stuart Wellington

[32:49] Sorry, guys.

[32:49] I'm just working through some stuff.

[32:51] You know, I just got back from the Midwest.

[32:55] And, like, it was kind of a homecoming, but not really.

[32:58] Oh, real Elizabethtown.

[33:00] Yeah.

[33:01] Not far from Elizabethtown, right?

[33:03] And I met this girl named Kirsten Dunst.

[33:06] And she was like.

[33:07] And she was all like, did you like my performance in Melancholia?

[33:10] And I was like, yeah, it was pretty good.

[33:14] Were you in Spider-Man?

[33:15] And she's like, na doi.

[33:17] And I'm like, okay, weird.

[33:18] Chill out.

[33:20] And then what happened?

[33:22] Tell me more about your venture with Kirsten Dunst.

[33:24] Okay, well, I guess we'll have to yes in this situation.

[33:27] Is she Kirsten or Kristen?

[33:28] Kirsten.

[33:28] She's Kirsten.

[33:29] Ugh, I was wrong.

[33:30] Kirsten Dunst is a completely different actress.

[33:32] Ugh, and then there's Kirsten Dunst and Checks In, who is an orangutan.

[33:38] Do you think that Dunst and Checks In gets referenced more on movie podcasts or in real life?

Elliott Kalan

[33:45] I'm going to say movie podcasts.

[33:48] And it is very rare that someone goes, ugh, we're in a real Dunst and Checks In situation.

Dan McCoy

[33:52] It gets referenced a surprising amount at the Daily Show, I'll say.

[33:56] And it never gets put into scripts.

[33:58] Because we're like.

Elliott Kalan

[33:58] It does not surprise me.

Dan McCoy

[34:00] There's a lot of discussion.

[34:01] It's like, do we think Trevor knows Dunst and Checks In?

[34:04] Is that a South African reference that he would?

[34:07] No, I don't think so.

Stuart Wellington

[34:08] No, is that the one where Joey, Joey, that's not his character.

[34:12] That's the character he played.

[34:13] Matt LeBlanc plays baseball.

[34:15] No, that's Ed.

Elliott Kalan

[34:16] That's Ed.

[34:16] Dunst and Checks In, I think, has Jason Alexander.

[34:19] Jason Alexander is in it.

[34:20] It's set in a hotel, hence the Checks In of the title.

Dan McCoy

[34:22] And it's What's-Her-Face, who was in American Beauty later.

[34:27] Mina Suvari?

[34:28] No, the other one.

Elliott Kalan

[34:29] Oh, uh.

[34:30] Thora Birch.

[34:31] Yeah, Thora Birch.

[34:32] Thora Birch, yeah.

[34:33] From Ghost World.

[34:34] Now, not to be confused with the movie where Rene Russo has a pet gorilla, which I don't remember

[34:40] the name of.

[34:41] It was like George or something like that.

Stuart Wellington

[34:42] What about the movie where Whoopi Goldberg is a cop and her partner is a dinosaur?

[34:46] That's Theodore Rex.

[34:48] Now, what's the movie?

Elliott Kalan

[34:49] Which is also the name of a, it's also the biography of Teddy Roosevelt, the second in Edmund

[34:53] Morrison's, Ed, Morrison's, Edmund Morrison's brilliant trilogy.

Dan McCoy

[34:56] Which is the movie where there's a great ape that lusts after Elizabeth Shue.

[35:02] That's, uh.

[35:03] Is that Mighty Joey on the remake?

[35:05] No.

[35:06] Fine.

[35:07] Boom.

Elliott Kalan

[35:08] Done.

[35:08] Oscar winning performance.

[35:10] Done.

[35:10] All right.

[35:10] Tangent over.

[35:12] It was Charlize Theron who was in the remake of Mighty Joe Young, right?

Dan McCoy

[35:15] I'm thinking of a Richard Franklin movie.

[35:18] Who's Richard Franklin?

[35:19] He made, uh, Psycho 2 and Road Games.

[35:23] Oh, okay.

[35:24] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[35:25] Anyway, so, we were at the most exciting part of the movie.

[35:28] Kevin Spacey is dangling for his very life.

[35:31] He slips, falls, he has the cat in his hand.

[35:33] Ah!

[35:36] He's in a coma.

[35:37] Uh-oh.

[35:38] But he can see it all happening.

[35:40] He's in the body of the cat.

[35:42] Oh, no!

[35:43] Hijinks ensue.

[35:45] Incorrect.

[35:45] Hijinks, they continue to not ensue.

[35:48] It's like the movie, it keeps setting up scenarios in which the cat can do funny things and does not pay them off,

[35:54] and the cat just does cat things.

[35:55] Long story, he goes home.

[35:57] He manages to drown his sorrows in some 50-year-old Macallan.

[36:03] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[36:03] He tips into his ashtray and licks it up cat style.

Elliott Kalan

[36:06] Mm-hmm.

[36:06] He tries to use a pen to write a note explaining that to his family.

[36:12] He's been taken back to his family's apartment.

[36:13] And his family, his wife and his daughter, are taking the fact that he's in a life-threatening coma pretty well.

Stuart Wellington

[36:19] I mean, he was a bad dad, developer dad.

Elliott Kalan

[36:22] That's true.

[36:22] But, like, they never cry.

[36:25] Like, there's one part where the daughter's like, Mom, can I sleep in your bed tonight?

[36:28] She goes, okay.

[36:29] But, like, they seem to be going through the motions.

[36:31] It's like, is that the thing I'm supposed to do if my dad's in a coma?

Stuart Wellington

[36:35] Is this like a choose-your-own-adventure Barry Sonnenfeld movie where you're like, if I was Barry Sonnenfeld, I'd make them cry in every scene in their fucking garments.

Elliott Kalan

[36:44] If they're dealing with, like, someone they love is in serious, like, I've had family members, I've had a family member in a coma.

[36:53] It was terrible.

[36:54] Like, everyone was shaken.

[36:55] But they're like, ooh, this is really inconvenient that dad's in a coma.

Dan McCoy

[36:59] I think this is supposed to be a bit of an indication of, like, how estranged he is from the family.

[37:04] Like, you know, Jennifer Garner was thinking about leaving him secretly.

[37:09] The daughter-

[37:10] Was also thinking about leaving him.

[37:11] The daughter doesn't see him a lot, but also, like, she's being shielded from how serious it is.

[37:16] Like, she thinks, like, her dad's going to wake up.

Elliott Kalan

[37:18] I guess so.

[37:18] What about his son?

Dan McCoy

[37:21] His son, yeah.

[37:22] His son probably should be a little more upset.

Elliott Kalan

[37:23] I mean, he throws himself into work.

[37:24] They all just kind of, like, take it in stride.

[37:26] I mean, the thing is that it made it feel to me like they were heartless in addition to his being heartless.

[37:32] Yeah, where do you think they learned it, dude?

[37:34] Good point.

[37:35] Yeah, from watching you, Dad.

[37:36] I learned it from watching you.

[37:38] Adults who do drugs have kids who do drugs.

Stuart Wellington

[37:40] Speaking of which, this is a movie about cats and a bad dad, and yet Cats in the Cradle never shows up a single time.

[37:46] Not played.

[37:46] There was a point where a record-

[37:47] I'm guessing it was too expensive.

Elliott Kalan

[37:48] A record is being put on a record player, and one of you guys was like, it better not be Cats in the Cradle.

[37:56] So now he's a cat, which, I mean, according to the Aristocats would be great, because everybody wants to be a cat.

[38:03] I don't, though.

[38:04] Neither does Kevin Spacey.

[38:05] And he's got to learn how to-

[38:06] You'd be allergic to yourself.

[38:08] Yeah, that would be the worst.

[38:10] Yeah.

[38:10] That'd be terrible.

[38:11] It's like a weird Twilight Zone.

[38:12] Yeah, a real X-File.

[38:14] Yeah.

[38:15] You say X-File?

[38:15] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[38:16] So there's a-

[38:17] It's a non-technology-based black mirror.

[38:20] So we're introduced to this-

Stuart Wellington

[38:22] It's just called regular mirror.

[38:24] Yeah.

[38:25] We're introduced to this cat, and at first we're like, man, that's a really cute, fuzzy cat.

[38:29] And then they start doing a lot of physical comedy that involves a CGI version of that cat.

[38:35] A very CGI cat.

Dan McCoy

[38:36] And I love cats, and this cat started to annoy me a lot.

[38:39] I was like, if I had this cat-

Stuart Wellington

[38:40] The real one or the CGI cat?

Dan McCoy

[38:42] The CGI cat.

[38:43] Yeah, no shit.

[38:44] It's a CGI cat.

[38:45] It's garbage.

Stuart Wellington

[38:46] But it was also being a dick of a cat.

[38:49] It was like-

[38:50] It kept destroying that picture of George W. Bush, and you're like, no.

Elliott Kalan

[38:54] There's a picture of-

[38:55] America's hero.

[38:56] There's a picture of Kevin Spacey hanging out with George W. Bush, and it filled the niche

[39:02] that in 80s movies, if you saw someone in an office and they had a picture of Ronald

[39:06] Reagan on their desk, you'd be like, oh, that's the bad guy.

[39:08] He's heartless and he only cares about money.

[39:10] And looking back now, I just took it for granted as a kid.

[39:13] If you saw a picture of Ronald Reagan in someone's office, that's the villain.

[39:16] Because it always was.

[39:17] Looking back now, I'm like, he was president at the time.

[39:20] Like, that's crazy.

[39:21] You're like, this is liberal Hollywood.

[39:23] Yeah, but George W. Bush, it's the same shorthand.

[39:26] Like, oh, of course he's a guy who only cares about money.

[39:28] There's a picture of him with George W. Bush.

[39:30] There's a couple jokes in a row where he accidentally does more damage to his picture

[39:33] of him with George W. Bush.

[39:35] And it was like-

[39:35] Those were kind of funny.

[39:36] Those were kind of funny.

[39:37] There were a couple moments that were kind of funny because it was like, oh, yeah, that's

[39:40] like a joke.

[39:41] Or like, that's most of the weight of the joke.

[39:43] But he's, to make a long story short, so it's not a

[39:46] shaggy cat story.

[39:48] Kevin Spacey has to learn how to like, be a good cat and become part of this family

[39:53] and show them the love he didn't show them as a human.

[39:56] And there are a number of sequences.

[39:57] One where dogs are chasing him in the apartment.

[39:59] One where he has to sneak into a building because Ian, meanwhile, is trying to take control

[40:03] the company away from his son who has come up with a way that they can beat Chicago at the

[40:08] tallest building game.

[40:09] There are all these scenes that are like demanding the cat do funny things and they just don't.

[40:16] He just doesn't do funny.

[40:17] He just kind of walks into rooms or sneaks around or the dogs chase him and they just

[40:22] kind of run through hallways.

[40:23] There's no jokes.

Stuart Wellington

[40:24] There's a couple of really good scenes where they, like the humans are interacting and

[40:30] then it will cut to the cat as if they're like, now the cat is being contemplative or like

[40:36] really thinking hard.

[40:37] And it's crazy because it's just the face of a cat.

Elliott Kalan

[40:40] It's just zooming in on a cat's face.

[40:43] And the cat is not acting.

Stuart Wellington

[40:44] The cat's clearly thinking like, I'm so high on whatever kind of drugs they gave Mr. Ed.

Elliott Kalan

[40:51] No, the cat is thinking, I'm going to keep staring at the laser pointer that is being held

[40:57] steady right off camera so that I look in the same direction that I'm supposed to.

[41:02] And Christopher Walken gets called in.

[41:04] They find the cat rips his ad out of the yellow pages to show it to him.

[41:07] The cat is, you hear Kevin's.

[41:09] How about yellow pages, huh?

[41:11] Yes.

Stuart Wellington

[41:12] Did it get that from a museum or something?

Elliott Kalan

[41:15] Speaking as someone who is, for some reason, always having phone books tossed in front of

[41:19] his door without asking for them.

[41:21] Those still exist, I guess.

Dan McCoy

[41:24] You assume that a bunch of them were printed up 20 years ago and they're still just trying

[41:28] to get rid of them.

Stuart Wellington

[41:29] Yeah, yeah.

[41:30] You're not waiting out front saying, I'm an old person.

[41:33] No, no.

[41:33] There's a listing in here for Andrew Rooney.

[41:35] He died years ago.

Elliott Kalan

[41:38] What?

[41:39] This?

[41:39] Oh, I'm not going to tell that joke, I guess.

[41:43] There's a whole page of numbers for the offices at the World Trade Center.

[41:47] This phone book is out of date.

[41:50] So I did tell the joke in the end.

[41:51] But he's every way he can find to try to communicate that he's actually their husband slash father,

[41:57] Tom.

[41:57] He uses the magnets on the refrigerator.

[41:59] He spells out his name in yarn.

[42:02] And finally, he rips out the ad from the Yellow Pages and it's for Mr. Perkins, Christopher Walken,

[42:08] a cat whisperer.

[42:09] And they bring him in.

[42:10] He's the only guy who understands Kevin Spacey, can talk to him.

[42:15] And he says, you've got to figure out how you got into this mess and you've got to be a good

[42:19] cat.

[42:20] And you're going to.

[42:21] And at one point he says, you're going to have to be a good cat.

[42:25] And he's like, I'm not going to do it.

[42:26] I hate cats.

[42:26] Blah, blah, blah.

[42:27] And he goes, ma'am, I've noticed this cat hasn't been fixed.

[42:31] And Kevin Spacey is like, I'll be good.

[42:33] And it's like, oh, guys, in this kid's movie, the main character was just threatened with

[42:36] castration.

[42:37] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[42:38] Well, Anthony, yeah, his motivating characteristic is like, I don't want to not have a dick.

Elliott Kalan

[42:46] I mean, it's a basic human drive.

[42:48] No, sure.

[42:49] Although like.

[42:49] Even among women, it's called penis envy.

[42:52] Floyd invented that.

[42:53] He was wrong.

[42:54] But as a cat, I couldn't help but like.

[42:57] As a cat, I was offended by this.

[42:59] My life has never been better since I was fixed.

[43:02] I can do whatever I want with no consequences.

[43:05] Yeah.

[43:05] I don't have a litter of runcs chasing me around that I know of.

Dan McCoy

[43:09] That's the thing.

[43:10] Like, I guess it's.

[43:10] Yeah, it's just that.

[43:11] First of all, I guess I misspoke.

[43:13] It was just his testicles that would be taken.

[43:15] That's true.

Elliott Kalan

[43:15] Actually, I shouldn't have said castrated.

Dan McCoy

[43:17] Yeah.

[43:17] But secondly, like.

[43:19] Testiculated.

[43:20] You have to draw this line of thinking out further and think like, all right.

[43:25] So Kevin Spacey, I guess, is assuming that he's not going to get back into his own

[43:29] body if he cares that much about these cats' testicles?

[43:32] And then like, is he like thinking about the future?

[43:35] Is he going to.

[43:35] Is he thinking about like when he's going to want to fuck a lady cat?

Stuart Wellington

[43:39] That's absolutely what he's thinking.

[43:41] When he gets back.

[43:41] Because unlike when when his I guess at this point is she considered his ex-wife or still

[43:48] his wife at this point?

[43:49] Jennifer Garner.

[43:50] Yeah.

[43:50] When he's turned into a cat.

[43:51] They're still.

Elliott Kalan

[43:52] As far as they know, he's in a coma.

[43:53] They're still married.

[43:54] So he was cat married.

[43:55] He was cat married.

[43:55] He's still married.

[43:56] Slippery slope.

Stuart Wellington

[43:57] So his wife pours out some cat food for him and he is disgusted.

[44:03] So it would if using that log logic, you would assume that he would also be disgusted at

[44:07] the possibility of having sex with a female cat.

Elliott Kalan

[44:10] Hey, if you're that desperate, I don't know.

[44:12] It's like being in jail.

[44:13] You know, you find new things or being a pirate.

[44:15] You know, you didn't.

[44:17] What?

[44:17] You didn't think you'd be attracted to a hole in a barrel, but soon you're sticking your

[44:23] penis in it because it's all there is.

[44:24] That explains a lot about the fourth Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

[44:28] Now, look, you see a manatee now and you're like, ew, gross, because you see human women

[44:33] all the time.

[44:34] When you're out with Blackbeard's crew, you see a manatee, you're like, it's the same

[44:38] vague shape as a person.

Stuart Wellington

[44:40] And the thing is, dude, back in that day, like that was what was attractive in a lady.

Elliott Kalan

[44:45] Yeah, that's why she had a tail and could eat seaweed.

[44:49] Well, mermaids had tails, too.

[44:52] Well, that's where the mermaids came from because they looked at manatees with their eye

[44:54] patch goggles and they saw them as beautiful women.

Stuart Wellington

[44:57] Yeah, but I mean, at the time, a woman with a healthy upper lip and kind of a grayish cast

[45:04] to her skin was what was popular.

Elliott Kalan

[45:06] Oh, yeah.

[45:06] Well, that meant you were rich because you never saw the sun.

[45:08] You could stay inside all day.

Stuart Wellington

[45:10] And that upper lip meant that you had a mustache.

Elliott Kalan

[45:13] Now, Dan, it's interesting that you mentioned human-cat marriage, because what this movie

[45:18] reminded me of more than anything else was a short story called My Father the Cat by

[45:22] Henry Slezar that I first...

[45:24] Starring Gerard Depardieu.

[45:25] Yeah.

[45:25] That I first...

[45:26] And Katherine Heigl in a bathing suit as a 14-year-old.

[45:29] But that I first encountered in a book called 101 Creepy Little Creature Stories that, as a

[45:35] kid, was...

[45:36] That and a short story book called Cosmic Creatures, I think, were two big building blocks

[45:41] for my interest in fantastic fiction and weird fiction, you might say.

[45:45] And it's this story about...

Stuart Wellington

[45:46] That led you right to Gunter Grass and Salman Rushdie.

Elliott Kalan

[45:49] Oh, yeah.

[45:49] It was right from that to the tin drum and the ground beneath her feet.

[45:54] But no, that came out.

[45:55] That was over.

[45:56] It's a book...

[45:57] Most of the stories in the book were like your basic horror stories where it was like,

[46:00] they say this part of the jungle has a monster.

[46:03] Eh, that's crazy.

[46:04] Q monster kills somebody.

[46:05] That's the end of the story.

[46:07] This was about a guy who is the son of a cat, a male cat and a human woman.

[46:12] And they raise...

[46:13] And the cat is very cultured.

[46:15] And they raise him in this kind of cultured, either English or French countryside.

[46:19] I think it's the French.

[46:20] And he goes off into the world.

[46:21] He meets another...

[46:22] He meets a girl and he falls in love.

[46:23] And he takes her home.

[46:24] And he's not sure how to broach the fact that his dad is a cat.

[46:29] And his dad, sensing this, pretends to be just a regular cat.

[46:33] And allows the woman to...

[46:36] Allows this fiancé to pet him and treat...

[46:38] And he, instead of eating at the table like he normally would,

[46:41] eats out of a dish on the floor.

[46:42] And the son is so heartbroken that his dad is having to demean himself

[46:48] in order to not scare away the woman that his son loves.

[46:52] And it's like, I found it to be a really touching story.

[46:54] And somehow, this movie reminded me of that story.

[46:57] And I was like, oh, so it is possible to find emotion in a story about a talking cat.

[47:01] But this movie didn't manage to do it.

[47:03] Anyway.

Dan McCoy

[47:03] Then there was a funeral outside.

[47:04] And the cat goes, and now I'm the king of the cats.

[47:07] And he shoots up the chimney.

Elliott Kalan

[47:08] I know what.

[47:14] Anyway, to get back to Nine Lives.

[47:16] I apologize.

[47:17] That was a tangent on my part.

[47:18] To get back to Nine Lives, yes, he wants to have sex with a cat.

[47:21] His big worry, of course, is that...

[47:23] The same worry any cat has.

[47:24] That paint will fall on his back and a skunk will try to rape him.

[47:29] Because that's a danger cats live with every day.

Dan McCoy

[47:33] Yeah.

[47:33] It's not funny, guys.

[47:35] We shouldn't laugh at it.

Elliott Kalan

[47:35] No, it's not funny at all.

[47:37] The same way that when you see a movie where the bad guy at the end is raped by a gorilla,

[47:41] that is not funny.

[47:43] Sorry, Trading Places.

[47:44] The punishment did not fit the crime.

Dan McCoy

[47:47] The crime being some sort of orange futures fraud.

Elliott Kalan

[47:53] Yeah.

[47:53] Like, oh, the crime was I tried to push Dan Aykroyd out of this company.

[47:59] Like, that didn't call for him to be violated by an animal?

[48:03] Come on.

[48:04] Come on.

[48:05] Come on.

[48:06] Yeah, while Al Franken watches.

[48:09] And Tom Davis, right?

[48:11] Was it both Franken and Davis?

[48:12] I don't remember.

[48:13] I think it's Franken.

[48:13] Maybe I'm wrong.

[48:14] Maybe it's not Franken and Davis.

Stuart Wellington

[48:15] And the whole Pepe Le Pew thing clearly inspired an entire generation of beta males to just follow

[48:21] women around until they eventually give in.

[48:24] Is that what a beta male is?

[48:26] I mean, I've never heard that term before.

[48:28] Is that a real thing?

Dan McCoy

[48:28] Sort of straight line from Pepe Le Pew to Gamergate, guys.

[48:31] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[48:32] I don't know that much about internet stuff, dude.

[48:34] I feel like that could be your doctoral thesis from Pepe Le Pew to Gamergate.

[48:38] A half century of male misogyny.

[48:40] Yeah.

[48:41] A half century of hostile privilege.

[48:43] Yeah.

[48:44] So, a lot of this Tom the Cat trying to build a relationship.

[48:50] Oh, I just get it now.

[48:51] Oh.

[48:52] Trying to build a relationship with his wife and daughter.

[48:55] We realize a symbolic thing is a video his daughter loves to watch of he and her dancing

[49:01] together when she was young to a song called Three Cool Cats.

[49:05] And he's like.

[49:05] Do kids like to watch that shit?

[49:08] I mean, kids like to watch videos.

[49:09] I guess is that the moment where you're like.

Dan McCoy

[49:11] I don't feel like kids are like.

[49:13] I mean, like, nostalgia is like this desire for a simpler time earlier in their life.

[49:17] I guess so.

Elliott Kalan

[49:17] But kids like to see videos and pictures of themselves when they were younger.

Dan McCoy

[49:21] All right.

[49:21] So, I think so.

[49:22] Even when they're like a.

Stuart Wellington

[49:22] Like a.

[49:23] She was like a preteen, right?

[49:25] Like, was she old enough to be like.

[49:27] She was a tween.

[49:27] In the movie.

[49:28] She's tween.

[49:29] Okay.

[49:29] So, she's probably not at the point where she's like, I hate myself and everything and my dad

[49:33] and this cat.

Elliott Kalan

[49:34] No, but it was the one moment where I was like, oh, okay, she's dealing with.

[49:37] She's somehow trying to cope with the fact that he might be leaving her.

[49:40] Oh, I guess that makes sense.

[49:40] And dying is that.

[49:41] She's watching these videos of happier times.

Stuart Wellington

[49:43] I'm just trying to figure out why she's watching this stupid video.

Elliott Kalan

[49:46] And Kevin Spacey, the cat, is like, oh, you know what?

[49:48] I'll play with her and be a good cat.

[49:50] And he's become, he's like, you know what?

[49:53] I turn over a new leaf.

[49:54] I'm going to be a good cat.

[49:55] I'm nice to everybody.

[49:56] There's a weird scene where he's watching Jennifer Garner get undressed and thinking about how

[50:00] beautiful she is.

[50:01] And she snuggles up with him.

[50:02] That's not that weird at all.

Stuart Wellington

[50:02] I mean, I feel like if any of us were turned into.

[50:05] It's only.

[50:06] If we were.

[50:06] If you were turned into a cat, are you telling me that you would not stalk your wife around

[50:11] and watch her at her most intimate moments?

Elliott Kalan

[50:13] I mean, I, right.

[50:15] I mean, now I like to watch her on this.

[50:17] Come on.

Stuart Wellington

[50:17] Answer the questions, sir.

Elliott Kalan

[50:18] You're right.

[50:19] If I was a cat, I would become a voyeur.

[50:22] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[50:22] You would use your ability to go into the bathroom while your wife takes a poop.

[50:26] Okay.

[50:28] No.

Elliott Kalan

[50:29] I need you to answer honestly on this.

[50:31] I've switched sides on this.

[50:33] Oh, yeah.

[50:34] That really, that was the Comey letter of cat stories.

[50:37] I'm turning against Stuart.

[50:38] Really, really swayed the vote on that one.

[50:42] Now, I think Stuart's a monster.

[50:44] Now, what I like is you mentioned it was one of my cat abilities to walk into a certain

[50:49] area.

[50:50] So, is that a superpower cats have?

Stuart Wellington

[50:52] If you hit the L bumper, you turn into a specter for a little while.

[50:56] You can't enter bathrooms.

[50:57] You can't take damage.

Elliott Kalan

[50:58] You can't take damage.

[51:00] So, he becomes a good cat.

[51:02] Unfortunately, he's running out of time, both because his company is being taken away from

[51:06] his son and because his male, his human male, his human body is dying.

[51:10] And so, there's only one thing left to do because the opening-

[51:15] Dance.

[51:16] Oh, shit.

[51:17] I mean, it does.

[51:18] It's because the opening of the building is coming soon.

[51:23] And Ian, the evil vice president of the company, is stealing control.

[51:27] He's already fired Tom's son somehow.

[51:30] Even though Tom has a document somewhere that he has to find.

Dan McCoy

[51:33] Yeah, Tom's son has a document showing that he has 51% of the company, just like his

[51:38] dad did, that it passes to him.

[51:41] But somehow, that doesn't matter.

[51:44] He has goons remove him from the building and he's fired.

Elliott Kalan

[51:48] Meanwhile, the daughter takes the cat back to Mr. Perkins.

[51:53] She's like, I want to return this cat.

[51:54] And he goes, are you sure you want to?

[51:56] It's defective.

[51:56] This cat's defective.

[51:57] I want to return the unused portion for a partial refund.

[52:01] You can just get store credit.

[52:03] And Christopher Walken says, let me put on a song and I'm going to walk out of the room.

[52:06] He puts on the Three Cool Cats record and she dances with the cat, mostly in slow-mo.

[52:11] And there's a lot of shots from her point of view looking down.

[52:14] So you have a CGI cat looking up at you kind of lovingly as it dances with you and it's super creepy.

Stuart Wellington

[52:22] Yeah.

[52:22] Do you think the director went into the VFX booth and was like, no, no, no.

[52:27] I want it to look more excited to be dancing.

[52:31] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[52:32] I want it to look like there's this...

[52:34] I want a weird, like, almost sexual tension between this cat and this small girl.

[52:40] Can I get that?

[52:41] Who is the cat's daughter?

[52:43] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[52:43] Is that possible?

[52:44] It was very weird.

[52:45] Yeah.

[52:45] It's animal magnetism, dude.

[52:47] You can't control it.

[52:47] Literally.

[52:48] Now, as somebody who's worked retail for a long time, I wish I had seen this movie so that

[52:55] when people tried to fucking return shit, like when I was working at Radio Shack...

[52:58] You just put on a record, walk out of the room.

[53:00] Oh my God.

[53:01] When I was working at Radio Shack, fucking people would bring back their shitty landline phones

[53:05] they bought.

[53:06] And I'm like, why did you buy this, dude?

[53:08] I know it's going to be garbage.

[53:09] You bought a landline phone at Radio Shack.

[53:13] That didn't sway them.

[53:14] If only I could have just popped a fucking little record on them.

[53:17] That didn't sway them.

Elliott Kalan

[53:19] What were you thinking, dude?

[53:22] Can I return this?

[53:23] That was a stupid thing to buy, moron.

[53:25] Get out of here.

Stuart Wellington

[53:25] If I could slap a little fucking seven inch on a turntable and just be like, I'll be back

[53:31] behind the beaded curtain at this Radio Shack.

Elliott Kalan

[53:34] And then you dance along in your own Christopher Walkanyway.

[53:37] In the adult section of this Radio Shack.

[53:41] Because they sell what?

[53:42] Fleshlights?

[53:44] I mean, that is a market that would have saved their company.

Stuart Wellington

[53:47] They sell transistors that look like boobs.

Elliott Kalan

[53:50] Yeah, I mean...

Stuart Wellington

[53:51] So what I'm saying is, if I had learned that, I probably would have been more successful at

[53:59] my Radio Shack.

Elliott Kalan

[54:00] So she says, no, I don't want to return this cat.

[54:03] But they're running out of time.

[54:04] And at this point, she believes this cat is her dad.

[54:07] And she's got to get it back to her dad's body.

[54:09] So she's rushing to the hospital.

[54:11] Meanwhile, the dad's body is dying.

[54:12] And the building is being announced.

[54:14] And the son, he's going up to the building for what he says will be his first and last

[54:19] jump.

[54:19] And now the movie opened with Kevin Spacey jumping out of an airplane with a parachute.

[54:24] And he asks his son, want to do this?

[54:25] And the son's like, nah, I don't want to.

Stuart Wellington

[54:27] I'm a little baby.

[54:28] I'm too scared.

[54:29] Oh, I can't do what George H.W. Bush does all the time.

[54:33] Jump out of aeroplane.

[54:34] Oh, what is this?

[54:36] High flying hair?

Elliott Kalan

[54:37] Oh, no.

[54:37] High flying hair wasn't.

[54:39] That wasn't a plane one, was it?

[54:40] I don't know, man.

[54:41] Was that the one where he jumps?

[54:42] He's in the.

[54:42] He jumps off of the.

[54:44] Or that's high dive hair I'm thinking of.

[54:46] What's the one where he's in the plane and the gremlin attacks the plane?

[54:49] Oh.

[54:49] That's fucking Twilight Zone the movie, dude.

[54:51] No, it's also a Bugs Bunny cartoon.

Dan McCoy

[54:52] Is that a Bugs Bunny cartoon and not a private snafu?

Elliott Kalan

[54:56] It's a Bugs Bunny cartoon.

[54:57] All right.

[54:58] And it ends with the plane is crashing for about.

[55:01] It's falling.

[55:01] It's plummeting for about 45 seconds.

[55:04] And then it stops a feet of like a foot away from the ground.

[55:07] It's like, oh, add a gas.

[55:08] And he says, oh, these A cards, you know.

[55:11] And it's like, you're going to end this on a joke about wartime rationing.

[55:14] That's not going to last the test of time.

[55:16] Come on, Bob Clampett, whoever directed this.

[55:20] Anyway, who knows?

[55:23] They thought the lower were the last one.

[55:24] They've had the ghost of Bob Clampett.

Stuart Wellington

[55:26] No, a blue Clampett he's called.

[55:28] I brought this up when we were watching the movie.

[55:31] But what is this little girl's end game?

[55:35] Is she planning on.

[55:36] She's going to stuff that cat down Kevin Spacey's throat.

[55:38] She's going to reverse Buster Poindexter, that cat.

[55:41] I'll tell you some dark side of the movie.

[55:43] And maybe it'll like start working the gears in there.

Elliott Kalan

[55:48] No.

[55:48] And it turns out, so I thought she was have to combine the body with the cat too.

[55:53] Au contraire, that's not how it works.

[55:54] Or like if they touch themselves.

[55:56] If they touch themselves and they're like, get a load of this.

[56:00] Have you seen this?

[56:01] It's amazing.

[56:03] And I can do it all the time whenever I want.

Stuart Wellington

[56:06] Maybe if she like smashed the cat into Kevin Spacey's body,

[56:09] they'd like morph together like Ron Silver in Time Cop.

Elliott Kalan

[56:12] In Time Cop.

[56:13] When it turned into like a goop that disappears.

[56:16] I mean, that's better than being in a coma, right?

[56:20] Anyway, but what happens is, so when Kevin Spacey's son didn't want to jump out of the plane with him,

[56:25] Kevin Spacey gave him a parachute with a note that said,

[56:27] for what, when you become a man, when you, if you, when you feel like you're man enough.

[56:31] When you're a man.

[56:31] When you're man enough or something.

[56:33] And so the son is going to the top of the building.

[56:36] It looks like he's going to jump to his death as a way of, I guess, getting out of his.

Stuart Wellington

[56:40] I assume, because he's up there wearing a suit and no parachute.

Elliott Kalan

[56:43] And that's the only way out of this predicament.

[56:45] He's shamed his family.

[56:46] He's lost everything.

Stuart Wellington

[56:47] Yeah, he's failed his father.

Elliott Kalan

[56:48] And now, I guess, at least his death will ruin the grand opening of this building.

[56:53] Mm-hmm.

[56:54] But the dad gets to the building on time in cat form and gets to the, he's almost tased by security guards,

[57:02] but that doesn't happen.

[57:03] He run, he gets captured by the goons, but Christopher Walken manages to save him in a scene in which

[57:09] we expected Christopher Walken to shoot someone.

[57:13] But he manages to get to the roof and he goes, no, son, don't jump.

[57:16] The son jumps wearing nothing but a suit.

[57:19] He's plummeting.

[57:20] He's plummeting.

[57:21] Cut to, he's got a parachute on his back all of a sudden.

[57:24] The cat jumps after him and tries to save him by grabbing onto a wire.

[57:28] The wire's not long enough.

[57:29] It snaps the cat back in a move that would have killed a cat.

[57:32] The cat's neck would have broken like Gwen Stacy falling off the George Washington Bridge

[57:36] when Spider-Man tries to save her.

[57:38] I know it's drawn to look like the Brooklyn Bridge, but in the dialogue, they say George

[57:41] Washington Bridge.

Stuart Wellington

[57:42] Yeah, it's worse than Curiosity in that it would have killed the cat.

[57:47] In the cat-killing business?

[57:48] Yeah.

[57:50] You're welcome, guys.

[57:51] I'm Curiosity Jones in the cat-killing business.

[57:53] Thank you for that.

Dan McCoy

[57:54] And business is good.

Elliott Kalan

[57:54] No, no, no.

[57:55] You're welcome, dudes.

Dan McCoy

[57:56] No, there was no thanks.

[57:58] No thanks proffered.

Elliott Kalan

[57:59] But they are plummeting, plummeting, plummeting.

[58:01] He opens the parachute.

[58:03] Yeah!

[58:04] And the cat is like, I guess you were man enough the whole time.

Stuart Wellington

[58:07] The cat-

[58:08] Then he fucking Hans Gruber's his way down.

Elliott Kalan

[58:10] Well, he parachutes down.

[58:11] The cat plummets to its death.

[58:13] And at that moment, Kevin Spacey's soul jumps back into Kevin Spacey, which means that all

[58:19] Kevin Spacey had to do was die, and he would have jumped back into his body.

[58:23] Well, okay.

Dan McCoy

[58:23] It was a sacrifice.

[58:25] Death, though.

[58:25] Oh, yeah.

[58:26] You're right, actually.

Elliott Kalan

[58:27] Chris Walken tells him that to show you care about your family, you have to sacrifice yourself.

[58:31] Now, had the cat not jumped off the roof, it would have changed nothing.

[58:36] He didn't really- I guess it was in the thought that counts that he was trying to save his

[58:40] son.

[58:41] But his son would have-

Stuart Wellington

[58:42] So wait, are you arguing like a Indiana Jones-

[58:44] It's a Raiders type thing.

[58:46] Yeah, Raiders of the Lost Ark.

[58:47] So that if he was never turned into a cat, the same result would have happened.

[58:52] I'm not saying that.

Elliott Kalan

[58:53] I'm saying if the cat didn't show up at the building and jump off the roof to try to

[58:57] save him, he would have been fine, because he has a parachute that was invisible until

[59:01] it was needed for the plot.

Stuart Wellington

[59:02] Yeah, it's not like he carried the parachute up on his little cat back or cat face.

[59:06] No, not on his cat face.

Elliott Kalan

[59:08] Which is what?

[59:09] North Face's pet line?

Stuart Wellington

[59:10] Cat face?

[59:11] What happens when the hero from Trigun wants to be extra sassy?

[59:14] His face morphs into a little cat.

Elliott Kalan

[59:17] That's Dick Tracy's new villain, Cat Face.

[59:19] Yeah.

[59:19] Like, no, no, no.

[59:20] It's just a girl on Halloween dressed up as a sexy cat.

[59:23] Sure.

[59:24] Ah, Cat Face, your crime is over.

[59:25] Bang, bang, bang.

[59:26] He stole all this candy.

[59:27] No, it was given to me at the Halloween party I went to.

[59:31] But yeah.

[59:32] And so he lands with the parachute.

[59:34] He reveals, hey, I have this paper that says that I control the company, and Ian, you're

[59:39] fired.

[59:39] And this building is great.

[59:41] Chicago may have beaten us with the tallest building, but this is the tallest building anyone's

[59:45] ever base jumped off of.

[59:48] Yeah.

[59:48] I guess the Guinness World Records guy is like, ha ha, a fine point to make, lad.

[59:53] I'll put it in me book.

Stuart Wellington

[59:54] Yeah.

[59:55] That's the Guinness World Records guy.

[59:57] Yeah.

[59:57] Basically, he did the whole thing just so that he could get a hold of the microphone and reveal

[1:00:01] that he has, what, the deed to the building?

[1:00:04] What was that piece of paper he had?

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:05] He has a piece of paper, I guess, that shows that he gets the 51% of the company that his

[1:00:10] dad had.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:10] Yeah.

[1:00:11] It's a magic piece of paper.

[1:00:12] It's the movie ending piece of paper.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:15] Yeah.

[1:00:16] And so everyone's okay.

[1:00:18] Kevin Spacey is alive again.

[1:00:21] But the bad guy, Ian, as he's walking away angry on his cell phone trying to get a new

[1:00:26] job, he's hit by a car.

[1:00:28] Suddenly, his body ends up, his soul ends up inside of a cat.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:31] Not just any cats, too.

[1:00:33] Who is he?

[1:00:34] He is movie and internet celebrity, Little Bub.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:38] A cat I did not recognize.

[1:00:40] Which is insane, dude.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:41] But Stuart was like, Little Bub!

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:43] Little Bub!

[1:00:44] Amazing!

[1:00:45] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:46] He had his autograph book out and we had to tell him, Stu, Stu, he's just on the television.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:50] You can't get his autograph.

[1:00:52] I kept trying to force it into the speaker of Dan's sound bar.

[1:00:55] He was like, let me pet this kitty cat.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:57] Oh, he feels like a TV screen.

[1:00:59] So smooth.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:00] Yep.

[1:01:01] I tried to break the screen to release Little Bub because he was trapped in there.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:06] He's trapped in that glass box.

[1:01:07] What is he?

[1:01:08] Tilda Swinton?

[1:01:09] Get him out of there.

[1:01:11] And then they go to Mr. Perkins to get a new cat.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:17] They give him the same cat.

[1:01:18] They give him the same cat.

[1:01:19] The cat came back the very next day.

[1:01:22] Yeah.

[1:01:22] Just like the song.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:23] Just like the Canadian animation.

[1:01:25] I thought they were going to give the little Bub cat to them.

[1:01:29] So he could, what, torture it?

[1:01:31] Yeah.

[1:01:31] I guess.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:32] And then they make a joke like, first thing we're going to do is chop its dick off.

[1:01:37] And the cat would look at the camera and go, credits roll.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:40] Yep.

[1:01:40] But no, it ends on Kevin Spacey requesting a dog.

[1:01:44] That would have been great.

[1:01:45] We got to get this cat fixed.

[1:01:47] And the cat just looks at the camera and goes, meow.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:49] And then he goes, bam.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:51] Bam, bam.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:52] The sound of like a katana being sharpened.

[1:01:55] That's the credits roll.

[1:01:57] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:59] I would have loved it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:01] Yeah.

[1:02:02] That's pretty much nine lives.

[1:02:02] And that's nine lives.

[1:02:03] That is nine lives.

[1:02:05] Were there any bloops in the credits?

[1:02:07] I didn't see any.

[1:02:07] We didn't wait for him to see any bloops.

[1:02:09] No.

[1:02:09] I got to say, I was disappointed at how little fun they had with cats doing stuff.

[1:02:15] It was pretty, it was not, nobody put a lot of effort into this movie, let's just say.

[1:02:19] Yeah.

[1:02:19] It looks like it was shot for television, except for those big zooming shots.

[1:02:24] Everyone's just kind of phoning it in.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:26] And I think it, I think it kind of highlights how as computer special effects have become

[1:02:33] cheaper and easier to do, a little bit less thought goes into practical stuff, i.e.

[1:02:39] like, what can we get this cat to do that would actually be funny or make for an interesting

[1:02:45] scene.

[1:02:46] Like, having limitations and having to work within a specific sandbox, I think would have

[1:02:51] made this movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:53] To play devil's catficant.

[1:02:55] Sure.

[1:02:56] I did feel better knowing that this was a fake cat and that a real cat had not been tortured

[1:03:01] into doing silly things on camera.

[1:03:04] And you don't like cats.

[1:03:05] I don't like cats, but I also don't like living things being put through pain.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:08] I mean, I think there's ways that you could have made a cat do funny things that didn't

[1:03:11] involve, like, flipping it over and stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:14] No, that's true.

[1:03:15] Flipping it over like a pancake?

[1:03:16] Like a tortoise.

[1:03:19] Yeah.

[1:03:19] I mean, you shouldn't do that to tortoises either.

[1:03:21] No, I know.

[1:03:22] They don't like that.

[1:03:23] That's cruel about it.

[1:03:24] But, like, there was a lack of invention and a lack of imagination in this movie about,

[1:03:31] it felt very, this was your basic by the numbers, busy businessman gets put in a cat's body while

[1:03:37] he's trying to build the tallest building in the Northern Hemisphere movie.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:40] We're there already, but I just want to make it official.

[1:03:43] Final judgments.

[1:03:44] Whether this is a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie you kind of like.

[1:03:48] Elliot, what do you have to say?

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:49] A bad, bad movie?

[1:03:50] It's not good enough to be a good, bad for me.

[1:03:52] If you want to see a good, bad Talking Cat movie, you go see a Talking Cat.

[1:03:56] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:56] Yeah, I was hoping to save this for recommendations, but yeah, just watch a Talking Cat.

[1:04:01] This was a bad, bad movie.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:03] You guys are going to think I'm brain damaged.

[1:04:05] You kind of liked it?

[1:04:06] I kind of liked this movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:07] Hey, I kind of liked Independence Day Resurgence.

[1:04:09] I can show no superiority to anybody.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:12] I like cats, and I like big goofiness.

[1:04:16] And this movie had a lot of goofiness.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:18] This was one of the few movies, usually Dan is Mr. I don't care about the plot, let me

[1:04:22] play Sonic the Hedgehog on my iPad, whatever.

[1:04:24] Where's my dinner?

[1:04:25] Let me deal with that for 35 minutes.

[1:04:27] But this was one of the few movies where we were talking and Dan was like, wait, what's

[1:04:32] going on with the paperwork?

[1:04:33] Guys, we've got to figure out what's happening with the plot.

[1:04:37] He was much more invested in the plot and figuring it out than I expected he would be.

[1:04:42] I didn't want the building to be taken away from them.

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:46] And it's got a great supporting cast in addition to this cat.

[1:04:49] Oh, sure.

[1:04:49] You've got Christopher Walken, Robbie Amell, Cheryl Hines.

[1:04:52] Cheryl Ketchup Hines.

[1:04:53] You've got Teddy Sears.

[1:04:55] Who's that?

[1:04:57] He was Jay Garrick from The Flash.

[1:05:00] He's like barely in the movie, though.

[1:05:01] Yeah, but I mean, just enough.

[1:05:03] You get a taste.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:03] Yeah, just a little.

[1:05:04] You just wet your beak out of it a little bit.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:06] Yeah, it's like tossing a little bit of salt in that stew.

[1:05:09] Mm.

[1:05:10] Stew.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:10] Mm-hmm.

[1:05:10] But to say that there's a time maybe like 10 or 15 years ago when if you said Kevin Spacey

[1:05:16] and Christopher Walken are making a movie together, I'd be like, this is going to be amazing.

[1:05:20] And now I just kind of take it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:21] Like Jackie Chan and Jet Li are in a movie together.

[1:05:22] Yeah.

[1:05:22] And you're like, this is going to be amazing.

[1:05:24] And then they're like, but the real star is this dopey white kid.

[1:05:27] And you're like, oh.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:27] Yeah, exactly.

[1:05:29] Jackie Chan, Honorary Academy Award winner, by the way.

[1:05:32] Is he?

[1:05:33] Yeah.

[1:05:33] So I hope Dan will from now on be able to remember whether he's seen him in a movie or not.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:38] Nope.

[1:05:39] Can't make any promises.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:46] Podcasts.

[1:05:47] Podcasts.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:47] Podcasts.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:48] They're audio programs that tell smart stories.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:51] In innovative ways.

[1:05:53] Using editing techniques like this.

[1:05:54] Like this.

Dan McCoy

[1:05:56] But let's face it.

[1:05:58] All that smart stuff can be exhausting.

[1:06:01] That's where Stop Podcasting Yourself comes in.

[1:06:03] It's so stupid.

[1:06:04] It's just two stupid dinguses.

S4

[1:06:06] Being dumb idiot jerks for 90 minutes.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:09] Stop Podcasting Yourself.

[1:06:11] The stupid show that smart people love.

[1:06:14] Find it on iTunes or MaximumFun.org.

S4

[1:06:18] Are you in need of a shakeup?

[1:06:21] Max Fun Con is our annual comedy and creativity festival and it changes lives.

[1:06:26] Max Fun Con West returns to Lake Arrowhead next June.

[1:06:30] And Max Fun Con East is back in the Poconos next September.

[1:06:33] Tickets for both are on sale right now.

[1:06:36] And they will sell out.

[1:06:37] Visit MaxFunCon.com to buy your tickets today.

[1:06:40] We can't wait to see you there.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:43] Tonight the Flophouse is sponsored in part by ZipRecruiter.

[1:06:48] Are you hiring?

[1:06:49] Do you know where to post your job to find the best candidates?

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:52] Because Dan's looking for work.

[1:06:54] Yeah.

[1:06:55] Please.

Dan McCoy

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[1:07:28] Right now our listeners can post jobs on ZipRecruiter for free by going to ZipRecruiter.com slash first.

[1:07:35] What is that?

[1:07:37] That's ZipRecruiter.com slash first.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:40] As a small business owner I can tell you it's tough trying to find good candidates and having something that does away with a lot of the technical bullshit and get you access to people that you can weed out through interviews and then train.

[1:07:58] That's what you want to spend your time doing.

[1:07:59] You don't want to spend your time trying to figure out websites you know.

[1:08:03] Yeah.

[1:08:04] Who cares about websites guys?

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:06] So go to ZipRecruiter.com slash first.

[1:08:09] Yeah.

[1:08:10] It's simple.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:11] We also have another sponsor for tonight's show.

[1:08:16] A new one or at least one that we haven't had in a long time.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:19] Yeah.

[1:08:20] What's their problem?

[1:08:20] The Flophouse is supported in part by Warby Parker.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:24] Oh wow.

[1:08:25] A new concept in eyewear.

[1:08:27] Contemporary eyeglasses that are extremely affordable and fashion forward.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:31] And you don't have to go anywhere.

[1:08:32] They come to you.

[1:08:33] Two thirds of the Flophouse are nerds with glasses.

[1:08:37] You know it.

[1:08:37] And I bet roughly two thirds of our listener base are also glasses wearing cool people.

[1:08:42] I'm going to up that number.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:45] I'm literally wearing Warby Parker glasses right now.

[1:08:50] No, no.

[1:08:50] You're just going to say how handsome you look.

[1:08:51] Not literally.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:53] Wait, what?

[1:08:53] That's what it means now.

[1:08:54] Now you say literally when it's not true.

[1:08:57] I love these glasses.

[1:08:59] I think that they're sharp.

[1:09:01] How do they deal?

[1:09:01] How do they comfort?

[1:09:02] How comfort wise?

[1:09:03] They feel good?

Dan McCoy

[1:09:04] Well, I've had them for years now.

[1:09:06] So they've molded to my face.

[1:09:08] Or your face is molded to them.

[1:09:09] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:10] And how do you see through them?

[1:09:11] Are their lenses good?

[1:09:12] Those are quality lenses.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:13] I see through them because the lenses are made of glass, which is a transparent medium.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:19] Now, Dan, let me introduce you to how advertising works.

[1:09:22] I'm asking you leading questions so you can tell me about the high quality of the lenses and comfort of your frames from Warby Parker, our sponsor.

[1:09:30] What I'm asking you is to tell me how good they are, not to give me smart-ass responses.

[1:09:35] I know how glasses work.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:37] I've been reading my Al Jaffe's Snappy Answers to Stupid Questions book.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:41] Al Jaffe's Bad Answers to Sponsor Questions.

Stuart Wellington

[1:09:45] Wait, I'm looking now.

[1:09:46] It's very a dog-eared copy lying by Dan's bedside with multiple Post-its shoved onto the, stuffed into the pages.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:53] Yeah, on the notes written, remember this, good one.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:00] Now, prescription glasses start at $95.

[1:10:04] That's including lenses.

[1:10:05] That's ridiculously cheap.

[1:10:07] $95 for the whole thing.

[1:10:08] Yeah.

[1:10:08] You are a price gouge with glasses.

[1:10:10] If you have bad eyes, then you are punished by the world.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:13] Well, yeah, because you're weak and your genes should have been weeded out a long time ago.

[1:10:18] But also, you can't see the bill.

[1:10:20] So they're like, just add a couple extra zeros on there.

[1:10:23] It doesn't matter.

[1:10:24] They'll pay whatever because their stupid blind eyes can't handle it.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:27] You're normally paying like, I don't know, $300, $400 for glasses.

[1:10:31] Oh, sure.

[1:10:31] Yeah.

[1:10:32] Just per screw.

[1:10:34] Now, options include both glasses and sunglasses.

[1:10:38] You can get sunglasses, too, at Warview Parker.

[1:10:40] And with a home try-on program, you can order five pairs of glasses, ship directly to you for free,

[1:10:46] try all the frames on, get a feel for them, and get feedback from people.

[1:10:50] That sounds like a fun night.

[1:10:52] Yeah.

[1:10:52] You've got them for five days.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:54] If you go into a bar, you just keep going in the bathroom and changing those glasses,

[1:10:58] you can make out with five different girls.

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:00] And the bartender's like, sir, I'm going to need to see ID.

[1:11:03] Sir, I'm going to need to see ID.

[1:11:05] But I just showed you, the guy in this license isn't wearing glasses.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:10] But when you're done, you can mail them back to Warview Parker in a prepaid package.

[1:11:14] Triple P.

[1:11:16] Just choose which glasses you like best and order those.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:21] Look, think about it.

[1:11:22] If this was the Middle Ages, your life would be over because you can't see.

[1:11:26] Best case scenario, you're going to be a monk putting your face up close to some parchment

[1:11:30] so you can just be copying some other monk's writing from 100 or 200 years ago.

[1:11:36] Thanks to Warview Parker, you don't have to live that life.

[1:11:38] You can wear glasses that allow you to see like a normie,

[1:11:42] and it doesn't cost you that much, and you don't even have to leave your house.

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:44] Now, Dan, are those glasses the kind where if you walk outside and it's really sunny,

[1:11:48] they get tinted?

[1:11:50] Transition lenses?

[1:11:51] Yeah, yeah.

[1:11:51] They get tinted and turn into cool sunglasses?

[1:11:54] You can get transition lenses?

[1:11:55] Tinted glasses?

[1:11:56] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:56] Now, my glasses are transitioning, but in a different way.

[1:12:00] Oh, okay.

[1:12:01] Oh, wow.

[1:12:02] They're turning into a monocle.

[1:12:03] Oh, wow.

[1:12:04] Yeah, that's a good joke.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:06] Now, there's a special offer for listeners to this podcast.

[1:12:10] If you go to warbyparker.com slash flop to order your free home try-ons,

[1:12:15] you can choose the five frames to try on, mail the frames back,

[1:12:20] choose your favorite pair to have your prescription added,

[1:12:22] and order, and it's completely risk-free with free shipping all around.

[1:12:26] If you visit warbyparker.com slash flop to be in your free home try-on experience today,

[1:12:34] that's warbyparker.com slash flop.

[1:12:39] Start seeing.

[1:12:41] Yeah.

[1:12:41] It's a beautiful world out there.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:43] Mm-hmm.

[1:12:44] Take a look around.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:44] It's a gorgeous world.

[1:12:45] Wee-oo, wee-oo, wee-oo, wee-oo.

[1:12:47] What's that?

[1:12:48] That's the alarm?

[1:12:49] Because we have a Jumbotron tonight.

[1:12:52] Is that the sound of the alarm that we got?

[1:12:54] Well, I'm trying something new.

[1:12:57] Tonight's Jumbotron reads,

[1:13:00] Do you enjoy your schlock with notes of nostalgia and a dash of self-deprecation?

[1:13:07] It's That Awful Sound,

[1:13:09] the podcast about the music you liked before you knew any better.

[1:13:14] Every week, That Awful Sound revisits a song and video from a guest's past,

[1:13:20] mining it for cringe-worthy moments and savoring the painful memories they generate.

[1:13:25] For example, episode 69.

[1:13:29] Nice.

[1:13:30] Come on, Stuart.

[1:13:31] Grow up.

[1:13:32] Nice.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13:32] Come on.

[1:13:33] Okay, I can do this.

[1:13:34] You can do this.

[1:13:34] Power through.

[1:13:35] For example, episode 69.

[1:13:37] No, Stuart, you can do this.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:38] Come on.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13:40] Episode 69.

[1:13:44] Okay, better.

[1:13:45] On Smash Mouth's riff-stealing Cool Dad anthem,

[1:13:50] Then the Morning Comes,

[1:13:52] a video that features singer Steve Harwell getting pissed on by a dog for ten full seconds.

[1:14:00] So guys, from Crazy Town to Creed, Aaron Carter to Aerosmith,

[1:14:05] Jillian Anderson to Journey.

[1:14:08] Get episodes of That Awful Sound on podcast apps and thatawfulsound.com.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:15] Did Jillian Anderson put out an album?

[1:14:17] I didn't know.

[1:14:17] Did she sing?

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:18] You're going to have to go to thatawfulsound.com and do some deep, deep mining.

[1:14:22] Sounds like a real house of mirth starring Jillian Anderson.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:26] We want to...

[1:14:27] Or an X-File.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:30] Sure.

[1:14:31] You're watching.

[1:14:31] Or The Fall.

[1:14:35] Hannibal.

[1:14:37] That's right.

[1:14:39] Trigger something.

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:41] Trigger something.

[1:14:42] That famous Jillian Anderson short film?

Dan McCoy

[1:14:48] So, I don't know whether it's sold out by the time we...

[1:14:52] This is going to come out, because this is going to come out after Thanksgiving.

[1:14:55] Mm-hmm.

[1:14:56] AT.

[1:14:57] I just want to mention that we have a live show.

[1:15:00] Live show alert.

[1:15:01] What?

[1:15:02] Woo, woo, woo, woo, woo.

[1:15:04] That's what a siren sounds like.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:06] Maybe in Europe.

[1:15:09] No, in Europe it's like...

[1:15:10] What's this, a Luc Besson movie?

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:15] Is Jean Van Out going to try and steal me away in a baguette cart?

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:19] The official sound of Luc Besson movies is that weird European police siren.

[1:15:25] That's just Luc Besson's ringtone.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:28] He's like, uh-oh, somebody's been taken.

[1:15:31] Uh-oh.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:32] On January the 21st, we have a...

[1:15:36] 2017.

[1:15:37] We're doing a live show at the Bell House in beautiful Gowanus, Brooklyn.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:41] It's a great venue.

[1:15:42] Thank you.

[1:15:42] We've had a lot of good times there.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:44] We'll probably announce the movie we're watching...

[1:15:46] Sometime.

[1:15:47] Yeah.

[1:15:47] Dan, what movie are we watching?

[1:15:49] We don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:49] Now, this is a live episode recording.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:52] Yes, this is a live episode recording.

[1:15:54] It's...

[1:15:54] Doors open at 7.

[1:15:56] Show is at 7.30.

[1:15:58] We'll probably last about an hour and a half, I would guess.

[1:16:01] Before we die.

[1:16:02] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:03] And then we'll all bundle into a giant clown car and head to Hinterlands to get twisted

[1:16:08] with Stewart.

[1:16:09] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:10] So it should be a lot of fun.

[1:16:12] If you haven't been to a Flophouse live show, they're a lot of fun.

[1:16:15] Buy your tickets now if they're available and you want to go because they do not usually

[1:16:20] last very long.

[1:16:22] We have had a number of sold-out shows at that venue.

[1:16:25] Yeah.

[1:16:25] And we want you to be able to go see it.

[1:16:28] Come on.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:29] If you don't get into it, though, we do...

[1:16:33] They might arrive, but they just don't get into it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:35] They're like, eh, this isn't for me.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:37] We have plans for...

[1:16:38] Too much over-talking.

[1:16:40] We have plans for another live show that same month, but we can't reveal it just yet.

[1:16:45] Tickets are not yet available.

[1:16:47] Tickets are not yet available.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:47] And a different venue, but an exciting one, and a different type of show.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:50] So we'll just tease that.

[1:16:52] So don't feel too bad, maybe, if you can't get into this one.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:54] Yeah.

[1:16:54] Have you ever seen Thunder from Down Under?

[1:16:57] It's going to be a lot like that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:00] Yep.

[1:17:00] The Flophouse has finally thrown away the whole illusion of the movie stuff and getting down

[1:17:06] to what we are, which is mail stripping.

[1:17:07] Yep.

[1:17:08] Beefcakes from Brooklyn, we call it.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:12] We call it artisanal pecs.

[1:17:14] One last announcement before we move on.

[1:17:17] So, and this is a semi-political announcement, so if that's something that bothers you...

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:23] Ride that 15-second jump forward button.

[1:17:25] Yeah, jump forward on that 15 thing.

[1:17:25] Just ride that button until it's time for the letter song.

[1:17:28] Just hit that button until you hear me sing, and then you're going to know you're safe from politics.

[1:17:32] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:33] But post-election, the Flophouse Facebook group was casting about for something they can do.

[1:17:42] And last year, we had a charity drive to help with suicide prevention, and this year...

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:50] The Facebook page did.

[1:17:51] The Facebook page did.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:52] Yeah, this is all fan-organized with the support of us, the Flophouse.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:59] Yeah, but we should not take the credit.

[1:18:00] We do not take the credit.

[1:18:00] We take no credit.

[1:18:01] We're a couple idiots.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:01] The fans are doing this and organized it and are seeing it through.

[1:18:05] But they voted on what charity they might want to contribute to, and they came up with Planned Parenthood.

[1:18:15] And so if you want to contribute to the Flophouse Planned Parenthood drive, you can do it through the Flophouse Facebook page, or there's a link.

[1:18:26] I will put it up on the site.

[1:18:29] And, you know, do a little something this holiday season maybe to help others in some way.

[1:18:38] But that's all I wanted to say about that.

[1:18:44] And now we're moving on to letters from listeners.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:48] Your second favorite part of the show.

[1:18:51] And now it's time for your favorite part of the show.

[1:18:56] The song.

[1:18:57] Everybody's always asking, where's that song?

[1:19:01] Everybody's always thinking, just how long will the song be this time?

[1:19:07] Is it wrong that I love that song?

[1:19:10] No, it's not.

[1:19:11] It's right.

[1:19:12] Tonight.

[1:19:13] All right.

[1:19:14] The song is here for you tonight.

[1:19:18] Out of spite.

[1:19:21] Keeping it long.

[1:19:22] Keeping it real.

[1:19:23] Keeping it real.

[1:19:24] Keeping it great for a guy's name, Neil.

[1:19:27] But even if you have a different name, this song can still be for you.

[1:19:33] Maybe you're Lou.

[1:19:34] Maybe you're Stu.

[1:19:36] Maybe you're Rue.

[1:19:36] That's me.

[1:19:37] In the hundred acre wood.

[1:19:39] And you just want a song for you.

[1:19:41] If I didn't mention your name, that's okay.

[1:19:44] I'm glad you came for this.

[1:19:45] The song about names.

[1:19:47] Send me a dollar in the mail.

[1:19:50] And I'll put your name in the song next time.

[1:19:53] Dan, that's okay, right?

[1:19:55] Right.

[1:19:56] Okay.

[1:19:57] Probably shouldn't be.

[1:19:59] But it is.

[1:20:00] So here are some more names for you.

[1:20:03] More rhymes with Thor.

[1:20:05] Which rhymes with Floor?

[1:20:07] Which rhymes with...

[1:20:08] What's another name that rhymes with Orr?

[1:20:11] Gore.

[1:20:12] Gore.

[1:20:13] And Orr.

[1:20:13] Bobby Orr.

[1:20:14] Hockey superstar.

[1:20:16] Not to mention Orr, the character from Catch-22.

[1:20:21] From me and you.

[1:20:23] This is the song.

[1:20:26] So...

[1:20:27] Cleaned out a lot of emails during that one.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:31] Before we get on to letters proper, we have a few gifts in the Flop House mailbag.

[1:20:35] You gotta say it like this.

[1:20:36] Letters proper.

[1:20:38] Like Hammer would say it.

[1:20:39] I just want to thank people for a couple of things.

[1:20:43] This, I believe, is from Timothy Stoltz.

[1:20:47] Oh, Eric's brother.

[1:20:48] If I'm reading this correctly, it's from Timothy Stoltz.

[1:20:51] Maybe that's just someone who is involved with the DVD.

[1:20:55] But, uh...

[1:20:56] The note says...

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:59] I haven't seen it, so I don't know how Dan is able to misunderstand the information available.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:04] It's hard to...

[1:21:05] I'll give you the...

[1:21:06] You can take a look at it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:08] Okay.

[1:21:09] Who's making some good podcasts?

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:11] This is a...

[1:21:12] Oh, no.

[1:21:12] Timothy Stoltz, I think, is just someone involved with it.

[1:21:14] Okay.

[1:21:15] So someone...

[1:21:16] I could be wrong.

[1:21:17] Maybe it's from them.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:17] Someone sent a DVD called Max Magician and the Legend of the Rings, which says...

[1:21:25] I don't like legends.

[1:21:26] The message says...

[1:21:27] You like rings?

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:28] Just look at this.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:29] The message says, I thought you floppers could use a little fun.

[1:21:33] Whoa.

[1:21:34] So I'm sending you guys the worst movie I've ever seen.

[1:21:37] Tip, take a shot every time the villain growls, sighs, makes that noise.

[1:21:41] You'll know the one.

[1:21:42] Thanks for making a shitty year less shitty.

[1:21:44] So thank you for this bad movie that's been sent to us.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:49] We gotta talk about this movie for a second.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:51] First off, there's a dude with a fucking morning star on the cover.

[1:21:54] That's sick.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:55] Nice.

[1:21:56] I'm not gonna talk about the size of the fake...

[1:21:59] Of the nose prosthetics on some of these guys.

[1:22:02] That's a little weird.

[1:22:04] But then at the bottom it says, three and a half stars, a fantasy epic in the tradition

[1:22:09] of Harry Potter and the Lord of the Rings.

[1:22:12] So the thing that's concerning about that is, does that mean this movie was made after

[1:22:17] those things because this seems like it should have been made way longer before it.

[1:22:23] Well, also, those are two very different type of fantasy stories.

[1:22:27] What are you talking about?

[1:22:29] One of them is a YA novel, the other is Harry Potter.

[1:22:34] JK, JK, I love Lord of the Rings.

[1:22:35] And speaking of Lord of the Rings, I want to say, perfect, the sister of JK Simmons.

[1:22:41] I want to say a thank you to listener Bill O'Donnell, who sent my bar Hinterlands a lovely 50th

[1:22:50] anniversary edition of the Lord of the Rings.

[1:22:54] It will be enshrined in a place of honor for the most drunken patrons to paw through and

[1:23:03] quote and sing the songs of.

[1:23:05] So thanks, Bill.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:08] And there's one more gift quickly from Erica, who writes, my dearest Peaches, I was going

[1:23:13] to save this gift for Cagemas, both in order to be seasonally appropriate and to give myself

[1:23:17] more time to craft a witty missive worthy of the Flophouse mailbag.

[1:23:21] Instead, I am sending it in the dark, raggedy second week of November, because one of the

[1:23:26] only ways I know to ease the kind of hurt and fear I'm currently experiencing is to put

[1:23:30] something nice into the world and tell people who are important to me how much I appreciate

[1:23:33] them.

[1:23:34] You three are a warm, fuzzy blanket of intelligent silliness that is comforting to the point

[1:23:40] of medicinal, and you cannot hear often enough how much you genuinely help people.

[1:23:45] Yours in uncharacteristic earnestness, Erica.

[1:23:47] So we have some wrapped...

[1:23:49] Thank you very much, Erica.

[1:23:50] ...things here.

[1:23:51] I haven't opened them.

[1:23:54] Who knows what they are?

Stuart Wellington

[1:23:55] Dan never learns his lesson and decides we open things on air.

[1:24:00] Guys, while you're opening, I want to talk about Max Magician and the Legend of the Rings

[1:24:04] again.

[1:24:05] So the first line of the description is, Max Magician and the Legend of the Rings is a

[1:24:09] magical tale about young Max.

[1:24:12] No shit.

[1:24:14] A shy bullied boy.

[1:24:16] Just reading that makes me want to bully this kid.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:20] And now we've unwrapped the presents and they are beautiful candles.

[1:24:25] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:26] This one just says Merry Cagemas.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:29] This one...

[1:24:30] And mine is a Tapwell Cider candle.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:32] Oh, whoa.

[1:24:33] Very smelly.

[1:24:34] That's a deep cut.

[1:24:35] This one's a Teddy Graham candle and it smells like cookies.

[1:24:39] That's a deep cut also.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:40] And what does yours say, Stuart?

[1:24:42] Mine says original peaches and smells unsurprisingly like peach.

[1:24:46] Nice.

[1:24:47] Thank you very much, Erica.

[1:24:48] Yeah.

[1:24:49] This is lovely.

[1:24:50] This will help kind of the scent orchestration of my apartment.

[1:24:55] Mm-hmm.

[1:24:56] Which it needs.

[1:24:57] Yeah, that was the thing.

[1:24:58] When you came to visit, you were like, I'm not getting a full smell story as I walk through

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:04] your apartment.

[1:25:04] I'm getting a narrative through every sense except one.

[1:25:07] And that's really bothering me.

[1:25:08] This is going to really up my sensual bath game.

[1:25:13] Mm-hmm.

[1:25:14] This will, uh...

Dan McCoy

[1:25:16] Unsurprisingly, the only candles in my apartment, as I am a bachelor, have been given to me

[1:25:22] by women in my life who are like...

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:27] Is that the way they say goodbye?

[1:25:29] No.

[1:25:29] They just leave a lit candle in the bed next to you?

[1:25:31] Yeah.

[1:25:32] I'm not...

Dan McCoy

[1:25:33] These are not lovers.

[1:25:35] These are just women who are like, you're a person who probably has a smelly apartment.

[1:25:40] Here's a candle.

Stuart Wellington

[1:25:41] They leave a fucking hand of glory on his bed stand so you can't follow them.

[1:25:44] Now you can enter any door.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:49] Uh...

[1:25:49] It was a hanged man's hand.

[1:25:51] Mm-hmm.

[1:25:52] But thank you very much.

[1:25:53] The only women who give me candles usually are around Hanukkah time when the Orthodox are

[1:25:57] out making sure I'm praying enough.

[1:25:59] And they hand out free menorahs and candles.

[1:26:03] Uh, do they...

[1:26:04] Just another...

Stuart Wellington

[1:26:04] When you're walking around Brooklyn and the guys stop you and they're like, excuse me,

[1:26:09] are you Jewish?

[1:26:10] Do you say yes or do you just keep going?

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:12] Here's the thing.

[1:26:13] Years ago, like when I was a college student, I would say no because I didn't want to talk

[1:26:17] to them.

[1:26:17] And I would feel really guilty about it because I was denying my faith.

[1:26:20] And now I find I say yes.

[1:26:23] I want to be honest to them and to God.

[1:26:26] But...

[1:26:26] And they say, oh, well, da-da-da.

[1:26:27] And I say, yes, but I'm not interested.

[1:26:29] Like, yes, but no, thank you.

[1:26:31] Because I'm very comfortable for the most part with my relationship with my faith.

[1:26:36] And I kind of don't need them to be involved.

[1:26:38] And so I've reached a point where I want to be honest with them because I don't want

[1:26:41] to lie to myself.

[1:26:42] Mm-hmm.

[1:26:43] But at the same time, I'm very honest to them about like, you and I are not the same.

[1:26:47] Let's not...

[1:26:47] We don't believe the same things even though the things we believe are closer than, say,

[1:26:52] what I and Christians believe.

[1:26:54] Mm-hmm.

[1:26:55] But I don't...

[1:26:56] It's like the way they...

[1:26:57] The way a lot of them view the world, if the Messiah means everyone's going to be like

[1:27:00] that, maybe I don't want the Messiah to come.

[1:27:02] Maybe I like this flawed world more.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:04] Every time they stop and ask me, because that's why I asked you in the first place.

[1:27:08] No, because they're just...

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:09] They're just...

[1:27:09] Because they are just non-describative.

[1:27:11] They're like, you never know.

[1:27:12] Anyone could be Jewish.

[1:27:13] Well, they stop and ask me.

[1:27:15] And I don't know.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:16] I could probably pass.

[1:27:17] You don't look...

[1:27:18] No, you don't look very Jewish at all.

[1:27:19] I'm like a Seth Rogen-y type character.

[1:27:22] But they think you're Seth Rogen.

[1:27:23] That's why they ask you.

[1:27:24] And every time...

[1:27:25] That's either Seth Rogen or Josh Brolin.

[1:27:27] Well, let's ask him.

[1:27:27] I always say no, but in my head I'm always like, but my wife is.

[1:27:31] Should I say that?

[1:27:32] And I'm like, no, Stuart.

[1:27:33] Don't say that.

[1:27:34] They don't give a shit.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:35] But my wife is.

[1:27:37] Yeah.

[1:27:37] Like, you want to make them feel better about it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:38] I'll say that and they'll be like, go tell it to the Marines.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:41] And I'll be like, oh, and go home crying.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:46] But now on to the letters proper.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:51] Let's see.

[1:27:51] It feels good, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:27:52] Wow.

[1:27:53] That sounds really cool.

[1:27:55] So this is from someone whose name I misplaced.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:00] I apologize.

[1:28:00] Listeners, do not take this as how Dan values you.

[1:28:05] He is just a forgetful guy who's got a lot on his mind.

[1:28:09] And look, let's just be fair.

[1:28:12] He's not in his right mind right now.

[1:28:15] And so he loses things.

[1:28:17] He forgets stuff.

[1:28:18] But he cares about you.

[1:28:19] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:20] But thank you.

[1:28:20] I remember it was a lady.

[1:28:22] So that removes 49% of the population.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:29] Okay, great.

[1:28:30] And I mean, we don't have huge listenership in China.

[1:28:32] So that's a billion people right there.

[1:28:34] We don't have to worry about forgetting to give credit to.

[1:28:36] We're going to narrow this thing down.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:39] Put on some coffee.

[1:28:41] We're going to figure it out.

[1:28:43] Dear Floppers, my local department store has a claw machine full of stuffed.

[1:28:49] Sorry, I'm going to start over.

[1:28:50] A claw machine.

[1:28:52] My local department store has a claw machine full of stuffed toys for children.

[1:28:57] I noticed last week that one of these was indeed a stuffed horse head embroidered The Godfather

[1:29:03] and had a strip of red cloth on the bottom to simulate blood.

[1:29:07] That's pretty great.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:08] I would spend so much goddamn money trying to dig that thing out of here.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:12] My husband and I have spent an unhealthy amount of time trying to figure out the long series

[1:29:17] of decisions that led to this decapitated head being put into a children's game.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:21] I'll tell you what happened.

[1:29:22] One of the stuffed animals in there wasn't doing what Vito Corleone wanted him to do,

[1:29:25] so they cut the head off his stuffed horse and they stuffed it in the claw machine with him.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:30] What would you put into a claw machine if you could add anything?

[1:29:33] And again, that's from I misplaced her name.

[1:29:37] Less held.

[1:29:38] With held.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:38] Well, clearly we want something that's going to have an appeal to kids.

[1:29:42] Now, does it have to be movie related or not?

[1:29:44] I mean, if it could be anything, of course it's just going to be a fucking foil wrapped baked potato.

[1:29:53] You make a good case.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:54] You make a good case.

[1:29:58] Self-evident.

[1:30:01] That's the top of everybody's list.

[1:30:02] Yeah, you're stuffing a buck and a machine.

[1:30:04] That's like the best possible situation.

[1:30:06] So since that's a given that we would all put a foil wrapped baked potato in there, let's go to number two on our list.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:12] It lies at the perfect nexus between delicious and sort of healthy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:16] And graspable with a claw.

[1:30:19] Yeah.

[1:30:19] Look, stuff that thing full of cheese and like...

[1:30:23] It'll dribble out.

[1:30:23] And scallions and you've got lunch in Scotland.

[1:30:26] Yeah, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:27] I mean, I carry cheese and scallions with me anywhere I go.

[1:30:30] What about one of the Oogie Loves?

[1:30:32] Can we put one of them in there?

[1:30:34] Like a two-feet?

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:35] Like a living person?

[1:30:37] Yeah, a full two-feet.

[1:30:40] I don't know.

[1:30:40] I guess.

[1:30:41] I don't think the claw's going to be able to haul them out of there.

[1:30:43] Well, here's the thing.

[1:30:44] The claw machine, you can never get whatever you want.

[1:30:47] So I don't know if you want to have...

Dan McCoy

[1:30:48] You can't always get what you want.

[1:30:49] But sometimes...

[1:30:50] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:51] You waste a lot of money trying to grab it.

[1:30:53] So do you want to put something really good in there like an Academy Awards that people waste their time trying to grab it?

[1:30:59] Or, to make people feel better about not being able to get anything with the claw machine, do you make it like a bag of poop?

[1:31:06] Because like, oh, I didn't get the bag of poop prize, even though I put in a couple quarters.

[1:31:10] Right.

[1:31:10] But I didn't really want it.

[1:31:12] I don't even know why I put the quarters in to try to get it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:14] The thing about a bag of poop is that bag, like it's a plastic bag in it.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:17] Like you can snag that.

[1:31:18] I was not imagining a plastic bag.

[1:31:20] I was imagining a paper lunch sack.

Dan McCoy

[1:31:21] Yeah, because you can set those on fire more easily.

[1:31:23] Exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:24] That's going to be really hard to grab with a little claw.

[1:31:27] But you don't even want it, so it's okay.

[1:31:28] Oh, so it's like it's just a spoiler in there?

[1:31:31] No, it's like since you're not going to get a prize anyway, why put something good in there?

[1:31:36] Make people feel better and be like, well, I didn't get anything, but I didn't want it.

Dan McCoy

[1:31:39] Yeah, you're sort of competing as a metaphor.

[1:31:43] You're like it.

[1:31:43] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:44] It's not you versus the claw machine because you're always going to lose.

[1:31:47] It's you versus yourself.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:49] Yeah.

[1:31:50] Yeah.

[1:31:50] I mean, when I think of a claw machine, I think of like the stuff you'd want to get at like the midway.

[1:31:57] If you're like walking along the boardwalk, eating one of them deep fried Oreos.

[1:32:01] I mean, the boardwalk and the midway I think would be two different.

[1:32:03] Same thing.

[1:32:04] And so I'm pumping a couple bucks on a claw machine.

[1:32:07] I'm going to want something that's going to fit my sense of style.

[1:32:09] So I'm going to want to get like a really badass Betty Boop or like a little Scarface.

[1:32:15] Or like a big novelty comb.

[1:32:17] Yeah.

[1:32:17] Like I want a Scarface that's just Al Pacino's face and it has Tony Montana like written in script along the cheek.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:25] Now, I want like a Tony Montana, Tony Manero mashup where he's Scarface, but he's wearing the Saturday Night Fever suit.

[1:32:32] Oh.

[1:32:33] And he's dancing, but he's still got the gun in his hand.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:35] Well, I love mashups and he's saying, wait, what does he say?

[1:32:39] Say hello to my little friend?

[1:32:41] Yeah.

[1:32:42] But mash that up with a Saturday Night Fever.

[1:32:43] With something from Saturday Night Fever.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:45] Don't, why is he touching my hair or something like that.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:48] This next letter, it was like this.

[1:32:51] There's a wonderful BBC radio comedy series called Cabin Pressure about a single plane airline.

[1:32:57] It has Benedict Cumberbatch and Roger Allum as pilots who play word games nearly every episode.

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:04] This is the most British sounding show.

[1:33:09] During a real listen.

[1:33:09] Also, they solve tea related murders.

Stuart Wellington

[1:33:17] They get in arguments about politeness.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:20] They bake cakes for the Queen Mother.

[1:33:23] During a real listen.

[1:33:25] Didn't she pass away a while ago?

[1:33:27] I don't know.

[1:33:27] Queen Mother?

[1:33:28] They reminded me a lot of your trio.

[1:33:30] Looking it up.

[1:33:31] One of my favorites is a word game, People Who Aren't Evil But Have Evil-Sounding Names.

[1:33:36] They come up with Russell Crowe, Agatha Christie, and Calista Flockhart.

[1:33:42] But I was wondering what you think is the most evil sounding name of any person.

[1:33:46] Cole Hauser.

[1:33:47] No.

[1:33:48] No, come on.

Stuart Wellington

[1:33:49] He seems like a hero guy.

[1:33:50] Like a rough and tough hero.

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:52] No, Cole Hauser is a bad, bad dude in the name.

[1:33:55] In real life, a hero.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:57] It's super easy.

[1:33:57] I got you both fucking true.

[1:33:59] Hold on.

[1:33:59] I got one more sentence in this.

[1:34:01] Okay.

[1:34:01] I think Elliot-

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:02] In the lessons is, you can't say Cole Hauser.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:05] No, he says, I think Elliot actually has a strong contender for a villain name.

[1:34:10] Love the podcast.

[1:34:10] All the best.

[1:34:11] First initial held, RG.

[1:34:13] Elliot Kalin?

[1:34:14] I could see that as a villain.

[1:34:15] Hands down.

[1:34:16] Max von Sydow.

[1:34:17] Boom.

[1:34:17] There you go.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:18] You got it.

[1:34:19] It's even better.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:19] What about Killian Murphy?

[1:34:22] It's got Kill in it.

[1:34:24] Oh, that's pretty good.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:25] It's pretty good.

[1:34:26] Max von Sydow is pretty hard to beat.

[1:34:28] Max von Sydow is-

[1:34:30] Oh, what about Adolf Hitler?

[1:34:32] Mm-hmm.

[1:34:33] That's a pretty villain.

[1:34:33] But I guess the game is not actually a villain, right?

[1:34:35] Mm-hmm.

[1:34:35] Because he was evil.

[1:34:36] Mm-hmm.

[1:34:37] Because that's an evil sounding name.

[1:34:39] Yeah.

[1:34:39] What about-

Dan McCoy

[1:34:41] Oh, it's so hard to beat Max von Sydow.

[1:34:43] Yeah.

[1:34:43] I know, right?

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:44] I mean, this is not to get political, but Newt Gingrich does sound like a villain in

[1:34:48] a fantasy novel.

[1:34:49] That's fair.

[1:34:50] Yeah.

[1:34:52] I'm trying to think-

Dan McCoy

[1:34:53] I was going to say Tilda Swinton, but she just sounds like an elf.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:56] Yeah.

[1:34:56] Tilda Swinton sounds like a woman who solves tea-related murders.

[1:35:00] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:02] F.

[1:35:03] Marie Abraham sounds like a hero.

Elliott Kalan

[1:35:06] If he was Marie F.

[1:35:07] Abraham, that's a presidential assassin name.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:09] I have a funny story about F.

[1:35:11] Marie Abraham.

[1:35:12] One of my regulars-

[1:35:14] Someone I've seen on stage in a play.

[1:35:15] Anyway, continue.

[1:35:16] One of my regulars is a set manager or some shit for whatever TV show he's on now.

[1:35:26] And they were-

[1:35:26] He and a couple other of the crew guys were hanging out in this office where they were shooting.

[1:35:31] And F.

[1:35:32] Marie Abraham walked into the room, clearly trying to go somewhere else.

[1:35:37] And he was looking for the bathroom.

[1:35:39] And they were like, oh no, it's down the hall.

[1:35:40] And he's like-

[1:35:41] And then before he left, he's like, well, at some point we should all go out for a drink

[1:35:47] because I have a lot of money.

Dan McCoy

[1:35:50] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:54] Which is great and fulfills my need for believing that F.

[1:35:58] Marie Abraham is an awesome dude.

[1:36:00] Yeah.

[1:36:00] Well, we're not going to get any better than that, so-

[1:36:02] No.

[1:36:03] Frank Zappa?

[1:36:04] Sure.

[1:36:05] Yep.

[1:36:05] He's some kind of electricity-based villain.

[1:36:08] Exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:10] Some kind of hot dog and electricity-based villain.

Dan McCoy

[1:36:13] Yeah.

[1:36:14] He's the Electro Gremlin from Gremlins 2.

[1:36:17] Oh, he wishes.

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:18] I mean, the Electro-

[1:36:19] That's more of an agent of chaos than an actual villain.

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:22] Exactly.

[1:36:22] Yes.

[1:36:23] He's barely even conscious of what he's doing.

[1:36:25] He's just causing trouble in a bubble.

[1:36:28] Trouble in a bubble.

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:29] He's just a dog chasing cars, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:31] Electro's real name was Max Dillon, so that's pretty close to Max von Sydow.

[1:36:35] Mm-hmm.

[1:36:36] This next letter.

[1:36:38] Now, Scorpion's real name is Mac Gargan.

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:40] Mm-hmm.

[1:36:41] That's a normal person's name.

[1:36:44] Did we talk about whether or not Scorpion's tail is attached to him or not?

[1:36:48] We did in a previous episode.

[1:36:49] Okay.

[1:36:49] Last one.

[1:36:50] Last episode, yeah.

[1:36:51] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[1:36:52] Hey, floppers.

[1:36:53] Hey, what's up?

[1:36:54] That's us.

[1:36:54] I've been-

[1:36:55] This is from Wade, last name withheld.

[1:36:57] Wilson.

[1:36:58] Deadpool.

[1:36:59] Hey, floppers.

[1:36:59] Garrett from Roadhouse.

Elliott Kalan

[1:37:02] Or is it Wade the Duck from U.S. Acres?

[1:37:04] We hate your cartoon.

[1:37:06] Don't write in.

Dan McCoy

[1:37:08] I've been re-listening to your back catalog.

[1:37:10] And it seems like the vast majority of the films you've watched ended up being bad, bad movies.

[1:37:15] Do you think any of these bad, bad movies?

[1:37:16] Do you think any of these bad, bad movies have any inherent value?

[1:37:19] Which of the bad, bad movies you've seen would be the best candidate for a reboot with a new director and writer at the helm?

[1:37:26] Would Spielberg be able to turn Sucker Punch into a watchable movie?

[1:37:30] Could Hitchcock cobble together something decent out of paranoia?

[1:37:33] What would Paul Schrader do if you put the treatment of abduction in front of him?

[1:37:37] Love the podcast and please never end it.

[1:37:39] Wade, last name withheld.

[1:37:41] Thanks, Wade.

[1:37:41] Thanks for listening.

Stuart Wellington

[1:37:42] And thanks, Wade, for reminding us that we've spent the last nine years watching bad, bad movies.

Elliott Kalan

[1:37:48] Wasting our time.

[1:37:50] Ugh.

Stuart Wellington

[1:37:51] So, Dan, it looks like you got an answer on the tip of your tongue.

Dan McCoy

[1:37:56] No, I hate, here's the thing, I hate any question that requires me to remember the movies that we've watched for this podcast.

Stuart Wellington

[1:38:04] It's hard to remember.

[1:38:05] I mean, the-

[1:38:05] And it's a little uncomfortable trying to play, like, backseat driver, imagining what one director would do with another person's movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:38:12] Yeah, I would say that, like, there are a couple movies like Next.

[1:38:20] Mm-hmm.

[1:38:20] Or, like, I don't remember what we said about Victor Frankenstein, but their movies were, like-

[1:38:25] I mean, there it's just the Frankenstein story, but, like, where you could take the same very-

[1:38:29] Like, the concept and do something with it.

[1:38:31] I don't remember if we called Gods of Egypt a bad, bad movie, but, like, that's a concept that could have been really fun, you know, if it was handled a little differently.

Stuart Wellington

[1:38:39] Yeah, but which director and whose specific vision would have made Gods of Egypt more interesting than the one we saw?

[1:38:47] Than that one?

[1:38:49] Uh, that's hard to know.

[1:38:50] Because you can't say your boy Tarsim, because we saw what he did with Immortals.

[1:38:54] And it was not very good.

Elliott Kalan

[1:38:56] Not very good.

[1:38:56] And very similar and not very good.

[1:38:58] I mean, as much as I love Tarsim's The Fall, yeah.

[1:39:01] But maybe someone like, you know what I'm gonna say for Gods of Egypt, and this is gonna sound crazy.

[1:39:08] Okay.

[1:39:09] Howard Hawks.

[1:39:11] Wow.

[1:39:11] Okay.

[1:39:11] Because that movie had plenty of crazy concepts.

[1:39:14] Visually, it was goofy in a stunning way at times.

[1:39:18] What the movie didn't have was it didn't have charismatic characters.

[1:39:23] I was about to say actors.

[1:39:24] Charismatic characters or good, solid action banter between the two of them.

[1:39:30] And that's right in Howard Hawks' wheelhouse.

[1:39:32] Is charismatic characters who banter in a funny way, but that also shows an appreciation of the stakes of the situation.

[1:39:39] Uh-huh.

[1:39:39] If you could apply that to the goofy craziness of Gods of Egypt, I think you'd have something there.

[1:39:45] You'd have maybe even like a Star Wars type of movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:39:49] Whoa.

[1:39:50] Now, I think the obvious answer here would be a remake of Food Fight from our boys at Pixar.

[1:39:57] Because they know how to turn brands into lovable characters.

[1:40:03] Well, that's a good bad movie, though.

Dan McCoy

[1:40:05] I mean, I could easily say that we throw David Lynch at Fateful Findings and call it a day.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:12] Just throw him at it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:40:15] I feel like you almost don't want to touch Fateful Findings.

[1:40:17] Because any minor tweak, even the slightest bit, like if they released a director's cut of Fateful Findings, it would just not be quite the same beautiful mess.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:28] Yeah, no.

[1:40:28] Fateful Findings is a masterpiece of crap.

Dan McCoy

[1:40:31] I mean, there's stupid movies like Olympus Has Fallen or something like that that I feel like if you threw a better action director at it, like John McTiernan or something like that, it would be...

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:42] Yeah, director of Rollerball, the remake.

[1:40:46] Everybody's got duds in their filmography.

[1:40:48] Not Stuart Gordon.

[1:40:50] Who's the one?

[1:40:51] Not Stuart Gordon.

[1:40:52] Sure he does.

[1:40:52] The only director...

Stuart Wellington

[1:40:54] Give me one.

[1:40:54] Give me a single dud in Stuart Gordon's filmography.

[1:40:57] And if you say robot jocks, I'm quitting the podcast.

[1:40:59] Well, then I guess there's nothing.

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:02] I mean, I don't love Castle Freak.

[1:41:04] That's the end of robot jocks where they're like...

Dan McCoy

[1:41:06] Truly, these robots were the jocks.

[1:41:08] He's like, yeah.

[1:41:09] We can't live.

[1:41:10] We're robot jocks.

[1:41:11] Yeah, dude.

[1:41:12] It's super poignant.

[1:41:13] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:41:14] It's a tale of the US and Russia overcoming their differences by beating each other up with robots.

[1:41:19] By being robot jocks.

[1:41:20] Yeah.

[1:41:21] Oh, what a good movie.

[1:41:23] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:25] And the only...

[1:41:26] Yeah, the only director who I think has no duds in his filmography is Gene Vigo because he made like one movie and a short and then he died.

[1:41:35] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:41:36] So that's your advice to young filmmakers?

Elliott Kalan

[1:41:39] Oh, make one great movie and then die for sure.

[1:41:42] That'll...

[1:41:42] I mean, you can have a sterling reputation.

Stuart Wellington

[1:41:44] I would say...

[1:41:45] I don't have a particularly good answer for this question, but I would say any of the horror movies, get Stuart Gordon to do it.

[1:41:52] Or any of the dramas, get Stuart Gordon to do it.

[1:41:56] Just throw Stuart Gordon at that.

[1:41:57] Yeah, yeah.

[1:41:58] Do Odd Life of Timothy Green directed by Stuart Gordon.

[1:42:00] That'll be horrifying.

[1:42:01] We'll watch that boy's body knit together in that box of the fucking components they assemble.

Elliott Kalan

[1:42:07] And it'll be goopy somehow, even though it's made out of plants.

Stuart Wellington

[1:42:09] Oh, it's gonna be so, like...

[1:42:11] It's the kind of goop that David Cronenberg has nightmares about.

Elliott Kalan

[1:42:15] I mean, in a way, The Odd Life of Timothy Green was already made by Jan Sphankmeyer with his movie Little Otik,

[1:42:21] which is about a boy who's grown out of a root and terrifies people.

[1:42:27] So, just watch those two movies together.

Dan McCoy

[1:42:29] We can make a boy out of pencils.

[1:42:31] We can make a pencil out of boys.

Elliott Kalan

[1:42:32] That's not what they said at all.

[1:42:35] Grind up the boys!

[1:42:37] No!

Dan McCoy

[1:42:39] Last letter of the evening.

[1:42:42] This is from...

[1:42:44] It says,

[1:42:44] Regards from the ships at sea, name withheld.

[1:42:47] I was just listening to the Max Bunn show, The Greatest Generation.

[1:42:51] I'm thinking what a natural fit it would be for the next Switcheroo.

[1:42:54] Then Adam Prananka?

[1:42:56] Did you listen to the show?

[1:42:58] We know our friend Ben Harrison is on it, but...

[1:43:01] I don't remember Adam's last name, and I don't know how to pronounce it.

[1:43:04] Okay.

[1:43:05] I'm gonna say Adam Prananka.

[1:43:07] Really?

[1:43:07] He's super funny.

[1:43:08] Ruined it by revealing that he thought Dan's Halloween Sherlock costume was a Brent Spiner playing Data pretending to be Sherlock.

[1:43:15] That's a much better costume.

[1:43:18] Dead to me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:43:18] Actually pretty accurate.

[1:43:20] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:43:20] Dead to me.

[1:43:21] That's how much of a Dan partisan I am.

[1:43:24] Anyway, not to tip your hands too far, but what shows would you like to do the next crossover with?

[1:43:29] The Adventure Zone is a classic, which I hope continues in its own right, but I'd also like to hear Stu finally resolve some of his teen problems with still buffering.

[1:43:38] Or Elliot pretending to be Canadian for Stop Podcasting Yourself.

[1:43:41] What say the floppers?

Stuart Wellington

[1:43:44] I mean, I do like having a chance to just talk to some fucking teens, you know?

[1:43:51] I mean, you're legally not allowed to do that anymore.

[1:43:53] Yeah, I guess you're right.

[1:43:54] So I'd have to pick something different.

Dan McCoy

[1:43:56] I mean, I'll prelude this by, or preface it by saying that I don't think there's going to be another swish-a-roo because it was largely unsuccessful.

[1:44:05] I think that it was very, it was like an idea that...

Stuart Wellington

[1:44:09] Wow, a peek behind the curtain.

[1:44:11] I was thinking the same thing, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:44:12] It was an idea that like people had a lot of enthusiasm before beforehand.

[1:44:17] They had an enthusiasm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44:18] That's when you have so much enthusiasm that you just are overwhelmed with players.

[1:44:21] Yeah.

[1:44:21] It was like, hey, listener, thanks for writing in here.

[1:44:23] Do people know about this?

[1:44:24] Do people know about this thing?

[1:44:25] Has anyone been feeling this?

[1:44:27] Has anyone done this?

[1:44:27] It's like, if I do this thing enough, something comes out of me and I feel amazing.

[1:44:31] And then I feel kind of tired.

[1:44:32] And then I feel really guilty.

[1:44:35] So mom, dad, what is this?

[1:44:37] Why don't we do this wherever you go, though?

[1:44:39] It's like on you all the time.

[1:44:41] This guy, he's doing this, it's Back to the Future, and he's just masturbating on stage in front of everybody.

[1:44:47] And this guy's like, Hugh, Hugh, it's me, your nephew, Gary Hefner.

[1:44:52] You know that new way to get off that you've been looking for?

[1:44:55] Well, listen to this.

[1:44:57] Where is he pointing the phone at?

[1:44:59] You pointing it in a direction away from your wiener.

[1:45:00] It's just gross, squeaky, squitching sounds.

[1:45:03] And as the cops are pulling away, he's like, you guys aren't going to like it, but your kids are going to love it when they turn 13.

Stuart Wellington

[1:45:10] Yeah.

[1:45:10] He points the phone toward a ramekin full of, I don't know, potato salad that you're jamming your thumb into.

[1:45:19] Turns a boot stuck in the mud, yep.

Dan McCoy

[1:45:23] The switcheroo was a very popular idea before it happened.

Stuart Wellington

[1:45:26] I love the idea that this listener wrote in and was like, I really like this.

[1:45:31] Which one would you like to do?

[1:45:33] And you're like, your premise is flawed.

Elliott Kalan

[1:45:35] You're like, nobody else wants to hear that ever.

[1:45:37] You're wrong.

Dan McCoy

[1:45:38] No, I'm just, I just don't want to, I don't, I don't want to.

[1:45:41] Turn in your gun and badge.

[1:45:42] I don't want to disappoint anyone.

[1:45:43] I just, I just know that there are a lot of fans who complained when the switcheroo actually happened.

[1:45:49] Because it turns out that they like people doing the podcasts that they do already.

[1:45:53] Podcasts are all about fantasies, baby.

Stuart Wellington

[1:45:55] But, that being said.

[1:46:02] Somebody has to know what that means.

Elliott Kalan

[1:46:04] Sound clip that shit.

Stuart Wellington

[1:46:05] Somebody, that is the new fucking MaxFun fucking logo.

Elliott Kalan

[1:46:10] I have no idea what that means.

[1:46:11] MaxFun, Maximum Fun.

Stuart Wellington

[1:46:13] Sound clip, I guess we're about fantasies, baby.

[1:46:15] Get out of here.

[1:46:16] That's like.

[1:46:16] Throw that in there.

Elliott Kalan

[1:46:17] This is, you are, you are a creepy podcast producer who's going after like lost runaways in Los Angeles.

[1:46:25] And you're like, hey, get loose.

[1:46:27] Podcasts are all about fantasies, baby.

[1:46:29] Unbutton your shirt.

[1:46:30] Hey, come on.

[1:46:31] Let's, baby, let's relax.

[1:46:32] Have a little bit of stew juice.

[1:46:34] You guys are making it gross.

[1:46:35] That's what he calls wine.

Stuart Wellington

[1:46:36] So, man, this is tough.

[1:46:39] Because I.

Elliott Kalan

[1:46:39] Yeah, I got answers for this.

Stuart Wellington

[1:46:42] Obviously, like, one of the new shows on the network, Dead Pilot Society.

[1:46:46] I would love to get to do a reading of a pilot written by my boys, Dan or Elliot.

[1:46:53] I've got one.

[1:46:54] I've got a pilot.

[1:46:55] I would love to do on it because it's going nowhere.

[1:46:57] I don't think it's really funny.

Elliott Kalan

[1:46:58] As somebody would literally.

Dan McCoy

[1:46:59] We could do that as a bonus episode sometime.

[1:47:01] We could totally do that.

Stuart Wellington

[1:47:02] Oh, okay.

[1:47:02] Sure.

[1:47:03] As somebody with no theatrical training, I really overestimate my ability to read something.

Elliott Kalan

[1:47:10] And you know Dan can't read anything.

[1:47:11] So it's hilarity.

Dan McCoy

[1:47:12] The weird thing is, though, my tongue becomes much more dexterous as soon as I'm playing another part.

[1:47:18] Like, I can act.

Elliott Kalan

[1:47:20] I just can't read.

[1:47:22] That Florida-based serial killer, Dexterous.

Stuart Wellington

[1:47:29] You and your dark passenger have to throw some bodies in Miami and drink some sopa de pollo.

Dan McCoy

[1:47:38] But, Elliot, you've seen me on stage.

[1:47:40] It's not like I'm tripping over myself.

Elliott Kalan

[1:47:41] When you're performing and when you're playing character, yes, you are quite fluent and very articulate.

[1:47:47] You have no trouble making yourself understood.

[1:47:48] You're a specific type of introvert.

[1:47:51] You like to lose yourself in a character.

[1:47:53] In the moment.

[1:47:54] You own it.

Dan McCoy

[1:47:55] Yeah.

[1:47:55] I never want to let it go.

[1:47:57] Yeah.

[1:47:57] Mom's spaghetti.

[1:47:58] Hands are sweaty.

[1:48:00] So, there's...

Stuart Wellington

[1:48:02] Mom's spaghetti.

[1:48:04] Serengeti.

Elliott Kalan

[1:48:06] Balthazar Getty.

[1:48:07] Estelle Getty.

[1:48:08] There's a lot of...

[1:48:10] Okay, they're all booing him off the stage.

[1:48:14] Boo.

Dan McCoy

[1:48:17] Amages by Getty.

Stuart Wellington

[1:48:18] No one boos louder than Balthazar Getty.

Elliott Kalan

[1:48:27] You know what podcast I'd love to cross over with?

[1:48:29] It's not a MaxFun podcast.

[1:48:31] It's called Presidents Are People Too, and it's not a podcast.

[1:48:33] It's an audio series I do for Audible.

[1:48:35] I co-host it.

[1:48:36] It's now available on iTunes.

[1:48:37] Presidents Are People Too.

[1:48:38] Me and Alexis Coe talk about a different president every episode.

Stuart Wellington

[1:48:42] That's an interesting dodge, Elliot, but it's a great show.

Dan McCoy

[1:48:46] There's a number of ones that I would like to do.

[1:48:48] I would like to do Jordan and Jesse Go just because it would be fun to do something totally unstructured.

[1:48:53] I mean, it is structured.

[1:48:54] As opposed to this.

[1:48:55] Yeah.

[1:48:56] It is structured, but it's talking about people's lives and whatever you want to talk about rather than having a central theme, which sounds fun to me to just do that.

[1:49:09] But I also would like to do either My Brother, My Brother and Me or Judge John Hodgman because...

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:15] We'd be so bad at that, though.

[1:49:16] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:49:16] We get to tell people what to do, though.

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:19] I know, but that's why we would be bad at it.

[1:49:22] Nobody wants our advice.

Dan McCoy

[1:49:24] I think it would be so much fun to give advice out.

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:28] You're probably right.

[1:49:29] It would be fun.

Elliott Kalan

[1:49:30] Okay, let's try that.

[1:49:31] Let's just change our podcast.

[1:49:32] Let's run a simulation.

[1:49:33] Okay, I'm having trouble.

[1:49:34] I have a secret Santa coming up, and I'm worried about staying under the money limit because I don't want to seem too cheap, but I also don't want to go over because the person's not even going to know it's from me.

[1:49:44] What should I do?

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:47] This is obviously the secret Santa we're doing here at the Flophouse, and you clearly have Dan.

[1:49:52] You can see we're asking Dan directly.

[1:49:53] Yes.

[1:49:53] So Dan's going to say go over.

Dan McCoy

[1:49:56] I was going to say give instructions on how to masturbate because as we've learned tonight, that's the best present.

Stuart Wellington

[1:50:02] Not enough people know, and it's the gift that keeps on giving.

[1:50:05] It's a present you can give yourself.

[1:50:07] Elliot's undoing his belt.

[1:50:09] Oh, wow.

[1:50:10] That's a very large belt buckle, Elliot.

Elliott Kalan

[1:50:12] Oh, yeah.

[1:50:12] Well, you know, I've got to keep these pants up somehow.

Stuart Wellington

[1:50:15] Oh, wow.

[1:50:15] Is that the official Texas sesquicentennial official belt buckle of their 150 years?

[1:50:22] Wow.

Elliott Kalan

[1:50:22] Yep, yep.

[1:50:23] I got it when I was in Texas for that very celebration.

Stuart Wellington

[1:50:26] Okay.

[1:50:26] Well, now your pants are coming all the way down.

[1:50:28] Okay.

[1:50:29] This is becoming very close to erotica now, and I'm getting very...

[1:50:33] Not that close.

Dan McCoy

[1:50:34] He's narrating, like, play by play, your pants being removed.

Stuart Wellington

[1:50:38] Most of the time when I hear erotica, I hear a joyful Stuart reading it out loud.

Dan McCoy

[1:50:45] That is the...

[1:50:46] Yeah, the problem now is I can't get off without hearing Stuart's voice reading the erotica.

Stuart Wellington

[1:50:51] Yeah.

[1:50:51] It's required a lot of weird late night phone calls for me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:50:54] Yeah, where you're like, Dan, are you okay?

[1:50:56] You're breathing funny.

[1:50:57] I'm fine.

[1:50:58] Just keep reading that story.

[1:50:59] It's a total goof.

[1:51:00] It's funny.

Stuart Wellington

[1:51:01] That's why I want you to read to me, just as a joke.

[1:51:02] Just keep reading the descriptions of movies on IMDb.

Elliott Kalan

[1:51:07] I think it might be the saddest masturbation fodder.

Dan McCoy

[1:51:12] Oh, brother.

[1:51:13] So, I hope that has answered all of your questions to the fullest of our abilities, but now...

Elliott Kalan

[1:51:21] Very quick recommendations.

Dan McCoy

[1:51:22] It's time to get on to recommendations of movies that we like.

Elliott Kalan

[1:51:25] Oh, my God.

[1:51:25] And we've been talking for a while, we should do this fast.

[1:51:29] Fast as a flash.

Stuart Wellington

[1:51:31] Man, I'm going to jump right in here.

[1:51:33] I'm going to recommend a movie called Waxwork 2, Lost in Time.

[1:51:39] Hell yeah, man.

[1:51:40] I haven't seen that a long time.

[1:51:40] That's a movie that picks up right where the first Waxwork left off, which is great because

[1:51:45] you probably got Waxwork 2 in a DVD bundle with the first Waxwork.

[1:51:53] You got the heroes from the first movie, one of them being Zach Galligan from Gremlins, and

[1:52:01] they have just survived the horrors of the original Waxwork, only to go home and have a severed

[1:52:07] hand a la, what, thing?

[1:52:09] Is that the thing from...

[1:52:10] Yeah, the family, yeah.

[1:52:11] Yep.

[1:52:12] Or the hand from Evil Dead.

[1:52:14] This is your quick version?

[1:52:15] Yeah.

[1:52:15] Murders her dad, and she gets arrested.

[1:52:18] And the only way they can clear this woman's name is by using a portal to travel through

[1:52:23] time and get an adventure.

[1:52:24] It's great.

[1:52:25] Check it out.

[1:52:26] Waxwork 2.

[1:52:27] Boom.

Elliott Kalan

[1:52:28] I'm going to recommend a movie that is, I guess, similar to today's in that it's also

[1:52:33] about a woman who is having trouble with her husband's focus on his career and his wants

[1:52:38] as opposed to what's best for the both of them.

[1:52:41] And that's Luke.

[1:52:41] It's a movie called Losing Ground from 1982.

[1:52:44] It was written and directed by Kathleen Collins.

[1:52:46] And it is a story about...

[1:52:50] I guess the best way to describe it is it's a story about a marriage of two black intellectuals.

[1:52:55] She is a philosophy professor.

[1:52:57] He is an artist.

[1:52:59] And she is finding that she is not getting from him the thing that she needs, which is

[1:53:04] his attention and support.

[1:53:06] And he is instead feeling that as an artist, he has the license to kind of live however

[1:53:10] he wants and do however he wants.

[1:53:12] And it's a really well-observed movie.

[1:53:15] And it's got a really good cast.

[1:53:17] A bunch of great actors are in it, like Bill Gunn and Dwayne Jones, who you may remember

[1:53:21] from Night of the Living Dead.

[1:53:22] And it's a really good independent movie about a world that I know I don't usually see a

[1:53:28] lot of movies about.

[1:53:29] So Losing Ground.

Dan McCoy

[1:53:31] And I'm going to recommend a documentary by Werner Herzog called Encounters at the End of

[1:53:37] the World about him at the South Pole.

[1:53:42] Antarctica, rather.

[1:53:45] And it's you sort of hear of a documentary set in Antarctica and you just imagine a bunch

[1:53:52] of penguins, you know, a bunch of beautiful nature photography.

[1:53:54] Marching, if you will.

[1:53:56] And there are penguins in the movie.

[1:53:58] There is beautiful nature photography.

[1:54:01] But the movie is largely about, and this is tipped by the title, Encounters at the End

[1:54:06] of the World.

[1:54:07] It's largely about both the people that he meets in Antarctica, the types of people that

[1:54:14] are drawn to living in Antarctica and doing research there and being support staff for researchers.

[1:54:24] There's, you know, like there's a plumber who takes comfort from the fact that he is the

[1:54:33] descendant, as he claims, because he has this particular deformity in his hands.

[1:54:39] He says he's the descendant of Aztec princes.

[1:54:45] There's a woman who has been in all sorts of war zones across the world and is a contortionist

[1:54:53] who can put herself inside a piece of luggage.

[1:54:58] There's all these just fascinating people who have been shaken down to the southernmost part

[1:55:04] of the world.

[1:55:05] And it's about that.

[1:55:07] And it's about sort of implicitly about how the the ice and the snow is obviously disappearing

[1:55:14] because of global warming and what that means for the world.

[1:55:19] And it's one of these essay documentary films that doesn't have like a strong central thesis,

[1:55:27] but is sort of poetic and beautiful and inquisitive about life and about humanity.

[1:55:36] And, you know, it's the sort of thing that Vern Herzog does very well.

[1:55:40] Encounters at the End of the World is what I recommend.

Stuart Wellington

[1:55:44] Wow, three recommendations.

[1:55:46] We did it.

[1:55:47] Okay.

[1:55:49] Now what do we do on this podcast?

Elliott Kalan

[1:55:51] Now we blessedly sign off.

[1:55:53] Let's say goodbye.

[1:55:54] Once again, we have talked for longer than the movie was.

Dan McCoy

[1:55:57] By half an hour.

[1:55:58] Oy, oy.

[1:56:00] Well, I mean, the movie didn't have to talk about letters and stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[1:56:04] That's true.

[1:56:05] So let's bid a fond adieu to all of our listeners.

[1:56:08] Thank you so much for listening and for giving us your time and your enthusiasm.

[1:56:13] And in some cases, your money.

[1:56:15] Thank you to Max Fun, our parent network, and all the other great shows on it.

[1:56:18] Thank you to the people who keep the lights on, keep the electricity humming.

[1:56:24] And thank you to the man upstairs, the guy who lives above Dan

[1:56:28] and doesn't complain about all of our loud talking late at night.

[1:56:32] Without him, we couldn't do it.

[1:56:33] Thanks, big guy.

Dan McCoy

[1:56:34] Yeah, thanks to the makers of Max Magician and The Legend of the Rings,

[1:56:38] whatever this movie is.

[1:56:43] Most of all.

[1:56:44] Most of all.

[1:56:45] Thanks to you.

[1:56:46] Thanks to you.

[1:56:46] Yeah.

[1:56:47] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:56:47] Let's sign off.

[1:56:48] Hey, guys, for the Flophouse, I've been Stuart Wellington.

[1:56:52] I've been Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:56:53] And I'll always, in a little corner of the world, be Elliot Kalin.

[1:56:58] Cut it.

[1:56:59] Good night, everyone.

Stuart Wellington

[1:57:08] Elliot likes old-timey shit.

[1:57:10] Stuart likes new-timey shit.

[1:57:13] Dad doesn't like anything.

Elliott Kalan

[1:57:15] But we all kind of like porn.

[1:57:17] That's why I've been trying to figure out a stand-up bit about how offended I am that

[1:57:24] movies, whenever it's just shorthand for a sad, lonely character to show him masturbating,

[1:57:29] it's like, look, there's any number of reasons you're masturbating.

[1:57:32] Maybe you're sad and lonely.

[1:57:33] Maybe you're just bored.

[1:57:34] Maybe you've got 15 minutes to kill before you've got to make a phone call.

[1:57:39] Maximumfun.org.

[1:57:40] Comedy and culture.

[1:57:41] Artist owned.

[1:57:43] Listener supported.

Ep. #218 - Nine Lives

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