Near Dark with Mani Lazic

[00:00:01] Blank Check with Griffin and David, Blank Check with Griffin and David Don't know what to say or to expect All you need to know is that the name of the show is Blank Check Boy, you people sure stay up late We keep on podcasts! We keep on powers!

[00:00:28] It's a nice short one Yeah, good, short Exactly, let's just get it over with That's great, we did it And as always, please remember to rate, subscribe No, no, no, that's short, come on, we can do 5 minutes Hi everybody, my name is Griffin and I'm in

[00:00:42] I'm David Sims It's a Blank Check with Griffin and David, that's the two of us We're hashtag the two friends A competitive advantage In podcast And in life! Being friends? It's helped me Yeah I mean, look, if I didn't have a friend Who would I hang out with?

[00:01:02] Would I ever try a one person hangout? It sucks! I do it all the time, are you kidding me? Me too, it's most of my life We are both weird, heretic, lonely men Oh boy, oh boy Yeah, how you doing? I'm doing okay Very relevant to today's movie

[00:01:20] I have to shoot a thing tomorrow morning From when we're recording this episode A piece of cinema? A piece of cinema And I have been keeping very terrible vampire hours My body has not Readjusted since Australia, which has been like three weeks now

[00:01:36] Yeah, but that really fucked you over It fucked me over I mean, that's rough I had been purposefully depriving myself of sleep Yeah, Griffin lives in yesterday now I'm trying to make myself overtired So you'll fall asleep tonight That's your plan I used to do this in college

[00:01:54] Where I would sleep later and later And then my sleep schedule would suddenly be I'd go to bed at 8am and wake up at 4pm And I'd be like, well this is a disaster So I'll just stay up for 36 hours But then what would happen is

[00:02:06] Your body would just go insane And you would fall asleep at 10pm And wake up at 2am and your body would be like You don't need sleep anymore, right? Because you haven't been sleeping so I'm waking you up Yeah, that's how I feel

[00:02:18] I've been dealing with one form of insanity for three weeks And it's very least if I can move to a lateral form of insanity Sure, yeah, yeah But I walked into the studio, leather jackets, sunglasses Face half chart Yeah, he's got his Duncan

[00:02:30] But no, but I feel like a vampir is my point, David I feel like a vampir Which is relevant because This is a podcast about filmography Directors who have massive success early on And they're going to issue you a series of blank checks That's true

[00:02:44] Sometimes those checks clear, sometimes they bounce, baby Turn your phone off I'm all over it But This is a mini series about the films of Catherine Bigelow Catherine Bigelow and what's it called? PUD 19 The Widowcaster Of course it is And we are now at her second film

[00:03:02] The things are starting to come together The pieces are starting to come together And the movie's called In The Air Dark Yeah, this was the movie that got her noticed, right? Right, because you know, Loveless She's co-directing it It's more of a sort of like artistic experiment

[00:03:16] It's a festival movie But she's making a studio film A low budget studio film, the likes of which Rarely exists today It's a DEG film, right? It's not really a studio Yeah, and he had an output deal with MGM

[00:03:30] He was like a quasi-studio head in the 80s though Dilaranthus But that's this movie I'm very curious to see what the numbers are like In terms of listenership for this episode Because this movie is almost impossible to watch now Right, and it's because of that

[00:03:44] Because I was trying to figure out why is this movie so hard to watch But it's the Dilaranthus thing Yeah Dino! But we're talking about Near Dark today And we have a great guest And we have a great guest who obeyed my rule Talking before the introduction

[00:04:00] We talked about this last week I know, I have to speak before you introduce me You must And you did And I tried Also a guest taking advantage of our freestanding policy That we will pay first class airfare For any International This is our first international guest

[00:04:20] But any guest who's traveling from another place By air She really called her bluff Fran Hoffner came from Chicago Amy Nicholson came from LA And we put Fran Hoffner on Spirit Airlines And only cost us like 70 dollars

[00:04:34] Yeah, well, where first class is basically just like a slightly bigger seat Come on Today's guests stretch the wallet a little bit Yeah She is a Film critic for Little White Lies Ladies and gentlemen, Mani Lazzak Did I pronounce your last name? Mani Lazzak

[00:04:52] Mani Lazzak is the actual real way of saying it But that's fine I shoplifted Little White Lies once when I was in college That's a good time to do By mistake But David, how would you have been able to shoplift that? That's a magazine That's published in England

[00:05:08] I grew up in England I've never heard that one before No, never Does FOP still exist? Yes, it's still there You mean the archetype or? That still exists FOP is still around FOP is a indie music It used to be like a record store

[00:05:28] It's a record store, they also sell books And DVDs and Breweries It's kind of a miracle that it still exists I can't believe they still exist I used to go to FOP all the time And I was in FOP once

[00:05:40] And I was looking at this brand new magazine Called Little White It was when it was first launching I think bad education was on the cover The Omotovar movie And I just walked out with it I didn't buy anything and I just walked out with it

[00:05:54] And I walked like four blocks And I realized, wait, I never paid for this thing No one stopped me It's like an accidental shoplift It wasn't very malicious Now you mention it on your podcast You're paying back If they want to come after me, I'll pay them

[00:06:10] Whatever the cover price was You're going to boost their listenership With this episode Was FOP like or is I guess it still exists Like the Kim's video of London But it came later FOP launched when I was in college They were trying to be like

[00:06:28] What if Virgin Megastore Was a little cooler Like a little more indie At least in London it worked I guess it still works FOP What if Amoeba Records had Branches all over the city Gotcha But not as good as that Kim's video closing felt like a watershed moment

[00:06:50] In the death of a certain kind of New York Kim's video is a very special New York thing IMO Amoeba's allegedly dangling by a thread These days That's obviously a big chunk of real estate That's a California thing

[00:07:04] This has been Shop Talk where we literally talk about shops Does HMV still exist? I think it closes in there I used to go to HMV all the time Clack, clack, clack, clack, clack That's me going through CDs Remember that? Yeah, because I went to high school

[00:07:20] In Brooklyn and I had a friend I grew up No London Yeah, right, that's what I'm saying My friend and I lived in the West Village We took the subway together My friend Spike and I Well, after school Spike Jones? It was Spike Jones, the filmmaker

[00:07:40] He had a weird Billy Madison style twist They wouldn't give him financing For adaptation unless he went back to school Right Because it turned out he had never graduated Okay So you're saying it's like never been kissed That's my sweaty bit I'm doing right now Whatever, I don't

[00:07:58] Not sleeping Forget about that one Forget it, Ben Record it, make it its own new podcast Start a network around it Make it a spin on it Emergency Mini, so just that joke But we would go to the Virgin Megastore And do the clack, clack, clack

[00:08:18] I don't want to brag but we do some clack, clack, clack And would get angry when Movies we owned on DVD And then re-released with new cover art Yeah, with like a better DVD Not even, like if it was better We'd begrudgingly upgrade

[00:08:32] We doubled it but if it was just like Now the Terminator has like a lenticular cover That's petty as hell though You're right, it was petty as hell But I had some flipper DVDs From way back in the day And I remember the new one would come out

[00:08:48] And you'd be like alright Was it Warner Brothers that had the little Warner Brothers was shitting the bed The first three years of DVD Because it was those cardboard cases and the flipper discs And they weren't making it easy for you Yeah, I agree

[00:09:02] If I can talk about another shop Because we're talking about shops There's the second hand DVD shops In the UK called CX I actually realized recently I used to go to CDX all the time But actually I found out recently That it's supposed to be pronounced sex

[00:09:20] Come on, look at it I was like no, it's a C You have to say all the letters Because it was computer exchange I think that's where it first came from I used to go there and buy Like old Nintendo games as well

[00:09:34] They would just have a bunch of Random second hand crap It was like a pawn shop for teens Yeah, almost like every And there was a Wi-Fi In one of the shops called the SAFE CES The Wi-Fi Anyways, my sister and her boyfriend So my sister Elin Alazik

[00:09:52] Elazik on Twitter also a frame critic And her boyfriend Paul Ridd He's going to bail away That was my joke about him in Toronto Yeah, because Paul Ridd, Paul Ridd He plays Art Man One letter away What they do almost every weekend

[00:10:10] Is that they walk to the CX in Camden And they buy like 15 shitty movies on DVD And they watch them and it's really fun It is fun But many times it's just really bad movies It's really fun I got a shop That I love that's from the UK

[00:10:28] Rough trade It's in Williamsburg I like listening to vinyl And so I go and I spend way too much money You can spend so much money at those places It's crazy Where you're like no, I need this yes album No, it's $18 Come on, not yes

[00:10:48] I'm just saying what I like That's fine That shop Opened pretty recently And it feels like anomalous That a new place like that's sprung up But then it's also so telling that it has to be a venue as well Right

[00:11:04] Like it's clearly bankrolled by the fact that they're able to do shows there Like I bet the liquor pays for Them having a brick and mortar record shop Oh for sure We also do like art installations In the space too Like monthly Which is really cool

[00:11:20] We recorded a podcast there once Oh my god, yes That was a mess TCGS after party But I actually purchased Cramps album Which is featured in the movie we're talking about Hey Look at that right back on The tracks Thank you producer Ben

[00:11:40] We're right back on the tracks We can go on with our episode poet laureate Thank you Haas, let's get straight to our talk The peeper Let's keep this episode moving The tiebreaker I mean if you need me to settle something I can do that

[00:11:56] We're talking about the song Near Dark, birthday Benny Well it was in June but you can wish me a birthday Sure You can wish you a birthday That's what you say Happy birthday Happy birthday to the meat lover Oh You want more?

[00:12:17] Are we just going to call it quits there? No I think it's important that we talk about We're here to talk about a movie And it's also important that we acknowledge He has graduated to certain titles over the course of different miniseries So that's producer Ben

[00:12:29] Kylo, Ben, Ben Sate, Ben Knight, Shyamalan Say Benny thing, Yaeli Ben is with the dollar sign Warhaz and Purdue Urbain These are important things How do you even remember these? I forget half of them He forgets them all the time but honestly He's the one who does it

[00:12:45] The manil is on him To remember these fucking names and he does it Yeah I also, I mean most of my rent Is paid for by remembering words Sure Yeah My rent is paid for by writing words But do you ever remember them? I ask you

[00:13:03] So rarely, in fact I usually repeat them constantly Within the same article I remember this pointed out to me later You said the word blunt eight times in this today And I was like yeah I've written some hacky review of yours recently Use the word and like 75 times

[00:13:17] I know, I really lean on that one Oh boy You can write this thing You wouldn't understand I'm getting writer Trump So this is Patheon Bigelow's second movie It comes out a good handful of years after The Loveless Yeah Loveless had a long lead time

[00:13:35] Extended birthing process because it was Doing a long retitling Film festival Circuit And also The Loveless made no money So I'm sure she was sort of hunting Around scraping for Bucks She starts developing a screenplay Which she Wants to make a genre movie A slightly more commercial film

[00:13:59] And she really wanted to make a western Yes She wanted to make a western Right in the western with her buddy Eric Red Who wrote The Hitcher For this Which was his college thesis And it got turned into a fucking great movie With Rucker Howe That I love

[00:14:21] His name is Eric Red Which is a very Scandinavian mythic name To have And he's a guy Excuse me? He's a couple letters away from Paul Red So it's not had to change it more Couple letters, yeah He Later writes Blue Steel Again with Catherine Bigelow

[00:14:45] That's a bad idea He wrote Undertow that like 90s TV movie that she made With the fucking Lou Diamond Phillips And Charles Dance Oh ho ho it's a thing alright my friend It's a fuzzy script With amateurish direction according to TV guide

[00:15:01] How did Lou get the nickname Diamond? I don't know man cause he's a badass That's how Well growing up originally he was Lou Cole Phillips He and then years of high pressure That's just not funny Too comedy plays

[00:15:15] I'll invite you to the end of the earth on that That is a good joke Apparently I may be delirious right now Apparently He was named after a war hero called Lou Diamond That was his name Lou Diamond His name was actually James Diamond That's crazy

[00:15:35] So Diamond's real but Lou isn't? Right and then his father died And he took his stepfather's surname Phillips As well So Diamond's the only part of his name that is real Yes isn't that bonkers? It's for Lou Diamond Phillips

[00:15:49] I mean I had to hold on to it too We've talked about Lou Diamond Phillips two episodes in a row Yeah and we're gonna talk about James Legro We're gonna talk about Well I don't want to spoil it actually So I'm very excited

[00:16:01] About someone else we're gonna talk about Who seems to have taken over my life Dramatic tease Man I'm not spoiling anything Okay So she's trying to make this western happen Sure And everyone goes dead genre Yeah not cool this is the 80s baby The 80s are about vampires

[00:16:23] Right so she goes I gotta mash it up Because in 85 you got Fright Night Yes vampires In 87 you got The Lost Boys Which comes out right before near dark So I refuse to accept

[00:16:35] But maybe they knew that was coming and that it was gonna be a big movie Sure cause that was a big movie It would probably like they might have read some announcement It was a big ish movie It was a major cult movie I like The Lost Boys

[00:16:47] Huge stars Jason Patrick Alex Winter So she She throws some vampire She essentially Decides to reinterpret Both the western and the vampire Because she loves to play with genre She does like to play with genre Now here's what I was very fascinated by watching this movie

[00:17:09] I think to some degree This movie plays like a remake Of The Loveless Little bit yeah I mean it's about Bad boys rolling through town Right it's this sort of like destructive Cloud Of like male ego Unchat Right but she's kind of like

[00:17:29] She's hanging in the balance a little bit She seems a little less bad than them She makes What's his name of vampire I agree dick move Not cool But like the big kind of center piece of this movie Is them holding this bar hostage

[00:17:45] Very similar to the center piece of Of The Loveless And I think notably during that whole section She just kind of disappears into the background Yeah sure You know there's like a 15 minute section where you're like Oh right she's in this movie

[00:17:59] Because you're mostly watching the boys rip it up Draw some blood And when she like goes for a victim She goes like seduction mode And then she lets the other guy like Pursue him so she's kind of Not playing it completely Helpful she's nice to

[00:18:15] Pazdar when he's like I don't want to kill people She seems to have a conscience in the way the others Don't Well especially you know Paxton who's that Now this movie shares three cast members with aliens Right Which came out the year before can you name them

[00:18:29] Yes they're Jeanette Goldstein Lance Henriksen and Bill Paxton My three best friends in the world Exactly the three great people And she knew Cameron Right but they're starting to Hang out So James Cameron together So there's obviously some sort of intertwining

[00:18:47] Of like hey I built a rep company here If you want to borrow them for a weekend Right And she scrapes she gets five million Dollars And the movie made less than that When it came out Made 3.4 million dollars But like very very quickly grew

[00:19:05] Sure you mean became like A sort of well regarded cult Head of the 80s yes I agree It feels very ahead of its time Yes It also has one of the best posters Of all time I agree But like everything about this movie screams

[00:19:21] Like comic content to me now Sure yeah in the sort of obsession With taking like different genres And coming up with like very kind of everyday A kind of graphic Images and outfits and all that sort of stuff You know yeah that's true The archetypes within it

[00:19:37] Like this like totally predates preacher Yeah Which has like a very similar kind of sensibility I'm trying to think of like other genre western Like how much of a thing was that before You know where it's like X genre plus western Right Cowboy vs. Aliens

[00:19:53] It all leads up to Cowboys vs. Aliens That's the way it all came together This is the beginning of the snake And Cowboy vs. Aliens is the I don't know Bone hammer Or bone tomahawk That movie is just like what if Some white guys got eaten Right

[00:20:11] The mashups of genres in that movie Are western and racism Those are the two genres that are being put together Racism movies are my favorite genre They're really yeah Yeah There's kind of that thing where people go Racism movies are meant for kids

[00:20:27] Is it kind of infantilizing to watch racism movies But I think when the craft is there It's not What was I going to say? The Wikipedia page Sites two previous vampire western Movies Curse of the undead And Billy the Kid vs. Dracula

[00:20:43] Right so those both sound like we have a weekend Let's make something Billy the Kid vs. Dracula looks Like a lot of fun, John Carradine played Dracula In it It was directed by I can't pronounce this Orson Welles William Baudine Who churned out many a move

[00:21:03] Many a picture This guys filmography is so in depth It has really numbered Into decades Nice His quote Wait I want to read this now These films are going to be made regardless of who directs them There's a market for them

[00:21:21] And the studios are going to continue to make them I've been doing this long enough I think I can make them as good or better than anyone else Very sort of stoic His last movie was Jesse James meets Frankenstein's daughter

[00:21:33] So he never really gave up on the old Just love Zsara Jesse James meets Frankensteins daughter He couldn't meet Frankenstein I also hope it's Dr. Frankenstein's daughter And not the monster's daughter It's like my dad was a scientist I'm more into like the arts This is pretty great

[00:21:51] You're right, in note, yes Really? That's what it's about Sometime in the 1880s My daughter Maria has moved to the American west In order to use prairie Lightning storms in her experiments On immigrant children Snatched from a dying town And she swaps out their brains With artificial brains

[00:22:11] That's nuts That sounds great I would totally watch that And Jesse James meets her? Apparently Two gunslingers come to town Jesse James who has survived his reported killing In 1882 Which the film addresses So this is a sequel to the assassination of Jesse James By the Coward Room

[00:22:33] Seems like they don't meet for quite a while The confrontation comes Sort of in the last act of the movie So it's just sort of parallel narrative She's doing bad shit He's riding into town, there's some business It's all of 83 minutes long

[00:22:49] They bump into each other on the street one day And they say, oops It's the end of film They just meet very quickly The tagline is roaring guns against raging monster So it's his last movie That sounds wonderful So this is near dark

[00:23:07] It's not exactly the same as this movie Which I just mentioned No, no Pretty bold still in terms of mixing genre And just felt like an evolution of her Trying to take all the themes she was interested in With the loveless and put it into A more entertaining

[00:23:23] Film, but it is a film With its own weird So this is what I find interesting about this movie Once he gets turned And he gets turned very quickly It's just sort of this chance meeting And it's not a long movie, it's like an hour and a half

[00:23:39] Once he gets turned the movie Just sort of becomes like This guy spends some time with vampires And they're basically just like Drifters On the road with vampires And there is this sort of narrative This hanging Acts of the dads trying to find the sun Sure

[00:24:01] They're coming after them At some point these two roads are going to cross But the movie just sort of lets you live With these vampires for a while And just see how they live Explore the ins and outs Of their daily routine How their culture works Their workarounds

[00:24:19] Their own weaknesses And all that sort of stuff But the thing she really injects In the movie which I don't think exists In The Loveless And then becomes like a cornerstone of her career I think her single strongest asset As a filmmaker is her ability to build tension

[00:24:35] Sure Like this movie has a lot of tension Because every scene is playing off of this Like are the vampires going to go buck wild We know what vampires do They go buck wild They go buck wild Mani how do you feel about this movie

[00:24:51] I really liked it I had seen it before and I rewatched it for this And yeah I think it's like It's really atmospheric but not in a like Whimsical way It's atmospheric because of the music And the way it's shot is a lot of slow-mo Music is incredible

[00:25:07] Great Tantry Dream Score But I think it's atmospheric also for what you said Like it really builds tension And the characters are like real characters Like really complex And they keep like kind of fighting In each other even when they belong to the same group

[00:25:21] So yeah there's like a lot of There's like a real bad vibe For how it's really good Yeah that's the big loveless for me Is that she like wants you to spend time With people who make you uncomfortable She likes to make movies about assholes

[00:25:35] Even when you like the asshole And it's this sort of like multi character study That doesn't really have like Very clear narrative stakes But each scene has its own like internal Tension to it Which is kind of interesting And then she just like hones that sense of tension

[00:25:51] Every film from here on out I also sort of noticed that there's a lot of punk Asc characters Which I think is so cool Because she I feel like Has done well with portraying those types Whereas like other times They just are so caricatures

[00:26:07] Just like people have no idea about Like subculture trying to represent it And that's the other thing I'm not gonna keep on hanging this thing relentlessly That's the other big overlap with this And loveless for me is like She's using punks who are kind of like the greasers

[00:26:21] Of this time period And she's depicting vampires rather than being like Monsters as like a weird counterculture Like a creepy counterculture And then heightening that by like also They're gonna slit your throat And that's what she does then with point break as well Like with the mob surfers

[00:26:37] And that's the menacing culture So that becomes like a more gentle culture And then it turns out to be menacing But they're very much like in point break They're very much against like the establishment And she really like always depicts Those groups as like a family

[00:26:51] And I haven't seen the loveless But in near dark It really feels like a family And a family that like You know there's like the mom and dad Kind of like the old guy And the red dude Yeah, they're like the mom and dad

[00:27:07] And there's like the younger one who you know He says You know what it's like to be a grown up In the body of a child But he's still a kid Isn't that always the best kind of vampire character? The Andy Millenockest vampire Right, like Kiersten Dunston

[00:27:23] Is here with the vampire right Yeah, like the eternal Child I just like that he has such a chip on Ash Olden And that he's also such a little shit He's a little shit Using the fact that he's a kid in really abusive ways

[00:27:37] And then what's his name? Bill Paxton is like the wayward You know sort of wild card child Yeah, like the rebel kid This is like because of troubles So much fun This is the first time we've like had to talk about Paxton Since he died

[00:27:53] Because we did our whole Cameron series And like Paxton kept on coming up And he died like very shortly after that I feel like he died like right around The very early episode about the fucking Titanic documentary that he's in Dropped I can't remember after that

[00:28:09] But I remember we like saw like How great he was in that documentary He's fucking fantastic And then Yeah, I got so sad Watching him in this movie Just because I was reminded of this thing This quality I think he had which like

[00:28:27] He always looked like he was having so much fun In movies Without like destroying the movie you get such a Pure sense of joy from him And I don't know how many people I feel that way about now I don't think that's like essential to being

[00:28:39] A good actor but he had this unique quality Where it was just like, God good for Bill He's having a good time He just loved his job You get the sense that he just was so happy Like I get to play a vampire And wear their leather jacket

[00:28:53] This is early in his career You know, I mean he's He's a great actor And he's a great actor And he's the one who all through the 80s And he's the punk in The Terminator But I feel like Aliens is his first big role Yeah, yeah

[00:29:09] The year after that But he doesn't really you know Hit I feel like until true lies Right, like Well, then twister is the first time They actually put him at the center Twister and Apollo 13 And then in the sequel movie Trespass Yeah, amen

[00:29:31] He's the star of that too But like in The New Dark He's playing such a loud person But he doesn't feel like he's just doing it Because he wants to have fun It really fits with the story He never seems like he's chewing scenery

[00:29:45] Which I think is the biggest compliment I could give about him in this movie I don't know what other actor could have played this part like this And not be super annoying Sure, well I think the key to it is Is the having fun thing

[00:29:57] Because these guys are just like These vampires in the movie are just like hedonists They just live for the sake of living And do whatever they want Like bikers, like cowboys Like many, yeah Right, and so you need For that character You need someone who you're really seeing

[00:30:15] The enjoyment in that lifestyle Rather than it just being cruel You know What this movie does is it weirdly Humanizes the vampires By Spending that much time with them Even though it kind of refuses to give them A central humanity Yes, but it makes their lifestyle So seductive

[00:30:39] It looks amazing Especially in contrast to the Form, family, life That the main character has That sounds super boring It's so cool Being a vampire, you know You just blow up stuff You burn the cars you use And you just move on And you go anywhere else

[00:31:01] And you do that forever Right as the sun touches you Cause this is like one of the rare vampire movies That isn't a horror movie at all Like it has horror elements But it's not a horror movie

[00:31:13] I saw some reviews saying it's one of the best horror movies of the 80s It's not a horror movie It's called a western I guess you could sort of call it a thriller Like it's kind of a very low-key thriller Yeah It has a lot of bloody moments

[00:31:27] Really intense The last 20 minutes there's more going on And the bow thing is really intense Like the scene Amazing scene You know, a car blows up Like there's some shit that happens A truck, a car People blow up too

[00:31:45] He essentially starts with what would be the final scene of a horror movie What, him getting turned? Yeah Or they'd stretch that thing out Finding a list of vampire films There's too many Yeah, it's a robust genre But I'm trying to

[00:32:03] I'm just trying to figure out where this was In the like Sort of in the vampire movie Apart from, yes, Fright Night had come out Which is a great movie I love Fright Night I do too The hunger is not that long before Which is a very different

[00:32:21] Yeah, a lesbian vampire With Dinov Yeah, and Susan Sarandon It's more of an ironic vampire thriller An ironic vampire thriller But I feel like Neo Dark is super erotic too Like when she first Gives him The arm I can't believe that It's pretty intense But it's cool

[00:32:47] You can't make a vampire movie And not draw the comparison Between sex and vampirism That's just what it's about That's always been That's what fucking Bram Stoker's Getting at, right? Dracula's a hedonist He's got all his ladies There's that whole thing that All the classic, iconic

[00:33:07] Monsters each represent A different basic elemental human fear Yeah, yeah Vampires are sexuality And the wolf man is The evil within us And Frankenstein is like Fear of death and all that sort of stuff That's the whole thing it's tapping into But she's playing with so many different

[00:33:27] Types of tension in this movie Without being a horror movie It's the sexual tension of that It's the comedic tension of the dark Humor and the fun they're having It's the tension of when they're gonna Burst because it's a lot of slow burn stuff

[00:33:41] Before you get these bursts That are very violent But they're kind of spread apart You know, you got Coppola's Dracula That's later In 92 I'm trying to see what came after this Obviously Buffy the Vampire Slayer The movie comes out in 92 Which is trying as well To merge genres

[00:34:03] Sure The bad at it The movie's bad I feel like a lot of just sort of Like the vampire lifestyle Rules that this movie establishes Are like a lot of the things That are being used in What we do in the shadows I've never seen that movie

[00:34:23] Oh, it's so good People like it, right? Cause I've seen them You know, shit, Scot, rail What the fuck is it called? Boy I miss that one That one's so cute It's a great little movie What we do in the shadows is the best movie

[00:34:41] I know what you mean It's very much How do they live every day How do they make it work It sucks to keep people That overlap is big Because you're spending so much time with these people It's just the sort of like

[00:34:57] The bit with him eating the chocolate bar And it's like, oh fuck they have to eat blood There's no other option Like what we do in the shadows gets a lot Of mileage out of that I just think they do a lot of

[00:35:09] Sort of very pragmatic like answering Of like filling in the gaps In vampire mythology The questions you've ever wanted to ask about vampires Like Buffy does that, True Blood did that There are so many TV shows that have dug Into like, yeah, what if vampires Day to day

[00:35:25] It does The first one As we said is I already forgot the name of it That Billy the Kid That was the beginning of wondering What is Dracula's life like day to day Has he ever hung out with Billy the Kid They were the original two friends

[00:35:43] The world's most diabolical killer That's the headline for that one That isn't how I would describe Dracula Given three chances What, in the world's most diabolical killer Yeah, I choose different words Things to say about him Yeah, I mean he's definitely Like the most diabolical Like landowner

[00:36:03] You know what I mean? Like most diabolical like Baron Other than Baron Trump But the thing about Dracula that I love The thing about Dracula That I love Not that this is Dracula movie obviously This is a vampire movie right there But Dracula's like, yeah I do like

[00:36:23] To eat people, suck their blood Sleep in a coffin, but come to me You know? I'm not gonna like Go to you and like You can come to my house And then like I'll lay it on And we'll have dinner and then I'll fucking Eat your neck

[00:36:39] Dracula's whole strategy was like Let me just have the best house of all time The house that's so fucking weird That works because then nobody comes out No one finds them, whereas in near dark They have to roam streets And then they get chased by police

[00:36:53] They get blown the fuck up And a mobile home is no home I mean this is no life they're living Going from motel to motel So what's the plot of this movie? You got Caleb Colton, played by Adrian Paster who had been in Top Gun

[00:37:07] But in a tiny role But I guess who's You know, I mean What do you think of Adrian Paster? He kinda looks like Frankenstein He's got this sort of baby handsome face But it's all weird and elongated And very square Like in a broke back

[00:37:25] Because he's dressed like a cowboy You didn't even think of that He has a bit of brows He's handsome, I don't know What do you think of Pazdar in general? I think of him as two different things I think of him as pretty 80s Pazdar And then heroes

[00:37:43] The show Prophet Which was the Ur text for the later Breaking Bad, Sopranos And then he made a show about a bad person But when that came out In 95, everyone was like What is this? And he sleeps naked in a box Do you remember the show?

[00:38:03] It sounds way too twisted It was very twisted It was about an executive At a multinational conglomerate Who will stop At nothing to make money And his name is Jim Prophet Is his name? It was a good show to be clear He was on Fox

[00:38:23] He talks to the audience And he basically does all kinds of insane shit And Sleeps as he did as a child Which is curled up in a shipping box Naked This show aired like one episode And Fox was like Excuse me? No, no And it was immediately cancelled

[00:38:43] So he didn't make any profits No, it did not It was very fine Five episodes were broadcast Before Fox cancelled it It was protested All over the United States From the usual suspects From big shipping box Who didn't like their depiction And it was created by David Greenwald

[00:39:05] Who then went on to create the TV show Angel Another big project You know Where Adrian Pazdar's Bread is mostly buttered these days You tell me Weird fact about him He is the guy who voices Iron Man In everything I knew that actually In all the cartoons

[00:39:27] Every other depiction of Iron Man Essentially is Adrian Pazdar He does a lot of voices But now it's weird Because he was doing Iron Man cartoons Before the movie came out And he's retained the job But they clearly push him towards Downey Jr So he's got it

[00:39:45] Downey Jr. jazzy Interesting Sure, that's harder to rip off He also directed a film called Cement In 2000 starring The extremely bankable Chris Penn Wow He's also married to a Dixie chick Is that right? Yeah We really had fun with Adrian Pazdar No, they're divorced Or they broke up

[00:40:09] I'm sorry to say They were married for 17 years But in July, this July They divorced You want to hear a crazy story That's completely off topic? Yes, of course Sorry I appreciate your support There was I think a fourth member Of the Dixie chick

[00:40:33] Who fell in love and left the band She was like the backbeat of the Dixie chicks She was either replaced Or they used to have four There are only three Dixie chicks She was one of the three Or if there were four and they left one

[00:40:47] And kept going But she left the band She married my like Yes, Robin Lynn Macy Right Cousin once removed by marriage She married into someone Who divorced out of my family Okay That was always the thing of She could have been a Dixie chick

[00:41:09] And then she got the plague She got the plague? Did she die? No, she survived So alive The disease at the plague I believe she got the plague There's no mention of her getting the plague on Wikipedia But that's not No one has the plague now

[00:41:29] They were the first people to get the plague This couple went vacationing And they were the first people in America It does once in a while Pop back up though Usually not in America But you know, it's a bacterial infection David's googling the plague Sorry buddy

[00:41:47] The plague, you know, you got the weird bumps So this movie starts Just like looking like Urban cowboy or something It's just sort of like dramatic Atmosy, tangerine dream Cowboy, trucker kind of stuff The shot when you first see that It's like, I think it's slow mo

[00:42:05] Or maybe it's just her the way she acts In that film she's so Her name is Jenny Wright She's so whimsical And just All over the place and never really there But the way she moves Is so weird and captivating She's like a

[00:42:23] I don't know if she thinks of Butterfly And when he sees her I don't know if it's slow mo But she's so looking around And he's like, I'm gonna talk to this girl And it's like the music starts there And the whole meet up is just

[00:42:37] Drowned in that atmospheric music And it's like It's just like, oh they're hitting it off Like they barely talk He walks up to her They go ride together It's a very movie Don't need words It's just a connection And this whole movie is very dark It's near dark

[00:42:59] And she makes her pop in terms of lighting She's kind of like this There's a lot of chiaroscuro lighting Which is like shadows In her face And also stark light And she's very pale And it works so well

[00:43:15] That was a thing this movie was criticized for at the time Which was like, oh so it makes sense This director used to be a painter She's so obsessed with these compositions And she's not even telling a story Was that Cisco? You recognize my impression

[00:43:33] That's my Cisco on top That's a dumb criticism It's very dumb, movies should look good Well right, it's cinema It's pretty obvious reflection Of what she's going for That's like out of place It's not like a style for style sake And also it's a heating genre

[00:43:51] He wants to go home with her I guess and she's like no And bites him on the neck Oh yeah, he's driving her to see a horse Right We have a nice little horse adventure When he first sees her

[00:44:05] He goes to talk to her and she's eating an ice cream And he says can I have a bite? And she's like what? But then they go to see a horse I wish there was a scene later where he was like Oh I get it now

[00:44:17] The bite thing, I didn't realize you were a vampire at the time Now it's funny And they never say the word vampire in the whole film Yeah But also like it's like have you never Like heard of the concept of vampires Like would you not mention it once?

[00:44:31] Sure It's not because you live in the middle of America And you're like a farmer that you don't know what vampires are So maybe you should like know the word Maybe educate yourself But maybe this is set in a world where vampires are real

[00:44:43] And thus we don't know about them You know what I mean? Is this a world without vampire Story telling Vampires But usually I mean like a show like True Blood They're like You're a vampire Where it's like oh my god you're a vampire

[00:45:01] Do you do all this stuff and they're like a lot of that stuff is exaggerated But sure I mean I do drink blood Right You have fangs Whereas in this no one seems to recognize the characteristics of a vampire Like they just go what the fuck are you

[00:45:13] But no one ever goes like wait a second Vampire right am I right? Oh no this is ringing a bell Wait a second Not Creature from the Black Lagoon What's the other one? Your vampire I mean it's very practical in terms of story That no one knows it

[00:45:31] But it's cool like it works So you're saying this is set in the world of Dracula Untold Where vampire stories have been untold It's a Dracula Untold It's a prequel to our culture This movie takes place before Dracula Untold was made Before Twilight Before everything else

[00:45:47] The last time this movie was available on home video before the rights got all fucked up 20 years ago They re-released it like 10 years ago On Blu-ray and DVD Where they made the cover just Twilight Oh yes you're right Here it is and this is the one that's like $60

[00:46:05] Right Adrian Paster's face is like Stark White It's literally like the Twilight Post It's disgusting It's like sexy The image of Paxton all burned up With the bullet holes And the light streaming through him Is such a perfect image And I remember when I was a kid

[00:46:25] This movie was in I think Empire Magazine Which I've spoken of a lot It was my childhood touchstone for me They used to release these special issues That were like the 50 best Blah genre movies And I think Near Dark's in the action one

[00:46:41] And I remember just seeing that image And being like And also being like That's an amazing post Being like immediately trans fixing it I gotta see this so that's when I saw the movie Way back when Hadn't seen it since Watched it On my laptop

[00:47:01] We had to find a legal streaming life I've never done anything illegal in my life No it's the first time The first time ever I was on the plane I do love Humble Brack Although we paid for it Humble Brack that we spent $5,000 $5,000

[00:47:21] To try to fire from Toronto Yeah it was a private jet Forgot to mention that And also you had to pay for the films We had to pay for the film It was a 35mm print on the plane We had to buy a projection system

[00:47:35] And we had to train a steward to use it And because the flight is so short You had to actually just drive me around Yeah they were like Don't land right away Maybe circle the guardia for half an hour Thank god Blank Check out the McArthur Genius Grant

[00:47:49] Otherwise we would be Flocked right now How much did you get for that? A million dollars right? Let's do it Yeah I should try Cause I remember they gave it to Lin-Man Welmaranda last year And it was just like No it's $625,000 Okay I mean

[00:48:07] I don't have quite enough for a jet But that's pretty good Paid out in quarterly installments Over 5 years Okay Whatever I like how quickly this movie Gets through all of that stuff though Mm-hmm She turns them like minute 9? Sure maybe And it just sort of is like

[00:48:31] They have this weird connection We're not gonna take the time to do The answer sort of stop They see each other, they fall for each other Yeah and I like how instead of taking time Doing a Classic meet cute thing It's just super weird and poetic

[00:48:47] Because she keeps saying stuff like Look at the night It's deafening And then she says things like Wait what did she say She says something like The night is so bright And just really whimsical So beautiful Where she's talking about the stars It's like look at this star

[00:49:09] By the time the light reaches here I will still be here because I'll be alive forever It's a billion dollars I mean a billion years, not a billion dollars And the movie almost frames her as an angel For the first 10 minutes

[00:49:21] Like she has this very ethereal way of moving And the way she's lit and the fact that he's just sort of drawn to her And then she starts biting them next Hey man, he tries to get her to stay out late He thinks it's a curfew issue

[00:49:31] Yeah, it's because of your daddy He's also being gross He's gross That's my favorite thing Is how he's like okay I'll drive you He stops the car and he's like I'll drive you to your daddy if you kiss me That's the least you can do

[00:49:47] Yeah, and then obviously she kisses him But then she bites him And he's a fucking vampire and he's in pain forever That's what you get That's what happens when you're gross with girls Yeah, it's true, it's a good move by her

[00:49:59] To bite him, but the only problem in my opinion Is like you bite the guy then he's like What do I do with a vampire now? I need to teach him how to be a vampire It was a really cool move for her in the moment

[00:50:09] And then she's like fuck, I just broke this big But at the same time it means he's gonna stay with her forever That's pretty cool And he's at her mercy Yes, yes, I just wonder That's what you want at school That's the thing, being a vampire

[00:50:23] Requires a really strong sense of commitment You know? You really have to think about these circumstances You're creating for yourself You really want to spend the rest of your life with this guy? Yeah, well not just rest of your life The rest of your time

[00:50:37] All time, right, right Unless you happen to go outside in the daytime Yeah Very easy to avoid that Yeah, vampires, vampires, vampires What am I thinking about? So very quickly, he's sort of on the side of the road Staggering He gets picked up by this RV

[00:50:57] And I like their weird kind of makeshift thrift store armor That they have on for the quick moments They have to go out into the sunlight They think he's just some pathetic fuck They're gonna drain a blood And then she's like Bad news guys And it turned up

[00:51:15] And she's like you can't kill him Or you have to kill me first And so that I okay, cool He has to prove himself You can kill someone Hooker, who is Lance Henriksen He's the one who's like You got a week to prove you're a real vampire

[00:51:31] Catherine Bigelow in a move that shows that she's a true artist Said I like Lance Henriksen But can we add more weird lines to his face And gave him prosthetic scars The crevices aren't deep enough In his cheeks What a legend he is

[00:51:45] We've talked about him a lot But he's great Yeah, he's kind of like A candle who melted into something You know what I mean? And that's a compliment No, it's a double compliment I love him He's so good And then right, so she's helping him along

[00:52:05] By having her drink From her After she eats something It's like a baby bird kind of way Exactly, like a mom barfing into the bird's mouth But it's a wildly sexual scene Sure, yeah In a movie with no sex, it's quite sexy It's insanely erotic Yeah

[00:52:25] That's why cinema is so good about it Cinema is good, you can make Sexy stuff out of The limits In Hollywood you can't always Show sex and so what do you do You have fucking vampires Drinking each other's blood Suggestion, eh? This movie is very sexy

[00:52:45] The loveless is, as we all know Point break is super sexy Yeah, it's unbelievable I feel like she's gotten away from that Detroit is not sexy You know what? It's many things, but it's not sexy Why can't she go back To making something more heightened

[00:53:03] I would also love to see her Try to Make a genre film Again With her new sort of sensibilities And I get that she wanted To stop doing that Because she was pigeonholed and all of that But now that I feel like Detroit Flopped

[00:53:25] And won't get any Oscar attention And got some pretty problematic reviews Sure She's got to do something new And the full collaboration maybe isn't surviving Well, I mean to me that's the issue I agree But I'd like her to not rip something From the headlines next time

[00:53:43] But she's got to do something from the funny books You want to make a comedy? No, I'm just funny books You mean like a cult Like take some sort of genre tropes And try to marry it To her new sort of like Ethical Like sort of Humanistic

[00:54:03] She's just gotten so political now She's gotten so political It's cool to have a woman making Really political movies like that Genres And her movies have also gotten like increasingly Literal Her style of Realism is still a style It is a sense of stylization

[00:54:23] But she hasn't made a movie that's this heightened And it would be cool to see her take all of her political Concerns And make it more allegorical And try to do Throw in like parkour Yes Just what needs to make a comeback With Detroit Yeah, I agree

[00:54:43] That was definitely the issue with that That was the problematic element She made surfers Jumping off planes Look like a thing that makes sense I agree Kathy, let's do it Make a space movie Space movie I'd love to see her do like an original big budget genre film

[00:55:03] Like that I'd love to see her make a cool space movie Yeah, I wonder if she'll do it I don't know what she wants to do It's kind of an exciting point in her career Right now, because it feels like she could Zag in any direction

[00:55:17] She kind of reached a point break Oh, hey These are Strange days for her I think the weight of water Is bearing down on her shoulders Maybe she should make the weight of water too The weight of air Yeah, sure The weight of water So we have

[00:55:39] Okay, I lost many points here No Okay, so near doc The next thing that happens is the bar scene But there's a lot of other stuff in between Where I feel like they're just kind of shambling around Like there's nothing really crucial

[00:55:53] It almost becomes like a tour documentary You know what's like You're watching this band on the road It's about like Leonard Skinner's later Right, it's like Jimmy Shelter Slightly less murder More, actually I think I'm pulling them out maybe I love the scene where they steal a car

[00:56:13] Build backs and steal the car And then they abandon their van And just set fire to it And there are many beautiful shots of them Against the backdrop of the fire It's really, really hot In that sense, it's really good

[00:56:27] The bar is really like the centerpiece of the movie Where you get to see them fully vamp out Right Also, you know the scene where Maxine is the spurs When Caleb, the main guy Tries to take a bus back home He stops in the town

[00:56:43] And the cinema is showing aliens That's right Aliens That's nice now I like that whole stretch though Where he just has really processed what's going on The refusal of the call if you will Yes It's such an interesting scene as well Because he's trying to get help

[00:57:03] He has to be $14 to get the bus And he only has $11 No one wants to help him Are you strung out on heroin or something? And it's really a critique Of how outcasts are So not helped By the system staff He is so rejected by society now

[00:57:21] That he has no choice but to go back to the vampires Even removing the physiological elements Of his survival They might not be great company But they're the only people who are supporting him At this point It's a nice political point But not as on-the-nose

[00:57:37] As she does now It's kind of like commentary on America And how outcasts Which is the classic western thing If you want to identify with the outlaws Give me a reason And it's like America's trash country He was just asking for help You know

[00:57:55] I would run away from him He's pale and shaking He looks like he's about to throw up on you He's the kind of guy on a bus When you're walking down trying to pick your seat You're not next to him

[00:58:07] It's turned on when he sees that the cop has a gash on his hand Oh yeah, that's so good It is good He's super gross He's good, he's good It's kind of the most annoying role Because he's like the whiner And then he just becomes

[00:58:23] The audience viewpoint for a good chunk of the movie You're just sort of using him as a conduit To like he's your entry point To be able to watch these people live their life So he rejoins them And then there's this whole bar section

[00:58:39] Where it's just like this powder keg under the table Which is like they're going to eat somebody Who are they going to eat and when are they going to do it And why is this taking so long But it's like that's the fun of it

[00:58:49] Especially Bill Paxson's character For him it's a sport He doesn't just want the blood He wants to like emotionally manipulate the people And it's so good Because there's so much passion to what a vampire is It makes sense, rather than just You know, gotta eat someone

[00:59:07] You just sort of drag someone behind a tree And also life doesn't have steaks for them anymore Exactly, it gives meaning But for them it's like It's the singer not the song Because it's like well we gotta eat people It doesn't matter, we can burn down the bar

[00:59:23] Like nothing's gonna catch us So let's at least have fun doing it Like how are we gonna throw it off the hump And do something different than we did last night It's like a show, they're just showmen It's very performative

[00:59:35] And then the kind of game of one upsmanship Of them trying to like I think Press each other by their levels of cruelty And like the different techniques Like everyone is a different technique To seduce people into killing them It's really interesting

[00:59:49] Like Bill Paxton is just like insanely aggressive Like he just provokes them until they beat him up And the girl she just like Is like come and dance with me And they dance and then Yeah, like they all have different approaches

[01:00:05] And it's the tension that builds in this room Is insane, like when I first saw that movie I was so shocked and I remember so much of it When I rewatched it because it's so traumatizing Like it's like the nightmare scenario When you go in a bar

[01:00:19] Yes, it's the nightmare scenario and you go like Which one are they gonna eat And then when it becomes clear that they're just gonna Burn the whole place down They're gonna fucking take down everyone And destroy all evidence Like that tension is Replaced with just like

[01:00:35] A weird form of horror Like it becomes very morally Uncomfortable to watch Right, because you're just watching a series of executions Essentially And James Legro just stands there Blank-faced, jaw-gap He's gonna be in Point Break Is he in anything else or hers?

[01:00:53] I don't think so, he's in the Point Break remake Oh, he's in the remake He plays one of the elder FBI agents No, no, he's on the other side of the line He's a fucking genius We'll talk about him in Point Break But he's a fucking genius

[01:01:07] I think James Legro is like one of the funniest actors alive Have you ever checked out James Legro's IMDB profile? Like the bio and stuff? No, is it one of those weird ones where it looks like it was written by James Legro?

[01:01:17] Yeah, and it's just all about the joke of him being like a funnier looking Brad Pitt It isn't hard to make James Legro Busted-gut-laughing Just call him Brad Pitt So he doesn't get 6 million a film I think Brad Pitt gets more than 6 million Yeah, this seems pretty outdated

[01:01:33] Or have his photo air kissed by legions Aswooning schoolgirls during recess What a chill out I used to do that all the time For pictures of Brad Pitt He would have air kissed the photo What? But if you've caught Legro's quirky personality

[01:01:49] You may wonder why he's still toiling away But this Minnesota native Two sentences starting with butt at the snap Bad rating Despite being tight-lipped on Pitt Legro will happily chit chat about his career Legro says he isn't very LA Though he did live there for a short while

[01:02:05] This biography is by Darlene Takagi D-Takagi at Hotmail.com I love James Legro He's been married to Robert Loge's daughter for like 25 years Which is awesome He's A cool guy who Makes a zillion movies Works a lot He was great in girls I just remember him in girls

[01:02:33] He was really good He was really good in everything And he does have this interesting Look to him because he's A weirdly goofy kind of handsome But I feel like back in the day He used to be often typecast As kind of like a strung out California dude

[01:02:51] Right? Living in oblivion Which is one of his best performances He's that The kind of like Ditsy LA guy And doing it sympathetically And empathetically But I think he's good in everything And I just like to shout him out He was in Scotland PA I remember that

[01:03:17] With a movie we've referenced weirdly often On this podcast We referenced it in the Insomnia episode for sure Cause that's a more tyranny joint Right and we definitely referenced it In our Billy Morris set miniseries Anyway It starts to freak out a little bit

[01:03:33] Watching the bar thing break down Yeah, that's such a great scene That's like the best set piece of the movie Right? Yes But largely he and May Are like removed from that You're barely kind of covering them There's some stuff at the beginning

[01:03:51] When Paxton is kind of egging him on There's that thing where he gets him To punch the guy That's Paxton's scene Because they're kind of not into Caleb And then it's when Caleb Sort of puts himself in harm's way Later to protect them in the daylight

[01:04:07] In that police raid thing That's when they're like You're alright, right? That's when he wins them over Cause there's also this thread that's been established That Pasdar's dad And his little sister Are looking for him Tim Thomerson is the dad That's kind of been running away in general

[01:04:29] It's not even, they don't know about the vampire thing Obviously They're just like that kid spent too much time in a truck Uh huh Kiss these days Kids in their trucks This kind of was the original monster trucks Yeah But you know it doesn't have that

[01:04:47] That certain something That's Genese Qua, the creature Right, well But that's what makes Bigelow a master filmmaker That audiences were not ready to meet 1987 people were not ready to meet Creech, 2017 Still not ready to meet Creech So try 30 more years 2047 will we be ready for Creech

[01:05:07] I thought you turned your phone off I didn't turn my iPad off I'm getting a new iPhone on Friday Is it the new iPhone? It's not the X The one that looks at your face Is it the 7s like the one I have? No it's way too big

[01:05:23] But they just give me them It's the upgrade program thing I dropped this phone and it started to crack And I was like I guess it's time Yeah but I regret it getting the big one It's way too big I liked when the whole thing about iPhones

[01:05:37] Was that they were getting smaller and smaller And now boom they're massive Here's the secret, no case Well yeah but then you break it I've had it for a year, I only broke it just now Right But now I get a new one

[01:05:51] That's impressive, you've never broken a phone? I've only broken like seriously broken a phone once And it was like freezing cold And I just dropped it on the concrete like face down And it just was obliterating You seriously broke a phone once but comedically

[01:06:03] How many times have you broken it? Well this one when I broke it I dropped it out of my hand Bounced under Andernonk Avenue in Queens And then rolled under a car And I was like it was one of those phones where you're like

[01:06:15] I don't know of a way to get this Like this may just not I may not be able to get the phone And also like phone take it down a notch You didn't need to break that many times You didn't have to do a full Jerry Lewis routine

[01:06:27] And then I had to get a tree branch And I swept it out from under the car How else do I get something from under a car? Like it was in the middle of the car I just love picturing you A very tall man

[01:06:39] Frowsed on the streets of Brooklyn Holding onto a branch Queens, sorry Was anyone around to witness this? My mother was around to witness it I was having lunch with her We had Nepalese food in Queens I kind of wish I would break my phone sometimes

[01:06:55] It's a good time And then I swept it underneath with the branch What is Nepalese food like? It's kind of like Indian food But with more like sort of dumplings And hearty stews and stuff We had this sort of like curry chicken thing

[01:07:11] But also these like vegetable dumplings And a little soup And then also there was this like rustic Yeah, it's like hearty food You know, it's a mountainous country And then also we had this like doughnut The sort of fried dough that was only

[01:07:25] A little sweet that you would like dip In stuff And like curry potatoes and stuff It was great, it's a great place In Queens Because it has a really weird name Burger King Dunkin' Donut That's it So it's called While in Kathmandu Or Kathmandu

[01:07:47] You're right, that is a weird name That Kathmandu is the capital of Nepal It's the while in Very few restaurant names are sentences Exactly I think it's on Seneca Avenue It's great, look see Hey, that looks fun It's a good time, you get a bunch of stuff

[01:08:05] Nepalese food One in Queens While in Kathmandu Queens You can branch in your phone out from under a car Oh boy With your mom Yeah, with my mother So Somebody Because there's that scene Where Jesse gets shot Where Henderson gets shot And you like spits the bullet out

[01:08:37] That happens at the bar No, I think it was right after That's the hotel shit They go to the motel because the sunlight is coming up So they gotta pull into a motel quickly And there's that great exchange Where the old guy behind the desk says

[01:08:53] Don't I recognize you from a while back I come here every 50 years Better make the reservation now Right Well I guess we should say Because they do let that actor you were just previously talking about Get away

[01:09:07] And so he reports to the cops to then bring the cops to The first motel room Because at first you think James Legro is just a very featured extra He's getting a lot of reaction shots from this guy He plays teenage cowboy That's his official title

[01:09:21] But he gets away He's the one who survives They go to this motel and then they're raided Yeah But even before that Little sneaky boy vampire Yes, Homer He goes to the soda machine Sees a little girl Who is Pazdar's sister And he wants a little friend

[01:09:43] And that sucks No pun intended So he prings her back And Pazdar is immediately like No way That's my sister Dad comes in He's like who are these fucking kids you're hanging out with That's when I believe The police raid happens very shortly after that Yes, exactly

[01:10:07] And that's when Caleb kind of rescues them And so they're into it But then Caleb escapes to this family At a certain point Try and remember the fucking plot of this movie I just remember the connections We flipped it Yeah, it's the shoot out They get away

[01:10:25] And then another motel And then this sister family There's a lot of motels They're all the same because they're motels It's a combined motel The shoot out is like great, it's like classic And the bullet's bit is cool The light coming in

[01:10:41] I feel like she's finding cool ways to do fun Vampire shit with no money Like the bullet's bit Very simple like practical Or later when you see them catching on fire That's just old school stuntman shit It's fun They just get really black and like

[01:10:57] Yeah, I like it And then finally they go This other cool idea Which I don't feel like I'd seen in a vampire movie before Which is like what if we do a transfusion With normal blood It's so simple Just get the blood out That might be the cure

[01:11:15] Now that's silly But because I buy it in this movie Because he just got turned into a vampire How much blood could he have Vampire blood I don't know Why do they have blood but no Like life They have like a brain Like why are they dead

[01:11:35] Yeah, and the whole thing of her Giving blood to him Why does she even have blood That's supposed to treat blood But do they have blood Because that's supposed to be dead Often that's how you sire them though Is like you give them your vampire blood

[01:11:51] But it's also like they're drinking blood Through their mouth but then it goes straight Into their veins rather than their tummy Shouldn't they have a blood tummy Rather than like They do have a blood tummy but right But then yeah do they like poop

[01:12:05] The nutrients go into the blood Do they? I don't know Do they have like a digestive system Before we just pee, I don't know Yeah right it is liquid A lot of questions We've had so many vampire tv shows So many vampire movies

[01:12:21] Just tweet at Griffin and David What you think about vampire poop Yeah hashtag vampire poop Okay so here's my pitch for how we answer these questions I want to make a procedural tv show Called Transylvania General Hospital Uh huh And it's a hospital that only treats vampires

[01:12:39] And every episode you have It's called vampire hospital Let's shorten that Transylvania general What about Transylvania general It will sound like it's about Transylvania general To me It just wanna cast his wideness A vampire patent That sounds good too General Transylvania and Transylvania general

[01:13:01] This is my new interconnected tv universe It's a series of Procedural shows I'm gonna be the dick wolf vampire Exactly so it'll be like a vampire fireman Dick wolf more like dick vampire Oh man why hasn't dick wolf ever made a spin off About how he's a werewolf

[01:13:19] Yeah Isn't that what Lo and Oda is all about though Yes all the criminals they're like vampires Right And the cops are like like ants It's like underworld I had a very short lived character bit That was dick werewolf Sounds bad

[01:13:37] Where instead of howling at the moon he does the dun dun I'm glad that was short lived Very short lived That's really good I've been out as long as it took me to do it once Here are the stories Sure But I just wanna show

[01:13:53] That's like house where they're like trying to solve The mystery, the medical mystery At the end of every episode the doctor goes like Okay I figured it out here's the deal They poop blood The doctor just looks at the audience and explains

[01:14:05] A new physiological element of like vampires existence Then must be In the works We're doing such a good job discussing near dark I'm so proud of us Me too We're gonna get 2.5 million dollars What happens next So now he's cured Now he's a nice Trucker boy again

[01:14:27] And the movie rides off in the sunset But unfortunately They want his sister Exactly Uh oh Because she's a witness And also because she has blood And is a witness That's like a little girl Oh you're gonna get a blood Yeah Yeah Like a horse Like a horse

[01:14:55] Like a horse Like a horse Like a horse Like a horse Like a horse Yeah Like a horse take for her. Exactly. She's been a vampire for years. Like how many years? Like she, did she say like four years or something? I thought she said 40. 40. Oh, yeah.

[01:15:19] I mean, like when you get a blood transfusion, does it replace like all of your blood? That would mean that the person giving you blood gives you all of her blood. You're right. And then she dies. Yeah. You know, there's limited amounts of blood here, right? Right.

[01:15:35] Like with him, if it's like, okay, he's got very, a very limited amount. He just needs to flush it out of his system. Right, exactly. It's like a cleanse, you know? Right. But with her, it's like you need a full blood transplant, essentially. Right. That's weird.

[01:15:50] You got to Google it? Yeah. Can you hear your vampiric? Sure. Isn't the right blood type? We don't even know. How much blood do you get in a transfusion? All these questions would be answered on transfusion. We should have a doctor on this podcast. We should.

[01:16:08] Yeah, well, we can. James Hamlin could be on it. My co-worker. He's a doctor. You have a co-worker who's a doctor? Yeah. He's a star writer at the Atlantic, who used to be a doctor. He writes about stars at the Atlantic. He writes about health stuff.

[01:16:22] He's interviewed Obama. He's like way much bigger, way bigger than I am. And he's a doctor. Yeah. He used to have a series called on the site called If Our Bodies Could Talk. He's good. I love talking to James about my body. Well, Ben has a PhD.

[01:16:38] That's true. Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot you're not Professor Crispin. No. Let's see. Blood transfusions. Okay. Don't get it confused. Usually you get one pint of blood. OK. OK. It's not that much. That's not that much. No. That's about as much as someone can give up,

[01:16:56] I think, as well before you faint. Yeah, I remember. Before it's medically unhealthy for you to give more. Like your body can make more blood, but it takes like a day. In high school, they wouldn't let me participate in the blood drive because I was so skinny

[01:17:13] that my body couldn't handle it. Wow. I'm not allowed to donate blood because I lived in another country. Although I think eventually that lapses. Jirty British blood. Yeah, there's some time limit on it, like 10 years or something. So I think I might be finally able to.

[01:17:27] You know, they have a lot of like really intense limits on who can give blood. Yeah, that's true. There was this whole point in high school where my doctor thought I had mercury poisoning because I was hanging out with a Jeremy Pettum.

[01:17:39] I was about to say we're eating a lot of sushi with old fish at all. I eat zero seafood and they were like, we think you might have dangerous levels of mercury in your bloodstream. So they had to take like 10 vials of blood out of my arm.

[01:17:51] It sounds like a lot. A lot, right? Like the little vials. But it's a pin. It's a pin. I'm like there. The most of those I've known is like three. Right. I'm strapped into this thing and it's just sort of going and I'm like purposefully like looking away.

[01:18:03] And then I just hear the nurse go, oh, and I went what? And she went, no more is coming out. Your body was just like enough. Yeah. And then we went to the other arm and got five vials out of the other arm.

[01:18:20] Last time I had blood taken, I was just sitting there and it's the blood. So I was like like as it's coming out, I was like, I haven't eaten today. And the nurse was like, are you fucking serious? Like that. And I was like, yeah, I've just realized

[01:18:35] I forgot to have breakfast. And she just went like this. She just held her hand out and I almost immediately went like like I just my head hit her hand and I just conked out. She had to really put up with some bullshit.

[01:18:46] The last time I did a blood test I was supposed to not eat saying it's the worst. Like you're supposed to go like, I don't know what you're saying in English, but we're having breakfast. Right, you can't eat before, right, if they're doing like cholesterol or whatever.

[01:18:57] Yeah, yeah, yeah. It doesn't cost us. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, man. But that was fine. What they should have done when you told them that was kept the one sort of drip in to get your blood out, but then also giving you an IV drip with like a hamburger.

[01:19:11] So one arm, they were putting nutrients in a burger. They should have given you one of those burger. Do you have any burger reports? No, and I've been looking so... Do you have any burger reports? Burger what? Oh, you know what? I saw Ben Mendelstein eating a burger.

[01:19:23] Fuck, that's a burger report. You said Ben. I was a tip. And listen, eating a burger? Did you see any famous people at the Toronto Film Festival eating burgers? No. I only saw Tracy Letts walking by twice. That's it. He wasn't eating a burger.

[01:19:36] Did you check his hands? I saw Tracy Letts. I checked his hands. Tracy, you got a burger in there somewhere? Yeah, he was a burger. He was a burger. He was like, all right. Anything in your mouth? Yeah, no. He was awesome. He was wearing that show...

[01:19:47] Wolfpuk, I forget now. Oh, the Greta Garwin T-shirt? Yeah, the Greta Garwin T-shirt. Because he's in her movie. He's amazing. And I saw him actually, I realized later that the woman next to him was Greta Garwin, but I didn't recognize her. Because I just care about Tracy Letts?

[01:19:58] The one person I... Sorry, Greta. The Greta Garwin was wearing a Tracy Letts T-shirt. Right? So? Her movie is the best movie I saw. It's really good. I'm really impressed. I went to a lot of parties at TIFF because you go to all these parties. Jesus Christ. OK.

[01:20:14] I'm the brand. But the only time I... And obviously the parties often have... Hit and play over here. I often have sliders. What, you get three house parties? Which is a burger. Yeah, I know what a slider is. But I'm just saying...

[01:20:26] I'm the jury O'Connell of sliders, OK? The star? Been on them for years. He really hasn't been on sliders three years at this point. I was for a new year. The burgers... I'm like holding... Just because you're the burger report judge, one of us has to be.

[01:20:46] You know, where it's like, does this marriage... The burger report. And definitely at the darkest hour party, that was when I... For the new Joe Wright movie, the Watson Church movie. I was so hungry and I had to go to a screening after this party.

[01:21:00] So I was trying to eat as many hors d'oeuvres as I could. Like I was the guy who like anytime someone came by, I was just like, yep, give me that. That's fine. Let's just put it in my mouth. That's like every critic though.

[01:21:08] I know, but it's so bad for you because like... I know. A healthy meal is not six sliders that you ate standing up. Like that's not like a nutritious... Your body's not going to react through that with the like, oh thank you, I'll digest this normally.

[01:21:22] I've been like so desperate to find the burger report of my own that like almost anytime I go to a restaurant that has a burger on the menu, I order it myself because I somehow think that will will up another Fimo into showing up.

[01:21:35] Oh right, yeah, it's like... That's how you do it. Because you don't even need to be eating a burger for a burger report to happen. There's no correlation in my mind, but I'm just like... Maybe it'll... Be the burger report you want to see in the world.

[01:21:45] So I'm standing there right by the kitchen door so I can really grab some hors d'oeuvres. And then Mendelssohn sweeps by me with his friends or whoever I always got and he sits down and he has brought many trays of food, including the burgers.

[01:22:01] And he went, Ben Mendelssohn, yeah, he looks like you... Picture, he would look. He looks like a very natty suit on. Is he short? No. Oh really? He always strikes me a short. Yeah. Yeah, I don't remember him as seeming short.

[01:22:13] I'm going to look up his height now. 715? Yeah, yeah, yeah. 511. Is he in Darker Star Wars? Yeah, and he's fantastic in it. He's Stuttering George, King Stuttering George VI. Great in it. Who doesn't love Ed Mendelssohn? No one. Good answer. Yeah. The Rebels? Sure, right, yes. That's true.

[01:22:37] K2SO? Yeah, RIP. Yeah. Well, that's been episode in your dark, obviously. Is there anything else in the end? I mean, it's cool when they all die. Yeah, we have to talk about that because it's really cool, I think.

[01:22:51] So then like, the good thing is that they all start fighting each other about do we kill this girl or not? Like, they all start getting angry because like, May doesn't want to kill her, but then all the guys kind of want to. Right.

[01:23:06] And then the other woman also doesn't want to and she like... Diamondback? That's the Jean Goldstein. Lou Diamondback. Yeah, Lou Diamondback Phillips. She tries and help her and then like this amazing scene where they're just running and the sun is like really up now

[01:23:22] and they won't kind of just burning. It's really cool. And the one kneels down... Can't run away from the sun. True. Although there are movies where I've seen people run away from the sun, it's really bad. Mummy Returns has a scene where they're trying to outrun the sun.

[01:23:37] Sure, the good sun. That scene where they kind of run away from the sun. But they do cure May. From Macaulay. Yeah. With the blood transfusion, which I'm not into. Why? It's so hacky. Yeah, but it's so romantic. All right. Well, you want me ever.

[01:23:54] And it's a bit like... It's been easy, but you know, all the others are dead. It's a bit easy. Sure. But all the others are dead after all, so... She's a good person. Truck blows up, one of them dies in the road. Like kneels down. Yeah.

[01:24:06] Turns into a pillar of salt practically. It's cool. I just wish they could keep dating and he didn't have to be a vampire. Like, I feel like that's the kind of progressive narrative I want. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know? Griffin just made like a weirdly intense face.

[01:24:21] I want! I want! Near Dark, they keep trying to remake it. I feel like that never happens, but you always hear that bubbling up. It came very close in the mid-2000s. And then they said, like, well, Twilight stole our thunder.

[01:24:34] And it's like, if you think that Twilight stole your thunder, then you shouldn't have been remaking Near Dark. Then you clearly don't understand Near Dark. Right. It's a movie about grody-ness. It is a grody movie. D.E.G. release, it came out October 2nd, 1987, 30 years ago,

[01:24:55] almost to the day. Which month? 3.3 million was its total domestic gross. Bad? On a budget of five million. It is number 50 in Box Office Mogos, Mojo's, Vampire. OK. Is number one Hotel Transylvania? No. No Hotel Transylvania is number seven. Wow. Think about it, dude. Oh, Twilight.

[01:25:18] There's four or five Twilight movies. And then Hotel Transylvania 2 and then Hotel Transylvania. It's G2 Elk or is it G1? Yeah, 169 to 148. Wow. Take that. Then Van Helsing, the Vampire. Those are the nine vampire movies that have grossed over 100. And the Coppola Dracula one came close.

[01:25:41] That's a bad movie. It is. It's great looking. It's a great, like, making of book. You know? I tried to watch it once in London. There was a pub who was showing it for free. And I went with a friend and I was like,

[01:25:53] what am I doing here? This is like the worst movie I've ever seen. And I just walked out. But if you took still images and put them up in a gallery, it would be a great show. That is not the best way to see France.

[01:26:02] But he's something like fun. Come on. Sure, sure. Vampire movie in the dark weird pub. We've got weirdos there. This is the best way to watch it. I don't know. But that movie's very, like, romantic and dark. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[01:26:15] Also a movie that probably plays better with the sound of... Sure, sure. And Keanu's horrible in it. Really, really bad. As we will talk about at point break. We're messed up from our finest actor. Number one, the weekend of October 2nd, near dark open. 87th.

[01:26:29] 13th at the box ups. Oh, good point. Thank you. Number one at the box office is the second most successful film of this year. And I can't wait for you to tell me what the most successful film of 87 was. It was like a thriller.

[01:26:46] It was like a huge financial hit, a huge like guys thing and it got a bunch of Oscar nominations. Don't think it won any. It didn't win any. Fatal attraction? Fatal attraction. My favorite movie. Adrian Lyons. I was going to say it, but it's fine. Sex thriller.

[01:27:03] Very good. What would you call it? Sort of a... It's an erotic thriller. It's an erotic thriller. One of the early ones. One of the best ones. But it's also like a male... It's a movie about... Yeah. Second wave feminism is making men paranoid.

[01:27:17] Don't know what to do with female freedom. That shot of her on the roller coaster. That's my favorite part about that movie. I love that so much. We were also talking about how like Michael Douglas is fascinating because he was the first movie star

[01:27:30] whose persona was this guy's a piece of shit. Yeah, it's true. Like they're like bad boys movie stars. But like he was just like this guy fucking stuff. Disclosure. They took a lot. Right, that's Oli's career. It's true. He's a slime ball. He's like 80s king slime ball.

[01:27:44] Which is funny because like in movies like Wonder Boys, he's such a like sweet little gremlin. Yeah. But I remember my dad seeing Wonder Boys and being like I can't believe I liked Michael Douglas in this because my dad was so revolved for years

[01:27:55] by the Michael Douglas persona. That he like almost couldn't reconcile him playing like a guy that he didn't want to punch. Right, I understand that. Fatal attraction which has been number one for three weeks. It makes it's made 31 million so far. How much do you think fatal attraction

[01:28:12] grossed domestically in 1987? 115. 156. I remember that and it was also the highest grossing film worldwide. That right worldwide. I could see that but second highest grossing domestic. What is the highest grossing domestic film of 1987? Was it also... It was a comedy, Three Men and a Baby.

[01:28:32] Three Men and a Baby. That was the number one hit of the year. I remember that because that's the most anomalous number one film of the year ever. And like the top five are Three Men and a Baby, Fatal Attraction, Beverly Hills Cop 2, Good Morning Vietnam and Moonstruck.

[01:28:46] Jeez. In case anyone forgets that Hollywood's changed in 30 years. Yeah. All right so number two is a comedy. It's sort of a fantasy comedy which is interesting. How do you describe this movie? Does it feature a big comedic star? Yes, you know what it is clearly.

[01:29:10] Is it the Golden Trail? No, good guess but no. It features a big comedic star but I would say his star is about to be sort of on the wane at this point. But not like an Eddie Murphy type. Like this is a comedian. It's not Chevy. No.

[01:29:26] It's... Across the pond. British guy. Dudley Moore? Dudley Moore. What is the movie? It is a fantasy comedy starring a teenage star. Oh, oh but God, but which one is it? It's not vice versa. No, no. It's a body switch comedy as Grishman has survived.

[01:29:47] Fuck, fuck, fuck, the Dudley Moore one. So wait, Dudley Moore is paired with not Kirk Cameron, right? It is Kirk Cameron. It is Kirk Cameron. Okay. Yep, Sean Ashton is in this movie. Is the title alliterative? Sure, yes it is. It is?

[01:30:05] It's two words and they both start with the same letter. It's four words but each phrase starts with the same letter. Fuck God damn it. I give up, I give up. Like father, like son. He's mad about it. Is that a first? That you didn't get it?

[01:30:24] No, it happens once in a while. It's a while, okay. It's rare that I know the movie and I don't know what it's called. Right, yes that's pretty unusual but it's a pretty anonymous title. Right, and there was that weird period

[01:30:35] where like three of those came out in one year. Yeah, this sort of Freaky Friday type movie. Right, but there were three like dad body swap movies. My favorite genre. Well put, well put. Number three, I mean this is seriously, this is a tough one. Okay.

[01:30:51] I've never heard of this film but it does star someone we've talked about a lot in recent, our recent interactions for some reason. On mic or off mic? On and off mic but on mic a lot in the Monday episode that we recorded.

[01:31:09] It's a crime thriller starring a white guy and a black guy. So I've never heard of this movie. It sounds completely fucking insane. We've talked about the director or the actor? No, the star, the white guy. It's okay, so it's two leads we talked about.

[01:31:29] Ben literally said his name at the start of the episode. Dave then? No, who what? David Sems? Yeah, I mean it. I was one year old. It's not the foe. No. Ben said his name at the beginning of the year. This is a hard one to fucking,

[01:31:46] the title of the movie is a job, like a job title. Is it like the blank? Yes, the blank. It's been out for three weeks. It's gonna gross $19 million. It's an R rated crime thriller. Geez, I'm trying a total blank here.

[01:32:04] Yeah, I don't know what to tell you man. Can you give me one of the two actors? The black guy is Louis Gossett Jr. It's on Iron Eagles. No. I have no idea. It's the other star is James Belushi. What? And it is called The Principal.

[01:32:26] Oh, I know that one. I was hoping you'd never heard of him. What is this movie? Yeah, I've heard of this movie. It's like Jim Belushi. Jim Belushi is a high school teacher with a drinking problem. It's like if dangerous minds was violent.

[01:32:40] It's like Jim Belushi is the new principal in town and like an inner city high school and has to lay down the law. He's transferred to a tough school. Louis Gossett Jr. is like the head of security at this school.

[01:32:51] The poster was like him outside of a school building holding a baseball bat. Yes. Yeah, which is upsetting. And it's like they have to clean up the school. I guess. Just beat up some kids, I guess. I have only seen the poster that movie. I imagine it sucks.

[01:33:05] Yeah, I don't think it's good. Is it a comedy? No. No, no, no. What? Which is again, we talk about it in another episode. Like Belushi made a lot of dramas. Had a lot of shots. So number four is sort of a surprise hit of 87,

[01:33:21] starring an Oscar winning, well-known veteran actor and kind of a young star. It's like a kind of like a crime comedy drama. You've actually weirdly guessed the sequel to this movie in the box office game before. Oh, Stakeout. Stakeout. Good job. Thank you. Good job.

[01:33:44] Have you seen Stakeout? Richard Dreyfus and Emilio Ascii. No, my friend used to swear by Stakeout and like hated another Stakeout. Another Stakeout is the sequel to Stakeout. And they add Rosie O'Donnell. Yes. That came out like way, it was like came out like seven years later

[01:34:00] and it's like why are you? Took too long. Stakeout was like a surprise hit. Surprise hit. Dreyfus Anestivus? Dreyfus Anestivus, yes. It also features Aiden Quinn. John Bannam director? John Bannam director, Forrest Whitaker. He also directed another Stakeout. That's the director of Sight and Out Live.

[01:34:17] I mean, sorry, I fever. Yes, he's been directing Sight and Out Live for 42 seasons. It's what else? He directed War Games. He directed. No, Deliverance is not important. Anyway, number five is a well-loved hit movie of the year that remains beloved to this day.

[01:34:39] Sort of a cheesy romantic movie that rocks. It rocks? That rocks? It's a great movie. Does it roll? Sure, a little bit in a 50s kind of way. You like it a lot. This movie is pretty lovable. It stars an actress that I just had

[01:34:56] the biggest crush on when I was a kid. But that might not be that helpful because I had weird crushes. That's why I think it might be helpful. And the actor is someone Bigelow will later work with. Interesting. Not Keanu. No. Oh, is it a Swayze picture?

[01:35:15] It's Dirty Dancing. Dirty Dancing. Dirty Dancing. Dirty Dancing. Had a huge crush on Jennifer Gray, mostly in Ferris Bueller. Yeah, not surprising at all. Queen. She's a queen of the 80s. How do you feel about Dirty Dancing, Mani? It's pretty fun. I think it's...

[01:35:38] Yeah, like it's maybe not the most walk movie ever, but it's just us. No. No, no. But I don't like judging movies like that anyway. Nah, it's a three-year-old movie. Jerry Orbach is in it. Agreed for her. That movie costs pretty much as much

[01:35:51] as Near Dark costs to make, but maybe more money. Nice. That movie almost went straight to video. I know, whether it feels like it should go straight to video. Do you put this idea for a movie ever? Do you know I had never seen it,

[01:36:05] but I saw Dirty Dancing Havana on Night's Opening Night. It's a good movie. It's not bad. Rama, Gary, Diego Luna. Two pretty people. Yep. Yeah. Which is like technically set in the same universe. Is that the sort of gimmick with that one? Right.

[01:36:19] Patrick Swayze appears in even though the movie is set 20 years earlier. Yeah, it doesn't make any fucking sense. He's 20 years older. Yes, correct. Other movies, you got Hellraiser. Oh, OK. That's pretty good. Yeah, I love that movie. That's a crazy 80s.

[01:36:36] That's number one in the puzzle box genre on Box Office Mojo, right? Number one in the configuration clue. Someone thinks he's funny. It is the number one Hellraiser movie. It made only $14 million domestic. It's crazy that there have been like four theatrical Hellraiser's off of that.

[01:36:55] They're like 10 in total. There's so many Hellraiser's. Yeah. You've got the pickup artist, young RDJ in a totally creepy movie with one of the most tobaccan films ever made. Oh my God, he's such a creep. You got big... But he's tobaccan. You got to give him credit.

[01:37:09] You got big shots. Big shot. I don't know what that is. Looking it up. OK. This was my worst Box Office game in a long time. It's kind of amazing actually. It's a hard one. I'm disappointed myself. I'd like to announce I'm stepping down from the podcast.

[01:37:25] You're better from... No, never. You're better from games when you were alive. True. That makes sense. But even still, I feel like I'm usually better at testing them out. I have nothing for you on big shots. I don't know. It was called a big bad comedy.

[01:37:39] So I think it was sort of... You know, there was some... Like it's like a black guy and a white guy and I'm sure it's all very... Things are bad. I don't know. All very clever. LaBamba number nine with our boy, Lou Diamond. It was his breakout.

[01:37:57] He's fantastic in that. So we've mentioned him 12 times in one episode? No way out with Gene Hackman and Kevin Costner. We don't have to go all the way down. Well, it's the top 10. Near Dark is number 13. That sucks. It opened in 262 theaters and it tried to build...

[01:38:19] Didn't really, but it did expand the next week and then it kind of just vanishes. But just kind of known now. People really like this movie now. Definitely. Yes, but I wish people could see this movie. Yeah, well, yeah. It would be nice if the DVD...

[01:38:32] They've heard of it. ...the blue rating cost 80 bucks on Amazon or whatever. Or if it were available. I mean, this is like the great crime of the death of video rental places. Is when all rentals exist digitally and then there's a rights issue,

[01:38:45] suddenly it disappears from every single platform simultaneously. Right, yeah, yeah. Well, I think I saw it because my sister found it in a CX. So that was cool. Sex. Very lucky. In the sex, yeah. It's great. Great movie. Yeah. Fun to talk about it.

[01:39:00] Yeah, fun to talk about other stuff as well. Mani, thank you so much for being here on the show. Thanks for having me. If you wouldn't mind flying coach on the way back because we're a little strapped. What?

[01:39:11] Well, it just turns out that MacArthur Grant's less than I thought of his. Yeah, shit. I thought it was one million lump sum and now I realize we're getting a quarter of $600,000? Yes, that's a good quarter of that. We might have blown our entire budget on this episode.

[01:39:23] Well, it was worth it, right? A, we had to buy near dark. Yeah. Every print available. Every print. Yeah. Well, you're welcome. Yeah. At least we own the rights now. That's true. So we can release it on Blu-ray. I got this idea like a real sexy cover

[01:39:38] and a real twilighty cover. Sure. Yeah. Let's really like sex it up. Sure. I'm going to do a true blood cover. Let's put on competing covers and see which one sells better. Great. Ask your followers.

[01:39:50] One of my earliest jobs on the internet was recapping true blood for the AB Club. Oh, really? Oh, wow. Because nobody wanted to deal with that show because they had the worst fans. Really? We're like true blood fans very territorial. Yeah.

[01:40:03] And they were the kind of the worst fans are always the fans who only watch that show. Yes. You know, they don't like view TV as like some sort of like spectrum of programming that has good things and bad things.

[01:40:13] They were just like, I know I watch true blood every week and I'm pretty sure it's the best show on TV. So what's this B minus you're giving us? This was a good episode of true blood because it was an episode of true blood. Yeah, right.

[01:40:23] In the yeah, comparing it to nothing else and I love it. I disagree with you. Fake blood. The true blood. It's always sunny in Philadelphia is another one of those South Park. There are certain shows where it's like the fans just don't watch other TV.

[01:40:38] They just love that show. The new ownership. They're new. They feel like that. Yeah. Uh-huh. Uh, people can follow you on Twitter? Yes, at Manilazik. That's me. I believe it's Lazitch. I'll let you off the hook for that one. Well, I didn't put the accent. Kind of embarrassing.

[01:40:54] Yeah. I'll let you off the hook. And follow your work on Little White Lies. Yes. I still write for them and I write for other places sometimes. Don't shoplift it. No, don't shoplift it. Go to website or buy a proper. Hand on over to FOP, just walk out.

[01:41:08] No one's going to bug you. That's true. But don't tell that to anyone. Come on. Just do it. Just to pay for it. It's nice. How much does it cost these days? I don't know. I get it for free because I write for them. Correct.

[01:41:19] But it's worth it. Yeah, those are the other lap of luxury we live in media. We're going to get our own magazines for free. Yeah. You have studios paying us to write good reviews and your magazine giving you free issues. My Marvel check's got to clear.

[01:41:31] I'll say Ragnarok's getting a pan. I mean, how much is Catherine Bigelow giving you? Catherine Bigelow paid for my trip here. So yeah. Yeah. That's true. We are basically a money laundering operation for Catherine Bigelow. 100%. It's directors who feel like their names aren't mentioned enough. Hire Us.

[01:41:50] Hire Us and other podcasts. Yes. Right, some other podcasts in the exact same order. At the same time. To discuss them. Yeah. But hey, look, we're probably the only podcast doing a near dark episode. Yes, that's true. We're the only podcast stupid enough

[01:42:06] to do a whole episode about a movie you can't watch. But we watched it. We talked about it. Great job. What if that episode makes someone decide to make it available? Hey. Huh? Huh? Hey. The power of podcasts. They're ganging up on me right now, guys. The power.

[01:42:23] They're like, huh, Davis? Like, I've got to be arguing against this. It's possible. It is possible and I hope it happens. And yeah, I hope that this end strange days get proper releases on Blu-ray. Again, you know, that are available.

[01:42:37] They just need to make a bigger box set. I would buy a Bigelow box set. Just like my Nolan box set that came with a lovely book about him. I got the same one. He gave us a little postcard. Nice. That was a little glossy postcard.

[01:42:49] Who wrote about him? Oh, just, you know, Tom Stopper. No, I don't know. It's like copywriters. It's like very generic. There aren't like essays. It just like has like a description of like, his next movie was about Batman. Have you heard of him? The superhero?

[01:43:04] What does what it's about? Sounds good. But he has bookheads, so. Yeah, I'd love one of them. And you'd have to like get the weight of water, but it would be fun. Yeah. You know, that's pretty light. One way down the box. Bar's heavy, man.

[01:43:17] Didn't know much you have. I remember studying that in school. I don't remember what the weight of water is. No one does. I guess I have to watch the movie. That's right. Spoiler alert. It weighs, I don't know, 40 pounds. Yeah. What? I think an hour 40, hour 45?

[01:43:31] Why the fuck is it called? Well, we'll see. I haven't watched yet. I guess we'll get to it. All right, Ben. Ben, Ben hates this. We're wrapping up. Wrap it up. Give us the, take us out. That has been part four of our near dark episode.

[01:43:44] So thank you all for listening. Please remember to rate, review, subscribe. Thanks to Andrew for good for our social media, Joe Bowen and Pat Rowns for our artworkly Montgomery for our theme song. Go to blankies.reddit.com for some real nerdy shit.

[01:43:58] Have you seen the recent thing that's going on in the Reddit? You have. Which thing? That someone found. Oh yeah, the misconnection. Someone found a misconnection for my since deleted Tinder profile. Because my Tinder profile was so bad,

[01:44:12] they were like, I haven't been able to forget how weird this was and shouldn't figure out if it was a bit or not. It was a bit, right? It was not. I just hate myself. Well, okay, but your whole life is a bit. Agreed in that sense. Yes.

[01:44:25] So wait, are you going to go on a date with this person? I have no idea. I emailed with her and she was like, why would you make that profile? Okay, maybe this isn't a winner for you. That's a good start. I don't know. I don't know.

[01:44:34] I'm trying to explain to her my life now. At least she's intrigued. Yeah. Yeah, my profile picture was. Was me with a fake gash on my chest. Right. What was it from? Thanksgiving, the Go 90 original series. May I ruin a bunch of Emmys?

[01:44:49] Wait, a gash on your chest? No comment. It was like makeup from a set that makes it look like I've been stabbed in the chest. But the photo was pretty realistic looking. Okay. Yeah. So maybe it looks like someone went and dug out your heart, right? Hey.

[01:45:04] And so you need to date someone to like find your heart again. Yeah. It's a little lower than that. I think it's got more of a like a liver of eye. Okay. Ben is angry about everything. He is scarlet with rage. Classic. Sorry. Sorry, Ben. It's fine.

[01:45:19] Go to Reddit. Thanks to Eric. All that stuff. And Shere Guto for our social. I said all of that. Oh, sure. Great. We're trying to wrap it up. Okay. David, come on. Oh, sorry. It's so baby's fault. David, let me explain this to you. Okay.

[01:45:31] We're trying to end the episode. So you shouldn't say things that I've already said. And as always, I literally, I just pulled my leg. What? Recording a podcast. I just pulled the muscle in my leg. My leg hurts a lot right now.