EPISODE 123 - Lifeforce

[JulyDiaz 2797]

Hello people of space! Beware of space vampires that will french kiss the blood out of you. Lennon Parham of Playing House and WOMP IT UP! joins Paul and Jason this week to talk all about sexy vampires in the 1985 film Lifeforce. They cover everything from Patrick Stewart being hypnotized, the news reporter of an "evil star," and the best & worst boobs in HDTGM history.

 

Check out Blake Harris’ Oral History of Lifeforce over at www.slashfilm.com!

 

Los Angeles: Grab your tickets now for How Did This Get Made? LIVE from Largo at the Coronet on January 23rd, 2 shows (8pm and 10:30pm)! Go towww.largo-la.com for tickets!

 

People of the internet: The League is back on FXX 10pm on Wednesdays! A while ago, Paul and Rob Huebel did a comedy special on a 60 foot glass bus that traveled around LA and now you’ll be able to see it. Go to https://itun.es/us/3M4J9 now to buy it! You can also see Jason in Sleeping With Other People in a theater near you!

The Hotwives (Casey Wilson, Danielle Schneider, Andrea Savage, Dannah Phirman, Tymberlee Hill, Angela Kinsey, Erinn Hayes) are back and this time they are in Vegas baby! Watch The Hotwives of Las Vegas on Hulu today!

Also, check out June in Grace and Frankie available on Netflix, Paul in Wet Hot American Summer: First Day of Camp on Netflix, all the episodes of NTSF:SD:SUV:: on HULU for free, ScheeRL on YouTube here:

, and Jason in The Dictator (he’s still in it!).

[wyldride 285]

The etymology of disaster is based on ill-starred. It's not exactly what they said in the movie, but described as a calamity derived from an unfavorable position of a star or planet.

[jarrycanada 2483]

 

got the force sucked right out of me waiting for this one.

[wyldride 285]

That thing with killing vampires with metal shafts appears to be a British thing, because the same idea appears in an episode of the old doctor who called State of Decay, part of the E-space trilogy.

[jarrycanada 2483]

How dare you make fun on the british space agency paul..

 

[jarrycanada 2483]

Not to be confused by the Canadian space agency.

 

[Bumpy 1674]

Lennon! Hoping to hear some Listler style music drops in this ep.

[walterwoodsiv 215]

First, the artificial gravity they mentioned is a real thing. Using acceleration, you can simulate gravity.

 

Second, per Lennon's question about nudity, I found this. Probably one of those movies that you can't find anywhere though.

[wyldride 285]

Not to be confused by the Canadian space agency.

 

 

Or the Canadian Agency for Space Exploration:

http://users.synapse.net/robr/green.html

[Cam Bert 8145]

Time for my semi-regular contribution to the comments with

 

How Did This Get Named?

 

This one is pretty straight forward actually and a bit more catchier if you ask me. In Japan Lifeforce is called スペースバンパイア(Supesubanpaia) which if you sound it out is "Space Vampire" which if you read the oral history was the original title anyway.

 

Additionally there is one more interesting thing I think about the Japanese version. There was some discussion in the episode over future Mrs. Mantzoukas's credit as "space girl" but I think her Japanese credit is a bit more telling. In Japanese she's credited as 女形バンパイア(onnagata banpaia) which can be read to mean "Female form vampire". The interesting part is that the term 女形 was used in kabuki to denote a male actor in a female role as women are not allowed to perform kabuki. So in a sense they acknowledge that the vampire is not really female but rather some creature possibly male or otherwise posing as female.

[PlanBFromOuterSpace 3138]

I'll have more to add later, but as I sit here closing up at my movie theater job, I just wanted to throw in a quick "Fandango can go fuck itself". Great episode so far though!

[SevenDollarsWorthofHoobastank 226]

Can someone please Photoshop a picture of a cereal box with the name of it being "Shriveled Raisin Tits"? Jason mentioned it at about 9:13 and I cannot get the image out of my head.

Neither can I not hear that being said to the tune of the old school 80's "Kellogg's Honey Smacks" jingle:

[ChunkStyle 1160]

I am very glad the guys brought up the reactions. My thought while watching the movie was that (conservatively) 15% of the movie's running time was made up of non-verbal reaction shots.

 

[WillowKasperLore 6]

The word is definitely glamour! And the idea of a glamour isn't specific to vampires; it's pretty prevalent in fairy folklore and literature. The Craft also displays some glamouring which ends up being kind of plot relevant. I was a little surprised at the confusion over glamouring in this episode, especially when Lennon says that's just a Twilight thing. She later referenced something that happens several seasons deep into True Blood - a vampire series that consistently portrays glamouring, starting from episode one.

[jarrycanada 2483]

Can someone please Photoshop a picture of a cereal box with the name of it being "Shriveled Raisin Tits"? Jason mentioned it at about 9:13 and I cannot get the image out of my head.

Neither can I not hear that being said to the tune of the old school 80's "Kellogg's Honey Smacks" jingle:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ScDCWNgf1S4

 

Remember when we were kids they would have a commercial like this would come on and it would have at the end, it's a part of this nutritional breakfast! And they would show all this other stuff with along the cereal like oranges and apple juice and milk, toast. like you're going to eat all of that stuff along with the friggin cereal.

[OoofMaGOOF 348]

Uhhhhh....has an ep ever ben released on a Saturday?

[ChunkStyle 1160]

I'd say my biggest problem with this movie which they didn't talk about is that because the plot is so incomprehensible there is A LOT of exposition. That maybe wouldn't be so bad if most of it wasn't coming out of the mouth of the movie's worst actor. I thought Carlsen was worse than Caine. Although I won't fight anyone over that.

[ChunkStyle 1160]

And now to turn the criticism to Paul himself for a second. June couldn't make the episode because she was filming. Check. But that is also why the episode dropped late? This is Lifeforce level reasoning.

[SevenDollarsWorthofHoobastank 226]

Remember when we were kids they would have a commercial like this on and it would have at the end, it's a part of this nutritional breakfast! And they would show all this other stuff with along the cereal like oranges and apple juice and milk, toast. like you're going to eat all of that stuff along with the friggin cereal.

 

Good point! I could hardly ever finish a single bowl of cereal. And why would you also want an EXTRA glass of milk, to go along with apple or orange juice? I think that would give you serious bubble guts.

[EllenM 943]

I'd say my biggest problem with this movie which they didn't talk about is that because the plot is so incomprehensible there is A LOT of exposition. That maybe wouldn't be so bad if most of it wasn't coming out of the mouth of the movie's worst actor. I thought Carlsen was worse than Caine. Although I won't fight anyone over that.

The biggest problem I had was Carlsen never giving all the information at once though. There was so much exposition and Carlsen kept playing the pronoun game, inciting Caine to continue asking questions. The scene in the helicopter was by far the worst example of it. I agree there was a lot of exposition but it was also broken up into separate chunks throughout the movie.

 

For the sake of argument, let's say that Carlsen was only getting bits and pieces as the bond between him and Space Elvira grew stronger. He was still keeping it to himself up until he was explicitly asked by Caine if he had any clues.

 

I think that Space Elvira was using Carlsen similar to Dracula using Lucy. She was giving him information telepathically so that they were always 2 steps behind her, because she needed him at the end of the movie. It fits in with the idea that they showed up to Earth already and that is how we incorporated vampires into our mythology. Dracula also used glamours and shapeshifted so it all fits. That's my theory anyways.

 

On a separate note: the revelation that Space Elvira's pubic hair received studio notes is probably the most upsetting thing they've talked about recently.

[liebot 55]

Omission; Nobody talked about the Choose Your Own Adventure books about space vampires which clearly inspired this movie. I own both and they are the best books I've ever read. The covers are also great too, particularly how the first artist seemed to have forgotten the fact that the sun kills vampires.

 

If anyone wants to go through either book, pick one and I'll give very condensed descriptions of each page for you to choose the next path

 

 

[SimonDesmet 0]

Now... i might be very European (which i am... greetings from Milan btw), but to me it does not seem such a long jump from disaster to: 'de', a prefix for everything bad and 'astra' -meaning star?

The word disaster really means: bad star and i am confused nobody on the show gets that... you are all educated people no?

 

Next to that i am confused that nobody knows the ESA? It is the European equivalent of NASA and launches rockets in space since 1975! Hundreds of satellites have been launched from Guyana... (french territory)

How can you be so oblivious?

 

all in all i am confused about the general knowledge about the hosts of HDTGM

[Quasar Sniffer 4174]

Omission; Nobody talked about the Choose Your Own Adventure books about space vampires which clearly inspired this movie. I own both and they are the best books I've ever read.

 

 

I can't tell if you find these books to be the best you've ever read because they are legitimately awesome, or because the only books you have read are these two and the first half of a Dan Brown novel.

 

I very familiar with the European Space Agency, but then again, I am a huge nerd... which kind of goes without saying because I am posting on a podcast message board.

[Ludachris325 1]

After hearing a movie called, "The Tit and the Moon" mentioned I had to pause the podcast and lookup that movie. Not only did a find a movie, that is described on Wikipedia to be about, "a young boy named Tete who goes on a personal mission to find the perfect pair of lactating breasts to feed on," I also found this picture.... yikes.

But the review for the movie they chose to pair with this tit-ular image says it all because bonkers is really the only word to describe everything about this movie.

[liebot 55]

 

I can't tell if you find these books to be the best you've ever read because they are legitimately awesome, or because the only books you have read are these two and the first half of a Dan Brown novel.

 

I very familiar with the European Space Agency, but then again, I am a huge nerd... which kind of goes without saying because I am posting on a podcast message board.

 

They're greater than Moby Dick and Gravity's Rainbow combined and say a lot about humanity (in particular, how it would interact with a space-vampire).