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Speaker 1: Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema rewind. This is Rob

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Speaker 1: Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. And Rob and I

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Speaker 1: are out on holiday break this week, but we've got

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Speaker 1: a great classic episode for you. This is our episode

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Speaker 1: on Morosco a k a. Jack Frost, the the the

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Speaker 1: Russo Finished fairy Tale from Another Universe. It's uh it,

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Speaker 1: what can I even say? I'm speechless. It's you're gonna

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Speaker 1: love it. Yeah, It's a magical film that I think

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Speaker 1: people of all all times and ages can really get into.

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Speaker 1: It's it has become for my family our Thanksgiving viewing tradition.

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Speaker 1: And so this is the Weird House Cinema episode where

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Speaker 1: we discussed the film. Uh. This was a lot of fun,

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Speaker 1: and I remember I really enjoyed hearing after the fact

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Speaker 1: from folks who grew up with this movie, either within

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Speaker 1: the Mystery Science theaters, the thousand traditions tradition, or outside

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Speaker 1: of that tradition, uh, you know, watching it on on

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Speaker 1: TV and Europe, or or being familiar with it doing

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Speaker 1: due to um a family history. So we heard from

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Speaker 1: a number of people regarding this film and it was

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Speaker 1: a delightful experience. Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind

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Speaker 1: a production of My Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Weird

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Speaker 1: House Cinema. This is Rob Lamp and I'm Joe McCormick,

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Speaker 1: and this is gonna be I think it's gonna be

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Speaker 1: the last new episode of Weird House Cinema for the

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Speaker 1: year before we return in the new year. And it's

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Speaker 1: pretty exciting because we essentially have one last holiday selection here.

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Speaker 1: It's one that is near and dear to my heart.

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Speaker 1: I can safely say at this point it's it's my

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Speaker 1: esteem for this film has built up over the years,

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Speaker 1: over the decades, and I feel like I'm I'm at

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Speaker 1: a level of just maximum appreciation for it now Christmas

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Speaker 1: with the Cranks. No, no, uh no, we're gonna be

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Speaker 1: talking about the nineteen sixties Russian fairy tale spectacular Moroscoe,

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Speaker 1: better known to many fans in the West as Jack Frost.

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Speaker 1: I think it's sometimes called Frosty or Father Frost. You

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Speaker 1: might recall our mention of this film in the in

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Speaker 1: past episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind that touch

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Speaker 1: on things like mushroom culture and Russian folklore. Now, I

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Speaker 1: did not know that it was called Frosty, but that

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Speaker 1: would make sense. Because immediately I think of how some

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Speaker 1: people I don't do this, by the way, but some

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Speaker 1: people who get the frosty is at Windy's dipped the

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Speaker 1: French fries in them. And this movie is very much

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Speaker 1: like that. It is a is like a salty fried

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Speaker 1: potato product dipped into something sweet and cold on the tongue. Uh.

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Speaker 1: It is a mash up of different kinds of fairytale

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Speaker 1: flavors and genres. It is a scatter gun blast of

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Speaker 1: of weird magical elements of folklore. Now, of course, if

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Speaker 1: you grew up in the United States, particularly during the

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Speaker 1: ninth nineties, then your introduction to this film I think

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Speaker 1: it was likely through Mystery Science Theater three thousand, episode

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Speaker 1: eight thirteen, which aired inn Uh, this was a riff

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Speaker 1: of this film. Um. But if you grew up in

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Speaker 1: Russia or in parts of Eastern Europe, then this movie

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Speaker 1: was likely far more than a weird oddity for your amusement. Uh.

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Speaker 1: This may have been your holiday viewing tradition, either around

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Speaker 1: Christmas or New Year's. In fact, in the late nineties,

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Speaker 1: I remember that this would have been not too long

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Speaker 1: after it actually an MST episode actually aired. I was

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Speaker 1: I instantly loved it. Um, I couldn't necessarily, you know,

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Speaker 1: explain why I loved it. And that's when I think

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Speaker 1: the beauties about Mystery Science Theater three thousand is. Like

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Speaker 1: I've said before, I feel like you kind of showed

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Speaker 1: many of us that these sorts of films existed and

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Speaker 1: taught us at least some ways of appreciating them. Um.

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Speaker 1: But but anyway, I really liked the episode. And I

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Speaker 1: was hanging out with um a friend from high school

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Speaker 1: and a are An exchange student from the Czech Republic

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Speaker 1: who was staying with that friend at the time, and

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Speaker 1: for some reason I either described this episode to them,

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Speaker 1: or perhaps I actually showed them part of the episode,

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Speaker 1: like I put it on a VHS tape or something,

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Speaker 1: and Marcatta, the student told me, instantly recognized it and said, oh,

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Speaker 1: this this is the film we watch every year. This

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Speaker 1: is our Christmas tradition, Um, that they show it on

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Speaker 1: TV every Christmas, and it's just an essential part of

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Speaker 1: the holiday, you know, as as Christmas e as the

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Speaker 1: baby Jesus lowering gifts from Heaven on a golden string. Now,

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Speaker 1: on one hand, that is very strange to me, because

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Speaker 1: I like you first encountered this on Mystery Science Theater,

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Speaker 1: where I you know, the mindset I was in when

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Speaker 1: I first saw it was what a you know, strange

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Speaker 1: mushroom to find in the forest, Like it was just

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Speaker 1: this bizarre oddity from from out of the nineteenth dimension.

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Speaker 1: But now seeing it again, especially without the Mystery Science Theater,

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Speaker 1: just watching the movie on its own, it has the

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Speaker 1: same kind of weird texture as a as a lot

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Speaker 1: of Christmas classics that that we did grow up with, like, um,

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Speaker 1: I don't know, like the stop motion Rudolph the Red

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Speaker 1: Nose Reindeer and things like that, except more earthy. I mean,

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Speaker 1: this feels more rooted in in actually in real folklore

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Speaker 1: and and archetypes and imagery that goes way back. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: this this film is Is this not one of those

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Speaker 1: films where you're like, Okay, I guess I need to

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Speaker 1: research my Russian history or my Russian folklore before I

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Speaker 1: watched this so I know what's going on. No, all

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Speaker 1: that is great and and helps you appreciate it more.

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Speaker 1: But but all of this like speaks on on a

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Speaker 1: level that I feel like like most of viewers, especially

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Speaker 1: the the sort of intended viewer, the child either the

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Speaker 1: actual child or the child at heart will instantly get

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Speaker 1: what's going on throughout most of this film. And in

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Speaker 1: a case in point, um, this film has been a

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Speaker 1: viewing that the MSTD version of this has been a

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Speaker 1: a ritual of of my wife and eyes for many

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Speaker 1: years now. We watched it every Thanksgiving. Last Thanksgiving me,

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Speaker 1: I believe, we introduced my son to it and he

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Speaker 1: was like, Okay, this is interesting. And this year he said,

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Speaker 1: I said, hey, do you guys want to watch Jack Frost?

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Speaker 1: And he said, yeah, but I think we should watch

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Speaker 1: it quote without all the jokes. So he wanted it unriffed.

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Speaker 1: And so I was delighted to try because I've been

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Speaker 1: wanting to try that out as well, because I knew

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Speaker 1: at this point that that, you know, the grubby visual

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Speaker 1: um film grade that we have in the MST episodes

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Speaker 1: is not a proper reflection of the film. Uh So

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Speaker 1: I really wanted to watch a high definition version of

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Speaker 1: it anyway, and so we we watched it and it

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Speaker 1: was an absolute delight. Everybody enjoyed it. He loved it. Um. So,

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Speaker 1: you know, nothing against the MST version. I think it's

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Speaker 1: a lot of fun. But if that is the only

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Speaker 1: version of Morosco you've watched, then you're missing out on

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Speaker 1: just so many extra dimensional colors. I think you're entirely correct.

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Speaker 1: I don't remember when we had this conversation, but you

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Speaker 1: were telling me this, uh sometime away back and uh

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Speaker 1: so I finally watched it in in a higher definition transfer.

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Speaker 1: And this movie is beautiful. Uh, it is, truly. It's

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Speaker 1: it's colorful. A lot of the locations are gorgeous. That

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Speaker 1: I mean, they picked really wonderful wilderness settings, especially in

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Speaker 1: the first half of the movie that takes place in

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Speaker 1: the in the spring or summer, I guess. And uh

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Speaker 1: so there are these hills and forests and caves and

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Speaker 1: meadows and uh and and the colors of the costumes

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Speaker 1: just pop. Uh. It's really wonderful. Yeah, it's um like,

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Speaker 1: it just transforms the film in so many ways. To

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Speaker 1: watch it in this this full colorful version. Uh. You know,

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Speaker 1: for starters, like if you have especially to Western viewers,

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Speaker 1: you have these scenes of uh, you know, people in

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Speaker 1: Babushka's uh you know, wandering about in the woods. Uh.

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Speaker 1: If you have drab colors, that takes on a drab quality.

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Speaker 1: But when it is so bright and so beautiful in

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Speaker 1: the babushkas are so you know, vibrantly uh decorated. Um.

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Speaker 1: You know, it paints an entirely to picture of of

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Speaker 1: like rural living. It it actually allows you to taste

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Speaker 1: the the the folkloric ideal. Uh. That's clearly this film

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Speaker 1: is celebrating. You know. It's funny. I mentioned the Rudolph

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Speaker 1: the Red Nose Reinder your thing. I just looked it

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Speaker 1: up and it came out apparently the same year as Asco,

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Speaker 1: both nineteen sixty four films. Okay, yeah, and it is

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Speaker 1: weird with with Moroscoe. I've I've seen different dates for it,

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Speaker 1: Like sometimes I see nineteen sixty four, sometimes I see

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Speaker 1: sixty five. Um, but at any rate, that is the

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Speaker 1: time period mid nineteen sixties, uh that it emerges. So yeah,

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Speaker 1: this is essentially a big budget folklore spectacular for children,

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Speaker 1: for the whole family, and it has everything. It has

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Speaker 1: the personification of winter, it has the the evil which

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Speaker 1: Baba Yaga and their chicken footed house. You have these

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Speaker 1: troll like bandits milling about, you have magical animals, you

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Speaker 1: have mushroom spirits, arranged marriages, folkloric lodge, and just much

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Speaker 1: much more. So in terms of an elevator pitch for

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Speaker 1: this movie, I the only the best thing I could

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Speaker 1: come up with is looking for a change in life,

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Speaker 1: consider wandering into the Russian folkloric wilderness and see what happens.

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Speaker 1: The other way, I'd frame it is always be polite

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Speaker 1: to magical old people you meet in the woods. Absolutely,

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Speaker 1: I mean, that's that's just universal. All right, Maybe we

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Speaker 1: need to hit some trailer audio. All right, we's playing

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Speaker 1: hide and seek with me? Not oh you yes, are

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Speaker 1: you a sorcerer? Granddaddy? I dabblings us for a little,

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Speaker 1: But the truth is that I get bored. You get bored.

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Speaker 1: I get bored. Come on, play with me. Let's play

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Speaker 1: hide and seek together with you? Play hide and seek?

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Speaker 1: Yes you're joking, I catch you in no time. Pick so, yes,

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Speaker 1: I think so if you catch me, I'll give you

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Speaker 1: a well bent bow and some nice eat ross. That

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Speaker 1: a bargain. It's a bargain, Father Mushroom. Okay, just kidding

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Speaker 1: that that wasn't the trailer, because apparently we we don't

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Speaker 1: know if there is a trailer that has any like

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Speaker 1: English narration. But I think there's a trailer at least

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Speaker 1: with some singing yeah, yeah, And it's possible in missing

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Speaker 1: something because I did find trailers with English language for

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Speaker 1: other films from this particular director, who will get to

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Speaker 1: in a bit now. Before we get to the connections,

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Speaker 1: we do want to talk just a little bit about

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Speaker 1: about folk tales and Russian folk tales and the Russian

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Speaker 1: folk tale that is at the key at the center

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Speaker 1: of all this UM. But before we do so, I

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Speaker 1: wanted to just mention a few quick points that are

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Speaker 1: actually from our episode on the list she uh from

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Speaker 1: last year that concerns Russian folklore. UH. These were points

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Speaker 1: made by Jack V. Haney in the the excellent book

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Speaker 1: or series of books and mythology and Anthology of Russian

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Speaker 1: folk Tales. So, first of all, he contends that more

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Speaker 1: folk tales may have emerged from the Russian people than

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Speaker 1: any other UH do in part to the fact that

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Speaker 1: rural oral traditions lasted well into the twentieth century. He

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Speaker 1: also says that Russia has the second largest number of

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Speaker 1: tale types according to the International Classification System, and within

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Speaker 1: these tales, who find lots of animal stories. Frequent villains

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Speaker 1: include Baba Yaga, which is nasty, dwarves, shape shifting magicians. However,

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Speaker 1: Baba Yaga is also sometimes a donor or a helper,

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Speaker 1: so you know, some sometimes she's a she's a villain.

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Speaker 1: Sometimes I guess she's kind of at an anti hero

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Speaker 1: or something, uh, somebody that begrudgingly helps our hero out.

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Speaker 1: And that's good to keep in mind in this film

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Speaker 1: because she's kind of both at times. Um frequent characters

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Speaker 1: in general, You've got Baba Yaga and her Hut the Firebird,

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Speaker 1: uh Coshi, the Deathless uh Ivan. Different versions of Ivan

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Speaker 1: pop up, and this is key. The hero frequently wanders

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Speaker 1: through the woods at some point and receives help in

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Speaker 1: his quest from an animal or some sort of supernatural aid. Now,

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Speaker 1: the movie Morosco or Jack Frost actually seems to smash

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Speaker 1: together a number of different fairytale archetypes. But I would

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Speaker 1: say that the the core, the core of the story,

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Speaker 1: the core situation, and backbone is based on a classic

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Speaker 1: Russian fairy tale known as moros Co or Father Frost,

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Speaker 1: which appeared in printed folk tale collections going back at

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Speaker 1: least as far as the nineteenth century, maybe before then,

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Speaker 1: and it appears to be a variant of an extremely

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Speaker 1: widespread folk tale archetype the essence of which is that

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Speaker 1: there are two girls, two sisters or step sisters, a

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Speaker 1: kind one who is rewarded in a wicked one who

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Speaker 1: has punished. Now, I thought it would be great to actually,

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Speaker 1: just uh, to read through a version of the Father

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Speaker 1: Frost fairytale. And this is the version collected by the

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Speaker 1: Scottish poet and anthropologist Andrew Lying in the nineteenth century. So, Robert,

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Speaker 1: are you game to read this folk tale with me

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Speaker 1: and then see how it relates to the movie. Let's

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Speaker 1: do it. So this is Andrew Lang's rendition of the

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Speaker 1: story of King Frost. There once upon a time was

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Speaker 1: a peasant woman who had a daughter and a stepdaughter.

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Speaker 1: The daughter had her own way and everything and whatever

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Speaker 1: she did was right in her mother's eyes. But the

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Speaker 1: poor stepdaughter had a hard time let her do what

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Speaker 1: she would. She was always blamed and got small thanks

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Speaker 1: for all the trouble she took. Nothing was right, everything wrong,

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Speaker 1: And yet if the truth were known, the girl was

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Speaker 1: worth her weight in gold. She was so unselfish and goodhearted.

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Speaker 1: But her stepmother did not like her, and the poor

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Speaker 1: girl's days were spent in weeping, for it was impossible

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Speaker 1: to live peacefully with the woman. The wicked shrew was

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Speaker 1: determined to get rid of the girl by fair means

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Speaker 1: or foul, and kept saying to her father, Send her away,

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Speaker 1: old man, Send her away anywhere, so that my eye

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Speaker 1: as shan't be plagued any longer by the sight of her,

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Speaker 1: or my ears tormented by the sound of her voice.

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Speaker 1: Send her out into the fields, and let the cutting

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Speaker 1: frost to do for her. In vain did the poor

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Speaker 1: old father weep and implore her pity. She was firm,

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Speaker 1: and he dared not gainsay her. So he placed his

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Speaker 1: daughter in a sledge, not even daring to give her

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Speaker 1: a horsecloth to keep herself warm with, and drove her

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Speaker 1: out into the bare open fields, where he kissed her

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Speaker 1: and left her, driving home as fast as he could,

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Speaker 1: that he might not witness her miserable death. Deserted by

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Speaker 1: her father, the poor girl sat down under a fir

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Speaker 1: tree at the edge of the forest and began to

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Speaker 1: weep silently. Suddenly she heard a faint sound. It was

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Speaker 1: King Frost, springing from tree to tree and cracking his

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Speaker 1: fingers as he went. At length he reached the fir

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Speaker 1: tree beneath which she was sitting, and with a crisp,

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Speaker 1: crackling sound, he alighted beside her and looked at her

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Speaker 1: lovely face. Well maiden, he snapped out. Do you know

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Speaker 1: who I am? I am King Frost, King of the

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Speaker 1: Red Noses. All healthy, you great King, answered the girl

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Speaker 1: in a gentle, trembling voice. Have you come to take

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Speaker 1: me away? Are you warm a maiden? He replied? Quite warm,

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Speaker 1: King Frost, she answered, though she shivered as she spoke.

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Speaker 1: Then King Frost stooped down and bent over the girl,

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Speaker 1: and the crackling sound grew louder, and the air seemed

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Speaker 1: to be full of knives and darts. And again he asked, maiden,

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Speaker 1: are you warm? Are you warm, beautiful girl, And though

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Speaker 1: her breath was almost frozen on her lips, she whispered gently,

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Speaker 1: quite warm, King Frost. Then King Frost gnashed his teeth

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Speaker 1: and cracked his fingers, and his eyes sparkled, and the crackling,

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Speaker 1: crisp sound was louder than ever, and for the last

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Speaker 1: time he asked her, maiden, are you still warm? Are

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Speaker 1: you still warm? Little love? And the poor girl was

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Speaker 1: so stiff and nun that she could just gasp still warm. King.

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Speaker 1: Now her gentle, courteous words, and her uncomplaining ways touched

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Speaker 1: King Frost, and he had pity on her, and he

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Speaker 1: wrapped her up in furs and covered her with blankets,

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Speaker 1: and he fetched a great box in which were beautiful

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Speaker 1: jewels and a rich robe embroidered in gold and silver.

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Speaker 1: And she put it on and looked more lovely than ever,

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Speaker 1: and King Frost stepped with her into his sledge with

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Speaker 1: six white horses. Okay, here we got intermission on the

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Speaker 1: folk tail. So so it seems like not complaining about

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Speaker 1: being cold worked out really good for her. She was humble, right.

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Speaker 1: I think the point is supposed to be that she's like,

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Speaker 1: she's so kind and polite that she won't even that

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Speaker 1: she won't even complain about the cold, maybe because it

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Speaker 1: would be like she's out in his domain, and it

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Speaker 1: would be like, you know, offensive to complain about the

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Speaker 1: cold to Grandfather Frost when you're out of it's kind

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Speaker 1: of like going to somebody's house and saying it smells bad.

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Speaker 1: That's the way I made sense of it, because otherwise

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Speaker 1: I don't really know what it is that's so kind

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Speaker 1: about saying you're warm when you're not. I think it's

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Speaker 1: that she's in his house right In the meantime, the

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Speaker 1: wicked stepmother was waiting at home for news of the

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Speaker 1: girl's death and preparing pancakes for the funeral feast, and

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Speaker 1: she said to her husband, old man, you had better

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Speaker 1: go out into the fields and find her daughter's body

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Speaker 1: and bury her. Just as the old man was leaving

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Speaker 1: the house, the little dog under the table began to bark, saying,

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Speaker 1: I don't know how to do dog voice? Okay here? Uh?

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Speaker 1: Oh the hell you do you know how to do

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Speaker 1: a dog voice? I do? I do a scooby doo voice. Here. Yes,

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Speaker 1: your daughter shall live. Your daughter shall live to be

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Speaker 1: your delight. Her daughter shall die this very night. Hold

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Speaker 1: your tongue, you foolish beasts. Go to the woman. There's

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Speaker 1: a pancake for you, but you must say her daughter

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Speaker 1: shall have much silver and gold. His daughter is frozen,

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Speaker 1: quite stiff and cold. But the doggie ate up the

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Speaker 1: pancake and barked, saying, his daughter shall wear a crown

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Speaker 1: on her head. Her daughter shall die on wood on

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Speaker 1: wed And then old woman tried to coax the doggie

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Speaker 1: with more pancakes and to terrify it with blows, but

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Speaker 1: he barked on, always repeating the same words. And suddenly

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Speaker 1: the door creaked and flew open, and a great heavy

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Speaker 1: chest was pushed in, and behind it came the stepdaughter,

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Speaker 1: radiant and beautiful in address, all glittering with silver and gold.

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Speaker 1: For a moment the stepmother's eyes were dazzled. Then she

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Speaker 1: called to her husband, old man, yoked the horses at

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Speaker 1: once into the sledge, and take my daughter into the

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Speaker 1: same field, and leave her on the same spot exactly.

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Speaker 1: And so the old man took the girl and left

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Speaker 1: her beneath the same tree where he had he had

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Speaker 1: parted from his daughter. In a few minutes, King Frost

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Speaker 1: came past, and looking at the girl, he said, are

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Speaker 1: you warm, maiden? What a blind old fool you must

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Speaker 1: be to ask such a question. She answered angrily, can't

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Speaker 1: you see that my hands and my feet are nearly frozen?

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Speaker 1: Then King Frost sprang to and fro in front of her,

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Speaker 1: questioning her and getting only rude, rough words in reply,

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Speaker 1: till at last he got very angry and cracked his

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Speaker 1: fingers and ashed his teeth and froze her to death.

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Speaker 1: But in the hut, her mother was waiting for her

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Speaker 1: to return, and as she grew impatient, she said to

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Speaker 1: her husband, get out the horses, old man, and go

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Speaker 1: and fetch her home. And see that you are careful

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Speaker 1: not to upset the sledge and lose the chest. Is

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Speaker 1: the mother becoming irish? I think, yeah, she might be.

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Speaker 1: She might be. I mean, as we'll discuss, like, it's

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Speaker 1: impossible to read these lines without thinking of the the

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Speaker 1: actors in this movie, and particularly the English dub of

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Speaker 1: those characters. And uh yeah, so, and then I'm also

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Speaker 1: drifting in my accent here. Okay, okay, But then so

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Speaker 1: we got a couple more lines. So the dog beneath

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Speaker 1: the table began to bark, saying, your daughter has frozen,

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Speaker 1: quite stiff and cold, and never shall have a chest

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Speaker 1: full of gold. Don't tell such wicked lies, scouted the woman.

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Speaker 1: There's a cake for you now say her daughter shall

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Speaker 1: marry a mighty king. But at that moment the door

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Speaker 1: flew open, and she rushed out to meet her daughter,

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Speaker 1: and as she took her frozen body in her arms,

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Speaker 1: she too was chilled to death. And that's the end. Man,

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Speaker 1: These old fairy tales are so mean, yeah they this is,

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Speaker 1: as is often the case. Yeah, the old tales didn't

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Speaker 1: play around they they were. They were often rather brutal

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Speaker 1: in ways that you might expect a film adaptation to

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Speaker 1: then soften things a bit and maybe not go so

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Speaker 1: hard not people, especially if they're not, you know, doing

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Speaker 1: anything particularly evil. But even if they are, like Frost

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Speaker 1: is just going around just murdering everyone. Um, how how

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Speaker 1: are the children going to connect with that? Right? So

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Speaker 1: the skeleton of this folk tale absolutely appears in the movie.

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Speaker 1: But but yeah, like you say, the the edges are

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Speaker 1: dulled a little bit, so so the the spoiled mean

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Speaker 1: daughter is is not frozen to death along with her mother. Instead,

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Speaker 1: she's just sort of uh made a fool of Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: and shein only there's just now that we've read through

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Speaker 1: the story, like, I admired the script even more because

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Speaker 1: they found great ways to soften the thorny nous of

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Speaker 1: the story, like instead of the instead of the old

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Speaker 1: man being like, well I better, I better do what

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Speaker 1: she says and and abandoning his daughter to die in

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Speaker 1: the in the in the cold, they do an alteration

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Speaker 1: on that where he is going to do that, he's

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Speaker 1: driving her out into the wilderness to abandon her. But

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Speaker 1: then he has a change of heart and says, nope,

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Speaker 1: I'm gonna go back and give her a piece of

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Speaker 1: my mind. But but but Nostinka is so good, she's

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Speaker 1: so good she can't see her her father go back

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Speaker 1: and and and you know, and and watch the stepmother

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Speaker 1: unleash hell on him for disobeying her. So she slips

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Speaker 1: off and goes out into the wilderness to die in

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Speaker 1: her own right, she decides she's going to freeze to

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Speaker 1: death in the woods because she doesn't want to make trouble, right,

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Speaker 1: I would say, by the way, you know, I'm a

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Speaker 1: sucker for stories that have a moral about being kind

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Speaker 1: and stuff. But that's that's a little too kind. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I think it's okay. I think it's okay to not

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Speaker 1: want to freeze to death, even if that's going to

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Speaker 1: create some headaches for your dad. Yeah. But but like,

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Speaker 1: like you said that, the skeleton of the story is there,

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Speaker 1: but then other elements are added in to to give it.

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Speaker 1: You know that this sort of an epic full motion

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Speaker 1: picture feel. Baba Yaga is thrown in because she's a

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Speaker 1: delightful villain. Um, you have a male hero thrown in

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Speaker 1: in the form of Van, you have various other high

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Speaker 1: jinks going on, a little bit of a sleeping beauty

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00:22:26,400 --> 00:22:29,200
Speaker 1: trope thrown in as well. Oh yeah, Morosco's got it

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Speaker 1: all all right. Well, we'll come back to the plot

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Speaker 1: here in just a minute, but let's take a moment

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00:22:43,080 --> 00:22:48,240
Speaker 1: to discuss the various people involved in this um because

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Speaker 1: because you, like me, may not be familiar with any

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Speaker 1: of the people that were involved in the making of Morosco.

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Speaker 1: I've been watching them for years, but I didn't really

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Speaker 1: know anything about them, and it was, it was it

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Speaker 1: was really fun to research this a little bit the

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Speaker 1: other day. So the director of this film is Alexander

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Speaker 1: row Uh. That's often spelled UM r O U for

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Speaker 1: in English, but you also see it spelled r o

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Speaker 1: w e uh. So he was born in nineteen o

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Speaker 1: six died in nineteen seventy three, legendary Soviet filmmaker of

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Speaker 1: Irish and Greek heritage. So his father was an Irish

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Speaker 1: engineer working in Russia. And U and uh and and

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Speaker 1: and uh. Apparently I think there's some story about the

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Speaker 1: father ended up like leaving the family uh in Russia. Uh.

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Speaker 1: At any rate, Alexander grew up, you know, as as

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Speaker 1: a Russian as a as a and then and then

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Speaker 1: working his way into what would become the Gorky Film

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Speaker 1: Studio and just becoming a mainstay there. He directed twenty

426
00:23:45,880 --> 00:23:50,440
Speaker 1: fantasy films, mostly based on Russian folklore and Russian literature,

427
00:23:50,760 --> 00:23:53,240
Speaker 1: and also some non fantasy films thrown in there as well.

428
00:23:53,280 --> 00:23:56,520
Speaker 1: But this was his, his his thing um, and you know,

429
00:23:56,640 --> 00:24:00,119
Speaker 1: certainly that's such a rich well to draw from. His

430
00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:03,280
Speaker 1: films include such notable works as A Wish upon a

431
00:24:03,400 --> 00:24:08,160
Speaker 1: Pike from nineteen thirty eight. This one features Czar Gorok

432
00:24:08,560 --> 00:24:11,760
Speaker 1: and the Princess who never smiled. There's That's at least

433
00:24:11,840 --> 00:24:14,480
Speaker 1: the Beautiful from nineteen forty. This has the Bobba Yaga

434
00:24:14,560 --> 00:24:17,720
Speaker 1: in it as well as the frog Princess. There's the

435
00:24:17,760 --> 00:24:20,760
Speaker 1: Humpbacked Horse in nineteen forty one film that has has

436
00:24:20,960 --> 00:24:24,399
Speaker 1: Van in it. There's Cache the Immortal in nineteen forty

437
00:24:24,440 --> 00:24:27,679
Speaker 1: five film that has a caste the Immortal. There's Firewater

438
00:24:27,800 --> 00:24:30,760
Speaker 1: and Brass Pipes from nineteen sixty eight that has cost

439
00:24:31,480 --> 00:24:35,919
Speaker 1: Babba Yaga Vodiano the water Spirit as well as apparently

440
00:24:36,000 --> 00:24:39,240
Speaker 1: some were wolves. There's Barbera the Fair with the Silken

441
00:24:39,320 --> 00:24:42,520
Speaker 1: Hair from nineteen seventy which has the Underwater King or

442
00:24:42,560 --> 00:24:46,240
Speaker 1: the Underwater Zre in it being known as Chuto Yudo.

443
00:24:47,080 --> 00:24:50,120
Speaker 1: And then there's The Golden Horns from nineteen seventy three,

444
00:24:50,200 --> 00:24:53,040
Speaker 1: which was I believe his last film and I think

445
00:24:53,280 --> 00:24:55,680
Speaker 1: another director had to had to complete it for him.

446
00:24:55,840 --> 00:24:58,119
Speaker 1: But that is a film centered around the Bobby Yaga

447
00:24:58,200 --> 00:25:00,719
Speaker 1: as well. Well. It is no was surprised at all

448
00:25:00,800 --> 00:25:05,040
Speaker 1: that this filmmaker has a long running uh affair of

449
00:25:05,119 --> 00:25:07,520
Speaker 1: the heart with with the Witch of the Woods, because

450
00:25:07,640 --> 00:25:11,600
Speaker 1: the Babba Yaga in this movie is wonderfully realized. She

451
00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:13,920
Speaker 1: lives in a house that walks around on legs, and

452
00:25:14,400 --> 00:25:17,640
Speaker 1: all of her scenes are just pitch perfect. Yeah, all

453
00:25:17,680 --> 00:25:21,800
Speaker 1: of these films feature similar folkloric threads, uh you know,

454
00:25:22,040 --> 00:25:24,960
Speaker 1: because for example, Bobby Yaga pops up in four of them,

455
00:25:25,440 --> 00:25:28,639
Speaker 1: um Yvan is in two of them, k is in

456
00:25:28,800 --> 00:25:32,240
Speaker 1: two of them, and some of the same actors pop

457
00:25:32,359 --> 00:25:35,080
Speaker 1: up in several of his films as well. Discuss So

458
00:25:35,359 --> 00:25:37,440
Speaker 1: so basically, the deal seems to be that that Row

459
00:25:37,640 --> 00:25:42,280
Speaker 1: popularized the epic folkloric fantasy film in Russia and set

460
00:25:42,359 --> 00:25:46,400
Speaker 1: a standard that that that is that was certainly emulated

461
00:25:46,440 --> 00:25:48,680
Speaker 1: by other directors of the time period, but it's also

462
00:25:48,800 --> 00:25:52,639
Speaker 1: still reflected to this day in Russian cinema, including the

463
00:25:52,760 --> 00:25:55,960
Speaker 1: films of the Walt Disney Company c I S, which

464
00:25:56,359 --> 00:25:59,920
Speaker 1: produced the live action Russian fantasy films The Book of

465
00:26:00,080 --> 00:26:03,520
Speaker 1: Masters in two thousand nine and the Lost Warrior trilogy

466
00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:06,480
Speaker 1: from two thousands seventeen through. I believe the third film

467
00:26:06,520 --> 00:26:10,520
Speaker 1: in that saga's coming out in two These are films

468
00:26:10,600 --> 00:26:13,879
Speaker 1: that feature most of the characters that I just highlighted, So,

469
00:26:14,560 --> 00:26:17,840
Speaker 1: you know, just a modern retelling of these various folkloric

470
00:26:17,960 --> 00:26:22,560
Speaker 1: stories with modern cinematic tools and styles. I gotta say,

471
00:26:22,600 --> 00:26:25,360
Speaker 1: I've never heard of any of these. Um, yeah, these

472
00:26:25,359 --> 00:26:28,240
Speaker 1: are I have not seen any of them, but now

473
00:26:28,720 --> 00:26:30,440
Speaker 1: I would like to check out some of them. I

474
00:26:30,520 --> 00:26:33,480
Speaker 1: looked at some trailers and some clips, and uh yeah,

475
00:26:33,520 --> 00:26:36,600
Speaker 1: I'm I'm impressed. I mean, apparently you have the likes

476
00:26:36,600 --> 00:26:40,240
Speaker 1: of Steven Spielberg, who has spoken admirally about Row in

477
00:26:40,320 --> 00:26:43,960
Speaker 1: the past. So uh, for for those who know, uh,

478
00:26:44,960 --> 00:26:46,920
Speaker 1: this guy was a master. Now, as far as the

479
00:26:46,960 --> 00:26:50,159
Speaker 1: screenwriters go, there are there are two credited screen Lighters writers.

480
00:26:50,200 --> 00:26:53,879
Speaker 1: The first one is Nicolay Erdman, who lived nineteen hundred

481
00:26:53,920 --> 00:26:57,880
Speaker 1: through nineteen seventy a Russian playwright and screenwriter, perhaps best

482
00:26:57,960 --> 00:27:02,240
Speaker 1: known for the suicide Uh this is a play, and

483
00:27:02,359 --> 00:27:04,800
Speaker 1: he turned to his cinema when his playwriting career ran

484
00:27:04,880 --> 00:27:08,680
Speaker 1: a foul of Soviet authorities. And then there's Michael Voltan

485
00:27:09,000 --> 00:27:12,879
Speaker 1: who lived nineteen o two through, a Russian screenwriter who

486
00:27:12,960 --> 00:27:17,600
Speaker 1: frequently worked with Erdman. Together they also wrote Rose, Firewater

487
00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:20,840
Speaker 1: and Brass Pipes of Open also wrote the nineteen sixty

488
00:27:20,880 --> 00:27:24,320
Speaker 1: one animated film The Key, which apparently ran a foul

489
00:27:24,320 --> 00:27:27,480
Speaker 1: of Soviet sensors due to its criticism of social conformity.

490
00:27:28,640 --> 00:27:31,000
Speaker 1: Right now, onto the cast. Let's start at the top

491
00:27:31,320 --> 00:27:35,560
Speaker 1: with the actor who plays Morosco, who plays Father Frost.

492
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:39,800
Speaker 1: This is Alexander Kivyallya who lived nineteen o five through

493
00:27:39,960 --> 00:27:43,280
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy six, a Russian actor of stage in screen.

494
00:27:43,359 --> 00:27:46,359
Speaker 1: He worked with Rowan several different films, including Golden Horns

495
00:27:46,440 --> 00:27:50,160
Speaker 1: and Firewater and Brass Pipes, as well as the really

496
00:27:50,240 --> 00:27:54,160
Speaker 1: interesting sounding row film titled Kingdom of Crooked Mirrors, which

497
00:27:54,200 --> 00:27:58,560
Speaker 1: apparently involves a mirror world and crooked mirrors that brainwash

498
00:27:58,720 --> 00:28:04,080
Speaker 1: people through these various subtle changes in reality. UM, I

499
00:28:04,160 --> 00:28:06,120
Speaker 1: may have to look that one up. He was also

500
00:28:06,280 --> 00:28:10,359
Speaker 1: in Rose n One The Night Before Christmas, based on

501
00:28:10,560 --> 00:28:14,240
Speaker 1: a Nicolay Gogol story. He does not play Santa Claus

502
00:28:14,240 --> 00:28:17,040
Speaker 1: in this in case anyone's curious. For anybody wondering, is

503
00:28:17,119 --> 00:28:21,919
Speaker 1: Father Frost Santa Claus, Well, no, but there's some significant

504
00:28:21,920 --> 00:28:26,440
Speaker 1: aesthetic overlap. Yeah, yeah, they it's enough to where you

505
00:28:26,600 --> 00:28:30,600
Speaker 1: sometimes see people described describe Father Frost has the quote

506
00:28:30,640 --> 00:28:33,359
Speaker 1: the Russian Santa Claus, which is which is incorrect. But

507
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:35,960
Speaker 1: they're kind of cut from the same cloth. You know,

508
00:28:36,040 --> 00:28:40,320
Speaker 1: there are similarities once you get into the amorphous you know,

509
00:28:40,400 --> 00:28:43,680
Speaker 1: collective unconscious. Um, you know, I guess you could make

510
00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:46,320
Speaker 1: an argument that they're essentially the same being. Both have

511
00:28:46,520 --> 00:28:49,880
Speaker 1: long white beard, both right around in the sleigh, Both

512
00:28:49,920 --> 00:28:52,880
Speaker 1: are associated with the winter months. Both have a scepter

513
00:28:53,120 --> 00:28:58,400
Speaker 1: that freezes people solid upon touching. They both have a

514
00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:02,040
Speaker 1: big beard, though, and then sometimes they bring gifts. Well, no,

515
00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:05,080
Speaker 1: he's okay, Father Frost says the scepter, but Santa Claus

516
00:29:05,080 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 1: has the flower to disappear if you know, well, yes,

517
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:12,080
Speaker 1: if you're watching um, yeah, you're watching Santa Claus. Uh,

518
00:29:12,200 --> 00:29:14,480
Speaker 1: the well, that's the nineteen sixties movie as well. Wasn't

519
00:29:14,480 --> 00:29:18,800
Speaker 1: it that Santa Claus versus the devil? All right, the

520
00:29:18,880 --> 00:29:22,440
Speaker 1: rest of the cast. So you have Nastinka, the beautiful,

521
00:29:22,520 --> 00:29:26,280
Speaker 1: perfect girl, the the uh you know, the step daughter,

522
00:29:26,840 --> 00:29:30,600
Speaker 1: played by Natalia Sack who was born in ninety eight,

523
00:29:30,800 --> 00:29:33,840
Speaker 1: still alive as of this recording. A former Russian figure

524
00:29:33,880 --> 00:29:37,480
Speaker 1: skater and ballet dancer. She was also in Rows, Firewater

525
00:29:37,600 --> 00:29:42,160
Speaker 1: and Brass Pipes. Hard to miss. She has just enormous eyes. Right,

526
00:29:42,280 --> 00:29:47,040
Speaker 1: So not Nastica or Nastia corresponds to the good sister,

527
00:29:47,200 --> 00:29:49,960
Speaker 1: the good daughter in the folk tale, the one who's

528
00:29:50,000 --> 00:29:53,240
Speaker 1: who's very nice and polite and is treated very harshly

529
00:29:53,320 --> 00:29:56,520
Speaker 1: by her by her hateful stepmother. Now let's let's go

530
00:29:56,520 --> 00:29:59,720
Speaker 1: ahead and talk about the bad sister, the step sister. Here.

531
00:30:00,080 --> 00:30:03,280
Speaker 1: This is Mafushka, the step sister, played by in A

532
00:30:03,400 --> 00:30:07,880
Speaker 1: Chakova born nine and uh, I have to say that

533
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:10,920
Speaker 1: this was the performance that I always admired, knowing nothing

534
00:30:10,960 --> 00:30:14,600
Speaker 1: about this actor. Like she's tremendous in this like just

535
00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:18,080
Speaker 1: you know this this uh snarling, but but at times

536
00:30:18,480 --> 00:30:23,080
Speaker 1: at times kind of vulnerable, um uh human being, you know,

537
00:30:23,240 --> 00:30:26,040
Speaker 1: like like she she is an outrageous caricature. But at

538
00:30:26,120 --> 00:30:29,320
Speaker 1: times you feel for her too. Well. She's detestable but

539
00:30:29,480 --> 00:30:32,640
Speaker 1: also pitiable in the way that all spoiled children are,

540
00:30:32,840 --> 00:30:35,720
Speaker 1: because you know, like there's nothing more revolting than a

541
00:30:35,800 --> 00:30:38,680
Speaker 1: spoiled brat child, but you know that, you know they

542
00:30:38,720 --> 00:30:40,680
Speaker 1: were made that way, and you get to see how

543
00:30:40,800 --> 00:30:44,960
Speaker 1: her her how her mother's sort of abusive doting causes

544
00:30:45,080 --> 00:30:47,160
Speaker 1: her to be the way she is, so you feel

545
00:30:47,200 --> 00:30:50,240
Speaker 1: bad for her. Yeah, and you know, given how good

546
00:30:50,280 --> 00:30:53,320
Speaker 1: this performance is, it it probably shouldn't come as a surprise,

547
00:30:53,360 --> 00:30:55,480
Speaker 1: but it might surprise some people to know that, Okay,

548
00:30:55,520 --> 00:30:59,240
Speaker 1: this was only her third screen role, but Chakova went

549
00:30:59,320 --> 00:31:02,040
Speaker 1: on to have this just highly successful acting career in

550
00:31:02,120 --> 00:31:05,560
Speaker 1: Russia and is highly acclaimed. Like she's essentially the the

551
00:31:05,680 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 1: Russian Meryl Streep, Like she's that level of successful. If

552
00:31:09,160 --> 00:31:12,120
Speaker 1: you if you look up lists of of like famous

553
00:31:12,200 --> 00:31:16,920
Speaker 1: Russian UM actresses, unless it's you know, some sort of

554
00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:18,960
Speaker 1: just modern list it's not taking in the like the

555
00:31:19,000 --> 00:31:21,840
Speaker 1: full scope of Russian cinema, you you may very well

556
00:31:21,880 --> 00:31:24,760
Speaker 1: find her on that list. She was born in nineteen

557
00:31:24,840 --> 00:31:30,280
Speaker 1: forty three, uh still active today. UM she is. She's

558
00:31:30,320 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 1: married to acclaimed Russian director Gleb Penvalov and has started

559
00:31:35,600 --> 00:31:42,400
Speaker 1: several of his historical films, including three Vassa. She's just

560
00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:45,320
Speaker 1: wonderful in this every moment on screen, she's doing something

561
00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:49,680
Speaker 1: interesting now. The character of Ivan, the male hero, was

562
00:31:49,720 --> 00:31:53,040
Speaker 1: played by Edward Izatov, who was born in nineteen thirty

563
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:56,560
Speaker 1: six died in two thousand and three. Tall, handsome Russian

564
00:31:56,640 --> 00:31:59,520
Speaker 1: actor whose career lasted throughout the sixties and seventies, but

565
00:31:59,600 --> 00:32:01,840
Speaker 1: was apparent Lea derailed in the early eighties due to

566
00:32:02,400 --> 00:32:05,719
Speaker 1: some manner of financial or real estate scandal. I couldn't

567
00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:08,080
Speaker 1: get the full details on it, but he was also

568
00:32:08,240 --> 00:32:12,400
Speaker 1: in Rows, firewater and brass Pipes. All right. Then there's

569
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:15,160
Speaker 1: the step mom. This is played. This part was played

570
00:32:15,200 --> 00:32:19,000
Speaker 1: by Vera Altaskaya, who was born in nineteen nineteen died

571
00:32:19,040 --> 00:32:22,000
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy eight, another established Russian actor and a

572
00:32:22,080 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: frequent cast member in Row films. In her later career,

573
00:32:25,240 --> 00:32:29,080
Speaker 1: apparently she found her niche playing this, this exact sort

574
00:32:29,120 --> 00:32:33,600
Speaker 1: of domineering moms step mom character. So apparently this is she.

575
00:32:33,840 --> 00:32:36,960
Speaker 1: She had a later career based on this type of character.

576
00:32:37,200 --> 00:32:41,320
Speaker 1: Wicked stepmother for life, yes, all right? And then Baba

577
00:32:41,400 --> 00:32:44,080
Speaker 1: Yaga the witch. Oh this is such a great character

578
00:32:44,240 --> 00:32:46,680
Speaker 1: and such a great screen presence in this film. She

579
00:32:46,960 --> 00:32:52,320
Speaker 1: is played by the actor um uh G Glory mil

580
00:32:52,440 --> 00:32:57,680
Speaker 1: Jar who lived nineteen o three through nineteen So this

581
00:32:58,040 --> 00:33:01,320
Speaker 1: this guy was a comedic Russian actor who also seems

582
00:33:01,360 --> 00:33:06,000
Speaker 1: to have specialized in playing supernatural folkloric villains. He played

583
00:33:06,080 --> 00:33:10,760
Speaker 1: Baba Yaga five times for for Alexander Rowe, and he

584
00:33:10,880 --> 00:33:14,560
Speaker 1: played um Kashkai the Immortal something like four times. He

585
00:33:14,640 --> 00:33:19,719
Speaker 1: also played Judo Uto, He played our um Goroko, various

586
00:33:19,880 --> 00:33:23,160
Speaker 1: devils and demons. So if you needed, if you needed

587
00:33:23,200 --> 00:33:26,160
Speaker 1: somebody to play this kind of menacing but also slightly

588
00:33:26,280 --> 00:33:30,959
Speaker 1: comedic villain, uh, this was your guy. He he has

589
00:33:31,080 --> 00:33:33,280
Speaker 1: given it his all. I don't want to cheapen it

590
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:36,880
Speaker 1: by this comparison, but for like modern American audiences think

591
00:33:37,200 --> 00:33:41,920
Speaker 1: like a level of commitment to to a frantic physical performance,

592
00:33:42,160 --> 00:33:46,520
Speaker 1: sort of like like Jim Carey in the nineties. Yeah, yeah,

593
00:33:46,640 --> 00:33:49,600
Speaker 1: like if in like in a sense, he's kind of like,

594
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:52,800
Speaker 1: you know, a big name monster player, you know, like

595
00:33:52,960 --> 00:33:56,560
Speaker 1: a Boris Karlaf But imagine if if Boris Karloff were

596
00:33:56,720 --> 00:34:00,440
Speaker 1: merged with you know, you know, you know, with one

597
00:34:00,480 --> 00:34:03,800
Speaker 1: of these just outlandish physical comedians. Uh, this is what

598
00:34:03,920 --> 00:34:06,680
Speaker 1: you might have, all right. We also have an interesting

599
00:34:06,760 --> 00:34:09,839
Speaker 1: bandit chief character who pops up in this played by

600
00:34:10,480 --> 00:34:14,440
Speaker 1: Anatoly Kubotsky who lived nineteen o eight through two thousand

601
00:34:14,520 --> 00:34:18,240
Speaker 1: and one. Character a Russian character actor who often played

602
00:34:18,320 --> 00:34:22,960
Speaker 1: heavies and bandits and kings and frequently worked with Alexander Rowe. Uh.

603
00:34:23,040 --> 00:34:24,919
Speaker 1: He's pretty fun in this. It is not a huge part,

604
00:34:25,040 --> 00:34:26,759
Speaker 1: but you know, he has a lot of you know,

605
00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:31,200
Speaker 1: snarling of scenes where you know he's he's staring off

606
00:34:31,320 --> 00:34:34,120
Speaker 1: and and uh off screen and looking very suspicious and

607
00:34:34,360 --> 00:34:37,279
Speaker 1: uh and greedy. So it's it's a fun role. He

608
00:34:37,360 --> 00:34:39,359
Speaker 1: has a great line that really sticks in my head

609
00:34:39,480 --> 00:34:44,480
Speaker 1: where in the English dub after Van has like apparently

610
00:34:44,640 --> 00:34:47,440
Speaker 1: magically thrown all of the bandits clubs up in the

611
00:34:47,520 --> 00:34:50,439
Speaker 1: sky so that they don't fall back down until months later,

612
00:34:51,680 --> 00:34:58,800
Speaker 1: the bandit chief just says, that's odd. I love it. Yeah, alright,

613
00:34:58,920 --> 00:35:00,360
Speaker 1: I just one more name to minh and since we

614
00:35:00,440 --> 00:35:04,040
Speaker 1: do tend to to to point out who did the music, Uh,

615
00:35:04,120 --> 00:35:07,520
Speaker 1: it was an individibal by the name of Nicolay Budashkin

616
00:35:07,560 --> 00:35:11,520
Speaker 1: who lived nineteen ten through I don't know much about him,

617
00:35:11,560 --> 00:35:13,919
Speaker 1: but he also did the music on through fire Water

618
00:35:14,040 --> 00:35:17,160
Speaker 1: and brass pipes. Uh, and yeah, I mean the score

619
00:35:17,280 --> 00:35:20,040
Speaker 1: is delightful in this it's uh, it's it's it's beautiful

620
00:35:20,160 --> 00:35:32,799
Speaker 1: and magical. Now. I don't really remember this introduction from

621
00:35:32,920 --> 00:35:35,560
Speaker 1: the Mystery Science Theater version. Maybe it's in there. But

622
00:35:35,880 --> 00:35:38,920
Speaker 1: the movie kicks right off letting you know it's a

623
00:35:39,000 --> 00:35:42,640
Speaker 1: fairy tale, because it begins with with a grandmother sort

624
00:35:42,680 --> 00:35:47,480
Speaker 1: of opening some like the wooden windows, the wooden shutters

625
00:35:47,560 --> 00:35:50,680
Speaker 1: of a playhouse, and she leans into the window and

626
00:35:51,040 --> 00:35:53,400
Speaker 1: and says the you know, once upon a time an

627
00:35:53,440 --> 00:35:55,760
Speaker 1: old man and an old woman lived in a village

628
00:35:55,800 --> 00:35:58,600
Speaker 1: with their daughters. So it's like you're you're being told

629
00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:01,840
Speaker 1: a a fairy hill. Buy your babushka, right, you know,

630
00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:04,640
Speaker 1: before bed or something. Yeah, yeah, this this is a

631
00:36:04,719 --> 00:36:08,239
Speaker 1: great opening, And apparently the exact same opening occurs in

632
00:36:08,320 --> 00:36:11,160
Speaker 1: other Row films with with I don't know if it's

633
00:36:11,160 --> 00:36:15,000
Speaker 1: the same grandmother type character, but a very similar storyteller

634
00:36:15,440 --> 00:36:17,440
Speaker 1: um saying yes, this is a folk tale, let me

635
00:36:17,520 --> 00:36:19,799
Speaker 1: tell it to you. And uh, yeah, this was cut

636
00:36:19,880 --> 00:36:21,759
Speaker 1: from the MS T three K version, I'm sure for

637
00:36:21,960 --> 00:36:24,719
Speaker 1: for time as they frequently did with those films. But

638
00:36:24,840 --> 00:36:27,839
Speaker 1: I also love it because if you remove her from

639
00:36:27,920 --> 00:36:32,080
Speaker 1: the film, there aren't really any like nice old Russian

640
00:36:32,200 --> 00:36:34,920
Speaker 1: ladies in the movie. You know, it's like mostly the

641
00:36:35,000 --> 00:36:39,080
Speaker 1: evil step mom, a you know, a would be mother

642
00:36:39,200 --> 00:36:42,120
Speaker 1: in law who's also kind of scheming, and then a

643
00:36:42,200 --> 00:36:46,040
Speaker 1: matchmaker who, um, I don't know. I guess the matchmaker

644
00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:49,320
Speaker 1: isn't isn't terrible, but still she lacks the charm of

645
00:36:49,440 --> 00:36:53,960
Speaker 1: this this grandmotherly storyteller who's here to entertain us. I think,

646
00:36:54,600 --> 00:36:57,080
Speaker 1: I think Yvonne's mom is you want to meet her

647
00:36:57,120 --> 00:36:59,040
Speaker 1: for a second, But she like gives him, she gives

648
00:36:59,120 --> 00:37:01,760
Speaker 1: him good advice that he doesn't obey though he should

649
00:37:01,840 --> 00:37:04,360
Speaker 1: have right And she also, I mean, she's just like

650
00:37:04,880 --> 00:37:07,440
Speaker 1: like she's desperately like trying to to tell him to

651
00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:10,520
Speaker 1: live his his his life correctly as he's leaving the house.

652
00:37:10,600 --> 00:37:12,680
Speaker 1: So I don't know, it's it's a very desperate scene

653
00:37:12,719 --> 00:37:14,600
Speaker 1: and not really a warm one. I guess you give

654
00:37:14,640 --> 00:37:17,560
Speaker 1: me a nice blind lady later on, but but nothing

655
00:37:17,640 --> 00:37:20,400
Speaker 1: like the grandma here who is speaking directly to us. No,

656
00:37:20,520 --> 00:37:22,120
Speaker 1: but you've got to give a shout out to Vaughan's

657
00:37:22,160 --> 00:37:25,560
Speaker 1: mom and she's right about everything. He's like, I'm running

658
00:37:25,560 --> 00:37:29,239
Speaker 1: off to cause trouble. I'm I'm gonna go rolling through

659
00:37:29,280 --> 00:37:31,640
Speaker 1: the woods, getting into getting in all kinds of mischief.

660
00:37:31,719 --> 00:37:34,560
Speaker 1: And she's like, wait, respect your elders. If he'd only

661
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:37,239
Speaker 1: listened to her, she could have saved him a lot

662
00:37:37,280 --> 00:37:39,520
Speaker 1: of grief. But isn't that always the way? Well, anyway,

663
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:42,120
Speaker 1: so you get the introduction that she says, you know,

664
00:37:42,280 --> 00:37:44,600
Speaker 1: she she explains the situation, which is similar to the

665
00:37:44,680 --> 00:37:48,440
Speaker 1: beginning of the original folk tale about grandfather Frost. You

666
00:37:48,520 --> 00:37:51,600
Speaker 1: get the two daughters. Uh, Nastica was the daughter of

667
00:37:51,680 --> 00:37:54,640
Speaker 1: the old man. Marfushika was the daughter of the old woman,

668
00:37:55,320 --> 00:37:58,280
Speaker 1: and uh. And then you fade to these idyllic scenes

669
00:37:58,400 --> 00:38:01,120
Speaker 1: of rural life. So you've got sunrise on a river

670
00:38:01,360 --> 00:38:04,840
Speaker 1: that's very smooth, in an old house deep in the woods,

671
00:38:04,960 --> 00:38:07,319
Speaker 1: and you see the family sleeping inside, or at least

672
00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:10,600
Speaker 1: most of the family, because the first character we get

673
00:38:10,600 --> 00:38:13,359
Speaker 1: to see is Marfushka. Again, this is played by by

674
00:38:13,440 --> 00:38:17,279
Speaker 1: inachure Cova. She is sleeping. And so there's a thing

675
00:38:17,320 --> 00:38:20,240
Speaker 1: I was wondering about, whether this is a real feature

676
00:38:20,480 --> 00:38:22,759
Speaker 1: of I don't know this time and place. Something you

677
00:38:22,800 --> 00:38:25,120
Speaker 1: would find in these rural Russian houses, or if this

678
00:38:25,280 --> 00:38:28,040
Speaker 1: is saying something about the character, but she's like a

679
00:38:28,719 --> 00:38:31,600
Speaker 1: like a teenager sleeping in what appears to be kind

680
00:38:31,640 --> 00:38:33,920
Speaker 1: of a crib, like it's like a wooden box. I

681
00:38:34,000 --> 00:38:36,520
Speaker 1: think that maybe rocks And I wonder if that's supposed

682
00:38:36,520 --> 00:38:38,839
Speaker 1: to be like, oh, she's spoiled like a baby. Yeah,

683
00:38:38,880 --> 00:38:40,920
Speaker 1: I don't know. I guess I always thought it was just, yeah,

684
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:42,680
Speaker 1: she's kind of a big baby, so of course she's

685
00:38:42,719 --> 00:38:44,840
Speaker 1: in something like a crib. But it's possible that this

686
00:38:44,960 --> 00:38:47,880
Speaker 1: is some sort of traditional box bed. I know we

687
00:38:48,000 --> 00:38:51,640
Speaker 1: have some we have some Russian listeners and listeners with

688
00:38:52,680 --> 00:38:56,360
Speaker 1: uh with with Russian roots or or or a greater

689
00:38:57,160 --> 00:39:00,400
Speaker 1: knowledge of of Russian customs. Perhaps you can chime in

690
00:39:00,920 --> 00:39:03,280
Speaker 1: on this. Is this something that an adult would actually

691
00:39:03,360 --> 00:39:07,360
Speaker 1: be sleeping in or is this just about telling us

692
00:39:07,440 --> 00:39:09,960
Speaker 1: that she's a big baby? Well, I think something that

693
00:39:10,040 --> 00:39:11,920
Speaker 1: has got to be true to the original, to the

694
00:39:12,000 --> 00:39:14,840
Speaker 1: Russian setting is the fact that she is being bothered

695
00:39:15,080 --> 00:39:18,320
Speaker 1: by mosquito. Is they're they're buzzing around her face, you know,

696
00:39:18,920 --> 00:39:22,239
Speaker 1: I hear the mosquitoes can be really rough h in

697
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:25,560
Speaker 1: the Russian woods and so they're they're buzzing around and

698
00:39:26,080 --> 00:39:30,320
Speaker 1: her her mother wakes up and she sees what's going on.

699
00:39:30,520 --> 00:39:33,279
Speaker 1: Oh no, my my poor baby is being bothered by mosquitoes.

700
00:39:33,360 --> 00:39:36,040
Speaker 1: So she wakes up her husband and makes him sit

701
00:39:36,160 --> 00:39:39,560
Speaker 1: at Marfushika's bedside to wave a branch over her face

702
00:39:39,640 --> 00:39:42,919
Speaker 1: to keep the mosquitoes away while she and she also

703
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:46,680
Speaker 1: gives her a lollipop to enjoy while she's sleeping. Is

704
00:39:46,760 --> 00:39:49,160
Speaker 1: that Is that normal or is that just a fairytale thing?

705
00:39:49,360 --> 00:39:52,239
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean, all all babies would love

706
00:39:52,320 --> 00:39:54,840
Speaker 1: to have a lollipop whilst sleeping, but you know, the

707
00:39:55,000 --> 00:39:57,200
Speaker 1: only parents are not going to give it to them. Uh,

708
00:39:57,960 --> 00:40:00,480
Speaker 1: But yeah, I don't know. I can't speak to that.

709
00:40:00,680 --> 00:40:03,640
Speaker 1: But the the interesting thing about the lollipop is that,

710
00:40:04,040 --> 00:40:07,360
Speaker 1: again the MST three K version of this, the video quality,

711
00:40:07,760 --> 00:40:11,840
Speaker 1: certainly on versions that lasted after the show went away. Initially,

712
00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:15,400
Speaker 1: the video quality is so poor that I all I

713
00:40:15,480 --> 00:40:18,279
Speaker 1: saw was red lollipop. It wasn't until I watched a

714
00:40:18,440 --> 00:40:20,400
Speaker 1: nice HD version of it that I saw that the

715
00:40:20,440 --> 00:40:23,920
Speaker 1: red lollipop is in the shape of a rooster, and

716
00:40:24,080 --> 00:40:25,960
Speaker 1: so I I looked into this. So it's like, why

717
00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:27,480
Speaker 1: why Is it in the shape of a rooster? Is

718
00:40:27,560 --> 00:40:29,319
Speaker 1: this a thing? And yes, it is indeed a thing.

719
00:40:29,440 --> 00:40:31,640
Speaker 1: There's this If something is in this film, I guess

720
00:40:31,760 --> 00:40:33,520
Speaker 1: there's a very good chance that it. I mean, it's

721
00:40:33,560 --> 00:40:36,560
Speaker 1: there for a reason. Um. There's a whole history to this.

722
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:41,240
Speaker 1: According to the website Russia Beyond Russian lollipops or leadin

723
00:40:41,280 --> 00:40:44,920
Speaker 1: its uh date back to the thirteenth century. The rooster

724
00:40:45,160 --> 00:40:47,359
Speaker 1: is there a tradition. There are other molds that are

725
00:40:47,440 --> 00:40:49,879
Speaker 1: used other animals, but that the rooster is the main

726
00:40:50,000 --> 00:40:53,280
Speaker 1: one because the rooster is a quote magical and regal

727
00:40:53,360 --> 00:40:57,480
Speaker 1: bird in Russian fairy tales, and by the nineteenth century

728
00:40:57,520 --> 00:41:00,440
Speaker 1: it was especially a big deal. So they're not always

729
00:41:00,480 --> 00:41:02,880
Speaker 1: red in color. I think this might have to do

730
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:06,080
Speaker 1: with the use of beat sugar, or perhaps then using

731
00:41:06,520 --> 00:41:09,520
Speaker 1: beat sugar and then beat juice to to color it.

732
00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:12,239
Speaker 1: Uh so. But sometimes they're more of a of a

733
00:41:12,360 --> 00:41:15,360
Speaker 1: brown color, and sometimes they're more yet more caramel colored

734
00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:18,279
Speaker 1: in nature. But they're still around. You can still buy them.

735
00:41:19,000 --> 00:41:22,120
Speaker 1: You can order them online. Um, and they're still sold

736
00:41:22,160 --> 00:41:24,640
Speaker 1: in Russian candy shops. Oh my god, what a good

737
00:41:24,719 --> 00:41:29,000
Speaker 1: Christmas gift. Getting somebody a bunch of more Fushkill lollipops. Yeah,

738
00:41:29,080 --> 00:41:31,040
Speaker 1: I really, after I've learned this, it's like, oh man,

739
00:41:31,120 --> 00:41:32,560
Speaker 1: now I want one. I don't know if I want

740
00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:34,160
Speaker 1: to sleep with it. That you know I want one.

741
00:41:34,480 --> 00:41:37,520
Speaker 1: You know, I've outgrown certain concerns about looking cool and

742
00:41:37,920 --> 00:41:40,640
Speaker 1: there's something, you know, like dignity questions I don't really

743
00:41:40,719 --> 00:41:43,920
Speaker 1: care about. But I will not eat the rooster lollipop.

744
00:41:44,120 --> 00:41:46,600
Speaker 1: That's that's a line that will not just in general

745
00:41:46,760 --> 00:41:51,680
Speaker 1: or only at night. Never what, well, I'll have to

746
00:41:51,680 --> 00:41:54,640
Speaker 1: get you one. You might change your mind, Okay, But anyway,

747
00:41:54,760 --> 00:41:56,640
Speaker 1: I think we're supposed to get the message. Okay, you

748
00:41:56,719 --> 00:41:59,040
Speaker 1: know they're giving her a lollipop all she's sleeping, So

749
00:41:59,120 --> 00:42:02,360
Speaker 1: I guess Marfushka is a spoiled brad even win asleep.

750
00:42:02,880 --> 00:42:04,960
Speaker 1: But then meanwhile we get the mother going into the

751
00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:08,560
Speaker 1: next room to see her stepdaughter, Nastia, who again corresponds

752
00:42:08,560 --> 00:42:10,879
Speaker 1: to the good daughter from the folk tale The Nice

753
00:42:10,960 --> 00:42:14,759
Speaker 1: One and Uh. Nastia is staying up through the night

754
00:42:14,920 --> 00:42:18,440
Speaker 1: to knit a pair of stockings that her stepmother asked

755
00:42:18,480 --> 00:42:21,880
Speaker 1: her to make for Marfushka, and when she comes in

756
00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:24,239
Speaker 1: and finds her hard at work, the stepmother is still

757
00:42:24,360 --> 00:42:27,400
Speaker 1: not satisfied. She She's like, I told you to make

758
00:42:27,440 --> 00:42:29,319
Speaker 1: the stockings, but I didn't tell you to click your

759
00:42:29,400 --> 00:42:32,759
Speaker 1: needles like that. You'll wake up, my darling girl. So

760
00:42:33,600 --> 00:42:36,440
Speaker 1: Nastia has sent outside in the cold to finish knitting,

761
00:42:37,000 --> 00:42:39,880
Speaker 1: and the stepmother is so mean. She says, the stockings

762
00:42:39,960 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 1: have to be finished by the time the rooster crows,

763
00:42:42,680 --> 00:42:45,239
Speaker 1: and she says, otherwise, my precious little girl, I will

764
00:42:45,320 --> 00:42:49,000
Speaker 1: tear your braid off. There's a lot of threats of

765
00:42:49,200 --> 00:42:52,760
Speaker 1: braid violence in this movie, yeah, the removal of braids.

766
00:42:52,880 --> 00:42:56,520
Speaker 1: And then, of course it's revealed that the stepsister does

767
00:42:56,600 --> 00:43:01,080
Speaker 1: not have an actual braid, she has a store bought braid. So, yeah,

768
00:43:01,520 --> 00:43:04,360
Speaker 1: I guess you know commentary on you know which daughter

769
00:43:04,640 --> 00:43:08,200
Speaker 1: is legitimately beautiful and good and which one is artificially

770
00:43:08,239 --> 00:43:11,920
Speaker 1: beautiful and good, which, of course is based entirely on

771
00:43:12,160 --> 00:43:15,480
Speaker 1: hair length. We can't respect that enough, right, Yes, hair

772
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:19,800
Speaker 1: length directly corresponds to moral virtue. Yeah, but I like,

773
00:43:19,960 --> 00:43:21,919
Speaker 1: I noticed the little thing. This is also in keeping

774
00:43:22,000 --> 00:43:24,000
Speaker 1: with the fairy tale, at least the version chronicled by

775
00:43:24,080 --> 00:43:27,759
Speaker 1: Andrew Lang, which is that the family dog barks at

776
00:43:27,800 --> 00:43:30,920
Speaker 1: the wicked stepmother when she's being mean Dynastia, so like

777
00:43:31,040 --> 00:43:33,920
Speaker 1: the dog is taking nastias side, just like in the

778
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:37,879
Speaker 1: story the dog takes the good daughter's side. Back at home,

779
00:43:38,040 --> 00:43:40,120
Speaker 1: She's like, you know, I'll give you a pancake if

780
00:43:40,200 --> 00:43:42,560
Speaker 1: you say that that the good daughter is bad and

781
00:43:42,600 --> 00:43:44,560
Speaker 1: the bad daughter is good and the dogs like, no,

782
00:43:44,800 --> 00:43:49,040
Speaker 1: I won't. Yeah, that the dog is important in this

783
00:43:49,239 --> 00:43:52,560
Speaker 1: movie as our other animals, like, they're not just they're

784
00:43:52,560 --> 00:43:55,400
Speaker 1: not just hanging around like they have agency, even if

785
00:43:55,480 --> 00:43:58,440
Speaker 1: the movie didn't go to the degree of having them

786
00:43:58,480 --> 00:44:02,000
Speaker 1: actually speak with dubbed human voices, though some of the

787
00:44:02,080 --> 00:44:04,240
Speaker 1: animals in the movie do speak. Yeah, like do they speak?

788
00:44:04,360 --> 00:44:05,840
Speaker 1: As I was trying to remember just now, I was like,

789
00:44:06,320 --> 00:44:09,600
Speaker 1: the pig speak, does the cat speak? The rooster speaks?

790
00:44:09,680 --> 00:44:12,440
Speaker 1: You remember, Oh, yes, that's right, that's coming right up.

791
00:44:12,480 --> 00:44:15,200
Speaker 1: So the sun's about to rise and a rooster hops

792
00:44:15,280 --> 00:44:17,759
Speaker 1: up into frame. Remember the stepmother was like, Okay, if

793
00:44:17,800 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 1: you don't finish these stockings by the time the rooster crows,

794
00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:24,120
Speaker 1: I'm gonna tear your braid off. And then uh, Nastya

795
00:44:24,160 --> 00:44:26,560
Speaker 1: goes and negotiates with the rooster. She's like, give me

796
00:44:26,600 --> 00:44:29,960
Speaker 1: a little time, please, pretty rooster. Uh, I guess she's

797
00:44:29,960 --> 00:44:33,240
Speaker 1: flattering him, or no, she's not, probably not flattering because

798
00:44:33,280 --> 00:44:36,279
Speaker 1: she's she's good and honest. So she just genuinely thinks

799
00:44:36,360 --> 00:44:38,400
Speaker 1: the rooster is pretty and throws that in there just

800
00:44:38,480 --> 00:44:41,600
Speaker 1: to be nice, and the rooster, actually talking with the

801
00:44:41,719 --> 00:44:45,239
Speaker 1: human voice, says, uh, sorry, roosters only obeyed the sun.

802
00:44:45,480 --> 00:44:47,359
Speaker 1: So you'll have to go. You have to you gotta

803
00:44:47,400 --> 00:44:49,719
Speaker 1: talk to my boss. You gotta, you gotta go deal

804
00:44:49,760 --> 00:44:53,080
Speaker 1: with the rosy finger Dawn. So she goes to plead

805
00:44:53,160 --> 00:44:56,480
Speaker 1: with rosy Finger Dawn. And she so she goes up

806
00:44:56,560 --> 00:44:59,560
Speaker 1: on this hillside with these trees behind her, and it's

807
00:44:59,600 --> 00:45:02,840
Speaker 1: like this crest crest of grassy hill that rises up

808
00:45:02,880 --> 00:45:06,520
Speaker 1: by the river, and she faces the sun and pleads

809
00:45:06,640 --> 00:45:09,759
Speaker 1: with it, and apparently the sun is so moved by

810
00:45:09,840 --> 00:45:12,640
Speaker 1: pity for her it sinks back down over the horizon

811
00:45:12,760 --> 00:45:15,880
Speaker 1: and gives her time to finish the stockings. And I

812
00:45:15,960 --> 00:45:18,080
Speaker 1: guess I think this was the first moment in the

813
00:45:18,160 --> 00:45:20,759
Speaker 1: movie where I was like, huh, Like, so far it's

814
00:45:20,800 --> 00:45:25,399
Speaker 1: been interesting and funny, but this scene is actually quite beautiful. Yeah, yeah,

815
00:45:25,719 --> 00:45:30,000
Speaker 1: And I have to admit when we recorded our our current,

816
00:45:30,000 --> 00:45:33,120
Speaker 1: I guess is the current series on time travel fiction.

817
00:45:33,400 --> 00:45:36,280
Speaker 1: I kept thinking of this like this, in some ways

818
00:45:36,440 --> 00:45:39,880
Speaker 1: is kind of a folkloric time travel into the past.

819
00:45:40,000 --> 00:45:43,239
Speaker 1: That the literal turning back of the clock, but not

820
00:45:43,440 --> 00:45:46,759
Speaker 1: the clock on the wall, but the clock, the celestial clock,

821
00:45:46,880 --> 00:45:50,000
Speaker 1: the great celestial clock of the the the the actual

822
00:45:50,160 --> 00:45:53,560
Speaker 1: movement of the sun. It's like Joshua stilling the sun

823
00:45:53,680 --> 00:45:56,319
Speaker 1: in the sky so he could finish his battle. Yeah,

824
00:45:56,760 --> 00:45:59,759
Speaker 1: and it works. So so it works. She she has

825
00:45:59,800 --> 00:46:02,280
Speaker 1: to him to finish the stockings before the brewster crows.

826
00:46:02,600 --> 00:46:05,000
Speaker 1: But you know what, the wicked stepmother is just still

827
00:46:05,080 --> 00:46:07,200
Speaker 1: not impressed. She comes out and she's like, so you

828
00:46:07,360 --> 00:46:09,600
Speaker 1: did it on time. Why you wicked little viper, You

829
00:46:09,719 --> 00:46:13,719
Speaker 1: wicked little witch. I'll give you much harder work next time. Uh.

830
00:46:14,040 --> 00:46:17,359
Speaker 1: You know, which is relatable dynamic to a lot of people. Maybe,

831
00:46:17,520 --> 00:46:20,000
Speaker 1: I'm sure at some point in your life everybody might

832
00:46:20,080 --> 00:46:22,600
Speaker 1: have had the experience of trying really hard, you know,

833
00:46:22,760 --> 00:46:26,960
Speaker 1: working hard to complete some task that seemed impossible, only

834
00:46:27,040 --> 00:46:30,320
Speaker 1: to discover that doing so is maybe not really rewarded

835
00:46:30,400 --> 00:46:33,279
Speaker 1: or appreciated. Instead makes people expect even more of you

836
00:46:33,400 --> 00:46:36,719
Speaker 1: in the future. Maybe that's more often a work thing

837
00:46:36,840 --> 00:46:38,960
Speaker 1: than than a family thing. I don't know, well, I've

838
00:46:39,000 --> 00:46:41,400
Speaker 1: encountered shades of it when in Dungeons and Dragons, like

839
00:46:41,480 --> 00:46:44,560
Speaker 1: when the dungeon master gives you an encounter and things

840
00:46:44,640 --> 00:46:47,560
Speaker 1: go a little bit too easy. Yeah, they just sort

841
00:46:47,560 --> 00:46:51,200
Speaker 1: of like ad hawc make up another one to punish you, Yeah,

842
00:46:51,320 --> 00:46:53,120
Speaker 1: or like next time, I don't have to make it harder,

843
00:46:54,360 --> 00:46:56,680
Speaker 1: like it's okay to with with. Sometimes we need a

844
00:46:56,719 --> 00:46:59,799
Speaker 1: cake walk, sometimes we need to win Natural twenty why

845
00:46:59,840 --> 00:47:05,640
Speaker 1: you wicked Little Vipers exactly. But as a reward, of course, Yeah,

846
00:47:05,640 --> 00:47:08,880
Speaker 1: she's going to get more chores, stuff like watering random

847
00:47:08,960 --> 00:47:12,560
Speaker 1: stumps and so forth. Yes, yeah, exactly. So she's sent

848
00:47:12,640 --> 00:47:14,400
Speaker 1: off with this big list of other chores to do

849
00:47:14,480 --> 00:47:17,200
Speaker 1: around the farm. Uh. And then we cut to meeting

850
00:47:17,400 --> 00:47:19,239
Speaker 1: one of our other main characters. I guess our two

851
00:47:19,320 --> 00:47:22,320
Speaker 1: main characters are Nastia and then this new character, Yvonne.

852
00:47:22,920 --> 00:47:25,160
Speaker 1: And so we see him coming out of his house.

853
00:47:25,239 --> 00:47:29,080
Speaker 1: We learned he's from another village nearby, and immediately we

854
00:47:29,160 --> 00:47:32,640
Speaker 1: get the vibe about Yvonne that he is young and strong,

855
00:47:33,000 --> 00:47:36,759
Speaker 1: but proud and vain, And so he walks out of

856
00:47:36,800 --> 00:47:39,520
Speaker 1: his house sort of, you know, chest puffed out looking

857
00:47:39,960 --> 00:47:44,000
Speaker 1: looking into a handheld mirror and and just really enjoying himself,

858
00:47:44,160 --> 00:47:47,239
Speaker 1: enjoying his own reflection and uh, like we were talking

859
00:47:47,239 --> 00:47:49,200
Speaker 1: about a minute ago, we see his his mother comes

860
00:47:49,200 --> 00:47:51,160
Speaker 1: out behind him, and she really worries for him. As

861
00:47:51,520 --> 00:47:54,360
Speaker 1: as he's leaving the house, she implores him not to

862
00:47:54,480 --> 00:47:57,279
Speaker 1: forget her. So it's as if he's just going off

863
00:47:57,360 --> 00:48:00,879
Speaker 1: to maybe never return, who knows. And she tells him

864
00:48:00,960 --> 00:48:03,279
Speaker 1: that he should should not harm the weak and that

865
00:48:03,560 --> 00:48:06,920
Speaker 1: he should respect his elders. Yeah, and he yeah, he

866
00:48:07,120 --> 00:48:11,880
Speaker 1: is a character cature of of of arrogance and uh

867
00:48:12,320 --> 00:48:15,120
Speaker 1: and and beauty. But also, I mean the thing about Vane,

868
00:48:15,239 --> 00:48:17,279
Speaker 1: and again it's my understanding that they are sort of

869
00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,280
Speaker 1: different versions of Vane that you encounter in the stories.

870
00:48:20,560 --> 00:48:23,000
Speaker 1: Like he has all the tools to back to back

871
00:48:23,080 --> 00:48:26,480
Speaker 1: it up, Like he is a beautiful man. He he

872
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:30,279
Speaker 1: does have like almost godlike powers. He is he's like

873
00:48:30,360 --> 00:48:34,800
Speaker 1: a Russian Hercules. Um uh. And he's also he's he's

874
00:48:35,160 --> 00:48:37,640
Speaker 1: he has a is a great mind. He's he's able

875
00:48:37,680 --> 00:48:40,920
Speaker 1: to trick people out of hurting him without necessarily getting

876
00:48:40,920 --> 00:48:43,560
Speaker 1: into a physical battle with him. But he is just

877
00:48:44,160 --> 00:48:47,000
Speaker 1: crushing le Vain, right, I mean, I think it picks

878
00:48:47,080 --> 00:48:49,360
Speaker 1: up on a folk tale theme that I find interesting.

879
00:48:49,400 --> 00:48:54,640
Speaker 1: Many folk tales concern concerned characters who are themselves vulnerable

880
00:48:54,760 --> 00:48:59,200
Speaker 1: to some more powerful uh threat within the story of

881
00:48:59,320 --> 00:49:03,600
Speaker 1: monster or a bear and animal of banded or something um.

882
00:49:03,840 --> 00:49:06,000
Speaker 1: But there's another type of folk tale that is about

883
00:49:06,040 --> 00:49:09,040
Speaker 1: the reckless arrogance of the strong young man. It's not

884
00:49:09,160 --> 00:49:13,200
Speaker 1: that he's vulnerable, it's that his that his strength and

885
00:49:13,360 --> 00:49:16,880
Speaker 1: his freedom make him a danger to himself and others

886
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:20,120
Speaker 1: right right, and he he can't even though he has

887
00:49:20,120 --> 00:49:23,360
Speaker 1: all the tools to be a true hero, He's not

888
00:49:23,440 --> 00:49:25,879
Speaker 1: going to be one until he learns like the right

889
00:49:26,040 --> 00:49:29,160
Speaker 1: path in life and and and actually starts um that,

890
00:49:29,440 --> 00:49:32,799
Speaker 1: you know, acting on the true values of of moral life.

891
00:49:33,360 --> 00:49:35,480
Speaker 1: But as soon as we see Vans setting out from

892
00:49:35,520 --> 00:49:38,479
Speaker 1: his house to to go on his wanderings, a song

893
00:49:38,560 --> 00:49:41,759
Speaker 1: and dancing begins, and I just I also don't know

894
00:49:41,840 --> 00:49:44,480
Speaker 1: if I remember this song and dancing from the Mystery

895
00:49:44,480 --> 00:49:46,719
Speaker 1: Science Theater, but I loved it. It's it's sort of

896
00:49:46,800 --> 00:49:51,279
Speaker 1: like Van's w W E entrance music. Uh. The song

897
00:49:51,480 --> 00:49:54,520
Speaker 1: is not translated in the dub, so I truly don't

898
00:49:54,600 --> 00:49:57,239
Speaker 1: know what they were singing about. But I'm guessing it's

899
00:49:57,239 --> 00:50:01,239
Speaker 1: about how everybody, including van On thinks Yvon is really

900
00:50:01,320 --> 00:50:04,800
Speaker 1: great scenes that way, And yeah, this is definitely a

901
00:50:04,840 --> 00:50:07,480
Speaker 1: scene that was not in the MST three K cut. Uh.

902
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:09,960
Speaker 1: So it's it's it's it's kind of like this delightful

903
00:50:10,640 --> 00:50:13,600
Speaker 1: uh bonus you get from watching it. You know, you

904
00:50:13,680 --> 00:50:15,400
Speaker 1: get to watch all these scenes you've you've seen a

905
00:50:15,440 --> 00:50:19,640
Speaker 1: million times transformed into something beautiful and then occasionally all

906
00:50:19,719 --> 00:50:23,880
Speaker 1: new scenes. But this leads into iv ongoing singing in

907
00:50:23,960 --> 00:50:26,399
Speaker 1: a tramping through the forests in the hills, and it's

908
00:50:26,480 --> 00:50:31,120
Speaker 1: just a really excellent musical scene. The song is good. Again,

909
00:50:31,200 --> 00:50:33,200
Speaker 1: it's not dubbed, so I don't know what it's about,

910
00:50:33,320 --> 00:50:35,600
Speaker 1: but I assume once it's Von by himself in the

911
00:50:35,640 --> 00:50:38,520
Speaker 1: woods singing, it's just, you know, I'm awesome, I'm the best.

912
00:50:38,640 --> 00:50:41,400
Speaker 1: I'm going to sing about myself. And then we go

913
00:50:41,560 --> 00:50:45,120
Speaker 1: straight into the bandit scene, which I did remember from

914
00:50:45,200 --> 00:50:48,320
Speaker 1: the from the other version, and the bandit scene is

915
00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,680
Speaker 1: a classic. It's how would we describe this one? Do

916
00:50:51,719 --> 00:50:54,200
Speaker 1: you want to take it? Oh? Well, it's just this

917
00:50:54,480 --> 00:50:58,200
Speaker 1: band of really only like watching this, It's it's easy

918
00:50:58,280 --> 00:51:00,400
Speaker 1: to imagine that they're not even humans, but there's some

919
00:51:00,480 --> 00:51:04,520
Speaker 1: sort of dwarves or trolls or something or gnomes. Because

920
00:51:04,560 --> 00:51:07,920
Speaker 1: it's just a bunch of very rugged looking, mostly bearded

921
00:51:08,040 --> 00:51:12,959
Speaker 1: men in mismatched garments setting around a campfire and they're

922
00:51:13,360 --> 00:51:16,479
Speaker 1: they're plucking the petals off of daisies. Uh, and they're

923
00:51:16,920 --> 00:51:18,640
Speaker 1: in they're they're trying to decide, they're trying to use

924
00:51:18,640 --> 00:51:20,799
Speaker 1: the daisies way to decide how they're gonna how they're

925
00:51:20,800 --> 00:51:24,319
Speaker 1: gonna go about their day, chanting we will rob them,

926
00:51:24,719 --> 00:51:28,160
Speaker 1: we won't rob them, we will eat them, we won't

927
00:51:28,239 --> 00:51:31,360
Speaker 1: eat them, et cetera. But the next one is we

928
00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:34,640
Speaker 1: will beat them, we will be beaten. So what happens

929
00:51:34,680 --> 00:51:37,160
Speaker 1: if they pick we will be beaten? They just still

930
00:51:37,200 --> 00:51:39,640
Speaker 1: get beaten. I don't think I never really noticed that

931
00:51:39,680 --> 00:51:42,960
Speaker 1: they were saying that part. Yeah, and the some of

932
00:51:43,040 --> 00:51:44,640
Speaker 1: the some of the bandits are like up in the

933
00:51:44,760 --> 00:51:47,839
Speaker 1: trees as lookout. So I love the set up here,

934
00:51:47,920 --> 00:51:50,560
Speaker 1: but of course that we're gonna have a clash of

935
00:51:50,640 --> 00:51:54,120
Speaker 1: the strong against the strong. Yvonne comes along whistling his

936
00:51:54,280 --> 00:51:58,200
Speaker 1: theme song, uh, still doing the tune of his entrance music,

937
00:51:58,840 --> 00:52:01,000
Speaker 1: and the bandits come up to him and they say Hey,

938
00:52:01,160 --> 00:52:03,839
Speaker 1: you're captured. Now we're going to rob you. I think

939
00:52:03,880 --> 00:52:07,520
Speaker 1: that's literally a quote, um, and so he says, all right,

940
00:52:07,600 --> 00:52:09,960
Speaker 1: then robbed me and he drops his satchel, which I

941
00:52:10,000 --> 00:52:12,920
Speaker 1: guess they would assume has his money in it, and

942
00:52:13,080 --> 00:52:15,560
Speaker 1: they start fighting over his satchel, and in doing so,

943
00:52:15,680 --> 00:52:19,600
Speaker 1: they dropped their clubs, and then Vaughan sets to grabbing

944
00:52:19,680 --> 00:52:21,920
Speaker 1: the clubs and chucking them way up in the air.

945
00:52:22,560 --> 00:52:25,120
Speaker 1: And then when when they're when they figure out what's

946
00:52:25,160 --> 00:52:26,440
Speaker 1: going on, they're like, hey, what do you do with

947
00:52:26,480 --> 00:52:28,359
Speaker 1: our clubs? And he's like, well, I threw them up

948
00:52:28,360 --> 00:52:33,000
Speaker 1: in the sky and they'll come down next winter. Okay, yeah,

949
00:52:33,040 --> 00:52:36,000
Speaker 1: it's great. I mean, the bandits are fearsome but but

950
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:39,719
Speaker 1: not the smartest, and Yvan is easily able to to

951
00:52:39,840 --> 00:52:42,600
Speaker 1: outsmart them without even really having to fight them. So

952
00:52:43,000 --> 00:52:46,480
Speaker 1: moving along, Van just goes about his business and then

953
00:52:46,560 --> 00:52:48,400
Speaker 1: the narrator comes in. I love that there were just

954
00:52:48,520 --> 00:52:51,279
Speaker 1: a few moments where a narrator suddenly talks. There's not

955
00:52:51,480 --> 00:52:53,560
Speaker 1: much narration in the movie, but every now and then

956
00:52:53,600 --> 00:52:56,000
Speaker 1: you get like a sentence or two, and it's kind

957
00:52:56,040 --> 00:52:58,520
Speaker 1: of jarring because it's like, whoa where did that come from?

958
00:52:59,440 --> 00:53:01,640
Speaker 1: But the nar vader says, how long did our young

959
00:53:01,760 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 1: hero Yvonne wander over hill? And Dale frankly, we have

960
00:53:04,719 --> 00:53:08,520
Speaker 1: no idea. And I was laughing when I saw that,

961
00:53:08,600 --> 00:53:11,160
Speaker 1: because I was like, who is we? Is this like

962
00:53:11,239 --> 00:53:14,040
Speaker 1: the God speaking like you know in Genesis? Let us

963
00:53:14,120 --> 00:53:19,200
Speaker 1: make man in our own image? Anyway, so the narrator says,

964
00:53:19,239 --> 00:53:22,120
Speaker 1: the fact remains that Ivan eventually reached far away in

965
00:53:22,280 --> 00:53:26,439
Speaker 1: unknown lands. And here is where we get another classic scene.

966
00:53:26,440 --> 00:53:28,600
Speaker 1: I think we talked about this scene a little bit

967
00:53:28,680 --> 00:53:31,919
Speaker 1: in our Mushroom Foraging episode, but this is the chase

968
00:53:32,000 --> 00:53:36,000
Speaker 1: scene between yvon and the old man Mushroom or grandfather Mushroom.

969
00:53:36,440 --> 00:53:39,480
Speaker 1: So Von meets this old man who wears a hat

970
00:53:39,640 --> 00:53:42,680
Speaker 1: that looks like a mushroom cap and uh he he

971
00:53:42,840 --> 00:53:47,120
Speaker 1: keeps disappearing and reappearing, and Von goes up to him

972
00:53:47,160 --> 00:53:51,440
Speaker 1: and says, are you a sorcerer, granddaddy? And uh he says,

973
00:53:51,680 --> 00:53:53,640
Speaker 1: I dabble in sorcery a little, but the truth is

974
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:56,880
Speaker 1: that I get bored. And what does that mean? Does

975
00:53:56,920 --> 00:54:00,239
Speaker 1: he get bored? Well, Grandfather Mushroom wants if On to

976
00:54:00,320 --> 00:54:03,200
Speaker 1: play hide and seek with him. Uh So, so they

977
00:54:03,239 --> 00:54:06,120
Speaker 1: work out a deal. If a Van can catch Grandfather Mushroom,

978
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:09,320
Speaker 1: he'll he will receive a well bent bow and some

979
00:54:09,520 --> 00:54:13,760
Speaker 1: straight arrows. But it is hard to catch Grandfather Mushroom

980
00:54:13,800 --> 00:54:16,200
Speaker 1: because he has the power to disappear and teleport. So

981
00:54:16,600 --> 00:54:20,080
Speaker 1: this does not really seem fair. So Van loses, but

982
00:54:20,400 --> 00:54:23,239
Speaker 1: because he admits to losing, the old man gives him

983
00:54:23,280 --> 00:54:26,640
Speaker 1: the bow and arrows anyway. But in keeping with the

984
00:54:26,719 --> 00:54:28,920
Speaker 1: themes of the original folk tale, here's what. So a

985
00:54:29,040 --> 00:54:33,080
Speaker 1: Vaughan is not in the classic Grandfather Frost, at least

986
00:54:33,120 --> 00:54:37,319
Speaker 1: the version chronicle by Andrew Lange, but the same rules apply.

987
00:54:37,480 --> 00:54:39,440
Speaker 1: So he has met a magical old man in the

988
00:54:39,480 --> 00:54:42,880
Speaker 1: woods and he is not courteous to him. He forgets

989
00:54:42,960 --> 00:54:45,680
Speaker 1: to say thank you for the bow, and he just

990
00:54:45,840 --> 00:54:48,040
Speaker 1: sort of he just sort of was like, Okay, I'm

991
00:54:48,040 --> 00:54:50,400
Speaker 1: gonna go about I'm gonna go about my business. And

992
00:54:50,440 --> 00:54:52,640
Speaker 1: the old man is like, hey, aren't you gonna say

993
00:54:52,680 --> 00:54:55,840
Speaker 1: thank you and bow to me? Bow your head and

994
00:54:55,920 --> 00:54:58,279
Speaker 1: if Vaughan says, those who bow run the risk of

995
00:54:58,400 --> 00:55:01,120
Speaker 1: losing their head, the bear or will bow before you

996
00:55:01,320 --> 00:55:05,160
Speaker 1: if you like, but not Yvonne, and this this is

997
00:55:05,239 --> 00:55:08,040
Speaker 1: bad news. So so Grandfather Mushroom is like then so

998
00:55:08,200 --> 00:55:10,120
Speaker 1: be it. Things will come to pass as you say.

999
00:55:10,280 --> 00:55:12,520
Speaker 1: The bear will bow before me down to the ground,

1000
00:55:12,600 --> 00:55:15,440
Speaker 1: but it is your back that will bend. So here

1001
00:55:15,480 --> 00:55:18,240
Speaker 1: we get the again, always be polite to old magical

1002
00:55:18,320 --> 00:55:29,239
Speaker 1: people in the woods. But eventually we got to have

1003
00:55:29,360 --> 00:55:32,440
Speaker 1: our our two protagonists or two plot lines collide. Right. So,

1004
00:55:33,440 --> 00:55:37,000
Speaker 1: so Yvonne comes across a carving on a rock that reads,

1005
00:55:37,320 --> 00:55:39,239
Speaker 1: find a feather in the fields and throw it to

1006
00:55:39,280 --> 00:55:41,319
Speaker 1: the winds, and if you follow that feather, you will

1007
00:55:41,360 --> 00:55:46,600
Speaker 1: find your destiny. So he has a uh, somewhat aggressive

1008
00:55:46,640 --> 00:55:49,040
Speaker 1: way of finding a feather in the fields. He shoots

1009
00:55:49,040 --> 00:55:52,160
Speaker 1: a bird with an arrow and then picks a feather

1010
00:55:52,239 --> 00:55:55,279
Speaker 1: off of it throws it. It floats all over all

1011
00:55:55,360 --> 00:55:57,680
Speaker 1: over the place, and he follows it and eventually it

1012
00:55:57,960 --> 00:56:02,040
Speaker 1: lands at a riverside where he finds Nastia. She is

1013
00:56:02,120 --> 00:56:04,799
Speaker 1: they're drawing water from the river. She's got her loyal

1014
00:56:04,880 --> 00:56:08,399
Speaker 1: buddy dog at the side, and she's singing this melancholy song,

1015
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:13,680
Speaker 1: and she is pouring water over a dead stump, and

1016
00:56:13,960 --> 00:56:16,399
Speaker 1: I Vaughn sees her falls in love at first sight,

1017
00:56:16,840 --> 00:56:19,640
Speaker 1: and he walks up to talk. She is, of course,

1018
00:56:19,680 --> 00:56:22,600
Speaker 1: hard at work watering the old stump. She says she's

1019
00:56:22,600 --> 00:56:25,000
Speaker 1: going to water it until flowers bloom out of it,

1020
00:56:25,200 --> 00:56:28,279
Speaker 1: something her stepmother told her to do, and I Vaughn's like,

1021
00:56:28,480 --> 00:56:30,759
Speaker 1: that's crazy. She she must she must be very mean

1022
00:56:30,840 --> 00:56:33,960
Speaker 1: to you. But Nastia does not complain. She's like, oh, no,

1023
00:56:34,120 --> 00:56:36,239
Speaker 1: it's fine, and you know I'll do it, and so

1024
00:56:36,480 --> 00:56:40,080
Speaker 1: ivn uh, I don't think there's really any lead up

1025
00:56:40,080 --> 00:56:42,279
Speaker 1: to this. He's just like, hey, will you marry me?

1026
00:56:43,120 --> 00:56:45,719
Speaker 1: So he's being very smooth, and she is like, I

1027
00:56:45,800 --> 00:56:48,040
Speaker 1: do not think we would make a good couple. And

1028
00:56:48,280 --> 00:56:50,200
Speaker 1: he wants to know why, and she says, well, it's

1029
00:56:50,239 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 1: because you're a braggert and I am not, and I

1030
00:56:53,719 --> 00:56:56,240
Speaker 1: like that. His response is, well, I'm not a braggert

1031
00:56:56,320 --> 00:56:59,360
Speaker 1: because I'm actually very good at everything, so he explains,

1032
00:56:59,400 --> 00:57:02,279
Speaker 1: so I guess not bragging if it's true. So he

1033
00:57:02,360 --> 00:57:05,279
Speaker 1: says he's a good fighter, he's a good fisherman, he's

1034
00:57:05,280 --> 00:57:08,239
Speaker 1: a great dancer, and he's a great hunter. And then

1035
00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:10,759
Speaker 1: he decides to show off how good he is at

1036
00:57:10,800 --> 00:57:13,560
Speaker 1: hunting by pulling out his bow and he says he's

1037
00:57:13,560 --> 00:57:15,400
Speaker 1: going to shoot a bear on the other side of

1038
00:57:15,440 --> 00:57:19,840
Speaker 1: the river and Nastia greatly opposes this. She says, no,

1039
00:57:20,040 --> 00:57:22,360
Speaker 1: she has cubs and she tries to stop him. So

1040
00:57:22,520 --> 00:57:25,000
Speaker 1: she calls out to her dog, who barks, and that

1041
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:27,720
Speaker 1: scares the bears and they run off, and then Nastia

1042
00:57:27,760 --> 00:57:30,880
Speaker 1: throws a bucket over Van's head. And then when the

1043
00:57:30,960 --> 00:57:35,440
Speaker 1: bucket comes off, the movie kicks into high gear because oops,

1044
00:57:35,520 --> 00:57:38,880
Speaker 1: here we get grandfather mushroom magic. And now yvon has

1045
00:57:38,920 --> 00:57:42,480
Speaker 1: a bear head and he sounds like Zoidberg. Yeah, I

1046
00:57:42,520 --> 00:57:45,040
Speaker 1: guess he does a bit, but yeah, it has this

1047
00:57:45,160 --> 00:57:49,120
Speaker 1: fabulous bear head that, um, I think it's actually well crafted,

1048
00:57:49,200 --> 00:57:51,360
Speaker 1: you know, I mean within the context of the of

1049
00:57:51,480 --> 00:57:54,040
Speaker 1: the film and the times. Uh, you know, it looks

1050
00:57:54,360 --> 00:57:57,920
Speaker 1: kind of terrifying but also kind of alive. Yeah. It's

1051
00:57:57,960 --> 00:58:01,560
Speaker 1: a very creepy looking also sometimes funny looking, and and

1052
00:58:01,720 --> 00:58:04,480
Speaker 1: his voice has changed. She no longer just sounds like Yvonne.

1053
00:58:04,560 --> 00:58:09,560
Speaker 1: He He's like, whoa, what has happened to me? And uh,

1054
00:58:09,720 --> 00:58:12,000
Speaker 1: when he realizes he has a bare head, he thinks

1055
00:58:12,080 --> 00:58:14,880
Speaker 1: that Nastia did it to him. He thinks that she

1056
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:19,960
Speaker 1: gave doesn't he I think he thinks she gave her head. Yeah, okay, yeah,

1057
00:58:20,040 --> 00:58:24,600
Speaker 1: because he starts saying, I curse you forever, you witch. Um,

1058
00:58:25,000 --> 00:58:27,800
Speaker 1: and he runs off and and is freaking out. This

1059
00:58:27,920 --> 00:58:30,280
Speaker 1: also looks very funny because he's just running between the

1060
00:58:30,360 --> 00:58:33,840
Speaker 1: trees sort of swinging his arms around and moaning, and

1061
00:58:34,320 --> 00:58:36,600
Speaker 1: Nastia is very sad and her tears fall in the

1062
00:58:36,720 --> 00:58:39,960
Speaker 1: river and for some reason this makes flowers bloom out

1063
00:58:40,000 --> 00:58:42,600
Speaker 1: of the dead stump that she was watering. Yeah. Yeah,

1064
00:58:42,720 --> 00:58:44,200
Speaker 1: and I think this is where we also have just

1065
00:58:44,280 --> 00:58:47,960
Speaker 1: a very beautiful, lengthy scene that I think was cut

1066
00:58:48,000 --> 00:58:51,760
Speaker 1: from the MST version where we just see this wonderful

1067
00:58:51,800 --> 00:58:54,320
Speaker 1: reflection in the water and you know, she's having this

1068
00:58:54,440 --> 00:58:57,280
Speaker 1: emotional moment and it's it's like again one of those

1069
00:58:57,280 --> 00:59:00,480
Speaker 1: where you just you just admire the look of the film.

1070
00:59:00,680 --> 00:59:03,600
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, you're very right. I mean, so there it

1071
00:59:03,760 --> 00:59:07,440
Speaker 1: is genuinely a sort of sad moment here, But then

1072
00:59:07,480 --> 00:59:09,600
Speaker 1: it cuts back to being kind of funny because then

1073
00:59:09,680 --> 00:59:12,160
Speaker 1: we see Van just like roaming all over the place,

1074
00:59:12,280 --> 00:59:16,040
Speaker 1: growling and moaning and feeling really sorry for himself. Um,

1075
00:59:16,360 --> 00:59:19,440
Speaker 1: and he somehow he gets back to grandfather Mushroom and

1076
00:59:19,520 --> 00:59:22,280
Speaker 1: he's like, I gotta know how to get this get

1077
00:59:22,360 --> 00:59:25,320
Speaker 1: this head, you know, barehead off of me. He begs

1078
00:59:25,400 --> 00:59:26,959
Speaker 1: him to teach him what he can do to become

1079
00:59:27,000 --> 00:59:30,919
Speaker 1: a man again, and Grandfather Mushroom says, you've never done

1080
00:59:30,920 --> 00:59:33,920
Speaker 1: a good deed, and then Barehead Avon just runs with it.

1081
00:59:34,040 --> 00:59:35,600
Speaker 1: So he's like, oh, so I must do a good

1082
00:59:35,640 --> 00:59:38,600
Speaker 1: deed and then I'll return to normal. And Grandfather Mushroom

1083
00:59:38,680 --> 00:59:41,080
Speaker 1: is trying to protest. He's like, no, it isn't that simple,

1084
00:59:41,200 --> 00:59:43,880
Speaker 1: but Barehead is always he's already running off to get

1085
00:59:43,920 --> 00:59:49,440
Speaker 1: it done. So it's still that that youthful sort of prideful, foolhardiness.

1086
00:59:49,520 --> 00:59:52,360
Speaker 1: He's not going to even read the full instructions. Yeah,

1087
00:59:52,400 --> 00:59:54,640
Speaker 1: And and from here we get kind of a montage

1088
00:59:54,680 --> 00:59:56,960
Speaker 1: with scene try where he's running up to people, random

1089
00:59:57,000 --> 00:59:58,960
Speaker 1: folks and just like he's saying, what can I do

1090
00:59:59,080 --> 01:00:01,880
Speaker 1: to help you? But he's a bear monster, so he's

1091
01:00:02,000 --> 01:00:05,280
Speaker 1: terrifying people and they're just running away from it. Right, Yeah,

1092
01:00:05,560 --> 01:00:08,640
Speaker 1: I mean it's it's kind only Frankenstein, right, Michelle, you

1093
01:00:08,720 --> 01:00:13,320
Speaker 1: know he he uh, the creature just just wants friends,

1094
01:00:13,480 --> 01:00:15,640
Speaker 1: but but he's scary looking, so people are going to

1095
01:00:15,760 --> 01:00:18,000
Speaker 1: run away. Oh, it is very it's in fact, it

1096
01:00:18,080 --> 01:00:20,480
Speaker 1: mirrors Frankenstein in in another way. They we'll get to

1097
01:00:20,560 --> 01:00:22,760
Speaker 1: in a second. Now, cutting back to the house where

1098
01:00:23,080 --> 01:00:26,360
Speaker 1: where Nastia and Marfushka live, there is a really funny

1099
01:00:26,400 --> 01:00:28,440
Speaker 1: scene leading up to I guess it's supposed to be

1100
01:00:28,720 --> 01:00:31,800
Speaker 1: a matchmaking scene where a suitor and his parents come

1101
01:00:31,840 --> 01:00:34,280
Speaker 1: to the house and uh, they're trying to set up

1102
01:00:34,320 --> 01:00:38,240
Speaker 1: Marfushka with this with this marriage bile bachelor, and so

1103
01:00:38,360 --> 01:00:41,080
Speaker 1: they're getting her ready for that, putting all this makeup

1104
01:00:41,200 --> 01:00:43,439
Speaker 1: on her, but it looks like clown makeup. And she's

1105
01:00:43,480 --> 01:00:47,439
Speaker 1: wearing this extremely colorful outfit with a with a red

1106
01:00:47,520 --> 01:00:51,040
Speaker 1: and yellow crown, and it's it's the colors look great.

1107
01:00:51,120 --> 01:00:53,360
Speaker 1: And again this is one reason that it really is

1108
01:00:53,440 --> 01:00:56,800
Speaker 1: worth watching the good HD version. But also I thought

1109
01:00:56,840 --> 01:00:59,640
Speaker 1: the scene is very funny because like the bachelor is

1110
01:00:59,760 --> 01:01:03,480
Speaker 1: this super dopey looking dude. He he slightly has a

1111
01:01:03,560 --> 01:01:06,640
Speaker 1: bit of um the energy of the guy in the

1112
01:01:06,840 --> 01:01:11,400
Speaker 1: who plays um microft homes in the BBC version of Sherlock,

1113
01:01:12,960 --> 01:01:16,800
Speaker 1: but like dope, he or with long flat hair and uh,

1114
01:01:16,880 --> 01:01:19,720
Speaker 1: and so there's a scene so they're trying to the

1115
01:01:19,800 --> 01:01:23,440
Speaker 1: parents are trying to get him to him and his

1116
01:01:23,560 --> 01:01:28,439
Speaker 1: parents to agree to marry Marfushka. But everything really goes

1117
01:01:28,520 --> 01:01:31,480
Speaker 1: wrong somehow. She ends up falling into the lake and

1118
01:01:31,600 --> 01:01:35,080
Speaker 1: then her fake braid comes off and it just it

1119
01:01:35,240 --> 01:01:37,680
Speaker 1: just all goes to hell and and the other people

1120
01:01:37,720 --> 01:01:39,640
Speaker 1: are making fun of her, and so the stepmother is

1121
01:01:39,680 --> 01:01:43,160
Speaker 1: really mad and uh. And then the worst thing of

1122
01:01:43,240 --> 01:01:46,160
Speaker 1: all is that the suitor dude is like, hey, what

1123
01:01:46,440 --> 01:01:48,920
Speaker 1: if I married Nastia instead? And that just makes the

1124
01:01:48,960 --> 01:01:53,400
Speaker 1: stepmother go like ballistic. Oh. And then eventually, after after

1125
01:01:53,960 --> 01:01:57,480
Speaker 1: a long interlude, Van does get his his original head back,

1126
01:01:57,600 --> 01:02:00,280
Speaker 1: and I think it's because he picks up a dick

1127
01:02:00,520 --> 01:02:03,480
Speaker 1: thinking it belonged to an old woman that he helped

1128
01:02:03,560 --> 01:02:07,320
Speaker 1: carry back to her home over a mountain, and he's like, oh,

1129
01:02:07,440 --> 01:02:09,280
Speaker 1: this is her stick. I better take it back to her,

1130
01:02:09,280 --> 01:02:11,160
Speaker 1: And for some reason that's the thing that does it.

1131
01:02:11,560 --> 01:02:15,800
Speaker 1: Then Grandfather Mushrooms like, okay, you deserve a human head now, yeah,

1132
01:02:16,080 --> 01:02:18,160
Speaker 1: and an old blind woman. So it kind of mirrors

1133
01:02:18,200 --> 01:02:22,800
Speaker 1: Frankenstein in that respect that he ends up. Initially, he's

1134
01:02:23,240 --> 01:02:26,320
Speaker 1: he ends up helping her by carrying her home, but

1135
01:02:26,480 --> 01:02:29,400
Speaker 1: it's but it's seeing her stick and thinking, oh, she

1136
01:02:29,480 --> 01:02:31,160
Speaker 1: needs that stick. I need to get that back to her.

1137
01:02:31,160 --> 01:02:33,480
Speaker 1: So it's almost like I mean, this is something that

1138
01:02:33,560 --> 01:02:36,600
Speaker 1: the MST three k Riff had fun with, you know,

1139
01:02:36,680 --> 01:02:39,240
Speaker 1: the idea that it's like he didn't actually do anything nice,

1140
01:02:39,280 --> 01:02:42,000
Speaker 1: he just thought about doing something nice and and that

1141
01:02:42,200 --> 01:02:45,720
Speaker 1: was enough. But if I'm going to re into it more,

1142
01:02:45,760 --> 01:02:49,640
Speaker 1: I feel like it's the idea that that he was

1143
01:02:49,800 --> 01:02:53,520
Speaker 1: doing it without any kind of a scheme behind it.

1144
01:02:53,640 --> 01:02:56,360
Speaker 1: You know, he he wasn't helping her because it would

1145
01:02:56,400 --> 01:02:59,280
Speaker 1: help him. He was just doing it as a reflex,

1146
01:02:59,440 --> 01:03:02,520
Speaker 1: you know. It like kindness was no longer something that

1147
01:03:02,800 --> 01:03:05,080
Speaker 1: he had to force himself to do. He could do

1148
01:03:05,200 --> 01:03:07,960
Speaker 1: it instinctually. Oh well that makes more sense, Okay, I

1149
01:03:08,240 --> 01:03:10,120
Speaker 1: I can accept that. But yeah, when it does come

1150
01:03:10,160 --> 01:03:12,080
Speaker 1: down to it, is very funny to point out that

1151
01:03:13,160 --> 01:03:15,400
Speaker 1: that he just thought about doing it and he gets

1152
01:03:15,480 --> 01:03:18,120
Speaker 1: rewarded for it. And uh, I don't know. I think

1153
01:03:18,160 --> 01:03:20,800
Speaker 1: sometimes people do sort of work that way, like they

1154
01:03:21,000 --> 01:03:24,040
Speaker 1: maybe congratulate themselves a little too much, not for actually

1155
01:03:24,160 --> 01:03:27,640
Speaker 1: doing anything good, but for becoming convinced that they would

1156
01:03:27,720 --> 01:03:31,160
Speaker 1: do something good if given the opportunity. Yeah, I think

1157
01:03:31,240 --> 01:03:33,400
Speaker 1: we've I think we've we've looked at some studies on that.

1158
01:03:33,880 --> 01:03:36,760
Speaker 1: For the core stuff to blow your mind episodes Okay, well,

1159
01:03:36,840 --> 01:03:39,560
Speaker 1: here sort of we hit the transition point because we

1160
01:03:39,640 --> 01:03:42,960
Speaker 1: skip ahead in time, so we we we skip ahead

1161
01:03:43,000 --> 01:03:45,560
Speaker 1: to winter. Previously, I don't know, I guess this was

1162
01:03:45,560 --> 01:03:48,320
Speaker 1: supposed to be in summer before. Uh, and and now

1163
01:03:48,400 --> 01:03:50,600
Speaker 1: we go to winter, and here's where we sort of

1164
01:03:50,680 --> 01:03:52,919
Speaker 1: really get into the meat of the original folk tale.

1165
01:03:52,960 --> 01:03:54,920
Speaker 1: I also think at this point we might we might

1166
01:03:55,040 --> 01:03:57,640
Speaker 1: skip over some things and describe in less detail. But

1167
01:03:58,000 --> 01:04:00,960
Speaker 1: there is so much wonderful stuff and magical characters in

1168
01:04:01,000 --> 01:04:02,920
Speaker 1: the second half of the movie too, because here's where

1169
01:04:02,960 --> 01:04:07,000
Speaker 1: we're gonna get Bobba Yaga and and Grandfather Frost. So

1170
01:04:07,560 --> 01:04:11,600
Speaker 1: the second part begins with the premise of the Grandfather

1171
01:04:11,680 --> 01:04:14,880
Speaker 1: Frost story, which is that the old man is taking

1172
01:04:15,000 --> 01:04:18,240
Speaker 1: Nastia out into the out into the frozen woods to

1173
01:04:18,360 --> 01:04:22,000
Speaker 1: die because presumably because suitors keep wanting to marry her

1174
01:04:22,200 --> 01:04:25,880
Speaker 1: instead of Marfushka, and stepmother is is tired of this,

1175
01:04:26,040 --> 01:04:28,320
Speaker 1: so she's like, an old man, you will kill your

1176
01:04:28,400 --> 01:04:31,800
Speaker 1: daughter for me? And uh, he's really broken up about it,

1177
01:04:31,920 --> 01:04:34,000
Speaker 1: but he's doing it like he's taken her out there

1178
01:04:34,040 --> 01:04:36,960
Speaker 1: on the sled. But then he while he's out there,

1179
01:04:37,000 --> 01:04:38,960
Speaker 1: he's like, no, no, I won't, and he tries to

1180
01:04:39,080 --> 01:04:41,480
Speaker 1: turn the sled around to take her back home, But

1181
01:04:41,800 --> 01:04:44,840
Speaker 1: like we talked about earlier, Nastia apparently doesn't want to

1182
01:04:44,880 --> 01:04:47,600
Speaker 1: cause trouble for her father, so she just hops out

1183
01:04:47,680 --> 01:04:50,400
Speaker 1: of the sled, so I guess, so as not to

1184
01:04:50,440 --> 01:04:53,120
Speaker 1: be a burden. She's just like, it's it's all right, dad,

1185
01:04:53,160 --> 01:04:55,000
Speaker 1: I'll just die of exposure. I don't want you to

1186
01:04:55,080 --> 01:04:59,160
Speaker 1: have a rough afternoon. I'll say again that is pathological kindness,

1187
01:04:59,280 --> 01:05:02,480
Speaker 1: that there's no reason to be that nice. But now,

1188
01:05:02,640 --> 01:05:04,840
Speaker 1: also in the in the same time period and the

1189
01:05:04,920 --> 01:05:07,840
Speaker 1: dead of winter, we find Yvonne out wandering the woods

1190
01:05:07,920 --> 01:05:10,680
Speaker 1: and what he's trying to find Nastia again. He's like, hey,

1191
01:05:10,840 --> 01:05:13,280
Speaker 1: I've got a human head again. I'm a better man.

1192
01:05:13,480 --> 01:05:16,160
Speaker 1: I'm not so selfish in vain now I am. I

1193
01:05:16,280 --> 01:05:20,960
Speaker 1: am a more suitable bachelor who who could marry Nastia

1194
01:05:21,040 --> 01:05:23,920
Speaker 1: because now she'll see I'm actually a good person. So

1195
01:05:24,080 --> 01:05:26,800
Speaker 1: he's out trying to find her and he comes across

1196
01:05:27,080 --> 01:05:30,400
Speaker 1: the cabin of of the Witch of of Bobby Yaga,

1197
01:05:30,720 --> 01:05:33,080
Speaker 1: which is up on legs, I think, as it is

1198
01:05:33,160 --> 01:05:37,280
Speaker 1: often depicted in these stories, and there's this great scene

1199
01:05:37,680 --> 01:05:41,080
Speaker 1: where they're they're like where he and the witch are

1200
01:05:41,120 --> 01:05:44,439
Speaker 1: both trying to order the house which direction to face. Yeah,

1201
01:05:45,120 --> 01:05:47,800
Speaker 1: that's that's a wonderful scene. And and this whole sequence

1202
01:05:47,920 --> 01:05:50,120
Speaker 1: is just great with with all the costumes and and

1203
01:05:50,200 --> 01:05:53,200
Speaker 1: the sets and everything. So yeah, she gets a bunch

1204
01:05:53,240 --> 01:05:56,600
Speaker 1: of trees to attack Yvonne and bring him inside because

1205
01:05:56,640 --> 01:05:59,080
Speaker 1: she wants to eat him. Uh, and she's going to

1206
01:05:59,200 --> 01:06:01,640
Speaker 1: load him into the then to cook him, but he

1207
01:06:01,760 --> 01:06:05,320
Speaker 1: tricks her in classic fairy tale style. He's like, oh, hey,

1208
01:06:05,440 --> 01:06:07,200
Speaker 1: you're you want me to sit on the shovel so

1209
01:06:07,320 --> 01:06:09,000
Speaker 1: you can put me into the oven. But I've never

1210
01:06:09,080 --> 01:06:11,040
Speaker 1: sat on a shovel before. You gotta show me how.

1211
01:06:12,040 --> 01:06:14,680
Speaker 1: It's like the youth have today. We're not taught anything.

1212
01:06:15,800 --> 01:06:18,600
Speaker 1: She's going to demonstrate it. So she gets on the

1213
01:06:18,640 --> 01:06:20,960
Speaker 1: shovel and and he shoves her into the oven. And

1214
01:06:21,040 --> 01:06:23,280
Speaker 1: then she's like, oh, get me out, so he lets

1215
01:06:23,320 --> 01:06:26,880
Speaker 1: her out. But then they're negotiating. He's trying to get

1216
01:06:27,000 --> 01:06:30,800
Speaker 1: her magical help to find Nastia. The interior of Bobby

1217
01:06:30,800 --> 01:06:34,160
Speaker 1: Iaga's hut is fabulous because it looks like Mario Baba

1218
01:06:34,280 --> 01:06:36,840
Speaker 1: was the end. It was the interior deck right here yes,

1219
01:06:37,000 --> 01:06:41,400
Speaker 1: blue and purple light everywhere, fog. It's full of animals.

1220
01:06:41,480 --> 01:06:46,560
Speaker 1: They're owls, pigs, cats, spider webs. I think some of

1221
01:06:46,640 --> 01:06:50,400
Speaker 1: the snakes other things I'm probably not even remembering. Uh.

1222
01:06:50,480 --> 01:06:54,920
Speaker 1: And then meanwhile, so while Yvonne is encountering this magical being, uh,

1223
01:06:55,080 --> 01:06:59,840
Speaker 1: Nastia is encountering grandfather Frost, and we get basically the

1224
01:07:00,000 --> 01:07:02,280
Speaker 1: same interaction that they have in the folk tale. So

1225
01:07:02,400 --> 01:07:04,959
Speaker 1: he's like, are you warm? And she says yes, even

1226
01:07:04,960 --> 01:07:07,560
Speaker 1: though she's obviously freezing, and he's like, uh, you know,

1227
01:07:07,680 --> 01:07:11,400
Speaker 1: you're a very nice girl, uh, because she you know,

1228
01:07:11,520 --> 01:07:14,280
Speaker 1: she's not gonna talk smack about how cold his forest is.

1229
01:07:14,920 --> 01:07:17,880
Speaker 1: And then he offers her his coat, but she's like,

1230
01:07:17,960 --> 01:07:20,160
Speaker 1: what about you, won't you be cold? But of course

1231
01:07:20,240 --> 01:07:22,000
Speaker 1: he's you know, he's Father Frost. He's not going to

1232
01:07:22,080 --> 01:07:26,600
Speaker 1: be cold. So it goes exactly this is this is

1233
01:07:26,840 --> 01:07:30,439
Speaker 1: this is a fashion coat. Um. So, just as she's

1234
01:07:30,440 --> 01:07:32,760
Speaker 1: about to freeze to death, father Frost is like, oh,

1235
01:07:32,880 --> 01:07:34,720
Speaker 1: she needs help, So he covers her up in his

1236
01:07:34,800 --> 01:07:37,160
Speaker 1: warm coat, takes her away in his sleigh, and they

1237
01:07:37,240 --> 01:07:40,840
Speaker 1: go to his house, which looks kind of like a church. Yeah, yeah,

1238
01:07:41,280 --> 01:07:44,640
Speaker 1: it's it's it's it's it's another beautiful structure inside and out.

1239
01:07:44,760 --> 01:07:48,880
Speaker 1: Inside especially it's just this this blue crystal palace with

1240
01:07:49,880 --> 01:07:52,400
Speaker 1: you know again, I'm kind of reminded of of Mario

1241
01:07:52,520 --> 01:07:56,600
Speaker 1: Bava films, except it's it's as if Mario Bava made

1242
01:07:56,640 --> 01:07:59,240
Speaker 1: a fairytale movie for children instead of you know, some

1243
01:07:59,400 --> 01:08:03,000
Speaker 1: sort of uh thriller. Right well, there there is something

1244
01:08:03,120 --> 01:08:06,120
Speaker 1: quite deadly within the house though, because Father Frost he

1245
01:08:06,200 --> 01:08:08,880
Speaker 1: leaves his scepter in there, and wouldn't you know it,

1246
01:08:09,120 --> 01:08:13,640
Speaker 1: uh Nastya's. Nastia's curiosity gets the better of her because

1247
01:08:13,680 --> 01:08:15,400
Speaker 1: she's like, what's the deal with de scepter? She goes

1248
01:08:15,480 --> 01:08:19,040
Speaker 1: to check it out, touches it, and it freezes her solid.

1249
01:08:19,160 --> 01:08:22,040
Speaker 1: She's in a chunk of ice. We we learned from

1250
01:08:22,120 --> 01:08:24,760
Speaker 1: Father Frost that that whoever touches the scepter will never

1251
01:08:24,920 --> 01:08:28,000
Speaker 1: wake again. And he comes back and finds her frozen

1252
01:08:28,120 --> 01:08:30,120
Speaker 1: like that, and he really beats himself up about it.

1253
01:08:30,240 --> 01:08:32,559
Speaker 1: He's like, you knit with you, donkey, you didn't watch

1254
01:08:32,680 --> 01:08:38,720
Speaker 1: over her. Meanwhile, somehow the Witch sends van off Um

1255
01:08:38,960 --> 01:08:41,560
Speaker 1: chasing after some kind of object. I think it's a

1256
01:08:41,640 --> 01:08:44,479
Speaker 1: sheep skin or something that will allegedly lead him to

1257
01:08:44,760 --> 01:08:48,840
Speaker 1: Nastia or a pig sled. Maybe that's the pig that

1258
01:08:48,960 --> 01:08:51,200
Speaker 1: lives in her hut is transformed into a pig sled,

1259
01:08:51,920 --> 01:08:55,000
Speaker 1: magical sled. It will take him where he needs to go. Uh.

1260
01:08:55,120 --> 01:08:57,560
Speaker 1: And she when she's alone, she has these scenes with

1261
01:08:57,680 --> 01:08:59,519
Speaker 1: like a cat and an owl and a snake where

1262
01:08:59,560 --> 01:09:03,120
Speaker 1: she's just lamenting that she did not get to cannibalize Yvonne.

1263
01:09:03,320 --> 01:09:05,400
Speaker 1: She really wants to eat him. I would remember the

1264
01:09:05,479 --> 01:09:09,040
Speaker 1: cat was doing her bidding by helping to engineer the

1265
01:09:09,120 --> 01:09:12,679
Speaker 1: moment where she touches the scepter and it's frozen. That's right. Yeah.

1266
01:09:13,200 --> 01:09:16,800
Speaker 1: But eventually von meets Nastia's loyal dog, you know, her

1267
01:09:16,800 --> 01:09:19,000
Speaker 1: buddy dog from way back in the beginning, and and

1268
01:09:19,120 --> 01:09:21,519
Speaker 1: the dog. I like this movie because this is a

1269
01:09:21,560 --> 01:09:25,439
Speaker 1: movie that appreciates the quality of a good dog, and

1270
01:09:25,920 --> 01:09:28,120
Speaker 1: the dog is a good friend. The dog leads him

1271
01:09:28,160 --> 01:09:31,120
Speaker 1: to Father Frost's house, and when he gets there, if

1272
01:09:31,160 --> 01:09:36,120
Speaker 1: An's love wakes her up and defrosts her basically, Oh

1273
01:09:36,240 --> 01:09:39,040
Speaker 1: and then, uh, what does the exchange they have? It's

1274
01:09:39,120 --> 01:09:42,000
Speaker 1: like she gets defrosted and he's there with his head

1275
01:09:42,040 --> 01:09:45,720
Speaker 1: back to normal, and she says something like um. She

1276
01:09:46,000 --> 01:09:48,400
Speaker 1: she says, well, she gives him the I guess it's

1277
01:09:48,439 --> 01:09:52,360
Speaker 1: the diminutive form of his Evenushka, she says, Evenushka, how

1278
01:09:52,479 --> 01:09:56,479
Speaker 1: nice you are? Now I like you better. And then

1279
01:09:56,560 --> 01:09:59,200
Speaker 1: he he brags now that he does good deeds all

1280
01:09:59,240 --> 01:10:02,559
Speaker 1: the time, and she seems to accept this, and then

1281
01:10:02,680 --> 01:10:04,560
Speaker 1: we we get sort of a happy ending. But the

1282
01:10:04,600 --> 01:10:06,400
Speaker 1: funny thing is the movie is not over yet, so

1283
01:10:07,240 --> 01:10:09,519
Speaker 1: you would expect that this is you know, the music

1284
01:10:09,640 --> 01:10:12,200
Speaker 1: kicks in and we go to credits, um, but it's

1285
01:10:12,240 --> 01:10:14,720
Speaker 1: not quite there yet that we do see the happy ending. Uh.

1286
01:10:15,200 --> 01:10:18,160
Speaker 1: Nastia and Ivonne arrived back at the family home in

1287
01:10:18,240 --> 01:10:21,800
Speaker 1: a regal sleigh. They're dressed like royalty with a box

1288
01:10:21,880 --> 01:10:24,560
Speaker 1: full of Jim's so it seems like they're married and

1289
01:10:24,640 --> 01:10:29,120
Speaker 1: they're happy and they're rich. And Marfushka is furious. She

1290
01:10:29,280 --> 01:10:34,200
Speaker 1: keeps saying I want stones so um so much like

1291
01:10:34,320 --> 01:10:36,640
Speaker 1: the fairy tale. Her mother demands that the old man

1292
01:10:36,760 --> 01:10:39,120
Speaker 1: take Marfushka out into the forest as well, so that

1293
01:10:39,200 --> 01:10:41,120
Speaker 1: the same thing can happen to her, because from their

1294
01:10:41,160 --> 01:10:43,639
Speaker 1: point of view, it's like, well, okay, daughter was left

1295
01:10:43,680 --> 01:10:47,200
Speaker 1: in the forest, came back. Uh. Married, happy and rich.

1296
01:10:47,360 --> 01:10:49,599
Speaker 1: So you know, we just assume the same will happen

1297
01:10:49,640 --> 01:10:52,479
Speaker 1: to the other daughter. But when father Frost comes across her,

1298
01:10:52,640 --> 01:10:55,280
Speaker 1: she basically beats him up. I think she actually hits

1299
01:10:55,360 --> 01:10:58,920
Speaker 1: him or something. Yeah, yeah, she's she's abusive and and

1300
01:10:59,040 --> 01:11:03,240
Speaker 1: awful to Frost. Uh And in the original folklore like

1301
01:11:03,320 --> 01:11:05,240
Speaker 1: he freezes her to death for it. But in this

1302
01:11:05,400 --> 01:11:07,280
Speaker 1: we get a you know, we get a sanitized version

1303
01:11:07,320 --> 01:11:10,160
Speaker 1: of that, right, so instead of him him killing her

1304
01:11:10,320 --> 01:11:13,880
Speaker 1: in the stepmother Marfushka is sent back home in uh

1305
01:11:14,360 --> 01:11:17,640
Speaker 1: not with a husband or not like royalty in a

1306
01:11:17,720 --> 01:11:20,560
Speaker 1: sleigh with a handsome husband, pulled by white horses and

1307
01:11:20,600 --> 01:11:23,000
Speaker 1: a box full of jewels. Instead she is by herself

1308
01:11:23,160 --> 01:11:25,519
Speaker 1: on a sled pulled by pigs, with a box full

1309
01:11:25,560 --> 01:11:29,320
Speaker 1: of crows. Yes, And there's also a great sort of

1310
01:11:29,400 --> 01:11:32,680
Speaker 1: epilogue scene where Van and Nasti are are riding off

1311
01:11:32,760 --> 01:11:36,360
Speaker 1: together and they get attacked by the bandits from earlier

1312
01:11:36,400 --> 01:11:39,000
Speaker 1: in the movie at the behest of the Witch the way. Yeah,

1313
01:11:39,040 --> 01:11:41,799
Speaker 1: this is kind of our final battle. So she's rallied

1314
01:11:41,840 --> 01:11:43,880
Speaker 1: the bandits and there's all there's a great scene where

1315
01:11:43,920 --> 01:11:47,160
Speaker 1: she comes flying in um in her in her mortar,

1316
01:11:47,800 --> 01:11:51,519
Speaker 1: which is which is her traditional means of flying about.

1317
01:11:51,600 --> 01:11:53,680
Speaker 1: And it reminded me so much of an illustration from

1318
01:11:53,720 --> 01:11:57,320
Speaker 1: the Enchanted World's book. Uh. It was this this really

1319
01:11:57,400 --> 01:12:01,839
Speaker 1: bright illustration by Ivan uh Billibbin from I believe nineteen

1320
01:12:01,960 --> 01:12:05,919
Speaker 1: hundred um. It was in the book on Witches and Wizards.

1321
01:12:06,200 --> 01:12:07,960
Speaker 1: But you can also see this image if you just

1322
01:12:08,000 --> 01:12:11,040
Speaker 1: go to the Wikipedia page on Bobba Yaga. It's like

1323
01:12:11,120 --> 01:12:14,200
Speaker 1: the top image and it's it's really cool. So, yeah,

1324
01:12:14,280 --> 01:12:18,160
Speaker 1: she's coming in. She's bribed the bandits, she's organizing them.

1325
01:12:18,240 --> 01:12:19,720
Speaker 1: So yeah, now you have the worst thing you have

1326
01:12:20,320 --> 01:12:23,400
Speaker 1: the Bobby. You have Bobba Yaga committed to bringing down

1327
01:12:23,840 --> 01:12:27,920
Speaker 1: Yvon and Nastinka, and she has convinced all of these

1328
01:12:27,960 --> 01:12:30,280
Speaker 1: bandits to work with her. The bandits aren't very smart,

1329
01:12:30,560 --> 01:12:33,599
Speaker 1: but now they have a general telling them what to do, right,

1330
01:12:33,840 --> 01:12:36,280
Speaker 1: And she I think she still wants to eat Von

1331
01:12:36,479 --> 01:12:40,000
Speaker 1: right like she's like, he looked so tasty. Yeah, yeah,

1332
01:12:40,080 --> 01:12:41,960
Speaker 1: she feels she cheated out of that meal. So she's

1333
01:12:41,960 --> 01:12:45,320
Speaker 1: gonna she's gonna get it right. So so the bandits attack,

1334
01:12:45,800 --> 01:12:48,439
Speaker 1: Nastia gets tied up. The bandits are beating up Yvon,

1335
01:12:49,200 --> 01:12:51,519
Speaker 1: but then we get, uh, just save the day. We

1336
01:12:51,560 --> 01:12:53,200
Speaker 1: get a couple of things. First of all, the loyal

1337
01:12:53,360 --> 01:12:57,320
Speaker 1: dog unties Nastia from the tree, and then the bandits

1338
01:12:57,400 --> 01:12:59,320
Speaker 1: are knocked out by their own clubs. We get a

1339
01:12:59,360 --> 01:13:01,600
Speaker 1: call back from earlier when when Yvon threw all the

1340
01:13:01,640 --> 01:13:04,519
Speaker 1: clubs up in the air. Yeah, I believe the riff

1341
01:13:04,600 --> 01:13:06,400
Speaker 1: and they miss T three K version is it's raining

1342
01:13:06,439 --> 01:13:10,680
Speaker 1: cinematic payoff, which I love. I love that riff and

1343
01:13:10,680 --> 01:13:13,240
Speaker 1: I think about in anytime something like this happens in

1344
01:13:13,320 --> 01:13:15,560
Speaker 1: a movie. And then I guess we get the epilogue

1345
01:13:15,600 --> 01:13:18,080
Speaker 1: to the epilogue, which is like we see our our

1346
01:13:18,520 --> 01:13:20,920
Speaker 1: Nasty and Van at their wedding here or at some

1347
01:13:21,040 --> 01:13:23,160
Speaker 1: kind of celebration. They're in a They're in a house

1348
01:13:23,920 --> 01:13:25,760
Speaker 1: with a bunch of people gathered for a feast, and

1349
01:13:25,840 --> 01:13:29,200
Speaker 1: it's like the most colorful scene I have ever witnessed.

1350
01:13:29,479 --> 01:13:34,000
Speaker 1: The colors are just like violent. Yes, it is absolutely beautiful.

1351
01:13:34,000 --> 01:13:38,800
Speaker 1: Do just faberge egg pastel explosions. It's it's gorgeous and

1352
01:13:38,800 --> 01:13:42,120
Speaker 1: they're on the table. You see bowls of food, apples,

1353
01:13:42,160 --> 01:13:46,000
Speaker 1: there's a rooster bowl. Um, everybody's here. And it's a

1354
01:13:46,040 --> 01:13:47,920
Speaker 1: great shot too, because we begin it, they're into the

1355
01:13:48,000 --> 01:13:51,800
Speaker 1: table and then we we we we pull back. Uh

1356
01:13:51,920 --> 01:13:54,720
Speaker 1: you know, we we're moving down the table, down this

1357
01:13:54,920 --> 01:13:58,080
Speaker 1: feast table. We feel like we're part of the feast, right. Yeah,

1358
01:13:58,240 --> 01:14:01,040
Speaker 1: So so you know what the this is a wonderful

1359
01:14:01,160 --> 01:14:04,559
Speaker 1: holiday film. This is It does make for great comedic

1360
01:14:04,600 --> 01:14:07,920
Speaker 1: fodder on on MST. But this is also just a

1361
01:14:08,120 --> 01:14:11,200
Speaker 1: really gorgeous, creative and fun movie. I I give it

1362
01:14:11,680 --> 01:14:15,439
Speaker 1: ten out of ten talking roosters. Yeah, Like most of

1363
01:14:15,479 --> 01:14:18,639
Speaker 1: the best MST three K films, it stands on its

1364
01:14:18,680 --> 01:14:21,280
Speaker 1: own without the riff. The riff is not necessary to

1365
01:14:21,400 --> 01:14:25,559
Speaker 1: enjoy it, uh in my opinion, so uh, I recommend

1366
01:14:25,560 --> 01:14:27,720
Speaker 1: everybody consider giving it a go, especially if you're a

1367
01:14:27,760 --> 01:14:29,800
Speaker 1: fan of the episode. You'll still love it. You've probably

1368
01:14:29,840 --> 01:14:33,000
Speaker 1: seen the Rift version enough that you've memorized all the

1369
01:14:33,080 --> 01:14:35,880
Speaker 1: good riffs, so you can just think them or say

1370
01:14:35,960 --> 01:14:39,240
Speaker 1: them while you're watching. Pretend there are yours. Yeah, yeah,

1371
01:14:39,320 --> 01:14:42,720
Speaker 1: pretending pretend there yours um And Lucky for you, you

1372
01:14:42,760 --> 01:14:45,440
Speaker 1: can buy or rent this digitally on a number of platforms,

1373
01:14:45,479 --> 01:14:47,960
Speaker 1: including Amazon Prime, where I think there are like two

1374
01:14:48,000 --> 01:14:51,560
Speaker 1: different versions of it. I'm I'm not sure about the

1375
01:14:51,640 --> 01:14:55,320
Speaker 1: quality on those, but whatever you end up finding, go

1376
01:14:55,560 --> 01:14:57,720
Speaker 1: with the high quality. If you find make sure it's

1377
01:14:57,720 --> 01:15:02,000
Speaker 1: the vibrant colors. Um you know, shop around. You can

1378
01:15:02,040 --> 01:15:04,840
Speaker 1: watch it in Russian with subtitles that you can also

1379
01:15:04,960 --> 01:15:09,040
Speaker 1: watch it again with this very fun English dub um. Uh.

1380
01:15:09,120 --> 01:15:13,360
Speaker 1: There's also a physical um Ruscico DVD that you can

1381
01:15:13,400 --> 01:15:15,680
Speaker 1: pick up for a quite reasonable price online if you

1382
01:15:15,800 --> 01:15:19,360
Speaker 1: want a physical disk to put into your DVD player. Nice.

1383
01:15:19,800 --> 01:15:21,479
Speaker 1: So I think this was our our what our second

1384
01:15:21,560 --> 01:15:25,000
Speaker 1: Russian film on Weird House Cinema. There was the Teams

1385
01:15:25,040 --> 01:15:27,600
Speaker 1: in the Universe, Oh yeah, the sci fi one with

1386
01:15:27,640 --> 01:15:31,400
Speaker 1: the great robots, also ultimately a children's film, and uh,

1387
01:15:31,520 --> 01:15:34,400
Speaker 1: and here we are with another Russian children's film. Well,

1388
01:15:34,439 --> 01:15:36,680
Speaker 1: and to understand, there's plenty more where that came from.

1389
01:15:36,760 --> 01:15:39,640
Speaker 1: It seems like, especially maybe the sixties and seventies have

1390
01:15:39,720 --> 01:15:42,439
Speaker 1: a lot of great, uh great looking fantasy and sci

1391
01:15:42,520 --> 01:15:45,240
Speaker 1: fi films from Russia. Yeah. Yeah, And we've heard from

1392
01:15:45,280 --> 01:15:47,719
Speaker 1: some listeners who have given us some recommendations that also

1393
01:15:47,760 --> 01:15:50,360
Speaker 1: look great and and I've also run across some older

1394
01:15:50,439 --> 01:15:52,960
Speaker 1: films that that also looked pretty good. There's a particular

1395
01:15:53,040 --> 01:15:56,200
Speaker 1: Russian horror film that is that is on my list

1396
01:15:56,760 --> 01:15:58,920
Speaker 1: uh that we we may have to get to in

1397
01:15:59,000 --> 01:16:01,920
Speaker 1: the months ahead, or rather in the year ahead, because

1398
01:16:02,160 --> 01:16:03,720
Speaker 1: like we said this, I believe this is gonna be

1399
01:16:03,760 --> 01:16:05,960
Speaker 1: it for this year. We're gonna have a couple of

1400
01:16:06,240 --> 01:16:09,400
Speaker 1: repeats in the weeks ahead, a couple of Weird House

1401
01:16:09,400 --> 01:16:12,599
Speaker 1: Cinema rewind episodes, but then we'll be back with something

1402
01:16:12,680 --> 01:16:18,479
Speaker 1: new Christmas with the Cranks in January, as it should be.

1403
01:16:19,800 --> 01:16:21,879
Speaker 1: All right. If you want to listen to other episodes

1404
01:16:21,920 --> 01:16:24,600
Speaker 1: of Weird House Cinema, you'll find it every Friday in

1405
01:16:24,720 --> 01:16:26,920
Speaker 1: the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast feed We are

1406
01:16:26,960 --> 01:16:30,280
Speaker 1: primarily a science and culture podcast, with core episodes on

1407
01:16:30,360 --> 01:16:34,120
Speaker 1: Tuesdays and Thursdays, but on Monday's we do listener mail,

1408
01:16:34,160 --> 01:16:36,280
Speaker 1: on Wednesday's we do a short form artifact episode, and

1409
01:16:36,360 --> 01:16:39,040
Speaker 1: on Fridays we set aside most serious matters and we

1410
01:16:39,120 --> 01:16:43,280
Speaker 1: just talk about a weird and interesting film. Huge thanks

1411
01:16:43,320 --> 01:16:46,599
Speaker 1: as always to our excellent audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson.

1412
01:16:46,960 --> 01:16:48,479
Speaker 1: If you would like to get in touch with us

1413
01:16:48,560 --> 01:16:51,040
Speaker 1: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest

1414
01:16:51,160 --> 01:16:53,080
Speaker 1: topic for the future, or just to say hello, you

1415
01:16:53,160 --> 01:16:55,880
Speaker 1: can email us at contact at stuff to Blow your

1416
01:16:55,920 --> 01:17:05,799
Speaker 1: Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production

1417
01:17:05,880 --> 01:17:08,599
Speaker 1: of I heart Radio. For more podcasts for My heart Radio,

1418
01:17:08,840 --> 01:17:11,479
Speaker 1: visit the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever

1419
01:17:11,560 --> 01:17:12,880
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.