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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is

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Speaker 1: Rob Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. It's time once

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Speaker 1: more to venture into the realm of Star Wars knockoffs,

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Speaker 1: films that, regardless of their creative integrity, were clearly getting funded, made,

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Speaker 1: and or released in an attempt to cash in on

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Speaker 1: the juggernaut that was nineventy seven Star Wars. I think

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Speaker 1: this will be our third blatant Star Wars roboff movie. Yeah. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: last year we watched n The Humanoid and you also

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Speaker 1: brought up that, Yeah, that Message from Space was also

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Speaker 1: technically in this, uh this Wheelhouse as well. I would

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Speaker 1: say that I'm going to rank today's film second among

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Speaker 1: our Star Wars knockoffs. I think Message from Space is

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Speaker 1: probably my favorite. I'd go with Battle Beyond the Starrs

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Speaker 1: and then The Humanoid, though I enjoyed all three. Yeah, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I don't know. I might have to give Battle Beyond

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Speaker 1: the Stars uh the top honors of these three. But uh,

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Speaker 1: but but but all three, all three of them, I

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Speaker 1: would say, had things going for them that, like I say,

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Speaker 1: stand apart from the whole Star Wars craze. So it's

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Speaker 1: not it's not like they were just entirely you know,

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Speaker 1: Star Wars ripoffs. Uh, they were creative folks involved. But

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Speaker 1: certainly when you start looking at like the funding and

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Speaker 1: the production, like these things came to these these films

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Speaker 1: came to the surface because somebody was chasing that Star

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Speaker 1: Wars money. Oh and in this case, you don't even

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Speaker 1: have to wonder because this movie was produced by Roger Corman,

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Speaker 1: And you can watch interviews with the people who worked

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Speaker 1: on the special effects and and other behind the scenes

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Speaker 1: jobs on this movie who said, yeah, Corman went to

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Speaker 1: us and said, I want to make a Star Wars movie.

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Speaker 1: So yeah. But one other big difference I would say

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Speaker 1: is that while the Humanoids certainly had definitely had its,

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Speaker 1: Vader knockoff definitely had its. You know, we have Darth

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Speaker 1: Vader at home moment um, this film does not. And

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Speaker 1: I think that alone makes it feel a little more authentic.

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Speaker 1: But but we'll get into all that. That's actually a

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Speaker 1: major distinction of this as a Star Wars among Star

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Speaker 1: Wars knockoffs. And yeah, we we We'll have to get

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Speaker 1: into more detail on that later. But the movie today

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Speaker 1: is Battle Beyond the Stars. And uh, you know, we

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Speaker 1: had a listener right in and said, hey, you guys

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Speaker 1: should tell us where to get the movie early in

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Speaker 1: the episode in case we want to watch it before

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Speaker 1: you get into all the details. So I don't know,

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Speaker 1: I guess we can try that. So, hey, we watched

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Speaker 1: this movie on an excellent Shout Factory Blu ray that

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Speaker 1: came out. Um, this is one that comes in a

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Speaker 1: limited edition steel book for you know, some reason. We

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Speaker 1: rented it from Video Drume here in Atlanta for protection protection.

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Speaker 1: He has to protect it from the elements or from

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Speaker 1: bandits and um space faring warlords. But anyway, beautiful picture quality,

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Speaker 1: some fun extras. You can all so rent or by

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Speaker 1: this movie from most of your digital sources. Yes, and

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Speaker 1: Battle Beyond the Stars is a good one to watch

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Speaker 1: in high definition, even if not every frame of the

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Speaker 1: movie is necessarily worth it. The movie as a whole

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Speaker 1: is because it's really a mixed bag on art design,

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Speaker 1: on art design, costumes and sets. Uh, some stuff in

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Speaker 1: this movie is kind of phoned in, kind of Z

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Speaker 1: grade cheese. I would single out maybe some of the

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Speaker 1: spaceship interiors but not others. And so forth. And then

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Speaker 1: on the other hand, there are some sets and costumes

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Speaker 1: and things that are I popping lee weird or just

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Speaker 1: absolutely gorgeous. It varies wildly from scene to scene. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and I think that has I've seen people comment on

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Speaker 1: the film where they're like, yeah, each ship has it.

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Speaker 1: It feels like it's truly from another planet, from another

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Speaker 1: culture entirely. But yes, sometimes it feels like maybe the

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Speaker 1: people who designed the ship interiors were also from other planets,

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Speaker 1: from different effects studios and other planets. Yeah. Now we

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Speaker 1: mentioned the Star Wars connected. I also should point out

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Speaker 1: that I think there are some of those ship interiores

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Speaker 1: that also draw some inspiration from Alien as well. Um,

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Speaker 1: you know, certainly not from this film doesn't have much

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Speaker 1: to do with Aliens from a plotting or character point

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Speaker 1: of view, but as a as a as far as

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Speaker 1: some like lived in space environments go, and maybe one

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Speaker 1: of the planetary surfaces that we see it made me

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Speaker 1: think of Alien. And it's kind of noteworthy, right, because

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Speaker 1: this film involves the talents of a particular Alien fan

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Speaker 1: and future Alien franchise director James Cameron. Yes, and I

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Speaker 1: think you can really see the James Cameron influence in

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Speaker 1: things like, uh, the beautiful set of the planet where

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Speaker 1: Shad finds Robert Vaughan. Will get into the plot details

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Speaker 1: about that later. Um, but also the design of the

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Speaker 1: main character's ship, Nell, which looks very weird on the

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Speaker 1: outside and very alien esque on the inside, despite the

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Speaker 1: fact to that this is a back talking, two D

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Speaker 1: grandma kind of ship. Yeah, we have a character in

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Speaker 1: this film called Cowboy. He is, yes, his space Cowboy.

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Speaker 1: He's the only character from Earth and as goofy as

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Speaker 1: his characters, and we'll get into him. The interior of

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Speaker 1: his spaceship I thought felt very alien esque. It it

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Speaker 1: felt lived in in a way that reminded me of

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Speaker 1: of then Nostromo. Yeah, it's got crushed beer cans and

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Speaker 1: magazine cutouts pinned on the walls and stuff like that,

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Speaker 1: and it's dirty. Now I have to share just a

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Speaker 1: little bit from Michael Weldon's ride up on this film

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Speaker 1: from the book The Psychotronic Encyclopedia Film. I just found

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Speaker 1: this amusing. Uh So, if you've listened to Weird Oubt Cineman,

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Speaker 1: you know I love well then I'm always interested in

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Speaker 1: his take on movies, exploring and finding new movies through

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Speaker 1: his writings. But I think I'm gonna have to agree

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Speaker 1: to disagree with him on this one, because in his

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Speaker 1: review of Battle Beyond the Stars, he writes, some of

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Speaker 1: the gags were cut out and the editing could have

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Speaker 1: been better, but it's a lot more memorable and more

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Speaker 1: fun than the Empire strikes Back, And I don't know

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Speaker 1: about that. The funny thing is at least in the

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Speaker 1: reviews in this book. Uh, and in the follow up book.

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Speaker 1: It's not like he says anything bad about Star Wars

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Speaker 1: or Empire or or even um Return of the Jedi ultimately,

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Speaker 1: but he, uh, yeah, he's just like, well, Batt'll Beyond

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Speaker 1: the Stars it's just more fun. So I guess fair enough,

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Speaker 1: I can't tell you what to have fun with, but yeah,

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Speaker 1: I don't think I would agree there. I'm sorry, but

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Speaker 1: Batt'll Beyond the Stars is great fun. It is. It is,

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Speaker 1: absolutely So let's get into the elevator pitch here. Uh,

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Speaker 1: it's The Seven Samurai as a space opera, which is

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Speaker 1: a pretty smart move. It's a great structure to thrust

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Speaker 1: under a different setting or genre. The locals are facing

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Speaker 1: a bandit threat, so what do they do? They hire

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Speaker 1: up some lawyers to defend them. Yes, And I just

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Speaker 1: want to note an interesting double input of Kurasawa on

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Speaker 1: this movie. So Battle Beyond the Stars was clearly and

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Speaker 1: if you listen to the interviews with the filmmakers from

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Speaker 1: Corman's perspective, it was explicitly supposed to be a combination

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Speaker 1: of two influences, the Magnificent Seven from nineteen sixty and

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Speaker 1: Star Wars. Both of these movies could be considered Western

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Speaker 1: adaptations of different movies by a Kirakura Sawa. So the

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Speaker 1: connection with The Magnificent Seven is overt. It's just a

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Speaker 1: remake of Seven Samurai with cowboy gun slingers instead of

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Speaker 1: mercenary swordsman. And I haven't seen Magnificent Seven and probably

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Speaker 1: ten years or so that I recall it being pretty fun.

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Speaker 1: Of course, it's hard to compete with the source material, right,

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Speaker 1: this is a case of a an okay remake of

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Speaker 1: an original masterpiece. It's certainly a famous film, but I've

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Speaker 1: actually never seen the Magnificent Seven. I've seen the Seven Samurai,

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Speaker 1: but not Magnificent Seven. Great cast though, oh yeah, including

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Speaker 1: Robert Vaughan who's in this movie. So he was in

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Speaker 1: Battle Beyond the Stars and the movie that it's based on.

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Speaker 1: Um so yeah, so that's that's a that's a two

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Speaker 1: step there, Seven Samurai adapted into a Western as Magnificent

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Speaker 1: seven and then adapted into a space opera by Battle

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Speaker 1: Beyond the Stars. Now, the other half of this, of course,

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Speaker 1: is Star Wars, and Star Wars itself has elements that

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Speaker 1: are loosely based on a nineteen fifty eight Corsolwa film

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Speaker 1: called The Hidden Fortress. Rob Have you seen this one?

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Speaker 1: I never have, but I've I've I've often been tempted

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Speaker 1: to just to check it out because of this connection.

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Speaker 1: I think it's fantastic. It's about two peasants and a

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Speaker 1: princess and a general played by Toshiro Mufune who are

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Speaker 1: trying to survive in the middle of a war between

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Speaker 1: two provinces. And if you watch Star Wars and Hidden

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Speaker 1: Fortress together, a lot of similarities really pop out. And

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Speaker 1: the most obvious, I think are the parallels between the

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Speaker 1: two peasants in The Hidden Fortress, who are sort of

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Speaker 1: traditional rustic clowns, like the the gaggle that runs along

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Speaker 1: with Bottom in Midsummer Night's Dream, you know, uh, the

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Speaker 1: their their rustic comedic relief, and uh, that's in the

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Speaker 1: Hidden Fortress, and then you've got the droids are two

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Speaker 1: D two and C three p O in Star Wars.

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Speaker 1: They're a very similar duo. In both movies, the action

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Speaker 1: begins with the sort of lowly bumbling down on their

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Speaker 1: luck characters who are mostly there for comic relief, trying

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Speaker 1: to escape the crossfire of two armies, and then they

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Speaker 1: become wrapped up in a in a lofty plot involving

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Speaker 1: an older general trying to save a princess. In both

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Speaker 1: cases interesting. So I thought it was notable that Battle

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Speaker 1: Beyond the Stars is not just a Star Wars rip off.

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Speaker 1: It is a mash up of two popular Western movies

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Speaker 1: that are both downstream from Kurosawa. So exactly how does

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Speaker 1: the mashup come together? Well, I would phrase it like this.

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Speaker 1: I would say the plot broadly is Magnificent seven slash

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Speaker 1: seven Samurai, and the details and the texture are from

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Speaker 1: Star Wars. That sounds fair. So I think you could

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Speaker 1: in a way look at this movie as like the

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Speaker 1: original Magnificent Seven, which was seven Samurai but as a Western,

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Speaker 1: and Battle beyond the Stars is seven Samurai but as

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Speaker 1: a Star Wars knockoff. Now there's another thing I'm always

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Speaker 1: on the lookout for when I watch Star Wars knockoffs.

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Speaker 1: I think we may have talked about this in our

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Speaker 1: episode on on the Humanoid Um, but I'm always curious

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Speaker 1: which elements from Star Wars get lifted and which do not, right,

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Speaker 1: because you know, you're not just making an exact copy

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Speaker 1: of the movie. You pick some things about it to

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Speaker 1: copy and you leave you leave out others. And for

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Speaker 1: some reason, it's interesting to me, like, what are the

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Speaker 1: features that people find salient or worth copying about Star Wars?

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Speaker 1: And also what what line designates going too far? Like

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Speaker 1: it seems it seems as if most filmmakers would agree

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Speaker 1: that you cannot have a lightsaber in your film if

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Speaker 1: you're not a Star Wars property. There are some glaring exceptions.

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Speaker 1: Star Crash does. Yeah, and when you when you break

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Speaker 1: that that rule, when you cross that line, I think

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Speaker 1: everybody kind of um, you know, has to sort of

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Speaker 1: look away. There's a there's a deep shame falls upon

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Speaker 1: everyone viewing and participating in the film. Totally agree. Um.

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Speaker 1: So a couple of things along these lines. I wanted

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Speaker 1: to mention right at the top, but maybe we can

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Speaker 1: mention some more um uh details that were copied or

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Speaker 1: not as we go along. But first thing I wanted

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Speaker 1: to draw attention to is Darth Vader design. I believe

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Speaker 1: one of the most universal features to be carried over

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Speaker 1: into a Star Wars copycat is the Darth Vader design.

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Speaker 1: Almost all of these movies have a menacing space lord

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Speaker 1: villain who wears a shiny black suit with some kind

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Speaker 1: of robotic entanglements and a Samurai inspired helmet, and this

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Speaker 1: movie is an exception. It clearly has a Darth Vader

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Speaker 1: inspired character whose name even rhymes with Vader, but this

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Speaker 1: character does not wear a Darth Vader type suit. And

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Speaker 1: I think there's a reason for this. Throb. We can

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Speaker 1: get to it when we talk about the actor, but

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Speaker 1: I wonder if you'll agree with me about the reasoning. Alright.

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Speaker 1: Second thing that is very often copied from a Star

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Speaker 1: Wars movie and is clearly and is present in this

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Speaker 1: one a planet killer weapon. This movie does not have

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Speaker 1: a death star, but it does have a space ship

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Speaker 1: that can shoot a beam that can destroy an entire planet.

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Speaker 1: All right, Well, let's go ahead and listen to the trailer.

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Speaker 1: Ruthless Invaders were a defenseless planet. Battle Beyond the Stars,

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Speaker 1: a bone youth escapes on a last ditch mission that

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Speaker 1: begins at the edge of the universe. The story of

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Speaker 1: a boy who finds more than he expected and all

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Speaker 1: he can handle. Does your species have kissing? Oh? Yes,

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Speaker 1: we have that. Try one. That's a hot dog. It

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Speaker 1: comes to Earth. Do you like it? There's no dog

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Speaker 1: in this soybean meal, nyasin dextros and sodium nitrate flavoring.

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Speaker 1: That's what we call meat back home. Battle Beyond the Stars,

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Speaker 1: All right, sounds like a lot of fun, right sure,

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Speaker 1: All right? Let's let's talk about the people who brought

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Speaker 1: this together. First of all, the director Jimmy T. Murakami,

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Speaker 1: who lived three American Irish animator of Japanese Americ and heritage.

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Speaker 1: He was also a director Ones Heavy Metal, helming the

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Speaker 1: soft Landing sequence alongside John Bruno, and this segment was

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Speaker 1: based on a comic pinned by Dan O'Bannon of Alien fame,

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Speaker 1: and was adapted for the film by Dan O'Bannon. Murrakami's

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Speaker 1: other directorial credits include um uncredited directorial work on nineteen

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Speaker 1: eighties Humanoids from the Deep, another Corman production, and various

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Speaker 1: animated credits, including directing the Twittsie pop how Many Licks

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Speaker 1: short commercial from nineteen sixty nine. Is this the one

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Speaker 1: with the owl? Yeah, this is the one of the

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Speaker 1: owl our our producer Seth will also he probably already

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Speaker 1: knows this, but uh. Murrakami also produced six episodes of

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Speaker 1: the original Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon. Uh. He also

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Speaker 1: directed When the Wind Blows from six about an elderly

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Speaker 1: British couple who survived a nuclear war. And and he

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Speaker 1: was the co founder of Mora Commie Wolf Productions later

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Speaker 1: known as just fred Wolf Films. Who did that original

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Speaker 1: Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle show? Well, Folk, Seth just filled

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Speaker 1: us in with all kinds of animation connections. I don't

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Speaker 1: think he was recording what he said so unfortunately, but

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Speaker 1: suffice to say, apparently fred Wolf is important in a

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Speaker 1: whole seventies animation scene. Now, Joe, you you dived into

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Speaker 1: the making of stuff on this one a little more

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Speaker 1: than I did. I noticed that on Internet movie database

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Speaker 1: Roger Corman is listed as not only a producer but

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Speaker 1: an uncredited He has an uncredited director's credit. I am

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Speaker 1: to believe he would he would at least show up

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Speaker 1: and fire people and so forth. I think that's a

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Speaker 1: common uh dynamic with Corman, that he is he directing

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Speaker 1: this movie, not really but sort of. I think this

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Speaker 1: wouldn't even be the first Corman produced movie that was

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Speaker 1: like this. Oh. I think it was the case with um,

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Speaker 1: what was it the Brain Eaters that was sort of

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Speaker 1: half directed by Corman or at least produced by Corman

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Speaker 1: without a credit. Uh so, So yeah, I think that

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Speaker 1: kind of thing happened a lot. There are a lot

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Speaker 1: of great stories about Corman. So I watched part of

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Speaker 1: a making of documentary that comes on the Blu ray

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Speaker 1: if if you pick this, pick up the new Blu

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Speaker 1: ray of this one, which mostly featured interviews with the

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Speaker 1: visual effects crew, and so they had a lot of

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Speaker 1: great stories about about working with James Cameron and what

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Speaker 1: that was like on set. But one of the things

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Speaker 1: that stuck out to me was well, first of all,

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Speaker 1: a lot of talk about Corman ended up having to

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Speaker 1: do with the budget, of course, like how can we

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Speaker 1: get costs down? Because they pitched this as you know,

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Speaker 1: this was going to be like the biggest budget Corman

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Speaker 1: movie of all time. It was gonna be a lot

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Speaker 1: Corman's finally making a movie with like a mainstream level budget.

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Speaker 1: But I think in actual fact that the budget just

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Speaker 1: kept shrinking during production until this really was kind of

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Speaker 1: done on a shoestring compared to how it looks in

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Speaker 1: the end. But one of the stories, for example, is

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Speaker 1: that I think major parts of this were shot on

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Speaker 1: a studio that Corman had purchased that was formerly a

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Speaker 1: lumber yard, And they said that Corman didn't change the

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Speaker 1: signs on the on the studio lot, it's still said

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Speaker 1: lumberyard because he reasoned that the sets were less likely

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Speaker 1: to get burglarized if it was labeled the lumber yard

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Speaker 1: instead of a movie studio. And then they ended up

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Speaker 1: hiring people for the production because carpenters would show up

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Speaker 1: looking to buy lumber, not realizing it wasn't a lumber

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Speaker 1: yard anymore, and they'd be like, Hey, you want to

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Speaker 1: work on a movie. Oh that's good. Yeah, all right,

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Speaker 1: Well let's get into the writing credits on this. So,

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Speaker 1: uh there is, uh, there's a writer by the name

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Speaker 1: of Ann Dyer who has a story credit, one of

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Speaker 1: only two writing credits alongside nine up from the Depths.

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Speaker 1: That's a Charles B. Griffith Jaws knockoff starring Sam Bottoms

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Speaker 1: and also one of our Lee Ermi's first screen roles.

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Speaker 1: It's supposedly about a giant sturgeon looking fish attacking what's

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Speaker 1: supposed to be Hawaii, but it is a Roger Corman

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Speaker 1: production filmed in the Philippines. How have I never seen

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Speaker 1: this one? I thought I'd seen every Jaws knockoff one.

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Speaker 1: Cannot I don't think there's enough time in the life

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Speaker 1: in a single lifetime to do that, not yet, not

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Speaker 1: until science catches up with us. Um. But the main

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Speaker 1: screen writing credit on this one is is pretty noteworthy

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Speaker 1: because it is John Sailis Um born nineteen fifty. Uh.

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Speaker 1: This was only the fourth screen credit for Sailists, who

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Speaker 1: would go on to be an award winning screenwriter and director,

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Speaker 1: noted for such films as nineteen six is Lone Star,

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Speaker 1: which earned him an Academy Award nomination, is Passion Fish,

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Speaker 1: which which also earned him in a nomination. UH. Eight

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Speaker 1: Men Out four Is The Brother from Another Planet, ninety

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Speaker 1: seven Men with Guns and eighty seven's May Twin, which

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Speaker 1: I remember watching in film class. That's a solid and

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Speaker 1: serious film about union f It's in nineteen twenties West

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Speaker 1: Virginia starring Chris Cooper, James Earl Jones, and David Strathan.

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Speaker 1: Oh that's interesting because I know Chris Cooper was also

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Speaker 1: in The Lone Star, which I haven't seen but I

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Speaker 1: was looking at. Yeah. Yeah, um yeah, that's that's a

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Speaker 1: good one. Very serious. Uh. These are, you know, serious

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Speaker 1: and prestigious films. But before he did any of that,

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Speaker 1: he also wrote the screenplays for Piranha, directed by Joe Dante. Uh,

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Speaker 1: nineteen eighties Alligator that that starred Robert Forrester and Ones,

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Speaker 1: The Howling, which was also directed by Joe Dante. So

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Speaker 1: he definitely has horror roots. Uh. He also wrote the

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Speaker 1: screenplay for nineteen eight six is the Clan of the

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Speaker 1: Cave Bear. And he directed not one, not two, but

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Speaker 1: three Bruce Springsteen videos Born in the USA, I'm on

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Speaker 1: Fire and Glory Days. Wow. I don't think I knew

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Speaker 1: there were music videos for any of those three songs. Yeah. Well,

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Speaker 1: in some form or another, he directed at least something

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Speaker 1: like a music video for for them. Huh. I gotta

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Speaker 1: look that up. I haven't seen Alligator in many years,

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Speaker 1: but if I'm remembering the right movie, I think that's

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Speaker 1: the one where they cast Richard Lynch in the in

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Speaker 1: the quint role. Oh I don't remember. Um, I think

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Speaker 1: I saw Alligator when I was a kid. I think

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Speaker 1: this is a sewer Gator movie. Wait, maybe thinking of

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Speaker 1: Alligator to the mutation. Yeah, but yes, yes, yes, it

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Speaker 1: is a sewer Gator movie. All right, let's get into

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Speaker 1: the cast on on this one, and we're gonna We're

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Speaker 1: gonna take the cast in the order that they're build,

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Speaker 1: which is I think I think is quite telling because

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Speaker 1: the top two names also apparently absorbed a great deal

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Speaker 1: of the budget for the movie. Oh really, this next

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Speaker 1: guy did? I feel like he kind of phoned it

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Speaker 1: in if you took all that much money. Well, it's

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Speaker 1: George Bopard, who plays our space cowboy, the only character

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Speaker 1: from Earth who goes by the name Cowboy. He is

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Speaker 1: called Cowboy, and he is a cowboy. Or actually I

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Speaker 1: think he sort of larks as a cowboy, because he

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Speaker 1: talks about how he spends all of his time watching

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Speaker 1: old Western movies, and so I think he may maybe

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Speaker 1: he is actually just a space trucker who puts on

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Speaker 1: the persona of a cowboy. He's a space trucker. Who's

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Speaker 1: gone insane in deep space all by himself, with only

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Speaker 1: West TV Westerns to keep him company, and has thus

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Speaker 1: taken on this this insane persona. He basically dresses like

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Speaker 1: a late seventies Texan trucker and he just drinks and

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Speaker 1: smokes constantly and frankly does little else in the film.

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Speaker 1: Yeah now. Georgia ba bard Here was born in n

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Speaker 1: died in probably best remembered for playing the struggling writer

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Speaker 1: Paul var Jack in the one film Breakfast at Tiffany's

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Speaker 1: and also for playing Hannibal on TVs the A Team.

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Speaker 1: They made a movie out of it, uh remake, but

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Speaker 1: I don't recall who is in the Hannibal role. Oh

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Speaker 1: now I'm reminded. It's It's it's Nisan's, it's Liam's and

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Speaker 1: Islam Okay, oh this guy is the I love it

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Speaker 1: when a plan comes together guy. Yes, so yeah, he's

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Speaker 1: our he's our space cowboy and he has he has

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Speaker 1: top billings. So um the uh he's kind of it's

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Speaker 1: it's kind of one of the many Han Solo esque

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Speaker 1: characters in this without being quite as cool as Han Solo,

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Speaker 1: not even close. This movie has several Han solos. This

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Speaker 1: guy is. I think they think that he works as

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Speaker 1: Han Solo because he's a scoundrel. But just scoundrel nous

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Speaker 1: does does not a Han Solo make you gotta have

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Speaker 1: that charm as well? Well, we have another shot at

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Speaker 1: pulling off that charm because the next actor of note here,

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Speaker 1: who also I think was was paid pretty heavily compared

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Speaker 1: to the rest of the cast, is Robert Vaughan playing Guilt. Um.

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Speaker 1: Everyone I think has seen Robert Vaughan in something, Oh yeah,

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Speaker 1: he n sixteen and um. In this he plays an

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Speaker 1: emotionless assassin with a thousand enemies, um, which is essentially

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Speaker 1: this is basically the same role he played in The

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Speaker 1: Magnificent Seven, right, yes, and so he's in the Magnificent seven,

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Speaker 1: is one of the mercenaries. And I would say that

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Speaker 1: he even kind of dresses in this movie like his

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Speaker 1: character in Magnificent Seven. Yeah, yeah, he's He's a fun

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Speaker 1: character in this film, unlike Cowboy, who's just kind of

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Speaker 1: a one note gag that hangs out a little bit

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Speaker 1: too long. Guilt feels so you know, authentic. I buy

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Speaker 1: into the idea that here's this guy that has that

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Speaker 1: is totally emotionalless, but also he has this loneliness to him,

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Speaker 1: like he's all he's done, has earned himself riches and

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Speaker 1: h enemies, and now he has like maybe one shot

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Speaker 1: at doing something good with his life. I can buy

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Speaker 1: into all this. I will say, Von actually makes a

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Speaker 1: couple of interesting acting choices, if you can believe me

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Speaker 1: saying that about this movie. Uh maybe maybe we'll get

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Speaker 1: to those during the plot section. But yeah, he he's

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Speaker 1: doing something with it. So, like I say, if you've

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Speaker 1: watched films or TV, you've seen Robert Vaughan in something.

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Speaker 1: He's probably most notable for his roles in nineteen sixties

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Speaker 1: The Magnificent Seven, of course, nineteen Bullet starring Steve McQueen,

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Speaker 1: who was also in The Magnificent Seven, UM seventy four

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Speaker 1: is the Towering Inferno in three Superman three. So he

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Speaker 1: always had a great screen presence, you know, he was

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Speaker 1: he was a you know, a bit smooth, a bit menacing,

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Speaker 1: and this I think allowed him to play a wide

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Speaker 1: variety of villains and authority figures. So, for instance, you'll

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Speaker 1: find him as the voice of the Proteus four in

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Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven's Demon Seed. But You'll also find him

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Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventy Chuck Heston Julius Caesar film. You'll

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Speaker 1: also see him pop up in things like Joe Diamato's

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Speaker 1: Zombie five or Um or the movie Pootie Tang. On TV.

424
00:24:54,320 --> 00:24:57,040
Speaker 1: He's done everything from Coronation Street to The A Team.

425
00:24:57,600 --> 00:25:00,800
Speaker 1: He played a vampire in Jim war Narski's nine nine

426
00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:06,520
Speaker 1: film Transylvania Twist, And of course he's also America's favorite lawyer.

427
00:25:06,840 --> 00:25:09,200
Speaker 1: Oh man, this is what I've been waiting to get to,

428
00:25:09,400 --> 00:25:12,760
Speaker 1: So if you're not familiar. Later in his career, Robert

429
00:25:12,840 --> 00:25:16,679
Speaker 1: Vaughn the actor had an extensive run as a quote

430
00:25:16,760 --> 00:25:21,119
Speaker 1: spokesman in personal injury lawyer commercials. I think with the

431
00:25:21,200 --> 00:25:25,359
Speaker 1: implicit intention of tricking people into thinking that this classy

432
00:25:25,480 --> 00:25:29,160
Speaker 1: yet tough looking attack dog was one of the lawyers

433
00:25:29,200 --> 00:25:32,200
Speaker 1: who worked at the firm being advertised. I remember years

434
00:25:32,200 --> 00:25:34,960
Speaker 1: ago we had some kind of but something on our fridge.

435
00:25:34,960 --> 00:25:36,960
Speaker 1: It was either a magnet or a cutout of a

436
00:25:37,000 --> 00:25:40,240
Speaker 1: magazine ad or something, but it was for a local

437
00:25:40,320 --> 00:25:42,800
Speaker 1: law firm and it had a picture of this guy

438
00:25:43,000 --> 00:25:45,399
Speaker 1: of Robert Vaughan and then down at the bottom and

439
00:25:45,440 --> 00:25:49,960
Speaker 1: fine printed said Robert Vaughan spokesman. And you know, I

440
00:25:50,000 --> 00:25:53,200
Speaker 1: think in this picture he was jacket off, wearing suspenders

441
00:25:53,240 --> 00:25:55,960
Speaker 1: and to tie so real ready to tussle. Look, I

442
00:25:55,960 --> 00:25:59,160
Speaker 1: think they're going for a feeling of that. This guy

443
00:25:59,320 --> 00:26:02,520
Speaker 1: makes claim suggesters just with their pants like they are

444
00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:05,040
Speaker 1: terrified of him. Uh. And if you look it up

445
00:26:05,080 --> 00:26:08,680
Speaker 1: on YouTube, you can find tons of Robert Vaughan lawyer

446
00:26:08,720 --> 00:26:15,600
Speaker 1: commercials millions of dollars. That's knowledge, that's experience, that success.

447
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:21,840
Speaker 1: You've got one opportunity for justice. Why except less put

448
00:26:21,840 --> 00:26:24,800
Speaker 1: the law firm with they proven track record to work

449
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:28,320
Speaker 1: for you. And I would say, I want, I want

450
00:26:28,320 --> 00:26:31,840
Speaker 1: to pose it that Robert Vaughan's success as a spokesman

451
00:26:31,880 --> 00:26:36,440
Speaker 1: in lawyer commercials is almost perfectly aligned with the quality

452
00:26:36,520 --> 00:26:39,800
Speaker 1: that got him cast at least two times as a

453
00:26:39,880 --> 00:26:42,959
Speaker 1: mercenary who is hired to defend a bunch of farmers

454
00:26:43,000 --> 00:26:46,160
Speaker 1: from an evil bandit king in in the Western End

455
00:26:46,200 --> 00:26:49,160
Speaker 1: in the Space Opera, because he just seems like like

456
00:26:49,240 --> 00:26:53,400
Speaker 1: the tough, cutthroat s ob that in an alternate timeline

457
00:26:53,480 --> 00:26:56,399
Speaker 1: might be working for the bandit king or for the

458
00:26:56,440 --> 00:26:59,879
Speaker 1: insurance company. But you just happened to have been lucky

459
00:27:00,040 --> 00:27:02,760
Speaker 1: enough to get him on your side, and now he

460
00:27:02,800 --> 00:27:08,240
Speaker 1: fights for you. Yeah. I even memory serves they used

461
00:27:08,240 --> 00:27:10,280
Speaker 1: to show one of these in in the Atlanta area,

462
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:13,080
Speaker 1: some firm or another, and maybe they still do. I

463
00:27:13,119 --> 00:27:16,200
Speaker 1: don't know. It's it's possible that that he's I mean,

464
00:27:16,240 --> 00:27:18,320
Speaker 1: just because he's dead doesn't mean he can't be the

465
00:27:18,320 --> 00:27:22,280
Speaker 1: spokesman for a law firm, right, right, Sure, I mean

466
00:27:22,320 --> 00:27:26,480
Speaker 1: I'm assuming. I'm assuming Robert Vaughan had all these interesting

467
00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:29,760
Speaker 1: characteristics that I didn't even know about until I started

468
00:27:29,880 --> 00:27:32,679
Speaker 1: reading up on him for this episode. Like at some

469
00:27:32,760 --> 00:27:36,080
Speaker 1: point he was interested in politics. Uh. And I imagine

470
00:27:36,320 --> 00:27:38,720
Speaker 1: probably the same quality that makes him appealing as a

471
00:27:38,800 --> 00:27:41,800
Speaker 1: lawyer commercial spokesman probably would have made him a successful

472
00:27:41,800 --> 00:27:46,560
Speaker 1: political candidate. Uh. He I found even an old episode

473
00:27:46,560 --> 00:27:50,680
Speaker 1: of firing Line where he's like arguing with Willie William F. Buckley,

474
00:27:50,720 --> 00:27:54,919
Speaker 1: he's arguing against the Vietnam War. Um. So he's a

475
00:27:55,080 --> 00:27:59,119
Speaker 1: strange and complex figure. Yeah, and I mean I mentioned

476
00:27:59,119 --> 00:28:01,720
Speaker 1: Coronation Street earlier, that, of course, is a long running

477
00:28:01,720 --> 00:28:04,439
Speaker 1: British TV series. It's interesting to see that he's a

478
00:28:04,440 --> 00:28:07,200
Speaker 1: guy that I guess we're predominantly in the United States.

479
00:28:07,200 --> 00:28:09,320
Speaker 1: But then you'll see him pop up in not just

480
00:28:09,880 --> 00:28:12,959
Speaker 1: European or British films, but like British TV series for

481
00:28:13,119 --> 00:28:16,719
Speaker 1: periods of time, So he certainly worked a lot. Another

482
00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:19,720
Speaker 1: thing I want to point out about his lawyer spokesman persona.

483
00:28:19,760 --> 00:28:22,680
Speaker 1: So I said the image, I remember he's wearing suspenders,

484
00:28:22,680 --> 00:28:24,800
Speaker 1: and I think I'm right about that. But if you

485
00:28:24,800 --> 00:28:27,480
Speaker 1: look up these commercials today, in almost all of them,

486
00:28:27,760 --> 00:28:31,679
Speaker 1: he's wearing a vest. And I think his character wears

487
00:28:31,720 --> 00:28:35,280
Speaker 1: a vest in The Magnificent Seven, just like Han Solo

488
00:28:35,400 --> 00:28:39,200
Speaker 1: wears a vest. So I don't know. There's something going

489
00:28:39,280 --> 00:28:41,680
Speaker 1: on here. There's a through line from Han Solo to

490
00:28:41,840 --> 00:28:44,400
Speaker 1: this guy who's going to fight for you and against

491
00:28:44,400 --> 00:28:49,480
Speaker 1: the against the greedy insurance companies. All right, well, let's

492
00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:53,520
Speaker 1: get to our our actual central character. Here are our

493
00:28:53,600 --> 00:28:56,840
Speaker 1: Luke Skywalker, if you will. It's a character named Shad,

494
00:28:57,440 --> 00:29:01,600
Speaker 1: and Shad is played by Richard Thomas. One yep, this

495
00:29:01,720 --> 00:29:04,640
Speaker 1: is this is John Boy from The Waltins. This is

496
00:29:04,680 --> 00:29:08,920
Speaker 1: the grown up Bill Denbro from the TV adaptation of it.

497
00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:12,760
Speaker 1: This is good casting because young Richard Thomas does kind

498
00:29:12,760 --> 00:29:18,000
Speaker 1: of have that that naive, likable farm boy charm. Like

499
00:29:18,000 --> 00:29:22,280
Speaker 1: like Mark Hamill. Yeah, there's there's also in general, there's

500
00:29:22,320 --> 00:29:25,240
Speaker 1: often a sweaty intensity to Richard Thomas that I tend

501
00:29:25,240 --> 00:29:28,520
Speaker 1: to like in a performance. Um, and you see it

502
00:29:28,520 --> 00:29:31,480
Speaker 1: in this film too. He's good at that. That's sort

503
00:29:31,520 --> 00:29:34,280
Speaker 1: of being you can see the gears moving in a performance,

504
00:29:34,280 --> 00:29:35,880
Speaker 1: and I feel like, and even in this film, a

505
00:29:35,920 --> 00:29:39,520
Speaker 1: film that does not demand any kind of, uh, you know,

506
00:29:39,560 --> 00:29:42,680
Speaker 1: an earnest performance from its various players, I felt it

507
00:29:42,720 --> 00:29:46,240
Speaker 1: felt like Richard Thomas was able to bring it. Now

508
00:29:46,320 --> 00:29:48,440
Speaker 1: more I guess a lot of viewers out there might

509
00:29:48,480 --> 00:29:51,480
Speaker 1: know him better from some recent television series is that

510
00:29:51,560 --> 00:29:53,240
Speaker 1: he was a series that he was a part of.

511
00:29:53,280 --> 00:29:56,800
Speaker 1: He was was on Ozark, he was on The Americans

512
00:29:57,560 --> 00:30:00,680
Speaker 1: and uh the anthology round up for Amas is actually

513
00:30:00,760 --> 00:30:02,920
Speaker 1: kind of fun for me because he was in a

514
00:30:02,960 --> 00:30:05,160
Speaker 1: Tales from the Crypt episode. A pretty good one is

515
00:30:05,200 --> 00:30:08,000
Speaker 1: I recall titled Mute Witness to Murder, in which he

516
00:30:08,040 --> 00:30:13,960
Speaker 1: plays a demented psychologist with slick back hair. Yeah there's, yeah,

517
00:30:14,880 --> 00:30:16,560
Speaker 1: he was. He was a fun villain in that, like,

518
00:30:16,720 --> 00:30:21,200
Speaker 1: if memory serves, he's killing somebody in uh, in his

519
00:30:21,240 --> 00:30:26,920
Speaker 1: own apartment and somebody across the street in another apartment building,

520
00:30:27,240 --> 00:30:30,400
Speaker 1: rear windows, the whole situation. But then she shows so

521
00:30:30,520 --> 00:30:33,280
Speaker 1: shocked by the murder that she goes mute. And then

522
00:30:33,440 --> 00:30:37,080
Speaker 1: she winds up in an asylum situation. Who is her doctor,

523
00:30:37,520 --> 00:30:41,120
Speaker 1: but it's the murderer. It's uh, it's it's Richard Thomas,

524
00:30:41,680 --> 00:30:45,520
Speaker 1: and so anyway, typical tales from the cryptan Anigan's in Sue.

525
00:30:46,240 --> 00:30:48,520
Speaker 1: But he was also in an episode of the nineties

526
00:30:48,520 --> 00:30:52,240
Speaker 1: Outer Limits uh titled The New Breed. This was about

527
00:30:52,360 --> 00:30:55,800
Speaker 1: mutation inducing nanobots and it had some some pretty nasty

528
00:30:55,880 --> 00:30:58,560
Speaker 1: horror elements in it, And in that Richard Thomas plays

529
00:30:58,560 --> 00:31:02,440
Speaker 1: a mad scientist. Wow against type agains. I kind of

530
00:31:02,520 --> 00:31:06,240
Speaker 1: like that move though, of taking somebody who seems very

531
00:31:06,280 --> 00:31:09,240
Speaker 1: a good hearted and innocent in casting them as a villain.

532
00:31:09,320 --> 00:31:12,200
Speaker 1: Like I think Ron Howard should have played villains more

533
00:31:12,280 --> 00:31:16,160
Speaker 1: when he was, you know, in his forties fifties. Yeah, yeah, alright,

534
00:31:16,200 --> 00:31:20,480
Speaker 1: Speaking of villains, though, our our main villain in this

535
00:31:21,000 --> 00:31:24,680
Speaker 1: is um is this sad or say door? Yeah, sate

536
00:31:24,840 --> 00:31:28,720
Speaker 1: or say door? What does that rhyme? With its like Vader,

537
00:31:28,920 --> 00:31:32,800
Speaker 1: but but with with with the with something sadistic added

538
00:31:32,840 --> 00:31:35,400
Speaker 1: to it, A sadistic Vader is a sad or what

539
00:31:35,440 --> 00:31:39,840
Speaker 1: if Darth Vader was sadistic or if Vader was with Sader,

540
00:31:39,960 --> 00:31:42,520
Speaker 1: I don't know. But anyway, played by John Saxon, the

541
00:31:42,520 --> 00:31:46,800
Speaker 1: great John Saxon, who lived nineteen thirty six. So bust

542
00:31:46,800 --> 00:31:49,960
Speaker 1: out your John Saxon punch card, because we've got more

543
00:31:50,000 --> 00:31:53,360
Speaker 1: Saxon action for you in this film. Um, I'll refer

544
00:31:53,400 --> 00:31:55,959
Speaker 1: you back to our episode on Cannibal Apocalypse from more

545
00:31:55,960 --> 00:31:59,239
Speaker 1: of a breakdown on Saxon himself and his work, but

546
00:31:59,520 --> 00:32:02,280
Speaker 1: sufficed to say he plays an evil warlord and master

547
00:32:02,400 --> 00:32:05,040
Speaker 1: of mutants in this film. And oh, he's got some

548
00:32:05,080 --> 00:32:07,959
Speaker 1: wonderful lines lines that I had I had heard in

549
00:32:08,160 --> 00:32:12,240
Speaker 1: a mix before actually off the album Saifu by wax Factor.

550
00:32:12,360 --> 00:32:15,560
Speaker 1: But like there's one he's saying, I possess a stellar converter,

551
00:32:16,000 --> 00:32:19,680
Speaker 1: the most powerful weapon in the universe. And then another

552
00:32:19,720 --> 00:32:23,480
Speaker 1: great line is Daco is expert at inflicting pain. Now,

553
00:32:23,600 --> 00:32:27,080
Speaker 1: what do you make of John Saxon's accent in this movie?

554
00:32:27,320 --> 00:32:30,440
Speaker 1: He's not speaking with his natural voice, but he's also

555
00:32:30,640 --> 00:32:33,680
Speaker 1: not really affecting the accent of like any other region

556
00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:38,000
Speaker 1: or country I would It's not a British accent, but

557
00:32:38,080 --> 00:32:41,640
Speaker 1: it's like he adopts a formal accent, do you know

558
00:32:41,640 --> 00:32:44,320
Speaker 1: what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah, he's it's like it's

559
00:32:44,320 --> 00:32:46,880
Speaker 1: like a formal American villain. I guess I don't know.

560
00:32:48,160 --> 00:32:51,120
Speaker 1: The other thing, Saxon clearly was not able to convince

561
00:32:51,160 --> 00:32:53,600
Speaker 1: them to give him a shirtless scene in this movie.

562
00:32:53,600 --> 00:32:55,800
Speaker 1: I don't think he had one. No, No, he didn't,

563
00:32:56,320 --> 00:32:58,960
Speaker 1: which which is is kind of a rarity for for

564
00:32:58,960 --> 00:33:02,840
Speaker 1: for the Saxon films. EVE been watching anyway, Um, and

565
00:33:03,000 --> 00:33:05,040
Speaker 1: it is interesting that, yeah, he doesn't have a Darth

566
00:33:05,080 --> 00:33:07,560
Speaker 1: Vader helmet, and he also he has a little bit

567
00:33:07,600 --> 00:33:09,920
Speaker 1: of makeup on his face, like some sort of a

568
00:33:10,000 --> 00:33:13,200
Speaker 1: scar effect. This hasn't been added over one of his eyes,

569
00:33:13,800 --> 00:33:16,760
Speaker 1: but he's not nearly as made up as his legion

570
00:33:16,880 --> 00:33:21,200
Speaker 1: of mutant underlings, who all have very pronounced disfigurements and

571
00:33:21,280 --> 00:33:25,000
Speaker 1: like a cleft in their face. Yeah. So I was wondering,

572
00:33:25,440 --> 00:33:28,040
Speaker 1: why does this movie not do the thing that every

573
00:33:28,120 --> 00:33:31,360
Speaker 1: other Star Wars knockoff does and have a Darth Vader suit.

574
00:33:32,160 --> 00:33:34,160
Speaker 1: And if I I don't know, but if I had

575
00:33:34,200 --> 00:33:37,080
Speaker 1: to guess, I would guess it's because they had John

576
00:33:37,120 --> 00:33:39,480
Speaker 1: Saxon in this role and they wanted to show his

577
00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:41,840
Speaker 1: face on screen, or because Saxon wanted to show his

578
00:33:41,880 --> 00:33:44,360
Speaker 1: face on screen. You just you don't hide your Saxon

579
00:33:44,440 --> 00:33:48,000
Speaker 1: under a helmet. That's ludicrous. Yeah. But plus, you know,

580
00:33:48,040 --> 00:33:50,600
Speaker 1: thinking back to Cannibal Apocalypse, there are some details about

581
00:33:50,640 --> 00:33:53,560
Speaker 1: that movie where Saxon did put his foot down about

582
00:33:53,560 --> 00:33:55,520
Speaker 1: certain things that you know, he didn't want to do.

583
00:33:56,120 --> 00:33:57,959
Speaker 1: He didn't think we're the right choice for him. So

584
00:33:58,040 --> 00:33:59,680
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know the story, but I

585
00:33:59,680 --> 00:34:03,040
Speaker 1: can imagine a scenario in which Saxon's like, I just

586
00:34:03,120 --> 00:34:04,880
Speaker 1: I don't want to wear that much makeup or I

587
00:34:04,920 --> 00:34:06,680
Speaker 1: don't want to wear that helmet. Can you do something

588
00:34:06,720 --> 00:34:08,880
Speaker 1: else that works? And uh, and maybe they found that

589
00:34:08,920 --> 00:34:11,640
Speaker 1: middle ground. And ultimately, yeah, if you're paying for John Saxon,

590
00:34:11,719 --> 00:34:14,799
Speaker 1: put him on the screen. I know how Corman budgets work.

591
00:34:14,880 --> 00:34:17,200
Speaker 1: You wouldn't put you wouldn't have John Saxon in a

592
00:34:17,320 --> 00:34:19,319
Speaker 1: role where you gotta have helmet on him. You you

593
00:34:19,560 --> 00:34:21,560
Speaker 1: just gets you know, some p a to do that,

594
00:34:22,080 --> 00:34:24,600
Speaker 1: and then maybe you'd cast a voice actor. All right, Well,

595
00:34:24,600 --> 00:34:27,319
Speaker 1: more more on Saxon's performance here in a bit, but

596
00:34:27,960 --> 00:34:33,240
Speaker 1: moving on to other characters, we have Darlene Flugel playing Nenelia.

597
00:34:33,360 --> 00:34:38,000
Speaker 1: This is the central love interest for shad uh Flugel

598
00:34:38,040 --> 00:34:41,040
Speaker 1: Live nineteen fifty three through seventeen, and she was in

599
00:34:41,080 --> 00:34:43,680
Speaker 1: some major films of the nineteen eighties, including To Live

600
00:34:43,680 --> 00:34:46,000
Speaker 1: and Die in l a Once and Put a Time

601
00:34:46,040 --> 00:34:49,560
Speaker 1: in America Running Scared. Later in her career, she also

602
00:34:49,600 --> 00:34:53,960
Speaker 1: appeared in pet Cemetery to Scanner Cop and dark Man three.

603
00:34:54,360 --> 00:34:57,600
Speaker 1: Wow we got a scanner cop in here. Yeah. Her

604
00:34:57,640 --> 00:35:01,759
Speaker 1: first film was I Is of Laura Mars, which I've

605
00:35:01,760 --> 00:35:04,200
Speaker 1: been tempted to check out. I have not seen it,

606
00:35:04,239 --> 00:35:06,480
Speaker 1: but it has a number of wonderful connections in it,

607
00:35:06,680 --> 00:35:09,759
Speaker 1: and John Carpenter has a screenplay credit on it. Oh

608
00:35:09,880 --> 00:35:13,840
Speaker 1: I didn't know that. Yeah, Okay, move over because the

609
00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:17,120
Speaker 1: next character is what is the Saint St x Men?

610
00:35:17,440 --> 00:35:23,799
Speaker 1: St x Men? Played by Sybil Danning? Wow? Wow Wow

611
00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:28,040
Speaker 1: yeah this bo This of course is the Austrian born

612
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:31,960
Speaker 1: b movie queen uh Civil Danning, who we previously talked about.

613
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:37,440
Speaker 1: In Hercules, she played Audrianna and that and boy this

614
00:35:37,440 --> 00:35:42,720
Speaker 1: this is just an absolutely ridiculous performance and costume and character.

615
00:35:43,480 --> 00:35:45,680
Speaker 1: This is one of the most ludicrous roles I have

616
00:35:45,800 --> 00:35:50,279
Speaker 1: ever seen in any movie is it's just completely outrageous.

617
00:35:50,360 --> 00:35:54,040
Speaker 1: Saturn Award winning, by the way, a Saturn Award winning performance.

618
00:35:54,440 --> 00:35:57,960
Speaker 1: I didn't even know where to begin talking about this character. Yeah,

619
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:00,880
Speaker 1: because even for a civil Danning role, this character is

620
00:36:00,920 --> 00:36:04,800
Speaker 1: a lot. And she you know, I'll credit disiplit to

621
00:36:05,120 --> 00:36:08,640
Speaker 1: disipl Danting for committing to the character because they managed

622
00:36:08,680 --> 00:36:11,960
Speaker 1: to squeeze her into some of the silliest costumes in

623
00:36:12,040 --> 00:36:16,040
Speaker 1: the whole film. Um. And then she's so her character

624
00:36:16,120 --> 00:36:18,200
Speaker 1: is to back up a little bit, her her character

625
00:36:18,280 --> 00:36:25,160
Speaker 1: is basically an amorous space Amazonian warrior valkyrie uh type character.

626
00:36:25,320 --> 00:36:29,279
Speaker 1: You know, like all those tropes just mashed together. Um.

627
00:36:29,360 --> 00:36:33,680
Speaker 1: She's often dressed in this kind of space valkyrie costume

628
00:36:33,719 --> 00:36:36,520
Speaker 1: that looks like it's made out of dried silly string. Yeah,

629
00:36:36,600 --> 00:36:40,960
Speaker 1: it's kind of a like it's a skeletal bone corset

630
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:46,640
Speaker 1: with like with like grimlin ear head headwear. Um, it

631
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:51,680
Speaker 1: is so weird. Yeah, it's it's it's completely ridiculous. And

632
00:36:51,719 --> 00:36:55,440
Speaker 1: then she's a she's a hotshot space pilot and so

633
00:36:55,480 --> 00:36:57,759
Speaker 1: you have you have all these scenes where she's piloting

634
00:36:57,760 --> 00:37:01,000
Speaker 1: the cockpit, but they have her in this pit environment

635
00:37:01,360 --> 00:37:03,640
Speaker 1: that makes it look like she's getting a dental exam,

636
00:37:03,920 --> 00:37:07,680
Speaker 1: like shooting there from this really unflattering angle, in an

637
00:37:07,719 --> 00:37:11,160
Speaker 1: unflattering angle for just any member of the human species.

638
00:37:11,200 --> 00:37:14,799
Speaker 1: So it's up the nose angle. Yeah, so this like

639
00:37:14,880 --> 00:37:17,480
Speaker 1: this does not I can't I can't imagine how anyone

640
00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:19,799
Speaker 1: thought this was a great shot and and needed to

641
00:37:19,880 --> 00:37:23,279
Speaker 1: be used in the film. But here she is, and

642
00:37:23,280 --> 00:37:27,000
Speaker 1: when she's not piloting that spaceship, she's coming onto Shad

643
00:37:27,040 --> 00:37:29,720
Speaker 1: in some of the cringe eest moments in the entire film.

644
00:37:29,920 --> 00:37:32,920
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, nothing like a like a double entendres sex

645
00:37:33,040 --> 00:37:36,359
Speaker 1: joke that's based on machinery metaphor that goes on for

646
00:37:36,440 --> 00:37:43,240
Speaker 1: like seventy seconds. It's it's unbearable. Yeah, alright. The next

647
00:37:43,440 --> 00:37:46,760
Speaker 1: human of note in this is a Sam Joffey playing

648
00:37:46,960 --> 00:37:50,680
Speaker 1: Dr he Festus. Um. Wow, I mean we're going from

649
00:37:50,800 --> 00:37:55,359
Speaker 1: weirdest to almost on par weirdness. Yeah. Yeah, This one

650
00:37:55,360 --> 00:37:57,920
Speaker 1: I think is a close second to st x men

651
00:37:58,480 --> 00:38:01,399
Speaker 1: Um in terms of just ludicrous green presence. I don't

652
00:38:01,400 --> 00:38:02,920
Speaker 1: even know how much we want to get into this,

653
00:38:03,000 --> 00:38:06,839
Speaker 1: but basically, he's an android scientist who has done some

654
00:38:06,880 --> 00:38:10,160
Speaker 1: silly things to his own body. And oh, it's just

655
00:38:10,480 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 1: it's just so I didn't I want, I don't want

656
00:38:12,719 --> 00:38:16,839
Speaker 1: to say it's embarrassing, but it's just so silly. It's

657
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:19,919
Speaker 1: just it's just laughing dizzy. Well, I want to be clear.

658
00:38:19,960 --> 00:38:22,840
Speaker 1: You said he's an android scientist, so he makes androids,

659
00:38:22,920 --> 00:38:28,560
Speaker 1: but he is originally human has become essentially when we

660
00:38:28,600 --> 00:38:32,280
Speaker 1: meet him. Uh, he is a head, a human head

661
00:38:32,360 --> 00:38:36,160
Speaker 1: on top of a cabinet full of synthetic organs, right,

662
00:38:36,280 --> 00:38:39,560
Speaker 1: and it the cabinet opens in a way that feels

663
00:38:39,640 --> 00:38:42,640
Speaker 1: kind of dirty, like he's a flasher and a trench coat.

664
00:38:43,200 --> 00:38:46,680
Speaker 1: And but but I want to stress to the cabinet

665
00:38:46,760 --> 00:38:49,440
Speaker 1: is really well designed as well. So it's one of

666
00:38:49,480 --> 00:38:53,040
Speaker 1: these moments where on one level, yes, this looks really good,

667
00:38:53,040 --> 00:38:54,600
Speaker 1: this is a great shot, and this is a great

668
00:38:54,640 --> 00:38:57,680
Speaker 1: prop you created for for Sam Jaffee here, but on

669
00:38:57,719 --> 00:39:02,239
Speaker 1: the other hand, just looks completely ridiculous. He and he's

670
00:39:02,400 --> 00:39:05,400
Speaker 1: he's just giving this kind of like smiling, super happy

671
00:39:05,440 --> 00:39:09,920
Speaker 1: grandma grandpa performance as well. Uh, It's it's a weird

672
00:39:09,960 --> 00:39:13,120
Speaker 1: one to process. Yeah, but I would say, exactly like

673
00:39:13,160 --> 00:39:16,240
Speaker 1: Sybil Danning, I give Sam Jaffee credit here for committing

674
00:39:16,440 --> 00:39:21,200
Speaker 1: Both of these people were given absolutely unbelievably weird stuff

675
00:39:21,239 --> 00:39:24,359
Speaker 1: to do, and they just go all in. Yeah. Uh.

676
00:39:24,400 --> 00:39:29,080
Speaker 1: Sam Jaffee lived through four actor of stage and screen,

677
00:39:29,120 --> 00:39:32,000
Speaker 1: best known for The Asphalt Jungle, The Day the Earth

678
00:39:32,040 --> 00:39:36,160
Speaker 1: Stood Still, bed knobs and broomsticks and Ben her I

679
00:39:36,200 --> 00:39:38,759
Speaker 1: want to highlight what you just said, which is that

680
00:39:38,840 --> 00:39:42,239
Speaker 1: this is an actor born in eight a product of

681
00:39:42,239 --> 00:39:46,360
Speaker 1: the nineteenth century, who, in this Star Wars ripoff, plays

682
00:39:46,400 --> 00:39:50,200
Speaker 1: ahead on a cabinet full of Organs who wants to

683
00:39:50,400 --> 00:39:54,880
Speaker 1: imprison a young Luke Skywalker clone in order to produce

684
00:39:54,920 --> 00:40:00,520
Speaker 1: grandchildren for him. Yes, all right, um, the next of

685
00:40:00,560 --> 00:40:02,800
Speaker 1: actor of note this This is a more of a

686
00:40:03,880 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 1: small role, but it's worth noting because so you have

687
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:10,759
Speaker 1: these nests, uh Nest Tour. It's kind of like it

688
00:40:10,760 --> 00:40:12,520
Speaker 1: sounds like it should be a brand of like cheap

689
00:40:12,520 --> 00:40:15,560
Speaker 1: coffee that you encounter in a hotel, but no, these

690
00:40:15,560 --> 00:40:20,480
Speaker 1: are like four pale white aliens that all like think

691
00:40:20,600 --> 00:40:24,759
Speaker 1: and speak and taste in unison and so yeah, so

692
00:40:24,800 --> 00:40:27,640
Speaker 1: it's four different actors, you know, dalled up the same way.

693
00:40:28,040 --> 00:40:31,279
Speaker 1: One of them is played by Earl Bowen, who was

694
00:40:31,320 --> 00:40:35,640
Speaker 1: more than and uh it's probably best known to everyone

695
00:40:35,680 --> 00:40:39,799
Speaker 1: out there as uh Silberman Dr Silberman in the Terminator films.

696
00:40:39,800 --> 00:40:43,120
Speaker 1: He's the crooked psychiatrist who keeps Sarah Connor in in

697
00:40:43,120 --> 00:40:46,440
Speaker 1: in the Institution. Yeah. He was also in the Man

698
00:40:46,520 --> 00:40:49,280
Speaker 1: with Two Brains and he's done a lot of voice work.

699
00:40:49,320 --> 00:40:51,840
Speaker 1: He also appears in the Dead Right episode of Tales

700
00:40:51,880 --> 00:40:54,960
Speaker 1: from the Crypt, which started Demmy Moore and Jeffrey Tamber.

701
00:40:55,360 --> 00:40:57,880
Speaker 1: I wonder if this is where he met James Cameron

702
00:40:58,040 --> 00:41:00,719
Speaker 1: and how he ended up in the Terminator movies. Yeah, yeah,

703
00:41:00,719 --> 00:41:04,280
Speaker 1: it seems I would bet that is the case because

704
00:41:04,280 --> 00:41:09,240
Speaker 1: so speaking of the of the James Cameron uh acting ensemble,

705
00:41:09,320 --> 00:41:13,520
Speaker 1: Bill Paxton allegedly did carpentry work on this film. Okay,

706
00:41:13,560 --> 00:41:15,400
Speaker 1: so I guess you know. He's like, hey, you you

707
00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:17,520
Speaker 1: you're in. How about you all right? Put down that

708
00:41:17,600 --> 00:41:20,239
Speaker 1: put down that hammer. You're going to be in in

709
00:41:20,239 --> 00:41:23,080
Speaker 1: a film of mine? Can you grow a mohawk? He

710
00:41:23,120 --> 00:41:26,360
Speaker 1: did have a mohawk and Terminator right, Oh yeah he did? Yeah,

711
00:41:26,400 --> 00:41:29,000
Speaker 1: but didn't he wasn't. There also a story about how

712
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:33,960
Speaker 1: Harrison Ford was was originally working as a carpenter on

713
00:41:34,360 --> 00:41:36,520
Speaker 1: set for Star Wars before he was cast, And I'm

714
00:41:36,560 --> 00:41:40,680
Speaker 1: wrong about that. Oh, seth just set us straight. I

715
00:41:40,680 --> 00:41:44,320
Speaker 1: think he was in American Graffiti with Lucas before Star Wars,

716
00:41:44,320 --> 00:41:47,040
Speaker 1: which but but being a carpenter had something to do

717
00:41:47,080 --> 00:41:50,000
Speaker 1: I think with getting him in there. All right. Another

718
00:41:50,160 --> 00:41:54,200
Speaker 1: credit of note here, Kathy Griffin plays an uncredited alien

719
00:41:54,280 --> 00:41:56,920
Speaker 1: extra in this. So yeah, this is the first screen

720
00:41:56,960 --> 00:41:59,880
Speaker 1: appearance of actor and comedian Kathy Griffin. Blink and you

721
00:42:00,080 --> 00:42:02,640
Speaker 1: miss it, and you'll miss it unless you're you're actively

722
00:42:02,680 --> 00:42:05,040
Speaker 1: looking for it. But yes, she is in there. Born

723
00:42:05,120 --> 00:42:09,799
Speaker 1: nineteen sixty. Uh, she's an uncredited alien. Did not catch her? Yeah,

724
00:42:09,840 --> 00:42:12,440
Speaker 1: she's she's part of She's on Shad's home planet. So

725
00:42:12,480 --> 00:42:14,839
Speaker 1: she's relatively early in the film and I don't think

726
00:42:15,160 --> 00:42:18,240
Speaker 1: you see her in the background anymore after that. Okay,

727
00:42:18,239 --> 00:42:20,480
Speaker 1: so she's walking around, she's hanging out with the guys

728
00:42:20,520 --> 00:42:24,799
Speaker 1: who look like they're in Leonard skinnerd Yeah. Yeah, okay. Oh,

729
00:42:24,920 --> 00:42:26,839
Speaker 1: now it's time to talk about the music on this one,

730
00:42:26,880 --> 00:42:29,720
Speaker 1: because the score for this film is by James Horner.

731
00:42:30,080 --> 00:42:34,080
Speaker 1: Oh wow, okay, I believe this would be yet another

732
00:42:34,200 --> 00:42:40,680
Speaker 1: James Cameron connection, right, yeah, yeah, James Horner lived. This

733
00:42:40,760 --> 00:42:44,319
Speaker 1: was one of the first scores that he composed. He

734
00:42:44,400 --> 00:42:46,960
Speaker 1: would go on to score a number. I mean so

735
00:42:46,960 --> 00:42:52,279
Speaker 1: so many classic scores films such as James Cameron's Aliens, Uh,

736
00:42:52,360 --> 00:42:55,800
Speaker 1: Star Trek to The Wrath of con Willow, Field of Dreams,

737
00:42:56,320 --> 00:43:01,160
Speaker 1: Apollo thirteen, Titanic, A Beautiful Mind, and Avatar, and Uh.

738
00:43:01,200 --> 00:43:03,040
Speaker 1: When I think of Horner, I have to say, I

739
00:43:03,080 --> 00:43:05,600
Speaker 1: often think of, you know that that great tension building

740
00:43:05,960 --> 00:43:09,239
Speaker 1: bit from the Alien score. I think of various blockbusters

741
00:43:09,280 --> 00:43:11,120
Speaker 1: like some of the ones I mentioned. But you know,

742
00:43:11,160 --> 00:43:13,520
Speaker 1: I have to say, Uh, the score that he did

743
00:43:13,600 --> 00:43:16,360
Speaker 1: for the six adaptation of the Name of the Rose,

744
00:43:16,600 --> 00:43:19,280
Speaker 1: I think it's really quite excellent. It's a superb mix

745
00:43:19,320 --> 00:43:26,160
Speaker 1: of chorl electronic and orchestral themes. Uh that that kind

746
00:43:26,160 --> 00:43:29,080
Speaker 1: of come together in a perfect way for a film

747
00:43:29,160 --> 00:43:31,360
Speaker 1: like this that is supposed to be about, you know,

748
00:43:31,440 --> 00:43:34,400
Speaker 1: monastery on sort of the edge of of the world

749
00:43:35,600 --> 00:43:38,040
Speaker 1: now and one. This is kind of interesting as well.

750
00:43:38,280 --> 00:43:43,480
Speaker 1: Horner's last film score was a remake of The Magnificent Seven.

751
00:43:43,719 --> 00:43:47,799
Speaker 1: How about that? Yeah? I never saw that. Yeah. Oh.

752
00:43:47,800 --> 00:43:50,400
Speaker 1: And prior to Battably on the Stars, he also worked

753
00:43:50,400 --> 00:43:53,600
Speaker 1: on the scores for Humanoids from the Deep and Up

754
00:43:53,640 --> 00:43:57,200
Speaker 1: from the Depths, the Killer Sturgeon movie in the Philippines

755
00:43:57,719 --> 00:44:00,960
Speaker 1: referenced earlier, And finally, like we been pointing out, yes,

756
00:44:01,120 --> 00:44:04,759
Speaker 1: James Cameron has art, direction and visual effects credits on

757
00:44:04,840 --> 00:44:08,319
Speaker 1: this film. Um, you know, obviously he would go on

758
00:44:08,360 --> 00:44:13,239
Speaker 1: to be quite a big deal. But Cameron's big directorial

759
00:44:13,320 --> 00:44:17,440
Speaker 1: writing break wouldn't come until the following year after this film,

760
00:44:17,440 --> 00:44:21,120
Speaker 1: with Piranha to the Spawning and that was followed by

761
00:44:21,440 --> 00:44:23,160
Speaker 1: The Terminator, and of course at that point you're just

762
00:44:23,200 --> 00:44:26,640
Speaker 1: off to the races. But at this point he had

763
00:44:26,719 --> 00:44:30,440
Speaker 1: done a short film titled Xeno Genesis and seventy eight

764
00:44:30,480 --> 00:44:33,600
Speaker 1: he'd been a production designer on Galaxy of Terror, which

765
00:44:33,640 --> 00:44:37,040
Speaker 1: he also did second unit director duties on, and the

766
00:44:37,080 --> 00:44:41,160
Speaker 1: following year in eighty one would see him serve in

767
00:44:41,440 --> 00:44:45,360
Speaker 1: a capacity for special visual effects and uh and and

768
00:44:45,440 --> 00:44:49,640
Speaker 1: matt artwork on John Carpenter's Escape from New York. Well. Yeah,

769
00:44:49,640 --> 00:44:51,120
Speaker 1: so there are a lot of stories in the making

770
00:44:51,120 --> 00:44:54,480
Speaker 1: of documentary about James Cameron's work behind the scenes on

771
00:44:54,480 --> 00:44:58,160
Speaker 1: this movie. Uh. He like, there are a lot of

772
00:44:58,160 --> 00:45:01,800
Speaker 1: just little details about him wanting to really ambitious things

773
00:45:01,840 --> 00:45:04,040
Speaker 1: that some of which did end up in the movie

774
00:45:04,160 --> 00:45:06,759
Speaker 1: ended up looking amazing. But I think we're sort of

775
00:45:06,800 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 1: pressing up against the budget constraints that this movie was

776
00:45:10,000 --> 00:45:13,160
Speaker 1: operating on. Uh. And so, like some of the other

777
00:45:13,520 --> 00:45:16,080
Speaker 1: production designers and visual effects people who worked on the

778
00:45:16,080 --> 00:45:18,279
Speaker 1: movie said, you know, we'd be working on this and

779
00:45:18,320 --> 00:45:21,040
Speaker 1: then somebody would come to us and say, hey, you know,

780
00:45:21,160 --> 00:45:24,160
Speaker 1: Jim is uh he's got this idea and it's going

781
00:45:24,239 --> 00:45:26,279
Speaker 1: to cost a lot more than we expected, So can

782
00:45:26,320 --> 00:45:29,520
Speaker 1: you do what you're doing now much cheaper? And so forth.

783
00:45:30,280 --> 00:45:32,560
Speaker 1: But there was also a story one person on there

784
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:36,920
Speaker 1: told about an argument that James Cameron got into with

785
00:45:37,080 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: the director I think it was the director of photography

786
00:45:39,680 --> 00:45:42,480
Speaker 1: on Battill Beyond the Stars, who was a unfortunately I

787
00:45:42,520 --> 00:45:44,480
Speaker 1: forget his name at the moment, but he was a

788
00:45:44,480 --> 00:45:47,759
Speaker 1: French guy, and they were arguing about the science of

789
00:45:47,800 --> 00:45:52,720
Speaker 1: twinkling stars because the DP was saying, Okay, from the

790
00:45:52,760 --> 00:45:56,440
Speaker 1: spaceship's cockpit, we should have the stars twinkling, and uh.

791
00:45:56,640 --> 00:45:59,840
Speaker 1: Cameron was like, no, because stars only twinkle because of

792
00:45:59,880 --> 00:46:02,600
Speaker 1: the atmosphere of a planet, and that is true. Like

793
00:46:02,640 --> 00:46:05,440
Speaker 1: the reason the star twinkles is has to do with

794
00:46:05,480 --> 00:46:09,080
Speaker 1: how the the light from a point like source is

795
00:46:09,120 --> 00:46:12,880
Speaker 1: affected by you know, drafts and the gases of the atmosphere.

796
00:46:12,920 --> 00:46:14,560
Speaker 1: Before it reaches your eyes, it takes a kind of

797
00:46:14,560 --> 00:46:18,800
Speaker 1: wiggly zigzag pattern and that causes the twinkling. And according

798
00:46:18,840 --> 00:46:22,400
Speaker 1: to this interview, this ended with the the DP getting

799
00:46:22,480 --> 00:46:26,799
Speaker 1: up in Cameron's face and pulling his beard and sing like, ms,

800
00:46:26,800 --> 00:46:32,600
Speaker 1: your Cameron, you are a brat. So James Cameron easy

801
00:46:32,640 --> 00:46:37,200
Speaker 1: to work with right from the get gap basically. But

802
00:46:37,560 --> 00:46:39,320
Speaker 1: but he was right, he was right about the story.

803
00:46:39,920 --> 00:46:51,120
Speaker 1: Each one is a setting sun. All right, well, let's

804
00:46:51,160 --> 00:46:53,520
Speaker 1: get into the Let's get properly into the plot of

805
00:46:53,560 --> 00:46:56,360
Speaker 1: this film and flesh out some of these just weird

806
00:46:56,480 --> 00:47:00,359
Speaker 1: choices and weird moments that the make up the runtime. Okay, well,

807
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:01,920
Speaker 1: this is one of those where we're not going to

808
00:47:02,000 --> 00:47:03,799
Speaker 1: do every scene in the movie, but I want to

809
00:47:03,840 --> 00:47:07,000
Speaker 1: focus on some some highlights and some themes. But we

810
00:47:07,239 --> 00:47:10,040
Speaker 1: will start with the beginning, because in a Star Wars

811
00:47:10,120 --> 00:47:12,160
Speaker 1: knockoff movie, what's your opening going to be? You know

812
00:47:12,280 --> 00:47:14,360
Speaker 1: exactly what it's gonna be. In fact, I think almost

813
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:18,120
Speaker 1: all of these begin with a shot of a star

814
00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:21,319
Speaker 1: field and then what's it going to be? What's it

815
00:47:21,320 --> 00:47:26,120
Speaker 1: gonna be? Spaceship Spaceship Pans comes over the top of

816
00:47:26,120 --> 00:47:29,760
Speaker 1: the camera um. And in this case, the first spaceship

817
00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:33,160
Speaker 1: we see, I would say, is shaped pretty much like

818
00:47:33,520 --> 00:47:36,160
Speaker 1: the Blockade Runner we see at the beginning of Star Wars.

819
00:47:36,440 --> 00:47:39,279
Speaker 1: You know, it's the horizontal cylinder at the bow and

820
00:47:39,320 --> 00:47:42,160
Speaker 1: then an array of parallel rocket engines in the stern

821
00:47:42,760 --> 00:47:45,479
Speaker 1: right off the bat though this ship looks really good,

822
00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:48,840
Speaker 1: I have to say, yeah, yeah, I agree. Uh And

823
00:47:48,840 --> 00:47:50,840
Speaker 1: and here though, the the interesting thing is that the

824
00:47:50,880 --> 00:47:54,320
Speaker 1: allegiance of this ship is flipped because in Star Wars

825
00:47:54,520 --> 00:47:57,560
Speaker 1: that ship is the ship with this shape is Princess

826
00:47:57,600 --> 00:48:00,719
Speaker 1: Leah's corvette. It's being chased by the Imperial Star Destroyer,

827
00:48:01,360 --> 00:48:04,080
Speaker 1: and in this movie there's no chase going on. The

828
00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:07,000
Speaker 1: ship just is the star Destroyer, and it's also sort

829
00:48:07,000 --> 00:48:09,600
Speaker 1: of the death Star. It is the flagship of the

830
00:48:09,680 --> 00:48:13,279
Speaker 1: wicked and treacherous Melmoory, who have arrived in your star

831
00:48:13,360 --> 00:48:19,480
Speaker 1: system to do evil essentially space warlords, an army of

832
00:48:19,480 --> 00:48:22,440
Speaker 1: of what failed mutants kind of like messed up clones

833
00:48:22,600 --> 00:48:26,120
Speaker 1: or something, and they are led by John Saxon, right,

834
00:48:26,280 --> 00:48:29,400
Speaker 1: And so they approach the approach a planet, and we

835
00:48:29,440 --> 00:48:32,560
Speaker 1: hear technicians on this evil capital ship discussing what they

836
00:48:32,600 --> 00:48:35,279
Speaker 1: see on the viewscreen. They say, this is a Kere,

837
00:48:35,800 --> 00:48:39,239
Speaker 1: a planet of stone with a single green spot, life

838
00:48:39,280 --> 00:48:43,200
Speaker 1: forms compatible with ours, oxygen forms with radial symmetry. I

839
00:48:43,200 --> 00:48:46,960
Speaker 1: think they's a radial symmetry. They have a solar technology,

840
00:48:47,000 --> 00:48:51,440
Speaker 1: no known defense capacity. And then I think somebody, John Saxon,

841
00:48:51,520 --> 00:48:55,400
Speaker 1: I think, says interesting, let's check that. And so oh no,

842
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:58,160
Speaker 1: first thing, the star Destroyer just rolls up on this

843
00:48:58,280 --> 00:49:02,200
Speaker 1: kind of twittering weather satellite. It is crewed by a

844
00:49:02,200 --> 00:49:05,640
Speaker 1: couple of extremely polite boys from a Kre and they're

845
00:49:05,680 --> 00:49:08,960
Speaker 1: staring down this doom ship and the minor cords are

846
00:49:09,000 --> 00:49:13,080
Speaker 1: swelling and they're like, hello there, welcome to our atmosphere. Uh,

847
00:49:13,200 --> 00:49:15,680
Speaker 1: this is the planet of here. Could you identify yourself please?

848
00:49:15,760 --> 00:49:20,120
Speaker 1: And then the ship just of vaporizing. But I like

849
00:49:20,160 --> 00:49:24,080
Speaker 1: how the sort of sweet Midwestern corn nous of the

850
00:49:24,120 --> 00:49:28,040
Speaker 1: guys from a ker in this satellite is immediately contrasted

851
00:49:28,080 --> 00:49:31,320
Speaker 1: by weird imagery when we see what the planet surface

852
00:49:31,360 --> 00:49:35,960
Speaker 1: looks like. So we only get these brief glimpses, but

853
00:49:36,640 --> 00:49:40,640
Speaker 1: what we see is like that the the infrastructure of

854
00:49:40,680 --> 00:49:44,560
Speaker 1: the civilization on this planet surface seems to be built

855
00:49:44,600 --> 00:49:49,720
Speaker 1: out of flesh trees that are also giant screaming skulls.

856
00:49:49,760 --> 00:49:53,480
Speaker 1: So it's like the Ewok Village, but imagine the forest

857
00:49:53,560 --> 00:49:57,080
Speaker 1: instead of wood is warped flesh and the bones of

858
00:49:57,120 --> 00:50:01,439
Speaker 1: whatever species. Pac Man is. It's it's it's really quite

859
00:50:01,480 --> 00:50:05,280
Speaker 1: cool looking. It reminds me a little bit of Salvador Dali.

860
00:50:05,480 --> 00:50:09,880
Speaker 1: It reminds me a bit of Fantastic Planet. Uh. Overall,

861
00:50:09,880 --> 00:50:13,160
Speaker 1: it has a wonderful, like weird seventies sci fi vibe

862
00:50:13,200 --> 00:50:15,719
Speaker 1: to it. Yeah, and I already mentioned this, but a

863
00:50:15,719 --> 00:50:19,240
Speaker 1: lot of the locals have a distinct classic rock vibe.

864
00:50:19,280 --> 00:50:23,719
Speaker 1: That the dunes look like the Alman Brothers. This is

865
00:50:23,760 --> 00:50:26,040
Speaker 1: a film, you know, you look back at Star Wars.

866
00:50:26,040 --> 00:50:29,600
Speaker 1: Star Wars is a product of the nineteen seventies, and yeah,

867
00:50:29,600 --> 00:50:31,400
Speaker 1: if you look hard enough you can you can see

868
00:50:31,400 --> 00:50:34,719
Speaker 1: the seventies in it, but but not nearly as strongly

869
00:50:34,920 --> 00:50:38,040
Speaker 1: as the seventies often bleeds through into a picture like this.

870
00:50:38,160 --> 00:50:42,080
Speaker 1: And yeah, the seventies is is strongly manifested even though

871
00:50:42,280 --> 00:50:43,759
Speaker 1: this is the really eighties, of course, but you know,

872
00:50:43,760 --> 00:50:45,839
Speaker 1: we're still still very much a product of the late

873
00:50:45,880 --> 00:50:49,839
Speaker 1: nineteen seventies. The decade is strongly present in this film. Oh,

874
00:50:49,920 --> 00:50:55,280
Speaker 1: it was the seventies until night four that is canon anyway.

875
00:50:55,360 --> 00:50:58,000
Speaker 1: So the evil capital ship it slides over the city,

876
00:50:58,080 --> 00:51:00,760
Speaker 1: blots out the sun and they are treated to a message.

877
00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:04,719
Speaker 1: You see John Saxon's face projected in the sky and

878
00:51:04,760 --> 00:51:08,359
Speaker 1: he says, I am say door of the Melmory. I've

879
00:51:08,400 --> 00:51:11,160
Speaker 1: come here with my forces to conquer you. If you resist,

880
00:51:11,320 --> 00:51:14,640
Speaker 1: I will crush you. I possess a stellar converter, the

881
00:51:14,640 --> 00:51:18,200
Speaker 1: most powerful weapon in the universe. In the universe, how

882
00:51:18,280 --> 00:51:22,680
Speaker 1: do you know that anyway? You cannot resist me. I

883
00:51:22,760 --> 00:51:25,680
Speaker 1: want your planet to be my colony. Your harvest comes

884
00:51:25,680 --> 00:51:28,840
Speaker 1: in seven risings of your red Giant. I will return.

885
00:51:28,920 --> 00:51:31,680
Speaker 1: Then you will accept me as your master. If you

886
00:51:31,760 --> 00:51:34,359
Speaker 1: do not submit, your planet and all life on it

887
00:51:34,400 --> 00:51:38,879
Speaker 1: will be burned to ash. And I think this kind

888
00:51:38,880 --> 00:51:42,000
Speaker 1: of opening would probably work better if you were to

889
00:51:42,080 --> 00:51:45,840
Speaker 1: see the least bit of the flavor of everyday life

890
00:51:45,880 --> 00:51:49,160
Speaker 1: before the evil space lord shows up. Like it seems

891
00:51:49,239 --> 00:51:51,399
Speaker 1: kind of clumsy plotting to me because here we get

892
00:51:51,400 --> 00:51:55,120
Speaker 1: absolutely nothing. We we meet the good guys at the

893
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:58,160
Speaker 1: exact moment that they're being threatened with death by the

894
00:51:58,200 --> 00:52:01,080
Speaker 1: big bad Yeah. The other an asting thing is that

895
00:52:01,120 --> 00:52:03,319
Speaker 1: you're watching this film you would think, okay, and then

896
00:52:03,360 --> 00:52:06,640
Speaker 1: they surrender, right, I mean that they have no defense capabilities.

897
00:52:07,040 --> 00:52:10,920
Speaker 1: The overlord just showed up full force in their orbit.

898
00:52:11,000 --> 00:52:14,400
Speaker 1: He has orbital superiority over the planet. Like that's it,

899
00:52:14,480 --> 00:52:16,759
Speaker 1: the game's over. There's there's what are you? What are

900
00:52:16,760 --> 00:52:18,799
Speaker 1: you gonna even try to do? Yeah? And then like

901
00:52:18,960 --> 00:52:21,920
Speaker 1: just to be mean, he starts like blasting them with lasers.

902
00:52:21,960 --> 00:52:25,319
Speaker 1: Also that are that are manned by what he calls snipers.

903
00:52:25,360 --> 00:52:27,360
Speaker 1: Who are these the zombies that work for him? I

904
00:52:27,360 --> 00:52:31,040
Speaker 1: guess they're they're mutants. Yeah, They're a little vague on it,

905
00:52:31,080 --> 00:52:33,400
Speaker 1: but I kind of got the the sense that they

906
00:52:33,440 --> 00:52:36,280
Speaker 1: had their failed mutants. But they're also kind of clones.

907
00:52:36,800 --> 00:52:39,160
Speaker 1: I don't know if they're supposed to be clones of

908
00:52:39,239 --> 00:52:42,760
Speaker 1: John Saxon's character or not. There is that similarity between

909
00:52:42,760 --> 00:52:47,200
Speaker 1: like the red scar on the face um overall. Yeah,

910
00:52:47,200 --> 00:52:51,799
Speaker 1: I would say that that that Saydor's character is is

911
00:52:51,880 --> 00:52:55,120
Speaker 1: weird and keeps you questioning what exactly his whole deal is,

912
00:52:55,200 --> 00:52:58,000
Speaker 1: which which I kind of liked. I kind of like that. Yeah, Yeah,

913
00:52:58,960 --> 00:53:01,800
Speaker 1: I was kind of wondering if all of the mutants

914
00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:05,879
Speaker 1: on the ship are like clones of himself. That he

915
00:53:05,960 --> 00:53:08,960
Speaker 1: created so he could harvest their organs, because we see

916
00:53:08,960 --> 00:53:11,560
Speaker 1: about him later that he's constantly getting parts of his

917
00:53:11,640 --> 00:53:15,600
Speaker 1: body replaced. Yeah. Yeah, I think that's that's a very strong,

918
00:53:15,760 --> 00:53:19,040
Speaker 1: uh strong theory. Yeah, and it ultimately doesn't care where

919
00:53:19,040 --> 00:53:21,239
Speaker 1: he gets those parts. He's like, that's a nice arm

920
00:53:21,280 --> 00:53:25,839
Speaker 1: you got there. Uh, doctor, strap it on? Right. Uh So,

921
00:53:25,960 --> 00:53:28,560
Speaker 1: down on a kre we're we're about to actually hear

922
00:53:28,600 --> 00:53:30,279
Speaker 1: the locals talk to each other. Oh and just I

923
00:53:30,320 --> 00:53:33,400
Speaker 1: wanted to flag one thing quickly. I suspect that this

924
00:53:33,440 --> 00:53:35,960
Speaker 1: planet is called a ker and the people on it

925
00:53:35,960 --> 00:53:39,960
Speaker 1: are called a Kira because he is an adaptation of

926
00:53:39,960 --> 00:53:45,399
Speaker 1: seven Samurai via Magnificent Seven. Anyway, so we we hear

927
00:53:45,560 --> 00:53:48,839
Speaker 1: the Akira discussing their situation, and the very first thing

928
00:53:48,880 --> 00:53:52,239
Speaker 1: we get is this whiny sounding guy making a passionate

929
00:53:52,280 --> 00:53:55,320
Speaker 1: case that they should not defend themselves in any way.

930
00:53:55,680 --> 00:53:58,160
Speaker 1: He says, so we live by the Varda. The Varda

931
00:53:58,360 --> 00:54:02,040
Speaker 1: is not to fight, and this is the first reference

932
00:54:02,040 --> 00:54:04,680
Speaker 1: in the movie to the Varda, which will be brought

933
00:54:04,719 --> 00:54:07,640
Speaker 1: up many, many more times. I think it's supposed to

934
00:54:07,680 --> 00:54:10,960
Speaker 1: be the stand in for the force, but I don't

935
00:54:10,960 --> 00:54:14,240
Speaker 1: know if it quite works. It works differently than the Force.

936
00:54:14,320 --> 00:54:18,040
Speaker 1: So the Varda seems to be some kind of formalized

937
00:54:18,200 --> 00:54:21,279
Speaker 1: creed like it. You can quote the Varda. It is

938
00:54:21,320 --> 00:54:24,920
Speaker 1: a set of Dogma's rules and proverbs, and our young

939
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:28,080
Speaker 1: hero frequently does quote from the Varda as if it

940
00:54:28,120 --> 00:54:31,120
Speaker 1: were like a book that is supposed to guide your life,

941
00:54:31,560 --> 00:54:33,839
Speaker 1: whereas the Force is not like that, Like you can't

942
00:54:33,920 --> 00:54:36,200
Speaker 1: quote the Force. I would say the Force is more

943
00:54:36,280 --> 00:54:39,080
Speaker 1: like the Tao or like the Holy Ghost. It is

944
00:54:39,880 --> 00:54:43,600
Speaker 1: a substance into being a type of divine power or

945
00:54:43,680 --> 00:54:47,719
Speaker 1: will permeating all things. Yeah, Varda, I guess they're they're

946
00:54:47,920 --> 00:54:51,840
Speaker 1: kind of alluding to Veda here, so yeah, yeah, So

947
00:54:52,080 --> 00:54:54,440
Speaker 1: I'm not sure if this incongruity between the Force and

948
00:54:54,480 --> 00:54:57,080
Speaker 1: the Varda is like a deliberately a deliberate choice to

949
00:54:57,160 --> 00:55:01,360
Speaker 1: do something different, or if I don't know, but I

950
00:55:01,360 --> 00:55:03,120
Speaker 1: don't know if it was a deliberate choice, I guess

951
00:55:03,120 --> 00:55:05,399
Speaker 1: that's kind of interesting, But I'm not sure exactly what

952
00:55:05,480 --> 00:55:08,080
Speaker 1: that cashes out to. But in any rate, a strong

953
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:13,919
Speaker 1: theological slash legal argument for simply surrendering to the Maltmori Empire. Right.

954
00:55:13,960 --> 00:55:15,719
Speaker 1: He says the Varda is not to fight, and he

955
00:55:15,719 --> 00:55:19,560
Speaker 1: says the Akira haven't fought for centuries, and then immediately

956
00:55:19,680 --> 00:55:24,200
Speaker 1: we hear somebody off screen bellowing, I have fought, and

957
00:55:24,560 --> 00:55:28,000
Speaker 1: this bearded guy wanders and this is z the Corsair,

958
00:55:28,120 --> 00:55:31,200
Speaker 1: an old man who is nearly blind who used to

959
00:55:31,239 --> 00:55:35,279
Speaker 1: fly a spaceship and has experience with war, and he

960
00:55:35,320 --> 00:55:42,000
Speaker 1: cantankerously explains that the way to defeat violence is with violence. Uh,

961
00:55:42,239 --> 00:55:45,319
Speaker 1: He's like, I fought once it worked, Let's do that. Yes,

962
00:55:45,840 --> 00:55:48,320
Speaker 1: he says that in order to fight creatures of violence,

963
00:55:48,360 --> 00:55:52,759
Speaker 1: you must use creatures of violence, and everybody's just kind

964
00:55:52,760 --> 00:55:55,879
Speaker 1: of like okay. So it's immediately decided that they need

965
00:55:55,920 --> 00:55:59,920
Speaker 1: to hire mercenaries. And here's our seven samurai recruitment situation,

966
00:56:00,040 --> 00:56:03,279
Speaker 1: and so somebody's got to go recruit them, but who

967
00:56:03,320 --> 00:56:06,920
Speaker 1: can do it well. Immediately a young character played by

968
00:56:07,000 --> 00:56:11,799
Speaker 1: Richard Thomas volunteers, and emotional music plays as if we

969
00:56:11,840 --> 00:56:15,520
Speaker 1: know something about this character, but we don't, because this

970
00:56:15,640 --> 00:56:19,200
Speaker 1: is the first time he's talked. And I think this

971
00:56:19,280 --> 00:56:21,320
Speaker 1: is a good place to point out it probably hasn't

972
00:56:21,320 --> 00:56:24,040
Speaker 1: been clear in our explanation so far, but to point

973
00:56:24,040 --> 00:56:27,520
Speaker 1: out how fast everything is happening in this sequence. Like,

974
00:56:27,920 --> 00:56:30,759
Speaker 1: you do not really have time for any of these

975
00:56:30,800 --> 00:56:34,200
Speaker 1: developments to cause emotions or or mean anything. It's just

976
00:56:34,320 --> 00:56:37,160
Speaker 1: I'm sad or I will kill you. We cannot fight,

977
00:56:37,280 --> 00:56:40,720
Speaker 1: We must hire mercenaries who can do it this guy

978
00:56:41,480 --> 00:56:44,120
Speaker 1: and you know, of course, I enjoyed this movie very

979
00:56:44,200 --> 00:56:46,840
Speaker 1: much despite all this, But I think it's also a

980
00:56:46,840 --> 00:56:51,080
Speaker 1: good opportunity to point out things that make good storytelling

981
00:56:51,080 --> 00:56:54,600
Speaker 1: really work, like one thing Star Wars actually does quite well.

982
00:56:54,640 --> 00:56:59,080
Speaker 1: By contrast, before Luke Skywalker is called to adventure, you

983
00:56:59,120 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 1: get to see like the dreariness and the boredom of

984
00:57:02,239 --> 00:57:04,240
Speaker 1: his life on the farm, and you see him staring

985
00:57:04,239 --> 00:57:08,919
Speaker 1: at the sun's he's yearning for more. He's feeling that ineffable,

986
00:57:08,960 --> 00:57:13,600
Speaker 1: almost irrational angst of frustrated youth, which makes it emotional

987
00:57:13,640 --> 00:57:17,680
Speaker 1: and meaningful when his life is actually upended and he

988
00:57:17,320 --> 00:57:19,560
Speaker 1: he he has to go out and answer the please

989
00:57:19,600 --> 00:57:21,960
Speaker 1: of the princess and and you know, respond to the

990
00:57:21,960 --> 00:57:25,400
Speaker 1: death of his guardians. Here, I think the first time

991
00:57:25,440 --> 00:57:27,840
Speaker 1: the young hero speaks is when he's volunteering to go

992
00:57:27,880 --> 00:57:29,720
Speaker 1: on a mission, So you don't really get any of

993
00:57:29,760 --> 00:57:33,280
Speaker 1: that in this movie. The call to adventure is answered

994
00:57:33,320 --> 00:57:36,480
Speaker 1: immediately which is kind of an interesting sharp contrast to

995
00:57:36,600 --> 00:57:39,920
Speaker 1: Message from Space, in which the call to adventure seemed

996
00:57:39,960 --> 00:57:41,960
Speaker 1: to take most of the film to roll out and

997
00:57:42,000 --> 00:57:45,440
Speaker 1: then was molled over and finally accepted with like in

998
00:57:45,440 --> 00:57:48,000
Speaker 1: the last ten minutes of the film. Yeah, it's sending

999
00:57:48,000 --> 00:57:51,240
Speaker 1: out those magic nuts that fly over the galaxy. Yeah.

1000
00:57:52,600 --> 00:57:56,040
Speaker 1: But when Richard Thomas volunteers, the whiney guy from the beginning,

1001
00:57:56,040 --> 00:58:00,280
Speaker 1: he says, you you're a boy, and he says, and

1002
00:58:00,360 --> 00:58:02,959
Speaker 1: Richard Thomas says, but the Varda teaches us that each

1003
00:58:03,000 --> 00:58:05,520
Speaker 1: form has its function. So I guess the point is,

1004
00:58:05,800 --> 00:58:07,760
Speaker 1: even when you're a boy, you can still go on

1005
00:58:07,760 --> 00:58:11,000
Speaker 1: an adventure. Uh. And so it basically has to be

1006
00:58:11,080 --> 00:58:14,000
Speaker 1: Shad who does this. That's the character's name because he's

1007
00:58:14,000 --> 00:58:17,640
Speaker 1: the only one who can fly Zed's ship Nell. Now

1008
00:58:17,720 --> 00:58:20,200
Speaker 1: Nell will be I would say, one of the other

1009
00:58:20,360 --> 00:58:23,800
Speaker 1: main characters of the movie. Nel is a talking spaceship

1010
00:58:24,360 --> 00:58:26,280
Speaker 1: that I would say looks like a cross between a

1011
00:58:26,320 --> 00:58:32,080
Speaker 1: flayed horse and a bosomI hammerhead shark. Yeah. Yeah, it's

1012
00:58:32,200 --> 00:58:36,800
Speaker 1: um it's it's an impressive ship design reminds me of

1013
00:58:36,800 --> 00:58:39,520
Speaker 1: of a particular World War two like super glider that

1014
00:58:39,600 --> 00:58:43,160
Speaker 1: the Germans used. I wouldn't be surprised if I don't

1015
00:58:43,200 --> 00:58:44,600
Speaker 1: know if there was a model kit of that at

1016
00:58:44,600 --> 00:58:46,960
Speaker 1: the time, but I wonder if that was potential possibly

1017
00:58:47,120 --> 00:58:50,800
Speaker 1: adapted into this model for this spaceship. But uh, yeah,

1018
00:58:50,840 --> 00:58:54,720
Speaker 1: the ship has character. Um it's uh, it's pretty cool looking.

1019
00:58:54,960 --> 00:58:57,160
Speaker 1: I like the coloration of it. It has this kind

1020
00:58:57,200 --> 00:59:00,040
Speaker 1: of a what is like a deep, rusty kind of

1021
00:59:00,640 --> 00:59:04,200
Speaker 1: brown slash crimson e color. Yeah. Yeah, I'd say that's right,

1022
00:59:04,240 --> 00:59:07,560
Speaker 1: and it clearly has It has biomechanical design, like it

1023
00:59:07,600 --> 00:59:10,120
Speaker 1: doesn't look like sharp angles and metal like a lot

1024
00:59:10,120 --> 00:59:13,600
Speaker 1: of the other spaceships. To this looks like a like

1025
00:59:13,640 --> 00:59:17,440
Speaker 1: a naked body with a hammer head shark head. Yeah.

1026
00:59:17,440 --> 00:59:20,200
Speaker 1: Oh but then also you so you say the ship

1027
00:59:20,240 --> 00:59:23,439
Speaker 1: has character, and it has character quite literally because it's

1028
00:59:23,440 --> 00:59:26,440
Speaker 1: not just design. It talks, and it's not just saying like,

1029
00:59:26,480 --> 00:59:29,400
Speaker 1: you know, engage thrusters. It has a twod it's like

1030
00:59:29,440 --> 00:59:33,280
Speaker 1: a rooting twoton back talking robot Grandma. Yeah, it's a

1031
00:59:33,280 --> 00:59:36,680
Speaker 1: little bit sassy, and it encourages young Shad to kill

1032
00:59:37,400 --> 00:59:40,640
Speaker 1: This is a strange theme that's repeated throughout the movie.

1033
00:59:40,720 --> 00:59:43,440
Speaker 1: But uh, you know, Shad, like he first leaves the

1034
00:59:43,440 --> 00:59:46,120
Speaker 1: planet on his mission, which is first he's going to

1035
00:59:46,120 --> 00:59:48,680
Speaker 1: get weapons from a guy named Dr. He faced Us

1036
00:59:49,960 --> 00:59:53,320
Speaker 1: and he has attacked by some guards left behind. There's

1037
00:59:53,320 --> 00:59:56,000
Speaker 1: a big space battle. He's trying to escape and he

1038
00:59:56,040 --> 00:59:58,600
Speaker 1: refuses to shoot back at the guards, and Nell is

1039
00:59:58,720 --> 01:00:02,160
Speaker 1: urging him. She's like, do it, shoot them, And later

1040
01:00:02,400 --> 01:00:06,760
Speaker 1: Nell will blast spaceships without Chad's consent. But then after that,

1041
01:00:06,800 --> 01:00:09,720
Speaker 1: Shad gets a real like taste for war and starts

1042
01:00:09,720 --> 01:00:13,400
Speaker 1: to love blasting that. That's kind of strange, yeah, especially

1043
01:00:13,440 --> 01:00:16,760
Speaker 1: since again the Varda is not to violence, and yet

1044
01:00:16,800 --> 01:00:19,400
Speaker 1: here they are violencing all over the place. All right,

1045
01:00:19,480 --> 01:00:21,840
Speaker 1: So I'm not gonna do super detail on this, but

1046
01:00:21,880 --> 01:00:25,320
Speaker 1: the sequence with Dr Have faced Us is so weird.

1047
01:00:25,440 --> 01:00:28,160
Speaker 1: So Chad goes to a space station seems to be

1048
01:00:28,200 --> 01:00:32,600
Speaker 1: populated entirely by androids, but then he meets one human Nenelia,

1049
01:00:32,800 --> 01:00:35,440
Speaker 1: the daughter of Dr. He faced Us, and she's like

1050
01:00:35,480 --> 01:00:39,440
Speaker 1: a brilliant scientist who repairs androids and she can do

1051
01:00:39,480 --> 01:00:42,800
Speaker 1: all the technical wizardry, but she's also very naive about

1052
01:00:42,800 --> 01:00:45,800
Speaker 1: the world because she has never left this space station.

1053
01:00:46,480 --> 01:00:49,600
Speaker 1: And uh so they they meet, and then he has

1054
01:00:49,640 --> 01:00:52,800
Speaker 1: taken to Dr Who faced Us himself, who was supposed

1055
01:00:52,840 --> 01:00:55,320
Speaker 1: to supply them with with arms to defend their planet.

1056
01:00:55,640 --> 01:00:58,720
Speaker 1: But oops, Dr faced Us is no longer a human body.

1057
01:00:58,760 --> 01:01:02,200
Speaker 1: He's now just ahead on this cabinet full of organs uh.

1058
01:01:02,240 --> 01:01:05,320
Speaker 1: And his plan is like, well, I'm not interested in

1059
01:01:05,400 --> 01:01:08,640
Speaker 1: defending your planet. Instead, Chad, I'm going to imprison you

1060
01:01:08,680 --> 01:01:13,120
Speaker 1: on this space station and make you father children with Nnelia. Uh.

1061
01:01:13,400 --> 01:01:16,480
Speaker 1: Shad is reasonably creeped out by this, but then together

1062
01:01:16,600 --> 01:01:20,000
Speaker 1: he and Nenelia Uh, they decide to flee the station.

1063
01:01:20,080 --> 01:01:23,000
Speaker 1: So they break out together, and in this scene they

1064
01:01:23,000 --> 01:01:27,560
Speaker 1: seem to bond by sharing scientific and anthropological facts about

1065
01:01:27,560 --> 01:01:31,040
Speaker 1: other planets in the galaxy. They like bond over learning.

1066
01:01:31,600 --> 01:01:34,280
Speaker 1: I have to say, this whole sequence to reminded me

1067
01:01:34,320 --> 01:01:36,480
Speaker 1: a lot of Logan's Run. It had a real Logan's

1068
01:01:36,520 --> 01:01:39,480
Speaker 1: Run kind of feel to it. Yeah. But now, of

1069
01:01:39,520 --> 01:01:42,080
Speaker 1: course this is sort of our first recruit. Nonelia is

1070
01:01:42,120 --> 01:01:44,600
Speaker 1: now on board for the cause of protecting a cure,

1071
01:01:45,000 --> 01:01:47,240
Speaker 1: and they're gonna split up and both go try to

1072
01:01:47,240 --> 01:01:51,720
Speaker 1: recruit mercenaries, right right. So, on the quest to recruit mercenaries,

1073
01:01:51,760 --> 01:01:55,320
Speaker 1: he has so far recruited uh. This this one woman

1074
01:01:55,360 --> 01:01:58,320
Speaker 1: who has no combat experience that we know of, but

1075
01:01:58,400 --> 01:02:01,040
Speaker 1: she has like, uh, that's true, but she has like

1076
01:02:01,080 --> 01:02:05,120
Speaker 1: scientific technical she can like do stuff with androids, though

1077
01:02:05,120 --> 01:02:07,640
Speaker 1: I don't recall if she ever does anymore in the movie,

1078
01:02:08,200 --> 01:02:10,840
Speaker 1: but they're prepared just in case that comes up. Yeah,

1079
01:02:11,240 --> 01:02:13,080
Speaker 1: of course they are going to fall in love because

1080
01:02:13,120 --> 01:02:16,000
Speaker 1: of course, um and in the sequence there are also

1081
01:02:16,320 --> 01:02:19,080
Speaker 1: there are several really funny moments. One of them that

1082
01:02:19,160 --> 01:02:21,520
Speaker 1: made me laugh out loud was the scenes of them

1083
01:02:21,640 --> 01:02:25,680
Speaker 1: riding around on these carts in the space station, because like,

1084
01:02:25,760 --> 01:02:28,960
Speaker 1: the cart will seat too. It's like Chad and Nenelia

1085
01:02:29,080 --> 01:02:31,120
Speaker 1: sitting next to each other on a love seat on

1086
01:02:31,160 --> 01:02:34,480
Speaker 1: a cart, and the carts are extremely slow and they're

1087
01:02:34,520 --> 01:02:46,720
Speaker 1: almost as wide as the hallway they're in. Now, I

1088
01:02:46,760 --> 01:02:48,959
Speaker 1: think a lot of the fun in seven Samurai type

1089
01:02:49,000 --> 01:02:51,800
Speaker 1: movies is the rounding up of the gang, right, you know,

1090
01:02:51,840 --> 01:02:53,880
Speaker 1: you gotta pick all the mercenarias who are going to

1091
01:02:53,920 --> 01:02:56,320
Speaker 1: come back and help protect the village. So I guess

1092
01:02:56,360 --> 01:02:59,240
Speaker 1: we should talk a bit about each of the recruits.

1093
01:02:59,680 --> 01:03:04,440
Speaker 1: Now we've already mentioned Cowboy played by George Poppard. How

1094
01:03:04,480 --> 01:03:07,840
Speaker 1: exactly is he recruited? Well, Shad like runs up on

1095
01:03:08,000 --> 01:03:11,280
Speaker 1: his spaceship as he's being attacked by pirates, and the

1096
01:03:11,400 --> 01:03:14,840
Speaker 1: question is should Chad intervene and blast the pirates. He

1097
01:03:14,920 --> 01:03:17,919
Speaker 1: again says the var to prohibits taking life, and then

1098
01:03:17,920 --> 01:03:20,360
Speaker 1: Nell says ah, but the Varda says we can take

1099
01:03:20,440 --> 01:03:24,439
Speaker 1: life to save life, and then he hesitates, but Nell

1100
01:03:24,640 --> 01:03:27,240
Speaker 1: blasts on his behalf. So they blow up the pirates

1101
01:03:27,720 --> 01:03:31,240
Speaker 1: and and it turns out they've saved this guy named Cowboy.

1102
01:03:31,840 --> 01:03:34,280
Speaker 1: Uh So, as we said earlier, this is a space

1103
01:03:34,320 --> 01:03:37,880
Speaker 1: trucker who loves watching old Western movies. Uh he has

1104
01:03:37,960 --> 01:03:41,080
Speaker 1: much experience fighting. And then Shad asks him, hey, well

1105
01:03:41,160 --> 01:03:44,080
Speaker 1: then will you fight for us? Well, Cowboy says there's

1106
01:03:44,080 --> 01:03:46,120
Speaker 1: a problem with that. He says, you're fighting sad Or,

1107
01:03:46,240 --> 01:03:49,160
Speaker 1: and sad Or never loses and never quit, so fighting

1108
01:03:49,160 --> 01:03:51,440
Speaker 1: on your side, that's that's a losing game. I'm not

1109
01:03:51,480 --> 01:03:55,360
Speaker 1: going to do it. But then suddenly Nell shares a

1110
01:03:55,440 --> 01:03:58,960
Speaker 1: video feed of a totally different planet somewhere else where.

1111
01:03:59,240 --> 01:04:04,080
Speaker 1: I guess they have of refused Saydor's uh ultimatum, and

1112
01:04:04,120 --> 01:04:06,960
Speaker 1: then Saydor just blows up the planet. He vaporizes it

1113
01:04:07,000 --> 01:04:09,880
Speaker 1: with his stellar converter, and as luck would have it,

1114
01:04:10,200 --> 01:04:13,200
Speaker 1: that planet that just got blowed up, that was where

1115
01:04:13,360 --> 01:04:17,320
Speaker 1: Cowboys buyer was stationed, so he's he can't take his

1116
01:04:17,320 --> 01:04:20,720
Speaker 1: his cargo anymore. And what he was transporting just happens

1117
01:04:20,720 --> 01:04:24,080
Speaker 1: to be blasters, so Shadows like, yes, we need those,

1118
01:04:24,120 --> 01:04:27,280
Speaker 1: take them to my planet, and so Cowboy agrees. So

1119
01:04:27,680 --> 01:04:31,120
Speaker 1: he wasn't interested in doing good until it messed up

1120
01:04:31,160 --> 01:04:34,960
Speaker 1: with his arms deal. So he's like, no, it's personal.

1121
01:04:35,920 --> 01:04:39,920
Speaker 1: Can't stand now. It's he's taken it too personal. Um

1122
01:04:39,960 --> 01:04:43,120
Speaker 1: and Cowboy. There's so much weirdness about Cowboy. One thing

1123
01:04:43,160 --> 01:04:46,800
Speaker 1: that I was like, what, I guess it? I don't know,

1124
01:04:46,960 --> 01:04:49,400
Speaker 1: So he there's one part where I think he has

1125
01:04:49,440 --> 01:04:52,600
Speaker 1: a Confederate flag on the side of his spaceship. There

1126
01:04:52,720 --> 01:04:55,600
Speaker 1: is definitely a Confederate flag blaster to the side of

1127
01:04:55,640 --> 01:04:59,000
Speaker 1: his spaceship. I'm not sure what the significance of that,

1128
01:04:59,240 --> 01:05:02,120
Speaker 1: thousands of years into the future is supposed to be,

1129
01:05:02,200 --> 01:05:07,920
Speaker 1: but weird choice to say the least. Uh. Cowboys belt buckle,

1130
01:05:08,000 --> 01:05:11,560
Speaker 1: though in a more charming touch, includes a Scotch and

1131
01:05:11,600 --> 01:05:15,320
Speaker 1: soda dispenser. So he literally like puts a glass under

1132
01:05:15,320 --> 01:05:19,160
Speaker 1: his belt buckle and you hear like a water sound,

1133
01:05:19,480 --> 01:05:21,680
Speaker 1: and it's like whiskey or soda coming out of it,

1134
01:05:21,720 --> 01:05:23,760
Speaker 1: And I think he can also plink down cubes of

1135
01:05:23,800 --> 01:05:25,919
Speaker 1: ice from his put buckle. Yeah he can do. Yeah,

1136
01:05:25,960 --> 01:05:28,600
Speaker 1: the ice, the soda, and the whiskey all three come

1137
01:05:28,600 --> 01:05:31,640
Speaker 1: out of the belt buckle on And so I guess

1138
01:05:31,640 --> 01:05:34,040
Speaker 1: we're to leave. We're led to believe this is just

1139
01:05:34,080 --> 01:05:37,720
Speaker 1: a fancy bit of technology that allows him to drink constantly.

1140
01:05:37,960 --> 01:05:41,080
Speaker 1: But I also wonder what if what if Cowboys no

1141
01:05:41,160 --> 01:05:44,640
Speaker 1: longer human? And uh and this is him just simply

1142
01:05:44,680 --> 01:05:49,200
Speaker 1: recycling the ice cubes, soda and uh and and whiskey

1143
01:05:49,360 --> 01:05:52,280
Speaker 1: that he actually can't can't really process. It just comes

1144
01:05:52,320 --> 01:05:54,920
Speaker 1: back out again into the cup. Oh, he's like a fountain,

1145
01:05:55,040 --> 01:05:56,960
Speaker 1: you know, it goes down and then it like shoots

1146
01:05:56,960 --> 01:06:00,200
Speaker 1: back out. Yeah no, no, but then no, he's just

1147
01:06:00,240 --> 01:06:02,120
Speaker 1: supposed to be on Earth. Dude on Earth dude who

1148
01:06:02,160 --> 01:06:06,160
Speaker 1: drinks and smokes and again little else. Uh. Thinking back

1149
01:06:06,200 --> 01:06:07,760
Speaker 1: on it, it's hard for me to remember what he

1150
01:06:07,800 --> 01:06:12,280
Speaker 1: truly contributed to the film, except for the occasional bursts

1151
01:06:12,360 --> 01:06:16,360
Speaker 1: of comic relief and hooking everyone up with blasters. Well,

1152
01:06:16,360 --> 01:06:19,880
Speaker 1: in the final battle, he shows the he he plans

1153
01:06:20,000 --> 01:06:24,080
Speaker 1: the ground defense, so he helps them like defend the

1154
01:06:24,120 --> 01:06:26,480
Speaker 1: trenches they dig on the planet's surface. So there's like

1155
01:06:26,520 --> 01:06:29,760
Speaker 1: spaceship battles and battles on the ground with Sador's troops

1156
01:06:30,320 --> 01:06:32,920
Speaker 1: and he he helps them defend on the ground. Oh

1157
01:06:32,960 --> 01:06:35,800
Speaker 1: and then there's one part where Shad is talking to

1158
01:06:35,880 --> 01:06:39,160
Speaker 1: cowboy and cowboys smoking a cigarette and Chad says, is

1159
01:06:39,200 --> 01:06:42,400
Speaker 1: that real smoke you're putting in your lungs? And cowboys

1160
01:06:42,480 --> 01:06:46,040
Speaker 1: like yep, and it's not good for you. And then

1161
01:06:46,160 --> 01:06:48,960
Speaker 1: Chad says, I don't think you should do it. A

1162
01:06:49,040 --> 01:06:54,120
Speaker 1: little anti smoking message. Okay, next recruit, how about how

1163
01:06:54,120 --> 01:06:59,040
Speaker 1: about a lizard guy? Do we want to Uh? This

1164
01:06:59,200 --> 01:07:02,440
Speaker 1: is Cayman of the Lambda Zone h as as well

1165
01:07:02,520 --> 01:07:06,480
Speaker 1: as a few other allies portrayed by Morgan Woodward. So uh,

1166
01:07:06,640 --> 01:07:10,440
Speaker 1: this is a fighter recruited by Ninelia. This again, this

1167
01:07:10,480 --> 01:07:14,440
Speaker 1: recruitment happens sort of by accidents. So Nnelia is captured

1168
01:07:14,480 --> 01:07:18,160
Speaker 1: by this boss like lizard man named Caman, who seems

1169
01:07:18,160 --> 01:07:21,880
Speaker 1: to be planning to sell her like as as as

1170
01:07:22,040 --> 01:07:25,400
Speaker 1: meat to an alien butcher shop. I think, um, but

1171
01:07:25,480 --> 01:07:28,840
Speaker 1: then she's like, you're heartless, just like say door And

1172
01:07:28,880 --> 01:07:32,960
Speaker 1: then this was a laugh out loud moment, immediate music sting.

1173
01:07:33,240 --> 01:07:35,200
Speaker 1: He goes say do or say do or of the

1174
01:07:35,240 --> 01:07:38,400
Speaker 1: Melmori and when he finds out there fighting Sador, his

1175
01:07:38,560 --> 01:07:41,600
Speaker 1: tune changes immediately and he's like, I will fight with

1176
01:07:41,640 --> 01:07:45,040
Speaker 1: you because I hate Sedor. Now. Fun fact about Morgan

1177
01:07:45,080 --> 01:07:47,919
Speaker 1: Woodward though I didn't include him in the original line

1178
01:07:47,960 --> 01:07:52,960
Speaker 1: up here, but he through he was on Dallas. But

1179
01:07:53,040 --> 01:07:55,560
Speaker 1: the most notable thing is he's the man with no

1180
01:07:55,720 --> 01:08:00,360
Speaker 1: eyes from nineteen sixty seven's Cool Hand Luke That the

1181
01:08:00,360 --> 01:08:02,840
Speaker 1: the guard with the silver shades that you know for

1182
01:08:02,960 --> 01:08:05,160
Speaker 1: most of the film you you can't see his eyes

1183
01:08:05,200 --> 01:08:07,720
Speaker 1: because of those, and he's kind of this uh you

1184
01:08:07,760 --> 01:08:10,600
Speaker 1: know this, this this very threatening presence in the film,

1185
01:08:11,120 --> 01:08:13,480
Speaker 1: uh that it's rather iconic. You see this reference to

1186
01:08:13,640 --> 01:08:16,280
Speaker 1: later on in the Cohen Brothers, Oh Brother where art

1187
01:08:16,280 --> 01:08:20,559
Speaker 1: thou it has a similar character whose eyes you never see. Yeah,

1188
01:08:20,920 --> 01:08:24,599
Speaker 1: but yes in this lozardman um but the lizard Man

1189
01:08:24,640 --> 01:08:27,479
Speaker 1: also comes with buddies. He has He has a blonde

1190
01:08:27,600 --> 01:08:30,519
Speaker 1: muscle man who like a lot of times his butts

1191
01:08:30,560 --> 01:08:33,439
Speaker 1: hanging out. He's wearing like like sort of chaps and

1192
01:08:33,520 --> 01:08:36,840
Speaker 1: leather suspenders, and he has a face tattoo. And then

1193
01:08:36,880 --> 01:08:40,679
Speaker 1: there are two creatures with giant bald heads wearing silver suits.

1194
01:08:40,760 --> 01:08:43,240
Speaker 1: They have no ears, and they speak by emitting heat

1195
01:08:43,360 --> 01:08:47,519
Speaker 1: rays that burn people. Yes, those are his public relations

1196
01:08:47,520 --> 01:08:54,760
Speaker 1: guys exactly. Um okay, So next next recruit the Nestor's

1197
01:08:55,000 --> 01:08:58,000
Speaker 1: Nestor one through Nestar five. I think this is Earl

1198
01:08:58,040 --> 01:09:01,559
Speaker 1: Bowen and others. Uh. This is once again just like

1199
01:09:01,600 --> 01:09:05,880
Speaker 1: the last one. It's a recruitment via capture. So Shad

1200
01:09:06,240 --> 01:09:09,360
Speaker 1: is captured in space by a gang of five psychic

1201
01:09:09,439 --> 01:09:12,240
Speaker 1: clones who are dressed in white robes and look like

1202
01:09:12,280 --> 01:09:15,320
Speaker 1: a cross between the Brain guy and old Man Gary

1203
01:09:15,320 --> 01:09:21,040
Speaker 1: old Man Dracula with the uh so Shad. When they

1204
01:09:21,080 --> 01:09:23,759
Speaker 1: capture him, they bring him onto their ship. Chad points

1205
01:09:23,760 --> 01:09:26,400
Speaker 1: a blaster at them, but then they psychically force him

1206
01:09:26,400 --> 01:09:28,759
Speaker 1: to point it at himself, and he's like, my mistake.

1207
01:09:29,479 --> 01:09:32,280
Speaker 1: And then they say, oh, it's okay. We know you're

1208
01:09:32,320 --> 01:09:35,120
Speaker 1: not of a violent form. We've scanned everything you're doing.

1209
01:09:35,160 --> 01:09:38,439
Speaker 1: We scan everything, we scan all uh, and we've been

1210
01:09:38,479 --> 01:09:41,120
Speaker 1: brain scanning you from the astral plane and know all

1211
01:09:41,120 --> 01:09:43,559
Speaker 1: about your quest for mercenaries and well we want to

1212
01:09:43,640 --> 01:09:46,559
Speaker 1: join uh. And of course Shadows so like, well, we

1213
01:09:46,560 --> 01:09:48,720
Speaker 1: don't have any money, we can't pay you and they say,

1214
01:09:48,720 --> 01:09:51,920
Speaker 1: no need, We're self sufficient. We are nest store. So

1215
01:09:51,960 --> 01:09:54,960
Speaker 1: they explained that they are a group of clones of

1216
01:09:55,000 --> 01:09:59,400
Speaker 1: a species that are all that all have one unitary

1217
01:09:59,479 --> 01:10:03,559
Speaker 1: shared consciousness. But there's a problem with having a unitary

1218
01:10:03,600 --> 01:10:06,400
Speaker 1: shared consciousness, which is that life can become very dull.

1219
01:10:07,000 --> 01:10:09,439
Speaker 1: And it turns out they have to seek adventure in

1220
01:10:09,560 --> 01:10:13,080
Speaker 1: order to avoid being literally bored to death. We also

1221
01:10:13,160 --> 01:10:16,040
Speaker 1: find out that they have no tolerance for pain. Like

1222
01:10:16,240 --> 01:10:19,400
Speaker 1: basically you said the word pain, they've already had too much.

1223
01:10:20,080 --> 01:10:22,880
Speaker 1: And you know what, I thought this was Actually so

1224
01:10:22,920 --> 01:10:26,280
Speaker 1: this movie is fun, not much about it as thought provoking,

1225
01:10:26,800 --> 01:10:29,320
Speaker 1: but weirdly half of these characters kind of were. Okay,

1226
01:10:29,360 --> 01:10:32,680
Speaker 1: So the idea of uh, sort of individual drones of

1227
01:10:32,720 --> 01:10:36,720
Speaker 1: a species that have a constant, a synchronous shared consciousness

1228
01:10:36,760 --> 01:10:40,680
Speaker 1: throughout the galaxy. They cannot become bored. They have to

1229
01:10:40,720 --> 01:10:45,360
Speaker 1: be constantly stimulated, and they cannot bear pain, I guess

1230
01:10:45,439 --> 01:10:48,920
Speaker 1: because that would like share both of those states with

1231
01:10:49,000 --> 01:10:52,040
Speaker 1: all of them throughout the galaxy. So they have to

1232
01:10:52,040 --> 01:10:57,320
Speaker 1: be constantly like stimulated with interesting stuff and and never

1233
01:10:57,439 --> 01:10:59,760
Speaker 1: in pain. And I was like, wow, that's okay. You

1234
01:10:59,800 --> 01:11:02,519
Speaker 1: can like write a really interesting story about that. I

1235
01:11:02,560 --> 01:11:06,200
Speaker 1: felt like they were the most interesting characters that we

1236
01:11:06,280 --> 01:11:08,840
Speaker 1: encounter in the film, and they get two things that

1237
01:11:08,880 --> 01:11:10,880
Speaker 1: are great. They get I think one of the best

1238
01:11:10,880 --> 01:11:13,680
Speaker 1: comedic scenes in the film when they try to eat

1239
01:11:13,680 --> 01:11:15,479
Speaker 1: a hot dog. I mean, well, they don't just try,

1240
01:11:15,520 --> 01:11:18,280
Speaker 1: they succeed and they have feedback on hot dogs. And

1241
01:11:18,320 --> 01:11:20,639
Speaker 1: then they also have a really fun and I thought

1242
01:11:20,680 --> 01:11:24,920
Speaker 1: creative assassination attempt on say door tell the hot dog

1243
01:11:24,960 --> 01:11:27,720
Speaker 1: scenes story cowboys eating a hot dog. Cowboys eating a

1244
01:11:27,720 --> 01:11:30,320
Speaker 1: hot dog and um, I can't remember if he offers

1245
01:11:30,360 --> 01:11:32,120
Speaker 1: the hot dog or they're like, what's that? Can we

1246
01:11:32,160 --> 01:11:34,479
Speaker 1: try that? And then you write hot dog gets handed

1247
01:11:34,479 --> 01:11:36,519
Speaker 1: off to the next doors and we get a fun,

1248
01:11:36,640 --> 01:11:39,599
Speaker 1: just visual gag where one of them is of course

1249
01:11:40,000 --> 01:11:41,840
Speaker 1: holding up the hot dog and taking a bite out

1250
01:11:41,880 --> 01:11:44,759
Speaker 1: of it, but all four of the heads are chewing

1251
01:11:45,240 --> 01:11:48,639
Speaker 1: and experiencing the hot dog. They then give a readout

1252
01:11:48,720 --> 01:11:52,000
Speaker 1: on all the ingredients and if I remember correctly, none

1253
01:11:52,040 --> 01:11:54,160
Speaker 1: of the ingredients are met right. No, it's all just

1254
01:11:54,240 --> 01:11:57,800
Speaker 1: like soy proteins and then names of chemicals, and then

1255
01:11:57,920 --> 01:12:02,519
Speaker 1: cowboys like on Earth, that's what we all meat. So

1256
01:12:02,600 --> 01:12:04,479
Speaker 1: I enjoyed that. I thought like, okay that I think

1257
01:12:04,479 --> 01:12:08,960
Speaker 1: this scene landed like it was supposed to. Um. But yeah,

1258
01:12:08,960 --> 01:12:12,720
Speaker 1: then they also have this this wonderful kind of complicated

1259
01:12:12,840 --> 01:12:17,040
Speaker 1: and and uh surprising assassination attempt on sad Or where

1260
01:12:17,080 --> 01:12:19,639
Speaker 1: one of them is captured. They allow one of them,

1261
01:12:19,680 --> 01:12:22,600
Speaker 1: their their clones, to be captured by sad Or. What

1262
01:12:22,720 --> 01:12:24,240
Speaker 1: sad Or are going to do? Well, he's of course

1263
01:12:24,280 --> 01:12:27,200
Speaker 1: going to torture said clone. Uh. This is where we

1264
01:12:27,240 --> 01:12:31,800
Speaker 1: get that line about about the his his doctor is

1265
01:12:32,120 --> 01:12:37,120
Speaker 1: expert at inflicting pain and uh, and so they torture

1266
01:12:37,160 --> 01:12:39,760
Speaker 1: him to death rather quickly. But then sate Or is like,

1267
01:12:40,000 --> 01:12:42,160
Speaker 1: that's a pretty good arm. Let's go ahead and put

1268
01:12:42,160 --> 01:12:44,840
Speaker 1: that on my body. They do. His doctor does that,

1269
01:12:44,920 --> 01:12:46,600
Speaker 1: and he's like trying it out. You know, it's like

1270
01:12:46,800 --> 01:12:49,760
Speaker 1: it's got good reached, good muscle. He's only got these

1271
01:12:49,760 --> 01:12:51,280
Speaker 1: it's got a weird number of fingers. Will have to

1272
01:12:51,320 --> 01:12:53,839
Speaker 1: fix that later. But you know they're not, they too concerned.

1273
01:12:54,000 --> 01:12:56,120
Speaker 1: But then what did the Nestor start doing. They start

1274
01:12:56,160 --> 01:13:00,240
Speaker 1: controlling the arm and trying to like like cut state

1275
01:13:00,280 --> 01:13:04,639
Speaker 1: wars throat with his own hand. Uh, it's narrowly able

1276
01:13:04,680 --> 01:13:06,800
Speaker 1: to stop them and cut the arm. Off with a

1277
01:13:06,800 --> 01:13:10,439
Speaker 1: crystal chainsaw. It was a great sequence. I loved it. Yeah,

1278
01:13:10,640 --> 01:13:14,040
Speaker 1: really good. Okay, I gotta mention a couple more recruitments

1279
01:13:14,040 --> 01:13:16,400
Speaker 1: before we wrap up. So one is guilt Robert Vaughan.

1280
01:13:16,479 --> 01:13:18,920
Speaker 1: We're back to Robert Vaughan, and I gotta say the

1281
01:13:18,960 --> 01:13:23,280
Speaker 1: planet where they pick up gelt looks awesome. Mountain spires

1282
01:13:23,320 --> 01:13:25,519
Speaker 1: made out of rocks that look kind of like veins,

1283
01:13:25,760 --> 01:13:29,160
Speaker 1: dark skies and lightning. This is like lv f s

1284
01:13:29,360 --> 01:13:33,479
Speaker 1: from Alien. It's beautiful. It's uh. I feel like I

1285
01:13:33,479 --> 01:13:37,000
Speaker 1: I detect some Cameron influence here, though I guess I

1286
01:13:37,000 --> 01:13:39,920
Speaker 1: can't be sure. Um, But to describe the set up

1287
01:13:39,960 --> 01:13:42,760
Speaker 1: to the scene, we're being set up as if the

1288
01:13:42,800 --> 01:13:45,960
Speaker 1: next stop for Shad is going to contain the most

1289
01:13:46,120 --> 01:13:50,360
Speaker 1: icely Cantina scene because he's headed to a wretched hive

1290
01:13:50,400 --> 01:13:52,760
Speaker 1: of scum and villany full of the best mercenaries in

1291
01:13:52,800 --> 01:13:55,760
Speaker 1: the galaxy. So you think that's what you're getting, you know,

1292
01:13:55,880 --> 01:13:58,080
Speaker 1: bar full of criminals and he's gonna have to you know,

1293
01:13:58,160 --> 01:14:01,200
Speaker 1: recruit one of them. But in a twist, when he

1294
01:14:01,240 --> 01:14:05,360
Speaker 1: gets there, there's nobody there. It's like this abandoned underground

1295
01:14:05,479 --> 01:14:07,800
Speaker 1: bunker that looks like it used to be kind of

1296
01:14:07,800 --> 01:14:10,640
Speaker 1: a pleasure palace. Yeah, that's right, and there's there's no

1297
01:14:10,680 --> 01:14:14,439
Speaker 1: one else here we encountered guilt, and guilt is just

1298
01:14:14,680 --> 01:14:18,240
Speaker 1: he's the only living human, only living being left. He's

1299
01:14:18,280 --> 01:14:22,519
Speaker 1: there with all his treasures, all his ill gotten gains.

1300
01:14:22,520 --> 01:14:25,160
Speaker 1: But he's like, clearly he has nothing to do. He's

1301
01:14:25,200 --> 01:14:28,320
Speaker 1: just he's he's like a prisoner in his own golden

1302
01:14:28,360 --> 01:14:31,559
Speaker 1: cell here. Right. He explains in a twist that all

1303
01:14:31,600 --> 01:14:35,600
Speaker 1: the planets the galaxy bound together and created a defense alliance,

1304
01:14:36,000 --> 01:14:38,720
Speaker 1: which they used to wipe out all of the mercenaries

1305
01:14:38,760 --> 01:14:42,000
Speaker 1: and criminals on this planet, and only guilt is left.

1306
01:14:42,040 --> 01:14:45,520
Speaker 1: He says, there's nothing left but me in the lower forms,

1307
01:14:46,200 --> 01:14:48,120
Speaker 1: and then he says there's a bounty on his head

1308
01:14:48,280 --> 01:14:51,360
Speaker 1: on every planet in the galaxy. So he's he's in

1309
01:14:51,400 --> 01:14:54,679
Speaker 1: this Catch twenty two. He has wealth and he has

1310
01:14:54,720 --> 01:14:57,599
Speaker 1: like he's he's got all this treasure for himself, but

1311
01:14:57,680 --> 01:14:59,920
Speaker 1: nowhere he can spend it, and no where he can go,

1312
01:15:00,000 --> 01:15:02,360
Speaker 1: oh know where he can rest. Yeah, and there's this

1313
01:15:02,400 --> 01:15:04,760
Speaker 1: wonderful shot. There's a lot of screen shots of this

1314
01:15:05,080 --> 01:15:08,120
Speaker 1: on the internet, but he's seated at this throne and yeah,

1315
01:15:08,160 --> 01:15:10,360
Speaker 1: you see all of his treasure chest around him, and

1316
01:15:10,400 --> 01:15:13,600
Speaker 1: it's gloriously lit. He's got this kind of stylish outfit on.

1317
01:15:13,680 --> 01:15:17,439
Speaker 1: He's got his laser blaster out um. And oh and

1318
01:15:17,479 --> 01:15:20,160
Speaker 1: the throne that he's seated upon, it has these two

1319
01:15:20,240 --> 01:15:23,960
Speaker 1: cherubs built into it and they're holding a crown and

1320
01:15:23,960 --> 01:15:26,160
Speaker 1: it's as if they are they are holding the crown

1321
01:15:26,240 --> 01:15:28,720
Speaker 1: over his head or lowering it onto his head. It's

1322
01:15:28,760 --> 01:15:31,760
Speaker 1: just this wonderful shot. It's great. And so of course

1323
01:15:31,800 --> 01:15:35,040
Speaker 1: he ends up getting recruited because mainly because on a

1324
01:15:35,160 --> 01:15:37,439
Speaker 1: keer he can rest. It's a place where there's not

1325
01:15:37,520 --> 01:15:39,439
Speaker 1: a bounty on his head, so he can go there.

1326
01:15:40,120 --> 01:15:42,479
Speaker 1: Uh So, so that's what he does. But I wanted

1327
01:15:42,479 --> 01:15:46,240
Speaker 1: to say about Robert Vaughan's performance in this movie. It's

1328
01:15:46,240 --> 01:15:48,880
Speaker 1: actually kind of interesting the way he plays the character

1329
01:15:48,880 --> 01:15:51,800
Speaker 1: and what he does with his body. For example, uh,

1330
01:15:52,120 --> 01:15:56,519
Speaker 1: Guilt never moves his head, really, he only moves his eyes.

1331
01:15:56,640 --> 01:15:59,599
Speaker 1: There are scenes of him talking and scenes of him

1332
01:15:59,760 --> 01:16:03,880
Speaker 1: like in battle, piloting his spaceship, and he almost never

1333
01:16:03,960 --> 01:16:06,880
Speaker 1: moves his head at all, is completely still. He just

1334
01:16:07,040 --> 01:16:09,680
Speaker 1: you see his eyes going back and forth, and that

1335
01:16:09,720 --> 01:16:15,439
Speaker 1: creates a kind of reptilian quality that really works. Yeah,

1336
01:16:15,520 --> 01:16:18,320
Speaker 1: even though he is he's not the reptile man. Yeah,

1337
01:16:19,040 --> 01:16:22,040
Speaker 1: the Mercenary gang here. But but yeah, that's that's a

1338
01:16:22,080 --> 01:16:25,160
Speaker 1: good point about the particulars of his performance when one wonders,

1339
01:16:25,280 --> 01:16:27,519
Speaker 1: was that a like a choice that he made or

1340
01:16:27,560 --> 01:16:31,080
Speaker 1: did he have just did you have Frankenstein neck during Yeah,

1341
01:16:32,040 --> 01:16:34,519
Speaker 1: and just you know, ended up using it? Uh at

1342
01:16:34,520 --> 01:16:36,839
Speaker 1: any rate? Uh? Yeah, I really, I really like his performance.

1343
01:16:36,880 --> 01:16:38,559
Speaker 1: And I have to say I was not expecting to

1344
01:16:38,600 --> 01:16:41,080
Speaker 1: like his performance. I was expecting it to be a

1345
01:16:41,200 --> 01:16:43,200
Speaker 1: lot more phoned in than this, but it was. It

1346
01:16:43,280 --> 01:16:47,040
Speaker 1: was fun. Okay, one last Mercenary It is st x

1347
01:16:47,080 --> 01:16:50,839
Speaker 1: Men played by Sybil Danning. So we meet her because

1348
01:16:51,040 --> 01:16:54,920
Speaker 1: she starts she basically she's harassing chads ship in space.

1349
01:16:54,960 --> 01:16:59,000
Speaker 1: She's like zipping around taunting him, shooting blanks at him,

1350
01:16:59,400 --> 01:17:02,920
Speaker 1: and he hit her because she's moving too fast. Uh.

1351
01:17:02,960 --> 01:17:05,200
Speaker 1: And then she finally explains, like, it has been great

1352
01:17:05,200 --> 01:17:07,960
Speaker 1: fun jousting with you. I want to join your mission.

1353
01:17:08,439 --> 01:17:11,719
Speaker 1: I'm part of a warrior culture. We must fight. And

1354
01:17:11,960 --> 01:17:16,479
Speaker 1: shadd is just infinitely annoyed with her at times. Yeah,

1355
01:17:16,520 --> 01:17:20,479
Speaker 1: she's just constantly coming on to him and he's he's

1356
01:17:20,520 --> 01:17:23,600
Speaker 1: basically like, this is inappropriate. You should not be doing this.

1357
01:17:24,760 --> 01:17:27,760
Speaker 1: I am not interested. I already have a space girlfriend

1358
01:17:27,920 --> 01:17:32,240
Speaker 1: and I find you incredibly irritating. But she's just like,

1359
01:17:32,280 --> 01:17:36,519
Speaker 1: but I want to fight. And of course the rest

1360
01:17:36,520 --> 01:17:39,200
Speaker 1: of the structure is somewhat predictable. You know, the mercenaries

1361
01:17:39,560 --> 01:17:42,519
Speaker 1: gathered together, they gathered for battle against Sedor, and they

1362
01:17:42,560 --> 01:17:46,479
Speaker 1: all contribute in various ways to the effort. But all

1363
01:17:46,560 --> 01:17:49,880
Speaker 1: of the I think, do all of the mercenaries get

1364
01:17:49,880 --> 01:17:53,920
Speaker 1: slain in battle except maybe Cowboy? Does Cowboys survive? I

1365
01:17:53,960 --> 01:17:57,000
Speaker 1: thought he bought it too. But this is kind of

1366
01:17:57,120 --> 01:17:59,520
Speaker 1: this is the model, right, Like they all have to

1367
01:17:59,080 --> 01:18:03,200
Speaker 1: to pare it, well, not all of the most of them.

1368
01:18:03,479 --> 01:18:06,439
Speaker 1: But eventually the young heroes Chat and Anilia they have

1369
01:18:06,520 --> 01:18:08,840
Speaker 1: to save the day. They're flying around and nail the

1370
01:18:08,880 --> 01:18:11,439
Speaker 1: spaceship and they got to save the day in the end,

1371
01:18:11,960 --> 01:18:13,519
Speaker 1: and it's kind of like, you know, you get something

1372
01:18:13,680 --> 01:18:16,000
Speaker 1: kind of similar to the trench run scene in Star Wars.

1373
01:18:16,320 --> 01:18:20,240
Speaker 1: The Stellar Converter is U is destroyed. The ship is destroyed.

1374
01:18:20,840 --> 01:18:22,960
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, we we don't have to endure some sort

1375
01:18:23,000 --> 01:18:26,959
Speaker 1: of a lightsaber knockoff battle, which was nice. Yeah, does

1376
01:18:27,080 --> 01:18:29,639
Speaker 1: anybody fight hand to hand with sad Or. I don't

1377
01:18:29,640 --> 01:18:31,880
Speaker 1: recall that. I don't think it happens now. He's just

1378
01:18:31,920 --> 01:18:33,599
Speaker 1: like a straight I guess he's more in the mold

1379
01:18:33,640 --> 01:18:36,240
Speaker 1: of Peter Cushing in that regard. Yeah, they just blow

1380
01:18:36,320 --> 01:18:38,880
Speaker 1: up the ship and he's there. Yeah, it's more and

1381
01:18:38,920 --> 01:18:40,960
Speaker 1: more like them. Off. Well, there's a ton more that

1382
01:18:41,000 --> 01:18:42,800
Speaker 1: happens in the movie that we we did not have

1383
01:18:42,880 --> 01:18:44,920
Speaker 1: time to get into. But Rob, I have greatly enjoyed

1384
01:18:44,920 --> 01:18:47,360
Speaker 1: talking about Battle Beyond the Stars with you. Yeah, this

1385
01:18:47,400 --> 01:18:49,960
Speaker 1: is this is a fun one. Uh, just just a

1386
01:18:49,960 --> 01:18:52,439
Speaker 1: fun flick. I again, I don't know if it's more

1387
01:18:52,520 --> 01:18:56,439
Speaker 1: fun than than Empire Strikes Back, but but fair enough,

1388
01:18:56,600 --> 01:18:58,720
Speaker 1: it's a really fun film. And I can i if

1389
01:18:58,720 --> 01:19:02,040
Speaker 1: someone likes this more than Empire than more power to them. Uh.

1390
01:19:02,640 --> 01:19:04,680
Speaker 1: We we we need films in our lives there that

1391
01:19:04,760 --> 01:19:11,479
Speaker 1: are dis enjoyable, better, more fun, more fun than Seven Samurai. Yeah, yeah,

1392
01:19:11,479 --> 01:19:14,439
Speaker 1: I would say that, I would say that, of course

1393
01:19:15,360 --> 01:19:19,439
Speaker 1: I would. I think since seven Samurai better film, Battle

1394
01:19:19,479 --> 01:19:24,800
Speaker 1: Beyond the Stars more fun for me, and certainly yeah,

1395
01:19:25,160 --> 01:19:28,960
Speaker 1: lower investment. It's not as long and it's not as serious. Okay,

1396
01:19:29,200 --> 01:19:30,840
Speaker 1: I've I've reached the point in my life we have

1397
01:19:30,880 --> 01:19:34,160
Speaker 1: to realize, am I gonna watch Seven Samurai again? Probably? Not?

1398
01:19:34,439 --> 01:19:36,800
Speaker 1: Am I gonna watch Battle Beyond the Stars again? Yeah,

1399
01:19:37,000 --> 01:19:42,160
Speaker 1: it's probably gonna happen. Sorry, I don't know. If you

1400
01:19:42,360 --> 01:19:45,160
Speaker 1: make time for seven Samurai. It's a very rewarding experience.

1401
01:19:45,160 --> 01:19:46,599
Speaker 1: It's a it's a great film. I mean, I love

1402
01:19:46,600 --> 01:19:49,320
Speaker 1: the karat Karrosawa. I I can envision myself going through

1403
01:19:49,360 --> 01:19:52,760
Speaker 1: a Curasawa phase where I like suddenly have to get

1404
01:19:52,760 --> 01:19:55,519
Speaker 1: back into all these films. But uh, yeah, there's some

1405
01:19:55,560 --> 01:19:58,439
Speaker 1: great stuff. Throwing a blood? Who throwing a blood is good?

1406
01:19:59,080 --> 01:20:01,000
Speaker 1: All right, Well we're gonna go ahead and close it

1407
01:20:01,080 --> 01:20:04,320
Speaker 1: out here, but as always, right into us, let us

1408
01:20:04,360 --> 01:20:08,439
Speaker 1: know what you think about Battle Beyond the Stars various

1409
01:20:08,479 --> 01:20:12,000
Speaker 1: other Star Wars knockoffs as well. We would love to

1410
01:20:12,000 --> 01:20:15,320
Speaker 1: hear from everyone out there. In the meantime, we'll remind

1411
01:20:15,320 --> 01:20:17,680
Speaker 1: you that, yes, Weird How Cinema publishes every Friday and

1412
01:20:17,680 --> 01:20:20,240
Speaker 1: the Stuff to Blow your Mind podcast feed were primarily

1413
01:20:20,280 --> 01:20:23,160
Speaker 1: a science podcast, but on Friday's we put most of

1414
01:20:23,200 --> 01:20:25,640
Speaker 1: that aside and we just talk about a weird film.

1415
01:20:26,040 --> 01:20:30,360
Speaker 1: I blog about these episodes at Samuta music dot com.

1416
01:20:30,920 --> 01:20:32,960
Speaker 1: Uh you can go there for a blog post about

1417
01:20:33,040 --> 01:20:35,280
Speaker 1: this movie. I also did a blog post about that

1418
01:20:36,000 --> 01:20:39,360
Speaker 1: name of the Rose score from from Horner. Check that

1419
01:20:39,439 --> 01:20:41,800
Speaker 1: out if you would like. Also, we have a letterboxed

1420
01:20:41,800 --> 01:20:44,240
Speaker 1: to count I think that's that's pretty much our only

1421
01:20:44,240 --> 01:20:47,400
Speaker 1: active social media account these days, where once a week

1422
01:20:47,439 --> 01:20:49,639
Speaker 1: I go in there and add the film that we've

1423
01:20:49,680 --> 01:20:51,799
Speaker 1: covered to Weird House Cinema or the film we're about

1424
01:20:51,800 --> 01:20:54,960
Speaker 1: to cover onto our list there. So if you want

1425
01:20:55,080 --> 01:20:58,680
Speaker 1: just an easy one, you know, glimpse look at what

1426
01:20:58,720 --> 01:21:01,640
Speaker 1: we've covered in our evering, that's a good place to go.

1427
01:21:02,040 --> 01:21:04,719
Speaker 1: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer Seth

1428
01:21:04,800 --> 01:21:07,240
Speaker 1: Nicholas Johnson. If you would like to get in touch

1429
01:21:07,280 --> 01:21:09,439
Speaker 1: with us with feedback on this episode or any other,

1430
01:21:09,520 --> 01:21:11,880
Speaker 1: to suggest topic for the future, or just to say hello,

1431
01:21:12,000 --> 01:21:14,360
Speaker 1: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow

1432
01:21:14,400 --> 01:21:23,840
Speaker 1: your Mind dot com. Stuff to Blow Your Mind is

1433
01:21:23,880 --> 01:21:26,559
Speaker 1: production of I Heart Radio. For more podcasts for My

1434
01:21:26,600 --> 01:21:29,560
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

1435
01:21:29,600 --> 01:21:31,360
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.