0:00

Hey there, floppers. This is Elliot speaking. Before we

0:02

begin this week, let's be nice and call it

0:04

nonsense. I just want to make

0:06

sure you knew about the live show stuff we

0:08

have coming up, in case you miss it later

0:11

in the episode or just can't wait to hear

0:13

about it. We are still in the streaming window

0:15

for the Flophouse Sinks Speed 2, our virtual online

0:17

video event. Just go

0:19

to stagepilot.com/speed, and you will see

0:21

that whole show with exclusive footage

0:24

that the in-theater audience didn't get

0:26

to see through

0:28

May 19th. After May 19th, of

0:30

course, it goes back to the Flophouse vault, where

0:32

it will never be seen again for a long

0:34

time. Then on May 24th,

0:36

we will be in Oxford, England as part of

0:38

the St. Audio Podcast Festival. We're doing two shows

0:41

in one night, 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. Two

0:43

totally different shows, totally different movies, totally

0:45

different presentations, totally different questions. It'll be great. And

0:48

then for something even more completely different, on

0:51

July 26th, we will be in Boston

0:53

in person at WBUR City Space. We

0:56

don't know what movie we're doing yet, but it'll be a fun

0:58

show. It's going to be all new stuff. You're going

1:00

to love it. So that's the Flophouse Sinks Speed 2,

1:02

streaming now in Oxford May 24th

1:04

and in Boston July 26th. And now

1:06

on with our regular nonsense. Hello

1:14

and welcome to this Flophouse Mini. That's

1:16

what we do every other week when

1:18

we're not talking about a bad movie.

1:21

We talked about kind of whatever

1:23

we want to talk about. They're not the

1:25

boss of us. We can do what we want,

1:27

right Dan? Yeah, unlike the regular episodes where

1:29

the movies show up holding a gun and they're

1:31

like, talk about me. And I'm like, honestly, if we wanted

1:33

to, we could spend that time, you know, like,

1:37

I don't know, ranking our favorite Ben and

1:39

Jerry's flavors or something else. Damn. But

1:42

we don't. Doughboys did it. The

1:45

Scar Giver attention must be paid to

1:47

the Scar Giver. Let's

1:50

introduce ourselves so we all know who that

1:52

was. I'm Dan McCoy. I'm

1:55

Stuart Wellington. Yeah. I'm Elliot

1:57

Kalin, the last of the regular three, but

1:59

who's this time? joining us today. Why it's

2:02

special. No,

2:05

we have a critic and author,

2:07

Matt Singer, specifically here in connection

2:09

with his current blockbuster

2:13

number one best-selling book about

2:15

movie reviewers. I

2:17

mean, I wanted to start off saying like,

2:19

okay, the book, of course, his last year's

2:22

opposable thumbs, how Cisco and the Ebert

2:24

changed movies forever. And honestly,

2:26

like I would have asked Matt to

2:28

be on earlier, but he was doing

2:30

like good morning America and I'm like,

2:32

let him, let him cool down from,

2:34

you know, taking a press tour of

2:36

real things before I bother him about.

2:41

Yeah, I guess that's true. I do

2:43

have mass and matter. Uh,

2:46

but anyway, I just like, it's a, it's

2:48

a great book. I want to compliment Matt,

2:50

uh, not only because I

2:53

fear that sometimes that he might be

2:55

annoyed at me when I show up

2:57

in this letterbox comments to argue something,

2:59

uh, but also Oh Matt is nodding

3:01

his head vigorously. Yeah. No, he's shaking

3:03

my head vigorously. The opposite. But,

3:05

uh, Exact opposite. Well,

3:07

I may argue in the letterbox. I do

3:10

not argue at all with his writing ever

3:12

because opposable thumbs is really

3:14

great. Like I tore through it and

3:17

I'm sort of amazed not only by the

3:19

amount of research it must've taken, but

3:22

also the skill it takes to then take

3:24

that research and turn it into something that's

3:26

sort of breezy to read. So,

3:29

uh, thank you for writing a book that I

3:31

was like, I got to get

3:33

this book and not just cause I know this guy

3:35

immediately. And while,

3:38

and while Dan might argue with

3:40

you on letterbox, you're only going

3:42

to see me come out when

3:44

you are reviewing what like slimmer

3:46

flavored potato chips on your Instagram,

3:48

which I'm like, this is, I'm,

3:50

I'm, enraptured by to

3:53

being, to being an incredibly talented

3:55

writer. Uh, and, uh, and

3:57

critic Matt is also of course, a say, masochist

4:00

horrible masochist who loves punishing

4:02

myself by eating the worst

4:05

movie related food. Yes Has

4:09

to be something that at a certain point you were like, why did

4:11

I make this a thing that I do? Why

4:13

right? Yes regularly as a matter of fact

4:15

last night I got a text at like

4:18

11 o'clock at night from our friend Griffin

4:20

Newman who texted me and he's like I

4:23

Am out on the if I hop menu

4:26

and I was like, I was like wait

4:28

a minute What I thought he now now

4:30

I knew that there was also a Baskin

4:32

Robbins if menu I already knew about that.

4:35

So I thought he made a mistake. I

4:37

was like, oh, do you mean the Baskin

4:39

Robbins thing? Ah, very funny. He's like, no,

4:42

there's an if one too And he sent

4:44

it to me and this thing has blue

4:46

pancakes with fruity pebbles and like vanilla mousse

4:49

It's got a French toast sandwich.

4:51

It has a pizza omelette, which

4:54

could be one of two different things Just based

4:56

on the title. I mean it is it is

4:58

so So much just every

5:00

item is so it looks like it was

5:02

made specifically to punish me for something I

5:04

did and And

5:07

that so yes and that was one of those moments

5:09

where I was like how did this become the thing

5:11

that I do because and and I have to do

5:13

it by myself now unless one of you guys want

5:16

to come because Griffin who came recently and At

5:19

least shared the I hop wonka menu with me

5:21

is already like there's no way I'm putting any

5:23

of these things in my mouth So I'm in

5:26

real trouble. I think I think

5:28

Dan's health is doing pretty good these days He's doing

5:30

a lot of yoga. You should do that. It's true.

5:33

I've I've lost some ways. Maybe I should put it

5:35

back on I mean, yeah If

5:37

yeah, yeah, they're both important cause

5:39

Matt I want you I

5:41

want to thank you for putting in to focus

5:43

and into perspective The argument in my house right

5:45

now is that my kids really want to see

5:47

if and I do not want to see it

5:49

And so but knowing that I would just be

5:51

putting the movie into my eyes and ears and

5:54

not actually ingesting It as food into my stomach

5:56

makes it makes it a little bit more understandable

5:58

that there's a word. There's a worse scenario There's

6:00

a worse form of if to literally ingest.

6:02

Now would you rather it was a I

6:05

love it, I love it, I. Lindsay Anderson's

6:07

if, string Malcolm McDowell. I love the idea

6:10

of like British school food. Yeah,

6:12

yeah, a lot of like puddings, a

6:14

lot of like boiled meat. Beans. Yeah,

6:17

I can only imagine these. How do we turn the

6:19

ellipsis into foods? Maybe it has, it means the food

6:21

with like three little portions. It's

6:24

like a progression in some way. Yeah. I

6:27

can't fucking imagine ears over at IHOP are

6:29

like, okay, we're going to

6:31

need the Matt Singer bump. What kind of fucked

6:33

up nasty shit can we put on here? I

6:36

don't think it has anything to do with me in

6:38

all sincerity, but I genuinely have been wondering like, who

6:41

are the people that work over there? Who are, whose

6:43

job, someone's job it is to be like, what

6:46

kind of messed up shit can we make this time? Sounds

6:48

like you got your next book. You got your next book

6:50

right there. Clorimac McCarthy. Yeah, the late Clorimac McCarthy was like,

6:55

my ideas that are new twisted for literature. I

6:57

put them in the menu. Yeah. Madly,

7:01

you're right. Movie Food Nation. Hold

7:04

on, let me write that down somewhere. Wait

7:06

a minute. Hold on. So

7:10

yeah, I was going to, my idea was,

7:12

you know, I talked to you a little bit about Cisco and

7:14

Evert, old, old interview

7:16

style, like normal style. And

7:19

then the second half, we're going to do kind

7:21

of a game, but not really. You'll, you'll see

7:23

when we get to it. Don't oversell it. Yeah,

7:25

yeah, yeah. I like

7:28

to undersell and not over deliver, but

7:30

deliver about where you might have expected originally, you

7:33

know, so it's still a seems like.

7:35

But after the underselling, it seems like

7:37

overdelivering because our standards have been

7:39

set so low. My

7:42

secret. Okay. So I think

7:46

a lot of fans have like a

7:48

lot of movie people have a particular

7:50

fondness for Roger Ebert specifically, because

7:53

I think he wrote with like a

7:55

lot of personality and personal liveliness

7:57

and his writing was sort of. better

8:00

preserved and of course he outlived Gene. So

8:03

he had more, so first

8:05

off, make the case for Gene, make

8:08

the case for Gene. Because I feel

8:10

like, no, I feel like Roger is more remembered.

8:14

I don't think that's an outrageous

8:16

statement at all. I think you're

8:18

absolutely right about that. And

8:20

it's something I kind of thought about when

8:23

I was doing the book. I mean, I think

8:26

this is one thing that I really appreciated

8:28

about Gene. That

8:33

if I knew it as a kid,

8:35

it certainly, I kind of, doing

8:37

the research and revisiting all the episodes,

8:40

watching all this stuff, it definitely kind of made

8:42

me appreciate it and knew, which is that he

8:45

was absolutely, in

8:48

any other profession, he would have been described as honest to a

8:50

fault. In this profession, perhaps it

8:52

would be honest to a plus, to

8:54

a benefit. And he

8:56

was absolutely fearless about saying

8:58

anything he believed in

9:01

any scenario, in any context, and to

9:04

anyone. He

9:06

wouldn't just say honestly, sometimes very

9:08

mean things on Siskel and Ebert,

9:10

and then he would go on

9:13

the Tonight Show and schmooze with the guests. He would

9:15

say these things on Siskel and Ebert, where it was

9:17

just him and Roger and the crew, and then he

9:19

would go on the Tonight Show and then say it

9:21

to the faces of the people he was talking about.

9:23

He would just be absolutely transparent

9:25

about the fact that he didn't

9:27

like something, or flip side, maybe

9:30

he liked it, but there's the very

9:32

famous viral clip of Siskel and

9:34

Ebert on the Tonight Show with Chevy Chase, where

9:36

Chevy Chase is there to promote three

9:38

amigos. And Carson

9:41

asks both

9:43

of them, like, I

9:46

don't wanna do a Johnny Carson impression. Do an impression, yeah,

9:48

do it. Yeah,

9:50

is there, I don't, I can't, I've suddenly have

9:52

forgotten the ability to do it on each other.

9:54

You did it great, you did it great. Pretty

9:56

good, pretty good. Well, it's my Johnny Carson. Jimmy

10:00

Carson, that's right. So

10:03

he asks like, what's the worst Christmas movie?

10:06

And I think it's Roger who

10:08

goes first and is like, I can't in

10:10

any good conscience recommend Three Amigos. And Chevy

10:12

Chase, it's the tide show, the old school

10:14

tonight show where the guests just hang out

10:16

on the couch all night. So

10:18

Chevy is sitting right there next to him.

10:20

And he kind of like kind of smiles

10:23

and everyone, the audience goes, whoa, whoa, whoa.

10:26

And it keeps going, like the whole segment becomes

10:28

this sort of- It's the audience of

10:30

bears that night. It's like- Every

10:33

Friday, Johnny Carson's audience would be bears.

10:35

It's the thing they call this. They

10:37

called it barely an audience Fridays. Yes,

10:40

I should have mentioned that, you're right. That was an important context

10:42

that I left out. But

10:45

it becomes this kind of dance

10:47

between them where Chevy's not trying to

10:49

get too upset. He's kind of playing

10:51

along with them. But they're being honest that

10:53

they think his movie sucks. And

10:56

that was not an isolated incident. They

10:58

would both do it, but really Gene, I think of as

11:00

the guy who was, Roger

11:03

liked having friends with filmmakers. Yeah, he would

11:05

be honest, but he would go to film festivals,

11:07

he would schmooze. Gene would always

11:09

say, and I really believe it, he had

11:11

like no interest in socializing with filmmakers, hanging

11:13

out in Hollywood. He didn't have a lot

11:15

of filmmaker friends as far as I know.

11:17

And as people told me when I did

11:20

my research and stuff, he really didn't

11:23

care. So he didn't really spare their feelings.

11:25

And again, in another world, like maybe in

11:27

another world, that's not such a great thing.

11:29

But as a critic, I really respect that

11:32

about him because he

11:34

was never tempering his feelings to make

11:36

a publicist happy, make a filmmaker happy,

11:38

make anybody happy. He was just

11:40

gonna say what he honestly

11:42

thought. And I think there's a value in that

11:44

at least as a film critic. Yeah,

11:48

well, I mean, that actually plays into something something

11:51

else I had in my notes about how they

11:53

could get kind of hilariously mean at times like

11:56

Roger's famous, I hated, hated, hated this movie.

11:58

I hated it. you know,

12:00

like of North and

12:02

I was wondering about sort of that Hold

12:05

no punches Criticism

12:07

like I feel like you see

12:10

it amongst assholes on the internet. I

12:12

mean perhaps sometimes us even Yeah,

12:15

we're on the internet No,

12:29

I just like I feel like it's less common I mean

12:31

like there's fewer big

12:34

critics these days So maybe that's just

12:36

part of it. But like I feel like they had Enough

12:40

clout that they didn't have to worry about Access

12:43

as much maybe and that's I don't know do

12:45

you think there's anything in that or well I

12:47

mean you're you're not wrong. I mean they did

12:50

get to a certain point where they were You

12:53

know quite powerful I mean they

12:55

you know, there was a in

12:57

the early days of Entertainment Weekly They did a

13:00

I think they called it the power list or the

13:02

Hollywood list something like that Where they ranked the most

13:04

powerful people in Hollywood and they put Cisco and ebert

13:06

at number 10 Which

13:08

put them below the head of Disney

13:10

the company they were syndicated by at

13:13

the time Michael Eisner But it put

13:15

them above Jeff Jeffrey Katzenberg who was

13:17

sort of the executive overseeing the

13:19

part of the company that they worked for which is

13:21

sort of surreal and I it does

13:24

it does speak to the Degree to which they

13:26

were seen as these king makers at the time

13:30

And you know, there are examples of studios

13:32

getting angry at them for mean reviews and

13:34

for doing exactly what we're talking about There's

13:36

a famous story of them being on I

13:38

think it was Regis and Kathy Lee and

13:40

they were they're promoting an Oscar special

13:42

Or something and of course because

13:45

they're film critics and they're on a talk show

13:47

The hosts are asking them like is this movie

13:49

good is that movie good and they started going

13:51

off on I want to say It

13:53

was nuns on the run Mercilessly

13:56

making fun of the movie because you know,

13:58

like they're trying to be entertaining, which

14:01

they often really were very good entertaining

14:03

talk show guests. And

14:05

the studio that was involved with that, and

14:07

I want to say it's Fox, could be

14:09

wrong. It's been a little while since I

14:11

did this research. Can you check your poster

14:13

of nuns on the run that I see

14:15

right behind you in the rear? Yes.

14:20

The studio got furious that they

14:22

did this, and they banned them.

14:24

You're banned. You're banned from

14:26

all screenings for the forever because

14:28

you're, you know, they claimed that

14:30

they objected not to their reviews. They were entitled

14:32

to their opinions, but that they were like making

14:35

fun of it on an appearance that had nothing

14:37

to, you know, they were on a talk show

14:39

and they were just making jokes, cracking easy jokes

14:41

or something like that. And

14:44

you know, they had this whole big thing and they

14:46

were completely unfazed. They said, that's fine. We'll go pay

14:48

and see the movies when we can see them. We'll

14:50

write reviews if we can in time, if we can,

14:53

if we can. And if we won't, we won't cover

14:55

your movies and we won't review them on our show.

14:58

And supposedly they

15:02

privately between the two of them discussed this and

15:04

like made a bet about

15:06

when the band would be reversed. And

15:09

Gene thought it would last one movie. And

15:12

Roger said, we'll be invited back before the

15:14

same studio has another movie. And he was

15:16

right. They didn't, the band did not last

15:19

a movie, the very next movie

15:21

that Fox or whoever it

15:24

was had, they were invited back to

15:26

the screening. I wonder

15:28

what movie the studio

15:30

was like, we need these guys to see this. They're

15:32

going to love it. North.

15:35

Oh no. Exactly. But

15:37

I mean, again, like that just shows, yes,

15:39

they, they definitely had the juice. And this

15:41

is like, we're talking about the early nineties,

15:44

I think. And that's,

15:46

you know, in that period, they

15:48

definitely had that aura about them,

15:50

whether it was always true or not, that they

15:52

could make or break a movie. There was definitely

15:55

a period where they were seen in

15:57

that light. This

16:00

is a bad movie podcast

16:03

primarily. I'm gonna

16:05

focus sort of- It's not little ourselves, but

16:07

okay, sure. I mean, you

16:09

think of us as sort of a

16:11

culture and what baking podcast, maybe? Yeah,

16:13

baking and general lifestyle. Yeah, educational, yeah.

16:16

I've been meaning to get onto scented candles at

16:19

some point in this podcast, and I just never

16:21

find the time usually. You guys razz

16:23

me for being into astrology, but

16:26

Elliot's scented candles fucking multi,

16:29

what multi-level marketing scheme he's

16:31

been trying to pull out. That's an

16:33

interesting way to describe people, helping people

16:35

to find the better candle for the

16:37

best bets. Well,

16:40

anyways, bad movies are our purview. I

16:44

was gonna focus maybe on

16:46

Siskel and Ebert, and if

16:49

not bad movies, movies they disliked. And

16:53

one thing I wanted to say is they seem to

16:55

have particular issues

16:57

with certain movies. Stuff

16:59

that you might categorize as a

17:01

blind spot, and I'm thinking most

17:04

specifically about their version of a

17:06

lot of horror slasher

17:09

movies in particular during the 80s, and

17:12

yet there'd be moments like

17:14

the one where Roger Ebert gave Last House

17:16

on the Left four stars, and

17:18

number one, I just, I was curious as

17:23

you watch so many of the reviews, whether

17:25

there are other things where you're like, oh, this is like

17:27

a blind spot of this person and

17:29

also what do you make of the moments where they

17:32

sort of cut against the tide? Cut

17:34

against their own tide or cut against the- Their own

17:37

tide, yeah. Give something

17:39

like Last House a

17:41

rave. Right, those

17:43

moments are fun because, I mean, to give you

17:45

an idea of when I was

17:47

doing the research, I tried to watch every single

17:49

episode of the show as many as I possibly

17:51

could, and at the time,

17:56

not every single episode was available online,

17:58

but the vast, vast- Majority

18:00

was so that was part of

18:02

the fun of like watching every episode in order

18:04

and like kind of trying to game it would

18:07

be a movie would come up and sometimes I

18:09

would know what they were with the review as

18:11

if it was a famous movie you know like

18:13

I knew they gave speed to cruise control two

18:15

thumbs up to speak of a bad movie. You

18:19

know I knew that that Roger gave die hard

18:21

thumbs down but gave to cruise control thumbs up

18:23

like I knew stuff like that but then there

18:26

was on the same day. Yes,

18:28

but I heard a famous movie by

18:30

then he just kept bringing it up.

18:32

He couldn't he couldn't he hated it.

18:34

He kept piling on. So

18:37

there were but there were times where I wouldn't

18:39

know and it was sort of fun to be

18:41

like well what are they get like it is

18:43

this going to be one of those movies that

18:45

surprises me and many times there were surprises like

18:47

that. In terms of

18:49

like horror specifically yes they definitely

18:51

gave a lot of negative reviews

18:53

to horror movies mostly

18:56

in like the period the early days

18:58

of the show like they really they

19:00

both like Halloween but then it seems

19:03

like. So many bad

19:05

Halloween knockoffs came out in the years

19:07

after that that they really grew very

19:09

sick of just maybe

19:11

slasher movies in general but just like bad you

19:14

know schlock yeah exploitation movies and so

19:16

many that they actually did. Whether

19:20

you agree with them or not and you know

19:22

I'm not I'm not judging anyone if you love late

19:25

seventies early eighties you know like

19:28

exploitation movies and slasher movies wonderful

19:31

but there's a really interesting episode. Of

19:34

the show where they did like a whole

19:36

episode about this phenomenon and I think if

19:38

you just like type Google you know Google

19:40

Cisco Ebert slasher movies or

19:42

something like that it'll probably come up

19:44

the title is something like extreme violence

19:46

against women is like the name of

19:48

the episode. And it's

19:51

an interesting you know it's a very interesting

19:53

like half hour it's almost

19:56

like a like a

19:58

prototypical video essay in a way. you

20:00

know pre-youtube because they're showing clips from the

20:02

movies and Making arguments about

20:05

them and again you might agree

20:07

or disagree But it's a very interesting

20:09

like half hour to watch it's a

20:11

work of film criticism on Television,

20:14

you know to the people who dismiss

20:16

always dismiss siskel-neighbor is oh, it's just

20:18

these two guys they give thumbs They've

20:20

ruined film criticism. They've turned it into

20:22

this binary thing Like it's sort of

20:25

puts the lie to that whether you

20:27

agree with them or not That's uh,

20:30

you're bringing up something that I that I hadn't really thought

20:32

about Enough I think which

20:34

is that they were also reviewing at a time when if it

20:37

was gonna be in the theaters Basically, they were

20:39

seeing it right and now we live in

20:41

a time where there's so many different outlets

20:43

for movies that you as a critic You

20:45

are not going to see every thing

20:48

that's potential that's coming out So one day

20:50

they might be watching a big classy Hollywood

20:52

movie and the next are gonna be watching

20:55

Kind of cheap schlock and so they were probably

20:57

also It must if

20:59

you really don't like that stuff you're being

21:01

reminded constantly of what else you could be

21:03

watching at the same time you know, yeah,

21:05

you're watching stuff that now probably wouldn't reach

21:07

the level of Being

21:09

reviewed by a by a major critic in

21:12

the same way I'm guessing you're you're absolutely

21:14

right in that time period being like the

21:16

daily critic at a big newspaper like the

21:18

Chicago Sun times the Chicago Tribune You

21:22

know really was to try to see as

21:24

many movies that are opening in that town

21:26

every week as possible And so that you

21:28

know, they probably were not seeing everything a

21:30

lot of weeks but they were seeing a

21:32

lot of stuff and and and it's it's

21:34

pretty interesting because like If

21:36

you watch those really early episodes, you'll see like

21:38

they're not just going to like press screenings Like

21:40

they'll they'll say I went to the so-and-so theater

21:43

this week and I saw this weird

21:45

horror movie that you know so-and-so attacks

21:48

and here and and it's like it's

21:50

it's much more like I'm just going

21:52

to the movies to see what's playing

21:55

and here's what I saw And

21:57

it does have that Survey

22:00

quality to it. Whereas you're right

22:02

now, A, there's so many movies

22:04

coming out all the time, every single week, it

22:07

literally would be impossible for any person to see

22:09

them all. And even at the, you know, B,

22:11

there's almost no film critics at

22:13

newspapers or magazines doing that sort of

22:16

approach to the job anymore. And

22:18

see the, you know, the newspapers that do care

22:20

enough to do this kind of stuff like the

22:22

New York Times, A, they don't cover everything and

22:24

B, they have multiple full

22:26

time critics, plus they farm

22:29

out stuff to freelancers. So

22:31

yeah, nobody is seeing as

22:33

much as critics like Cisco Niebert did

22:35

in that day and age. So yes, part

22:37

of the part of it, it might just

22:39

be right. They didn't have a choice. They

22:41

had to go see these horror movies. And

22:43

if you're seeing two of them every week

22:45

for three straight years, even if

22:48

you like that kind of thing, it might get a little

22:50

tiresome. Well, Dan was

22:52

born too late, I think Dan would love

22:54

that. I would

22:56

have haunting those Times Square theaters or

22:58

whether the Times Square equivalent of in

23:01

Eureka, Illinois, making my job to just be in

23:03

a movie theater all the time. Sure. I'll eat

23:05

it up. You could have that job right now,

23:07

Dan, if you work in a movie. Wait,

23:11

hold on. No, but

23:14

I that's the part of

23:16

it. Actually, the answer that I zeroed

23:18

in on like a similar thing where, yeah,

23:21

the, the, if

23:23

there were that many post Halloween

23:26

slasher knockoffs and

23:28

you're, you know, also predisposed maybe to think that

23:30

like, oh, they're too violent or whatever, but like,

23:33

just being tired of it, you know, being

23:35

tired of it. And I was wondering, sorry

23:39

to diverge from Cisco Niebert into you,

23:41

Matt, but I

23:43

guess, based on what you said,

23:45

maybe you don't have to see as much

23:48

to make this be true. But other than superhero movies,

23:51

which is sort of the easy mode answer, is there

23:53

something that you're just like, maybe now

23:56

in a vacuum, you would like it more, but

23:58

you're so sick of that type of thing. that

24:01

you wonder whether you're like verging in and

24:03

like I just can't, I can't anymore with

24:06

this. You might like a blue pancake with

24:08

fruity pebbles on it if it wasn't. Yeah,

24:10

that's probably the right. After a long line

24:12

of, yeah. Yeah, that's probably the right answer.

24:14

That's what I'm sick of, yes. Poisoning myself

24:16

slowly, year by year. Matt,

24:19

have you had to eat any promotional pop

24:21

tarts for Unfrosted yet? Ha ha ha

24:23

ha. You joke,

24:26

but there were like, track

24:30

pops, if you've seen the film, there

24:33

were like branded with

24:35

Jerry Seinfeld's face and

24:37

I went to the grocery store looking for them. I was

24:39

gonna eat Unfrosted pop

24:41

tarts. No, I love that shit.

24:44

I don't keep looking, I haven't found them yet, but. Yeah,

24:46

yeah. But in terms of movies, you were

24:48

gonna say, what's there, something that you're like. No, I

24:51

wanna hear more about his Vore content. Ha

24:53

ha ha ha ha. I'm honestly

24:55

kind of like Dan in

24:58

the sense that I

25:00

never got to have that Cisco and Ebert

25:02

experience and I kind of think

25:04

I might enjoy it.

25:07

Maybe not after, I mean they did that in

25:09

the case of Gene for

25:11

25, 30 years, in the case of Roger, 40 years. And

25:15

so maybe by the end of it, I

25:17

could see how it could become exhausting, but

25:20

I don't know. I

25:24

started doing this thing recently where I'm

25:27

going to press screenings and

25:29

most of the press screenings in New York, the

25:31

ones that I can go to, because I have kids and

25:33

I have to work during the day, are like evenings, but

25:36

they're early evenings. And so I've started to go

25:38

to movies, make it a

25:40

double feature and go afterwards to see things.

25:43

And I've been doing it more and more

25:46

now that my kids are a little older and I feel

25:48

like I don't have to rush home and

25:50

I'm also sleeping more, so I don't feel like

25:52

I'm on the verge of complete collapse all the

25:54

time. And I'm really

25:57

loving it. I'm enjoying going to

25:59

movies. Last week I

26:04

saw the TV glow and then afterwards I

26:06

went and saw Challengers. And I was like,

26:08

oh wow, that's a fun double feature. I

26:10

was like Vin Diesel going to the movies.

26:13

I was really, I

26:15

was digging it. So I don't know, I

26:17

guess, I am

26:20

fortunate that I do get to see a lot of stuff and

26:22

write about a lot of stuff. But I

26:24

wouldn't mind seeing more things and getting to

26:26

cover more things. It's sort of the double

26:28

edged sword of it's never enough. I

26:31

wouldn't mind seeing some more. Maybe

26:34

not 30 slasher

26:36

movies in a month, but I

26:38

could stand a few more in my life to

26:40

be honest with you. You know, when I was

26:42

a kid, my parents basically never took us to the

26:45

movies, to the theater. That

26:49

was what I wanted to do on my birthday because I was like,

26:51

yeah, finally, a chance to see a movie in the theater. And

26:53

sometimes I wonder whether it's like that Harpo Marx story where he

26:56

loved licorice black jelly beans when he was a kid, but

27:06

there's only one ever in a bag and he was

27:08

like, and then we were adults, I'm just going to

27:10

buy a fuck ton of black jelly beans and eat

27:12

them till I'm sick. And yeah,

27:15

anyway, this is not therapy. So are

27:17

you sick yet? Have you blown yourself

27:19

out? Have you smoking a turtleneck? I

27:21

might be approaching sick,

27:23

but let's move

27:25

on to another question. And that is just one

27:29

thing that kind of hit me in the book

27:31

is how shows like say the

27:33

flophouse or any other cultural

27:36

discussion show would not exist

27:39

without Cisco and the effort because they kind of.

27:44

The ones who made the format big, the idea

27:46

that you could just talk about movies and people

27:48

would find entertaining. I

27:51

don't know. Like what do you think the downriver

27:53

influences? Did you think a lot about this? I know that

27:55

you sort of get into other parts of the book. I

27:59

absolutely. I mean, I do think that the

28:01

whole sort of movie

28:04

discussion industrial complex is

28:07

kind of, Stuart, it's fist

28:09

pumping. It's kind of, yeah,

28:12

I mean, the big, the thing

28:14

that is interesting, that's different though,

28:17

is that the world

28:20

of movie podcasts, which I love, I

28:23

used to host two different movie podcasts, and I

28:25

listen to a lot of podcasts, including yours, there's

28:27

a bunch that I listen to every single week,

28:29

there's others I kind of dip in and have.

28:32

You listen to ours first, right? Like ours is

28:34

the first one you listen to. Always. Always. And

28:37

then you'll listen to the episode again. I only

28:39

listen to the one that you guys had

28:42

me on every week over and over, and

28:44

then I get to the new ones, because

28:46

it's all about me. But then I dabble

28:48

into the other ones. No, but this

28:51

is the, but I really did think about this, though, is

28:53

like, the difference, though, is

28:55

that, and you guys are a perfect example, like

28:58

you guys are friends. You enjoy talking

29:00

to each other and conversing, and there's

29:02

a, to a certain extent, you guys

29:04

would be doing this whether there was

29:06

a podcast involved or not. It

29:09

may be not at this length, maybe not this

29:11

regularly, but you would be talking about movies, you

29:13

would be making jokes, you would be watching things.

29:16

Like, and that's true of the, frankly,

29:19

every single podcast I know of, I

29:22

can't think, I don't know of an example of a podcast that's

29:25

been going on for any length of

29:27

time. That's two people who hate each

29:29

other or are intense rivals who really

29:32

don't socialize, can't stand

29:34

each other, and have a

29:36

professional relationship only. Like,

29:39

that's the part that's different. It's

29:41

like the discussion part is what

29:43

kind of filtered down into podcasts.

29:46

But that aspect is not as present.

29:48

And that's something I find interesting, is

29:50

that, like, of all the podcasts that

29:53

are out there, there isn't one like

29:55

that. Maybe that's a niche that

29:57

someone, we're waiting for someone to fill. I

29:59

don't know. know and

30:01

it's not like I sit listening to The Flophouse

30:03

or any other podcast going, boy, I wish these

30:05

people hated each other. But it is

30:07

something. It's an element of that original formula.

30:11

Give us five more years, Matt. We'll get there. Yeah, you'll

30:13

get there. I feel like that's part of the appeal of

30:15

the Doughboys, is there's a little bit of conflict there. Yeah,

30:22

they do sometimes have a little tension there,

30:24

yeah. But it's not like a...

30:27

Yeah, and that's a good example, I suppose.

30:30

But it's like I don't see the Siskel

30:33

and Ebert podcasts in a real

30:35

strict way. You could say, well, this podcast

30:38

has two people. They're very intelligent critics. I'm

30:40

interested in their thoughts. They have different perspectives.

30:42

There's lots of examples of that. But in

30:44

terms of like, and also,

30:46

these people kind of can't stand each other

30:48

or that's where it started. Maybe now they

30:51

go, they can kind of get along, they

30:53

respect each other now. They have reached this

30:55

sort of understanding or mutual respect. But it

30:57

all started from, this guy pisses me off

31:00

and I'm going to kind of tell him

31:02

to his face. Like that energy, I

31:05

don't know of a podcast. Look, if there's a

31:07

podcast out there like that, I would be interested

31:10

to hear it. Please tell me about it. Well,

31:12

the fact that they were brought together right from

31:14

the point of view of like, these guys will

31:16

argue with each other. Like these

31:18

are... Yeah, they will. And

31:21

that the relationship kind of continued to

31:23

be that way of like, being professional

31:25

colleagues, rather than, you know, they

31:28

wouldn't be like best man at each other's weddings

31:30

or anything like that. Right. And they were. They

31:32

literally were not. Although, Jean's daughters,

31:35

I think, were the flower girls at

31:37

Roger's wedding. He was, Jean was not

31:39

the best man at Roger's wedding. But

31:41

yes, you're absolutely right. And it's like,

31:43

it's a good point to

31:45

note that like, even though it was, we think

31:47

of it as Cisco and Ebert. That's the name

31:49

I certainly think of, even though it wasn't always

31:51

called that. Like, it wasn't like Cisco and Ebert

31:53

got together and said, we're gonna make a show.

31:55

Yeah, they were in the beginning, they were hired

31:58

guns, you know, they were brought in. by

32:00

other people to host the show. And

32:04

to some extent, maybe it was the thought that they

32:06

would argue, but I think even more than that, it

32:08

was just it was a Chicago based show and they

32:10

were the big critics in town. And

32:13

they were the ones who really kind of

32:15

approached it as like, I don't really like

32:17

this guy and I'm gonna I'm gonna make

32:19

that a part of this, you know, because

32:22

it was it. I mean,

32:24

I genuinely believe if Roger Ebert had created

32:26

the show, Gene Siskel would not have been

32:28

his co-host, his choice, and vice versa. They

32:30

would have found somebody else to do it with. They

32:32

would not have wanted to do it with the other

32:34

one. It was only because they were sort of put

32:37

together and they kind of didn't have a choice, but

32:39

they both sensed a good opportunity

32:41

that they went along with it. Instead,

32:44

it would have been in Siskel and Shallot. Or

32:46

you know, you know, whoever else was going

32:48

Whipple. Well,

32:52

Shallot and Whipple is a real. Wow. If

32:59

that's not a sketch, a

33:01

sketch comedy sketch for an audience of

33:03

one person who's named Ben Singer, I

33:05

don't know what is. That

33:08

sounds great. Hello teachers

33:10

and faculty. This

33:15

is Janet Varney. I'm

33:19

here to

33:21

remind you that listening to my podcast,

33:23

The JV Club with Janet Varney, is

33:25

part of the curriculum for the school

33:27

year. Learning about the

33:29

teenage years of such guests as

33:32

Alison Brie, Vicky Peterson, John Hodgman,

33:34

and so many more is a

33:36

valuable and enriching experience. One

33:39

you have no choice but to

33:41

embrace because yes, listening is mandatory.

33:43

The JV Club with Janet Varney

33:45

is available every Thursday on Maximum

33:48

Fun or wherever you get your

33:50

podcasts. Thank you. And

33:52

remember, no running in the

33:54

halls. the

34:00

go try STOP P-O-D-C-A-S-T-I.

34:03

Hmmm. Are you trying to put the name of the

34:05

podcast there? Yeah, I'm trying to spell it, but it's

34:07

tricky. Let me give it a try. Okay.

34:11

If you need a laugh and you're on

34:13

the go, call STOP P-P-A-D. I

34:16

will never fit. No, it will. Let me

34:18

try. If you

34:20

need a laugh and you're on

34:22

the go, try STOP P-P-D-C-O-O. Ugh!

34:25

We are so close. Stop

34:28

podcasting yourself. A podcast

34:30

from maximumfun.org. If

34:32

you need a laugh and you're on the go. Hey,

34:36

the Flop House is brought to you

34:38

by the Spring Cleaning Champions Manscaped.

34:42

This season, make sure to groom

34:45

your carpets and the drapes with the leaders in below

34:47

the waste grooming. Clear

34:50

out that winter bush. I'm

34:53

not talking about Holly or Ivy

34:56

with Manscaped's Lawn

34:58

Mower 5.0 and watch your confidence bloom

35:04

like the springtime flowers. And

35:07

look, you know, I'm

35:09

not going to get too far into it, but I've

35:13

experimented with grooming in the past. Sometimes

35:17

you get itchy. Sometimes

35:19

there's some snagging. This is

35:21

a good product. And

35:23

despite the name, you know,

35:25

it's not just for guys. This is an

35:27

all gendered scaping

35:31

tool that is built

35:33

for the job. So

35:35

if that is of interest to you,

35:38

you can get 20% off and

35:40

free shipping with the code flop

35:43

at manscaped.com. That is 20% off

35:46

and free shipping with the code

35:49

flop at

35:51

manscaped.com. Nothing

35:53

like a little spring cleaning. in

36:00

your pants. And also,

36:02

now the natural transition from

36:06

downstairs grooming to our personal

36:08

plugs. And that is

36:10

to say that, hey, you can still,

36:12

for a very short period of time,

36:14

if you are listening to this, when

36:17

it first came out, I believe

36:19

this episode will drop on May 18th. So

36:21

you still have a slim window

36:24

of time. This is the last weekend

36:26

you can watch our video on demand

36:29

Flophouse Sinks Speed 2 show. That

36:32

is a beautifully shot and edited

36:34

version of a live show we

36:36

did in Los Angeles with

36:38

a little extra behind the scenes stuff as well. You

36:41

can watch it in your home at

36:44

your leisure until midnight

36:47

on May 19th. And if you're interested in that, go

36:50

to stagepilot.com/speed. We also

36:52

have a couple of shows

36:55

in Oxford, England at the end

36:58

of May. That's right. International

37:01

Flophouse. I mean, I know we've been to Canada

37:03

before. Fine, fine, fine. But we are going

37:06

across the pond, as they say, which is a

37:08

misnomer. I'm not sure that you all know this,

37:10

but it's much larger than a pond. Yeah,

37:13

it's true. On May the 24th at

37:15

Oxford Town Hall, we're going to be

37:17

doing two shows, one

37:19

at 7pm. It's about the Avengers, the

37:21

one with Ray Fiennes and Uma Thurman,

37:25

not the one with all your favorite

37:27

Marvel heroes. And at nine, we'll be

37:29

talking Spice World. We're

37:31

going to stop right there. Thank

37:34

you very much. And discuss

37:36

Spice World. If

37:38

you're interested in tickets for those or

37:40

any of the shows, the

37:42

one I previously mentioned or the one

37:45

I'm about to, you can go to

37:47

flophousepodcast.com/events and look into that. Yes,

37:50

there's another show to plug. It is live in

37:52

Boston. It is on July 26th. So you got

37:55

a lot of time, but,

37:57

you know, don't delay. Why not do it while

37:59

you're thinking about it? We'll be at

38:01

WBUR City Space, movie

38:04

TBD, but we

38:07

had a great time at City Space

38:09

before in Boston, a great show. Stuart

38:11

almost killed me with a presentation about

38:13

cars. Can he reach those heights again? Perhaps.

38:18

We'll see. And if you're interested in any of these shows,

38:20

again, just go

38:23

to flophousepodcast.com/events. But

38:26

now, back to the show. We're

38:31

back. Since

38:33

we're a bad movie show, I wanted to

38:36

spend... Well, we're a good show about bad movies,

38:38

right guys? Yeah, yeah, yeah. You were

38:40

just telling me how you needed to get out of here at a

38:42

particular time. I wanted

38:44

to spend the second half of the

38:47

show on their Dog of the Week

38:49

segment. Siskel and Ebert were not

38:51

above some goofy

38:53

stagecraft, especially early on

38:55

in the series. And they would have

38:57

an actual dog, Spot the Wonder Dog, and they

39:00

would highlight a movie they thought was

39:02

terrible. So

39:04

and I... The idea that they were like, it's a new

39:06

show, maybe it stays about movies, maybe it becomes a show

39:09

about dogs, we don't know. Yeah, who

39:11

knows? Yeah,

39:14

go on, sorry. No, I mean,

39:16

this is one of the fun things that,

39:19

you know, like people who've only seen the

39:21

later episodes might not realize. Yeah. I

39:24

knew about the Dog of the Week,

39:27

but until you really watch it, you

39:30

don't... First of all, there was multiple dogs. There

39:33

were, to my knowledge, there

39:36

were three different dogs. They replaced dogs whenever

39:38

they felt like it. There was

39:40

Spot the Wonder Dog, there was Zeke the Wonder Dog,

39:42

and there's one other one. And

39:44

then when they went into... That was at PBS, the original incarnation

39:46

of the show. Then when they went to PBS, they were worried

39:48

if they brought the dog with them, they'd get sued. So

39:51

they became the Stinker of the

39:53

Week, and they had a skunk

39:55

on the set with them. Literally,

39:57

Aroma the Educated Skunk. was

40:00

sitting next to them in the balcony. And

40:03

I could tell you stories about the skunk, if

40:05

you want. Then eventually

40:08

they got sick of the

40:10

skunk because they're sitting next to

40:12

a skunk, for God's sake. And

40:15

they told their executive producer, we don't like

40:17

the skunk, the skunk. We're

40:20

better than this, aren't we essentially?

40:23

Yeah. And they convinced the producer, let's

40:25

get rid of the skunk. And then the producer

40:27

came to them and said, boys,

40:29

I got a great idea. And

40:32

they were like, well, what do you want us to do

40:34

now? He's like, all right, you didn't like the skunk of

40:36

the week. But what about the turkey of the week? Oh

40:40

God, you want us to be in the

40:42

balcony with a turkey? No,

40:45

no, no, no, no, a turkey

40:47

vulture. Oh God. Yeah,

40:50

it's something more dangerous, please. Exactly. So

40:53

anyway, that was the end

40:55

of the weeks. But yes,

40:57

the thing that's amazing about them is

41:00

that on

41:04

the flip side of, well, if you watch these

41:06

old episodes, you'll see they're doing actually pretty high

41:08

level criticism. If you watch the episodes

41:10

where they do Dog of the Week, it's

41:12

like watching the origins of Mystery Science Theater

41:14

3000. They're not their criticism. These

41:17

movies are there to be teed up to make jokes.

41:19

And they're watching them on a screen and they're sitting in

41:21

a theater. It actually feels a little like

41:25

Mystery Science Theater 3000. I

41:28

would love to know if the people

41:30

involved in

41:33

the origins of MSC3K, if

41:35

that was in the back of their minds at all. I

41:38

don't think we know anybody who knows Joel. We

41:40

don't know anybody who had any access. Yeah, they

41:42

have no access to those people. They don't know

41:44

those people. They're not familiar with them. Don't know

41:46

the show you're talking about. But it's something I

41:48

have wondered about. And it is fun to

41:50

go back and watch. I should ask him

41:52

about that. He always would say that he was inspired by

41:54

an image in an

41:56

Elton John album cover.

41:59

There's an image. of a silhouette of people sitting in

42:01

front of a screen for the song I've seen that

42:03

movie too or whatever it's called. I don't know how

42:05

John's available. And he always said he was inspired by

42:08

that, but I wonder. I'll have to ask him sometime.

42:10

I mean, I'm not going like, obviously they stole Cisco

42:12

Nebert. It's just like- Oh no, I'm going to present

42:14

it to him. Yes,

42:17

I've accused them of plagiarism. I

42:19

mean, maybe I, because these are

42:21

literally the two shows that so like infected

42:23

my brain when I was 12 years old

42:25

with Cisco Nebert, Mystery Science here. They were

42:27

like the things I was obsessed with that

42:30

now I can't, I see one and I see the

42:32

other. But I'm telling you, they're

42:34

not sitting there going, yes, this is a treatise

42:37

on the lost innocence

42:41

of men. They're going, look at this stupid

42:43

movie. Look at how silly they look. They're

42:45

cracking jokes all the time and they're cutting

42:47

to them in the theater looking at the

42:50

movie on the screen. You go, well, that's

42:52

kind of interesting. It's sort of the prehistory

42:54

of that sort of thing. Just

42:56

interesting. Well,

42:59

this bit is halfway to

43:01

a game, halfway just chatting

43:03

about some movies. It's

43:07

got, I'm going to talk about a few dog of

43:09

the week movies here. I'm

43:12

going to ignore the ones that they're obviously wrong

43:14

about, like the brood or Ms. I

43:17

think the brood is fine. It's

43:20

no dog of the week. It's not a dog of

43:22

the week. It's compared to the level of most dogs of

43:24

the week. It's not a dog of the week. That's

43:26

fair. I like the brood a lot. Anyway,

43:29

so I've got some titles for each

43:31

one. I'm going to ask two questions.

43:34

One, can you tell me anything about this

43:36

movie? This probably will mostly be for Matt,

43:38

who will see his, whether he retained these

43:41

dog of the week segments. Right. And

43:43

two, do you think the public

43:45

agreed with Cisco and Ebert? For the purposes of this, if

43:49

the IMDB rating average from

43:51

users is below five, they

43:54

agree it's a dog of the week. But if it's

43:56

above five, it's not quite dog level. First

44:00

one I got here is the island of the

44:02

fishmen from 1979. So

44:05

this is the kind of movie that nowadays I

44:07

feel like a critic would not bother to cover.

44:09

This is the difference I'm talking about, yeah. Yeah,

44:12

anyone know anything about island of the fishmen? It's

44:15

a great name. It is a great name.

44:17

It's an evocative title if nothing else. I'm looking

44:19

in my notes from this period. Cheating?

44:26

Well, I'm curious if there was anything notable

44:28

from any of these reviews. And

44:31

this one I don't even have in my

44:33

notes, so perhaps I didn't even find this

44:35

episode when I was looking and watching them.

44:38

That's good for the paperback, the updated

44:40

edition. I did keep track of, you

44:42

know, every episode I watched

44:44

I took very copious notes of each

44:47

movie, the dogs of the week, the

44:49

votes on each movie, and any

44:51

notable stuff that happened I would write down. But

44:54

this one isn't even in my notes. That's how

44:56

obscure this one is. Well, before I tell you

44:58

just a little bit about it, would you

45:00

say it's a dog or not a dog in

45:03

the eyes of the IMDb voting public? I'm

45:06

gonna—I would guess that it is a dog. I

45:09

don't know. I'm gonna say if the IMDb voting public is

45:11

voting on this movie, they are the kind of person who

45:14

would like a movie called Island of the Fishmen. So I'm

45:16

gonna say not a dog. Good point. Good point. You

45:19

know, but between you guys—you can see where if

45:21

you want to win, you can, but you

45:24

seem—I was checking

45:26

the IMDb page. Another

45:29

theater. I'm the only one playing fair. Not

45:32

a dog, just barely at 5.3. It's

45:34

about a prison ship

45:36

that sinks into the Caribbean and prisoners

45:39

and a doctor walks ashore where they discover a

45:41

strange couple who invite them to stay at their

45:43

house. And apparently

45:47

the doctor does a little investigation, finds out

45:49

what the pair is up to and why

45:51

prisoners keep disappearing mysteriously. I'm guessing

45:53

it has something to do with fishmen.

45:56

Yeah, I mean, put money on fishmen.

46:00

Classic Fishman scenario. The doctors could be

46:02

named Dr. Fishman. Yeah,

46:04

he taught him a little

46:06

IMDb trivia, future director, and

46:09

then head of publicity and marketing for

46:11

New World Pictures, Jim Wynorski, came

46:14

up with a title change and did a little

46:16

additional filming so they could release this as

46:18

screamers in the US. Let's

46:21

keep with the island theme. There's

46:24

Frankenstein Island from 1981. Did

46:28

you recall anything about this film? Frankenstein

46:31

Island. I don't. But now

46:33

that you mentioned the other movie with screamers,

46:35

I do have that in my notes. And

46:37

I can tell you, screamers was reviewed as

46:40

the dog of the week on the episode

46:42

where Cisco and Ebert reviewed Raiders of the

46:44

Lost Ark. Oh, wow. They like Raiders more

46:46

than screamers? Hard to believe. Amazing. Did they

46:48

like Raiders of the Lost Ark? They

46:50

did. They did. They gave it to... Well,

46:53

in those days, it was not thumbs. The

46:55

thumbs had not been invented yet. But they

46:58

gave it two yes votes in the early

47:00

days of the show. About as catchy? Everything

47:03

got a yes or a no. Not

47:06

nearly as catchy. Frankenstein

47:08

Island sounds like one of the Hotel

47:11

Transylvania sequels. Yeah, for sure it

47:13

does. The one they wear, they go on vacation. Yeah. Yeah.

47:16

I don't know anything about it, but I

47:18

can tell you, I'm looking at my notes

47:20

now. And this was an Ebert's dog of

47:22

the week. Sometimes they would both have a

47:24

different dog of the week. On

47:27

an episode, they were both seeing so much

47:29

crap. They would often each have their own.

47:32

Double dog day. Yeah. Up or

47:34

down vote dog or no dog. Matt,

47:38

I vote dog. I'm going to be voting. I'm going

47:40

to probably be a straight dog. Most of the dog.

47:42

Yeah. I'm a dog. Let's make it three. Dog. This

47:45

is a dog that says 2.0, the

47:47

lowest score of the bunch. You just

47:50

might just might listen to this when

47:52

a hot air balloon. All right. Was

47:58

it Ebert who said there's no good movie? with hot air

48:00

balloons in there. Yeah. That was one of Ebert's

48:02

like rent, like his rules. He has that like

48:04

little movie glossary that he was, you know, like,

48:07

which is crazy since the Wizard of Oz

48:09

is maybe the greatest movie of all time.

48:11

And then you got very great Muppet caper.

48:14

That's a good one with a hot air balloon. Yeah. Uh,

48:17

anyway, the diddons of this hot air balloon discovered

48:20

Dr. Frankenstein's ancestor, carrying

48:22

on the family work, carrying on an ancestor. I

48:25

don't know. Yeah. That seems to be miswritten. Whoever

48:27

wrote that. Yeah. Along with a

48:29

race of mutants and population of

48:31

Amazon's trivia. John Carradine

48:33

only appears to floating image during the

48:35

whole film. It's it's the

48:37

same shot of him all the time, sometimes

48:40

repeating dialogue and sometimes with

48:42

new dialogue. Wow. What's

48:46

let's, let's, let's race on to, uh, this

48:49

movie dirt from 1979. Do

48:52

you remember anything about dirt? I

48:55

don't remember anything on

48:57

dirt. There's also

49:00

dirty tricks was a different dog of

49:02

the dirt related dog of the week.

49:05

Ah, here we go. Dirt. This

49:08

was also an Ebert dog of

49:10

the week. Cisco had his own separate dog.

49:12

I could tell you, I don't want to know. I don't

49:14

know if that's also on your list. I don't want to

49:17

spoil it. No, tell us ruined a game. What

49:19

was Cisco's dog of the week that week was

49:21

named. Demonoid. Be

49:26

followed by rated R. I

49:30

think I would like that. Your cousin's

49:32

house when his errands go to sleep. Would

49:35

you call this what now in the eyes of the public

49:37

dog or not a dog? Allie, I'm going to go to

49:39

you first. Was it called dirt? I'm

49:42

going to say dog. I

49:44

could be wrong, but I'll say dog also.

49:46

Well, I like the movie mud. This

49:52

is a prequel. Yeah, mud's a pretty wet movie. So

49:55

I guess before they went to the swamp. See,

49:58

I'll say this is a dog. I'm

50:01

gonna I'm gonna say not a dog

50:03

Wow Matt your iconoclast

50:05

must paid off because this is the highest

50:07

score of the bunch with a six point

50:09

eight This

50:12

is a apparently a documentary Wow The

50:15

footage is from between 76

50:17

and 78 about varied

50:19

types of off-road competition through

50:22

the US and Baja, California. There's

50:24

no Trivia for

50:26

this but the soundtrack with the songs

50:28

snow climb swamp buggy

50:30

and Jeep Ridge runners I

50:34

have some I have some fun trivia for you. Are you ready?

50:36

I'm looking at my yeah This

50:39

dog of the week appears on an

50:42

extremely notable episode of okay, not Cisco

50:44

and Ebert But this sneak previews at

50:46

the time it is the

50:48

same episode where they reviewed gates of heaven

50:50

with a really

50:52

big movie

50:55

as a result of their review I

50:57

actually spoke to Errol Morris for

50:59

my book and he credited them with this

51:02

review and then they kept bringing it up

51:04

on Episode after episode he literally

51:06

said they gave me a career by

51:08

talking about my movie gates of heaven

51:10

So same episode they all

51:12

sent a little more. They also reviewed

51:14

escape from New York on this episode,

51:17

but That did not

51:19

get two thumbs or two. Yes is up

51:21

one of the two men Gave

51:23

it a no vote. Would you care to guess?

51:26

I'm now hijacking your game with my Cisco

51:32

or Ebert who gave escape from

51:34

New York the immortal classic a

51:36

no vote Ebert

51:38

Ebert famously gave the thing

51:40

a bad review Yeah,

51:43

so I'm going to guess that Ebert

51:46

also didn't like escape from me. I

51:48

agree. I'm gonna say Cisco I don't

51:50

know. You know Ebert I think he had a

51:52

bit of a blind spot for carpenter even though he liked

51:54

how lean the correct answer the Host

51:57

that gave it a no vote is Roger

52:00

Ebert. Oh. That

52:03

Errol Morse, sorry, go on. It's

52:05

funny to me, I feel like as Roger Ebert

52:07

got older, he got softer on that type of

52:10

movie. I remember, near the end of his career,

52:12

there was a camera movie and a lot of

52:14

his review is about, you know, when you're young,

52:16

you like movies that are well made, like a

52:18

movie like Air Force One. And then you get

52:20

older and you want to see movies that have

52:23

like, show you things you're not going to see.

52:25

And you kind of get tired of movies like

52:27

Air Force One. And it's like a, I

52:30

always found that to be a really memorable reveal

52:32

where he's basically saying like, my taste has

52:34

changed somewhat and I've prized different things about

52:36

movies than I maybe once did. So maybe

52:38

he came around to ask it from

52:40

New York someday. I don't know, maybe. And that

52:43

Errol Morse story just made me think

52:45

like, I feel like people

52:48

who don't like film criticism, like

52:51

there are people who are just like, oh, it's,

52:53

you know, it's people like wanting to ruin the fun. Like

52:56

one of like, like, it was

52:58

a Marvel shill, right? Yeah. Like,

53:00

cutie people or shills or like, yeah, like there's

53:02

all this kind of negativity. And

53:05

I feel like what we've lost in having

53:07

influential film critics is people who will champion

53:11

good movies and actually like move

53:13

the needle on them and like help

53:15

sort of the art. Luckily we

53:17

have, we luckily we have Dan's letterbox for that.

53:20

Thank you. I'll

53:22

champion some bullshit from 1983.

53:27

Dan's letterbox is like four stars,

53:29

cheeky, directed by Tinto. Really getting

53:31

them what it's like to have

53:34

a butt. Yeah, it's

53:37

truth and art. Let's,

53:41

we have two more of these. Let's get through them so

53:43

we can get everyone out the door. He's like, I

53:45

just watched this movie. I did not like it. Here's

53:47

my letterbox review. Three and a half stars. I

53:52

did. I mean, I like it, but God damn it. I

53:54

respect it anyway. The next

53:56

one, the vampires night

53:58

orgy from 19. P3 speaking

54:01

of but it

54:03

feels like night is unnecessary there a vampire

54:05

is gonna do everything at night especially Or

54:07

she was the original one. This is the

54:09

sequel This

54:12

one's not in my notes either I wonder if

54:14

it has an alternate title like screamers did Well,

54:19

we'll get into an altar You

54:21

know in the interest of actually

54:23

moving us along I'll say this is a

54:27

dog with a score of 4.8

54:35

from the public close and Yeah,

54:40

I think about that orgy was a Daytime

54:44

orgy boring the fact that it was

54:46

a nighttime orgy that made it

54:48

what really appeal I feel like it's

54:50

hard to get a higher score than that when your movie has the

54:52

word orgy Well, I wanted

54:55

to say I'm surprised I was looking at a

54:57

list of these I'm surprised at how many Horny

55:00

sounding movies ended up on

55:02

dog the week knowing how horny

55:04

Roger Bieber was and how Cheerfully

55:07

open he was about that fact So look when he

55:09

when he went to that when he did his job,

55:11

he took off his pervert hat and put on his

55:13

Review, you know, that's right. Yes Well,

55:17

all I know about this is the IMDb

55:19

B plot says a busload of tourists stops

55:21

in to visit a small European town Well,

55:24

they don't know is the towns really inhabited

55:26

by vampires sounds pretty

55:28

standard But from

55:30

the alternate version section It

55:32

says this film like many Spanish films from

55:34

the late 60s to the end of the

55:36

Franco era Shot its racy

55:39

scenes twice Once with the

55:41

actors nude and then again with clothes on the

55:43

covered versions mostly appeared in Spanish prints But

55:45

not always the nude scenes would be included

55:47

in the dubbed versions that were

55:49

offered for sale elsewhere This film

55:52

has three scenes where the actresses are nude and

55:54

these appear in an English dub print retitled orgy

55:56

of the vampires So

55:59

they move on Orgy, I guess to the front of

56:01

the title. Yeah, yeah, really emphasize the

56:04

important and On

56:07

a similar note. We'll close out

56:09

this whole shipping this whole weird

56:12

deal with a movie called The

56:14

kinky coaches and the pom-pom pussycats

56:19

It is amazing to me that they that this

56:21

is a movie that they've reviewed at all Okay,

56:25

so this I have in my note this

56:27

one I do have my notes. Yeah Cisco

56:30

this was a Cisco dog of the week

56:32

and I and I actually wrote down a

56:34

quote from his review here This is from

56:36

Jean's dog of the week comments on this

56:39

film quote Also,

56:41

there's very little nudity in the

56:43

movie. That's disappointing Yeah,

56:47

I mean with a title. Yes, if you're

56:49

going to see the kinky coaches and the

56:51

pom-pom pussycats I mean you look I

56:53

will say it does have it

56:55

is also known by the less

56:57

intriguing title Heartbreak high which is

57:00

yeah, I'll be generic after the

57:02

kinky coaches of the pom-pom pussycat

57:04

Yes, I think that's an Australian

57:06

like sitcom like a euphoria style

57:08

show on Netflix right now. Yeah

57:12

Ebert's dog of the week on this

57:15

episode was called the much less excitingly

57:17

titled a hard way to die Rated

57:21

are mean. That's a mean. I don't know. That's

57:23

a good I wanna know

57:25

what the hard way to die is what about

57:27

like prostate cancer though? It's

57:31

a Mike Lee movie It's

57:39

a you know plot wise it's a football

57:41

sex comedy But the top

57:43

three build actors are not who

57:45

you would necessarily expect from movie

57:47

called the kinky coaches and the

57:49

pom-pom pussycat weren't Olivier and those

57:51

are John Vernon Norman

57:53

fell and Robert Forster. So there

57:56

you go Three

58:00

Wow. I

58:02

could see them playing teachers and coaches in a sex kid

58:06

movie. Part of it is like I'm imagining them. They

58:08

play the pom pom pussy cat sound. That's the thing.

58:10

That's the thing. That's the twist. I

58:12

am imagining them as older men, I think is

58:14

part of the problem is as I mostly knew

58:16

them. But before we

58:18

go. Oh no, this was when they were

58:21

young bucks. Yeah, they were just real hot

58:23

hunks. Faith around pom pom pussy cats. Before

58:27

we go, obviously we focus a lot of

58:29

bad movies but I wanted to

58:31

end on a positive note because Cisco Ebert, as we said, championed

58:34

a lot of movies. You close

58:37

your book with an appendix.

58:39

That's really nice where you

58:41

highlight some buried treasures, 25 movies

58:44

that are more forgotten these days, but got

58:47

two thumbs up from Cisco Ebert. And I

58:49

wondered if you might pick, you

58:52

know, just one dimension that off the top of your head

58:54

that, and then, you know,

58:56

people can go buy the goddamn thing if

58:58

they wanna know more. Yes. Yeah,

59:01

that idea was kind of like my attempt because

59:06

it is a book about film critics and it

59:09

is fun to watch

59:11

them just make fun of these

59:13

terrible movies and I enjoy that too. But,

59:16

you know, I also was inspired to be a film

59:18

critic by the show and it really introduced me to

59:20

a lot of stuff and to the idea of film

59:23

criticism as a thing in the first place. So I

59:25

definitely wanted to put a little, at

59:27

least film advocacy in the book and that was

59:29

what inspired, yeah, this appendix that

59:32

has these 25 movies. As

59:35

you said, it's all like movies that got

59:38

two thumbs up or two yes votes in

59:40

the early days, but they're not the

59:42

gates of heavens or the do the right things

59:45

or those kind of movies. I'm

59:48

thinking of like one that I should recommend

59:50

because I've seen it having like revival screenings

59:52

for the first time in a really long

59:55

time is this movie Household Saints. I

59:57

think it played the New York Film Festival last.

1:00:00

fall in like a revival screening and I've

1:00:03

been seeing it kind of popping up in art

1:00:06

houses in different places I think

1:00:08

it might be playing at the Jacob berms

1:00:10

film Center This

1:00:13

month in May I'm not sure when this will this

1:00:15

podcast will come out But I'm pretty sure it's it's

1:00:17

part of this like festival that they're doing of like

1:00:19

restored Recently restored movies and

1:00:21

I think they're even showing a documentary about the making

1:00:23

of it But for

1:00:26

a long time this movie like it was shown

1:00:28

and it got good reviews this Glenn Ebert gave

1:00:30

it to very enthusiastic thumbs up And

1:00:35

then it kind of faded away and it for a long

1:00:37

time you couldn't find it it

1:00:39

might have come out on VHS maybe but it

1:00:41

like never got released even on DVD and You

1:00:44

had to like really track it down and it's this

1:00:47

really if you hook up the

1:00:49

IMDB page It has all these great actors in it

1:00:52

A lot of New York actors people

1:00:54

from the Sopranos you might recognize are

1:00:56

in there And it's a movie about sort

1:00:58

of it's sort of like a cross between like a

1:01:00

90s Indie drama

1:01:03

mixed with like a film about

1:01:05

religion and spirituality and faith Which

1:01:08

is something that isn't always in those movies that are

1:01:10

a lot more like, you know Like I

1:01:12

think of that period a lot more like Tarantino we

1:01:14

knockoffs More like

1:01:17

a boondock Saints than yeah. Yeah,

1:01:19

it's all attitude and people You

1:01:21

know a lot of profanity and you

1:01:23

know, I like a lot of those movies too

1:01:26

but this is something that's a

1:01:28

little different from that period and This

1:01:31

was the I think probably of the 25 movies that

1:01:33

are in there this or there's like one or two

1:01:35

other candidates were like My

1:01:38

favorite of all those movies everything

1:01:40

that's in the appendix. I went out of my way

1:01:42

to watch So it's all things they liked but there's

1:01:44

some things that they liked that I don't like and

1:01:46

I wasn't in the boat It all had

1:01:48

to be it had to make it through my filter too. And

1:01:51

of all those movies This was I

1:01:53

thought like one of the biggest like blow

1:01:55

away surprises where I was like wow This is one

1:01:58

of the best like 90s movies that I've seen scene

1:02:00

and it when I wrote the book when I

1:02:03

did the appendix I had no idea that it

1:02:05

was about to be restored and now it's playing

1:02:07

in some theaters and I hope

1:02:09

that means within the next year or two it'll be

1:02:11

out on some form either on

1:02:14

streaming or on home video. So

1:02:16

that's one that I would absolutely recommend

1:02:19

like household scenes keep your eyes peeled

1:02:21

if it pops up at your local

1:02:23

art house. Yeah does get a release

1:02:25

on vinegar syndrome vinegar. Yeah,

1:02:28

yeah, paging vinegar syndrome or one of those

1:02:30

labels. Something weird. Yeah, we need we need

1:02:32

one of those. So that is that's one

1:02:35

I mean I could give you more if

1:02:37

we have time or if you want but

1:02:39

that would that's the first one that jumps

1:02:41

out at me. Cool. I

1:02:44

think we got to close up the

1:02:46

balcony but as

1:02:50

they famously said on the show well

1:02:52

we've got to close up the balcony.

1:02:54

And then they'd sweep up the spotlight.

1:02:56

Yes, they locked the doors. And

1:03:00

that's when the movies would come to life when no one

1:03:02

was around. But

1:03:04

thank you Matt for coming

1:03:07

on the show and talking with us and for writing

1:03:09

a book I really enjoyed and

1:03:12

everyone listening should read. Before

1:03:16

we sign off I want to say thank

1:03:19

you to our producer Alex Smith. Check

1:03:21

him out on the internet. He goes by how old

1:03:24

Dottie most places there. He's got his own projects

1:03:27

you should see maximumfun.org

1:03:31

is where you go for other podcasts

1:03:33

on our network maximum fun. Check

1:03:36

those out. But for

1:03:38

this flophouse many I will

1:03:40

say goodbye. My name has been Dan

1:03:43

McCoy. I'm Stuart

1:03:45

Wellington. I've been Elliott

1:03:47

Kalin and remain that same person

1:03:49

and we've been joined by the

1:03:51

skargiver. I'm Matt Singer. Matt

1:03:55

Singer. The comma the skargiver.

1:04:05

Maximum Fun. A worker-owned

1:04:07

network of artist-owned shows. Supported

1:04:09

directly by you.