PodCast 211: "Vampira/ Old Dracula" (1974) - a Halloween PodCast w/ SimonUK and Ryan

Watched:  07/26/2022

Format:  Amazon Streaming

Viewing: First

Decade:  1970's

Director:  Clive Donner

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SimonUK and Ryan take a bite out of a 1974 vampire movie neither of them had previously seen, starring David Niven as a Dracula whose seen better days. It's 1970's hipsterism mixed with Blaxploitation meets horror meets comedy meets a sad trombone moment in the last 45 seconds. Join us as we kick off Halloween 2022!

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The Signal Watch PodCast · 211: "Vampira/ Old Dracula" (1974) - a Halloween PodCast w/ SimonUK and Ryan

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Music:

Vampira - David Whitaker 

Halloween and Horror

The Signal Watch PodCast · Halloween and Horror

80's Watch: American Gigolo (1980)

Watched:  09/17/2022

Format:  Streaming Paramount+

Viewing:  First

Director:  Paul Schrader

After watching Cat People for our Halloween podcasts, and making my way through Karina Longworth's You Must Remember This podcast series Erotic 80's, I figured I should get around to watching American Gigolo (1980) a movie I'd successfully not seen for 42 years but never actively avoided.  

I was doubly enticed by a Georgio Moroder soundtrack and finding out the movie had Bill Duke and Lauren Hutton, and was excited to see both for very different reasons.  

I should have watched the movie years ago after catching a cab in Las Vegas with some pals and - as I am wont to do - I began chatting with the cab driver who revealed to us his dream of becoming a gigolo.  And he used that word (with what seemed like a Russian accent, but I didn't ask).  We stayed in the car way after arriving at the hotel and listened to him discuss his strategy and goals.  He really, really wanted to sleep with older women for money.  I hope he's out there now with someone named "Gertrude" just raking it in.  

Anyway, I was completely ignorant of the plot of American Gigolo (1980), but what I assumed it to be was not what it is.   Honestly, I assumed it was a melodrama entirely about the life and loves of a gigolo in LA in 1980.  Seemed like there was plenty there as hunky Richard Gere impeccably banged his way across the Los Angeles landscape until finding real love or something.  And it is that, but with 45% of the runtime caught up in a murder plot that, frankly, is intensely telegraphed from the minute it kicks into gear (no pun intended).

I don't know exactly what I was expecting, but American Gigolo is also a movie that seems to live in a curious twilight zone of being frank about sex in many ways, but in comparison to, say, Body Heat which would show up a year later, it feels almost chaste.   Look, Lauren Hutton is...  a whole scene.  But I kinda wish the movie was just whatever was going on with Gere and Hutton.  

That said - this is a watershed film.  It isn't looking backward the way Body Heat would, it's leaning forward into adult-oriented fare but it also needs to serve an audience in 1980 who probably could have been interested in just the loves and issues of a gigolo, but would really get hooked by a crime story.  But I was kinda curious where the movie was going with Gere's alternately broken and abstracted sexuality which feels like it needs a lot more investigation than what it gets.

Everything you've heard about the hyper-stylization of the movie is true.  It's gorgeously shot and really does do its utmost to bring the various worlds of the Cali nouveau-rich and establishment rich as well as the occasional dive into other locales from gay clubs to political fundraisers.  It's a Playboy spread of the best in the lifestyle of the swinging gentleman, from cars to stereos to tasteful book collections and artfully placed desks.  

But now it almost looks quaint.  Miami Vice did this weekly on TV within a few years.  It's become a pastiche in other movies.  Still, it works.  And in no small part because the score on this thing (Moroder) - riffing occasionally on Blondie's Call Me is so f'ing great.*

All in all, the movie wasn't what I expected, and that took some adjustment.  What it did do, though, I think earns the reputation in some ways, less so in other ways (sexy ways).  But as a perfect artifact of "what set the tone for the 1980's?" you'd be hard pressed to find the thing better than this movie, which seems unaware the 1970's ever existed.  

*no one told six year old me blasting Call Me from the Chipmunk Punk album how the song became so mainstreamed  

Happy Belated Birthday, Cassandra Peterson

Happy Birthday to one of the greats of the Signal Watch faves pantheon, Cassandra Peterson!

This year, we read Peterson's memoir, Yours Cruelly, Elvira: Memoirs of the Mistress of the Dark.  And, kids, it is a wild @#$%ing ride.  

Here's to Ms. Peterson living her best life.  

Ida Watch: Ladies in Retirement (1941)

Watched:  09/16/2022

Format:  Amazon Watch Party

Viewing:  First

Director:  Charles Vidor

Everything about this movie screams pre-WWII play.  More or less a single location/ set, daffy characters, moments of strong internal reckoning, a maid to be the dumb one, a ne'er-do-well relative, and a dowager-type causing trouble.

And I loved it.  

We picked this as a watch party before we dive into the monster season entirely on the cast.  Starring Ida Lupino, Louis Hayward, Elsa Lanchester, Evelyn Keyes, Isobel Elsom and Edith Barrett, I was entirely curious as I'd only seen mention of the film on Jenifer's blog before - and that was a faded memory.  It's now streaming on Prime, and I suggest you go check it out.  

And, man, is Elsa Lanchester ever good (and so underutilized by Hollywood).

Friday Watch Party: Ladies in Retirement

Before we get into the Halloween season, we need to check in on another Ida Lupino movie.  I know nothing about it, but here's what Amazon is saying it's about:

A wealthy woman's companion turns to murder to keep her deranged sisters from being committed to an asylum.

That's bananas, and I'm here for it.  Add in Lupino and the always amazing Evelyn Keyes (we'll do 99 River Street some time.  Amazing film.), and - of course - Elsa Lanchester, my imaginary movie friend.

It's mystery and murder on the moors!

Day:  09/16/2022 - Friday

Time:  8:30 Central/ 6:30 Pacific

Cost:  $0 if you have Amazon Prime

CLICK HERE TO JOIN US FOR A THRILLING SOMETHING OR OTHER

link live 10 minutes prior to showtime

Noir Watch: Hit and Run (1957)

Watched:  09/15/2022

Format:  TCM Noir Alley

Viewing:  First

Director:  Hugo Haas

Eddie Muller may or may not have programmed this flick for Noir Alley, but he did host it.  I don't really know how Noir Alley selections work, to be honest.

But he seemed delighted to show a poverty row-adjacent film and talk about Hugo Haas, the producer, director and star of Hit and Run (1957), a self-made man in cinema who only made a handful of films, but did it on his own terms, including casting himself alongside Cleo Moore, one of the lesser known blonde bombshells of the mid-50's.  And there's probably a fascinating movie or prestige TV show about the shadow world of these films and their distribution in an era where the studios were still running the show and for everyone else, it was the collision of art and commerce and doing what you could afford to do.

Hit and Run plays mostly like a local theater production of The Postman Always Rings Twice, but like the local community theater producer had some ideas for revisions to juice it up a bit.  But, similarly, it features Cleo Moore as the blonde girl who, down on her luck, marries the most stable and financially sound guy in her world, even if he's older and they make a weird pair.  Rather than John Garfield wandering into the gas station, Vince Edwards (whom I like a lot, generally), is already employed there, so it's Moore who's the interloper breaking up a happy home.

This version leans (a) first into the idea that the blonde is not a willing participant in her romance with Edwards or his murderous scheme to take out her husband.  And (b) there's a previously unseen twin who appears to take the husband's place and stir things up.  Y'all, this is how you just keep plussing an idea.

Weirdly, both Moore and Edwards seem like they didn't get enough takes or just weren't that into it, and the energy level in this film, aside from Haas, is weirdly flat from beginning to end.  Which, in contrast to 1946's Postman, is weirdly odd.  But part of that is the ambiguity about what is really happening with Edwards and Moore - she seems to loathe him but melt in his arms when he forces himself on her - so what is she playing?  And Edwards is laconic and then suddenly is not.  It's weird.

There's some curious touches like a society for people to make fun of superstitions and the people who believe them, which seems mostly to be about drinking and shit-talking people you don't know, which may make me an honorary member.

And Chekhov's goldfish enter in the first act but don't really achieve any significance.  

It wasn't great, but I like all of the players - Cleo Moore has really grown on me - and was so weird as a parallax version of a well known film, I couldn't really look away.  But at film's end, I was probably more interested in the movie someone should make about Hugo Haas and Cleo Moore.

PodCast 210: "Thor: Love And Thunder" (2022) - a Marvel Madness PodCast w/ Jamie and Ryan

Watched: 09/11/2022

Format:  Disney+

Viewing: First

Decade: 2020's

Director:  Taika Waititi

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Jamie and Ryan sit down with Marvel's return to Asgard that apparently people didn't like, and we're not exactly sure why it got the hate. Join us as we harness up the goats and take off on a journey through a movie that takes us all over and manages to really land their use of Guns n Roses.

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The Signal Watch PodCast · 210: "Thor: Love And Thunder" (2022) - a Marvel Madness PodCast w/ Jamie and Ryan

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Music:

Sweet Child of Mine - Guns'n'Roses, Appetite for Destruction 

Welcome to the Jungle - Guns'n'Roses, Appetite for Destruction 

Marvel Madness

The Signal Watch PodCast · Marvel Madness - Movies and More...!

PodCast 209: "The Sandman" - Season 1 discussion w/ MRSHL and Ryan

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MRSHL and Ryan step into the dream-realm to talk Netflix's gigantic gamble - adapting a comic property that isn't based on superheroes, is written for older readers, has nuance and complexity, and doesn't talk down to the audience. It's the thing fans didn't believe could ever be adapted faithfully. Do we dare dream?

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The Signal Watch PodCast · 209: "The Sandman" - Season 1 discussion w/ MRSHL and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

The Kingdom of Dreams - David Buckley

Mr. Sandman - The Chordettes 

DC Comics Playlist

The Signal Watch PodCast · DC Cinema and TV

PodCast 208 B: "Inhumans" (2017) - Episodes 3 & 4 - A Superheroes Every Day PodCast w/ Danny and Ryan

contrary to this image, this show is not about two women about to present at a conference

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More Coverage:

Episodes 1 & 2

Danny and Ryan discuss episodes 3 and 4 of the ongoing tale of a bunch of mutant moon men kicking around Hawaii - all part of a TV series which made Marvel decide network TV was probably a terrible idea. Let alone doing it on a budget. Join us as we recount the puzzling adventures of our "heroes".

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The Signal Watch PodCast · 208 B: "Inhumans" (2017) - Episode 3 & 4 - A Superheroes Every Day PodCast w/ Danny and Ryan

YouTube

Music:

Paint It Black - Valerie Broussard

Don't Fear the Reaper - Denmark & Winters 

Superheroes Every Day Playlist

The Signal Watch PodCast · Superheroes Every Day

Cage Watch: The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022)

Watched:  09/04/2022

Format:  Amazon?  Jamie put it on

Viewing:  First

Decade:  2020's

I am a fan of Nathan Fielder's The Rehearsal on HBOmax, a show that is absolutely about Inception levels of reality.  It's a reality show, pushing the envelope of what is real, what is fiction, what is simply dicking around with people who expect reality to conform to certain principles and people who have made up their own reality tossed into the mix and given lead roles.

I feel like that was good training for The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022), a film - a bit like Being John Malkovich - that asks an actor of particular talent and quirkiness to engage with their own persona and perform as themselves as a central character in a movie in which everyone else is fictional, and the version of themselves is only loosely based on reality.  

For those of us old enough to have grown up on Vampire's Kiss, Leaving Las Vegas, Moonstruck, as well as Raising Arizona and Honeymoon in Vegas, Cage's late 90's turn to action-hero came as a bit of a surprise.  He was the hero of the indie film world who was out there walking tightropes, making films he was in memorable and better.  His Sailor in Lynch's Wild at Heart (paired with Dern's Lula) is still a favorite character of mine in anything.

The film is a fascinating fractal of a kaleidoscope of Cage - tracking his career in beats through the movie, which starts as a small, character-driven quirky indie feature and ends as a huge Hollywood-style actioner with an operatic happy ending in slow-mo, starring Cage as himself, of course.  

In the purest sense, it's absolutely a love letter to Cage, an actor whose post Leaving Las Vegas career I've not stuck with (Con-Air delivered my very first migraine, through I didn't know that's what it was at the time).  But one does not make it through a year of one's life and not see a Nic Cage movie.  

Structure aside, Cage is here to remind you - he's one of the most talented actors of his generation, and when he's not cashing a check, there's no one else like him on screen.  If you need an actor who can convey every range of human experience and emotion without a word, Cage is your guy.  

And I do wonder how he viewed the script, which couldn't have been written about anyone else and landed the same way, which includes whole scenes with Cage fighting with his younger, punk rock version of himself - something the younger kids won't get, but for those of us who recognize this version of Cage, it's a whole thing.  

Of course, the movie co-stars Pedro Pascal as an olive importer/ exporter who may actually be a criminal mastermind - but who is using his money to bring his favorite movie star, Nic Cage, to his villa in Majorca.  And, as it's turning out, Pascal's success in the US is not a fluke.  At the heart of the film is the unlikely friendship between Pascal and Cage as Pascal's Javi doesn't just understand Nic's filmography, there's a real kinship there.  

Meanwhile, Cage has to navigate his broken relationship with his teen daughter (I don't know if he even has a teen daughter) and ex-wife (he has several).  

I'm underselling how genuinely hilarious the film is, but it is genuinely the funniest movie I've seen this year.  I don't *think* you have to have been tracking Cage for decades to enjoy it - I've mostly not been.  But there's certainly layers upon layers if you know much about the guy.  And it's absolutely a treat to see Pascal and Cage making all of this look so easy.