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Speaker 1: Hey, Welcome to Weird House Cinema. Rewind. This is Rob Lamb.

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Speaker 1: Today's episode, originally published September twenty fourth, twenty twenty one. Oh,

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Speaker 1: it's a fun one because we are discussing the Thing

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Speaker 1: from Another World. This, of course was the original adaptation

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Speaker 1: of John W. Campbell Junior's short story Who Goes There,

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Speaker 1: and it would of course be remade years and years

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Speaker 1: later in John Carpenter's The Thing. But this is a

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Speaker 1: pretty terrific movie in its own right from nineteen fifty one.

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Speaker 1: Let's jump right in. This episode of the Stuff to

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Speaker 1: Blow Your Mind Radio Hour is brought to you by Thermid.

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Speaker 1: If you need a high temperature burst of heat, then

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Speaker 1: this pyrotechnic composition of metal powder and metal oxide is

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Speaker 1: for you. Metal refining, fireworks, munitions burning through the ice

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Speaker 1: to retrieve down spaceships and alien beings. Thermite does it all, Am,

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Speaker 1: I ask for it by name.

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Speaker 2: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

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

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Speaker 3: And I'm Joe McCormick, and it's finally time on the

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Speaker 3: Weird House Cinema podcast to cover the Thing No, not

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Speaker 3: that The Thing, not the one you're thinking of, the

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Speaker 3: horror classic, the other The Thing, the Thing from another world.

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Speaker 1: Yes, this is a film that I had never seen

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Speaker 1: prior to this week, and I think part of it

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Speaker 1: was because John Carpenter's nineteen eighty two film The Thing

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Speaker 1: is just this masterpiece of science fiction and horror for

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Speaker 1: so many obvious It's visceral but intelligent. It's well acted,

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Speaker 1: it's effectively scored, it makes great use of sets and locations,

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Speaker 1: and just features a bounty of legendary and grotesque practical effects.

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Speaker 3: Totally, without a doubt, an absolute masterpiece, one of the

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Speaker 3: best horror movies ever made. Can't say enough good stuff

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Speaker 3: about Carpenter's The Thing, from the effects, to the acting

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Speaker 3: to the music, it's just it's pretty much pitch perfect.

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Speaker 1: But of course, one of the things we always have

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Speaker 1: to remind ourselves, especially perhaps if we're becoming getting a

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Speaker 1: little too judgmental about remakes and reboots and so forth,

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Speaker 1: is because I have to remind myself of this is

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Speaker 1: that John Carpenter's The Thing is also essentially a remake

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Speaker 1: or a reboot, if you will, based on the story

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Speaker 1: who goes there by John W. Campbell Junior, an author

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Speaker 1: from like the sci fi so called pulp Golden Age,

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Speaker 1: and Carpenter's film is the second official adaptation of this story,

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Speaker 1: but the first is the film we're talking about here today,

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty one's The Thing from Another World.

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Speaker 3: I had also never seen this movie in full before,

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Speaker 3: though I'd seen some scenes from it, and I had

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Speaker 3: seen it because it is briefly featured on a television

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Speaker 3: in John Carpenter's Halloween.

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Speaker 1: Oh that's right, I forgot about that.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, one of the kids who's being babysat is watching it.

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Speaker 3: I think he's I think maybe he's not quite old

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Speaker 3: enough for this movie.

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Speaker 1: So this is a film I've always known this was around,

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Speaker 1: you know. At some point after being exposed to Carpenter's

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Speaker 1: The Thing, I learned about this older version, and maybe

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Speaker 1: I would even occasionally see it in the schedule or

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Speaker 1: catch part of it on like Turner Classic Movies or something.

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Speaker 1: But I never sat down and watched it. And we'll

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Speaker 1: get into some of the reasons why, but basically they

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Speaker 1: all roll down to me thinking, oh, this this film

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Speaker 1: is a modern film. I don't want to see this

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Speaker 1: earlier like proto Thing Vision I'm going to stick with perfection.

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Speaker 1: But then I was looking through Michael Weldon's and the

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Speaker 1: author of the Psychotronic video and film Guides, I was

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Speaker 1: looking at his ride up on First on John Carpenter's

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Speaker 1: The Thing, which was glowing and you know, and says, oh,

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Speaker 1: you know this is this is a wonderful, grotesque, monstrous film.

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Speaker 1: Not surprised that he would love that one. But of

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Speaker 1: course Welden's also a fan of older genre films as well,

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Speaker 1: And I was reading this really high praise for this

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Speaker 1: nineteen fifty one film, talking about it having intelligent dialogue

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Speaker 1: and a strong female lead, and so that that really

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Speaker 1: got me thinking, well, maybe I should give this a look.

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Speaker 1: You know, the strong female lead being sort of doubly

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Speaker 1: interesting because on one hand, it's nineteen fifty one, You

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Speaker 1: don't you know that you don't necessarily think of of

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Speaker 1: this being the era of strong female leads. And then

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Speaker 1: also you think about John Carpenter's adaptation, and there are

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Speaker 1: no women in it at all. It's an entirely male cast.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, And Carpenter's version, the all male cast of characters,

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Speaker 3: somehow fits the miserable bleakness of the Antarctic bass in

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Speaker 3: the movie, but I would say that having watched it

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Speaker 3: now I know what Michael Weldon is talking, though I

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Speaker 3: think it might be slightly over selling Margaret Sheridan's role

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Speaker 3: in the movie, though she is fantastic and I really

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Speaker 3: like her character. She does a great job with it.

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Speaker 3: But I was expecting her to be the main character

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Speaker 3: of the movie based on this, which she is not.

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Speaker 3: But in her scenes she is great.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and we'll get into this a bit later. It

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Speaker 1: basically comes down to this idea of the Haxian woman,

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Speaker 1: and well you'll find out what that means.

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Speaker 3: But in terms of differences between the Thing and the

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Speaker 3: Thing from Another World, I think we're sort of burying

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Speaker 3: the lead because the one major way in which The

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Speaker 3: Thing from Another World nineteen fifty one differs from Carpenter's

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Speaker 3: movie is that the original film does not involve impersonation.

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Speaker 3: People who are familiar with Carpenter's movie will remember the

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Speaker 3: main thing about it is that the alien can assume

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Speaker 3: the forms of the humans or the animals that it kills.

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Speaker 3: So it is this polymorphous being that can sort of

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Speaker 3: sample the tissue of an organism it comes into contact

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Speaker 3: with and then make its own body into a copy

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Speaker 3: of that being, which is a wonderful plot device. The

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Speaker 3: central mechanic of Carpenter's movie gives rise to the paranoia

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Speaker 3: that doesn't really exist in the original. Or maybe there

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Speaker 3: is a kind of sense of paranoia, but it's powered

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Speaker 3: by different factors that I want to discuss in more

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Speaker 3: detail as we go on. But in this movie, the

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Speaker 3: Thing is simply a big, hulking alien that thaws out

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Speaker 3: of a block of ice and then attacks the base

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Speaker 3: where all the characters are stationed. It doesn't assume the

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Speaker 3: form of anyone if you're actually able to get a

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Speaker 3: good look at it, which you're not really in the movie,

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Speaker 3: And in fact, that's a really good thing about the movie.

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Speaker 3: The movie obscures the form of the monster for most

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Speaker 3: of the runtime in a highly effective way. But if

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Speaker 3: you were able to get a really good, well lit

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Speaker 3: gander at it, it just looks kind of like James

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Speaker 3: Arness in a big, creepy Frankenstein makeup and spacesuit.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and this was a huge reason why I had

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Speaker 1: never checked out a film before, because I'd see that

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Speaker 1: famous publicity shot of James Arnez in the Thing costume,

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Speaker 1: and I would think, well that that looks kind of lame.

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Speaker 1: I don't really want to see a movie about that,

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Speaker 1: especially when John Carpenter's version of it is this amorphous,

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Speaker 1: ultimately formless thing that takes on just a number of

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Speaker 1: just grotesque and shifting forms.

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Speaker 3: Yeah. And in fact, I mean I've said this on

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Speaker 3: the show before, I think one big mistake a lot

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Speaker 3: of horror movies make is letting you get too much

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Speaker 3: of a look at the monster. I mean, horror movies

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Speaker 3: should be sparing in letting you see the monster. It's good,

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Speaker 3: it's good to heighten the tension and make it more

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Speaker 3: mysterious by usually keeping the monster off screen, I'd say

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Speaker 3: Carpenter's The Thing is a movie that breaks that rule

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Speaker 3: to great effect. You get tons of great shots of

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Speaker 3: the monster and it looks fantastic. So, you know, if

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Speaker 3: you're kind of the thing about rules with artistic media

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Speaker 3: is you have to obey the rule unless it's just

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Speaker 3: really good anyway. Yeah, but yeah, I know what you're

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Speaker 3: talking about. With the way the monster looks in this movie.

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Speaker 3: This is a major thing I wanted to talk about.

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Speaker 3: I was shocked how scary the creature was in this movie,

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Speaker 3: and I really mean that like movies of this era

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Speaker 3: are I really appreciate them, but they're rarely viscerally disturbing

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Speaker 3: on a visual level to modern audiences. And that's not

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Speaker 3: a knock on them. And in fact, like at the

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Speaker 3: time they might have had people fainting in the aisles

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Speaker 3: or falling out of their cars with drive in, but

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Speaker 3: makeup effects from before roughly the I don't know, the

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Speaker 3: seventies or so, I think, rarely pack a strong punch

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Speaker 3: with audiences today. We've just sort of standards have been updated.

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Speaker 3: And so even if the way Boris Karloff looked and

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Speaker 3: his Frankenstein makeup was terrifying to people at the time,

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Speaker 3: I think it looks beautiful. I think it looks amazing.

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Speaker 3: I love to look at it, but I don't find

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Speaker 3: it really really terrifying. And I would say that the

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Speaker 3: baseline monster in this movie is no exception to that

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Speaker 3: rule that if you just look at the makeup effects

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Speaker 3: of the time, they're usually not going to pack a

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Speaker 3: very strong punch. If you look at well lit still

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Speaker 3: photographs of James Arnest that the actor who plays the

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Speaker 3: monster in the Thing, in his alien makeup and costume

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Speaker 3: for the movie, I think he looks goobery. He just

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Speaker 3: looks kind of like an EGA guy. He looks like Frankenstein,

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Speaker 3: sort of in a space in a jumpsuit, and yet somehow,

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Speaker 3: on the screen within the narrative, he is so much

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Speaker 3: more than that. This is a movie monster that benefits

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Speaker 3: immensely from really strong staging, lighting, and camera work more

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Speaker 3: so than makeup effects. So most of the time you

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Speaker 3: see the monster in the movie, his appearance is sudden

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Speaker 3: or brief or obscured in some way. So maybe the

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Speaker 3: characters are looking out at him through frosted glass on

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Speaker 3: a snowfield, or he or somebody opens a door and

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Speaker 3: he suddenly reaches out through it as they try to

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Speaker 3: slam it shut, or he's just a menacing silhouette at

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Speaker 3: the end of a corridor, you know, and his features

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Speaker 3: are covered in shadow. So really hats off to the

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Speaker 3: team that came up with the staging for all these

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Speaker 3: scenes and the lighting and the framing and all that,

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Speaker 3: because even though the makeup effects kind of fall short,

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Speaker 3: the monster on screen within the narrative looks wonderful. He's

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Speaker 3: really frightening.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely, Like, for instance, in the movie, you never get

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Speaker 1: a sense that this character is wearing partially ragged space pajamas.

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Speaker 1: But if you look at the still, you're like, those

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Speaker 1: are space pajamas, clearly. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, So they took a kind of goober Frankenstein and

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Speaker 3: turned him into this truly menacing being a really excellent,

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Speaker 3: excellent filmmaking technique.

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Speaker 1: Well, I'd like to get into this more. Let's go

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Speaker 1: ahead and just give the basic elevator pitch of the plot,

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Speaker 1: especially for people who, you know, did they just know

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Speaker 1: the Carpenter version. They maybe don't know how much in

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Speaker 1: common this one has with that film, aside from the

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Speaker 1: details of the monster.

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Speaker 3: Okay, well, maybe I'll do the straight elevator pitch first

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Speaker 3: and then we'll see if we have any variations on it.

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Speaker 3: The straight plot description, I would say is a mysterious

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Speaker 3: object from space crashes near a remote Arctic research base.

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Speaker 3: When a team of scientists and military men go to investigate,

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Speaker 3: they find a humanoid body frozen in the ice, and

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Speaker 3: they have to bring it back to the base with them,

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Speaker 3: and I guess you just better hope it doesn't thaw out.

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Speaker 1: I like that. Let's go ahead and listen to a

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Speaker 1: little bit of that trailer audio.

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Speaker 4: The thing from another world. This is the spot where

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Speaker 4: it was first seen, and these are the first people

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Speaker 4: who saw the thing. How did it get here? Where

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Speaker 4: did it come from? What is it? That being alive?

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Speaker 4: So I saw it, I shot it, I hit it,

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Speaker 4: I know it. Nothing happened, but just kept coming up me,

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Speaker 4: making it noise like codn It was awful, those hands

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Speaker 4: and those eyes. So you've got to tell you about it.

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Speaker 4: You've got is it human or inhuman? Earthly or unearthly?

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Speaker 4: Baffling questions, astounding questions that not even the world's greatest

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Speaker 4: scientific minds can answer. Gentlemen, do you realize what we've found?

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Speaker 4: A being from another world's different from us, is one

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Speaker 4: pole from the other if we can only communicate with it?

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Speaker 1: All right? So I want to come back to something

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Speaker 1: you were just talking about, and that was the idea

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Speaker 1: of doors opening. So yes, the research base in this

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Speaker 1: movie feels it's more or less in keeping with the

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Speaker 1: spirit that Carpenter had in his version of the film.

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Speaker 1: You know, there are these a lot of these long corridors.

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Speaker 1: There are doorways separating different sections of it. Everything feel

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Speaker 1: doesn't feel super modern. It feels very very rough. In places.

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Speaker 1: There's this idea that outside of this compound there's just

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Speaker 1: frozen death awaiting any creature, and it's inside that we

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Speaker 1: have this slim, artificial version of life, sustaining temperatures.

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Speaker 3: And that makes actually for a killer twist later in

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Speaker 3: the movie, where you haven't even really been thinking about

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Speaker 3: this while they're coming up all these different ways of

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Speaker 3: battling the thing. The thing is sort of laying siege

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Speaker 3: to the humans in the base, and then at a

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Speaker 3: certain point they're like, oh no, somebody turned off the heaters.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's a wonderful set piece in which to

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Speaker 1: engage with this monster. But one of the things that

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Speaker 1: I was really taken by watching it is just how

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Speaker 1: scary all the doors are. There's a lot of characters

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Speaker 1: going in and out of doors in this film, often

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Speaker 1: very quickly, and even before a monster the monster jumped

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Speaker 1: out from behind a door. I was feeling anxious whenever

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Speaker 1: a door would open like it was. It was really effective.

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Speaker 1: And then eventually a monster is coming out from behind

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Speaker 1: the door, and there's worry about things jumping out behind doors.

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Speaker 1: I don't think doors have ever been quite this scary.

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Speaker 3: One hundred percent agree, Yeah, this movie does something really

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Speaker 3: special with like portals, openings, doors, windows, It's really good.

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Speaker 1: Also lots of scenes where like the door to the

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Speaker 1: outside has been opened and you know there's the sense

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Speaker 1: of that crushing cold coming in. So it works on

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Speaker 1: several levels.

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Speaker 3: I think since we're not going to do a scene

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Speaker 3: by scene breakdown on this one, I guess to make

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Speaker 3: more sense for people who haven't seen especially either movie,

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Speaker 3: it might make sense to do a quick, fuller rundown

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Speaker 3: on the plot. So the basic cast of characters is

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Speaker 3: that you have a journalist and then a group of

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Speaker 3: military commanders who fly by plane up to a remote

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Speaker 3: Arctic research base where there is some scientific research going on.

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Speaker 3: And then, like I said in the elevator pitch earlier,

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Speaker 3: there is a crash of some kind of object near

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Speaker 3: the base, and the scientists and the soldiers go out

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Speaker 3: to investigate it, and it looks like what they have

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Speaker 3: encountered is a crashed flying saucer, a crash Dailien spacecraft.

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Speaker 3: And then they're frozen in the ice. On the ice

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Speaker 3: field is a humanoid figure. So they chip that they

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Speaker 3: dig that out of the ice with ice axes and

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Speaker 3: with thermite. Yes, this movie is a big fan of thermite,

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Speaker 3: of course, and the thermite thing kind of goes wrong.

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Speaker 3: I think they end up sort of melting the ship

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Speaker 3: by accident while they're trying to get it up out

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Speaker 3: of the ice. But they do get this body out

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Speaker 3: of the ice and they bring it back to the base,

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Speaker 3: and then through a series of mishaps, this body in

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Speaker 3: a chunk of ice is accidentally thought out, and what

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Speaker 3: they come to discover is that this is a being

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Speaker 3: from another planet that is not an animal, but is

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Speaker 3: in fact an animate of vegetable. They sort of explore

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Speaker 3: the alternative evolutionary history of this creature and say, what

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Speaker 3: if plant life on Earth had evolved the ability to

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Speaker 3: move quickly and have intelligence and have a mobile body

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Speaker 3: instead of animal life. And so that's sort of what

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Speaker 3: we're dealing with. And there's a lot of discussion about

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Speaker 3: the creature's mindset toward humans. It apparently needs to consume us,

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Speaker 3: it wants to drink our blood, but it doesn't have

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Speaker 3: any It doesn't really have any remorse for us or

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Speaker 3: understanding of us as fellow creatures. Instead, as one character

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Speaker 3: so eloquently puts it, he regards us the same way

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Speaker 3: we would regard a field of cabbages.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, this idea that the dog is just the short,

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Speaker 1: furry blood container and then the humans are just the larger,

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Speaker 1: hairless blood containers. Yeah, and it just needs the blood.

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Speaker 3: It's just calories.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: But so within this plot, a number of interesting themes emerge,

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Speaker 3: and maybe we can talk more about those as we

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Speaker 3: go on. But I guess here's where we would typically

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Speaker 3: get into some of the people involved in this and

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Speaker 3: talk about some connections. Now, Rob, you might have read

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Speaker 3: more about the production of this film than I did.

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Speaker 3: I'm to understand. I think there's some disagreement or confusion

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Speaker 3: about what the level of control, like who basically was

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Speaker 3: in charge of making this movie, who was the director,

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Speaker 3: and what was their relative level of control.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's kind it's kind of an open question or

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Speaker 1: a matter of debate that'll probably never be fully settled,

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Speaker 1: especially since I think everybody involved with this film or

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Speaker 1: most of them, have passed on. But the basic situation,

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Speaker 1: I'm going to talk about who is the credited director first.

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Speaker 1: So the credited director on this is Christian Nibe who

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Speaker 1: lived nineteen thirteen through nineteen ninety three, is a TV

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Speaker 1: and film director who served as editor on such films

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Speaker 1: as Howard Hawke's nineteen forty six adaptation of The Big Sleep.

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Speaker 1: This had Humphrey Bogart in it, and William Faulkner actually

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Speaker 1: co scripted this adaptation of the Raymond Chandler Philip Marlowe novel,

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Speaker 1: which is a really good novel by the way.

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Speaker 3: Interesting I've actually never read it.

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Speaker 1: However, this film, The Thing from Another World is Nibby's.

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Speaker 1: It was his first directorial credit. It's easily the biggest film,

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Speaker 1: or at least biggest, you know, the most well remembered

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Speaker 1: film that he did, although he worked an entire career

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Speaker 1: afterwards as a TV director up until the mid nineteen seventies.

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Speaker 3: Okay, so Nibee is credited as the director of the film,

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Speaker 3: but for some reason, I've always heard this described as

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Speaker 3: having been directed by Howard Hawks, who of course is

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Speaker 3: an acclaimed filmmaker of the time. So what's the deal

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Speaker 3: with that?

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Speaker 1: Okay, So Howard Hawks, who we just alluded to, had

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Speaker 1: worked with Nibe. Nibe was his editor. So Hawks was

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Speaker 1: also known as the Silver Fox, and if you look

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Speaker 1: up pictures of it you can see why, you know,

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Speaker 1: dashing sort of silver looking hair.

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Speaker 3: I guess it looks like somebody who would be in

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Speaker 3: like a whiskey a Scotch commercial on TV in the

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Speaker 3: fifties or something.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely dashing. Character and director of sech films is Red River,

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Speaker 1: Rio Bravo, nineteen thirty two, Scarface, El Dorado, and Hatari,

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Speaker 1: as well as the aforementioned The Big Sleep. He was

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Speaker 1: nominated for an Academy Award for nineteen forty two Sergeant York,

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Speaker 1: and he received an Honorary Academy Award in nineteen seventy four.

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Speaker 1: He's considered a legend of the classic Hollywood era, and

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Speaker 1: while he was not the credited director or the credited

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Speaker 1: co writer on The Thing From Another World, you'll often

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Speaker 1: see it looks like. For instance, you'll see him listed

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Speaker 1: on IMDb as uncredited director, uncredited writer. Basically, various accounts

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Speaker 1: indicate that he was the director and he, for some

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Speaker 1: reason or another, let Christian Nibe take the directing credit,

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Speaker 1: which again would be his first. John Carpenter among others,

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Speaker 1: have echoed this view. However, various other folks, including some

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Speaker 1: people involved with the actual production of the film, have

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Speaker 1: said otherwise, and they say no, Nibe was the director,

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Speaker 1: So ultimately, you know how can you say one way

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Speaker 1: or the other. It does seem like Hawks greatly valued Nibe,

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Speaker 1: and it's said that Nibe was an instrumental editor in

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Speaker 1: many of his films. So it's been argued that perhaps

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Speaker 1: Hawks thought that sci fi was beneath him and didn't

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Speaker 1: want his name on it, and or he gave the

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Speaker 1: credit to Niby so that he could get into the

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Speaker 1: director's guild, you know, like, let's go ahead and put

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Speaker 1: your name on this film and this will help your career.

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Speaker 1: It's hard to say what exactly was going on here,

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Speaker 1: but I doubt we're going to get a definite answer

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Speaker 1: on it ever. But it does not say I want

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Speaker 1: to stress though. I've seen no accounts that indicate that

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Speaker 1: this was some sort of This was a situation of

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Speaker 1: animosity or like one director being replaced. We often see

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Speaker 1: that in this in production stories where I this this

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Speaker 1: guy's out on the outs, bring in this guy. No,

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Speaker 1: it seems like something else was going on here, and

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Speaker 1: you know, if anything, it was probably Hawk's helping out Naiby,

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Speaker 1: or it's just been a situation where Hawks was involved

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Speaker 1: in the production and Nibee was still the director, and

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Speaker 1: maybe people were more inclined to give Hawks more credit

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Speaker 1: than he perhaps deserved for it. I mean, I don't

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Speaker 1: know what the answer is here.

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Speaker 3: Sure, I guess we'll have to leave that one sort

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Speaker 3: of unanswered.

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Speaker 1: That being said, folks that are familiar with Hawks, they

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Speaker 1: do point to various things about this film that have

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Speaker 1: his fingerprints on it. So and you put you can

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Speaker 1: of course explain that, explain. You can explain that away

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Speaker 1: a bit by saying, well, Hawks and Nibe worked together

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Speaker 1: so much. You know, they had similar interests, they worked

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Speaker 1: together to make these previous films. So who knows. We're

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Speaker 1: not going to reach an answer today.

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Speaker 3: Well, I will emphasize yet again that I think pretty

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Speaker 3: much across the board in terms of technical filmmaking, this

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Speaker 3: is an excellently made movie, especially for science fiction films

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Speaker 3: at the time. I mean, there are definitely things that

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Speaker 3: you can criticize about it, and we will as kind

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Speaker 3: of kind of like quaint or product of their era.

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Speaker 3: But a lot of that's in the actual sort of

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Speaker 3: story content. In terms of a technical exercise in filmmaking,

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Speaker 3: I think the Thing from Another World just is awesome

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Speaker 3: for nineteen fifty one.

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Speaker 1: Absolutely. Yeah, if you're hesitant to watch this just because

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Speaker 1: it is an early nineteen fifties film. Just know that

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Speaker 1: it is in many ways ahead of its time. All Right,

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Speaker 1: So we mentioned already that this was based on a

402
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Speaker 1: short story based on a short story by John W.

403
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Speaker 1: Campbell Junior, who lived nineteen nineteen through nineteen seventy one.

404
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Speaker 1: Pulp era sci fi writer and editor of Astounding Science Fiction.

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Speaker 1: He wrote numerous short stories in several novels, though Who

406
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Speaker 1: Goes There? The story that this is based on is

407
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Speaker 1: perhaps his best remembered, and I believe it was recently

408
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Speaker 1: re released in an expanded form, like they went back

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Speaker 1: to an old manuscript, and there's stuff in that original

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Speaker 1: manuscript that in some cases is actually present in the

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Speaker 1: film version, but not in the original story, if I'm

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Speaker 1: correct on that.

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Speaker 3: Now, having read only a little bit about Campbell, it

414
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Speaker 3: seems to me that his life sort of breaks into

415
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Speaker 3: a couple of different parts that like early on, it

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Speaker 3: seems like most of what you read about him is

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Speaker 3: that he's just sort of like an output machine, Like

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Speaker 3: he's just writing tons and tons of very influential science

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Speaker 3: fiction and editing tons of people and like cultivating the

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Speaker 3: early careers of a lot of people who would become

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Speaker 3: later science fiction writers. And then it seems like the

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Speaker 3: other half is that he descends into increasingly bizarre interest

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Speaker 3: in pseudoscience and right wing politics.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, that seems to be the case.

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Speaker 4: You know.

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Speaker 1: Some accounts indicate that he could always be a bit

427
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Speaker 1: of a blowhard and would was prone to just talk

428
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Speaker 1: a lot, like if you were going to go in

429
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Speaker 1: and chat with them about anything, you were going to

430
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Speaker 1: get a monologue. But yeah, in life, he apparently increasingly

431
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Speaker 1: espounded ideas that did not set well with more progressive

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Speaker 1: sci fi authors of his time, such as Isaac Asimov.

433
00:23:54,640 --> 00:23:56,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, the main things I've seen picked out are increasing

434
00:23:56,880 --> 00:24:00,080
Speaker 3: interest in hard right politics, and then like belief in

435
00:24:00,480 --> 00:24:05,000
Speaker 3: psychic powers and stuff, and being into sort of the

436
00:24:05,320 --> 00:24:08,720
Speaker 3: Dianetics nexus of alternative psychiatry.

437
00:24:09,200 --> 00:24:13,119
Speaker 1: Yeah. Plus, I was reading about him in a twenty

438
00:24:13,200 --> 00:24:15,800
Speaker 1: nineteen piece in The New York Times by Peter Libby

439
00:24:16,320 --> 00:24:20,520
Speaker 1: about the renaming of a science fiction writing award that

440
00:24:20,600 --> 00:24:23,719
Speaker 1: had been named for Campbell and how they changed it

441
00:24:23,800 --> 00:24:28,800
Speaker 1: because the reason was it like Campbell supported racial segregation

442
00:24:29,040 --> 00:24:32,400
Speaker 1: during his life, and he has founded numerous racist and

443
00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:35,959
Speaker 1: inflammatory viewpoints, like the kind of guy who would not

444
00:24:36,000 --> 00:24:41,920
Speaker 1: only hold hold racist viewpoints, but also would like seem

445
00:24:41,960 --> 00:24:44,399
Speaker 1: to go the extra step in just trying to rile

446
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:49,440
Speaker 1: people up and shock people with his opinions. So yeah,

447
00:24:49,480 --> 00:24:52,200
Speaker 1: that's that is John W. Campbell Jr.

448
00:24:52,960 --> 00:24:55,000
Speaker 3: Now do you know if Campbell does he have any

449
00:24:55,080 --> 00:24:57,159
Speaker 3: involvement with the film or was it just that he

450
00:24:57,200 --> 00:24:59,159
Speaker 3: wrote the story and then it was adapted to a

451
00:24:59,200 --> 00:25:01,080
Speaker 3: screenplay with without his involvement.

452
00:25:01,600 --> 00:25:04,040
Speaker 1: I don't know the details of his involvement, but I

453
00:25:04,080 --> 00:25:08,840
Speaker 1: know that he's not credited with any screenwriting credits on this. Instead,

454
00:25:08,920 --> 00:25:13,280
Speaker 1: we have the credited screenwriter is Charles Letterer, who lived

455
00:25:13,320 --> 00:25:16,520
Speaker 1: nineteen eleven through nineteen seventy six. This is somebody who's

456
00:25:16,520 --> 00:25:20,920
Speaker 1: a screenwriter on Hawks's Gentleman Preferred Blondes as well as

457
00:25:20,960 --> 00:25:24,560
Speaker 1: the original Oceans eleven in nineteen sixty that was not

458
00:25:24,640 --> 00:25:28,280
Speaker 1: a Hawks film, but just another credit for a Letterer here.

459
00:25:28,800 --> 00:25:32,639
Speaker 1: There's also an uncredited writer listed on IMDb, Ben Hesched,

460
00:25:32,960 --> 00:25:35,600
Speaker 1: who lives lived eighteen ninety four through nineteen sixty four.

461
00:25:35,640 --> 00:25:37,600
Speaker 1: And this is a guy who'd also worked with Hawks

462
00:25:38,359 --> 00:25:43,360
Speaker 1: writer on Scarface as well as Alfred Hitchcock's film Notorious.

463
00:25:44,720 --> 00:25:46,679
Speaker 3: Now I guess we're about to talk about the cast

464
00:25:46,760 --> 00:25:49,880
Speaker 3: a little bit, and again I will say, as great

465
00:25:49,920 --> 00:25:52,760
Speaker 3: as this movie is, one of the top criticisms I

466
00:25:52,800 --> 00:25:56,320
Speaker 3: would lodge about it is it has way way too

467
00:25:56,359 --> 00:25:59,800
Speaker 3: many characters, way too many characters. This movie could have

468
00:25:59,840 --> 00:26:03,400
Speaker 3: had seven or eight characters at the base, I think,

469
00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:06,600
Speaker 3: and achieve the same factional dynamics. Instead it has like

470
00:26:06,720 --> 00:26:10,080
Speaker 3: thirty seven characters. There's way too many. I could not

471
00:26:10,200 --> 00:26:12,879
Speaker 3: keep track of who was who among the minor characters,

472
00:26:13,040 --> 00:26:16,119
Speaker 3: you know, I could recognize like like three or four people,

473
00:26:16,160 --> 00:26:18,280
Speaker 3: and then everybody else. I was just getting mixed up.

474
00:26:18,600 --> 00:26:21,320
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Like you're immediately just thrown into a cast

475
00:26:21,440 --> 00:26:25,480
Speaker 1: of a very interchangeable looking like clean cut white military

476
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:28,679
Speaker 1: guys yea, and you're just scrambling to figure out for

477
00:26:28,680 --> 00:26:31,440
Speaker 1: a little bit, because again, the writing is really tight

478
00:26:31,480 --> 00:26:34,600
Speaker 1: on this thing. You pretty quickly figure out who your

479
00:26:34,640 --> 00:26:36,639
Speaker 1: main character is, and you can sort of tell who

480
00:26:36,720 --> 00:26:38,480
Speaker 1: matters and who doesn't. But there are a lot of

481
00:26:38,480 --> 00:26:40,119
Speaker 1: They are a fair number of characters on the screen

482
00:26:40,359 --> 00:26:43,280
Speaker 1: who ultimately don't matter, and they're not even there to

483
00:26:43,320 --> 00:26:46,199
Speaker 1: be cannon fodder for the monster or anything. Right, Like,

484
00:26:46,359 --> 00:26:48,040
Speaker 1: most everybody survives this thing.

485
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:50,920
Speaker 3: I think the monster only kills like two or three people.

486
00:26:50,720 --> 00:26:53,280
Speaker 1: Right, yeah. Yeah, So if you see this many people

487
00:26:53,320 --> 00:26:55,200
Speaker 1: and you're like, oh, it's gonna be a blood bath. No, no,

488
00:26:55,160 --> 00:26:59,520
Speaker 1: it's it's not. Even the smaller teams like Team Science

489
00:27:00,320 --> 00:27:02,560
Speaker 1: get into that in a bit. But there were like

490
00:27:03,080 --> 00:27:05,720
Speaker 1: three characters that stood out. Well, there were two that

491
00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:08,280
Speaker 1: were important characters, one who stood out, and two that

492
00:27:08,320 --> 00:27:10,200
Speaker 1: were just interchangeably in the background.

493
00:27:10,560 --> 00:27:13,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, so maybe we should talk about the actor playing

494
00:27:13,640 --> 00:27:14,159
Speaker 3: our hero.

495
00:27:14,800 --> 00:27:19,520
Speaker 1: All right, this is Kenneth Toby playing Captain Patrick Hendry.

496
00:27:19,880 --> 00:27:23,479
Speaker 3: Ooh, Patrick Hendry, this is our hero. This is the

497
00:27:23,520 --> 00:27:27,560
Speaker 3: all American lug. He is a handsome, blonde man of

498
00:27:27,600 --> 00:27:31,439
Speaker 3: action who holds his liquor. He thinks fast, and he brooks.

499
00:27:31,520 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 3: No sympathy for bloodsucking aliens or any such nonsense.

500
00:27:35,920 --> 00:27:39,320
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, he's It doesn't take long to realize this

501
00:27:39,359 --> 00:27:43,560
Speaker 1: guy's our lead. He's an interesting actor, though two hundred

502
00:27:43,560 --> 00:27:46,719
Speaker 1: and twenty three acting credits on IMDb. I'm not sure

503
00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:49,120
Speaker 1: if I gave his dates yet, nineteen seventeen through two

504
00:27:49,160 --> 00:27:53,280
Speaker 1: thousand and two. He in his later career, Oh, he

505
00:27:53,320 --> 00:27:59,320
Speaker 1: played air controller Newbauer in nineteen eighties Airplane, the parody film,

506
00:28:00,040 --> 00:28:02,439
Speaker 1: but back in the day. He was in nineteen fifty

507
00:28:02,440 --> 00:28:04,879
Speaker 1: five's That Came From Beneath the Sea, and he has

508
00:28:04,960 --> 00:28:09,359
Speaker 1: quite a few interesting cameos and uncredited bits, especially from

509
00:28:09,440 --> 00:28:12,960
Speaker 1: later in his life, including playing a hologram priest and

510
00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:16,880
Speaker 1: hell Raiser Bloodline. He was a projectionist in Grimlins two.

511
00:28:17,080 --> 00:28:19,879
Speaker 1: He had another cameo in Grimlins playing a different character.

512
00:28:20,320 --> 00:28:23,879
Speaker 1: He was in Big Top Peewee, he was in The Howling,

513
00:28:24,000 --> 00:28:25,159
Speaker 1: he was in Inner Space.

514
00:28:25,600 --> 00:28:28,159
Speaker 3: You know, I'll say, I think he very much fits

515
00:28:28,200 --> 00:28:31,439
Speaker 3: the mold of a leading man character of these nineteen

516
00:28:31,520 --> 00:28:34,119
Speaker 3: fifties sci fi movies where the leading character is often

517
00:28:34,280 --> 00:28:38,840
Speaker 3: just this kind of lug this you know, macho cigarette

518
00:28:38,880 --> 00:28:41,920
Speaker 3: ad man. But you know what, he's good. He's good

519
00:28:41,920 --> 00:28:42,520
Speaker 3: with this role.

520
00:28:43,000 --> 00:28:45,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And it seems to be the like he

521
00:28:45,200 --> 00:28:47,840
Speaker 1: was in a lot of stuff before these more recent films.

522
00:28:48,080 --> 00:28:50,840
Speaker 1: I'm naming here. But what seems to be the case

523
00:28:51,400 --> 00:28:54,040
Speaker 1: is that he had a long career, so he was

524
00:28:54,080 --> 00:28:57,440
Speaker 1: still active by the nineteen eighties. But also he was

525
00:28:58,080 --> 00:29:00,000
Speaker 1: in the Thing from Another World. He was part of

526
00:29:00,800 --> 00:29:05,440
Speaker 1: this era of TV that this new generation of directors

527
00:29:05,440 --> 00:29:08,000
Speaker 1: had grown up on. So you see folks like Joe

528
00:29:08,120 --> 00:29:11,800
Speaker 1: Dante using him a lot. John Carpenter used him in

529
00:29:12,400 --> 00:29:15,760
Speaker 1: I Want to Say Starman. So you know, they look

530
00:29:15,800 --> 00:29:17,160
Speaker 1: back and they're like, this is the star of the

531
00:29:17,160 --> 00:29:20,440
Speaker 1: thing from another world. If he's looking for work, I

532
00:29:20,440 --> 00:29:22,040
Speaker 1: want to put him in my film. Have him. I'll

533
00:29:22,080 --> 00:29:23,840
Speaker 1: just give hi him a cameo something. Let's get him

534
00:29:23,880 --> 00:29:25,640
Speaker 1: on the screen. I just want to be in his presence.

535
00:29:26,040 --> 00:29:29,040
Speaker 3: Now we mentioned that in this movie he's a ruggedly

536
00:29:29,120 --> 00:29:33,760
Speaker 3: handsome lug. He is also the love interest of Margaret

537
00:29:33,800 --> 00:29:37,960
Speaker 3: Sheridan in this movie, playing a character named Nicky Nicholson.

538
00:29:38,040 --> 00:29:41,920
Speaker 1: Is that right, yep, Yeah, So Sheridan's interesting. She lived

539
00:29:41,960 --> 00:29:45,840
Speaker 1: nineteen twenty six through nineteen eighty two. Hawks apparently discovered

540
00:29:45,880 --> 00:29:48,680
Speaker 1: her while she was still in college, and Hawks was

541
00:29:48,720 --> 00:29:51,440
Speaker 1: just convinced that this was going to be the next

542
00:29:51,440 --> 00:29:52,960
Speaker 1: big star, that she was like a once in a

543
00:29:53,040 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 1: generation talent. So he wanted to cast her in nineteen

544
00:29:56,760 --> 00:30:00,000
Speaker 1: forty eighth Red River. That's the Hawks film, but apparently

545
00:30:00,040 --> 00:30:01,959
Speaker 1: she was pregnant at the time. She passed on it,

546
00:30:02,480 --> 00:30:05,680
Speaker 1: and she ended up being in this film, which, you know,

547
00:30:06,040 --> 00:30:09,360
Speaker 1: depending you know, whether Hawks directed it or not, it's

548
00:30:09,360 --> 00:30:13,800
Speaker 1: still very much a Hawks film, you know, but her

549
00:30:13,840 --> 00:30:16,840
Speaker 1: career ultimately didn't take off quite like Hawks had imagined it.

550
00:30:16,960 --> 00:30:20,280
Speaker 1: She was in five more films and she did some TV,

551
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:25,200
Speaker 1: but this is the one she's best remembered for. Other

552
00:30:25,240 --> 00:30:28,400
Speaker 1: credits include nineteen fifty three's I've a Jury in nineteen

553
00:30:28,440 --> 00:30:30,600
Speaker 1: fifty four's The Diamond Wizard.

554
00:30:31,080 --> 00:30:31,920
Speaker 3: I'd like that name.

555
00:30:32,240 --> 00:30:33,880
Speaker 1: It's a cool name. I think I looked at it.

556
00:30:33,880 --> 00:30:35,680
Speaker 1: I think maybe it's like a diamond heist kind of

557
00:30:35,680 --> 00:30:38,760
Speaker 1: a film. Oh so, nothing that stands out to modern

558
00:30:38,840 --> 00:30:39,960
Speaker 1: viewers perhaps so much.

559
00:30:40,360 --> 00:30:43,920
Speaker 3: Well, Margaret Sheridan's wonderful in this movie. She has such

560
00:30:44,040 --> 00:30:48,440
Speaker 3: a ry, jolly energy. I love the way that she

561
00:30:48,800 --> 00:30:52,480
Speaker 3: was a win Kenneth Toby's talking and she's got scenes

562
00:30:52,520 --> 00:30:55,400
Speaker 3: with him. I love the way she's constantly either kind

563
00:30:55,440 --> 00:30:58,720
Speaker 3: of laughing at him or visibly trying to hold back

564
00:30:58,880 --> 00:31:02,800
Speaker 3: laughter while he's There's something kind of powerful and almost

565
00:31:02,880 --> 00:31:05,480
Speaker 3: kind of threatening about the way she just laughs at him,

566
00:31:06,200 --> 00:31:07,920
Speaker 3: and I love it. But then also it's very clear

567
00:31:07,920 --> 00:31:10,840
Speaker 3: that she does like him. So yeah, she's got a

568
00:31:10,880 --> 00:31:12,120
Speaker 3: wonderful screen presence.

569
00:31:12,440 --> 00:31:14,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can see what Hawks saw in her. She

570
00:31:14,760 --> 00:31:18,720
Speaker 1: has this great energy and the role is really good

571
00:31:18,840 --> 00:31:22,200
Speaker 1: for really well written for nineteen fifty one. You know,

572
00:31:22,240 --> 00:31:26,480
Speaker 1: she's not a damsel in distress, she's not a fem fatale.

573
00:31:27,320 --> 00:31:31,280
Speaker 1: You know, she is this this strong, capable professional woman

574
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:36,040
Speaker 1: in this you know, outrageous scenario, and she you know,

575
00:31:36,080 --> 00:31:39,000
Speaker 1: stands toe to toe with her male counterparts in the film.

576
00:31:39,480 --> 00:31:42,480
Speaker 1: And this is where we get to something that was

577
00:31:42,480 --> 00:31:45,320
Speaker 1: apparently one of Hawk's trademarks. And I have to admit

578
00:31:45,400 --> 00:31:47,520
Speaker 1: I haven't seen any other Howard Hawks film, so I

579
00:31:47,560 --> 00:31:50,320
Speaker 1: can't really speak to this personally, but apparently in film

580
00:31:50,360 --> 00:31:53,239
Speaker 1: theory this is known as the hawksy and woman, an

581
00:31:53,320 --> 00:31:56,920
Speaker 1: archetype of sort, you know, a tough talking or fast

582
00:31:56,960 --> 00:32:00,719
Speaker 1: talking woman that converbally spar with male care on her parts.

583
00:32:01,120 --> 00:32:02,760
Speaker 1: And that's certainly something we see in.

584
00:32:02,800 --> 00:32:05,320
Speaker 3: This role his girl Friday.

585
00:32:06,320 --> 00:32:09,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, I guess so, you know, not to say, I

586
00:32:09,480 --> 00:32:11,200
Speaker 1: want to be clear, it's not like there are no

587
00:32:11,400 --> 00:32:16,280
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty sensibilities in this character or in the film entirely,

588
00:32:16,960 --> 00:32:19,800
Speaker 1: but I feel like it's it's a shockingly strong role

589
00:32:20,440 --> 00:32:32,400
Speaker 1: for a film from this time period, certainly a genre film. Yeah,

590
00:32:32,520 --> 00:32:35,360
Speaker 1: so far we've spoken about two characters in depth here,

591
00:32:36,520 --> 00:32:40,320
Speaker 1: and Nikki is very much on team Science and and

592
00:32:40,440 --> 00:32:45,440
Speaker 1: Toby is one of the military men. You off, Mike here,

593
00:32:45,440 --> 00:32:48,720
Speaker 1: you talked about this film essentially being about jocks versus nerds.

594
00:32:48,920 --> 00:32:52,280
Speaker 3: Oh, totally. Yeah, this is a jocks versus nerds movie,

595
00:32:52,560 --> 00:32:55,280
Speaker 3: though there's some crossover because ultimately, I will I would

596
00:32:55,280 --> 00:32:59,440
Speaker 3: say that while Margaret Sheridan is playing a scientist, her

597
00:32:59,480 --> 00:33:01,880
Speaker 3: real loyal are more on the jock side. She's with

598
00:33:01,960 --> 00:33:05,680
Speaker 3: the military guys in the end. But yeah, this is

599
00:33:05,760 --> 00:33:09,920
Speaker 3: a movie in which the jocks the military represent a

600
00:33:10,320 --> 00:33:15,800
Speaker 3: tough common sense and the nerds the scientists represent an

601
00:33:16,000 --> 00:33:20,360
Speaker 3: unhealthy and ill advised curiosity, you know, a mind that

602
00:33:20,520 --> 00:33:23,800
Speaker 3: is a little too open for its own good. And

603
00:33:23,840 --> 00:33:27,320
Speaker 3: this brings us to the next character that we wanted

604
00:33:27,360 --> 00:33:29,560
Speaker 3: to talk about and the actor who plays him, and

605
00:33:29,600 --> 00:33:32,760
Speaker 3: that's if this movie has a human villain, this is

606
00:33:32,800 --> 00:33:36,360
Speaker 3: the human villain. This is doctor Carrington. I would say

607
00:33:36,400 --> 00:33:40,040
Speaker 3: he is the main figure in the movie representing the

608
00:33:40,160 --> 00:33:44,880
Speaker 3: villainous potential of the nerds among us. He's so curious

609
00:33:44,920 --> 00:33:47,920
Speaker 3: to know more about the life forms from other worlds

610
00:33:48,200 --> 00:33:51,200
Speaker 3: that he forgets his loyalty to this one. And I

611
00:33:51,200 --> 00:33:53,840
Speaker 3: think this is a good jumping off point to talk

612
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:57,000
Speaker 3: about some of the historical political context of the film.

613
00:33:57,600 --> 00:33:59,400
Speaker 3: So I want to be clear, I do not know

614
00:33:59,600 --> 00:34:02,440
Speaker 3: if it is intended this way by the filmmakers. This

615
00:34:02,520 --> 00:34:05,880
Speaker 3: could be something that is just an artifact of interpretation.

616
00:34:06,200 --> 00:34:11,080
Speaker 3: But it's easy to see how this has been interpreted

617
00:34:11,200 --> 00:34:14,360
Speaker 3: as a Cold War paranoia movie. You know, it was

618
00:34:14,440 --> 00:34:18,600
Speaker 3: released early during the Second Red Scare, and it involves

619
00:34:18,840 --> 00:34:23,440
Speaker 3: sort of commie coded intellectuals who betray their loyalty to

620
00:34:23,480 --> 00:34:29,520
Speaker 3: the home team in a spirit of suicidal interplanetary cosmopolitanism.

621
00:34:29,880 --> 00:34:33,480
Speaker 3: So doctor Carrington, there's something kind of off about him

622
00:34:33,520 --> 00:34:37,279
Speaker 3: in his esthetics. He dresses in these strange slacks that

623
00:34:37,360 --> 00:34:39,719
Speaker 3: look I'm not sure what they were. They look kind

624
00:34:39,760 --> 00:34:42,879
Speaker 3: of like pajama pants with a strange pattern on them.

625
00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:46,640
Speaker 3: And he wears a turtleneck sweater and a double breasted jacket,

626
00:34:47,040 --> 00:34:49,200
Speaker 3: and he has a pointy beard. So he looks almost

627
00:34:49,200 --> 00:34:52,840
Speaker 3: like the classic Looney Tunes caricature of the Freudian psychiatrist,

628
00:34:52,920 --> 00:34:55,840
Speaker 3: you know what I'm talking about. He looks like the

629
00:34:56,520 --> 00:35:00,680
Speaker 3: archetype of an untrustworthy godless in a li actual like

630
00:35:00,719 --> 00:35:03,239
Speaker 3: somebody that John Wayne would slug in the mouth in

631
00:35:03,280 --> 00:35:04,240
Speaker 3: Big chim McLean.

632
00:35:04,880 --> 00:35:11,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, almost like like a stereotypical communist sympathizer intellectual of

633
00:35:11,200 --> 00:35:11,600
Speaker 1: the day.

634
00:35:11,960 --> 00:35:12,160
Speaker 3: Yeah.

635
00:35:12,239 --> 00:35:12,560
Speaker 1: Yeah.

636
00:35:13,040 --> 00:35:15,120
Speaker 3: There are a number of sci fi movies of this

637
00:35:15,200 --> 00:35:18,160
Speaker 3: time interpreted as Cold War paranoia movies, and they tend

638
00:35:18,239 --> 00:35:22,920
Speaker 3: to feature plot devices of either or one of two mechanisms,

639
00:35:22,960 --> 00:35:27,480
Speaker 3: either mind control or body snatching. And what this means

640
00:35:27,560 --> 00:35:30,400
Speaker 3: is that you end up with enemies who look like

641
00:35:30,480 --> 00:35:33,640
Speaker 3: your friends and neighbors, but secretly they're working for the

642
00:35:33,680 --> 00:35:36,880
Speaker 3: other side. And you can see examples of this in

643
00:35:36,880 --> 00:35:39,759
Speaker 3: the nineteen fifty six Invasion of the Body Snatchers, the

644
00:35:39,800 --> 00:35:42,720
Speaker 3: original Invasion of the Body Snatchers. There was a remake

645
00:35:42,800 --> 00:35:46,200
Speaker 3: in seventy eight that I think is absolutely fantastic. If

646
00:35:46,200 --> 00:35:49,080
Speaker 3: you've never seen the seventy eight version, that's another remake

647
00:35:49,120 --> 00:35:51,560
Speaker 3: from I guess a few years before, but around the

648
00:35:51,600 --> 00:35:53,800
Speaker 3: same time as Carpenter's Thing remake.

649
00:35:53,840 --> 00:35:54,200
Speaker 1: That is a.

650
00:35:54,560 --> 00:35:57,800
Speaker 3: Remake that is at least as good as the original,

651
00:35:57,840 --> 00:35:58,600
Speaker 3: and probably better.

652
00:35:58,960 --> 00:36:01,400
Speaker 1: I've never seen the seven remake. I've only seen the

653
00:36:01,680 --> 00:36:05,600
Speaker 1: nineteen fifty six version, which, as a child like scared

654
00:36:05,600 --> 00:36:08,080
Speaker 1: the crap out of me. A bet like something about

655
00:36:08,120 --> 00:36:10,560
Speaker 1: just the black and white nature of it and just

656
00:36:10,640 --> 00:36:15,080
Speaker 1: how just frenzied Kevin McCarthy's character is towards the end

657
00:36:15,200 --> 00:36:18,600
Speaker 1: like he's just completely losing it with well, it's not

658
00:36:18,640 --> 00:36:21,040
Speaker 1: even paranoia in the context of the film, because people

659
00:36:21,080 --> 00:36:24,200
Speaker 1: are being replaced by pod people and he's the like

660
00:36:24,239 --> 00:36:26,640
Speaker 1: the only sane man left trying to warn us.

661
00:36:26,920 --> 00:36:28,840
Speaker 3: Oh, well, you really should see The seventy eight Body

662
00:36:28,840 --> 00:36:32,200
Speaker 3: Snatchers because it's also just fantastic. It's it's got a

663
00:36:32,239 --> 00:36:37,239
Speaker 3: great cast, Donald Sutherland, Brooke Adams, Veronica Cartwright, Jeff Goldblum,

664
00:36:37,280 --> 00:36:38,040
Speaker 3: Leonard Nimoy.

665
00:36:38,200 --> 00:36:38,359
Speaker 1: There.

666
00:36:39,040 --> 00:36:42,919
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a wonderful cast and excellently scripted, like really good.

667
00:36:43,719 --> 00:36:43,839
Speaker 4: So.

668
00:36:43,960 --> 00:36:47,080
Speaker 3: But anyway, in those cases, especially the original fifty six

669
00:36:47,120 --> 00:36:49,279
Speaker 3: Invasion of the Body Snatchers, because it's in this sort

670
00:36:49,280 --> 00:36:52,160
Speaker 3: of red scare period of the fifties after World War Two,

671
00:36:53,400 --> 00:36:55,839
Speaker 3: it's it fits into this mold. You've got people who

672
00:36:55,880 --> 00:36:58,760
Speaker 3: look like your friends, but actually they work for the enemy.

673
00:36:59,040 --> 00:37:01,160
Speaker 3: And on the Hammy or b movie side of things,

674
00:37:01,160 --> 00:37:03,600
Speaker 3: you've also got movies like It Conquered the World, which

675
00:37:03,600 --> 00:37:05,360
Speaker 3: I think you could say the same thing about also

676
00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:08,760
Speaker 3: came out in nineteen fifty six, a Korman special Roger Korman,

677
00:37:09,719 --> 00:37:12,319
Speaker 3: And how would you describe it? Conquered the world. It's

678
00:37:12,320 --> 00:37:15,960
Speaker 3: a movie where like a giant communist mind control arto

679
00:37:16,000 --> 00:37:19,720
Speaker 3: Choke from Venus conquers a military base in a nearby

680
00:37:19,760 --> 00:37:22,480
Speaker 3: town by like making a brain thrall out of Lee

681
00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:23,080
Speaker 3: van Cleef.

682
00:37:23,520 --> 00:37:26,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's an interesting film. It has a ridiculous monster

683
00:37:26,280 --> 00:37:30,440
Speaker 1: in it, but a lot of it revolves around around

684
00:37:30,560 --> 00:37:35,040
Speaker 1: Peter Graves's character having these conversations with Lee van Cleef's

685
00:37:35,320 --> 00:37:39,200
Speaker 1: character kind of like it just a philosophical arguments about

686
00:37:39,560 --> 00:37:42,600
Speaker 1: how we should be treating the aliens that are invading

687
00:37:42,640 --> 00:37:45,000
Speaker 1: the world, you know, with Lee van Cleef, you know,

688
00:37:45,040 --> 00:37:46,640
Speaker 1: since he tends to play the more villainous role as

689
00:37:46,640 --> 00:37:49,759
Speaker 1: though he's not really an outright villain, not an unsympathetic

690
00:37:49,800 --> 00:37:50,239
Speaker 1: villain in.

691
00:37:50,200 --> 00:37:52,279
Speaker 3: This he comes through in the end.

692
00:37:52,520 --> 00:37:54,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, he comes through in the end, but he also

693
00:37:54,280 --> 00:37:57,080
Speaker 1: seems to be he has a very logic based approach

694
00:37:57,120 --> 00:38:01,080
Speaker 1: to everything into why he is essentially with the aliens,

695
00:38:02,200 --> 00:38:03,520
Speaker 1: and that's kind of the heart of it. Like the

696
00:38:04,239 --> 00:38:07,799
Speaker 1: alien threat exists, and it's about how are we as

697
00:38:08,000 --> 00:38:10,319
Speaker 1: a as a as a as a culture responding to

698
00:38:10,360 --> 00:38:15,480
Speaker 1: it and are we engaging in dangerous sensibilities and dangerous

699
00:38:15,520 --> 00:38:18,640
Speaker 1: ideas regarding the treatment of alien beings.

700
00:38:19,080 --> 00:38:21,400
Speaker 3: Will we learn only too late that man is a

701
00:38:21,400 --> 00:38:22,720
Speaker 3: feeling creature.

702
00:38:22,760 --> 00:38:24,640
Speaker 1: Right, And that's a big that's a big theme in

703
00:38:24,680 --> 00:38:27,960
Speaker 1: all of these right, the idea that this this dangerous

704
00:38:28,000 --> 00:38:32,000
Speaker 1: ideology or you know, or or alien presence, whatever the

705
00:38:32,040 --> 00:38:35,440
Speaker 1: infection happens to be, it will rob you of your individuality.

706
00:38:35,760 --> 00:38:38,040
Speaker 1: You're just going to be made into you'll be a

707
00:38:38,080 --> 00:38:41,799
Speaker 1: pod person, you'll be a you know, whatever the thing is.

708
00:38:41,840 --> 00:38:45,000
Speaker 1: You're going to be robbed of your individuality and your personality.

709
00:38:45,320 --> 00:38:48,839
Speaker 3: And that this alien persuasion, this alien frame of mind,

710
00:38:48,920 --> 00:38:51,640
Speaker 3: or the sympathies to the enemy are not visible from

711
00:38:51,719 --> 00:38:54,960
Speaker 3: the outside, right, that the enemy, whether it's mind control

712
00:38:55,160 --> 00:38:58,120
Speaker 3: or body snatching, either way, the effect is the same,

713
00:38:58,160 --> 00:39:01,000
Speaker 3: which is that the enemy is among us, blending in,

714
00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:04,080
Speaker 3: you know. And this is very much in the political

715
00:39:04,080 --> 00:39:06,880
Speaker 3: spirit of the age. It's like, you know Mcarthy's speech

716
00:39:06,920 --> 00:39:09,560
Speaker 3: when he stood up in nineteen fifty and he said

717
00:39:09,560 --> 00:39:12,160
Speaker 3: he had a list of Communist spies who were secretly

718
00:39:12,239 --> 00:39:15,000
Speaker 3: working in the state departments. They're just blending in with

719
00:39:15,080 --> 00:39:19,359
Speaker 3: everybody else. And so the main mood or theme of

720
00:39:19,400 --> 00:39:23,239
Speaker 3: these movies a little bit less than outright terror is

721
00:39:23,280 --> 00:39:26,359
Speaker 3: instead paranoia, right, It's this thing of like who can

722
00:39:26,400 --> 00:39:29,120
Speaker 3: I trust? Who is not what they seem? And there's

723
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:32,719
Speaker 3: an irony here because I think Carpenter's adaptation of the

724
00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:37,160
Speaker 3: Thing accomplishes this theme of paranoia much more powerfully than

725
00:39:37,200 --> 00:39:40,279
Speaker 3: the original Thing from Another World, even though I don't

726
00:39:40,280 --> 00:39:43,680
Speaker 3: think Carpenter's version has any of that red scare political DNA.

727
00:39:44,000 --> 00:39:46,200
Speaker 3: I don't think that's it's concerned with that at all.

728
00:39:46,920 --> 00:39:49,480
Speaker 3: It's just sort of like more free floating paranoia, and

729
00:39:49,520 --> 00:39:53,680
Speaker 3: I think it accomplishes that because specifically it involves an

730
00:39:53,760 --> 00:39:57,560
Speaker 3: alien who impersonates people who can look like your co workers,

731
00:39:57,640 --> 00:40:00,279
Speaker 3: and you wouldn't know it was actually an alien until

732
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:04,320
Speaker 3: you test their blood. Unlike this movie, instead of having

733
00:40:04,760 --> 00:40:07,760
Speaker 3: somebody who's an alien body snatcher or someone under alien

734
00:40:07,800 --> 00:40:12,400
Speaker 3: mind control, it has just the suspect loyalties of the

735
00:40:12,480 --> 00:40:16,799
Speaker 3: scientists and the intellectual because they're hungry for knowledge and

736
00:40:16,840 --> 00:40:20,319
Speaker 3: they're open minded to a fault, and because of that,

737
00:40:20,400 --> 00:40:24,000
Speaker 3: they will flirt with dangerous forces from outside the zone

738
00:40:24,040 --> 00:40:27,239
Speaker 3: of safety. And that's who that's the role that doctor Carrington,

739
00:40:27,280 --> 00:40:30,320
Speaker 3: this character plays in the movie. And for the record,

740
00:40:30,360 --> 00:40:33,359
Speaker 3: the actor Robert Cornthwaite is great in this role. I

741
00:40:33,400 --> 00:40:36,000
Speaker 3: love him as the godless, untrustworthy nerd.

742
00:40:36,640 --> 00:40:40,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's pretty great, even though at times it feels

743
00:40:40,200 --> 00:40:42,160
Speaker 1: like they're laying on a bit thick with him.

744
00:40:42,200 --> 00:40:43,920
Speaker 3: But oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a little cheesy.

745
00:40:43,960 --> 00:40:46,480
Speaker 1: Yeah, cause he says, he's like everyone else is like this,

746
00:40:46,480 --> 00:40:49,000
Speaker 1: this thing's murdering people and it's drinking blood. And he's like, yes,

747
00:40:49,320 --> 00:40:51,480
Speaker 1: but I think we should reason with it. There's so

748
00:40:51,600 --> 00:40:53,920
Speaker 1: much we could learn from this murderous carrot.

749
00:40:54,560 --> 00:40:55,120
Speaker 3: Yeah.

750
00:40:55,160 --> 00:40:56,719
Speaker 1: And even right up there at the end, you know,

751
00:40:56,719 --> 00:41:00,000
Speaker 1: they're trying to lure it into a high tech track

752
00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:02,520
Speaker 1: to shock it to death, and he's like, wait, let

753
00:41:02,520 --> 00:41:05,520
Speaker 1: me speak to the creature. It must not be hurt,

754
00:41:05,560 --> 00:41:05,759
Speaker 1: you know.

755
00:41:06,120 --> 00:41:08,080
Speaker 3: And we get to see the nerd get punished for

756
00:41:08,120 --> 00:41:11,040
Speaker 3: his foolishness. You know, he's so naive that he thinks

757
00:41:11,080 --> 00:41:14,000
Speaker 3: he can he can form a relationship with the alien,

758
00:41:14,239 --> 00:41:17,040
Speaker 3: you know, Unlike he doesn't have the rough common sense

759
00:41:17,120 --> 00:41:20,080
Speaker 3: of the of the captain and the army, who's like, well,

760
00:41:20,080 --> 00:41:22,360
Speaker 3: you just got to kill this thing. Yeah, So he

761
00:41:22,440 --> 00:41:25,839
Speaker 3: goes squatted. Yeah, he gets smacked down. I think they

762
00:41:25,840 --> 00:41:28,680
Speaker 3: say he survives. I think they say that he does

763
00:41:28,800 --> 00:41:30,400
Speaker 3: just ends up with some broken bones.

764
00:41:30,560 --> 00:41:33,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, broken bones in a wounded spirit. But perhaps he'll

765
00:41:33,840 --> 00:41:37,239
Speaker 1: he'll now he knows that he shouldn't, he shouldn't put

766
00:41:37,280 --> 00:41:43,120
Speaker 1: science first, right. So this actor, cornth Waite, he was

767
00:41:43,200 --> 00:41:45,560
Speaker 1: born in nineteen seventeen died in two thousand and six.

768
00:41:46,160 --> 00:41:48,080
Speaker 1: He did a lot of TV and film work throughout

769
00:41:48,080 --> 00:41:51,640
Speaker 1: his long career, including Future World that was the one

770
00:41:51,640 --> 00:41:55,400
Speaker 1: of the sequels to Westworld. He was in nineteen fifty

771
00:41:55,440 --> 00:41:58,080
Speaker 1: three's War of the Worlds. Nineteen sixty two is whatever

772
00:41:58,080 --> 00:42:00,840
Speaker 1: Happened to Baby Jane? He was in The Ghost Mister Chicken?

773
00:42:01,760 --> 00:42:04,640
Speaker 1: And is that we don't know to ghost? To mister Chicken?

774
00:42:04,760 --> 00:42:06,840
Speaker 1: I do not know the ghost just like it was

775
00:42:06,840 --> 00:42:10,120
Speaker 1: a Don Notts comedy. Oh okay, I think I saw

776
00:42:10,120 --> 00:42:12,840
Speaker 1: it a lot as a kid for some reason. But anyway,

777
00:42:12,840 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 1: this actor was on a He was on tons of

778
00:42:14,400 --> 00:42:17,280
Speaker 1: famous TV shows from the old day, stuff like Andy Griffith,

779
00:42:17,480 --> 00:42:21,920
Speaker 1: Twilight Zone, Alfred Hitchcock. This was his first credited film

780
00:42:22,000 --> 00:42:25,200
Speaker 1: or TV acting gig, though, and he often played lawyers

781
00:42:25,239 --> 00:42:28,160
Speaker 1: and scientists because he had that kind of like intellectual air,

782
00:42:28,280 --> 00:42:31,360
Speaker 1: you know, that intellectual delivery that lent itself well to

783
00:42:31,400 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 1: those roles.

784
00:42:32,280 --> 00:42:34,960
Speaker 3: Yeah, maybe a nasal voice and a pointy beard, and

785
00:42:35,440 --> 00:42:37,239
Speaker 3: you just look at that guy and you're like, I

786
00:42:37,640 --> 00:42:38,839
Speaker 3: don't know if I can trust him.

787
00:42:39,160 --> 00:42:43,239
Speaker 1: Now. We also have a very amusing journalist character who

788
00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:46,840
Speaker 1: has a lot of screen time. That's our character, Ned Scott,

789
00:42:46,880 --> 00:42:49,680
Speaker 1: and I enjoyed this character a lot because he's He's

790
00:42:50,000 --> 00:42:54,080
Speaker 1: very stereotypical in many ways, but is so well written,

791
00:42:54,160 --> 00:42:55,520
Speaker 1: has a lot of snappy.

792
00:42:55,080 --> 00:42:59,880
Speaker 3: Dialogue, fast talking journalist, has some extremely cheesy lines. He

793
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:03,440
Speaker 3: gives the final the final speech at the end of

794
00:43:03,440 --> 00:43:06,439
Speaker 3: the movie. So this movie's version of the he learned

795
00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:09,440
Speaker 3: too late that man is a feeling creature is instead

796
00:43:10,000 --> 00:43:13,200
Speaker 3: him like talking over the military radio to I don't know,

797
00:43:13,239 --> 00:43:16,160
Speaker 3: some command post and like dictating a news story off

798
00:43:16,200 --> 00:43:17,040
Speaker 3: the top of his head.

799
00:43:17,200 --> 00:43:17,399
Speaker 1: Yeah.

800
00:43:17,480 --> 00:43:21,279
Speaker 3: It starts off with some line like, thousands of years ago,

801
00:43:21,440 --> 00:43:23,680
Speaker 3: a man named Noah saved the earth with an arc

802
00:43:23,760 --> 00:43:28,120
Speaker 3: made of wood. Today a man named Captain Whatever saved

803
00:43:28,160 --> 00:43:29,960
Speaker 3: the earth with an arc of electricity.

804
00:43:30,400 --> 00:43:32,880
Speaker 1: Yep, yeap, great lead, great lead.

805
00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:34,880
Speaker 3: Ned, really really good.

806
00:43:35,840 --> 00:43:37,879
Speaker 1: The interesting thing about that ending with the keep watching

807
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:41,400
Speaker 1: the skies is I sometime having never seen it before,

808
00:43:41,480 --> 00:43:45,279
Speaker 1: but being familiar with that ending line. I kind of

809
00:43:45,880 --> 00:43:50,480
Speaker 1: combined that knowledge with the ending to Invasion of the

810
00:43:50,480 --> 00:43:54,560
Speaker 1: Body Snatchers, where there's like a crazed urgency to it,

811
00:43:54,640 --> 00:43:56,839
Speaker 1: and there's no crazed urgency here. He's not like, for

812
00:43:56,840 --> 00:43:59,080
Speaker 1: God's sake, keep watching the skies because this is gonna

813
00:43:59,120 --> 00:44:01,400
Speaker 1: happen again and again. And he's just kind of like

814
00:44:01,440 --> 00:44:04,200
Speaker 1: in generally saying, keep watching the skies just in case.

815
00:44:04,200 --> 00:44:06,359
Speaker 1: I don't know, there might be who knows, Just keep

816
00:44:06,440 --> 00:44:07,200
Speaker 1: watching the skies.

817
00:44:07,320 --> 00:44:10,080
Speaker 3: Yeah, watch those guys, keep watching them.

818
00:44:10,880 --> 00:44:15,799
Speaker 1: Anyway, This character though very amusing Ned Scott. He was

819
00:44:15,840 --> 00:44:19,280
Speaker 1: played by Douglas Spencer, who lived nineteen ten through nineteen sixty,

820
00:44:19,440 --> 00:44:22,279
Speaker 1: so you know, ultimately didn't it didn't have as long

821
00:44:22,280 --> 00:44:24,759
Speaker 1: ago a career as as he could have, given that

822
00:44:24,840 --> 00:44:27,080
Speaker 1: his life was a bit cut short there. But he

823
00:44:27,200 --> 00:44:30,600
Speaker 1: was in, among other things, This Island Earth, The Diary

824
00:44:30,640 --> 00:44:34,320
Speaker 1: of Anne Frank, and the classic Western Shane. And speaking

825
00:44:34,360 --> 00:44:37,600
Speaker 1: of westerns, let's talk about Team Monster here. Oh boy,

826
00:44:37,880 --> 00:44:40,960
Speaker 1: now you mentioned already the James Arnez plays the Monster,

827
00:44:41,120 --> 00:44:43,960
Speaker 1: and it is indeed James Arnez lived nineteen twenty three

828
00:44:44,000 --> 00:44:48,280
Speaker 1: through twenty eleven. This is the guy that's mostly mostly

829
00:44:48,320 --> 00:44:51,120
Speaker 1: well known and well remembered for one or two things.

830
00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:53,800
Speaker 1: First of all, he played the lead character Matt Dillon

831
00:44:53,920 --> 00:44:57,359
Speaker 1: on the long running gun Smoke Western TV show. That

832
00:44:57,440 --> 00:45:01,239
Speaker 1: show aired nineteen fifty five through nineteen seventy five and

833
00:45:01,320 --> 00:45:05,520
Speaker 1: then was just always in syndication afterwards. It seems like,

834
00:45:05,560 --> 00:45:07,799
Speaker 1: I remember my grandpa would watch it like every day

835
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:08,320
Speaker 1: on TV.

836
00:45:08,840 --> 00:45:10,960
Speaker 3: I've never seen gun Smoke. I really don't know anything

837
00:45:11,000 --> 00:45:11,439
Speaker 3: about it.

838
00:45:11,600 --> 00:45:13,480
Speaker 1: I mean, all I know, I don't think I ever

839
00:45:13,560 --> 00:45:15,480
Speaker 1: actively watched it, because I mean I was a kid.

840
00:45:15,480 --> 00:45:18,560
Speaker 1: I wasn't interested in gun Smoke so much, but it

841
00:45:18,640 --> 00:45:21,120
Speaker 1: was on and he was like a you know, cowboy

842
00:45:21,200 --> 00:45:22,200
Speaker 1: sheriff or whatnot in it.

843
00:45:22,280 --> 00:45:24,520
Speaker 3: He's like, let me guess. Is he the new sheriff

844
00:45:24,600 --> 00:45:27,560
Speaker 3: who comes into a lawless town and has to fix everything?

845
00:45:28,080 --> 00:45:30,480
Speaker 1: I guess, But it's I mean, the show ran for

846
00:45:30,520 --> 00:45:32,759
Speaker 1: like twenty years, so you'd think he'd get into a

847
00:45:32,920 --> 00:45:34,000
Speaker 1: pattern there after.

848
00:45:34,160 --> 00:45:36,880
Speaker 3: Eventually the people would be like, you've had fifteen years

849
00:45:36,920 --> 00:45:38,920
Speaker 3: to fix this town and it's still lawless.

850
00:45:39,080 --> 00:45:41,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like does he have to run for reelection? How

851
00:45:41,080 --> 00:45:43,440
Speaker 1: does it work? I don't know. Gunsmoke fans, let us

852
00:45:43,480 --> 00:45:47,120
Speaker 1: know but it wasn't just Westerns for James Arnez. He

853
00:45:47,160 --> 00:45:50,880
Speaker 1: was also in nineteen fifty four's Them, a Giant bug movie.

854
00:45:50,880 --> 00:45:51,760
Speaker 1: Have you seen this one?

855
00:45:52,040 --> 00:45:54,600
Speaker 3: Actually a shamed to say no, I have not. I

856
00:45:54,680 --> 00:45:55,480
Speaker 3: know it's a classic.

857
00:45:55,800 --> 00:45:59,319
Speaker 1: The other interesting thing about James Arnez is that he

858
00:45:59,480 --> 00:46:03,279
Speaker 1: was born James King of Arness, and he was the

859
00:46:03,360 --> 00:46:05,600
Speaker 1: older brother of a guy by the name of Peter

860
00:46:06,520 --> 00:46:11,440
Speaker 1: Duesler Arness who acted under the name Peter Graves. I

861
00:46:11,600 --> 00:46:13,959
Speaker 1: just mentioned, Yeah, so this is Peter Graves brother.

862
00:46:14,239 --> 00:46:16,359
Speaker 3: So you could have literally had a brother to brother

863
00:46:16,400 --> 00:46:18,960
Speaker 3: conversation about how you learn too late that man is

864
00:46:18,960 --> 00:46:19,760
Speaker 3: a feeling creature.

865
00:46:20,120 --> 00:46:24,120
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it's interesting though, I mean this is often

866
00:46:24,160 --> 00:46:27,080
Speaker 1: the case with siblings, right, I mean, this is nothing remarkable,

867
00:46:27,120 --> 00:46:30,640
Speaker 1: but you don't think of James Arness and Peter Graves

868
00:46:30,680 --> 00:46:33,560
Speaker 1: as being is playing the same sorts of characters. There's

869
00:46:33,680 --> 00:46:36,319
Speaker 1: like a there's a ruggedness to James Arnest, like he's

870
00:46:36,360 --> 00:46:39,440
Speaker 1: just always going to be that cowboy. And Peter Graves,

871
00:46:39,440 --> 00:46:42,640
Speaker 1: on the other hand, often played these more you know,

872
00:46:42,760 --> 00:46:46,839
Speaker 1: these thoughtful characters, sometimes villainous, but there's like a sternness

873
00:46:47,120 --> 00:46:49,239
Speaker 1: today it's just sternness to both actors, but I don't

874
00:46:49,239 --> 00:46:51,959
Speaker 1: know Peter Peter Graves different type of roles. I can't

875
00:46:52,000 --> 00:46:54,920
Speaker 1: imagine them ever, like competing for the same character and

876
00:46:55,000 --> 00:46:57,879
Speaker 1: in being like the same character. If either of them

877
00:46:57,880 --> 00:46:58,959
Speaker 1: played it, well, if.

878
00:46:58,880 --> 00:47:01,719
Speaker 3: It's been Peter Graves as the thing from another world.

879
00:47:02,840 --> 00:47:05,040
Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, I wonder. I don't know

880
00:47:05,120 --> 00:47:07,360
Speaker 1: if Peter Graves ever played a monster. He might have

881
00:47:07,440 --> 00:47:12,360
Speaker 1: early in his career. I'd have to go through his filmography.

882
00:47:19,920 --> 00:47:22,879
Speaker 1: Now another going back to Team Science, there's one guy

883
00:47:22,920 --> 00:47:25,480
Speaker 1: that stood out to me. I was just gonna skip

884
00:47:25,520 --> 00:47:27,600
Speaker 1: over all the rest of them, but there's a character

885
00:47:27,640 --> 00:47:29,759
Speaker 1: by the name of doctor Stern. Did he stand out

886
00:47:29,760 --> 00:47:30,719
Speaker 1: to you, Joe.

887
00:47:30,920 --> 00:47:33,160
Speaker 3: I don't remember which one he was. Oh wait, was

888
00:47:33,200 --> 00:47:35,280
Speaker 3: he one of the scientists who had black hair?

889
00:47:35,640 --> 00:47:38,120
Speaker 1: He was, no, well, he might have had black hair.

890
00:47:38,160 --> 00:47:41,880
Speaker 1: He was tallish and was had kind of like a

891
00:47:41,920 --> 00:47:45,319
Speaker 1: subdued but seeming like thoughtful delivery. He had some good

892
00:47:45,360 --> 00:47:48,680
Speaker 1: lines here and there. Played by this actor by the

893
00:47:48,760 --> 00:47:51,839
Speaker 1: name of Edward Franz. He lived nineteen oh two through

894
00:47:51,880 --> 00:47:55,640
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty three. Again not a main character, but his

895
00:47:55,680 --> 00:47:58,560
Speaker 1: screen presence impressed me, so I thought i'd include him here,

896
00:47:58,600 --> 00:48:01,880
Speaker 1: a stern faced character actor whose many credits include The

897
00:48:01,920 --> 00:48:06,960
Speaker 1: Ten Commandments. He was in Hatari Johnny Got his Gun,

898
00:48:07,239 --> 00:48:10,400
Speaker 1: and also he was in Twilight Zone the movie. So

899
00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:12,360
Speaker 1: the sequence with the you know about the monster on

900
00:48:12,400 --> 00:48:16,440
Speaker 1: the wing of the plane was John lithcow Edward Franz

901
00:48:16,760 --> 00:48:18,920
Speaker 1: plays the old man on the flight.

902
00:48:19,800 --> 00:48:22,600
Speaker 3: Okay, now I just looked him up. I do remember him,

903
00:48:22,640 --> 00:48:25,920
Speaker 3: but I don't remember what he did in the movie,

904
00:48:26,360 --> 00:48:26,520
Speaker 3: you know.

905
00:48:26,680 --> 00:48:30,560
Speaker 1: Sorry, Doctor ser in some of the science conversations, he

906
00:48:30,680 --> 00:48:36,040
Speaker 1: kind of was a voice of reason and skepticism. I

907
00:48:36,120 --> 00:48:39,000
Speaker 1: kind of I liked his presence there. Okay, again, the

908
00:48:39,040 --> 00:48:42,360
Speaker 1: dialogue is pretty tight and in this in this movie,

909
00:48:42,400 --> 00:48:46,279
Speaker 1: and even like bit characters like him, he has a

910
00:48:46,360 --> 00:48:49,240
Speaker 1: chance to shine. Okay, one more actor I want to include,

911
00:48:49,239 --> 00:48:52,720
Speaker 1: and that's the character the character doctor Vorhees was played

912
00:48:52,719 --> 00:48:55,440
Speaker 1: by this guy, Paul Freese, who lived nineteen twenty through

913
00:48:55,520 --> 00:48:58,520
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty six. And I'm including him because he had

914
00:48:58,560 --> 00:49:01,239
Speaker 1: a long career as of voice actors. So he played

915
00:49:01,239 --> 00:49:03,759
Speaker 1: a radio reporter in War of the Worlds. He did

916
00:49:03,800 --> 00:49:08,280
Speaker 1: several voices in the animated The Last Unicorn. Other credits

917
00:49:08,280 --> 00:49:11,759
Speaker 1: include The Wind and the Willows, The animated version of

918
00:49:11,800 --> 00:49:14,600
Speaker 1: the Return of the King and the Hobbit. Then also

919
00:49:14,719 --> 00:49:18,760
Speaker 1: just various Rankin and Bass holiday specials, and then finally

920
00:49:18,760 --> 00:49:21,160
Speaker 1: we'll get to the music here. The music was provided

921
00:49:21,200 --> 00:49:25,960
Speaker 1: by Dimitri Tiompkin, who lived eighteen ninety four through nineteen

922
00:49:26,080 --> 00:49:29,840
Speaker 1: seventy nine. The music in this film is largely what

923
00:49:29,880 --> 00:49:34,200
Speaker 1: you'd expect from the time period, but this Russian born composer,

924
00:49:34,920 --> 00:49:38,000
Speaker 1: it was a major name during this era. Here in

925
00:49:38,040 --> 00:49:42,360
Speaker 1: twenty two Academy Award nominations and won four Oscars, and

926
00:49:42,440 --> 00:49:46,040
Speaker 1: most notably for this film. Again, it's very standard in

927
00:49:46,080 --> 00:49:49,439
Speaker 1: a lot of brass in it, but you do hear

928
00:49:49,520 --> 00:49:52,120
Speaker 1: the theremen from time to time to provide a little

929
00:49:52,120 --> 00:49:55,800
Speaker 1: bit of sci fi intrigue. And I've seen this score

930
00:49:55,880 --> 00:49:58,800
Speaker 1: singled out as one of the works that helped cement

931
00:49:58,880 --> 00:50:02,520
Speaker 1: the electronic music instruments placed in sci fi cinema. The

932
00:50:02,560 --> 00:50:04,759
Speaker 1: other big one was nineteen fifty one's The Day the

933
00:50:04,800 --> 00:50:07,200
Speaker 1: Earth Stood Still, scored by Bernard Hermann.

934
00:50:07,600 --> 00:50:10,680
Speaker 3: Oh, so that's interesting. I didn't realize that these two

935
00:50:10,719 --> 00:50:12,359
Speaker 3: movies came out the same year. The Thing from Another

936
00:50:12,400 --> 00:50:14,920
Speaker 3: World and The Day the Earth Stood Still, And I

937
00:50:14,920 --> 00:50:17,799
Speaker 3: think it would also be interesting to kind of compare them.

938
00:50:18,239 --> 00:50:21,320
Speaker 3: I haven't seen The Day the Earth Stood Still nearly

939
00:50:21,360 --> 00:50:23,799
Speaker 3: as recently, but I would say that The Thing from

940
00:50:23,800 --> 00:50:27,200
Speaker 3: Another World is probably a much better movie, just on

941
00:50:27,239 --> 00:50:31,400
Speaker 3: a technical level in terms of like how effective and scary,

942
00:50:31,520 --> 00:50:33,920
Speaker 3: like the shots and the horror and everything is in it.

943
00:50:34,400 --> 00:50:36,480
Speaker 3: But I think The Day the Earth Stood Still is

944
00:50:36,560 --> 00:50:40,960
Speaker 3: probably a more thematically interesting movie.

945
00:50:41,200 --> 00:50:43,600
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I think they're both examples of sort of

946
00:50:43,680 --> 00:50:48,200
Speaker 1: you know, the high minded early nineteen fifties sci fi film. Yeah,

947
00:50:48,400 --> 00:50:52,200
Speaker 1: and this was in an era where I the genre

948
00:50:52,239 --> 00:50:55,799
Speaker 1: films of this caliber were not generally elevated to that level.

949
00:50:55,840 --> 00:50:59,120
Speaker 1: They certainly weren't getting nominated for Academy Awards and so forth.

950
00:50:59,320 --> 00:51:01,440
Speaker 3: But you know what should have been nominated for an

951
00:51:01,440 --> 00:51:06,160
Speaker 3: Academy Award is the opening title of The Thing. For goodness, Yeah,

952
00:51:06,239 --> 00:51:12,200
Speaker 3: absolutely ballistic, best opening title I've ever seen. Probably, of

953
00:51:12,239 --> 00:51:15,200
Speaker 3: course it inspired I think some things that came afterward,

954
00:51:15,239 --> 00:51:17,000
Speaker 3: but it's the one where it starts with, you know,

955
00:51:17,040 --> 00:51:19,560
Speaker 3: the black screen, and then you just see the word

956
00:51:19,840 --> 00:51:24,439
Speaker 3: thing lettered in a large, jagged script that burns through

957
00:51:24,480 --> 00:51:28,719
Speaker 3: a black sheet like it's been like like spelled in kerosene.

958
00:51:28,760 --> 00:51:31,480
Speaker 3: And then set ablaze absolutely amazing.

959
00:51:32,520 --> 00:51:35,040
Speaker 1: I love it, and I imagine Carpenter loved it as well,

960
00:51:35,080 --> 00:51:38,720
Speaker 1: because they didn't they basically recreate the same title card

961
00:51:39,120 --> 00:51:42,000
Speaker 1: for that kind asssion. Yeah, where it sounds burning through

962
00:51:42,040 --> 00:51:44,640
Speaker 1: the screen. It's beautiful. I have no idea how they

963
00:51:44,640 --> 00:51:45,520
Speaker 1: did it. It's beautiful.

964
00:51:45,520 --> 00:51:45,759
Speaker 4: Though.

965
00:51:46,000 --> 00:51:48,400
Speaker 3: There's another thing before we wrap up that I wanted

966
00:51:48,400 --> 00:51:50,920
Speaker 3: to talk about with this movie, which is that it

967
00:51:51,080 --> 00:51:55,680
Speaker 3: has an interesting dialogue. So this film has what you

968
00:51:55,760 --> 00:52:01,000
Speaker 3: might call naturalistic dialogue or overlapping dialogue. So maybe there

969
00:52:01,000 --> 00:52:04,319
Speaker 3: are other examples of movies like this from the time,

970
00:52:04,360 --> 00:52:06,400
Speaker 3: but if so, I'm not really aware of them. I

971
00:52:06,440 --> 00:52:11,760
Speaker 3: think filmmaking conventions of the early fifties would have overwhelmingly

972
00:52:11,840 --> 00:52:16,879
Speaker 3: favored the clear, crisp delivery of stage drama conventions, where

973
00:52:16,880 --> 00:52:19,560
Speaker 3: you know one character speaks at a time and you

974
00:52:19,600 --> 00:52:22,719
Speaker 3: can hear every word they say because the lines are important.

975
00:52:22,719 --> 00:52:25,640
Speaker 3: They're meant to develop the character or move the plot along.

976
00:52:26,239 --> 00:52:31,040
Speaker 3: But this movie is trending toward a more naturalistic and

977
00:52:31,120 --> 00:52:36,240
Speaker 3: atmospheric approach to dialogue, where characters sometimes mumble, sometimes talk

978
00:52:36,360 --> 00:52:39,359
Speaker 3: over each other at the same time, more like you'd

979
00:52:39,360 --> 00:52:42,160
Speaker 3: get in a later movie like Robert Daltman movies, where

980
00:52:42,200 --> 00:52:44,600
Speaker 3: a lot of the dialogue is it's clear that you're

981
00:52:44,640 --> 00:52:47,360
Speaker 3: not supposed to hear and take in every single word,

982
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:50,360
Speaker 3: but get a mood or get an atmosphere from the

983
00:52:50,480 --> 00:52:53,560
Speaker 3: chatter of the characters as they go about their business.

984
00:52:53,840 --> 00:52:56,680
Speaker 1: Yeah, like sometimes they are just incomplete thoughts, like one

985
00:52:56,760 --> 00:52:59,759
Speaker 1: character is talking about something they're interrupted, or yeah, there's

986
00:52:59,760 --> 00:53:02,319
Speaker 1: crow talk and you don't you don't always make out

987
00:53:02,360 --> 00:53:05,640
Speaker 1: what some of the characters are saying it. So it feels, yeah,

988
00:53:05,640 --> 00:53:08,480
Speaker 1: it has this very natural feel to it and also

989
00:53:08,640 --> 00:53:12,320
Speaker 1: just moves right along like it's a snap. It's snappy dialogue.

990
00:53:12,320 --> 00:53:17,800
Speaker 1: You know, it keeps you engaged, and it feels relatively real.

991
00:53:18,080 --> 00:53:20,680
Speaker 1: Though of course, at the same time, it's nineteen fifty

992
00:53:20,680 --> 00:53:22,359
Speaker 1: one reel, so you know there's gonna be a bit

993
00:53:22,400 --> 00:53:25,279
Speaker 1: of like dames and cigarettes, you know, that's sort of

994
00:53:25,320 --> 00:53:28,640
Speaker 1: thing going on. Another aspect of the dialogue that instantly

995
00:53:28,719 --> 00:53:32,399
Speaker 1: reminded me, there's one shot in particular of this there's

996
00:53:32,560 --> 00:53:34,920
Speaker 1: there's a nice walk and talk sequence. Again, we have

997
00:53:35,000 --> 00:53:38,200
Speaker 1: these long hallways between these rooms and this and this

998
00:53:38,320 --> 00:53:41,400
Speaker 1: snowy base, and we got some scenes where like scientists

999
00:53:41,480 --> 00:53:45,160
Speaker 1: or military men walking down the hallway and the cameras

1000
00:53:45,200 --> 00:53:47,279
Speaker 1: in front of them filming them talk to each other,

1001
00:53:47,560 --> 00:53:49,680
Speaker 1: and of course this would this just becomes a staple,

1002
00:53:49,760 --> 00:53:53,000
Speaker 1: especially of like police procedurals and it shows like the

1003
00:53:53,000 --> 00:53:56,200
Speaker 1: West Wing and here it is present the thing from

1004
00:53:56,200 --> 00:53:56,800
Speaker 1: another world?

1005
00:53:57,000 --> 00:53:59,520
Speaker 3: What's that guy who does the way Aaron Sorkin loves

1006
00:53:59,560 --> 00:54:04,319
Speaker 3: the walk can talk, which I, frankly personally often find irritating.

1007
00:54:05,400 --> 00:54:08,560
Speaker 1: Imagine if Aaron Sorkin did a remake of the Thing.

1008
00:54:08,680 --> 00:54:11,880
Speaker 3: I think I would hate that all walk.

1009
00:54:11,680 --> 00:54:14,920
Speaker 1: And talk, you never even see the monster. I bet

1010
00:54:14,960 --> 00:54:15,880
Speaker 1: it would have a great cast.

1011
00:54:15,920 --> 00:54:16,120
Speaker 4: Though.

1012
00:54:16,400 --> 00:54:19,719
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, Rob, I know we can't finish without talking

1013
00:54:19,760 --> 00:54:22,080
Speaker 3: about There are a number of scenes in this that

1014
00:54:22,120 --> 00:54:24,760
Speaker 3: are so good, but one that just had my jaw

1015
00:54:24,880 --> 00:54:28,120
Speaker 3: on the floor was the fire attack scene.

1016
00:54:28,400 --> 00:54:32,520
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this scene is so solid and terrifying.

1017
00:54:33,760 --> 00:54:36,160
Speaker 1: Like afterwards, I'm just I was just like, like, I

1018
00:54:36,160 --> 00:54:38,800
Speaker 1: think I audibly said something like, oh crap, Like that

1019
00:54:39,280 --> 00:54:42,800
Speaker 1: sequence was. It was literally on fire because it's a

1020
00:54:42,840 --> 00:54:45,960
Speaker 1: scene where the thing busts into a room and they

1021
00:54:46,000 --> 00:54:48,239
Speaker 1: what They throw some kerosene at it, and they then

1022
00:54:48,280 --> 00:54:49,640
Speaker 1: they throw some fire at him.

1023
00:54:50,120 --> 00:54:52,320
Speaker 3: They figured out that it's in vulnerable to bullets.

1024
00:54:52,640 --> 00:54:55,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that shooting it didn't work earlier, so they're

1025
00:54:55,239 --> 00:54:59,239
Speaker 1: using fire against it, and it's just it's rampaging and

1026
00:54:59,400 --> 00:55:03,560
Speaker 1: it's on fire. There's like, from an effects standpoint, terrifying,

1027
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:05,960
Speaker 1: you know, because it's like there's all this visible, real

1028
00:55:06,040 --> 00:55:09,240
Speaker 1: fire on the set. There are multiple shots of somebody

1029
00:55:09,280 --> 00:55:12,640
Speaker 1: doing a man on fire stunt. And then within the

1030
00:55:12,680 --> 00:55:15,920
Speaker 1: context of the film, Yeah, it's just this intense feeling

1031
00:55:16,120 --> 00:55:21,000
Speaker 1: of danger, both the environmental danger of of their of

1032
00:55:21,120 --> 00:55:22,960
Speaker 1: of where they are in the world, but also the

1033
00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:26,080
Speaker 1: fact that now things are increasingly on fire and there's

1034
00:55:26,120 --> 00:55:31,440
Speaker 1: a rampaging, you know, blood drinking alien that's also on fire. Tremendous.

1035
00:55:31,800 --> 00:55:36,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, and the fact that it something about that scene

1036
00:55:36,200 --> 00:55:39,359
Speaker 3: and the way that it's scary heightens something that's a

1037
00:55:39,440 --> 00:55:41,920
Speaker 3: sort of progressive tension throughout the plot, which is that

1038
00:55:42,000 --> 00:55:46,560
Speaker 3: the characters are having to make strategic decisions really fast

1039
00:55:47,000 --> 00:55:50,000
Speaker 3: that you know, they're not given time to like compile

1040
00:55:50,080 --> 00:55:53,560
Speaker 3: everything they know and try and figure out what's going on.

1041
00:55:54,280 --> 00:55:56,480
Speaker 3: I recall that the set up to that scene is

1042
00:55:56,560 --> 00:55:58,840
Speaker 3: just like we think he's attacking the door, Okay, what

1043
00:55:58,880 --> 00:55:59,560
Speaker 3: are we going to do?

1044
00:55:59,680 --> 00:55:59,880
Speaker 1: You know?

1045
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:02,600
Speaker 3: The bullets don't work, what if we try fire? And

1046
00:56:02,640 --> 00:56:05,879
Speaker 3: so they just like arranged this fire trap for it

1047
00:56:06,160 --> 00:56:09,319
Speaker 3: in real time pretty much. It happens really fast, and

1048
00:56:09,360 --> 00:56:11,680
Speaker 3: then it all goes to hell and it becomes clear

1049
00:56:11,680 --> 00:56:13,640
Speaker 3: that you can't kill this thing with fire, or at

1050
00:56:13,719 --> 00:56:16,319
Speaker 3: least maybe you heard it with fire, but it like,

1051
00:56:16,760 --> 00:56:19,239
Speaker 3: it's not like us. Each of it sells is kind

1052
00:56:19,239 --> 00:56:21,279
Speaker 3: of independent, so you might be able to burn its

1053
00:56:21,320 --> 00:56:23,400
Speaker 3: outer layer, but it's ultimately going to be okay.

1054
00:56:24,160 --> 00:56:27,319
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, And then afterwards they've lost an entire room

1055
00:56:27,360 --> 00:56:30,680
Speaker 1: of the facility and they have finite resources there, which

1056
00:56:30,960 --> 00:56:32,440
Speaker 1: I thought was also a great touch.

1057
00:56:32,880 --> 00:56:35,880
Speaker 3: You know, it's an old standby, but I gotta admit

1058
00:56:36,000 --> 00:56:39,680
Speaker 3: I'm really a sucker for setting a trap for the monster.

1059
00:56:39,960 --> 00:56:42,640
Speaker 3: That's just a kind of set piece that I always enjoy.

1060
00:56:42,920 --> 00:56:45,279
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's where we wind up towards the end. Here,

1061
00:56:45,320 --> 00:56:50,080
Speaker 1: they develop a trap, they explain how it's going to work,

1062
00:56:50,360 --> 00:56:52,640
Speaker 1: and so you know that this is always the case.

1063
00:56:52,719 --> 00:56:56,160
Speaker 1: If a trap is fully explained, something is going to

1064
00:56:56,200 --> 00:56:59,680
Speaker 1: go wrong, or if a plan is fully explained, something

1065
00:56:59,719 --> 00:57:01,920
Speaker 1: is going to go wrong. So, yeah, it doesn't quite

1066
00:57:01,960 --> 00:57:06,640
Speaker 1: go off as they're planning it to. But it also

1067
00:57:06,760 --> 00:57:10,160
Speaker 1: is not doesn't go off the rails disastrously. I don't

1068
00:57:10,200 --> 00:57:12,080
Speaker 1: think that would have been allowed in nineteen fifty one.

1069
00:57:12,880 --> 00:57:15,080
Speaker 3: No, I guess not. No, you couldn't. I don't know

1070
00:57:15,200 --> 00:57:17,080
Speaker 3: at the time. Could you have an ending like you

1071
00:57:17,120 --> 00:57:18,280
Speaker 3: have in Carpenter's Thing?

1072
00:57:18,800 --> 00:57:22,640
Speaker 1: I don't know. Yeah, I don't know. How would audiences

1073
00:57:22,680 --> 00:57:23,560
Speaker 1: have reacted to that.

1074
00:57:23,920 --> 00:57:26,560
Speaker 3: I don't know the answer to this question, Listeners right in.

1075
00:57:26,720 --> 00:57:29,800
Speaker 3: Are there examples you can think of of sci fi

1076
00:57:29,880 --> 00:57:34,240
Speaker 3: or genre movies from say the fifties with an utterly

1077
00:57:34,360 --> 00:57:38,640
Speaker 3: bleak ending, just ending where the alien wins and Earth loses.

1078
00:57:39,200 --> 00:57:41,880
Speaker 1: I mean the main example that comes to mind instantly,

1079
00:57:41,920 --> 00:57:44,120
Speaker 1: and perhaps part of it because we already talked about it,

1080
00:57:44,200 --> 00:57:47,560
Speaker 1: is the fifty six Body Snatcher's film. Like at the

1081
00:57:47,640 --> 00:57:50,400
Speaker 1: end of that film, it's like, we have one sane

1082
00:57:50,720 --> 00:57:53,560
Speaker 1: man left and everyone thinks he is insane. And I

1083
00:57:53,560 --> 00:57:55,920
Speaker 1: guess you could also have looked to various like short

1084
00:57:55,960 --> 00:57:59,360
Speaker 1: form of Twilight zones Twilight Zone type stuff where yeah,

1085
00:57:59,360 --> 00:58:02,840
Speaker 1: you'll definitely have the downer ending and all, but yeah,

1086
00:58:02,880 --> 00:58:05,280
Speaker 1: this one, this one does not. This one leaves things

1087
00:58:05,280 --> 00:58:08,240
Speaker 1: on a positive note. Humans were tested and they were

1088
00:58:08,280 --> 00:58:09,320
Speaker 1: they were up to the test.

1089
00:58:09,880 --> 00:58:13,000
Speaker 3: It's easier to end on a downer note. I think

1090
00:58:13,040 --> 00:58:16,000
Speaker 3: after like a sub thirty minute story than it is

1091
00:58:16,040 --> 00:58:19,280
Speaker 3: to end on a downer note after a ninety minute story.

1092
00:58:19,520 --> 00:58:21,920
Speaker 3: You know, you've got more investment on a feature length

1093
00:58:22,200 --> 00:58:24,800
Speaker 3: and so people are going to feel really mad if

1094
00:58:25,320 --> 00:58:26,919
Speaker 3: you get a downer ending at the end.

1095
00:58:26,800 --> 00:58:30,440
Speaker 1: Of a movie. Yeah, you got to send them home happy. Yeah,

1096
00:58:30,560 --> 00:58:31,560
Speaker 1: and that's what this film does.

1097
00:58:31,560 --> 00:58:32,000
Speaker 4: I was.

1098
00:58:32,040 --> 00:58:34,880
Speaker 1: I was happy with the film after we were done here.

1099
00:58:34,920 --> 00:58:39,000
Speaker 1: It has some terrific sequences, you know, great dialogue, a

1100
00:58:39,040 --> 00:58:41,960
Speaker 1: lot of interesting things about it. So you know, older

1101
00:58:41,960 --> 00:58:44,120
Speaker 1: films like this are not everybody's cup of tea, but

1102
00:58:44,320 --> 00:58:46,960
Speaker 1: I wouldn't. If you're all tempted, I encourage you to

1103
00:58:47,040 --> 00:58:49,000
Speaker 1: give the Thing from Another World a chance.

1104
00:58:49,440 --> 00:58:51,480
Speaker 3: I'm still thinking about this thing I just talked about.

1105
00:58:51,560 --> 00:58:54,240
Speaker 3: Wait a minute, this might be developing into a broader theory,

1106
00:58:54,320 --> 00:58:57,360
Speaker 3: Rob would you generally agree then? When it comes to

1107
00:58:57,440 --> 00:59:02,800
Speaker 3: horror literature, it's way more common to have horror short

1108
00:59:02,880 --> 00:59:07,000
Speaker 3: stories where the monster or the evil entity wins in

1109
00:59:07,040 --> 00:59:10,520
Speaker 3: the end, but horror novels where the hero wins in

1110
00:59:10,560 --> 00:59:10,960
Speaker 3: the end.

1111
00:59:11,560 --> 00:59:14,160
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, I would say, by and large, that's the case.

1112
00:59:15,040 --> 00:59:19,520
Speaker 1: You know, I've seen, I've certainly seen examples where longer

1113
00:59:19,560 --> 00:59:23,960
Speaker 1: works that have dark endings, those dark endings are not

1114
00:59:24,000 --> 00:59:27,960
Speaker 1: always that well received, even if the audience tends to

1115
00:59:28,120 --> 00:59:32,360
Speaker 1: be into darker, grittier stuff. You know, I've seen. I've

1116
00:59:32,360 --> 00:59:35,000
Speaker 1: seen that time and again. So I think that probably

1117
00:59:35,000 --> 00:59:37,880
Speaker 1: holds true. And I don't know how much of that

1118
00:59:37,960 --> 00:59:41,560
Speaker 1: is yet investment in a longer work, or sort of

1119
00:59:41,600 --> 00:59:45,880
Speaker 1: expectations of a longer work, or or also just like

1120
00:59:45,960 --> 00:59:49,280
Speaker 1: effective storytelling, if you stick with it that long, like

1121
00:59:49,440 --> 00:59:52,200
Speaker 1: you you're rooting for the good guys or what whoever is,

1122
00:59:52,360 --> 00:59:54,720
Speaker 1: you know, the protagonists happen to be like you want

1123
00:59:55,120 --> 00:59:59,080
Speaker 1: them to overcome the adversary, and generally, I guess in

1124
00:59:59,080 --> 01:00:02,640
Speaker 1: those longer works you to have a protagonist that you're

1125
01:00:02,720 --> 01:00:06,760
Speaker 1: genuinely rooting for and not like in short fiction you

1126
01:00:06,800 --> 01:00:09,680
Speaker 1: sometimes have, you know, very problematic characters and you know

1127
01:00:09,760 --> 01:00:12,080
Speaker 1: something terrible is going to happen to them. Basically the

1128
01:00:12,080 --> 01:00:16,680
Speaker 1: Tales from the Crypt model short stories, bad people, bad endings.

1129
01:00:17,840 --> 01:00:20,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, Tales from the Crypt exactly. It is short

1130
01:00:20,920 --> 01:00:22,840
Speaker 3: enough that you don't need to like anybody.

1131
01:00:23,160 --> 01:00:26,720
Speaker 1: Yeah, like I hate everybody in this I know something

1132
01:00:26,800 --> 01:00:28,640
Speaker 1: bad is going to happen. I'm probably going to celebrate

1133
01:00:28,640 --> 01:00:31,480
Speaker 1: it when it does. And it's a short ride to

1134
01:00:31,520 --> 01:00:31,919
Speaker 1: get there.

1135
01:00:32,320 --> 01:00:34,120
Speaker 3: Well, I guess we got kind of sidetracked there, but

1136
01:00:34,200 --> 01:00:37,320
Speaker 3: I'll come back to my original recommendation. I say, thing

1137
01:00:37,320 --> 01:00:41,440
Speaker 3: from another world. Yeah, this one's really really good horror filmmaking,

1138
01:00:41,560 --> 01:00:43,000
Speaker 3: especially for nineteen fifty one.

1139
01:00:43,400 --> 01:00:45,880
Speaker 1: Absolutely, and if you would like to see this film,

1140
01:00:45,920 --> 01:00:48,960
Speaker 1: you're in luck because it I think our last one

1141
01:00:49,040 --> 01:00:53,280
Speaker 1: that we covered, is widely available. You can easily pick

1142
01:00:53,360 --> 01:00:55,960
Speaker 1: up a DVD or Blu ray of it. You can

1143
01:00:55,960 --> 01:00:59,240
Speaker 1: also digitally rent or buy it pretty much any place

1144
01:00:59,440 --> 01:01:02,360
Speaker 1: you you digitally buy or rent films.

1145
01:01:02,800 --> 01:01:03,840
Speaker 3: Watch the Skies.

1146
01:01:05,640 --> 01:01:08,080
Speaker 1: I know that there was also a colorized version of

1147
01:01:08,080 --> 01:01:14,040
Speaker 1: this film. I can't imagine watching it colorized. I feel

1148
01:01:14,040 --> 01:01:17,280
Speaker 1: like the black and white is essential. Yeah, all right,

1149
01:01:17,320 --> 01:01:20,760
Speaker 1: we're gonna go ahead and wrap it up there. But hey,

1150
01:01:20,840 --> 01:01:23,280
Speaker 1: if you would like to listen to other episodes of

1151
01:01:23,640 --> 01:01:25,960
Speaker 1: Weird House Cinema, you'll find it every Friday in the

1152
01:01:26,000 --> 01:01:28,960
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed. We have core

1153
01:01:29,040 --> 01:01:33,040
Speaker 1: episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We have a listener mail

1154
01:01:33,040 --> 01:01:36,919
Speaker 1: on Monday's Artifact on Wednesday, and a rerun on the weekends,

1155
01:01:37,320 --> 01:01:41,320
Speaker 1: and hey, keep watching the skies out there. If you've

1156
01:01:41,320 --> 01:01:42,800
Speaker 1: got a sky keep watching it.

1157
01:01:43,760 --> 01:01:46,320
Speaker 3: But what would that have done if you've seen it,

1158
01:01:46,360 --> 01:01:49,000
Speaker 3: you just you'd be like, I see something crash landing

1159
01:01:50,400 --> 01:01:51,080
Speaker 3: you at.

1160
01:01:50,840 --> 01:01:51,400
Speaker 1: Alert the sight.

1161
01:01:52,160 --> 01:01:53,440
Speaker 3: I guess you're like, oh, we got to get all

1162
01:01:53,480 --> 01:01:54,560
Speaker 3: the thermite really quick.

1163
01:01:56,280 --> 01:01:58,520
Speaker 1: That is one more thing. It's this terrible time in

1164
01:01:58,560 --> 01:02:00,520
Speaker 1: the episode to remember it. But we have some great

1165
01:02:00,520 --> 01:02:03,720
Speaker 1: sequences too of plotting where the character is trying to

1166
01:02:03,760 --> 01:02:06,240
Speaker 1: track it with like a Geiger counter. Oh yes, an

1167
01:02:06,360 --> 01:02:10,280
Speaker 1: enclosed space. Very reminiscent of films to come much later,

1168
01:02:10,480 --> 01:02:12,280
Speaker 1: like like Alien and Aliens.

1169
01:02:12,640 --> 01:02:14,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, totally.

1170
01:02:14,520 --> 01:02:17,200
Speaker 1: So. Yeah, this film feels ahead of its time in

1171
01:02:17,240 --> 01:02:18,080
Speaker 1: a number of ways.

1172
01:02:18,320 --> 01:02:22,360
Speaker 3: Okay, we got a stop gushion about the thing. Okay, okay, yeah,

1173
01:02:22,400 --> 01:02:24,800
Speaker 3: so what we're were saying, Oh yeah, we're ending the

1174
01:02:24,800 --> 01:02:27,280
Speaker 3: episode all right. Well anyway, thanks as always to our

1175
01:02:27,320 --> 01:02:30,680
Speaker 3: wonderful audio producer Seth Nicholas Johnson. If you would like

1176
01:02:30,720 --> 01:02:32,720
Speaker 3: to get in touch with us with feedback on this

1177
01:02:32,800 --> 01:02:35,320
Speaker 3: episode or any other to suggest topic for the future,

1178
01:02:35,520 --> 01:02:38,400
Speaker 3: just to say hello, you can email us at contact

1179
01:02:38,440 --> 01:02:47,680
Speaker 3: at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.

1180
01:02:47,800 --> 01:02:50,760
Speaker 2: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

1181
01:02:50,840 --> 01:02:53,640
Speaker 2: more podcasts from my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

1182
01:02:53,800 --> 01:02:57,000
Speaker 2: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.