Leaderboard

Insert your own "dream of the 90s" joke here. But yes, wonderful movies all and I would add Romeo Is Bleeding to that list (though I think like Red Rock West, it was made in the 80s). The Last Seduction costars the interesting actor and director Peter Berg and has an amusing and memorable supporting role for Bill Pullman too. Edited to add what I meant to add in the first place: a much better 90s channelling of classic Double Indemnity/Postman Always Rings Twice style noir is the also underrated film of The Hot Spot, based on the pulp novel by Charles Williams (who also wrote Dead Calm), directed by Dennis Hopper, starring Don Johnson, Virginia Madsen, and Jennifer Connelly. It's not quite Body Heat quality, but it's well worth checking out, especially since it used the same "woman fucks her partner to death" device, albeit in a different way. Edited again to add more information about The Hot Spot and to consistently italicize film titles, because OCD.

On the subject of house boats vs. float homes and why single ladies might be drawn to them. While it does seem that house boats in Portland are referred to as float homes in real estate listings the fact is that in all of my 10 years of living in Portland I only, ever, heard them referred to as house boats. When I was looking for a place to live after liberating myself from an unhappy marriage I seriously considered renting a HOUSE BOAT. Rent was often cheaper for a place floating on the river than comparable houses on land, a big plus for one surviving on restaurant wages such as I was. Also, I dreamt it would be freeing to feel the rush of the river beneath me, bringing the promise of strength and boundless possibility. But, alas, it wasn't to be because I was not childless and decided it would be too stressful to live in a house surrounded by water with a young child. So, I get you single ladies of the 80's and 90's.

Here's a deep cut that I'm not even sure holds up anymore. I use to love Duckman in which Tim Curry had a reoccurring role as King Chicken. To this day when I think of Tim Curry as many times as I've seen this movie I still think of "Bwahaha buck buck buck" Fun Tim Curry fact. He was the original Joker is Batman TAS. He was doing Captain Hook for Peter Pan animated Saturday cartoon so he was cast as the Joker on the new upcoming Batman cartoon. He got sick and the part had to be recast. Now to me Mark Hamill will always be my Joker but one can't help but wonder how he would have been with Tim Curry voicing him.

I remember Duckman so why can’t I remember king chicken?

If it had been revealed at the end that Madonna and Anne Archer were lovers the movie would've fallen into "The Dead/Evil Lesbian Cliche." Which as the name suggests, is that when gay women appear on film or tv they end up dead, evil or both. There are long lists of examples. Hollywood's record of this has improved slightly in recent years but in 1993, the year after gay protests against Basic Instinct, it could've been extra offensive. I do not suggest that the filmmakers avoided that twist *for* that reason, but it's probably for the best that they did.

Oh I thought that part was obvious lol. It was Pennywise.

yes.

Noticing interesting parallels between FORREST GUMP and 1982’s THE WORLD ACCORDING TO GARP with Robin Williams. They’re both episodic, life-spanning stories about men born during WWII into chaotic and unknowable universes, and raised by single mothers. At a fundamental level both ask, how do we redefine masculinity in the wake of women’s liberation? But their answers, and the way in which they pose the question, are almost perfectly inverted. Gump is a slow-witted Southern boy whose mother sacrifices herself to a man for her son’s education. He learns of women’s lib indirectly through his friend Jenny, who he wants to domesticate. He doesn’t try to make sense of the changing world, however. He just passively fumbles through. Garp is an overeducated New Englander whose mother rapes a dying WWII vet in order to conceive of her only son without the need of a male partner. Garp learns of women’s lib through his mother, a pioneer of the movement (also named Jenny), thus has no choice but to grapple with the changing world. But he does so with a hypervigilance and futile attempts to gain a sense of control over the chaos. Gump finds strength in traits historically tantamount to male weakness. When fleeing from bullies chasing him in a truck, he discovers his running super power. He's further rewarded for his running skills with a purple heart for bravery in Vietnam. By contrast, when Garp attacks a bully the man retaliates by climbing into his truck and almost steamrolling him. The closest Garp comes to being a brave war hero pilot like the father he never knew is when a plane crashes into his house. In a bygone era, Gump might have been judged as effeminate for abstaining from sex with the prostitute, but here he’s rewarded by not dying from an STD like Jenny does. Meanwhile Garp’s extramarital sexual conquests result indirectly in the death of his son. The fates of Gump and Garp put their stories into the starkest contrast. After Lieutenant Dan’s sacrifice for his fellow man leaves him bitter and crippled, Gump offers friendship to the isolated man. Once the 60s and first half of the 70s have passed, Gump’s gesture of kindness becomes manifest when "Hurricane Carmen" (see: women's lib) destroys all of the boats surrounding Forrest’s but leaves his floating. Together, Forrest and Dan begin their journey toward riches by embracing their "shrimp" (see: compromised post-60s manhoods). Meanwhile in GARP, when feminist extremists’ act of sacrificing their own tongues in solidarity with a mutilated rape victim results in warring factions of women versus men, instead of reaching out to these isolationists, Garp writes a book criticizing them and is shot to death for it. GUMP is about a man who despite a conservative upbringing learns to thrive amid changing tides and a failing patriarchy. The key to his success, though, is by remaining a boy — by following his mother’s advice and never growing up or thinking about problems in the world greater than his own. Unfettered by a social conscience, it seems to say, the world is his (white male) shrimp. (Maybe this is why Gump’s waxing philosophical about whether or not we have a destiny rings hollow — that Gump never grows wise only further proves the story’s point.) GARP is about a man who, despite a liberal upbringing, clings to outmoded ideas about what a man should be and pays the price for it. Unlike Gump, Garp does make attempts to individuate from his mother — by defying her advice to practice abstinence, for example -- each of which ends in disaster. Its fatalistic message seems to be that for men to maintain a sense of identity in a post-feminist world they must continue to inhabit the more harmful traits of the human race that women stereotypically don’t share. The alternative — being better human beings — would require men to sacrifice their manhood. Pauline Kael said GARP amounts to nothing more than a castration fantasy. By extension, GUMP’s message might be that being good means never growing a proverbial pair to begin with. (Side note: yet another similarity is in both movies the women portraying the heroes’ mothers— Glenn Close and Sally Field— are only 4 and 10 years older, respectively, than the actors playing grownup Garp and Gump.)

Wow, as late as '93? Huh. I should really check that one out again (and a lot of the pictures mentioned in this exchange, many of which I haven't seen in 10-20 years) I did watch Lone Star again not long ago, and it is still one of the best pictures I have ever seen. Sayles is a hell of a talent, I wish he was better known to the general public. It drives me nuts that Lawrence Kasdan was able to rip off Sayles not once but twice and enjoy great commercial success with boomer shitfest The Big Chill (following Sayles' The Return of the Secaucus Seven) and Grand Canyon (after City of Hope). I don't think I have seen that remake of Double Indemnity but it sounds glorious, thanks for the recommendation. I'm sure you are aware of the remake of The Postman Always Rings Twice starring Jack Nicholson and Jessica Lange from the late 70s. That one has its defenders but it certainly pales in comparison to the original, or in comparison to the likes of Chinatown for that matter.

It’s a refreshing movie for having a black hero in a horror movie in the early 90s (they talk about how the black horror-loving audience was virtually ignored in the 80s in the excellent doc Horror Noire, which is a Shudder original. This film and Candyman are mentioned for standing out during this time period). It’s also fucking bonkers! I hope they do it at some point.

As a Portlander, I have to say that I was a bit disappointed that for the live show here we got the perplexing 2:22 instead of Body of Evidence, a film produced during a particularly dismal era of movies shot or taking place in Portland (there was also Dr. Giggles, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues and The Temp... we did get Drug Store Cowboy, though, so it wasn't all bad during the '90's). Still, I'm glad this movie finally made it onto the Podcast. Okay, not to get all Bullitt chase scene on this film, but the opening bridge crossing scene was, from a local perspective ...interesting. One of Portland's nicknames is "Bridge City," as we have quite a few bridges linking the east and west sides of the city over the Willamette River. Towards the beginning of the film, we see Willem Defoe's character driving across the Fremont Bridge (a raised suspension bridge with these distinct triangle-shaped trusses) from the north/northeast going west into the city. That's all well and good, but then the very next shot shows him driving east across a two-way cantilever bridge which is named the Hawthorne Bridge, and is geographically four bridges southward from the Fremont Bridge. This scene is cut in a way to make it look like he's driving on the same bridge, but in reality he's essentially driving across one bridge and going through downtown to get to another bridge to go back almost in the direction he came from, and doing in a matter of seconds what Google maps approximates would take 15 minutes to accomplish (traffic permitting). Even odder still, it appears that, in an establishing scene, Defoe's character's law office is in Downtown Portland (located in the southwest section of the city), so why is he driving from the north/northeast area in the evening to get to the southeast section of the city? The 90's-era neo-noir with Linda Fiarntino Jason was trying to remember is The Last Seduction, and it is an underrated and amazing film. It's a must-see along with Red Rock West , A Simple Plan, Devil In a Blue Dress, and One False Move.

I’m sorry, I’ve been super busy this month and I haven’t had a chance to check anything out. Is everyone still game to try to resurrect movie nights?

I have no idea what you mean...

I think every performance he gives is great, whether the movie is good or not. I’ve never seen him phone it in. He even did a voice as the main character in a computer game series—Gabriel Knight—where he played a New Orleans supernatural detective and he was awesome doing THAT. Even his Pennywise in the TV version of IT (which has a decent first half and a shitty second half) is iconic. So I can’t choose, although Clue is also a lot of fun. which performance terrified you, Tay-loe? Or did all of them?

haha an "awooga" old timey horn would be perfect

Mantzoukas is totally right about Body Heat... which is a remake of Double Indemnity but since DI was made under the strict Hayes Code it could barely even hint at sex between Fred MacMurray and Barbara Stanwyck. The only thing that could even be a possible clue was that Barbara Stanwyk visits Fred MacMurray at his apartment, closes the door behind her and then there is a fade as if some time had passed and she exits the door. Soooo steamy! Body Heat takes that great plot and adds all the sex that should be happening between the two characters. The first sex scene between Dafoe and Madonna is pretty much a crappy remake of the first sex scene between John Hurt and Kathleen Turner in that movie. Unfortunately I can't find the complete scene on Youtube but it's HOT AF. Body Heat lead up to sex scene. It's real good y'all.

I just rewatched Clue last night!!! He's so fucking good in it! And like kinda really hot??? I think Frank is my favorite performance of his, but he's so good in everything I've seen him in, and he's the reason why I'm fucking terrified of so many things and have to shower with music playing or else I'm convinced he's standing just outside the shower curtain waiting to kill me......

FTFY - I kind of brought it up earlier, but I really hate seeing Frank get killed off even though he is the villain because of that Question for the group - what are your favorite Tim Curry performances/characters? I think mine is Wadsworth from Clue.

I enjoy almost every single song sooo much! Like Cam Bert said above I do think that the later songs aren't as good, and honestly the dinner table song that Dr. Scott sings can be skipped over, but I keep many many of them on my rotation still to this day. Oddly enough I think the very first song - Science Fiction Double Feature - might be my favorite??? But every time someone says "Oh there's a light!" I have to start singing, "There's a liiiiiiiight over at the Frankenstein place!" No matter how good the actual movie is, or how good you think the shadowcast performances are, these songs are fuckin straight up bops!

Shoulda done this for the past Halloween it’s a classic

One of my very few claims to fame is that I appeared on L!ve TV performing stand-up comedy, which was broadcast straight after the topless darts. My act had to be cleared by Legal before it could be broadcast.

Hedgehogs forever!!!

They should be available everywhere. I'm honestly torn between wanting to use the hedgehog for its intended purpose and ONLY using hedgehogs from now on.