The Flop House: Episode #30 - Bangkok Dangerous

Dan McCoy

[0:00] In this episode, we get dangerous.

[0:03] Bangkok dangerous.

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

[0:33] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:34] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[0:36] I'm Elliot Kalin.

[0:37] We're coming at you from the center of the internet.

[0:40] Yeah.

[0:41] If I understand Galileo's teachings correctly.

[0:44] The Flophouse is right in the middle.

[0:47] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[0:48] Well, he was actually told me, originally suggested that.

Dan McCoy

[0:51] Yeah.

[0:52] Cosmology of the internet.

[0:53] Yeah.

[0:54] Wait, they had the internet back then, Dan?

[0:56] They just called it the net.

Stuart Wellington

[0:58] Back in the olden days?

[0:59] Yeah.

[1:00] Wait, isn't that a Sandra Bullock movie?

Dan McCoy

[1:01] You're thinking of Miss Congeniality.

[1:04] Mm-hmm.

[1:05] So, what did we watch tonight, dude?

[1:07] We watched a little film called Bangkok Dangerous.

[1:11] A movie that's so dangerous, it doesn't need any other words in that title to make it like

[1:18] a sentence that's actually a complete thought.

[1:21] Well, there isn't even...

Elliott Kalan

[1:22] I was waiting for the point in the movie where he goes, this isn't just dangerous.

[1:25] This is Bangkok dangerous.

[1:26] Yeah.

[1:27] Like, that's a level of danger.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29] Uh, they didn't hit that point though, right?

Elliott Kalan

[1:31] Uh, if it exists, they did not hit it.

[1:33] No.

Stuart Wellington

[1:33] It was great.

[1:34] It was exciting.

[1:35] It starred Nicolas Cage, that's for sure.

[1:37] Oh.

[1:38] Did it?

[1:38] Well, I don't...

[1:38] And that haircut of his.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39] I don't know.

[1:40] He was the lead character, but I don't know if you could say it starred Nicolas Cage.

[1:43] Nicolas Cage was in front of the camera for most of the film.

Dan McCoy

[1:45] There was a void at the center of this film.

[1:47] There was...

[1:48] And his name is Nick Cage.

[1:50] Stuart, you did such a great job summing up Step Up to the Streets last time.

[1:55] But I'm going to toss it over to you.

[1:57] I know that Elliot's done a lot of summing up, but I want to hear you sum up Bangkok Dangerous.

Stuart Wellington

[2:02] So, first of all, Elliot, check this out.

[2:04] Check this summary out, okay?

[2:06] Whoa, you're stepping up to me.

[2:07] Burn.

[2:08] Okay.

[2:08] It's surprising.

[2:09] So, the movie begins with Nicolas Cage.

[2:11] He's this bounty hunter or hitman or something with a heart of gold in Prague, and he kills

[2:17] some dude when his alarm rings, and then he kills his messenger guy, and then he goes

[2:24] to Thailand, to Bangkok specifically.

[2:28] And he lives by certain rules.

[2:29] Yeah, he's got some rules, obviously.

[2:31] Like every hitman in a film, he has rules.

[2:33] He's got cool hair.

[2:35] He's got rules like a normal hitman.

[2:37] And then he finds this new messenger guy named Kong, and he's like, never get attached to

[2:44] your messenger or anybody at all.

[2:46] Of course, he breaks that rule.

[2:47] Yeah.

[2:48] Almost instantly.

[2:49] Yeah, and he starts teaching Kong the way of the force of being a hitman, and then he

[2:53] falls in love with...

Dan McCoy

[2:54] He's just like Ghost Dog, the way of the samurai, except for it's the way of Nick Cage as a hitman.

Stuart Wellington

[2:58] Yeah, and the best part about it was when this guy, his messenger, gets beaten up, so he

[3:06] shows up to talk to Nicholas Cage, and Nicholas Cage, you know, and he's like, hey, teach me

[3:10] or something.

[3:10] And then Nicholas Cage attacks him with a knife, and you're like, whoa, is he going to kill

[3:14] him?

[3:14] But of course he doesn't, and he teaches him how to avoid getting stabbed with a knife,

[3:19] and then he's like, uh, that was your first lesson.

[3:23] It was really awesome.

[3:24] So he goes on, and he kills some dudes.

[3:27] Well, you mentioned the love interest.

[3:28] He has a love interest, absolutely.

[3:29] He falls in love with this deaf chick.

[3:31] Who works at a pharmacy.

[3:32] At a pharmacy, yeah.

[3:33] He goes there because he gets his arm scratched really bad from a passing, uh, like, necklace

[3:37] vendor, I guess.

[3:38] Yes, that's exactly what it was.

Elliott Kalan

[3:41] And, uh...

[3:42] Who he had a weird moment with.

[3:44] Yeah, it was weird.

[3:44] Before killing someone, where he just was staring in the face of this child's necklace vendor.

[3:48] I like to think of her as a personification of destiny.

[3:51] Oh, okay.

[3:52] I would have said lost innocence.

[3:53] No, destiny.

[3:54] Destiny works, too.

Dan McCoy

[3:55] And because she's deaf, uh, though, the love interest, she is a weakness for contract killers.

[4:01] Yeah.

[4:01] Well...

[4:02] Who don't speak the same language as her.

Stuart Wellington

[4:03] He claims to be in banking.

[4:05] That's true.

[4:05] Banking dangerous.

[4:07] And he does a pretty good job of, uh, of following that cover story by not doing anything banking

[4:13] related.

[4:13] And dressing like a slob all the time.

Dan McCoy

[4:15] But how many jobs does he have to do in Bangkok?

Stuart Wellington

[4:18] He has to do four, exactly.

[4:19] The first three are relatively simple, except for a little bit of, uh, high-speed boat chasing

[4:24] anybody.

Elliott Kalan

[4:25] Yeah, and what...

[4:25] How does he solve that problem?

Stuart Wellington

[4:27] By chopping off a dude's hand with a boat propeller.

[4:31] And then shooting him in the head.

[4:33] Yeah.

[4:33] Um, okay.

[4:34] So, fast forward.

[4:35] Final person he has to kill is the Prime Minister of Thailand, suckers.

Elliott Kalan

[4:40] Uh-oh.

[4:40] And this is a country where you can be thrown in jail just for insulting the king of Thailand.

Dan McCoy

[4:45] Yeah.

[4:45] Let alone murder...

[4:46] Wait, the king of Thailand?

Elliott Kalan

[4:47] There's a king, and he's more of a figurehead figure.

[4:49] But there was, like, there's a story, I think it was a Danish guy who recently was thrown

[4:53] in jail for...

[4:54] He was drunk, and he defaced a poster of the king of Thailand.

[4:57] And they threw him in jail, and the Danish embassy said, no, then we can do.

[5:01] Like, that's the law.

Stuart Wellington

[5:02] I don't know this country.

[5:02] Okay, stop talking about a better story than the one on the other.

Dan McCoy

[5:05] I don't know if you listeners realize this, but Elliot is a genius.

[5:09] I mean, who among us knew that Thailand had a king?

[5:12] He just celebrated his 60th year on the throne not too long.

Stuart Wellington

[5:15] I thought Thailand was just a place that made really delicious food.

[5:19] They do that too, my friend.

[5:20] Okay.

[5:20] And they had prostitutes.

Elliott Kalan

[5:21] Yes, they also have that.

Stuart Wellington

[5:23] And had a silly named city.

[5:26] Capital, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[5:27] So, okay, so Bangkok...

[5:29] An erotically named city.

[5:30] Okay.

[5:31] So if you like getting your cock slammed by something...

Stuart Wellington

[5:35] Like in a drawer or something.

[5:39] Yeah.

[5:39] Anyway, you were saying, sorry.

[5:40] Okay, guys, chill out.

[5:41] I know it's hilarious.

[5:42] So, okay, so he has to kill the prime minister of Bangkok and kill Suprize.

[5:49] He's unable to do it.

[5:51] He accidentally kills a bunch of dudes right in front of his deaf girlfriend who gets, like, mad and runs away.

[5:58] And then he is unable to kill the president of Thailand, or whatever.

[6:03] And then, like, the mob...

[6:05] Mr. Thailand, let's call him.

Elliott Kalan

[6:06] Well, he chooses not to do it.

[6:07] Well, I guess he is stalling, and then they see that he's up with a sniper rifle.

[6:13] Yeah, like, it's hard.

Stuart Wellington

[6:14] He's being really obvious.

[6:15] For somebody who's a professional killer, he's not doing a very good job of hiding himself.

[6:20] No.

[6:20] Which I think could be described...

[6:22] Could describe his entire performance in this movie, which...

[6:24] He's a very clearly foreign guy with a really awesome haircut walking around the whole time.

[6:31] There's no one else in Thailand who looks anything close to like him.

Elliott Kalan

[6:35] They only have, like, three other American characters who are...

[6:38] Three tourists who are incidental to an earlier scene.

Stuart Wellington

[6:41] And easily grifted.

[6:43] Very easily grifted.

[6:43] Which, you can't say the same thing about his character.

Dan McCoy

[6:45] No, he was ungriftable.

[6:47] But what's the denouement, Stuart?

[6:49] How does this tangled web resolve itself?

Stuart Wellington

[6:52] The mobsters who he's working for capture his buddy Kong, who is his messenger, who he's grown attached to.

[6:59] And Kong's like...

[7:00] And his girlfriend.

[7:02] And then, not Nicolas Cage's girlfriend.

[7:04] I don't know what happened to her.

[7:05] Well, they just stop seeing each other after she sees him kill those guys.

[7:07] She disappeared.

[7:08] Yeah, which I don't believe.

[7:10] I mean, he's really handsome.

[7:11] So, she...

Elliott Kalan

[7:12] And they bonded over it meeting that elephant.

Stuart Wellington

[7:15] Yeah, absolutely.

[7:16] And elephants are awesome.

[7:18] So, he goes and he kills a bunch of mobsters in really cool ways.

[7:23] There's some scenes that evoke moments from the movie Hard Target with Jean-Claude Van Damme.

[7:28] Or the movie Loaded Weapon 1, which I think Elliot brought up.

Elliott Kalan

[7:31] Well, just in that they were shooting things and then streams of stuff were coming out of the cans they had shot.

[7:35] Oh!

[7:36] Like in the supermarket shootout scene in the hit parody film Loaded Weapon 1.

Stuart Wellington

[7:40] Absolutely.

[7:41] So, moving forward, he then manages to capture the head mobster.

[7:47] He thinks back on his life.

[7:48] Thinks about all the bad things.

[7:50] This is Nicolas Cage we're talking about.

[7:51] He thinks back on his life.

[7:52] Thinks about all the bad things he did.

[7:54] There's cops all around.

[7:56] He puts his head next to the mobster's head.

[7:58] Puts the gun to his temple.

[8:00] And I'm not going to spoil it for you.

[8:03] You need to finish watching this movie because it's great.

[8:06] So, what do you think about that, Dan?

[8:08] Yeah, it's pretty good.

Dan McCoy

[8:09] And now that we've given the listeners an overview, we can dissect a little Bangkok Dangerous.

[8:17] Bangkok DOA.

[8:19] My major problem with this movie is I feel like if there's a Hitman movie, in general, if there's a Hitman movie.

Elliott Kalan

[8:26] Of which there are a lot.

[8:27] Can I talk later, by the way, about – I may have talked about this before on the podcast.

[8:30] I don't remember how I am baffled that there are so many Hitman movies that get made.

[8:34] Yes, you may.

[8:35] Okay.

[8:35] Thank you for asking permission.

Dan McCoy

[8:36] There was even a movie called Hitman.

Elliott Kalan

[8:38] Movie called Hitman, but there's like – there's Hitman comedies, Hitman romances, Hitman adventure films.

[8:44] Like, I'm waiting for Hitman jungle films.

[8:46] Well, Hitman is a very –

[8:47] Animated films.

[8:47] There's Hitman mysteries.

Dan McCoy

[8:48] That's a very, very common profession.

[8:50] Like Goal Goal 13.

[8:51] Particularly in this economy, Hitman is one of the two growth industries.

Elliott Kalan

[8:56] I will probably never meet a Hitman in my life unless I –

[8:59] Hopefully.

[8:59] Hopefully, Elliot.

[9:01] I certainly hope so.

[9:01] Most people will never meet one.

[9:03] They'll never hire one.

[9:04] They'll never know anyone who was hired by one or who hired one or hired – there is one in my family history, which I won't get into.

[9:13] But that was someone who was hired one.

[9:15] But, like, I'll never meet one, and most people won't either.

[9:18] And yet there are tons of movies about it.

[9:19] And, like, secret agents, I can understand.

[9:21] I'll never meet one.

[9:22] But, like, that's a hero fantasy character.

[9:25] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[9:25] Someone who doesn't just murder people.

Stuart Wellington

[9:27] Yeah.

[9:28] It's a character that you would, like, fantasize about being.

[9:30] Like, oh, man, I'm going to get beautiful women.

[9:32] I'm going to do awesome secret missions.

Elliott Kalan

[9:34] And I'll save the world while screwing dames.

Stuart Wellington

[9:37] But who really fantasized about being paid to shoot people possibly from a distance?

[9:43] Aside from, like, really unhappy 13 or 14-year-old guys.

Dan McCoy

[9:45] You know, sociopaths.

[9:46] Yeah.

[9:46] But anyway, I can tell you about that one.

[9:47] Well, this is what I was going to say was, you know, Hitman – this is what I'm saying.

[9:51] You would agree that you need to do a little work to make the Hitman a sympathetic character.

[9:57] Yes.

[9:58] And most films do this in one of two ways.

[10:01] They either make the person that the Hitman has to hit someone that is personal to them that they have some sort of stake in.

[10:10] And then they have to make a choice about what they're going to do about this hit.

[10:14] Or it becomes, like, a Hitchcock sort of film where, like, you create sympathy through the fact that this person is on the run.

[10:22] You show, like, a professional that is then being tracked down and the fact that they have had the tables turned on them is enough to sort of give a little sympathy.

Elliott Kalan

[10:31] Or you do the gross point blank way of making him an emotionally damaged character.

[10:37] Like, he does this but he's not – he doesn't enjoy it and he would be a likable enough guy if he didn't have emotional issues but, you know, so forth.

Dan McCoy

[10:46] Whereas this is a movie about a guy who is just a Hitman.

[10:51] It's a movie about four guys he's hired to kill who we don't know anything about.

[10:57] And he just kills them one after the other.

[11:00] And there's no real, like, personal stake he has in any of it.

[11:04] He isn't being chased down by anyone until the very end.

[11:07] I don't understand why we're supposed to care about Nicolas Cage's, you know, what happens to him in this movie at all.

[11:14] It's because he looks sad all the time, I think.

[11:16] But that's the thing.

Elliott Kalan

[11:17] Like, in the other movies, the people are sad and then become hitmen.

[11:20] Whereas in this it's like, oh, I've made a bad choice when I became a hitman.

[11:24] I didn't realize my life was going to be so lonely and I wasn't going to be able to settle down and have a family.

Dan McCoy

[11:29] Oh.

[11:30] I should have learned – I should have listened to my high school guidance counselor when he told me not to become a hitman.

[11:34] Yeah, exactly.

Stuart Wellington

[11:35] Or like a movie where one twin brother is a hitman and the other one is like a straight arrow cop and then they have to get together to solve like a galaxy-spanning mystery.

[11:45] Yeah.

[11:45] Or one –

[11:46] A space crime.

[11:47] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[11:48] Or one is a hitman and the other –

[11:50] That's the name of the movie, by the way, space crimes.

[11:52] One is a hitman and the other is like an accountant.

[11:54] Sure.

[11:54] And the hitman gets killed but the accountant gets mistaken for the hitman and suddenly he's in this – he's in over his head in these goofy scenarios.

Stuart Wellington

[12:01] But it turns out the hitman brother who was killed actually isn't killed.

[12:04] Yeah.

[12:04] He comes down.

[12:05] Only so he can get closer to his brother.

[12:07] Sure.

[12:07] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[12:08] He pretends to be a ghost giving his brother advice.

Stuart Wellington

[12:11] Yeah.

[12:11] I think you brought up an interesting thing, the idea of like the person who is like forced to become a hitman and like that reminded me of that –

[12:18] the Stuart Gordon movie King of the Ants where the main character is this guy who's got this really shitty job and he ends up taking a job to kill somebody and he ends up like totally regretting it.

[12:29] And like after killing the guy in the most like horrible way – he has to kill Ron Livingston, by the way, from Office Space.

[12:36] Oh, why would you want to kill Ron?

[12:37] And it's like really super like – and he like totally regrets ever doing it and then of course gets tortured for it by George Wendt from Cheers.

[12:46] And that was an example of a hitman character where you're like I can kind of understand this and feel bad for him even though like he shouldn't have done that clearly.

Dan McCoy

[12:53] Honestly, the only thing I remember about that movie is that Kari Wurr is in it.

[12:57] Yeah.

[12:57] And of all the B-movie starlets, I find her the most attractive.

[13:01] She's got a great ass.

[13:03] Oh, so sorry.

Stuart Wellington

[13:05] Anyway.

[13:05] This issue.

[13:06] But yeah, there's no moments like where you genuinely feel him like – you don't feel Nicolas Cage's character like feeling bad at any point or like caring.

[13:15] He just – the only emotion we see from him is that he seems to like this deaf girl.

[13:19] Yeah.

[13:19] He might feel bad.

Elliott Kalan

[13:20] For no apparent reason and she likes him for no apparent reason.

Dan McCoy

[13:23] Nicolas Cage might feel bad but we are left to infer that from him turning a picture of an elephant upside down.

[13:30] And then burning it.

[13:31] Yeah.

[13:32] He does –

Stuart Wellington

[13:32] Which was identical to the way he burns the pictures of the people he has to kill.

[13:36] That's called good directing.

Dan McCoy

[13:38] He has a real affinity for Elliot's.

[13:40] For Elliot's, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[13:41] Weird.

[13:42] That's so strange.

[13:44] Awkward.

[13:44] Hey, ooh.

[13:45] And elephants.

[13:46] Hey, hello.

[13:47] Hey now.

[13:48] Elliot's an elephant.

[13:49] Freudian slip.

[13:50] I don't know what it means but –

[13:51] You look like an elephant.

[13:53] Thank you.

[13:54] Maybe the most majestic animal there is.

[13:56] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[13:57] And adorable as a baby.

[13:58] And adorable.

[13:59] Amazingly adorable.

[14:00] They're furry.

Elliott Kalan

[14:02] I think if this movie had been an hour and a half of elephant footage, it would have been a far better movie.

[14:05] Yep.

[14:06] And they just called it Elephant.

[14:07] Mm-hmm.

[14:07] But actually there's a movie called Elephant already about the Columbine shooting.

[14:10] Yeah.

[14:10] They called it Elephants.

Stuart Wellington

[14:12] Maybe if they had just shown that clip from the movie The Protector.

[14:16] Operation Dumbo Drop?

[14:17] Yeah.

[14:17] Or The Protector where the dude –

[14:19] Larger Than Life?

[14:20] Where the bad guy beats up on the baby elephant.

[14:22] If they'd just shown the clip of him throwing the elephant over and over for an hour and a half, I'd probably like it more than this movie.

[14:28] It's too bad –

Elliott Kalan

[14:28] Not to make judgment calls.

[14:29] It's too bad Tony Ja couldn't protect that elephant.

[14:31] The reason that –

Stuart Wellington

[14:32] He did a really shitty job despite the fact that the movie's called The Protector.

Dan McCoy

[14:36] The reason that Nicolas Cage really thinks about elephants a lot is because while he's courting the deaf girl, they have a tender moment that involves a baby elephant.

Elliott Kalan

[14:46] He's just wandering around the streets.

[14:48] Yeah.

[14:49] I've never been to Thailand.

[14:50] I know they have elephants there.

[14:51] I don't know if they just wander freely through urban areas.

[14:53] It feels a real connection to elephants.

[14:54] Probably.

[14:55] Maybe it's like a bear.

[14:56] Like where I grew up, sometimes bears would come down out of the woods looking for food and they'd have to like shoo them away.

[15:02] Maybe it was like that with elephants.

[15:03] New Jersey.

[15:04] Did he live in a world of a Berenstain bear?

[15:05] He's talking about New Jersey.

[15:07] Yes, they were Berenstain bears wearing clothing and walking on their hind legs.

[15:11] And hopping on pop.

Stuart Wellington

[15:12] Yep.

[15:13] And making a clubhouse where there were no girls allowed.

Elliott Kalan

[15:16] Exactly.

[15:17] Those hop on pop bears are kind of like mutant bears after a radioactive bomb or something.

Dan McCoy

[15:22] The thing is like the early Berenstain bears are like these charming sort of Dr. Seuss knockoffs.

[15:27] And then the late Berenstain bears are always like Berenstain bears learn why you should get a flu shot.

[15:33] Why you shouldn't steal pumpkins from people.

[15:36] Yeah.

[15:36] Berenstain bears just got too preachy.

[15:38] Yeah.

[15:39] What the fuck?

Elliott Kalan

[15:39] It happens to a lot of bears.

Stuart Wellington

[15:41] Yeah.

[15:41] Understandably.

[15:42] So Bangkok Dangerous.

[15:44] Elliot, you talked a little bit about the editing of this movie and how it was really good.

[15:48] Bad?

Elliott Kalan

[15:48] This is a movie that from a technical standpoint, not just from a, I mean, you were talking about from a creative character motivation standpoint, it's very bad.

[15:56] But from a technical standpoint, it's also very bad.

[16:00] The editing is awful.

[16:02] The shooting is awful.

[16:03] Subpar.

[16:04] The framing, I would say like, not even subpar.

[16:06] Subpar is like, that's a choice I wouldn't have made.

[16:09] I think it hurts the film.

[16:10] But here it's like, I don't, it's like worse than the scene in The Rock, the Michael Bay film The Rock, where the good guys get corralled into a room in The Rock and the bad guys are waiting above them and shoot at them.

[16:22] And you just see close-ups of guns going off and close-ups of guys going, ah, and falling down.

[16:28] And then when the smoke clears.

[16:28] It's really putting you in the heart of the action.

[16:30] When the smoke clears, you're like, oh, that's what happened is they got shot.

[16:33] But that is like a picture of coherence next to this movie.

[16:37] The climactic shootout in a warehouse is almost entirely pitch black.

[16:42] And you have no idea what the layout of the inside of this building is.

[16:44] You don't know how far away Nicolas Cage is from these people.

[16:47] The boat chase scene, you're like, how far apart are these boats?

[16:50] Where are the boats going?

[16:51] You have guys shooting, like the scene where he's a sniper and he gets caught and the police start shooting up at him.

[16:58] It takes you a second.

[17:00] Your brain knows like, oh, I saw him.

[17:02] Then I saw guns going off.

[17:04] Then I saw a figure in a room, kind of like the one I think he's in, running away from gunshots.

[17:08] He must be getting shot at.

[17:10] But, like, they just don't give you the shots where it's like you don't have to figure it out for yourself.

[17:14] It's just a poorly made movie.

Dan McCoy

[17:16] Well, there's one scene in the final shootout where I guess there's a grenade involved.

[17:20] Suddenly there's an explosion.

[17:22] And you're kind of wondering, who brought the grenade to this fight?

[17:25] Why did the grenade go off and Nicolas Cage just gets blown back?

[17:29] Whereas one guy gets blown in half.

Elliott Kalan

[17:31] Here's what I inferred from that.

[17:32] Nicolas Cage has the bad guy pinned up against a door.

[17:35] And the bad guy somethings and the Nicolas Cage somethings.

[17:38] And then there's somehow a grenade blowing up in the bad guy's belly.

[17:42] So the bad guy gets blown up and Nicolas Cage is okay.

[17:45] And that is one of the best scenes in the movie, even though it makes no sense.

Dan McCoy

[17:47] It's like the movie Impostor where there's a bomb and the guy's ribcage.

[17:52] I don't remember that movie.

[17:52] Gary Sinise, everyone.

[17:54] That sounds great.

Elliott Kalan

[17:55] The classic Stuart dismissal of what was just said.

[18:00] Yeah, that's right.

[18:01] Anyway, there's...

Stuart Wellington

[18:02] That's terrific.

[18:03] Good stuff.

[18:04] I've seen better movies where they...

[18:07] Than this one?

[18:08] Surely not.

[18:09] Yes, I've seen a few better movies that have played off the arrival of a strange weapon.

[18:15] And you go along with it.

[18:17] Like in They Live where Rowdy Piper all of a sudden happens to have a gun on him.

[18:22] And you're like, well, I know...

[18:23] Rowdy Roddy Piper?

[18:25] I know enough about that character to imagine that he secretes weapons all around his body.

[18:30] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[18:30] It's believable that he might have a weapon we didn't know about before.

Stuart Wellington

[18:33] But in this movie, you're just like, wait, there's a grenade?

[18:35] Who brought that?

Elliott Kalan

[18:36] Why does that guy have that in his pocket?

Dan McCoy

[18:38] And by the way, when Rowdy Roderick Piper returned to the House of Usher, that was really...

[18:42] That was a tragedy.

Elliott Kalan

[18:43] Rowdy Roderick Usher?

[18:44] Yeah.

[18:45] Oh, my God.

[18:46] Sorry.

[18:46] Now I'm trying to think of a way to do a line from the story of the fall of the house of Roderick Usher.

[18:51] Of Rowdy Roddy Usher.

[18:53] I came here to chew gum and bury my sister alive.

[18:57] And I'm all out of gum.

Dan McCoy

[18:58] There you go.

[18:59] That's for the Poe fanatics in the audience.

[19:01] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[19:02] And the They Live fanatics in the audience.

[19:03] Now, this is a remake of a movie called Bangkok Dangerous.

[19:07] Written and directed by the same guys who wrote and directed this.

[19:10] The Pang Brothers?

[19:11] The Pang Brothers.

[19:12] I have not seen it.

[19:13] In that movie, the hitman is deaf, apparently, or mute.

[19:16] I can't remember which.

Dan McCoy

[19:17] I think he might be a deaf mute.

Elliott Kalan

[19:19] And in this one, Nicolas Cage merely doesn't talk for most of the movie.

Stuart Wellington

[19:24] I would think being a deaf mute would make being a hitman really challenging.

Elliott Kalan

[19:28] Well, that's why he did it.

[19:29] He wants the challenge.

Dan McCoy

[19:30] Oh, okay.

[19:31] Yeah.

[19:31] I think that it was one of these things where the idea was, in the original, okay, being

[19:37] deaf gives him this pre-international focus.

[19:40] The strange thing is that Nicolas Cage was like, I want to remake this film, but I want to

[19:45] remove anything that's interesting about the main character.

[19:49] Yes.

[19:49] And he was a producer on this film, Nicolas Cage.

[19:51] Yeah.

[19:52] Why wouldn't he want to keep the gimmick of the film intact?

[19:56] Otherwise, it's just a movie about a guy who's a hitman who has four jobs to do, does

[20:02] the first three successfully, fails the third, and then dies.

[20:05] Well, yeah.

[20:06] He does fail the first.

[20:07] Oh, dude.

Dan McCoy

[20:07] Spoiler alert, guys.

[20:08] Oh, sorry.

[20:09] Sorry.

[20:10] Guess you don't have to watch Bangkok Dangerous now.

[20:12] Consider yourself.

Elliott Kalan

[20:13] You should mail $5 to Dan right now.

[20:16] I'll set up a PayPal account.

[20:17] This is a movie that, like, we've had trouble watching movies in the past before.

[20:21] I'm thinking of specifically 10,000 BC, where they just don't keep your attention.

[20:24] And this was another one.

[20:25] It just failed to keep your attention.

[20:26] Honestly, I think this might tie in terms of how bored I was.

[20:29] Possibly.

[20:30] At least 10,000 BC had crazy costumes.

[20:35] Yeah.

[20:35] Like, they were dressed as cavemen.

[20:36] Whatever.

Dan McCoy

[20:37] I'll tell you that there are two things that I enjoyed in this movie.

[20:40] One was the guy's arm being cut off by a boat propeller, and it was still holding the gun.

[20:47] Yeah.

[20:47] That was pretty good.

[20:48] Very Star Wars-y.

[20:49] And then the other was there was a Bangkok nightclub they kept returning to that always had a bunch of Thai girls in different outfits, scanty outfits, dancing like line dances on the stage.

[21:04] And it was always fun whenever we turned to that nightclub to see what slutty outfit they'd be wearing this time.

[21:10] Yeah, once they were dressed up as doctors.

Elliott Kalan

[21:12] Yeah, it was a very boring movie.

[21:13] For an action movie, it was...

[21:15] There's not a lot of action.

[21:16] There's very little action.

[21:17] It's boring.

[21:18] The action that's in there is not very good.

[21:20] They managed to make the city of Bangkok seem incredibly dull.

Dan McCoy

[21:23] For a movie with Nicolas Cage, there's not a lot of hammy acting.

[21:27] Yeah, he is a statue.

[21:28] He is a cigar store Indian throughout the entire movie.

[21:31] As you said, his hair does most of the acting for him.

Stuart Wellington

[21:33] You know, these guys, the Pang Brothers, I mean, they even have, like, a name for themselves.

[21:38] Like, they're...

[21:38] Yeah, the Pang Brothers.

[21:40] Theoretically, guys who like him.

[21:42] But people who are movie buffs have probably heard of the Pang Brothers.

[21:46] Yeah, probably.

[21:46] You would think that they would be able to make a movie that isn't a total turd and isn't

[21:50] completely inept in every regard.

Dan McCoy

[21:52] By the way, this is the second movie that we've watched with the Flophouse that's done

[21:56] by a brothers team, along with the brothers Strauss, who did Alien vs. Predator 2.

[22:02] I missed that one.

Stuart Wellington

[22:03] Which, Alien vs. Predator 2, AVP Requiem, better movie.

Elliott Kalan

[22:06] What made it a Requiem?

[22:08] What was it a Requiem for?

[22:09] Well, it was a funeral mass for...

[22:12] It was a real dirge.

[22:13] I'm looking forward to AVP Aria.

[22:16] Wait, Aria Giovanni's in it?

[22:18] Yes, Aria Giovanni is in it.

[22:19] Porn star Aria Giovanni.

Dan McCoy

[22:21] Alien vs. Predator 3.

[22:23] Fugue.

Elliott Kalan

[22:24] I think there is a porn movie named Aria, but she's not in it.

[22:28] That's disappointing.

[22:28] It might be an Asia Carrera film.

[22:29] Sure.

[22:30] She's a member of Mensa.

Stuart Wellington

[22:32] Really?

[22:33] Yeah.

[22:34] I didn't know that.

[22:34] It was in the porn house.

[22:35] Like her and Geena Davis.

[22:36] Wow, I bet they probably hang out.

[22:38] They do archery together.

[22:41] Yep, archery.

[22:44] There's archery in the movie Friday the 13th.

Elliott Kalan

[22:47] I don't know how you got to that subject.

Stuart Wellington

[22:49] I saw a poster for the remake in the subway when I was walking over here.

Elliott Kalan

[22:53] It seems like if all the movies do not just do a sequel to,

[22:57] at least even call it Friday the 13th, New Beginnings, or something like that.

[23:00] Or like part a million.

Stuart Wellington

[23:01] It doesn't care.

[23:02] People will go see it.

[23:03] You don't need to.

[23:04] Well, I'll tell you one thing.

Dan McCoy

[23:05] I was totally uninterested in the Friday the 13th remake

[23:10] until Rich Duncan, former Flophouse guest co-host Rich Duncan,

[23:16] for a couple of episodes.

[23:17] Good guy.

[23:17] Yeah.

[23:18] Said two words to me from the trailer,

[23:21] and that was topless water skiing.

[23:24] That's a pretty good set.

[23:25] I'd watch an hour and a half of that.

Elliott Kalan

[23:27] But it's not going to be an hour and a half of topless water skiing.

[23:29] It's going to be an hour and a half of,

[23:30] there's going to be 20 seconds of topless water skiing.

[23:32] Wait, did Rich do?

[23:33] I guess if you want an hour and a half of topless water skiing,

Dan McCoy

[23:35] you should pay for the topless water skiing DVD.

[23:36] Even the real world,

Elliott Kalan

[23:37] even the real Cancun doesn't have two hours of topless,

[23:39] an hour and a half of topless water skiing.

Dan McCoy

[23:41] Did Rich just lie to me then?

[23:43] Yes.

[23:43] No.

[23:44] Rich called you up and guaranteed an hour and a half of topless water skiing.

[23:48] Man.

[23:48] It's like,

[23:48] I directed Friday the 13th,

[23:50] the remake.

[23:52] Oh,

[23:52] that's disappointing.

Elliott Kalan

[23:53] Are they going to do a remake of,

[23:54] like,

[23:55] Nightmare Before Elm Street?

[23:56] Nightmare Before Elm Street.

[23:57] The Nightmare Before Elm Street.

[23:58] Jack Skellington has to figure out how to stop this child molester from invading people's dreams.

Dan McCoy

[24:03] Before Heather Langenkamp moves to Elm Street,

[24:06] she will have a nightmare involving Jack Skellington.

[24:09] I think they actually are.

Stuart Wellington

[24:10] They're working on it.

[24:11] And, like,

[24:12] Robert Englund's not even in it.

[24:14] He's not coming back.

[24:15] I mean,

Elliott Kalan

[24:15] that's,

[24:15] there are a few times when I'm...

Stuart Wellington

[24:17] Timothy Olyphant will be Freddy Krueger.

Elliott Kalan

[24:20] But there's,

[24:21] there's so few,

[24:22] like,

[24:23] actors who are associated with a character that I'm disappointed that they wouldn't be playing it,

[24:26] and Robert Englund is one of them.

[24:28] Yeah,

[24:28] that's like,

Stuart Wellington

[24:28] that's like making a Evil Dead movie without Bruce Campbell.

Dan McCoy

[24:32] Yeah.

[24:32] Speaking of Robert Englund,

[24:33] I just watched Zombie Strippers.

[24:36] Mm-hmm.

[24:36] And in general,

[24:37] I'm not a fan of movies that are sort of trying for camp.

[24:41] However,

[24:42] I will say that...

Stuart Wellington

[24:42] Usually featuring Ron Jeremy.

[24:45] Now,

[24:46] those are just porno films.

[24:47] What have I been watching?

[24:49] I will say this for Zombie Strippers.

Elliott Kalan

[24:50] This movie isn't funny at all.

[24:51] There's just lots of sex scenes in it.

[24:53] I will say this.

[24:54] With a fat guy.

Dan McCoy

[24:55] Is that Zombie Strippers delivers on its dual promise of zombies and strippers.

[25:00] So,

[25:01] if you're,

[25:01] just on that level,

[25:02] it is not,

[25:03] it does not shy away from its exploitation.

[25:06] Are we at the recommendation part of this podcast?

Elliott Kalan

[25:08] It's the exact opposite of Naked Lunch is what you're saying.

[25:10] Exactly.

[25:11] As they pointed out on The Simpsons.

[25:12] Yeah.

[25:12] Two things wrong with that title.

Stuart Wellington

[25:14] So,

[25:15] Elliot,

[25:15] you were talking about Hitman movies.

[25:17] Yes.

[25:17] What's the story there?

Elliott Kalan

[25:19] The story there is,

[25:20] I don't know exactly,

[25:21] like,

[25:21] it's one of those things where there are a lot of mob movies.

[25:23] I can understand that.

[25:24] Married to the Mob.

[25:25] Married to the Mob,

[25:25] Godfather,

[25:26] Mobsters,

[25:27] Scarface,

[25:28] Scarface,

[25:28] what have you.

[25:29] A lot of organized crime movies.

[25:30] My Blue Heaven.

[25:30] A lot of organized crime movies.

[25:32] Goodfellas,

[25:33] Mickey Blue Eyes,

[25:34] and so forth.

[25:35] Johnny Dangerously.

[25:37] Johnny Dangerously,

[25:38] Donnie Brosco,

[25:39] and so forth.

[25:40] There are a lot of these movies.

[25:42] Mr. Mob.

[25:45] Mr. Mob.

[25:47] Mob in law.

[25:48] Mafia.

[25:49] Mobbing it up.

Dan McCoy

[25:51] Mobbing around.

Elliott Kalan

[25:53] Mobbing around.

[25:54] Meet the Mobbersons.

[25:56] And Honey,

[25:57] I Shrunk the Mob.

[25:59] There are a lot of these mob movies,

[26:01] but I can understand that,

[26:02] because there's,

[26:03] like,

[26:03] the mafia,

[26:04] even though you may never meet somebody in organized crime,

[26:06] at least has a place,

[26:08] if a criminal place,

[26:09] in society,

[26:11] and there's a lot of things,

[26:12] it's based around a corporate structure,

[26:14] and a family structure,

[26:15] there's a lot of room for stories there,

[26:17] and there's a lot of things about it,

[26:18] that are very relatable,

[26:20] even if you've never been in organized crime.

Stuart Wellington

[26:22] It's all part of the American dream,

[26:24] you know?

Elliott Kalan

[26:24] Well,

[26:24] it's the dark side of the American dream,

[26:26] I like to say.

[26:27] But,

[26:28] wouldn't really be the dark side of the American dream,

[26:29] is Guantanamo.

[26:30] Yeah,

[26:30] I was the first to make that parallel,

[26:32] by the way.

[26:33] First time.

[26:34] But,

[26:34] like,

[26:35] there is a,

[26:35] like,

[26:36] you can feel a psychological connection with those characters,

[26:38] in a way that,

[26:39] to have so many movies about hit men,

[26:41] and,

[26:42] a good hit man story,

[26:43] I'm fine with.

[26:44] I don't care,

[26:44] when I was a kid,

[26:45] Boba Fett was my favorite Star Wars character,

[26:46] whatever,

[26:47] dude.

[26:47] But,

[26:48] when,

[26:49] when,

[26:49] but to have,

[26:50] I don't know if he was out,

Dan McCoy

[26:51] I don't think he had,

[26:52] like,

[26:52] a hit out on Han Solo,

[26:54] I mean,

[26:54] he did.

[26:54] He was more of a bounty hunter.

Elliott Kalan

[26:55] He was a bounty hunter,

[26:56] but he would kill.

[26:57] Yeah,

[26:58] I guess.

[26:58] You have to assume he killed plenty.

[26:59] I mean,

[27:00] it is the Star Wars universe,

[27:01] so probably everyone shot at him first,

[27:02] but he did kill them.

[27:03] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[27:04] Then he got eaten by a giant anus in the ground.

[27:07] Yeah,

Elliott Kalan

[27:07] but that,

[27:07] in the books,

[27:08] he's escaped from that,

[27:09] so it's okay.

Stuart Wellington

[27:10] Thanks,

[27:10] Timothy Zahn.

Elliott Kalan

[27:11] That was,

[27:11] that was the one moment in Return of the Jedi,

[27:13] where it felt like David Cronenberg had started directing the film.

[27:16] Wait,

[27:17] there's a giant anus that eats people in the middle of the desert?

Dan McCoy

[27:20] Just in the ground somewhere?

[27:22] I don't understand.

[27:23] I think it burps after eating Boba Fett,

[27:25] Yes,

[27:25] it does,

Elliott Kalan

[27:25] which implies that it has a stomach,

[27:27] and a side,

[27:28] like,

[27:28] a throat,

[27:29] everything.

Stuart Wellington

[27:29] And it has a sense of comic timing.

Elliott Kalan

[27:34] I want to tell you one thing about that Sarlacc,

[27:35] is it really knows when,

[27:37] that's also,

[27:38] how do you laugh?

Dan McCoy

[27:38] It also burps really fast,

[27:40] considering that it slowly digests over,

[27:42] over thousands of years.

[27:43] Yeah,

Dan McCoy

[27:43] exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[27:43] Everything in Return of the Jedi burps after eating.

[27:46] Jabba the head eats a frog,

[27:47] burps.

[27:47] That little thing that sticks out of the desert ground,

[27:50] zaps a bug with its tongue,

[27:52] burps.

[27:52] You're talking about Salacious Crumb.

[27:53] Salacious Crumb doesn't burp.

[27:54] He would have used the name,

[27:55] Mitrosillian.

[27:56] Come on.

[27:57] Thank you.

[27:57] This was,

[27:58] we were doing,

[27:59] it worked today,

[27:59] we were doing Jack Nicholson impressions of,

[28:01] Agribo,

[28:01] Saisnoodles,

[28:02] they're all there.

[28:03] They're all there.

[28:04] The Rancor probably.

[28:05] I don't remember.

[28:06] A Man,

Elliott Kalan

[28:06] Yak Man.

[28:08] They're all,

[28:09] I wish I could remember the name of the Rancor Keeper,

[28:12] but I forgot his name.

[28:13] Admiral Ackbar probably.

[28:15] I don't fucking care.

[28:16] We were doing,

[28:17] we were doing Jack Nicholson in other roles today.

[28:20] Good morning, guard.

[28:20] So it was like Jack Nicholson in other things,

[28:23] and I,

[28:23] Chief Chirpa.

[28:24] And my contribution to that was Jack Nicholson as Bib Fortuna.

[28:28] Just,

Dan McCoy

[28:29] no Jabba Wonga,

[28:31] you know,

Elliott Kalan

[28:31] that kind of thing.

[28:32] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[28:33] Hey man,

[28:34] no Jabba,

[28:37] Jabba Nobata.

Elliott Kalan

[28:39] And again,

[28:39] my favorite thing in Return of the Jedi,

[28:41] they create Huttys as a language,

[28:42] and the Huttys phrase for Jedi mind trick is Jedi mind trick.

[28:47] Huttys does not have a word for a mind or for trick.

[28:50] Look.

[28:50] The great,

[28:51] the great mobster race of the universe has no word for trick.

Dan McCoy

[28:56] I mean,

[28:56] that makes sense to me.

[28:57] It's like,

[28:58] it's like in France where they're like,

[28:59] the blue jeans,

[29:00] you know.

Elliott Kalan

[29:01] But blue jeans are an invention that was brought to them.

[29:04] It's not,

[29:04] it's not a common everyday thing like tricking stuff.

[29:07] Well,

[29:07] you know,

Dan McCoy

[29:07] like Jedi's are not common in the Hutt.

[29:09] No,

[29:09] it's not Jedi that I have such an issue with.

Elliott Kalan

[29:11] It's mind trick.

[29:12] Oh,

Elliott Kalan

[29:12] I see.

[29:13] So they've never referred to their minds or tricking.

Stuart Wellington

[29:15] Maybe they,

[29:16] they say mind trick because they,

[29:18] they give no credence to it.

[29:19] They think it's bullshit.

[29:21] They're trying to like lessen it in the eyes of their race.

[29:23] Oh,

[29:23] maybe.

[29:24] Anyway,

[29:24] this is off topic,

Elliott Kalan

[29:25] but.

[29:26] Really?

[29:26] I'm just saying,

[29:27] Hitman,

[29:28] Hitman are just so.

[29:29] We didn't watch Return of the Jedi tonight?

[29:31] Here's my problem.

[29:33] The Ewoks are so technologically primitive.

[29:35] How could they,

[29:36] the Zulu Wars show us that.

[29:38] What I don't understand is how.

[29:39] Really the Ewoks are the Vietnamese.

[29:41] There's that one moment in that movie where the one Ewok.

[29:43] It was a war of attrition that took a day and a half.

Stuart Wellington

[29:47] That was the problem with the Imperial Army.

[29:49] There's that one moment where the one Ewok looks to the other guy when C-3PO says some bullshit.

[29:53] And the one Ewok looks to his friend and goes,

[29:55] that guy's wise.

[29:57] And you're like,

[29:57] holy shit,

[29:58] he just spoke English for a second.

[30:00] What's going on there?

[30:00] I don't remember that part.

Elliott Kalan

[30:01] You need to watch it again.

[30:02] I promise.

[30:03] I usually stop watching Return of the Jedi after they get away from Jabba's palace.

[30:06] Yeah,

Dan McCoy

[30:06] that's the best part.

[30:07] It's like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom where the opening sequence is the best sequence in the film.

Elliott Kalan

[30:12] Yeah,

[30:12] except I still like a lot of that movie,

[30:15] even though people don't.

Dan McCoy

[30:16] Yeah.

[30:16] No,

[30:16] I like it.

[30:17] I actually like it better than Last Crusade.

[30:18] Last Crusade gets a little too goofy for me.

[30:20] I agree.

Stuart Wellington

[30:22] Okay,

[30:22] so Hitman.

[30:23] Hitman.

[30:24] Most Hitman movies feature like a guy with a barcode on his neck or something, right?

[30:29] Just the one.

Elliott Kalan

[30:30] But like Hitman movies also have like a gimmick.

[30:33] Like it's one of those things.

[30:34] They almost always get like a hot girlfriend too, right?

[30:37] A hot girlfriend and they're amazing at everything.

[30:40] Like if I saw a movie that was a Hitman movie where,

[30:42] and I'm sure these exist,

[30:43] they're just nothing that come to mind at the moment,

[30:44] that is a very like a realistic movie about this is a shitty job and you do it

[30:49] and you kill people for money but like you don't perform amazing kung fu all the time

[30:54] and also sneak into people's rooms and then shoot them through mirrors,

[30:58] you know,

[30:58] and things like that.

[30:59] Yeah,

Stuart Wellington

[30:59] these are guys who could probably find a significantly more fulfilling career somewhere else.

Elliott Kalan

[31:03] Yes,

[31:03] but it's this kind of like,

[31:05] this kind of fantasy glorification of Hitman that just confuses,

[31:09] it's not like I'm like,

[31:10] this is a sign of the decay of society that we're glorifying these men,

[31:15] but it just boggles my mind that this is the,

[31:17] like rather than astronauts for instance.

Stuart Wellington

[31:19] Well,

[31:19] and it's the same thing with like serial killer movies in Hollywood.

[31:23] It's all like,

[31:23] these weird serial killers.

Dan McCoy

[31:24] These serial killers are all fucking geniuses.

Stuart Wellington

[31:27] They're like Mensa members serial killers.

[31:29] They're like super monsters.

[31:30] And they have like moral superiority.

[31:32] They're like,

[31:32] I do this.

[31:33] To show you what's wrong with your life.

[31:36] And it's like,

[31:37] you know what?

Elliott Kalan

[31:37] You wouldn't understand the things I've shown you.

Stuart Wellington

[31:39] And like the vast majority of them are just repressed masturbators or something.

[31:43] Well,

[31:44] in real life,

[31:44] yeah.

[31:45] But in,

[31:45] in these movies,

[31:46] they're like,

[31:47] uh,

[31:47] they're able to show you the dark side of our culture or something.

Elliott Kalan

[31:50] Even then,

[31:50] like,

[31:51] at least there's,

[31:52] I mean,

[31:52] there's the old trope,

[31:53] uh,

[31:53] that is in like revolutionary road of like,

[31:56] the insane person sees the truth through,

[31:58] sees through the illusions of society.

[32:00] And it's a bit much for that person to be a serial killer.

[32:02] But even then,

[32:03] that makes more sense to me than like,

[32:05] let's make a hit man movie.

[32:06] Dudes like here,

[32:08] well,

[32:08] our hero will be the guy who kills people for money,

[32:10] you know?

[32:10] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[32:11] Well,

[32:11] I've just been really waiting to write this awesome novella about the greatest hit man

[32:15] ever to live.

[32:16] What's his name?

[32:17] Jack,

[32:18] John,

[32:18] John Doe.

[32:20] Okay.

[32:21] John Doe,

[32:21] and he kills serial killers.

[32:23] Okay,

[32:24] that's Dexter.

[32:25] Oh,

[32:25] okay,

[32:25] but he does it for money.

Dan McCoy

[32:27] And he only kills these serial killers in the eye of a hurricane.

Stuart Wellington

[32:31] Yep.

[32:32] And he only uses,

[32:33] he only uses a crossbow.

Elliott Kalan

[32:35] And he has one webbed hand.

Stuart Wellington

[32:37] He has,

[32:38] he has one gimpy hand,

[32:39] yeah.

Dan McCoy

[32:40] And only other serial killers who don't appreciate their life of serial killing enough.

[32:44] And on the moment of,

[32:45] And his eyes are two different colors.

Stuart Wellington

[32:46] And on the moment of shooting a serial killer,

[32:48] he has an almost orgasmic release where he lives the life of one of our presidents.

[32:55] Just in a flesh.

[32:56] Yeah,

[32:56] in a flesh.

[32:56] Which one?

[32:57] You'll have to watch the film.

[32:58] It depends.

[32:59] Well,

[32:59] it changes.

[33:00] Or,

[33:00] well,

[33:00] wait,

[33:01] I just ruined it.

[33:01] Well,

Elliott Kalan

[33:01] that's the other thing I mentioned before.

[33:02] Like,

[33:03] you see,

[33:03] it's because they want to give the character a distinctive look,

[33:05] but they make them so crazy looking,

[33:07] like,

[33:08] as to stick out anywhere.

[33:10] And it's like,

[33:10] if you want to hire someone to kill somebody,

[33:11] like,

[33:12] you pick a guy to blend into crowds.

[33:13] At least Nicolas Cage,

[33:14] with just the addition of a hat and a camera,

[33:17] could make himself into a member of the press to escape the police.

[33:20] Yeah.

[33:21] That's true.

[33:21] But you have,

[33:22] like,

[33:22] in the movie Hitman,

[33:23] he's got a barcode on the back of his neck.

[33:25] He's bald.

[33:25] He's shaved bald.

Stuart Wellington

[33:26] He's Timothy Oliphant,

[33:28] who's,

[33:28] under normal circumstances,

[33:30] is a kind of distinctive looking dude.

Elliott Kalan

[33:32] they put the barcode.

[33:33] Everyone would be like,

[33:34] aren't you the guy from Deadwood that we don't like,

[33:35] even though he's the center of the show?

Stuart Wellington

[33:37] Aren't you that great guy from The Girl Next Door,

[33:39] who's really weird?

Dan McCoy

[33:40] They put the barcode on the back of a hitman's neck

[33:42] because they just want to speed up the whole process.

[33:45] If you want to kill someone,

[33:46] you pull out the scanner,

[33:47] you're like,

[33:48] all right,

[33:48] you're activated,

[33:49] scan it over.

[33:51] It's like,

[33:51] okay,

[33:51] well,

[33:51] $1,000,

[33:53] great.

[33:53] That's what I'll pay you.

Elliott Kalan

[33:54] So you're saying that the guys who hire hitmen have scanners to see what the price is?

[33:58] Yeah,

[33:58] sure.

[33:58] So if his price goes up,

[33:59] he's got to get a new tattoo of a barcode.

Dan McCoy

[34:02] Yeah.

[34:02] Well,

[34:02] that's why he has to charge so much,

[34:05] because he has to get laser tattoo removal.

Stuart Wellington

[34:07] Wouldn't they get,

[34:08] get a re-tattoo every time he changes his rates?

[34:09] Wouldn't they put the tattoo in a harder,

[34:11] like a less obvious place?

[34:12] I mean,

[34:12] it's on the back of his neck,

[34:13] for God's sakes.

Elliott Kalan

[34:14] But for a movie,

[34:15] they have to have that image on the poster of the back of his head,

[34:17] so they just forget about it.

Stuart Wellington

[34:19] Wasn't that movie based on a video game?

Elliott Kalan

[34:22] Oh,

[34:22] it might have been.

[34:22] You might be thinking of Max Payne.

[34:24] Maybe Hitman was also.

Stuart Wellington

[34:25] I think it was too,

[34:26] yeah.

[34:27] Well,

Dan McCoy

[34:27] let's cut this short,

[34:29] because we've talked a lot.

Elliott Kalan

[34:29] You might be thinking of Super Mario Brothers,

[34:31] with John Leguizamo and Bob Hoskins.

[34:33] Yeah,

[34:33] that was really great.

[34:34] And Dennis Hopper.

[34:34] And,

[34:35] of course.

[34:36] Academy Award winner Dennis Hopper.

[34:38] His descriptions of making that movie are so funny.

[34:40] He's,

[34:41] I think the Onion asked him about it,

[34:42] and he was like,

[34:43] I didn't know what was going on,

[34:44] they didn't know what was going on,

[34:46] my son was like,

[34:46] why don't you look like the guy in the game?

[34:48] And he was like,

[34:49] and I was like,

[34:49] that's what he looks like!

Dan McCoy

[34:53] Dennis Hopper's hilarious.

[34:55] Anyway,

[34:56] let's move on to our final judgments about Bangkok.

[34:59] Final judgments.

[35:02] Nice.

[35:03] So the categories are,

[35:05] for people who haven't listened before,

[35:09] if you exist,

[35:10] the categories are,

Elliott Kalan

[35:11] If there's anyone on God's earth

[35:12] that hasn't heard the Flophouse before,

[35:14] let's explain it on the very off chance

[35:16] that such a thing exists.

[35:18] Maybe there's an alien picking up this transmission.

Stuart Wellington

[35:20] Pause this podcast and download our original,

[35:23] how many have we done?

[35:24] Is it like the 28th or 29th?

Dan McCoy

[35:27] Yes,

[35:27] 10.

[35:28] Listen to all those first.

[35:29] You could do a month of pods,

[35:31] listener at home.

[35:32] Anyway,

[35:33] that's good shit.

[35:34] Is this a movie that you would not recommend to anyone?

[35:36] A movie that you would recommend as a good,

[35:38] bad movie?

[35:39] Or a movie that you liked in some way?

[35:42] So,

[35:42] Stuart,

[35:42] what would you say about this movie?

Stuart Wellington

[35:44] You know,

[35:45] this is a movie that I liked a lot.

[35:48] Wait,

[35:48] I'm joking.

[35:51] I had to go in there for a second.

[35:52] No,

[35:52] irony.

[35:53] I know.

[35:54] I'm just joking.

[35:55] This movie's not very good.

[35:56] I wouldn't recommend it to anybody.

[35:57] I might recommend it to Nicolas Cage.

[35:59] I think you should watch it again

[36:00] and think about his life.

[36:01] But it would be like a Ludovico procedure.

[36:03] You just got to prop his eyes open.

Dan McCoy

[36:04] Yeah,

[36:04] no,

[36:05] this movie is like a one film intervention.

[36:07] Like,

[36:08] Nick,

[36:08] what are you doing?

[36:08] Here,

[36:09] check it out.

[36:09] What's going on,

[36:10] dude?

[36:10] This is the last movie you made.

Stuart Wellington

[36:11] Destiny just turned on the radio.

Elliott Kalan

[36:13] He's not even in that,

[36:15] is he?

[36:15] No.

[36:15] I just made that up.

[36:17] Yeah,

[36:17] I know.

[36:18] That was the movie that,

[36:19] I just remember them hyping the fact that Quentin Tarantino was in it.

[36:22] Because it was right after Pulp Fiction,

Dan McCoy

[36:24] right?

[36:24] And Quentin Tarantino.

[36:27] You loved him in Reservoir Dogs.

[36:29] If you saw it.

[36:30] Now he's in a non-Quentin Tarantino movie.

Elliott Kalan

[36:32] You loved the movie you saw that he shot and wrote.

[36:35] And oh,

[36:35] he has that one small part in it.

[36:36] But this one he's just acting in.

[36:37] Nancy Travis and Quentin Tarantino in.

[36:40] He plays the guy who turns on the radio.

Dan McCoy

[36:44] This movie,

[36:44] yeah,

[36:45] I would not recommend it to anyone.

[36:47] However,

[36:49] as a movie that we all watched talking through a lot of it,

[36:53] it was a very easy movie to talk through.

[36:55] I would recommend it on the level of,

[36:56] you do not have to pay any attention to this movie to comprehend what's going on.

Elliott Kalan

[37:00] If you want to watch a movie,

[37:01] but don't want to watch a movie,

[37:03] then this is the movie to not watch.

Dan McCoy

[37:04] If you want visual wallpaper,

[37:06] then this might be the film for you.

Elliott Kalan

[37:07] You're tired of the Yule log at your video.

[37:09] Sure.

[37:09] At your parties,

Dan McCoy

[37:10] then.

[37:10] Yeah.

[37:11] Once Christmas is over,

[37:12] you're like,

[37:13] hmm,

[37:13] I would like to have something on my television that I don't need to pay attention to.

[37:18] I don't know what I could watch that's non-holiday related.

[37:21] Sure,

[37:21] I want to waste energy.

[37:22] Sure.

[37:23] But how can I do it in such a way that I don't pay attention?

Stuart Wellington

[37:27] Or I think if you're babysitting and you want to keep your kids busy for, you know, an hour and a half or so.

[37:32] This will not keep kids busy.

Elliott Kalan

[37:34] This would keep maybe like a vegetable busy.

Stuart Wellington

[37:36] Like someone with no...

[37:37] If you are babysitting a child who is a vegetable...

Elliott Kalan

[37:40] If you were babysitting Terry Schiavo and you wanted to shut her up for a second...

[37:44] Right.

[37:44] This would be the movie to show.

[37:45] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[37:45] If you get off on really greasy hair, then you could watch this.

Stuart Wellington

[37:49] If you are watching every single movie Nicolas Cage ever made...

Elliott Kalan

[37:52] Then you would have to watch that.

[37:54] For a bet or a dare of some kind.

[37:57] Or just...

Stuart Wellington

[37:58] That would take a really long time, right?

Elliott Kalan

[37:59] If you were doing it as penance for a sin you've committed, this is the one to watch.

[38:04] Well, it's one of the many that you would have to watch.

[38:07] Well, and I just want to go on the record as saying also I hate this movie and don't recommend it.

[38:11] It's rare that I...

[38:12] Oh, it's a strong word.

[38:13] It was just not worth talking about, really.

[38:16] It's rare that I use the phrase shit on a shingle, but, you know, if I had to pick a...

[38:20] Really?

[38:20] You use that.

[38:20] You say that all the time.

[38:22] It's rare.

[38:23] If I had to pick a piece of architectural supplies and a piece of feces to compare this to, it would be shit on a shingle, this one.

Dan McCoy

[38:29] Only one this year.

[38:30] Everybody, uh...

Stuart Wellington

[38:31] And just for the record...

[38:33] I think that was the product of peer pressure.

[38:35] Just for the record.

[38:35] Dan really didn't like it, and then he kind of made both of us not like it.

[38:38] Yeah, because I loved it before Dan actually.

[38:39] Yeah, you were talking about how the mise-en-scene and, like, the color choice was so colorful.

Elliott Kalan

[38:44] Just for the record also, in case anyone gets a bad idea, shit is not a good preservative for shingles.

[38:50] And if you place it on a shingle, it will blow away or get rained off.

Dan McCoy

[38:53] It's also not a good hors d'oeuvre to put shit on a shingle.

[38:55] Yes, people don't...

Elliott Kalan

[38:55] All you're going to end up getting is a dirty shingle and some wasted shit.

Dan McCoy

[39:00] Possibly hepatitis C.

Elliott Kalan

[39:02] That's M.R.G. Robinson, M.D.

Dan McCoy

[39:11] If you're keeping score at home, that's the strangest joke ever to be made on the Flophouse.

[39:18] So, anyway, let's move on.

[39:22] Before we get into our recommendations, I have a few letters from listeners.

[39:28] Number one, everyone should go to the flophousepodcast.blogspot.com.

[39:34] That's the website.

[39:35] That's our website.

[39:36] What?

[39:37] Because Flophouse superfan, Ksenia...

[39:41] Ksenia.

[39:42] ...has done some Netflix lists.

[39:46] What's that?

[39:47] She has put together a list of, number one, all of the movies that we've discussed on the Flophouse, in case you want to play along at home.

[39:55] What'd you do?

[39:55] No, what's Netflix?

[39:56] It's a service whereby, if you pay money, you can rent DVDs via the mail.

Stuart Wellington

[40:03] Oh, over the net.

[40:05] That's really clever.

[40:06] Okay, keep going.

[40:07] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[40:07] Dates back to Galileo's day.

[40:09] And there are also links to lists of all the films that we've recommended.

[40:14] And she says, I know that almost every time I listen to a new episode, you guys mention a movie I've yet to see slash have never heard of.

[40:22] I'm sure other listeners feel the same and will appreciate the ability to scroll through the lists of your old recommendations without having to skim your old episodes with pen and paper at hand.

[40:32] And so that is an awesome service that she has provided.

[40:35] That was fantastic of her.

[40:37] Free of charge, Stuart.

Stuart Wellington

[40:38] Yeah, I was actually glancing on the list.

[40:40] And there's even movies that I recommended as a Joker on there.

[40:43] So that's awesome.

[40:45] She was very thorough.

[40:46] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[40:46] You'll notice that the movies get much classier once I got on board.

[40:50] Sure, it's true.

Stuart Wellington

[40:51] Classier or more boring?

Dan McCoy

[40:52] A little bit of both?

[40:53] Who's going to make the call?

[40:55] There's also a link to her personal website on the site.

[40:59] So if you want to check that out.

[41:00] She has a lot of neat stuff on there.

[41:02] Also, I have a line.

[41:04] I have a line.

[41:06] I've got an email.

[41:07] I have a line in a television show.

Elliott Kalan

[41:09] It's an episode of Law & Order.

Dan McCoy

[41:12] You play the guy who discovers the corpse.

Elliott Kalan

[41:14] So your line is, yeah, guys, homie, Chetha.

[41:16] Huh?

Dan McCoy

[41:17] I have a line in the show, What's My Line?

[41:20] Which hasn't been on the air for, I don't know, 50 years.

[41:23] Yeah, somewhat.

[41:24] 40, some odd, at least.

[41:26] An email here from Eddie, last name withheld.

[41:31] Okay.

[41:31] What ethnicity is that?

[41:32] Hey, Dad.

[41:33] Hey, Dad.

Stuart Wellington

[41:35] Well, you're like the nerd in elementary school.

[41:37] I was going to say this is...

[41:38] I want to teach your mom.

Dan McCoy

[41:42] I've been drinking, ladies and gentlemen.

[41:44] Hey, Dan.

[41:44] It's Eddie from You, Your World, and You, which is a sketch show that I did with this gentleman.

[41:48] That was a very funny sketch show.

[41:50] I've been listening to the back episodes and have recently caught up.

[41:53] I wish I'd started listening sooner.

[41:55] Anyway, again, my roommate...

[41:55] Serves you right.

[41:56] Just told me about this movie called The Room that's apparently a cult hit for shittiness.

[42:00] Yeah, I've seen it.

Elliott Kalan

[42:01] I have seen it.

[42:02] We watched it at work once.

[42:03] Well, finish the letter and then I'll tell you about it.

Dan McCoy

[42:05] He says, maybe you guys have already heard of it, but I just want to make sure you knew it existed.

[42:09] Is Tommy Wiseau the Ed Wood of our era?

[42:12] Is this the ultimate good-bad movie?

[42:14] And I was going to open the question to you guys.

[42:17] Is this movie too little known to be on the Flophouse?

[42:22] Is this kicking a dog that has already been kicked several times before?

Elliott Kalan

[42:27] Or is it worth checking out?

[42:28] This is a movie, having seen it, it doesn't quite fall on our purview because we tend to avoid movies that are not bigger releases or fairly big releases.

[42:40] It is, however, a movie that I recommend we watch privately, if not for the Flophouse, because it is hilarious.

[42:45] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[42:45] It is incredibly poorly made.

[42:46] I do want to watch this movie.

[42:48] You can't get it on Netflix.

[42:50] However, you can get it very cheaply via Amazon.

[42:52] And I was thinking about purchasing it.

Elliott Kalan

[42:54] Oh, that sounds like a nice Saturday night.

[42:57] The only problem with it is it started becoming like, I still think there's this theater in L.A. that still shows it at like midnights.

[43:04] And the guy who made it was like, yeah, well, it was always supposed to be a comedy.

[43:09] Like, it's supposed to be funny.

[43:11] I meant it that way the whole time.

[43:12] And he pretty obviously did not, but it's kind of gotten sullied by that.

[43:16] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[43:17] I have read about this movie.

[43:18] I mean, it's a...

[43:19] It is an awful movie.

[43:20] It's a cause that has been taken up by many famous comedians as being a great bad movie to watch.

[43:27] It is hilariously bad.

[43:29] Because I'm curious to see it.

Stuart Wellington

[43:30] I watch whatever you guys make me watch, so that's cool.

Elliott Kalan

[43:33] We could do it for this one, but it's kind of...

[43:35] It would be harder, almost a little harder to talk about afterwards because it's...

[43:39] There's nothing for the person at home to visualize.

[43:44] Like, she wouldn't...

[43:45] She.

[43:45] There's a lot of our listeners are ladies.

[43:48] A lot of Stewart's fans are ladies.

[43:49] They wouldn't...

[43:50] They like...

[43:50] There's no one famous in it.

[43:52] You know, the scenes are all about...

[43:54] Are all characters talking in rooms?

[43:55] It's really phantasmagorical.

[43:57] It's very not phantasmagorical, my friend.

[44:00] It's like the Adventures of Tom Thumb.

[44:03] It's like the Adventures of Tom Thumb mixed with the yellow submarine.

[44:06] Oh, my God.

[44:07] It's like that...

[44:08] With a little dash of Return to Oz.

Dan McCoy

[44:10] It's like that Stan Winston-Tom Sawyer film.

[44:13] I don't even know that one.

[44:15] There's a Mark Twain.

[44:15] The Adventures of Mark Twain.

Stuart Wellington

[44:17] Yeah, so we're going to watch this movie then.

[44:19] Okay.

[44:20] We could.

[44:20] Okay, we'll make some plans.

[44:21] Let's do it for kicks sometime.

Dan McCoy

[44:22] Yeah, and I recommend to the listeners at home, watch it yourself.

[44:25] Maybe we'll do a movie minute about it.

[44:26] This is one that...

Elliott Kalan

[44:27] It's one of those movies that's really low budget and amateurishly made to the point

[44:31] that to discuss it is almost pointless, but to watch it is very funny.

Stuart Wellington

[44:35] Okay.

[44:36] It's like Twin Sitters.

Elliott Kalan

[44:37] I was just going to say, it's like Twin Sitters in that way.

[44:39] And lastly...

[44:40] The Barbarian brothers, unfortunately, are not in the room.

[44:42] Oh, that's too bad.

Dan McCoy

[44:43] In response to the email I read last time, my sister-in-law, Marina, last name withheld.

[44:50] Thanks, by the way, for reading that letter on the air.

[44:52] It was fun to listen to your podcast with John, my brother.

[44:56] That's my brother, not Marina, my sister-in-law's brother.

[45:00] There's no weird...

[45:01] When did he do the podcast?

[45:03] When did he do the podcast?

[45:04] No, no.

[45:04] You misunderstand entirely.

Elliott Kalan

[45:06] Listen to the podcast with John, my brother.

Dan McCoy

[45:09] But John, my brother...

[45:10] You have a brother named John?

[45:11] Sure.

Elliott Kalan

[45:12] No.

[45:12] My sister-in-law's brother that she's married to is named John.

[45:16] Oh, weird.

[45:17] I don't have a brother named John.

[45:18] Who's on first.

[45:19] Yeah, he is.

[45:20] He's a good player.

Dan McCoy

[45:21] You know, baseball players have crazy names nowadays.

Elliott Kalan

[45:23] He's one of the best offensive first baseball players in the league.

[45:26] The baseball league.

Dan McCoy

[45:27] Anyway, my sister-in-law points out that my brother would never have made the mistake

[45:32] about Karloff.

[45:33] As he pointed out, though, my sister-in-law was thinking of Horton Hears a Who, which was

[45:39] often paired with the Grinch.

[45:41] And that was...

[45:43] Who's he?

[45:43] What's this?

[45:43] Hans Conrad?

[45:44] Hans Conrad.

[45:45] Or...

[45:45] It was Hans Conrad.

[45:46] Hans Conrad, yeah.

[45:48] But also...

[45:48] Not Paul Henrid?

[45:50] No, not Paul Henrid.

[45:51] Or Conrad Veid?

[45:52] Neither of each.

[45:53] Okay.

[45:53] But in response to our question to tweens about High School Musical, they asked James,

[46:01] my nephew...

[46:03] Sure.

[46:03] Who was in the demographic...

[46:05] Son of John.

[46:06] Yeah.

[46:06] James Johnson.

[46:07] Why do people like High School Musical?

[46:10] And he said, quote, I don't know.

[46:14] I don't like it.

[46:16] I think it is because...

[46:18] Pause.

[46:20] It's bad.

[46:21] So there you go.

[46:22] That's a very realistic reply.

[46:25] If you're wondering about High School Musical, if you're puzzling it out, that's from someone

[46:30] who is in the age bracket targeted.

Stuart Wellington

[46:34] Finally, I'm able to see it unfettered.

[46:36] My gaze unsullied by my own preconceptions.

[46:40] Yeah.

[46:40] That was great.

[46:41] Don't we talk now about...

[46:42] Don't we talk now about movies we do like?

Dan McCoy

[46:45] Yeah.

[46:46] Recommendation time.

[46:47] Let's do that.

[46:47] Okay, Elliot, go.

Stuart Wellington

[46:49] Go, Elliot, go.

[46:50] Oh.

[46:50] Oh, wait.

[46:51] What are we doing right now?

[46:52] Dan, clarify.

Dan McCoy

[46:53] No, I'm just saying, at this point of the podcast, we prove that we're not miserable jerks

[46:57] who hate everything.

[46:58] No, I love movies.

[46:59] There are some things that we like.

Stuart Wellington

[47:00] Okay, I'm ready to go.

[47:02] Do it to it.

[47:02] Yeah.

[47:02] The other day, I watched this great movie with my buddy, Alexander Delicious.

[47:07] And we watched a little Clint Eastwood picture called The Beguiled.

[47:12] Oh, I've watched that recently, too.

[47:14] 1971.

[47:14] It was great.

[47:15] It is a great movie.

[47:16] There's some really awesome bits in it.

[47:18] And it's really...

[47:20] It's basically about this northern Civil War soldier who ends up in this southern girl's

[47:26] school and slowly, in a way, seduces them all.

[47:30] And they all end up putting all their hopes and dreams on him.

Dan McCoy

[47:33] And then when they find out he's been lying to them, they get extra mad.

[47:36] Yeah.

[47:36] A very distressing movie.

[47:37] Yeah.

[47:38] But it's great because it's...

Stuart Wellington

[47:39] Yeah.

[47:39] It's kind of creepy, like a horror movie.

[47:41] Like, it has everything that's good about Italian horror movies in it and none of the bad

[47:46] stuff.

[47:47] And it's really...

[47:47] That's a very good way to put it.

[47:48] Yeah.

[47:48] It's really...

[47:49] And there's just some really hilarious bits.

[47:52] So, it's good.

[47:53] Totally recommend it.

Dan McCoy

[47:54] I would recommend a movie that's in theaters.

[47:57] I would recommend that people go out and see My Bloody Valentine in 3D.

[48:01] I would not recommend that you see it in just regular digital...

[48:05] 2D.

[48:05] Yeah, 2D.

[48:06] Yeah, 2D.

Elliott Kalan

[48:07] Two dimensions.

[48:08] You're seeing it in...

[48:09] Fuck that.

[48:10] You're seeing it in 4D.

[48:12] Am I?

[48:12] The dimension of time.

[48:15] That's true, Elliot.

[48:16] Continue.

[48:18] What an asshole this guy is.

[48:21] This Elliot.

[48:22] What a dick.

Dan McCoy

[48:23] I'm glad he said that.

[48:24] It's not a great movie.

[48:26] It's, in fact, your average slasher film, but done with a modicum of talent.

[48:32] It's done with good pacing, like a good sense of fun.

[48:35] But there's something about seeing a horror movie in 3D that really gets at the carnival element

[48:42] of seeing a horror film.

[48:44] That sort of amusement, thrills, that novelty feeling.

[48:49] It feels trashier.

[48:51] It feels...

Stuart Wellington

[48:51] You said there's 3D boobs that just pop out of the screen, right?

Dan McCoy

[48:55] I didn't say it in those words.

[48:57] However, there is a 5-minute sequence in which a woman runs around entirely nude.

[49:03] Yeah, it's just fun.

Stuart Wellington

[49:05] That sounds fun.

[49:06] I assume she's running through a sprinkler.

Elliott Kalan

[49:09] Yep.

[49:10] Through a butter factory.

[49:12] She slips and falls on another nude girl.

Dan McCoy

[49:15] Yeah.

[49:16] They have wrestling or something.

[49:17] There are a lot of spring sound effects.

Elliott Kalan

[49:20] Sure.

[49:20] Yeah, because this is a Hanna-Barbera-scored porn film.

Dan McCoy

[49:24] It's not necessarily porn at this point.

Elliott Kalan

[49:26] It's very hard.

Stuart Wellington

[49:27] That sounds great.

[49:28] Good job.

[49:29] I like that recommendation.

[49:30] Smell it?

[49:31] What do you got for us?

Elliott Kalan

[49:32] Real quick.

[49:34] I saw a movie called Mock-Up on Moo.

[49:36] It was a very arty, experimental science fiction film, kind of sewn together from tattered pieces of other science fiction films, which was a lot of fun, but you might have trouble finding it.

[49:47] So if you can find it, it's called Mock-Up on Moo.

[49:50] It's worth seeing.

[49:51] You'll feel like it's pointless in the beginning, and then you might get into it.

[49:56] An easier film to find that I saw recently that I'd never seen before was Silver Streak with Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor.

[50:03] You haven't seen Silver Streak before?

[50:04] No, which is not the funniest movie, but frankly, Gene Wilder's a pretty good action-adventure star in that film.

[50:13] It's supposed to be like, he's a goofy guy caught up in this thing, but he doesn't come off as goofy.

[50:17] He comes off as pretty competent, and at the end, the cops are having a shootout with the bad guy, the late dearly departed and missed, Patrick McGowan.

[50:25] They just hand Gene Wilder a gun, and there's no like, well, what am I going to do with this thing?

[50:31] He just takes it, and they hand him his bullets, and he starts loading it, and it's this great like, yeah, I guess he'll just take part in the shootout, too.

Dan McCoy

[50:37] You know what?

[50:38] That's the way I've always felt about Silver Streak, too.

Stuart Wellington

[50:40] I'm like, as a comedy, eh, all right.

Dan McCoy

[50:44] There's some laughs in it, but as like a sort of Hitchcock pastiche.

[50:49] It's very good.

[50:49] Yeah, it's a lot of fun.

Elliott Kalan

[50:51] And there's also like Richard Pryor's very good in it, and there's a shot where, and there's also a lot

[50:55] of like atmosphere in it, considering it was shot in Canada, not in the United States.

[51:00] It feels like American when they're driving around or taking the train or whatever.

[51:03] But there's a part where he and Richard Pryor are just like driving, and there's just a shot of the road with them driving,

[51:10] and it's kind of like almost haunting music as they drive past these kind of pastoral landscapes,

[51:15] and it's this nice little like Badlands moment in this otherwise like odd couple adventure film, you know.

[51:22] So I liked it a lot, actually.

[51:24] And also, like Richard Kiel gets shot with a fucking spear gun.

[51:27] Spoiler alert.

[51:28] So.

Elliott Kalan

[51:28] Hey.

[51:29] See, it happened.

[51:30] Richard Kiel.

[51:31] He just keeled over.

[51:32] It's got a great cast.

[51:34] Gene Wilder, Richard Pryor, Patrick McGowan, Richard Kiel, Ray Walston, Ned Beatty.

[51:39] There's a lot of great people in it.

Dan McCoy

[51:41] You know, Stuart, our friend Liz has a signed photo of Richard Kiel.

Stuart Wellington

[51:45] I didn't know that.

Dan McCoy

[51:46] Yeah.

[51:46] That's pretty awesome.

Stuart Wellington

[51:47] I need to meet this friend Liz.

[51:49] Heir to the Kiel's fortune.

[51:51] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[51:51] The Kiel's cosmetic fortune.

[51:53] He has the patent on the word keelhaul.

[51:56] Which is paid off.

Elliott Kalan

[51:57] Anyway, but mock up on Moo if you get the chance to see it, I would say go for it.

[52:01] But Silver Streak is available in video stores everywhere.

[52:07] Don't take my word for it.

[52:08] Check out Silver Streaky, your local library.

[52:10] Is it available on Blu-ray yet?

[52:14] I think it will never be available on Blu-ray.

[52:17] It's in your video store.

Stuart Wellington

[52:20] Silver Streak.

[52:21] View.

[52:23] Anyway.

[52:23] You didn't hit the high note at the end.

[52:25] I was kind of disappointed.

[52:25] Viewing, Franco.

[52:27] Thanks.

[52:28] Yeah, so this has been a good one.

[52:31] Yeah, it has.

[52:32] Oh, man.

[52:32] So many laughs.

[52:33] We talked about Return of the Jedi.

[52:35] We talked about Hitman.

Elliott Kalan

[52:37] Now Dan can't edit out either of those things.

[52:39] Man.

[52:39] In the final one.

Dan McCoy

[52:41] Don't you wish you could live in the flop house with us?

[52:44] Yeah.

[52:45] Seriously?

Elliott Kalan

[52:45] If I could drop almost my entire life and me and my girlfriend go live in the flop house,

[52:50] this mythical construct, I would do that instantly.

[52:52] Yeah.

[52:53] If it was like that Stephen King short story where the guy's in that house and people just

[52:56] give him, they put slip the money under the door for his living expenses.

[52:59] Yeah, absolutely.

[52:59] Everything's eventual, sure.

Dan McCoy

[53:01] Yeah.

[53:01] I don't remember what else happens in that story.

Elliott Kalan

[53:04] It's weird.

[53:04] We'll talk about later.

[53:05] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[53:05] For now, I'm Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[53:08] I'm Stuart Wellington.

Dan McCoy

[53:09] And eternally, I'm Elliot Kalin.

[53:11] Good night.

[53:12] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[53:14] Okay.

[53:15] I gotta pee.

[53:16] I've been holding for like ever.

[53:20] The flop house is recorded before a live studio.

[53:23] How are my levels?

[53:24] You look great, Stephen.

[53:25] I'm looking good.

[53:27] Especially that mustache.

[53:28] Yeah.

[53:28] That mustache.

[53:30] I'm pretty drunk, guys.

[53:30] I don't know if I'll be very funny.

[53:32] I thought that was like your fucking spinach.

[53:34] All right.

Dan McCoy

[53:38] Let's do this thing.

[53:40] Oh, that's, hey, just like Tangling Cash.

[53:42] Yeah.

[53:42] Let's do this thing.

The Flop House: Episode #30 - Bangkok Dangerous

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