WEBVTT - Weirdhouse Cinema: Deep Blue Sea 0:00:03.000 --> 0:00:05.400 Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind production of My 0:00:05.480 --> 0:00:15.280 Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Weird How Cinema. This is 0:00:15.360 --> 0:00:18.520 Rob Lamb and I'm Joe McCormick. In Today, we're gonna 0:00:18.520 --> 0:00:21.599 be talking about the movie that that delivers on the 0:00:21.640 --> 0:00:24.440 promise when your Titanic sinks. This is the movie you're 0:00:24.440 --> 0:00:28.720 gonna meet. It is Deep Blue Sea, which I feel 0:00:28.720 --> 0:00:32.120 like we're getting into what you might call slightly dangerous 0:00:32.159 --> 0:00:34.559 waters here because it's definitely going to be one of 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:38.960 the most mainstream films we've ever done. Yeah, it's Um, 0:00:39.000 --> 0:00:41.600 it's also as dangerously close as we've come to covering 0:00:41.640 --> 0:00:46.320 a movie from this century. It's from It's also the 0:00:46.440 --> 0:00:49.479 most expensive film we've ever watched, more than doubling the 0:00:49.520 --> 0:00:52.480 thirty million dollar budget of Free Jack. Um. I should 0:00:52.479 --> 0:00:55.279 also add that it is, without a doubt, the deepest 0:00:55.360 --> 0:00:58.840 and the bluest film that we've watched. Is this also 0:00:58.920 --> 0:01:02.200 the first movie we've done that had its own dedicated 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:05.399 original pop song to go with it? I guess so 0:01:05.520 --> 0:01:08.280 those those two tracks from that didn't quite Um, Oh 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:10.440 that's right, I forgot about those. Okay, so never mind, 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:12.680 I take it back. Oh yeah, we'll also take back 0:01:12.720 --> 0:01:16.080 the Sun Joe because Godzilla versus Hetera had its own 0:01:16.360 --> 0:01:18.800 track as well. That's right too. Okay, so I've just 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:21.160 forgotten everything, you know what. I think maybe even Teens 0:01:21.160 --> 0:01:24.240 in the Universe had its own music, but its own 0:01:24.280 --> 0:01:28.240 dedicated music video, which we'll get to that maybe a first. 0:01:28.880 --> 0:01:31.080 So this is a thing I love from like big 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:36.199 budget nineties movies, which is the dedicated popular genre song 0:01:36.560 --> 0:01:39.080 for the movie. So it's not a movie that's a musical. 0:01:39.120 --> 0:01:40.880 It's just got like a song that will maybe play 0:01:40.880 --> 0:01:44.480 on the end credits, and it's often done by a 0:01:44.560 --> 0:01:47.600 musician who's also an actor in the movie. So like 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:50.240 some of the Will Smith movies and the nineties had 0:01:50.240 --> 0:01:53.360 a song Men in Black or Wild Wild West, this 0:01:53.440 --> 0:01:56.720 movie has LLL cool J in it in a tour 0:01:56.800 --> 0:02:00.080 to force performance and it has the song for the 0:02:00.080 --> 0:02:03.640 original motion picture. It's called Deepest Bluest. My hat is 0:02:03.680 --> 0:02:06.440 like a shark's fin And if you've never seen this 0:02:06.520 --> 0:02:09.880 music video, you must go watch right this moment. Yeah, 0:02:09.880 --> 0:02:11.799 I mean, it's got it all. It's got it's got 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:15.560 water dancing and synchronized swimming, it's got L cool J 0:02:16.040 --> 0:02:20.080 just looking ridiculously jacked. It's got sharks footage from the 0:02:20.120 --> 0:02:23.679 film up into a shark yeah, oh yeah, and then yeah, 0:02:23.840 --> 0:02:27.880 full on morphing into a shark human hybrid. Yeah. One 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:31.280 thing I like about these songs and music videos like 0:02:31.320 --> 0:02:32.440 you said that used to come out with all these 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:34.919 blockbusters is they would of course come out as part 0:02:34.919 --> 0:02:37.239 of the hype train leading up to the release of 0:02:37.280 --> 0:02:40.520 the film, and they would, I think, to a large extent, 0:02:40.960 --> 0:02:44.440 inform how the movie was supposed to make you feel, 0:02:44.760 --> 0:02:48.040 you know, so like I forget which Batman movie it was, 0:02:48.120 --> 0:02:50.919 but there were several different tracks. One of them was 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:52.519 a YouTube track, but then you also had that that 0:02:52.639 --> 0:02:55.799 seal track about what I've been kissed by the thorn 0:02:55.840 --> 0:02:57.720 of a Rose, kiss from a Rose. Yeah, it's a 0:02:57.840 --> 0:03:00.680 that's for Batman Forever, the one with Valkill, Morris Batman, 0:03:00.800 --> 0:03:03.760 Tommy Lee Jones's two Faced Jim Carey is the Riddler. 0:03:04.000 --> 0:03:08.000 Nicole Kidman as a Batman's girlfriend her Her character's name 0:03:08.040 --> 0:03:11.760 in the movie is Dr Chase Meridian, which, as Rogeriebert said, 0:03:11.760 --> 0:03:16.320 her name sounds like a bank. Uh. That's also the 0:03:16.320 --> 0:03:19.079 Batman movie that has the thing We've talked about several 0:03:19.080 --> 0:03:22.000 times on the show, The the bank vault full of 0:03:22.200 --> 0:03:28.640 boiling acid. Chase Meridian might have worked in a in 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:32.320 a Cronenberg film. I love a good Cronenberg name, but yeah, 0:03:32.360 --> 0:03:34.040 you gotta be Cronenberg to get away with some of 0:03:34.080 --> 0:03:36.560 those yes. So that song let you know that. And 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:39.520 I never actually saw Batman Forever, but it informed me 0:03:39.600 --> 0:03:43.040 that this was going to be a romantic, heartfelt affair. Um. 0:03:43.240 --> 0:03:46.560 Songs like that Aerosmith song for that movie about the 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:50.760 don't was what was that I don't want to miss 0:03:50.760 --> 0:03:53.080 a thing or I don't want that close my e 0:03:53.240 --> 0:03:56.440 I don't know, something like that, but that it made 0:03:56.440 --> 0:03:58.760 you think though that it was about the asteroid. It's 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:01.680 like the asteroid hopeing it doesn't miss Earth and like 0:04:01.800 --> 0:04:04.760 just do a narrow pass by. Well, I mean it 0:04:04.800 --> 0:04:06.760 told you that, Yeah, this is a disaster film, but 0:04:06.800 --> 0:04:09.760 it's about our feelings in the disaster film, it's about 0:04:09.760 --> 0:04:14.440 our loved ones and all. And likewise, Deepest Bluest I think, 0:04:14.440 --> 0:04:16.760 for the most part, accurately prepares you for the fact 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:18.920 that this film is just gonna come at you. This 0:04:18.960 --> 0:04:21.960 film is just coming at you like a shark with 0:04:22.040 --> 0:04:25.440 its intensity. Uh. And it um, it might play around 0:04:25.480 --> 0:04:27.919 with you a little bit. It might play with its food, 0:04:27.920 --> 0:04:30.120 but it is going to devour you. It's a song 0:04:30.200 --> 0:04:32.640 full of superlatives, and the entire mood of it is 0:04:32.640 --> 0:04:35.920 superlatives as it as it says, other fish in the sea. 0:04:35.920 --> 0:04:39.320 But barracudas ain't equal to a half human predator created 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:42.560 by a needle. Then that's that's that's the plot. I 0:04:42.560 --> 0:04:45.880 mean that that's that's accurate. LLL cool J read his 0:04:45.960 --> 0:04:48.200 script for sure. I mean the song is easy to 0:04:48.240 --> 0:04:50.760 make fun of because the premise is so ludicrous. But 0:04:50.839 --> 0:04:53.200 I also want to say I think it is legitimately 0:04:53.320 --> 0:04:56.200 like a well crafted rap song. It has a lot 0:04:56.240 --> 0:04:58.599 of really funny word play in it. Yeah, yeah, I know, 0:04:58.680 --> 0:05:01.599 it's it's it's. It's a sold track, much like J's 0:05:01.600 --> 0:05:04.240 performance in this film, as we'll discussed, is really solid 0:05:04.680 --> 0:05:08.279 um intentionally funny and just the right places, and then 0:05:08.640 --> 0:05:11.040 intentionally cool and all just the right places. It's a 0:05:11.120 --> 0:05:14.560 it's a nice alchemy they manage with his character. So, 0:05:14.720 --> 0:05:18.000 in addition to being the most expensive movie we've ever done, 0:05:18.120 --> 0:05:20.839 probably the most mainstream movie we've ever done. I guess 0:05:20.839 --> 0:05:22.320 it depends on if you count. I don't know, like 0:05:22.360 --> 0:05:24.480 the e Walks movie or something that kind of fits 0:05:24.480 --> 0:05:26.960 in in a strange place, like being part of a 0:05:27.040 --> 0:05:30.000 very mainstream franchise but being a weird sort of outgrowth 0:05:30.040 --> 0:05:33.000 of it. Uh. And being the one of the most 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:36.440 recent movies we've ever done. This is also our first 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:40.120 shark movie, right, we haven't done another one. Yeah, I don't. 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:42.560 I don't think so. Um. I feel like sharks have 0:05:42.680 --> 0:05:46.839 maybe come up just as in conversation, like in like 0:05:46.920 --> 0:05:48.440 Death Moon, they're like, oh, it looks like a shark 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:51.000 at him, that kind of thing. Okay. Yeah, And the 0:05:51.120 --> 0:05:54.359 shark movie genre is very interesting to me for a 0:05:54.480 --> 0:05:56.320 number of reasons. So I want to talk about a 0:05:56.320 --> 0:06:00.480 few facts. First of all, between the year's nineteen seven five, 0:06:02.000 --> 0:06:04.960 I checked, and there have been over eighteen point six 0:06:05.080 --> 0:06:08.640 billion shark movies produced in the United States alone during 0:06:08.680 --> 0:06:11.880 that time. That's not even counting Italy. That's true. And 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:15.640 I'm imagining like Carl Sagan, uh, you know, in a 0:06:15.720 --> 0:06:18.919 deeply somber voice saying like there are more shark movies 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:22.839 on Earth than there are stars in the sky. Uh. 0:06:22.880 --> 0:06:24.839 And and so you've got that figure. I mean, like 0:06:24.880 --> 0:06:28.320 the shark movies are just prolific, copious, you know, the 0:06:28.920 --> 0:06:33.040 world overfloweth with shark films, and yet I can literally 0:06:33.080 --> 0:06:36.320 only think of one shark movie ever made that I 0:06:36.320 --> 0:06:40.279 would argue is good in an unqualified since. I would 0:06:40.279 --> 0:06:42.839 say the closest runner up is probably the movie we're 0:06:42.839 --> 0:06:45.880 talking about today, which is Uh, you know, you you 0:06:45.920 --> 0:06:48.000 can level some criticisms at it, but I think this 0:06:48.040 --> 0:06:50.800 movie definitely works. You can get this one off the lot. 0:06:51.680 --> 0:06:54.320 So they're like a basilion shark movies. Almost all of 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:57.440 them are in some conventional since at least pretty bad, 0:06:58.160 --> 0:07:02.600 and essentially all of them are in some sense derivative 0:07:02.760 --> 0:07:05.400 of this single original film. You can probably find a 0:07:05.480 --> 0:07:08.040 little exception here or there with something that that has 0:07:08.040 --> 0:07:11.560 a very different approach, but almost all of them descend 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:14.400 from Jaws, you know, directed by Steven Spielberg, released in 0:07:14.480 --> 0:07:17.040 nineteen seventy five. I don't really need to introduce Jaws. 0:07:17.040 --> 0:07:19.960 I think everybody knows Jaws, and I mean you suffice 0:07:20.000 --> 0:07:23.040 to say Jaws is a shark movie. It is the 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:26.520 granddaddy of all shark movies. It's also the granddaddy of 0:07:26.560 --> 0:07:30.160 all summer blockbusters. It's one of the most influential films 0:07:30.160 --> 0:07:32.800 of all time. Yeah, and rightly so. I mean, I 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:35.440 I watched Jaws almost every year. Rachel and I watched 0:07:35.440 --> 0:07:37.360 it on fourth of July every year. It's a tradition, 0:07:37.560 --> 0:07:40.320 and I never get tired of it. Jaws is endlessly entertaining. 0:07:40.320 --> 0:07:43.640 It has that great seventies character driven quality, you know, 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:46.360 especially with Robert Shaw as Quinn. I mean, I just 0:07:46.440 --> 0:07:49.240 never get tired of it. But it's somehow it's funny 0:07:49.280 --> 0:07:53.760 that it has spawned this many imitators, and that almost 0:07:53.800 --> 0:07:56.440 all of them mostly fail. And you've had a couple 0:07:56.440 --> 0:07:58.960 of different kinds of imitators. So you've got some like 0:07:59.160 --> 0:08:01.640 one we've alluded who several times but never devoted an 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:04.960 episode to Lultimo Squalo that you know, the Last Shark, 0:08:05.080 --> 0:08:08.000 or I think it's also called Great White, which are 0:08:08.080 --> 0:08:12.120 just direct scene by seeing ripoffs of Jaws. Yeah, yeah, 0:08:12.200 --> 0:08:13.880 that one, we've alluded to that one before. That one 0:08:13.920 --> 0:08:15.920 has a vic morrow and it added playing the Quint 0:08:16.040 --> 0:08:20.200 character or their version of the Quint character. Yeah. And 0:08:20.360 --> 0:08:23.480 and then there are others that are at a greater remove, 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:26.680 you know, might be several levels of abstraction away from 0:08:26.720 --> 0:08:29.320 their progenitor. And yet still I think it's a fair 0:08:29.400 --> 0:08:33.000 bet that almost none of these shark movies would exist 0:08:33.200 --> 0:08:37.120 if it were not for Jaws. Yeah, absolutely, it's really 0:08:37.920 --> 0:08:41.880 you really can't overstate it's importance, especially if you're talking 0:08:41.920 --> 0:08:44.959 about shark movies, right, So, I think you can kind 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:49.959 of imagine Jaws as this grand ancestral, great king who 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:54.000 produced a great, many incompetent warring errors that battle for 0:08:54.120 --> 0:08:57.280 supremacy once there, you know, once the powder Familius has 0:08:57.360 --> 0:09:00.559 passed on into the great hall under the waves. And 0:09:00.760 --> 0:09:02.719 so the movie we're talking about today is one of 0:09:02.840 --> 0:09:06.800 these many warring heirs to the throne, one of these contenders, 0:09:07.520 --> 0:09:09.800 And like a lot of these shark movies, it is 0:09:09.880 --> 0:09:13.280 full of what are in fact conscious nods to Jaws. 0:09:13.440 --> 0:09:15.920 For example, I saw this pointed out by one film critic, 0:09:16.000 --> 0:09:18.439 and this was actually confirmed by one of the writers 0:09:18.520 --> 0:09:20.760 of the movie. How long is the Shark and Jaws? 0:09:20.840 --> 0:09:23.360 What knows to tail? What's the length? Do you remember 0:09:23.400 --> 0:09:27.240 the line? Okay, so well, well Hooper sees that. He says, 0:09:27.280 --> 0:09:30.000 that's a twenty footer, and then Quin says twenty five 0:09:30.480 --> 0:09:34.440 three tons of them? Yeah, twenty five ft? How long 0:09:34.640 --> 0:09:36.800 is the Shark? And Deep Blue sy they say in 0:09:36.880 --> 0:09:39.440 the movie it's twenty six ft long. It's a literal 0:09:39.600 --> 0:09:44.520 one up, and screenwriter Duncan Kennedy acknowledged that this was deliberate. 0:09:44.559 --> 0:09:46.320 I'm not sure whose idea was. It might have been 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:49.360 Rinny Harland, the director, But I was also reading a 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:53.119 chapter from a book called Horror Zone, The Cultural Experience 0:09:53.160 --> 0:09:56.000 of Contemporary Horror Cinema, which is a book I've I've 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:57.640 talked about on the show a little bit before. It's 0:09:57.720 --> 0:10:00.400 edited by a scholar named Ian Conrich, but the chapter 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:04.079 was by a scholar named Stacy Abbott, and it's about 0:10:04.120 --> 0:10:07.440 the idea of the horror blockbuster, what happens when horror 0:10:07.480 --> 0:10:11.600 movies become like big event type films. And Stacy Abbott 0:10:11.640 --> 0:10:14.880 points out that in the original marketing materials for the movie, 0:10:15.440 --> 0:10:20.800 one of the taglines was quote bigger, smarter, faster, meaner. 0:10:22.000 --> 0:10:24.480 So I think it's possible that could refer to daft punk. 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:27.760 I'm not sure how the the timing lines up there, 0:10:27.880 --> 0:10:32.240 but those are also comparative words, bigger, smarter, faster, meaner 0:10:32.440 --> 0:10:36.000 than what. I think. The unspoken part is pretty well understood. 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:39.199 It's it's saying bigger, smarter, faster, meaner than the shark 0:10:39.280 --> 0:10:43.319 in Jaws or otherwise Jaws derivative movies that you've seen before. 0:10:43.880 --> 0:10:45.839 It also seems like a setup for like, Okay, you're 0:10:45.840 --> 0:10:49.640 gonna You're gonna make a Shark movie too, bigger, smarter, faster, meaner. 0:10:50.000 --> 0:10:56.080 Pick two? What your was that daft punk song? By 0:10:56.120 --> 0:10:58.319 the way, Oh man, I don't remember. If it feels 0:10:58.320 --> 0:11:00.360 like it's just always been a part of the the 0:11:00.480 --> 0:11:02.800 musical landscape, doesn't it. Oh I just looked it up. 0:11:02.920 --> 0:11:06.360 That was two thousand one. Blue sy predates it, well, 0:11:06.440 --> 0:11:10.720 it it's released, predates um an evolution in my taste 0:11:10.760 --> 0:11:13.959 in music. So uh so it feels to me like 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:16.160 it's always been there. But another thing about Deep Blue 0:11:16.200 --> 0:11:18.319 Cy is that it displays one of the ways that 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:22.079 a you know, a grandchild of Jaws the Great, can 0:11:22.200 --> 0:11:26.000 distinguish itself, and that is by fusing with another film 0:11:26.120 --> 0:11:30.240 concept and becoming a monstrous hybrid. And so I think 0:11:30.280 --> 0:11:33.320 it's pretty clear what's going on with the elevator pitch 0:11:33.440 --> 0:11:35.800 for Deep Blue Sy, uh it is that it is 0:11:35.880 --> 0:11:38.240 actually supposed to be And if they made it of 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:41.800 two different Steven Spielberg movies. On one hand, you've got 0:11:41.920 --> 0:11:44.760 Jaws since nearly all shark movies descend from the King. 0:11:45.320 --> 0:11:47.520 And then on the other hand, you've got Jurassic Park, 0:11:47.960 --> 0:11:51.760 definitely more recent Spielberg feed in and the main source 0:11:51.840 --> 0:11:55.680 for a lot of the plot situation, plot developments throughout 0:11:55.760 --> 0:11:58.319 the movie. You know, it's about people visiting a facility 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:00.640 to do a safety check up after there is a 0:12:00.679 --> 0:12:04.160 breakout and someone is injured, and then there's stuff about 0:12:04.320 --> 0:12:07.559 like the the animals being smarter than people expected, and 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:09.680 so on and so forth. I mean, it just follows 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:13.199 Jurassic Park almost to a t. Yeah, absolutely. I'll say 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:15.160 there's there's one scene in there that also feels very 0:12:15.200 --> 0:12:18.640 Poseidon adventure. So I think there's also a fair amount 0:12:18.679 --> 0:12:21.720 of just disaster movie d NA thrown in here. Um, 0:12:21.920 --> 0:12:24.760 which is good. It helps it helps pat out the film, um, 0:12:25.160 --> 0:12:27.000 because it's one of the problems with any kind of 0:12:27.000 --> 0:12:28.319 a monster movie. What do you do when the monster 0:12:28.440 --> 0:12:32.120 is not actively on screen, actively attacking or stalking? Right, Right, 0:12:32.480 --> 0:12:35.240 have characters just like putting bandages on each other and 0:12:35.320 --> 0:12:38.520 saying like, we'll make it through this. It can't just 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:40.320 be that, right, Yeah, you gotta have some other set 0:12:40.360 --> 0:12:42.599 pieces in mind other than just the monster and so 0:12:42.960 --> 0:12:44.599 I agree that there are a few other things that 0:12:44.640 --> 0:12:46.320 get drawn on as well. I can see beside an 0:12:46.320 --> 0:12:49.240 adventure definitely, But I would also say that it's not 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.400 just the plot mechanics. Jurassic Park, I think is also 0:12:52.480 --> 0:12:56.640 the inspiration for the sort of scatter shot themes of 0:12:56.760 --> 0:13:02.360 this movie, which, like Jurassic Park, basically reflects anxieties over 0:13:02.600 --> 0:13:07.079 dangers about what could happen when arrogant scientists screw around 0:13:07.160 --> 0:13:10.640 with Mother Nature, which is actually not just Jurassic Park. 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:12.800 That's more broadly a theme of a lot of sci 0:13:12.880 --> 0:13:17.079 fi horror in the nineties, particularly fears about the emerging 0:13:17.200 --> 0:13:20.360 field of genetic engineering, which was just starting to look 0:13:20.440 --> 0:13:22.959 like plausible reality at the turn of the century, or 0:13:23.280 --> 0:13:25.360 as the turn of the century approach. Do you remember, 0:13:25.440 --> 0:13:29.000 like the Human Genome Project was launched in and then 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:31.719 completed in two thousand three, So this was sort of 0:13:31.840 --> 0:13:34.480 the limbo period, the sort of what's going to happen 0:13:34.559 --> 0:13:38.440 with genetics period? Yeah, you can basically hear a nineties 0:13:39.360 --> 0:13:43.400 trailer narrator saying in the year nineteen ninety the Human 0:13:43.480 --> 0:13:47.319 Genome Project began, Yeah, and and so forth, and it 0:13:47.480 --> 0:13:51.400 ends up with something about genius Sharks. Yeah, but then 0:13:51.520 --> 0:13:54.520 I wanted to further situate Deep Blue Sea in recent 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:58.040 film history by adding a note from something else in 0:13:58.120 --> 0:14:01.400 that Stacy Abbott chapter in Horrors own so, she points 0:14:01.440 --> 0:14:06.240 out that before it was not normal for studios to 0:14:06.440 --> 0:14:09.600 release horror films in the summer, like the summer release 0:14:09.600 --> 0:14:12.360 schedule is normally or at the time was normally a 0:14:12.480 --> 0:14:16.599 time um for your mass market blockbusters in genres like 0:14:16.720 --> 0:14:21.320 action and adventure, and traditionally most horror movies were released 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:25.240 in the autumn, especially around Halloween or around the Christmas season, which, 0:14:25.280 --> 0:14:27.200 in a way I'm still partial to. I like it 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:30.080 when horror movies come out in October. But there was 0:14:30.120 --> 0:14:32.800 a revolution in this principle in the summer of ninety nine, 0:14:32.960 --> 0:14:36.000 so Abbott writes. Quote. The summer of ninety nine, however, 0:14:36.120 --> 0:14:38.720 marked a distinctive change to this release pattern, with a 0:14:38.800 --> 0:14:41.680 number of horror films opening throughout the summer and making 0:14:41.720 --> 0:14:45.600 a noticeable impact upon the box office. Reconceived through the 0:14:45.680 --> 0:14:48.960 high concept style, either in their reworking of the genre 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:52.440 or through their marketing. Two of the summer's major releases 0:14:52.520 --> 0:14:56.720 drew directly from classic horror texts as source material. Stephen 0:14:56.760 --> 0:14:59.880 Summer's remake of the universal horror film The Mummy or 0:15:00.040 --> 0:15:03.680 generally from ninety two, and Yen de Buns The Haunting 0:15:03.800 --> 0:15:06.400 and adaptation of the novel The Haunting of Hill House 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:09.600 by Shirley Jackson that had been previously made in nineteen 0:15:09.680 --> 0:15:13.480 sixty three by Robert Wise. While Renny Harland's Deep Blue 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:17.360 c a film about genetically altered sharks, is not a 0:15:17.440 --> 0:15:20.360 remake er adaptation, it clearly not only drew upon the 0:15:20.400 --> 0:15:23.240 cultural memory of Jaws. Uh. And then she says, but 0:15:23.440 --> 0:15:25.680 it also nodded to Jaws through this thing already brought 0:15:25.760 --> 0:15:28.920 up the bigger, smarter, faster, meaner tagline, which seems to 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:31.440 be looking back. But then she notes about the the 0:15:31.600 --> 0:15:34.360 budgets of these films. So she says, quote, the budgets 0:15:34.400 --> 0:15:37.200 of these three horror films, The Mummy seventy six million, 0:15:37.600 --> 0:15:41.080 The Haunting eighty million, and Deep Blue cy seventy eight million, 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:45.440 demonstrate the escalation of the horror classic to blockbuster status 0:15:45.800 --> 0:15:49.400 and the expectation that higher investment will bring higher rewards, 0:15:49.760 --> 0:15:53.400 a promise that to varying degrees, paid off. And so 0:15:53.560 --> 0:15:55.480 I think that this is really interesting at this point 0:15:55.520 --> 0:15:58.280 in time. Yeah. Now I'm shocked to see these numbers 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:00.200 here in front of me now because I didn't see 0:16:00.240 --> 0:16:02.360 Deep Blue Sea until this week. But I did watch 0:16:02.400 --> 0:16:04.040 The Money and The Haunting back in the day when 0:16:04.080 --> 0:16:06.840 the you know the year they came out, and you 0:16:06.920 --> 0:16:09.920 know the Money say what you will and for starters. 0:16:10.000 --> 0:16:11.520 It is also kind of a hybrid. It's kind of 0:16:11.560 --> 0:16:15.320 Indiana Jones meets The Money, say what you about the Money, 0:16:15.360 --> 0:16:18.480 though it it makes an impact, I remember it, but 0:16:18.760 --> 0:16:21.800 The Haunting eighty million dollars, and I think the only 0:16:21.840 --> 0:16:25.120 thing I vaguely remember is Owen Wilson's character got his 0:16:25.440 --> 0:16:28.320 his head bashed in by by something, and that's it. 0:16:28.800 --> 0:16:31.960 I remember nothing. The Haunting I think suffers from bad 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.800 c G. I I recall um, and it's It's weird 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:40.600 that it is a very limp, banal adaptation of a 0:16:40.880 --> 0:16:46.000 book that is actually just on the page, enormously enlivening, 0:16:46.160 --> 0:16:50.120 lee scary and interesting. If you never read Shirley Jackson's 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:52.720 The Haunting of Hill House, it is a fantastic ghost 0:16:52.800 --> 0:16:55.640 story and and it will still raise hairs today. I 0:16:56.000 --> 0:16:59.320 think the Endabant movie is a is a prime example 0:16:59.440 --> 0:17:03.840 of really squandering excellent source material. But anyway, with all 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:06.760 that context, what we have here in Deep Blue Sea 0:17:07.000 --> 0:17:12.159 is a derivative sci fi horror mashup movie positioned in 0:17:12.240 --> 0:17:16.359 the market as a massive summer blockbuster, which was relatively successful, 0:17:17.200 --> 0:17:20.280 which was historically unusual at the time, but in keeping 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:23.639 with broader trends in the year n something was you 0:17:23.720 --> 0:17:26.320 might say in the water in Well, what do you 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:29.000 think that was culturally? I mean, was it the you know, 0:17:29.080 --> 0:17:32.520 the dawning of the millennium, was it, uh, you know 0:17:32.680 --> 0:17:34.680 something else. Was it just the you know, the fear 0:17:34.720 --> 0:17:39.520 of you know, genetic um advancements in science. It's a 0:17:39.560 --> 0:17:43.320 good question. I honestly, I don't know. I mean, it's 0:17:43.320 --> 0:17:45.960 clear that it did sustain in a way like horror, 0:17:46.119 --> 0:17:51.480 I think, remained relatively mainstream big business in film through 0:17:51.560 --> 0:17:54.320 the two thousands, even though a lot of the you know, 0:17:54.440 --> 0:17:57.000 the big money making horror movies at the time we're 0:17:57.760 --> 0:18:01.479 I would argue direct um. But it didn't go away. 0:18:01.720 --> 0:18:04.600 And so, yeah, I I don't know exactly what changed then, 0:18:04.720 --> 0:18:06.560 but I do think it's interesting. I mean, it could 0:18:06.640 --> 0:18:11.439 be that there were just a number of big hits 0:18:11.840 --> 0:18:15.440 that were more like the conventional summer movie, but had 0:18:15.600 --> 0:18:19.120 elements of horror in them that preceded this. So Jurassic Park, 0:18:19.160 --> 0:18:21.440 I think, is a great example there. I don't know 0:18:21.520 --> 0:18:24.280 if people remember this, because now nobody really thinks of 0:18:24.400 --> 0:18:26.840 Jurassic Park as a horror movie, but at the time 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:31.840 people did sort of semi classify it as horror. Yeah. 0:18:31.920 --> 0:18:35.120 I mean I watched it, rewatched all those Jurassic Park 0:18:35.200 --> 0:18:38.560 movies for the last few years, and you know that 0:18:38.680 --> 0:18:41.480 the scarees still hold up. Yeah, I agree. And so 0:18:41.560 --> 0:18:44.439 another thing is, despite the fact that, like I said earlier, 0:18:44.520 --> 0:18:48.879 there are almost no post Jaws shark movies that I 0:18:48.960 --> 0:18:52.280 would really personally argue our good in an unqualified sense, 0:18:52.359 --> 0:18:57.520 I think Deep Blue Sea comes close. It's consciously highly derivative. 0:18:57.720 --> 0:19:01.200 It is you could say, dumb, but like I said, 0:19:01.320 --> 0:19:03.760 you can definitely get this one off the lot. And 0:19:04.080 --> 0:19:06.200 you could tell that a lot of critics, even a 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:09.680 lot of the snootier film critics, really liked this movie 0:19:09.720 --> 0:19:12.239 against their better instincts. You can read even some kind 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:15.600 of artsy critics who are I don't know, just writing 0:19:15.600 --> 0:19:18.480 about it as if they sort of can't resist wanting 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:22.120 to tell you to go see Deep Blue Sea. Yeah, 0:19:22.160 --> 0:19:23.920 I mean part of it I think comes back. I 0:19:23.960 --> 0:19:26.440 mentioned earlier how the alchemy of the cool Day's character 0:19:26.840 --> 0:19:29.760 in this Preacher, about how they managed to make him 0:19:29.920 --> 0:19:32.800 just the right level of funny, just the right level 0:19:32.880 --> 0:19:34.960 of cool in a way that works in a way 0:19:35.040 --> 0:19:37.680 that but but but it's the sort of attempt that 0:19:37.840 --> 0:19:40.119 often fails in other pictures, and there's a lot of 0:19:40.200 --> 0:19:42.159 that in this film. You can point to where you 0:19:42.200 --> 0:19:45.120 can you can realize they're doing things that are often 0:19:45.200 --> 0:19:49.040 done poorly. Um, but they do so with finesse in 0:19:49.080 --> 0:19:51.480 this film. I agree. I don't think there's much about 0:19:51.520 --> 0:19:54.320 this movie that you could really classify as new or innovative, 0:19:54.400 --> 0:19:58.879 except in a recombinatorial sense. But it has a tremendously 0:19:58.960 --> 0:20:02.840 powerful autopilot at function. And uh and I think you're 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:04.960 you're not going to be sad you watched it. Yeah. 0:20:05.119 --> 0:20:07.320 And on that note, I will will also point out 0:20:07.400 --> 0:20:10.800 that there are at least a couple of really well 0:20:10.880 --> 0:20:14.280 executed twists in this film. So if you haven't seen it, 0:20:14.320 --> 0:20:16.240 if you have any interest in seeing it, um, and 0:20:16.320 --> 0:20:19.959 you've managed to avoid these the spoilers so far, let 0:20:20.080 --> 0:20:21.760 us not be the ones that spoil it for you. 0:20:21.920 --> 0:20:23.720 Go out and see it and then finish this episode. 0:20:24.040 --> 0:20:25.840 That's a good point. Yes, so there there are a 0:20:25.880 --> 0:20:29.240 couple of glorious twists. We will be discussing them. So 0:20:29.680 --> 0:20:31.520 so yeah, if if you would like to see the movie, 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:33.040 you haven't seen it, you don't want to know what 0:20:33.119 --> 0:20:35.920 they are paused? Right here, go watch right this moment. 0:20:36.240 --> 0:20:40.880 Always love issuing spoilers for movies that are decades old. Yeah, 0:20:41.160 --> 0:20:43.000 because it's weird, like this is one. Like I say, 0:20:43.040 --> 0:20:45.119 I didn't watch the year it came out. I watched 0:20:45.240 --> 0:20:47.720 this week and there's plenty of stuff in it that 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:50.639 was spoiled for me just through pop culture, just because 0:20:51.160 --> 0:20:54.600 the scenes, you know, hit well enough for for audiences 0:20:54.680 --> 0:20:58.359 and people keep rediscovering and they become memes, etcetera. Okay, 0:20:58.400 --> 0:21:00.479 how about the elevator pitch for this movie? I've got 0:21:00.560 --> 0:21:03.840 to Actually, the first one is the only way to 0:21:03.920 --> 0:21:07.639 find a cure for neurodegenerative disease is to create a 0:21:07.720 --> 0:21:12.239 batch of ordinary, hyper intelligent mutant sharks. Fortunately they are 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:16.480 contained within a cage and will never escape. Uh. Second 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:19.000 second I would say is ll O cool J has 0:21:19.040 --> 0:21:22.159 written a song where he turns into a supermind freak shark, 0:21:22.280 --> 0:21:24.240 and we need a movie to go with it. I 0:21:24.640 --> 0:21:27.280 don't think that is the actual creative process that led 0:21:27.320 --> 0:21:29.959