WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema: The Incredible Shrinking Man 0:00:02.960 --> 0:00:06.080 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio. 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:15.960 Hey you welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:19.599 Lamp and this is Joe McCormick. And today's movie on 0:00:19.680 --> 0:00:24.599 Weird House Cinema is the nineteen fifty seven introspective science 0:00:24.640 --> 0:00:30.280 fiction adventure The Incredible Shrinking Man, directed by Jack Arnold 0:00:30.600 --> 0:00:34.560 and based on a screenplay by Richard Matheson. And man, 0:00:34.640 --> 0:00:37.760 I've got to say this one totally surprised me. This 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:40.199 is not what I was expecting at all for a 0:00:40.360 --> 0:00:45.839 late fifties shrink movie from the director of Tarantula. I 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:51.479 was expecting something much sillier and much campier, and instead 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:55.280 what we got here is in many ways a rather 0:00:55.600 --> 0:01:01.160 thoughtful and fascinating science fiction tale about the search for 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:05.800 meaning and dignity in the face of absurdity and doom. 0:01:06.600 --> 0:01:10.000 And I suspect that a lot of the intelligence and 0:01:10.040 --> 0:01:12.760 the soul of this movie is sort of there on 0:01:12.760 --> 0:01:15.480 the page, like it comes from the story by Matheson. 0:01:15.959 --> 0:01:19.600 But also the special effects are excellent for the time, 0:01:19.640 --> 0:01:22.360 and most of the performances in this movie are very 0:01:23.560 --> 0:01:27.920 kind of a nuanced and warmly human This was a 0:01:28.040 --> 0:01:31.640 shockingly great film and not at all what I thought 0:01:31.680 --> 0:01:33.400 we were going to get based on the title and 0:01:33.480 --> 0:01:36.680 the premise. Yeah, yeah, I had the same experience with it. 0:01:36.720 --> 0:01:38.400 The only thing I'd ever seen from this film is 0:01:38.400 --> 0:01:41.039 I'd seen a kind of famous sequence from it in 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:44.440 which a tiny man has been reduced to the size 0:01:44.440 --> 0:01:46.840 of a doll is hunted by his own housecat in 0:01:46.880 --> 0:01:49.720 his living room, and I believe I saw it in 0:01:50.600 --> 0:01:54.720 and it came from Hollywood, that older picture that had 0:01:54.720 --> 0:01:56.800 a lot of trailers and clips and a lot of 0:01:56.920 --> 0:02:01.000 joking and riffing of the material there. M the riffing 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.240 wasn't particularly funny, but in isolation that that sequence was 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:07.120 amusing and kind of hilarious, and I just figured, yeah, 0:02:07.120 --> 0:02:09.120 the rest of the film would kind of fallow suit. 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:12.280 And we ended up picking this one up because we 0:02:12.120 --> 0:02:14.680 were actually, I think we're going to watch the amazing 0:02:14.680 --> 0:02:17.760 Colossal Man, right. I went to Video Drum to rent 0:02:17.800 --> 0:02:21.799 it and it's not available on disc anywhere, and which 0:02:21.840 --> 0:02:26.560 is yeah, yeah, yeah, but they said, well, we do 0:02:26.680 --> 0:02:29.520 have the Incredible Shrinking Man, and not only do we 0:02:29.520 --> 0:02:33.360 have it, we have it in this excellent Criterion collection edition. 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:36.200 So I was like, well, I didn't think this was 0:02:36.240 --> 0:02:38.639 the type of film that really merited that sort of treatment. 0:02:39.000 --> 0:02:41.760 But it looks looks interesting. I love that one sequence. 0:02:41.840 --> 0:02:43.960 Let's check it out, and here we are. Well. This 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:47.560 is another way I was surprised because I having so, 0:02:47.639 --> 0:02:50.600 I had also seen the cat attack part of the 0:02:50.639 --> 0:02:54.440 movie in isolation, in which it seemed quite funny to me, 0:02:55.360 --> 0:02:58.359 but in context I saw it in a whole new light, 0:02:58.440 --> 0:03:01.560 even though I'd seen the exact same footage before, in 0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:04.000 the context of the plot, I found it a rather 0:03:04.440 --> 0:03:10.000 frightening and effective action set piece. Absolutely, yeah. I mean, 0:03:10.000 --> 0:03:12.239 the effects and this are are great for the day. 0:03:12.280 --> 0:03:15.480 They were ambitious for the day. And you know, you 0:03:15.480 --> 0:03:17.000 can't you can't look back in a film like this 0:03:17.040 --> 0:03:20.880 without seeing a few scenes in the special effects generally speaking, 0:03:21.400 --> 0:03:23.799 and that's the case here. But by and large everything 0:03:23.840 --> 0:03:26.840 looks looks wonderful. And if you take the film in 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:29.880 its entirety and you let it to do its work 0:03:29.919 --> 0:03:32.720 on you, yeah, everything holds up really well. Another way 0:03:32.720 --> 0:03:34.200 in which I think we have to take it as 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:36.840 from its time is I did say the film is 0:03:36.960 --> 0:03:40.240 very like thoughtful and introspective, which it is, but a 0:03:40.280 --> 0:03:43.240 lot of that thoughtfulness and introspection comes in the form 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:49.360 of kind of ponderously delivered uh stentorian narration. You know, 0:03:50.480 --> 0:03:55.080 it's like the voiceover narration that like tells you all 0:03:55.200 --> 0:03:58.480 of the main character's inner thoughts about his own search 0:03:58.520 --> 0:04:02.480 for meaning is maybe a bit blustery, and its delivery, 0:04:03.240 --> 0:04:07.240 but nevertheless, like the sentiments expressed in the writing in 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:09.600 those sections I think are really good. Yeah. A lot 0:04:09.600 --> 0:04:15.160 of it does have to deal with like fifties American masculinity, 0:04:15.360 --> 0:04:17.520 and there are plenty of nineteen fifties pictures that we've 0:04:17.520 --> 0:04:21.239 watched that have that that masculinity of the time period 0:04:21.680 --> 0:04:26.320 prominently featured. But usually it's not self reflective. Usually it's 0:04:26.360 --> 0:04:30.920 not at all analyzing what this is that? What is this? Uh? 0:04:31.320 --> 0:04:34.760 What are these ideas? These fears and expectations that everyone's 0:04:34.760 --> 0:04:38.160 trapped with them? Right? Instead, it's usually just like, here 0:04:38.760 --> 0:04:41.640 is your your jaw line, who's ready to punch the 0:04:41.720 --> 0:04:45.640 alien that stands in for a communist? Yeah? It. As 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:47.560 I was watching it, I kept thinking a little bit 0:04:47.560 --> 0:04:51.000 about the television series mad Men, and in fact, my 0:04:51.080 --> 0:04:53.160 elevator pitch would be what if the male characters and 0:04:53.279 --> 0:04:56.440 Madmen physically shrunk and were attacked by their own cats 0:04:56.480 --> 0:05:00.840 and household pests. I mean that nails it. The main 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:03.960 character in this movie is literally an advertising I don't 0:05:03.960 --> 0:05:06.680 know if he's an executive, but he's he works in advertising. 0:05:06.680 --> 0:05:11.520 He's an adolist. Right, three interesting stats just for weird 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.200 house cinema here. This is our second Jack Arnold picture. 0:05:14.480 --> 0:05:17.679 This is our second Richard Mathison screenplay, and it's actually 0:05:17.720 --> 0:05:23.360 our second miniaturization film. We'd previously discussed nineteen forties Doctor Cyclops, 0:05:23.839 --> 0:05:28.440 which Doctor Cyclops also had really excellent special effects for 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:30.680 the time. That was a great looking movie, though, I 0:05:30.680 --> 0:05:32.839 think this one is a lot more interesting in terms 0:05:32.880 --> 0:05:38.080 of the characters. Yeah, definitely. The other Jack Arnold movie 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:41.920 was Tarantula, which was not nearly as good as this, 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:45.240 but was a lot of fun in that camp here direction. 0:05:45.279 --> 0:05:49.040 I was expecting this time. What was the other Mathison movie? 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:52.760 The other Mathison picture was The Devil Rides Out. It 0:05:52.880 --> 0:05:57.599 was he was adapting someone else's novel, a Wheatly novel. Okay, 0:05:57.640 --> 0:06:01.360 in this picture he adapts his own awful simon I'd 0:06:01.440 --> 0:06:06.360 rather see you dead than dabbling with shrink missed. All right, Well, 0:06:06.440 --> 0:06:09.240 let's go ahead and listen to the trailer. Some trailer 0:06:09.279 --> 0:06:11.440 audio here. This one's a lot of fun, and I 0:06:11.480 --> 0:06:31.839 love how this one begins with the incredible shrinking man shrinking. 0:06:43.480 --> 0:06:46.599 You are getting smaller. There's no medical precedent for what's 0:06:46.640 --> 0:06:50.680 happening to you. I simply know that you're getting smaller. 0:06:52.120 --> 0:06:56.039 I want you to stop thinking about us, our marriage. 0:06:57.480 --> 0:07:00.240 Some awful things might happen. So long as you got 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:08.840 this wedding ring on, you got me. This is awesome. 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:12.080 Well speaking, I have forty five seconds to tell you 0:07:12.120 --> 0:07:14.040 about something I think you will remember the longest day 0:07:14.040 --> 0:07:17.880 you live. It's about a man named Scott Kerrey. A 0:07:17.880 --> 0:07:19.840 few months ago, he was six feet two inches tall 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:22.760 and weigh one hundred and ninety pounds. Today he's two 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:24.760 inches tall and you can hold him in the palm 0:07:24.800 --> 0:07:27.240 of your hand. Now he lives in a world where 0:07:27.240 --> 0:07:29.440 he must stride for his life, a world or a 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:38.120 friendly housecat is a predatory monster. Incredible because it's almost 0:07:38.120 --> 0:07:44.280 beyond a Magini. Incredible because every hour he gets smaller 0:07:44.320 --> 0:08:02.520 and smallow. Incredible because every month the paramounts. A note 0:08:02.520 --> 0:08:04.000 before we keep going, if you want to watch this 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:06.720 as well. We watched it on the Excellent Criterion Collection disc, 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:08.960 which features a great four K digital restoration of the 0:08:08.960 --> 0:08:11.800 film itself and a load of great extras. I didn't 0:08:11.800 --> 0:08:13.120 get to go through all the extras, but I went 0:08:13.120 --> 0:08:15.840 through some of them and there they're pretty great. Highly 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:18.600 recommend this edition. It's available on DVD and Blu Ray 0:08:19.320 --> 0:08:22.040 rented the Blue from Videodrome. It's also available for digital 0:08:22.160 --> 0:08:25.480 rental on most platforms. All right, well, let's start talking 0:08:25.640 --> 0:08:27.880 a little bit about the people involved here. Some of 0:08:27.880 --> 0:08:30.160 these are people we've covered before, in which case I'm 0:08:30.200 --> 0:08:32.480 gonna try and cover them in just a little a 0:08:32.559 --> 0:08:35.200 little differently than before. But yeah, at the top of 0:08:35.200 --> 0:08:37.800 the picture we have Jack Arnold, the director. He lived 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:41.200 nineteen twelve through nineteen ninety two. Again, this is our 0:08:41.240 --> 0:08:44.640 second Jack Arnold film, following nineteen fifty fives Tarantula. He 0:08:44.760 --> 0:08:48.640 learned cinematography and filmmaking under Robert J. Flaherty while serving 0:08:48.640 --> 0:08:50.920 in the US military in World War Two, and following 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:54.040 the war, started the Promotional Films Company with Lee Goldman. 0:08:54.480 --> 0:08:57.480 He directed the nineteen forty eight short Chicken Off Tomorrow. 0:08:57.880 --> 0:09:00.840 This one is riffed on Mystery Sense three thousands. So 0:09:01.080 --> 0:09:03.000 I'd seen this one many times, but I did not 0:09:03.120 --> 0:09:05.960 know until this week. But it was a Jack Arnold production. 0:09:07.080 --> 0:09:09.240 I have never seen this in full, and I haven't 0:09:09.240 --> 0:09:11.400 seen it rift, but I was skipping around in the 0:09:11.440 --> 0:09:13.440 link you sent me, and there are parts where like 0:09:13.480 --> 0:09:17.240 it shows maps and the map se the animated map 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:20.640 segments reminded me of the World War Two propaganda films 0:09:20.640 --> 0:09:24.360 that Walt Disney made, like Victory through Air Power. Yeah, 0:09:24.440 --> 0:09:26.800 I mean it did. It makes sense given where he 0:09:26.840 --> 0:09:29.360 came out off where he learned his craft, and in 0:09:29.440 --> 0:09:33.160 nineteen fifty he directed the International Ladies Garment Workers Union 0:09:33.200 --> 0:09:37.480 documentary With These Hands, which was nominated for an Oscar. 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:41.960 This immediately caught my eye because, okay, so this is 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:49.200 an independent promotional film for the i LGWU, But the 0:09:49.240 --> 0:09:52.839 International Ladies Garment Workers Union is also the subject of 0:09:52.880 --> 0:09:57.240 my long time favorite commercial that appears on many tapes 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:00.400 of the Star Wars Holiday Special where they sing the 0:10:00.480 --> 0:10:04.240 union song you know, you know the one I'm talking about, 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:09.640 the one? Yeah, yeah, uh, it's it's great. It's tied 0:10:09.679 --> 0:10:12.960 from my favorite with Tobar. Of course, you know, our 0:10:13.920 --> 0:10:16.120 co worker Annie Reese really wants to come on the 0:10:16.160 --> 0:10:19.719 show and discuss about the Star Wars holiday special this year. 0:10:20.440 --> 0:10:22.520 He has made it known. Oh Annie and I have 0:10:22.600 --> 0:10:26.000 discussed the the International Ladies Garment Workers Union commercial and 0:10:26.160 --> 0:10:29.640 Tobar the telesonic robot a number of times, so we 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:31.720 can maybe when she does come, we can do a 0:10:31.800 --> 0:10:36.680 full ranking of all the holiday special commercials. Sounds good. 0:10:37.600 --> 0:10:40.320 So anyway, with these hands was was a hit, didn't 0:10:40.320 --> 0:10:42.680 win the Oscar, but was nominated, and this enough, it 0:10:42.760 --> 0:10:45.679 was enough to catch the attention of Universal Studios, so 0:10:45.720 --> 0:10:48.640 they signed Jack Arnold on as one of their directors. 0:10:49.120 --> 0:10:51.280 So I mentioned there's a great there's some great extras 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:54.199 on that Criterion collection disc and there's a great about 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:57.000 an hour long bio about Arnold's career. And one of 0:10:57.000 --> 0:10:58.600 the things that they stress in it is that when 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:00.760 you got hired by a major film studio as a 0:11:00.800 --> 0:11:03.800 director during this period, you were expected to deliver on 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:07.920 whatever they needed. So a studio like Universal, they had 0:11:07.920 --> 0:11:11.400 to bust out the full menu of films. You know, 0:11:11.440 --> 0:11:15.360 it wasn't just the pricey specials. They also had had appetizers. 0:11:15.360 --> 0:11:17.079 You know, they had to have the crowd pleasers, so 0:11:17.320 --> 0:11:19.480 you know, they had their prestige titles all the way 0:11:19.480 --> 0:11:22.720 down to the genre dregs, and certainly in this time 0:11:22.800 --> 0:11:25.720 that's where you would find your science fiction. So if 0:11:25.800 --> 0:11:29.120 you are a studio employeed director like Jack Arnold at 0:11:29.120 --> 0:11:31.440 this time, you're probably not doing a lot of what 0:11:31.679 --> 0:11:34.640 many people probably imagine director is doing today, which is 0:11:34.679 --> 0:11:36.760 like striking out on their own with like a script 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:39.640 that they're really excited about and then finding funding for 0:11:39.679 --> 0:11:42.640 that and putting together a production. It's a lot more 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:45.200 kind of like work for hire, like studio says, here's 0:11:45.240 --> 0:11:47.880 the movie you're making. Yeah. Yeah, they might assigned you 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:50.880 a western, and a horror, a sci fi film, you 0:11:51.000 --> 0:11:53.040 name it, and it was up to you to make 0:11:53.080 --> 0:11:56.439 it work and deliver. I guess this was reference to 0:11:56.640 --> 0:11:59.640 a good bit in the Collen Brothers film the titles 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:03.720 alluding me at the moment wrestling pictures. Oh, Barton Fink. 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:07.679 Barton Fink. Yes, he was a writer, but he was 0:12:07.760 --> 0:12:10.160 very much in the in the studio system and was 0:12:10.200 --> 0:12:12.959 expected to deliver what they needed. He was going to 0:12:13.000 --> 0:12:17.320 write for Wallace Beery or something. Yeah. So Arnold comes 0:12:17.520 --> 0:12:19.480 aboard their universal and the first thing they give him 0:12:19.480 --> 0:12:22.160 his nineteen fifty threes Girls in the Night. This is 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:26.400 a troubled youth picture with with fittingly aged youths, you 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:29.360 know that are clearly like in their their thirties or something. 0:12:30.320 --> 0:12:32.599 But he apparently did well with it and he was 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:35.720 handed it came from Outer Space, which ultimately came out 0:12:35.720 --> 0:12:38.240 the same year. Now I haven't seen it came from 0:12:38.240 --> 0:12:39.880 outer Space, but the way they were discussing it in 0:12:39.920 --> 0:12:43.040 this extra made it sound like something we might want 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:45.040 to check out sometime, because it was based on a 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:49.200 story treatment from Ray Bradberry, and it was pretty ambitious 0:12:49.240 --> 0:12:51.439 and ahead of its time in many ways. So it's 0:12:51.480 --> 0:12:54.000 one of these films where the aliens are not villainous 0:12:54.040 --> 0:12:58.839 but merely just difficult to understand. And also this is 0:12:58.880 --> 0:13:02.120 pretty crazy too. You were actually never meant to see 0:13:02.160 --> 0:13:05.160 the aliens. And this is the way they initially shot 0:13:05.200 --> 0:13:07.959 the picture and approached the picture. It wasn't until the 0:13:08.200 --> 0:13:11.040 studio basically had some time to think about this and 0:13:11.040 --> 0:13:13.240 they're like, look, we can't put nothing on a poster. 0:13:13.360 --> 0:13:15.320 We need to put a monster on the poster. This 0:13:15.440 --> 0:13:18.280 is a monster movie, Gosh darnett. So they ended up 0:13:18.320 --> 0:13:20.680 having to compromise and actually came up with like a 0:13:20.720 --> 0:13:24.280 pretty interesting looking creature to fit in there. And still 0:13:24.280 --> 0:13:26.000 that even though they had to compromise, the results were 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:28.360 supposed to be pretty good. Oh, I would be absolutely 0:13:28.400 --> 0:13:30.559 game to talk about this one. So that film was 0:13:30.600 --> 0:13:32.679 a hit, and for a long stretch it kind of 0:13:32.679 --> 0:13:35.320 cemented Arnold's place as their sci fi guy, you know, 0:13:35.559 --> 0:13:37.720 and this was a solid position even though you're further 0:13:37.800 --> 0:13:42.560 down the ranks in fifties Hollywood. His follow up, certainly, 0:13:42.559 --> 0:13:44.600 when we look back on Jack Arnold's pictures like this 0:13:44.679 --> 0:13:47.320 is maybe the one that made the biggest impact on 0:13:47.520 --> 0:13:51.360 popular culture nineteen fifty four's Creature from the Black Lagoon, 0:13:52.360 --> 0:13:54.520 the Creature from which, of course becomes one of the 0:13:55.120 --> 0:13:58.440 pantheon of universal monsters, the big ones you know about, 0:13:58.960 --> 0:14:03.240 yeah yeah, and it really just strikes through to the 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:08.560 public horror consciousness, becomes this enduring pop culture figure and 0:14:08.840 --> 0:14:10.880 was a huge hit at the time, so huge that 0:14:10.960 --> 0:14:13.800 it actually inspired a sequel, which wasn't like the normal 0:14:13.880 --> 0:14:15.680 like nowadays we just think, you know, that's what you 0:14:16.080 --> 0:14:18.400 assume is going to happen. If there's not a sequel, 0:14:18.400 --> 0:14:20.680 then I guess the first one wasn't successful, but it 0:14:20.720 --> 0:14:23.480 wasn't a given back in the day, so he ended 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:28.080 up doing the sequel, which is not as good or 0:14:28.360 --> 0:14:31.520 I don't know. It's hard to really judge the Creature 0:14:31.600 --> 0:14:35.320 films because the first one is it's both mostly about 0:14:35.320 --> 0:14:38.480 just how good that creature suit looks. Yeah, the first 0:14:38.480 --> 0:14:43.480 one I think of as wonderfully atmospheric and having that 0:14:43.560 --> 0:14:47.640 great monster in it. But I've seen it several times 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:50.240 and I really couldn't tell you anything about the human characters. 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:53.640 I don't recall at all. Yeah, yeah, I just remember 0:14:53.800 --> 0:14:55.920 the humans come off as jerks, like they come to 0:14:55.960 --> 0:14:58.520 where the creature lives and they start shooting at him 0:14:58.560 --> 0:15:02.160 and stuff. They're like, he's not attacking cities or anything. 0:15:02.160 --> 0:15:04.560 He's just hanging out in a bog or in a 0:15:04.640 --> 0:15:08.400 lake somewhere in the jungle and they come to him. Yeah. Yeah, 0:15:08.400 --> 0:15:10.160 So it's kind of hard to digest that. And then 0:15:10.200 --> 0:15:13.080 the second one they kind of rehash it, except they 0:15:13.160 --> 0:15:15.400 make the suit look goofy, like the eyes look goofy 0:15:15.440 --> 0:15:17.880 in the second one. Yeah, And then the third one 0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:22.120 is more disturbing, and perhaps there's a lot to talk 0:15:22.120 --> 0:15:24.520 about with the third one, but also it's just it's 0:15:24.520 --> 0:15:26.880 not as fun. It's the first one by any stretch. 0:15:27.240 --> 0:15:29.960 So anyway, it was a huge hit. Arnold comes back 0:15:29.960 --> 0:15:32.600 with Tarantula, which we've talked about on the show, and 0:15:32.600 --> 0:15:35.120 then in nineteen fifty seven he pulls off easily as 0:15:35.120 --> 0:15:37.880 greatest achievement in sci fi cinema, the Incredible Shrinking Man. 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:41.120 It's like we've been saying, it's really the total package, 0:15:41.160 --> 0:15:43.480 a big budget effects movie for the time and for 0:15:43.520 --> 0:15:47.600 the genre, with a great, intelligent script built on solid performances. 0:15:48.360 --> 0:15:51.120 This wouldn't be his last sci fi film, but outside 0:15:51.120 --> 0:15:54.240 of the sheer popularity of the creature itself from Creature 0:15:54.320 --> 0:15:56.640 from the Black Lagoon, this one is kind of his 0:15:57.080 --> 0:16:01.600 career defining film. Okay, Now, we also talked about how 0:16:01.640 --> 0:16:05.680 this film benefits from some excellent writing by Richard Matheson. 0:16:06.120 --> 0:16:10.000 That's right. Richard Mathison lived nineteen twenty six through twenty thirteen, 0:16:10.440 --> 0:16:14.240 American writer who's in large part I think best remembered 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:18.200 for his nineteen fifty four novel I Am Legend, But 0:16:18.320 --> 0:16:20.520 for a few different reasons, like some people who just 0:16:20.600 --> 0:16:23.240 are really fond of the book, and I've loved the book, 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:26.120 haven't read it in many years, but I read it 0:16:26.160 --> 0:16:29.040 a couple of times and loved it. But of course 0:16:29.040 --> 0:16:31.920 it became the basis for I think three different film 0:16:31.920 --> 0:16:34.360 adaptation sixty four is The Last Man on Earth starring 0:16:34.440 --> 0:16:38.640 Vincent Price, nineteen seventy ones, The Omega Man starring Chuck Heston, 0:16:39.160 --> 0:16:41.960 and then two thousand and sevens I Am Legend starring 0:16:41.960 --> 0:16:45.800 Will Smith, each one a very distinct, very said in 0:16:45.840 --> 0:16:49.400 its time adaptation of the source material. I got an idea, 0:16:49.680 --> 0:16:51.960 someday we should do three weeks in a row where 0:16:51.960 --> 0:16:55.160 we do all three of these movies. It could be fun, 0:16:55.240 --> 0:16:57.400 it could be we could learn a lot about ourselves. 0:16:57.400 --> 0:17:01.160 I think, yeah. But it was wasn't a one trick pony. 0:17:01.360 --> 0:17:04.160 He also wrote the excellent Haunted House novel hell House, 0:17:04.240 --> 0:17:08.040 the thriller Duel, The Shrinking Man. All of these were 0:17:08.040 --> 0:17:11.600 adapted into films A Duel by young Steven Spielberg. Some 0:17:11.640 --> 0:17:14.200 other books he had to adapted included What Dreams May 0:17:14.200 --> 0:17:17.240 Come and A Stir of Echoes. So in this case, 0:17:17.280 --> 0:17:19.720 he wrote a screenplay for this movie based on the 0:17:19.880 --> 0:17:23.560 novel he had published just the previous year. I think, right, yeah, 0:17:23.560 --> 0:17:26.960 it was still hot. It's still hot. Yeah. He also 0:17:26.960 --> 0:17:29.720 wrote a lot of TV, including sixteen episodes the original 0:17:29.760 --> 0:17:34.080 Twilight Zone, including such episodes as Nightmare at twenty thousand Feet. 0:17:34.640 --> 0:17:37.080 He also wrote for such shows as Night Gallery, The 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:50.119 Original Star Trek, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, and Thriller. So 0:17:50.160 --> 0:17:53.119 as as we've been discussing an Incredible Shrinking Man based 0:17:53.160 --> 0:17:58.399 on The Shrinking Man the novel, and yeah, it's you know, 0:17:58.400 --> 0:18:02.000 it's not just about the fantas pastic scenario of gradual miniaturization, 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:04.960 but it is this kind of analysis and rumination on 0:18:05.040 --> 0:18:09.679 masculine ideals in middle class America of the time. The 0:18:09.760 --> 0:18:12.880 book and this movie would also serve as inspiration for 0:18:12.960 --> 0:18:16.000 The Incredible Shrinking Woman in nineteen eighty one that was 0:18:16.080 --> 0:18:19.600 scripted by Jane Wagner, and I believe that was directed 0:18:19.640 --> 0:18:23.199 by Joel Schumacher. Oh okay, I personally haven't seen it, 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.280 but I hear it's good and it's a great idea, 0:18:26.480 --> 0:18:29.560 you know, to take this older movie that is all 0:18:29.600 --> 0:18:33.720 about like masculine miniaturization and what does that mean if 0:18:33.800 --> 0:18:39.199 you approach it from a feminine perspective. Oh, I just 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:44.200 looked up. Is Lily Tomlin this character? She's our shrinker, Yeah, 0:18:44.480 --> 0:18:48.480 our shrunken man in this film, however, playing the character 0:18:48.600 --> 0:18:52.679 Scott Carey is the actor Grant Williams, who of nineteen 0:18:52.760 --> 0:18:56.440 thirty one through nineteen eighty five. Williams was a versatile 0:18:56.480 --> 0:19:00.720 American actor of stage, TV, and screen. It noted in 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:03.520 the Criterion Collection edition that his casting in this film 0:19:03.560 --> 0:19:07.160 was very much that of an ascendant talent who could 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:09.920 play a relatable character as opposed to what you sometimes 0:19:09.960 --> 0:19:12.000 got in genre films of the day, some sort of 0:19:12.160 --> 0:19:15.080 pure Hollywood actor type who's kind of, you know, square 0:19:15.160 --> 0:19:17.439 jawed guy who's sort of fallen down the ladder of 0:19:17.480 --> 0:19:21.000 success and winds up in your B picture or your 0:19:21.160 --> 0:19:26.040 genre picture. But yeah, Grant, Grant Williams does a really, 0:19:26.160 --> 0:19:27.960 I think a great job and it's very tremendous, a 0:19:28.080 --> 0:19:34.080 very sort of isolated, self reflective kind of performance. This 0:19:34.119 --> 0:19:36.320 guy had a little bit less of the stink of 0:19:36.520 --> 0:19:41.800 Westerns than a lot of fifties sci fi movie protagonists do. Yeah, 0:19:41.800 --> 0:19:43.880 I know exactly what you mean. Like you, you look 0:19:43.920 --> 0:19:46.280 at him and you don't instantly think wins. This guy 0:19:46.320 --> 0:19:50.000 gonna punch somebody. Yeah. So Williams had had smaller roles 0:19:50.040 --> 0:19:53.280 in TV and film before this, but what really made 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:55.679 him stand out was a bit performance in the nineteen 0:19:55.720 --> 0:19:58.840 fifty six film a Rock Hudson picture titled written on 0:19:58.880 --> 0:20:02.399 the wind. It's I think he's like a gas station 0:20:02.440 --> 0:20:04.400 attendant in it or something. Not a very big part, 0:20:04.440 --> 0:20:07.800 but it made an impact. And Yeah, the incredible Shrinking 0:20:07.800 --> 0:20:11.159 Man is a great showcase for his acting talents and 0:20:11.520 --> 0:20:14.280 allows him to really stand out. He followed this up 0:20:14.320 --> 0:20:17.120 with the lead role in the Monolith Monsters, an interesting 0:20:17.119 --> 0:20:20.040 looking picture from one of the writers of Tarantula, and 0:20:20.080 --> 0:20:22.440 we talked about that a bit in our Tarantula episode, 0:20:22.440 --> 0:20:25.280 though I have not seen it. Yeah, I've eyed Monolith 0:20:25.359 --> 0:20:29.560 Monsters for Weird House before. Yeah, because that one, Like 0:20:29.600 --> 0:20:33.720 the basic idea is, let's do you know a fifties 0:20:34.080 --> 0:20:39.600 monster movie, but the monsters are geology. It sounds like 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:41.800 a terrible idea. So it's like I have to I 0:20:41.880 --> 0:20:43.840 have to look and see, you know, or it sounds 0:20:43.840 --> 0:20:49.520 like an idea the studio might have stumbled over. Yeah. Anyway, 0:20:49.560 --> 0:20:52.840 Williams found some success here. Then he moved from Universal 0:20:52.880 --> 0:20:55.120 to Warner Brothers in fifty nine. He did various TV 0:20:55.240 --> 0:20:58.479 and film roles after that. Some of the standouts include 0:20:58.560 --> 0:21:01.080 nineteen sixties The Leech One. This is one that was 0:21:01.119 --> 0:21:03.520 also featured on A Mystery Science Theater. This is the 0:21:03.560 --> 0:21:06.119 one that has a great line from The Leech Woman 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:08.960 where she says, you will never escape me. You are 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:14.199 the one in my dreams of blood. Great line. It 0:21:14.520 --> 0:21:17.840 was not supposed to be romantic exactly, but anyway. He 0:21:17.880 --> 0:21:19.840 was also in sixty three s p. Two one oh nine, 0:21:19.920 --> 0:21:23.160 nineteen seventy one's Brain of Blood in nineteen seventy six 0:21:23.280 --> 0:21:27.000 is Doomsday Machine. He did fifty episodes of TV's Hawaiian I, 0:21:27.600 --> 0:21:29.800 and he pops up in one episode of the original 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:33.160 The Outer Limits. He also did one episode of The Munsters. 0:21:33.640 --> 0:21:37.880 Oh is he a boyfriend that Marilyn Munster brings home? 0:21:37.920 --> 0:21:40.479 And then he gets scared and runs away, and they said, oh, 0:21:40.520 --> 0:21:44.399 you did it again one of sims. Yes, all right, 0:21:44.440 --> 0:21:47.440 so he's the I mean, he's the centerpiece in this picture. 0:21:47.560 --> 0:21:49.600 Most of your screen time is spent with him. But 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:53.120 we also have a major character in Louise Carry his 0:21:53.200 --> 0:21:56.280 wife played by Randy Stewart who of nineteen twenty four 0:21:56.320 --> 0:21:58.720 through nineteen ninety six, she was an actor in numerous 0:21:58.760 --> 0:22:01.520 popular movies of the forties and fifties like Late Forties 0:22:01.520 --> 0:22:05.000 and the Fifties, and later a frequent TV player. She 0:22:05.119 --> 0:22:07.560 was a supporting player in Howard Hawks. I was a 0:22:07.560 --> 0:22:10.160 male war bride from nineteen forty nine, All about Eve 0:22:10.200 --> 0:22:12.760 from nineteen fifty and she did a lot of TV 0:22:12.880 --> 0:22:16.520 and westerns leading into The Incredible Shrinking Man, and afterwards 0:22:16.800 --> 0:22:19.159 it was mostly TV westerns and police shows until the 0:22:19.160 --> 0:22:22.480 mid nineteen seventies. Now, there's another female character in this 0:22:22.720 --> 0:22:24.760 that we'll discuss when we get more into the plot. 0:22:25.080 --> 0:22:28.040 This is a character named Clarisse, played by April Kent, 0:22:28.160 --> 0:22:31.240 who lived nineteen thirty five through nineteen ninety eight. She 0:22:31.359 --> 0:22:33.760 has only six film credits to her name. She was 0:22:33.800 --> 0:22:36.600 the daughter of noted actor June Havoc who lived nineteen 0:22:36.600 --> 0:22:40.440 twelve through twenty ten, and was niece of the legendary 0:22:40.440 --> 0:22:43.560 burlesque dancer Gypsy Rose League, who lived nineteen eleven through 0:22:43.640 --> 0:22:46.199 nineteen seventy. She's only in a couple of scenes, but 0:22:46.240 --> 0:22:47.959 she's very good. She's kind of the soul of the 0:22:47.960 --> 0:22:51.720 movie in a way. Yeah, Yeah, you're right, Okay. The 0:22:51.720 --> 0:22:55.240 Shrinking Man also has a brother named Charlie. Charlie is 0:22:55.280 --> 0:22:58.679 played by Paul Lankton, who lived nineteen thirteen through nineteen 0:22:58.720 --> 0:23:01.480 eighty TV and film actor who appeared on a couple 0:23:01.560 --> 0:23:04.720 episodes of the Twilight Zones, a nineteen fifty four Yetti 0:23:05.000 --> 0:23:08.199