Slaxx, a 2020 Canadian horror comedy, is about a clothing outlet being terrorized by a pair of jeans possessed by the vengeful ghost of a slain sweatshop worker. As that brief description implies, Slaxx is both deeply absurd and highly didactic. It crams a lot of indictments of fast fashion, the retail mindset, and capitalism into its lean 77 minute running time, but also tosses in plenty of slapstick murder gags and broadly awful caricatures getting what's coming to them. Ryan is joined by Cheryl for a breakdown of this low budget sleeper hit. Discussion topics naturally include the socio-political issues that the film is directly addressing in its storytelling, but there's also conversation about how Slaxx chooses to get its message across and whether this is effective. In addition to that, Cheryl and Ryan delve into how Slaxx fits into the framework of horror filmmaking and the traditions it has decided to continue. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Felix the Cat has taken quite a few strange turns since the character's debut in 1919, but the absolute oddest take is arguably the feature film co-produced by a Hungarian and American partnership. Development dragged from 1985 to 1987 and the resulting movie, which inexplicably dropped the character into a high fantasy setting reminiscent of He-Man or Heavy Metal, was released to critical dismissal and tepid box office several years later. This effort was part of an unsuccessful campaign to turn Felix into a heavily-merchandised multimedia sensation like Garfield, Alf, My Little Pony, The Smurfs, or the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Ryan is joined by Sylvan and Cheryl for a dialogue about this fever dream of a feature, something that was a modest yet persistent source of childhood weirdness for all parties. Talking points include the various permutations that Felix went through before the film and since, the deceptively fun platform game released to Nintendo several years after the movie flopped, and why Felix hasn't completely fallen into the public domain despite being created over a hundred years ago. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Loosely adapted from John W. Campbell Jr.'s novella by Howard Hawks' production company, The Thing From Another World was a moderately profitable sci-fi thriller with a surprisingly lengthy reach across pop culture. Its plot points quickly became common tropes in genre filmmaking, its most memorable scenes were widely imitated, and it has gotten several remakes over the course of the past seven decades. Ryan is joined by Rachel, who considers John Carpenter's 1982 remake among her personal favorites. Discussion inevitably leads to a bit of comparison between the Carpenter film and the original, but other topics in the conversation include the movie's ethical skepticism of science, the story's connections to HP Lovecraft, whether or not the movie was shadow-directed by Howard Hawks, and how The Thing From Another World plays into Cold War politics. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Adapted from the French comics series by Jean-Claude Forest and produced by Italian film kingpin Dino De Laurentiis, Barbarella shared cast and crew with Danger: Diabolik and went through a slew of writers (including Terry Southern) before reaching its final form. It's odd to remember that Jane Fonda was far from the first choice for the starring role when one considers how strongly the part looms over her public persona, but even a cursory glance at her vivid, dizzying, salacious, and humorous performance will provide ample evidence as to how Barbarella became an enduring camp classic. Ryan is joined by Sylvan and Cheryl for a thorough examination of this cheesy, sexy, loopy, and unique time capsule of a very specific era in pop culture history. Discussion topics for Barbarella include the nature of consent, Jane Fonda's complex relationship with socio-political issues, how Barbarella reflects attitudes apparent in second wave feminism, Barbarella's thorny interpretation through the lens of sex positivity, and how a modern version of Barbarella might play out. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Developed during the troubled production of The Black Cauldron (1985) and released when Disney was at a very low period, The Great Mouse Detective was a modest success that convinced new CEO Michael Eisner and new chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg that animated features were still a relevant facet of Disney's business strategy. Based upon Eve Titus and Paul Galdone's Basil of Baker Street, The Great Mouse Detective marked the the first major contributions of many figures who'd become instrumental to the Disney Renaissance, not the least of whom would be directors John Musker and Ron Clements; they would pitch The Little Mermaid to Katzenberg shortly after The Great Mouse Detective turned a profit. Ryan is joined by Rachel, Sylvan, and Cheryl for a lively discussion for this product of Disney's most tumultuous rebuilding phase. Topics for this episode include the film's novel embrace of CGI, its roots in the traditions of animation, Disney's rivalry with Don Bluth during this period, and how The Great Mouse Detective fits in with how Sherlock Holmes has been depicted in film and television over the years. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Judy Garland suffered a significant blow to her reputation when, plagued by addiction problems, she was fired from 1950's Annie Get Your Gun and then spent three months in a Boston rehab facility. Summer Stock was conceived by MGM as a comeback vehicle for Garland since it harkened back to the backyard musicals that served as reliable moneymakers for the star throughout the 1940's. Director Charles Walters and romantic lead Gene Kelly considered the goofy and simplistic story to be beneath their ambitious talents, but they both signed on since they admired Garland and wished to help her get her career back on track. MGM's pressure to get Garland to lose weight and jump back into filmmaking so soon after her rehab stint contributed to a nasty relapse, which caused both delays and logistical problems in the making of Summer Stock. The resulting movie was still a modest earner, but Garland was unable to make a commitment to 1951's Royal Wedding and her contract with MGM was soon cancel...
Generally speaking, vintage comedy fans consider the golden era of The Three Stooges to be the shorts made between 1934-1946 with Curly Howard as the third player. However, all things must pass and the group was forced to soldier on after Curly suffered a massive stroke and was rendered unable to perform. His brother Shemp Howard, who was part of the act in its earliest days, was brought in as a temporary pinch hitter and was persuaded to stay when it became clear that Curly was not going to recover. Shemp contributed to dozens of shorts until he died a little under ten years he rejoined the troupe. Ryan is joined by Rachel for this examination of four representational shorts from the Shemp era. Discussion topics include Shemp's days with the Stooges under Ted Healy, his lengthy career as a character actor outside of Stooge films, the differences between Shemp's persona and Curly's, the legacy of the "fake Shemp", the etymology of slapstick, and the impact of Jewish comedy on American cinema. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Based upon Winsor McKay's pioneering comic strip and animated short, Little Nemo: Adventures in Slumberland was a joint production between Japanese and American animation studios that went through almost fifteen years of development hell before it was released to dismissive reviews and indifferent ticket sales in 1989. The roll call of those who worked on the film in some capacity can feel like a list of people who guided children's film for the next thirty years; notable names include Brad Bird, Jerry W. Rees, Brian Froud, Chris Columbus, Osamu Dezaki, Hayao Miyazaki, Andy Gaskill, Roger Allers, Isao Takahata, and many others. While the movie was a flop, it did attract a modest cult audience on home video (a decent pair of video games for the arcade and the NES console didn't hurt either). Ryan is joined by Cheryl for a breakdown of this interesting crossroad in the history of animated film. Discussion topics include the incomplete characterization of the main character, how the visual splendor of McKay's art nouveau-inflected style was translated to the screen, and the general grumpiness of Mickey Rooney. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
Envisioned as an unofficial sequel to the completely unrelated 1986 horror comedy Troll, this infamous turkey was shot in Utah by an Italian schlock factory and was cast with locals with no acting experience. Troll 2 suffered from a variety of technical issues over the course of its production, including (but not limited to) cheap props, little attention paid to continuity, and a crew that didn't speak English and refused to let the actors correct the multitude of grammar and syntax errors in the script. The resulting film was quickly consigned to the dregs of late night cable broadcasts where it was assumed that it'd be quickly forgotten, but Troll 2's bizarre aesthetics and campy performances began to attract a fervent cult audience in the early 2000's. It has since become a staple of ironic midnight screenings alongside other trash cinema "classics" such as The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) and The Room (2003). In 2009, former child actor Michael Stephenson directed Best Worst Movie, a documentary about his experiences on the set of Troll 2. Ryan is joined by Cheryl for a conversation about this oddly memorable artistic failure. Discussion topics include the story's weird approach to vegetarianism, the financial motivations for making films like Troll 2, how the earliest iterations of social media helped Troll 2 become well known, and why, out of all the bad movies put out every year, only a few contain the necessary factors to become cult favorites. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support
A remake of the 1925 film that was first greenlit after the success of Dracula (1931) and Frankenstein (1931), Universal's second adaptation of the Gaston Leroux potboiler tries to mix the gothic horror of its monster franchises with the pomp and opulence of a Hollywood musical. While financially and critically successful in its day (it's the only classic-era Universal horror movie to get any Oscar attention), movie nerds often consider this film to be one of the lesser cinematic renditions of the story; common complaints include tonal inconsistency, a lack of spookiness, an overemphasis on the musical set pieces, and a muddled screenplay that doesn't quite understand what its priorities are. Infamously, early versions of the story had the Phantom (Claude Rains) be the estranged father of Christine (Susanna Foster), but this plotline was dropped without any writers fleshing out another reason for the Phantom to be so fixated on this one random chorus girl. Ryan is joined by Sylvan and Cheryl for a discussion of this colorful, grandiose, and peculiar time capsule. Topics brought up over the course of this episode include the movie's lengthy journey through development hell, the curious decision to compose arias from nonexistent operas for the movie, the chemistry between Nelson Eddy and Edgar Barrier, and why movie versions of Phantom of the Opera are so radically different from both each other and the source material. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ryan-valentine3/support