What We Do In The Shadows & Missing Link

What We Do In The Shadows

Reegs: Welcome to bad. Dad's film review the show where quality and comedy go together, like ice cream and syphilis. We thought we'd shake things up this week by reviewing some movies and some kids' TV, occasionally swearing and dispensing some of our mindless and immature opinions just before we start, if you can't get enough of our mediocre content, you can take a look at baddadsfilm.com.

We have some brand new blogs up, including some film reviews, some music recommendations and other bits and pieces, which you could access for the frankly, still overpriced fee of absolutely nothing. I'm am rigs. Hello. And I meet joined by the usual triumvirate of titillating, travesties, Dan, and finally cheer them on of Michael Jackson's bedtime stories.

We have Howie. A man who once gave this Sage advice about women. To me, girls are like calculating square roots, 13, and under, you've got to do them in your head.

Howie: You should say Michael Jackson, cause I've got my Michael Jackson gloves on today.

Reegs: Yeah. What, what is that Howie?

Howie: It's years of either furiously looking at websites or it's it's like a splint for a rugby injury.

Reegs: Yes because you, you spend a lot of weekends having other men pile into you at high speed, don't you,

Howie: Yeah. I'm play rugby. Yes, yes, yes. So it's it's something I've given up over the years

Reegs: it's a good sort of eighties. Look, the fingerless glove thing.

Howie: Yeah, it isn't, it isn't because the first thing my wife said was why don't you wear one silver one and then moon walk around the house. And then the kids

Dan: that's why in Sydney knows you have to on that. That's a no-no you should just wear one

Sidey: prescription?

Howie: No, there are farmers in, because I'm a hypochondriac and self-diagnosed myself on Google. It was either I've got carpal tunnel syndrome or I've got an anal tumor. I, it was, it was one of the two

Reegs: have been both.

Howie: kind of in both.

Reegs: Can you get prescription gloves? It seems like.

Sidey: He's got prescription shoes.

Dan: G do you, do you buy like no varnish and paint your nails as well?

Howie: No. When I was a teacher before the investigation the kids decided to ruin in class my Amazon account to just approve how your tracking gets done. So they bought online. Well, I tried to buy online. They did searches for shovels, plastic bags, lime pancake, AFS, blindfolds what was the other thing?

Reegs: Basically the contents of your boot at car boot at the

Howie: Yeah. Yeah. What will eventually be the headline of the daily mail? When I'm arrested, I'll be down one of those sidebars next

Sidey: all the stuff that the noodles bought

Howie: yes,

Reegs: Yeah. Yeah.

Sidey: the deeds.

Howie: Yeah. So anybody listening outside of Jersey needs to look up the new old brothers. It's a, it's a hell of a case.

Reegs: They tossed off their parents. Didn't they.

Howie: Yeah. Got angry.

Dan: Are you sure those kids weren't just buying that to dispose of you?

Howie: Well, and it also did lead to various weird stuff coming up in my wishlist, which

Reegs: Yeah.

Howie: with my wife.

Reegs: That's what I was about to say. That's what you told Josephina. Oh yeah. The kids.

Howie: Oh, those, those crazy kids.

Reegs: Why did they put that massive double ended dildo in there? I just got no idea. Anybody been watching anything good this week?

Howie: I watched. Something that was good. And then three things which were marginally hemorrhaged material. I watched Kong Scala Island was con skull Island, sorry with my kids. And we loved it. Thought it was brilliant. Good bit of rubbish. And then I watched dune. Now,

Reegs: Oh,

Howie: I supposed to, yes. Am I now see? Oh, am I I'm going to be a heathen to so many people.

Yeah, we sting. Got it. I watched it it's on prime. It's just come out on prime and I've never watched it going to stick it on my God. It's a, it promises so much, but it's a bag of shit,

Reegs: it's slow. Isn't it. It's

Howie: but then it just, yeah, and it jumps, it seems to have huge plot holes that clearly the directors had to make concessions over.

Cause there's so much missing.

Reegs: you should have, you should do a blog on it.

Howie: Well I'll, I'll try and write something, but I can only use stencils crayons and slobber.

Dan: book's really good. And I think they just bit off, more than they could chew. They've done another one children of June. Which

Howie: Is that out?

Dan: our, I think, and McEvoy's in it. James McAvoy, I think he

Reegs: Hey, Riley.

Dan: But

Howie: yeah, it was supposed to be December. Wasn't it?

Dan: think it

Reegs: No, there's the big new dune coming out with Timothy

Dan: Oh, there is a new one coming out because maybe with the new technology they've got, there'll be able to keep it a little closer to the book.

Howie: the technology that they used and the set design is pretty amazing stuff. I mean, it holds itself. It's fine. It's just the. It just jumps about so much and it's, and it gets, it gets that classic Saifai problem where it gets obsessed with the names and the places, and it's all long-winded and you lose, you lose track of things and you're not quite sure.

So yeah, so I thought I'd put the, the market down ago. At least I've seen it. And then I can probably get involved with the, the remake. The next one I watched. Greenland with Gerald Butler,

Reegs: Oh, he's just started.

Howie: Oh, what? Yeah, it's terrible.

Dan: know he did documentaries.

Howie: Well, the worst bit of it all is his accent because it is, he's got that classic Scottish American screw up that has, he doesn't know where it is.

He's he's, he's half Hawkeye. They're new and you're semi Sam. It just doesn't, it goes mad. And and then the last thing that I watched was Netflix Saifai K film Korean film out called sweepers.

Sidey: yeah.

Reegs: yeah, the seen advertised.

Sidey: up. I've not watched

Howie: Watch it. It's all right. It's a bit weird and it tries a few things out. So it's got a huge international cast in it, mainly Korean in places, but it's got a huge international cost and everybody speaks their own language and it's sort of

Reegs: It's like wages are fair.

Howie: Well, yeah, so it's seamless in the way that it rolls, but, and it's had a lot of money thrown at it and I think it's there lane.

The villain is English actor. Is it Ben Armitage? Who's it was in spooks. And he was the, one of the villains in captain America. I think his name's Ben amputation. It's all it's worth. It's an easy watch, but considering the money that's been thrown, it's the, it shouldn't, it should be a bit better.

Dan: I was going to say a couple of things that I remember watching. One, I might mention on a previous pod called wander. I don't know if we just, what about that? It's we've Owen Wilson and Julia Roberts. Bringing up a couple of kids And one of them's had various difficulties and he's going into high school.

Yeah, that was pretty good. The other one we watched as a family was tooled girl. I don't know if you've seen that

Reegs: What's that about?

Dan: Yeah. is about a gal who's really tall. Let's go in and have experiences of being that really tall person at school. And being a girl.

Reegs: I can relate.

Dan: a comedy. And it was surprisingly, okay.

They say seven plus struggled with that a little bit, because there was a few scenes where you just fought. That's over, over sexy for like a seven year old or eight year old or that kind of thing. But but as yeah, exactly. You don't need it. No. So it's you know, I, I would suggest kids a little bit older would probably enjoy it, but ours enjoyed that.

Reegs: I watched a terrific documentary on Netflix called accomplice, which is just about basically probably if you're into the scene, you'll know all these guys, but it's these mountain bikers who just do the most insane biking. Like stunts and jumps and then just in India and British Columbia and just going down the sides of these mountains, it's got the director's Jeremy Grant.

It's got people like Brandon seminar can pull Genevese Hannah Bergman in it. It's it's about an hour. It's beautiful scenery, incredible biking, great shots of it. If you like that sort of thing, throw it on. And you'll be wowed.

Sidey: this is this cause you've got an exercise bike.

Dan: Oh,

Reegs: No, no, but I did.

Howie: have you got it on while you're on your stationary bike? Pull in a few bunny hops going through the foundations of the hallway.

Reegs: no, I was practicing my flips onto the bed though. After I'd watched it, I was like trying to do somersaults onto the bed and stuff much to my, my wife's amusement.

 Sidey: I watched Logan lucky.

Reegs: So you're going to nominate that I haven't watched it because I thought it was going to come up on the

Sidey: well, I'd watched started it and got about half an ages ago. So I started again and just blitzed it one night. Well It was pretty, it's really late, but I really enjoyed it. Could still potentially nominate it. Cause I think it would be fun to talk about. And then the Mrs. And I have been obsessed with Gogglebox.

So dinner time while my daughter is watching some fucking shit cartoon, we just stick on Gogglebox. And when that program first came to mind, Attention. I thought what a shit idea. Just watching people watch TV. I fucking love it. It's

Reegs: Yeah, we went through a big phase of, I had exactly the same reaction. I thought this is the most pointless thing I've ever seen,

Sidey: just binge watch it.

Reegs: yeah. Some of the characters though are really worth watching.

 Sidey: We've got a top five, I think, to complete from last week.

Reegs: Yep. ISO fam Stan gave us flipper. Stevie Robinson gave us the shape of water too, that we talked about. Mark gave us Orca, the killer whale, which I haven't seen, but feels like a one that almost certainly should go in for the movies with a poor poise.

Dan: yeah, escaped us. That one. Don't need to

Howie: we mention free Willy as well?

Reegs: Dan did. Yeah, because I've never seen it.

Dan: You know, half decent, but I'm happy for another Orca to enter the water.

Reegs: All right.

Sidey: that. You can go in.

Reegs: Okay. Thanks Mark. Or could the killer whale?

Sidey: right. Let's pile into this week's top five. Howie. This was your topic.

Howie: I've gone for a top five characters from films that scared the shit out of you as a child.

Reegs: And some TV ones are okay as

Howie: Take as, as always, we can bend the rules to make TV applicable.

Sidey: not bending the rules. They just are the rules.

Howie: They all the rules. Yeah. The rules, the rules are there to be. Rose

Sidey: I'd had to

Howie: at head. Good word.

Sidey: go

Reegs: on and how he hit it. So.

Howie: will go for the first one, which is a real obvious one.

And that is count Dracula in all his forms as a child. I think I read the lady bird classics, which was obviously the short form of count Dracula. And from that point in I distinctly remember having lots of childhood nightmares about count Dracula. One of which was that I woke up, I used to live above a restaurant that mom and dad run and I in the middle of the nights slept walked in terror through all the alarm systems broke into the restaurant, screaming apparently about count Dracula whilst all the fire alarms are going off.

And at that point it never really obviously affected me deep down psychologically to this day.

Reegs: is there a particular incarnation

Howie: not sure. I'm not sure because I think when I think of count Dracula, now I actually think of Gary Oldman's bouffant haired one, or Mr. Burns from the Simpsons. But I think at the time it must've been a classical count Dracula, like a, like a Vincent Price or or

Reegs: Nosferatu.

Howie: Yeah. Is it Christopher Lee, Christopher, Lee's probably the one actually Christopher Lee.  So yes, it's a very classical one and a very simple story. And one that hits kids where it hurts, which is it's at night. And you think something's going to get me at night. So yeah, that's that that'll be the first opening one.

Dan:  I don't like revisiting. These is an exercise to be honest, but The one that was always just really classically scary. Was the child abusing evildoer returning from the grave, Freddy Krueger in your

Howie: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah,

Dan: the name, you know, Freddy Krueger nightmare on Elm street. And you wouldn't have, I wouldn't have to have more than that going around in my head just to psych myself out, to be honest.

Obviously where's Craig where's Craven did this and he is one of. Movies. Great kind of villains. Isn't a bogey man. He is. He spooks the shit out of people since all the way through the eighties. And did, I don't know, four or five of these films?

Reegs: scary about him, of course, is he comes and attacks you in your dreams. So you're not even sleep safe when you're asleep.

Dan: to fall a flight in sleep. No, no, don't I, of course the more tired you got as a kid, the, the more, you know, in a bit of a tissue, my yourself, try not to go to sleep. Don't go. Freddy's going to come God.

Howie: Well, it was a film to watch as a kid that you were dead to watch. Wasn't it nightmare on Elm street, you were always dared to watch it. Yeah, I would say that's got to be a very British thing that, Oh, you're gonna have nightmares tonight. You've eaten cheese. Well, French you like what?

And, and his whole face, it was all, was it burnt?

Dan: was all, it all been scarred and melted and he just looked like, Oh, horrible. I mean, it was

Howie: one, two Fridays after you

Dan: Yeah,

Howie: three for

Dan: little chill

Reegs: fair, these coming for

Dan: dog. Okay. Okay. Move on. Move on.

Reegs: I can't remember the name of the show, but there was this cigar smoking jewelry, rattling track suit, wearing character who used to tell kids he was going to fix things. And now

Howie: on his lap?

Reegs: my number one, absolutely. As soon as you said this last week, Howie, my mind went there straight away. This is returned to Oz.

Does anybody

Dan: Yeah, I've got one here. I've got one of these who have you

Reegs: Well, I've got three from here. This absolute nightmare fuel from the offset with Dorothy being hauled off to an insane asylum to get primitive electric shock therapy before being busted out by a girl who may or may not have drowned. The you've got a real trio of characters.

All right. Dan's to show me a picture of who he's going to choose, so I'll leave them off. After that particular character that you're going to talk about in a minute, we're introduced to the sexy, but villainous mamby, a deranged sorceress who has a whole of more than 30 decapitated heads, which he can switch onto a smooth next stump, depending on what takes her fancy on a given day.

The scene when Dorothy goes to retrieve the powder of life from the head of mamby in a corridor of heads, and she finally gets the. She opens the door, gets the powder and then the head comes to life and goes

Then the other heads all wake up screaming loudly as she runs away from the headless body. Just absolutely terrifying. There's also the gnome King. I mean the same movie. It was a terrifying half human half rock hybrid species. You can only live underground. And what he was really, what made him really scary was this sort of veneer of geniality, which at any moment would be transformed into a murderous rage.

And then he learns Dorothy and the rest of her gang into this sort of thing. Death trap of a game where they have to guess who's been turned into an ornament. I mean, the whole thing from end to end is just terrifying. And if I think about it now, I can remember what it felt like as a child watching that for the first time.

I remember it being a really terrific movie. I haven't seen it in a few years.

Howie: you'll know that you'll not show your kids, that they, they weren't you.

Reegs: Oh, Oh. In the womb. I was piping it to them.

Sidey: okay.

Reegs: I feel like you should come up with what you were going to

Dan: Yeah. Along the same theme and it, it wasn't any of the other characters. I, I don't remember them too much maybe because the wheelers just

Howie: Yes. Yeah, yeah,

Dan: were just wrong. I mean, there were long arms and they're no, no feet or hands. They just had wheels and they were skating around and, and there were you know, close in your face, screaming at Dorothy's shouting and, and all sorts.

It was,

Reegs: They had this sort of like high-pitched shriek. Didn't they

Dan: don't know. Apparently they were, I don't remember them, but. This well, but I was reading it. They were all very dressed, very well with tight-fitting garments and all the way. I just remember it being scared to shit out these things that they were going to roll off to me. And they just looked so, you know, evil, to be

Reegs: well, it was that thing as well because their wheels were like badly oiled. Weren't a, so you could, you could hear them squeaking before they came on. Yeah. Terrifying. And they, they used to threaten to throw you into the deadly desert, which would turn you into sand by touching. Oh.

Sidey: I remember the you know, you get the breakfast cereal and pour the cigarette out. And I, some stickers came out of the wheelers, you know, he was those

Dan: Yeah. Yeah.

Sidey: used to get, and I thought, fuck it. I don't want that. And I get rid of them.

Dan: Yeah. Apparently

Reegs: a really imaginative movie though. Isn't it? I mean, it's full of like really brilliant design and that, you know, the characters you get, one of them is sort of flying sofa called the Gump.

Dan: Yeah, it was, I made, I suppose, off the wizard of Oz. There had to come out with a few. Can you imagine being in the brainstorming sessions,

Howie: Oh yeah.

Dan: to characters that it must've been, let's get the guys from, you know, magic roundabout over and saw Nick all together and see what we get.

Howie: Sid, have you got mate?

Sidey: This was definitely not a kids thing, but I did see it when I was very young and this was on a family holiday. We were away at Christmas time, staying with my cousins and uncle and all the grownups had fucked off drinking. I think we were just left our own devices and it must be pretty late. Cause this is a, this is a horror film.

And I think my, one of my cousins is a bit older, so they, they put this on it's the woman in black. But not the shitty Daniel Radcliffe remake version. It's an eighties suppose I don't think it's got anyone particularly well-known in it. But there's a particular scene where there's essentially, there's a ghost that is terrorizing this town or this village, and they send this fellow in to sort it out.

And there's a scene where he's trying to get to sleep. He's lying in bed  He can hear this voice. And then a toy appears in his hand and she fucking bursts in through the window.

Howie: Oh

Sidey: And not, not in a, Oh it really scared me. I was fucking traumatized by this for years, like years and that dormer window you've got there.

Howie. I had one in my bedroom at home and I had to hide. Bedtime under the covers for fare of something and fucking flooded in through a window.

Howie: I, can I just say, sorry.

Sidey: bring this up, say, I'm really sorry that we let you see that because I was fucking awful.

Howie: I genuinely, and I reckon the lads feel this to genuinely believe how horrible that was for you just by the way you told that story just then, because I was getting quite drawn into

Dan: going a little bit white.

Howie: Wow.

Sidey: of those where I had to have like a nightlight till I was about 17, because traumatized to fight by

Howie: Uh, Right. Well, I'll, I'll I'll take it to somewhere else then. As a child apparently. And I don't remember this. I was scared of the following character. So Citi is a ham puppet and right. Not scared of city, not scared to sweep, not scared of Sue. I was scared of, I was, I was scared of his horrible cousin Bush, and apparently when Bush came on, I would cry behind the sofa because Butch would beat up the three hand puppets.

So

Reegs: Whisper whisper pitcher a hand puppet like Soutine sweep or was he like a character in drag or whatever.

Howie: Yeah, it was, it was, it was Matthew, the guy who operated it in a dog collar with a bull gag in his mouth.

Reegs: Have you ever seen that episode? And now I don't know. This may be an urban myth

Howie: Oh, it's just rainbow. That's rainbow though. You're thinking of on it.

Reegs: Oh yeah. It's rainbow. That's why I'm thinking of where they're all swearing. Yeah.

Sidey: It's on YouTube.

Howie: Yeah. It's a real episode they made for a laugh.

Reegs: Did that have Soutine sweep in it?

Howie: No.

Sidey: was George and bungle.

Howie: Yes.

Reegs: sake.

Howie: Yeah. So I've just taken the edge off side is dormer windows story, and I'll go straight to city, but yeah, as a child that bothered me quite considerably let's just leave it at that.

Dan: well in the same theme of scaring children I, and it, it's going maybe a little off theme, but Michael Jackson's thriller.

Reegs: Oh, yeah,

Howie: Yeah. Oh yeah. Cool.

Dan: absolutely traumatized my boy when I showed him. Cause

Reegs: boy. It traumatized me when I

Dan: I know I'd forgotten how bad it was to be honest. And I didn't realize it was the fall. I thought we were just getting into the song, you know, it was going to be a little bit in

Reegs: No, because it's like a five or six minute bit before that isn't there. That's quite freaky.

Dan: was too long that I'd seen it. I just remember going, Oh, this song and we were having a. A bit of a dance around with different pop songs and things like that. And one of them was, was thriller that got into our heads and we said, Oh, we'll put it on. Anyway, when that came on and the eyes come out and the werewolf and everything, he,

Howie: some price. Does the voice, doesn't it?

Sidey: directed by John

Dan: Yeah, well, he absolutely shit himself. And it was, it was horrible. You know, you felt so bad, so guilty. And even now, like I'm not, not there. And we laugh about it now, of course, you know what I do he still

Howie: He just stands up. He just stands there. Did you have you guys seen the Indian thriller? I recommend you YouTube. That that's funny.

Sidey: it's

Dan: No, I missed that one.

Reegs: well the original Charlie and the chocolate factory has a whole load of. Scenes that might be scary for children like violet Beauregard blowing up like a blueberry, but the tunnel of terror is by far the most haunting part of the movie. And it starts as a.

Dan: are getting through to dude and he's like, no.

Reegs: Yeah, so you get these, you know, it starts as charming riverboat road ride through a sort of river of chocolate, and then it turns, they go through the dark tunnel and you get all these hallucinogenic. Images that would terrify an adult, let alone a child. You get like this giant insect looking thing, going flying through some trees, a millipede crawling on a man's face, a close-up of the human eyeball, a chicken being beheaded a chameleon chomping down on a bug of scorpion and then Willy Wonka himself starts to recite this sort of chilling poem until everyone is screaming, including the audience.

Howie: Sounds like a school trip. I went on.

Dan: Yeah.

Reegs: So, yeah, terrifying. There's also the  lumpers who were just little people in the books and other versions, but in this movie, they're orange skin, green haired, little demons. I sort of imagined, you know, like, Hey, Mr. And Mrs. Beauregard, your child was mutated by a freak accident. That's terrible. I know what will cheer you up.

And then with the radiated skin singing a monotone about he or she deserved it, and what a terrible parent you are.

Sidey: right though. They did deserve it.

Howie: Yes, they do. They're awful children.

Reegs: but yeah, that scene just terrified me.

 Sidey: I got to go for a classic and it's the Daleks

Howie: Oh, of course. Yes. You

Sidey: so feasible to someone like Howie. Who'd never saw this as a child, but when I was a youngster, this was one that when they appeared it was cover your face hide behind and so forth. I would just get out of the fucking room

Howie: Oh,

Sidey: the program was finished, it was scary shit. They were just screaming

Reegs: It was, the voice was awful. Wasn't it.

Sidey: was this inanimate object, screamed death in your face

Dan: me feel uncomfortable. I must say I never, never really.

Sidey: know, all the classic sort of slasher films where the, the enemy just can't be stopped the same. They were just relentless and ah, fucking

Reegs: Then they had a leader didn't they dab for us. It was like this sort of hideous green, old man in a darling chair. He was really terrifying.

Sidey: He didn't see him very often though. It was normally just the drone. So a network of killing machines. Yeah, it was scary. The cyber men were, were pretty chilling as well, like a kind of prototype book creation. But the dollars are the ones that really stood out.

Howie: I'm going to go for one and I still find it. Well. As you as a regular listeners of the podcast who know Dan and I are admittedly the least obvious horror film fans ever due to the fact that we're both scaredy cats, but the point being one of the films, I remember watching as a child that really did bother me.

And I might think it was slightly older cause of the timeline was the clown from

Dan: Pennywise.

Reegs: yeah

Howie: I still find that I still see my skin crawls when I see him poking out the drain

Reegs: they all float down here, Georgie.

Howie: fuck off. Fuck. Right off. Do not need that. Yeah.

Dan: know, it's like, Oh, who wants to pollute?

Howie: off. I find that actually, I, I think that's going to be my top one.

I can't deal with that at all. At least with Dracula, you got a chance with that clown you're being dragged feet first. In my mind, I've got a chance against Dracula in my mind.

Sidey: Have you seen the cost of Ania stuff on Netflix? The

Howie: Oh, I was,

Sidey: really

Howie: yeah, it was a 16 plus isn't it?

Sidey: violent as fuck. Yeah, it's really good.

Howie: Okay. I might check that out. Cool. Good record.

Dan: Pennywise. Yes, it's a good one.  One that I was, I was going to mention Ashley Pennywise. I've got him down, but I'll move on to To child play. And I don't mean that the 1980s quiz show where children were asked to describe words. Cause I was on that ITV. Yeah,

Howie: when Michael Barrymore.

Dan: it was with Michael Aspel.

Sidey: pull pie?

Dan: He didn't no, no, I never went on to because he was your Michael

Reegs: Are you being serious? Have you got the video of this? Can we get it up on

Howie: it's gotta to be on YouTube,

Dan: it again. I was asked to describe Ronald Reagan and I said, like everybody knew he enjoyed the Benny Hill show. And that he,

Howie: that's top of his Wiki page.

Dan: was enough. They got one awaken from that little snippet of information. So I'm not talking about that.

Child's play, I'm talking about the one with Chucky, the doll, that words smile and looked sweet until it wanted to rip your face off and shit on your neck. It was absolutely

Howie: creepy about dolls, full stop. Lifelike, porcelain, Victorian dolls.

Sidey: the Patton trailer Christos, the

Howie: yo. Yeah.

Dan: This w this went crazy though, this, it really kind of took her doors to a new level and, and they had all kinds of spinoffs from Childsplay and Chucky. I think they even did a bride of Chucky and they did like a

Reegs: It got much more. It got much more mattering comedic as it, as it went on. I think part of it, I mean, it had Brad dura. He's a terrific character actor playing the sort of voice and

Dan: Boy, sip the villain.

Reegs: Britain, certainly it took on a far more sinister edge after the Bolger. Abduction case because the boys who had abducted the small six year old James Bolger had been watching child's play.

So it be really became the forefront of this video nasty type thing. So yeah, it's, it's, it's a sinister one. And when you know that about it, it makes it seem even worse.

Howie: video nasty.

Sidey: back on the news last week as well,

Reegs: Hey, was the bulges Chucky? Why.

Sidey: the missing person thing.

Dan: really what I

Sidey: see that story that there was a F thing out in in the States for missing. Persons. And the picture of it was the Dole from Chucky that been some fuck up.

Dan: No. Well, somebody's genuine name and they've got a picture of Chuckie on there. Wow. Best of luck. Yeah. Yeah, and it, anybody can beat Chucky.

Reegs: Yeah, I've got a rare Grange Hill based example which was Michael sherd who played Mr. Bronson, who is the strict disciplinarian. He, you know, the corridor was used to reverberate to the sounds of you boy. The actor also played Hitler in Indiana Jones, which totally makes sense.

Howie: Oh yeah. I didn't realize that.

Dan: Mr. Bronson. Yeah.

Reegs: To follow that up, I've got the BBC test card F which showed a small girl playing noughts and crosses with a clown doll which I found out today was called bubbles.

The clown surrounded by various gray scales and color test signals. That thing, when it came on used to shit, me up something chronic, I don't like clowns or ventriloquist dolls or anything like that very much. And that played into those fears.

Sidey: you say like Tesco kids today just wouldn't have a fucking clue. What kind talking about

Howie: is.

Sidey: the TV used to go off at midnight and that was

Dan: choose to have this holding screen

Sidey: Yeah.

Howie: and on that sort of same line, nobody knows what channel, what? Ceefax and three, zero two means no one. No.

Reegs: that was the football. Wasn't it. Three zero, two.

Howie: Three, four, zero cricket, three seven zero rugby. Dan, what was that? Who was saying? I ate subtitles.

Reegs: Bamboozle as well. Remember

Howie: reveal the quiz.

Dan: think that that's a really good shout. And I think that along with just about most nursery rhymes played off the nine o'clock all sounds spooky. Don't they, you know, it's be, shouldn't be happening.

Sidey: I've got a shout for Superman three,

Howie: Oh, the woman.

Sidey: which is Vera when she She is transmogrified from human to some sort of Android human hybrid.

Howie: Tesla woman.

Sidey: not a particularly outstanding villain per se, but the scene where all the machinery is like stapled onto her face. It's fucking hideous.

Howie: The wires.

Sidey: freaked me out when

Howie: Yeah. Good. Cool.

Reegs: Yeah, absolutely. And it's really easy to miss that she returns to normal after the computers destroyed. Yeah, exactly.

Sidey: by then, I'd probably miss that.

Reegs: Yeah, I had that on my list. Terrified me that did.

Howie: I didn't know, she turned back to normal. I can't remember. I was just you mentioned return to Oz rigs and I was thinking yeah, that's a kid's film that has unwittingly become a horror film for kids. Another one in that genre is a, the witches from 1990 with Angelica Houston takes off her mask.

I see my kids have read that and they've both said, Oh, can we watch it? And I watched it first of all, before, and I went, this is just not suitable. It really isn't. The unmasking is really scary for kids and the new one. I don't know if the new one with Anne Hathaway. I don't know if that's made even worse because it's high Def enhanced more effects, but it's, it's particularly scary.

And the content of the, the actual, the book is obviously very scary. That is obviously aimed at children and children turning to mice.

Reegs: Yeah. Roald Dahl friend of my people.

Sidey: The the C the initial bit where she sort of grabs her scalp and there's this, this big skin flap. It fucking

Reegs: yeah, yeah.

Dan: What a witch is though, you know, that's what they, they're pretty ugly

Howie: and that's, that's pretty much the end of my

Dan: Well, I've, I've got Buffalo bill from the silence of the lambs.

Reegs: Purchase for lotion on the skin else it gets the hose again, the put the fucking lotion in the basket.

Dan: that's too close to being

Sidey: Wait till, sorry, wait till he tucks his cock in

Reegs: yeah.

Howie: What race.

Sidey: Would you

Dan: So for those who don't know what that was, that was a Buffalo bill. The silence of the lambs and it was was it Jamie gob or something? The name nightmare. gum who was the serial killer who murders women and uses this skin to make a suit for himself.

But I watched this, it was one of the huge in it, the time when it came out the film and everything. And I think it must've been a little while after I had gone to video and we watched it around the house. And we, we went out to watch it, you know, It was just, you know, sat in front of the TV and don't want to admit that you're absolutely shit scared because then you're being sent to bed.

And so I powered through this and and paid the cost of just having, having that kind of face and that scenery in your, in your mind. But yeah, it was, it was a pretty scary one at a time for me.

Sidey: I had a pretty powerful phobia of moths for a while, and I don't know if it was because of that film.

Reegs: yeah, could have easily been

Dan: in,

Sidey: Yeah.

 Reegs: 1987 GI Joe, the movie had Cobra commander being. Sort of body horrid into an actual snake which I can remember watching at the time and like, you know, it was probably at a friend's birthday party and you're all saying that was really good. Wasn't it guys. And then going home and not being able to sleep for like a month.

Howie: hugging blankie.

Reegs: Exactly. S similarly abominable was the garbage pail kids movie. Did anybody ever see that?

Howie: no.

Sidey: I had all the trading card

Howie: Yeah,

Reegs: Yeah. So do you remember the, this was like a, sort of the cabbage patch dolls, but gone completely wrong? Mostly it was, you know, that there were abominations who vomit on people and wet themselves and fall on each other and well, and then it's even like, which was played by Andrew dice.

Clay threatens people with a switchblade. It's a completely sociopathic movie and the character design I urge you now, if you haven't. Google the garbage pail kids movie and have a look at what comes up. It's absolutely terrifying. I can still see it in my mind's eye.

Sidey: okay. I've got a real classic one for you, which probably seems silly now, but at the time Darth Vader.

Howie: Yeah. Oh yeah.

Sidey: what should that? He was a serious villain, you know, big, tall, imposing dude, ruthless fucker, just kidding. People kills one of the heroes right at the start. You know, he was just another one who was just relentless.

And even to other to the other bad guys around he'd kill them. You know, it wasn't, it was not to be fucked with. And it was a scary dude.

Howie: yep.

Dan: yeah, definitely a hundred percent off. I'll, I'll, I'll wrap up with a couple more that I've got, I've got pinhead which

Howie: that from hell raiser. Yeah.

Dan: it was just the poster really. I, I.

Howie: Yeah.

Dan: You know, that was scary as shit as a kid. You just see, you knew that was great. That's what they were showing you.

They're me. What was it going to be like when you actually started watching that guy? Jigsaw was another one that I didn't watch as a kid, but I've, I've. Just scared the shit out of me, to be honest, the whole soar franchise, when I first saw them. The first one, I was just totally surprised by it.

It wasn't anything like I was

Reegs: Well that fucking puppet that rides a bike is pretty, pretty hideous. Isn't it? And that's the

Dan: they just give me, gives me shivers to be honest. But the last one that I'd mention is,

Howie: Oh, from the raccoons. Yeah. What a great kill.

Dan: did scale. They shout at me from the raccoon. So he was like, you're aardvark, anti villain or villain kind of always wanted those recoup means I'm dead and chopped. Yeah, he did lots of, and he would beat cigar smoking and kind of spit in and coffin and all the rest of it.

But yeah, Cyril snare was a definitely one that would haunt your dreams. If you let him.

Reegs: That's a good one. Zelda from Tara Hawks, which was a Jerry Anderson puppet extravaganza. She kind of looked like a cross between Tina Turner in a Tara dactyl. But she used to terrify me uh,

Sidey: with someone. I looked just like her as

Reegs: Oh, scary, scary.

We, Jimmy cranky was something that disturbed me as a kid and then it gets only more upsetting as an adult. When you realize that they were actually married to each other, it was really

Sidey: Oh, I thought you were going to mention Nicholas sturgeon or something.

Howie: Okay.

Reegs: Audrey from the little shop of horrors, scared the absolute shit out of me.  finally my last one. the 1955 classic Saifai this Island earth. If anybody remembers that it had the mysterious white haired in high four headed Exeter. Who I think was actually a good guy in the fight against the villainous Sargon, but his appearance terrified me so much.

It's a boy as a boy. It's hard for me to remember exactly which side he was on. And this was when channel four would routinely screen sort of 1950s B movies on like a Saturday afternoon. And my parents would leave me to watch TV and I'd scare myself shitless watching this stuff.

 Sidey: One of our favorites, I think it crops up just about every week was Joe's

Howie: yeah. Yeah. I could cope.

Sidey: me as a kid. And it was one of those that none of us would,

Howie: Does swimming ever again?

Sidey: we're surrounded by beaches. None of us would ever go and bloody go to the sea because we were so scared of sharks appearing. And I saw aliens when I

Howie: Oh, yes. Yeah.

Sidey: Certainly wasn't 18. And I saw aliens before I saw alien. And I remember when there, the Marines are all in this sort of chamber where all the nesters and, you know, it's all gonna, they're all gonna get harpooned by like alien tails and their face is been off and the anticipation, and then seeing some of these things moving in the war, fucking shitting

Reegs: Yeah. The scenes of the, the sort of the colonists have been sort of pulled into the walls and sort of strung up and that stuff. They're half alive. Aren't they?

Sidey: Yeah. It's one of them grabs one of the is like kill me or something.

Shall we whittle it down, go for Harry.

Howie: I'm going to go for Pennywise.

Dan: well, I, I didn't actually mention Jack Torrance from the shining Eva, but it won't be the one that, that goes to bed with me tonight. That will be Freddy Krueger.

Sidey: Okay, cool.

Reegs: The wheelers from return to us, although it could have been several different characters.

 Sidey: I've got for the women in black without

Howie: shadow. It's

Dan: Traumatized.

Howie: so true.

Sidey: So we've got Pennywise, Frederick Kruger at the wheelers from the turn two Wars and the women in black.

This week's film nomination was down to yeah. What we got.

Howie: Yeah, so neatly linking from the top five, we've got ourselves a horror film that I can cope with because it's a comedy horror. And it's what we do in the shadows. The film directed by Jemaine Clement and. Tai Chi Waititi is set in New Zealand. Yeah. Follows for ghouls or vampires who have problems adapting to the modern world.

It's a documentary of sorts. So we've got a group of vampires. They share a house in Wellington, New Zealand, and it's the usual flatmates squabbling about the washing up and facing off with various rival gangs of werewolves. One of them thinks it's a bit like Twilight The origins of the vampires are obviously that they're on dead from central Europe who have escaped problems in their home areas and various levels of heartache, which especially one of the characters VR go to go live in New Zealand.

And you get introduced to the four characters in this mockumentary style. Shots. If you like. So we've got VR guy. Who's a 379 year old dandy from the 18th century who originally traveled to New Zealand in 1910 in search of the love of his life. Catherine, you've got ladders laugh. Who's played by Jermaine Clement, and he's an actor, 162 year old no-nos ladders left the poker who is haunted by memories of his nemesis, the beast.

And then you've got the young guy deacon. Who's only 183 year old, former peddler. And he's the young rebel of the group who was turned into a vampire by Peter, who is the full vampire. He's the reclusive 8,000 year old vampire who behaves a bit like feral animal.

Reegs: Your classic Nosferatu

Howie: Yes.

Reegs: And in fact, they all represent a different type of vampire. Really? Don't they? Cause you've got you've got the VR go. The blood is love characters, domain, Clements character is kind of the sort of Bram Stoker, Gary old.

Howie: the Impaler.

Sidey: style and Gary Oldman's

Reegs: I did. Yeah. Yeah. It's definitely if that ILC and then you've got some from yeah, all different kinds.

Yeah.

Sidey: Taika based his performance on his mother.

Howie: Touch his mom. Oh my God. That's a, that's a compliment for her. And I like the way it kicks off with the alarm clock. Buzzing 6:00 PM. And this coffin raises slightly and his hand pops out and he's hitting the hitting and trying to smash it and stop it. And it's 6:00 PM, not 6:00 AM and he gets up and it's the way that he

Reegs: Where he sort of half levitates, doesn't he out of the,

Howie: It's a bizarre set of special effects that they do. It's like crap. But it works.

Reegs: no. I think the special effects are great in this.

Howie: But that's what I mean. It, it, it, shouldn't, it's clearly, obviously just wires and people, but it works really well. And it's quite funny. And then he introduced himself to the camera and he goes, he calls a flat meeting and basically he gets all of the members of the flat to come round and they have the usual banal

Reegs: Yeah, well, deacon hasn't done any washing up in five years.

Howie: Yeah, cause you've left with the blood,

Reegs: Yeah.

Howie: the bloody washing up

Reegs: down in the basement.

Sidey: yeah, he goes to game. Does nanny chips over something? He goes, Oh, Oh look, it's a spinal column.

Dan: I, I remember him giving me this and I'd seen it on the, what was it? Netflix or prime? I can't remember.

Howie: prime. It's on prime.

Dan: seen it on there and I was still all, you know, I might, my watch has done over this is this will be my thing. So you'd normally hate it. I fought, well, this is a grave situation, but I think you've, you've.

Howie: Oh, Oh,

Dan: think he's raised the stakes here because

Howie: Oh fuck.

Dan: it was quite a long intro into it actually wasn't it, before it broke out into the into the, the theme song and the credits and everything. And I think anybody

Reegs: sets the tone straight away.

Dan: away. So you got about five, 10 minutes before it kind of goes into this, as I remember, and I'd already load a couple of times in that and I just thought, wow, I've got.

I've got another sort of hour in a plaster. This, this is, this is going

Howie: well, I have to.

Dan: continues along this same way.

Howie: I, I really enjoyed deacon's interview at the start. When he revealed that he's part of his past lives, he was a Nazi vampire and he says, do you know the Nazis lost? And if you're a Nazi things, weren't good. And if you were a Nazi vampire, things were even worse. And it's like, we don't talk about that now.

Dan: was just absolutely on point there. So, I mean, I think of the other you know, Rocky mentorees or mockumentaries or whatever that are really, really good. And I think this is, is up there in their conversation when it comes to talking about vampire documentaries. Yeah.

Howie: was it w it was cleverly done with a documentary sort of theme.

Reegs: Well, I think what makes it really good is that sort of juxtaposition of the utterly banal, like you've been talking about like where they're talking about washing up rotors and you know, not putting some newspaper down before you kill someone. And then that juxtaposition with the, with the sort of classic vampire and law as well.

That makes

Dan: only way you don't find this funny, if it's just really not your sense of humor. I mean, he said dead pan sense of humor. It's all kind of understated. But

Sidey: okay. Well,

Dan: ere we go,

Sidey: clearly gonna be the the

Dan: yeah, it sounds

Sidey: cause I'm fucking bored. Uh, Fuck. After 10 minutes I

Dan: They, I, I tell you what, and I could understand that. So I say that 10 minutes you're alive.

And no, I think if you can enjoy this or you're not, but I load a couple of times in that first 10 minutes and thought I

Sidey: Yeah, there was a couple of funny Mark. And later on in the film, there was a couple of funny things, but it was like one or two comments. And the runtime was now in 26 minutes. And for me it felt like it went on for like four hours. It just, for

Reegs: I'm really surprised by that because I found tonally it's quite like the flight of the Conchords or something like

Sidey: I was, I was really excited because it's, you know, TICAS gray and it's like the Concours crew. And that sort of style is, is normally why I really enjoy the, got to the flat meeting. And I was like, I get it. You're vampires. And we were flipping the script for it to be all Monday. And you know, day-to-day life boring after a while.

It was just, I was so fucking bored. I

Dan: it was just the way it was just the way they delivered some of the lines to me that just, just made me laugh.

Reegs: Well, and I think, I think this speaks to something. I think that I was thinking about when putting some notes together for this, which is it's actually really hard to review comedies. Because you just go, it's either like, Oh yeah, I found that

Dan: Oh, you didn't.

Reegs: I wasn't, or you didn't and Sid you obviously didn't.

And I actually, I mean, I just found myself chuckling pretty much the whole way through almost nonstop it, you know, it, it really tickled me, but if you don't like it, you don't like, if it doesn't make you laugh, it doesn't make, you know, nobody can argue into you to think, Oh, that's Oh, I was wrong. That is funny.

Sidey: Yeah, no, the The initial sort of sound was quite music. There was a couple of good liners, one nice when they were being introduced. And then the, the werewolves, you know, were, were werewolves, not swear wolves. that particular line, I thought it was really funny, but after that I was done, I was just

Howie: I my big chocolate was when my big chocolate was when his familiar Jackie, who is, is, is, is basically his slave. Who's being promised that she'll turn into vampire. He takes his stuff to the dry cleaning and it's just blood everywhere. She says, Oh, he's my, husband's a hemophiliac.

Reegs: I, my standout character actually was the utterly bland Stu who is the human friend.

Howie: The software programmer,

Reegs: what he says to somebody it's like, are you, are you, is on B or your wearable? No, I'm a software analyst. I just thought he was brilliant and they all engaged. They all sort of gripped around Stu and they all talked about what terrific guy was, but he barely said anything.

And when he did his delivery was all, if it's to flight, it was one of the things that I really loved.

Sidey: Sort of a bit true to life cause they recruited him. Yeah, he'd been an extra in boy. But they had. Got heavy into this one on the premise that he was going to work on some computers or something in the background, and that he would only have a very, very small part in the movie.

And obviously it turned out to be bigger than that.

Reegs: Well, a huge amount of this movie was improvised and improvise to the extent that it actually altered the whole story structure. So I wouldn't be surprised if like you say society, that Stu was gonna feature like in a very nondescript way. And then, because they kept talking about how brilliant he was, that he ended up becoming a key part of the movie, even though he's really bland and he barely speaks and he's got no outstanding traits.

It's a toll.

Dan: he just kind of sits in there. But I think that the VI directors dramatic climate and a tie car were fantastic. I really thought they were absolutely. They kept the best lines to themselves and the way they delivered them, I just thought their comic timing was, was absolutely brilliant. There was.

The, the guy was in a flight of the Conchords is the band manager.

Reegs: Restart a, I think he's

Dan: I just love seeing him come into it as well as one of the werewolves. And it's right at the end where he's just kind of talking about ease being the alpha male and he just I'm going to stop. He

Howie: Get him to laugh.

Dan: him to laugh and then I'll look around.

Yeah, I'll make sure they're laughing. And then I'll say, what are you laughing at? It was twisting their shit. Like, and I thought he was. It was brilliant in it as well. There was a, there was a few cameos like that people just dropped in and you thought, Oh, you know, they just made it. I think it be a classic.

This, I think it really will.

Howie: Well, what I the reason I chose this was because I'm a big fan of the spinoff TV show, which has got

Reegs: It's got Matt Barry,

Howie: yeah. And it's got Novak from foam Jacker in it, and

Reegs: Oh yeah.

Howie: it's got Bugger. I can't remember her name,

Reegs: Well just have a go anyway.

Howie: no, I can't remember her name anyway at all. She's an English actress.

She's brilliant. And she plays the love interest of Matt Berry. And it's rather like the beast and Jermaine Clement's character,

Reegs: this is Jermaine Clement's. Vladimir has a nemesis called the beast, or you find out at the end is actually a woman named Catherine isn't it. And yeah.

Dan: Well, you, you always, you always get this drawing of that. Don't you where it's like an old, it's an old drawing of Beelzebub with like a cock and bows on it. And it's just like the beast to be said, them, you

Reegs: Oh, Pauline

Dan: out it's just some, some ex-girlfriend.

Howie: th well, no, Catherine was the one that VR guy was obsessed with. And when they get Stu to help them with the computer, he basically prints, he prints off a copy and then pins it to the inside of his coffin. And then you just see the coffin as he bashing one out. But yeah.

Reegs: He sets up a Facebook profile for Gladys lab who his blood has left the poker and he says, Oh, you can poke people. And his face is just amazing. I can't ruin all of the gags. I mean, it's just so many outstanding moments.

Howie: Yeah.

Dan: The last one though, for me like I remember laughing out loud was just the, the delivery of a tire when he's just found out the beast is coming and he kind of storms off doesn't. He goes into the next room. You hear him? He's trashing the place and he's really angry. And he just goes, because there's this documentary film crew, of course, in the.

In the whole program, filming them as a, so he turns to him and he just kind of says what he's having a reaction there. It's just the, it's just the kind of thing you would expect in a, in one of those like reality TV shows the answer. Well, what you're hearing is having a reaction to this news and was just fantastic.

Yeah. It got me laughing again.

Reegs: There are several really well-integrated fight scenes in the movie. What they're arguing about at the beginning about the dishes and then they both levitate to the ceiling to sort of hit

Dan: of tenon in any way?

Howie: yeah. Bev inception as well with the motion. Yeah.

Reegs: And then later on, there's a bat fight where they're sort of churning in Tibet. I thought they'd seen that the special effects were surprisingly good for those bits considering it looks like it cost. Absolutely fuck. All the set design was great. The house where they live was really, really good. And all the costumes that they wear were were excellent.

You know, you could tell that a lot of care was taken to choose the right staff and dress them up in the right way. What looks really. Simple and silly is actually, it's really hard. It's easy to take it for granted that you can get that stuff. Right. And if, if it tickles your funny bone, like it did for three of us, at least it's, it's, you know, it's a great, great film.

Howie:  It's a very simple plot involving just Nick and the werewolves, but it doesn't offer me it was, it's a fairly short film.

I, a lot of laughs through it and as a fan of the TV show I wish I'd seen the TV show first, but I'm sorry. I wish I'd seen the film first rather than the TV show, but I think they compliment each other nicely cause they take it on a slightly different tangent in the TV show, in the TV show.

They're trying to integrate more with people and the main star of the show is the equivalent of yeah. VR, which is  the face jacket chaps. Who's not escaped

Reegs: Kayla Novak

Howie: No. And it's called . And he finds out halfway through the series, what his ancestry is, and it's very key and it's very ironic as to who the hell he actually is.

When in fact he's a vampire familiar, so it's a lots of lines like that, and it's really nicely done. You, you summed it up very well. Re-explore saying you can't force someone to like a comedy if they don't, if it doesn't tickle them. And then that's fair enough. I just took this as easy entertainment that I, I really did laugh at my wife, enjoyed it, and most people I know, and this is sort of surprised me actually cited people.

I know who are big fans of flight of the Conchords and, and, and those guys really got into this and find it really quite amusing. So somewhere on the line, it doesn't take your boxes, which is fair enough. But If you are a fan of this listeners of these guys are strongly recommend you give it a go.

Dan: side. D did you like this is spinal tap. And we've no, you were so, so ammonia as I remember

Sidey: On the fence,

Dan: on the fence for that. Yeah. I totally get it in his comedies that people swear by a really funny, and I just died. GAM, you know, there is probably out of all the all the themes of film, it's the most kind of subjective, I guess.

You know, you, it's just what you're going to make of it. But this made me love on and I was smiling throughout. I just liked the delivery. I liked the way that I did it. It could have been really shit, this, I mean, to, to make a film like this using some of those crappy kind of.

Cinematography tricks and and not much plot, it could have just fell flat on his face. But I think that the writing the improvise zation and the delivery from the, the actors, particularly the, the, the two writer directors, it got me

 Reegs: For me, it's not, it's not especially deep film, although I do recognize that the skill it takes to make something like this. I had a big smile on my face for the whole running time. I, I like the fact, you know, it's, it's almost like just obvious to point out, but they're monsters, but they're also people with really petty flaws, like, like you or me or anybody else.

And I, I do, like I said before, I really liked that juxtaposition of the sort of quotidian with the fantastic, where, you know, you just get this run of the mill stuff with these very unlikely people in it. Enjoyed it. Yeah.

Howie: I was just gonna say, I, I just remembered one piece. I know that we shouldn't ruin the gags, but I did laugh quite hard at the the fact that when they were trying on clothes, because they don't have a reflection, they're all drawing each other. It's so rubbish, but you go, yeah. What a stupid idea, but that's the only way they're going to do it.

Dan: Yep.

Howie: So Sidey go on then.

Sidey: I was excited to say it. I was really glad that he nominated it, but I think it took about 10 minutes to realize that just didn't do it for me. I like to see that the TV show, because I think the shorter form of it. Well, maybe work a little bit better and I was sort of a big fan of Matt Berry.

So that excites me.

Howie: the only player.

Sidey: to distill it down a little bit more, the sort of a similar sort of theme, but Simon peg and crew, and big train to December thing with making the merciless and, and living in a sort of domesticated life and all that. For me that it's a gag to, you know, it doesn't. It doesn't work for me personally, over the longer form of a movie.

I like to see it just just a short thing.

Dan: it was a bit long in the tooth

Sidey: There were a couple of bits throughout the film there that did make me laugh, but all the stuff in between, it just didn't

Dan: pain in the neck.

Sidey: just,

Reegs: Oh, I feel, I feel it's a shame side because I really thought you would enjoy this, but you know, you can't, you can't, you know, force yourself, but yeah, I, it's got a puking scene to rival. Team America in it as well.

Howie: Oh yeah, the blood.

Dan: you're not member of the fan club, you know, vampires aren't real, unless you count Dracula.

Howie: Oh, that's the best. Thank you for keeping that one to the end, Dan.

Sidey: All right, we'll leave it there.

Dan: Thanks for the memory.

 Sidey: Family entertainment option. We went for a film this week. How are you

Howie: yeah. So this week I went for a Netflix showing of a film that for reasons, all or many of you probably know got missed couple of years back and this is the missing link which is an animation stop motion animation from Leica pitchers, and. It's features Hugh Jackman is playing so Lionel frost, who's an Explorer and it's got Zach Galifianakis as the missing link. I'll just say it's Dave. I see him. I can say it. And so what you've got is you've got like a league of gentlemen style club that  wants to desperately become a member of. I think it's called the society of great men and it's headed up by rather horrible Lord picket. Debris who is objections are the suffragettes electricity evolution and anyone who is a new thinker.

And that's voiced brilliantly by Stephen Fry and He's basically realized that in order to get into this club and receive the congratulations of these petty bunch of people that he wants to have membership of, he's got to go and do something quite considerable. And he does a wager with Stephen Fry's character that he will bring back significant proof of the Sasquatch or the Yeti.

The, the, the key selling point of this animation is the quality of it, though. I do have a bit of a query with the female character who I think was nicked out of team America for her puppetry. But it's basically stop motion that. Takes it up a level. Now that's not to say that this is a Oh, because of that, it should be an automatically fantastic film.

But the point is it does look a fantastic film. And that is something that you do have to take into account when

Reegs: It's breathtaking to look at, and it's almost, you have to pinch yourself and remember that it is stop motion animation, because it could easily be CGI. If you didn't know. When you're watching it. It's, it's really incredible.

Howie: And if you watch it well, if you watch it the, Oh, if you watch it, the very end down the credits with the fantastic song at the end, they show the in process motion of what's going on. So the camera's slightly set back. So you see the set design of the elephant.

Dan: in this film. I wish I'd have not been chasing for the off button as soon as this finished. And we had to watch a little more of the credits, but I'll I'll leave you to it. I'll leave you to it.

Howie: no.

Dan: to the truck. Yes.

Sidey: Well, the scene in the bar had more shots than any stop motion sequence ever produced. That was the level of attention to detail because it visually was quite incredible.

Reegs: they, they created unique faces for every single shot. So instead of a facial animator, having to pick from a library of like preexisting. Expressions. They could just, they basically had the, these 3d printing technology to produce the faces and then they pop them on and off on the models on the set.

And actually when you see them without their faces, they're an utter abomination. Yeah. Like these horrible moving parts underneath. But yeah, so they had 106,000 faces. Which, which was a big number I'm led to believe

Howie: well, I think that clearly, Oh, that clearly leads to another big number, which was the budget, which was but I think the fact that they spent about 130 million on this animation

Reegs: Jesus did

Howie: yeah, Yeah, and they, and the we'll go into it, but I'll just say it naturally it unfortunately completely bombed at the box office

Sidey: lost the house and this

Howie: yeah, they lost everything on this because, and the animator, the chief screenwriter, the producer, this chap, it broken, absolutely broken because he's department at the marketing department for the film company released it the same day as frozen two and Avengers end game. and yeah. Yeah. And he said, what killed him was the effort that went into this film and people kept coming up and going, Oh, you've got a really exciting film coming out. And he was like, yeah, it was out in December. It's done. It's finished. But they

Sidey: deadline, Hollywood calculate the net loss of this film. And do you know the number $101.3 million loss. On a animated film. And I'm with Dan, that's probably the most interesting thing about this. Cause it was fucking

Dan: I, I just, Oh, thank you. I just thought as well-made, as it was, I must admit, I thought he was just CGI. I then even look into it. It was just, I was this, we were watching this, it was Sunday afternoon gone. We were watching this and and we put it on and I pinned the house on this being a good one as well, because. We were all like color, no color watching this. I put my neck out. The big names were there, you know, you had Jackman and, and you know, and it really did look great. I mean, I didn't. I was watching it. I think questionnaire was CGI was stop motion. Now you telling me to stop motion. I'm just blown away.

And I kind of wish I would've taken paid more attention to it, but it didn't hide from the fact that I didn't like the characters. I didn't think there were anyone nice in it. What was going on? I just didn't care for any,

Reegs: What about Susan?

Howie: Susan.

Dan: to like Susan is okay. I want it to like the. Lionel, you know, I thought, Oh, this is going to start out really well, but he just became a bit too selfish and himself.

And I know that

Howie: well, no, that was the,

Reegs: but that's his arc

Dan: I know

Howie: his arc. Yeah.

Dan: arc, but it never arts. Far enough around that he was that much nicer after it, to be honest. There was, there was a lot to like about it. I liked the theme of, of the Victorian thing, the explore and the MIS you know, it was so much to like about it.

It just didn't deliver it to me. It just didn't

Howie: I watched it cause my kids told me that they absolutely loved it. So that's one of the reasons

Dan: no lofts in our house, none, zero, or maybe there was one, there was one laugh when they, I think it might've been Susan when they said, Oh my name's Susan. I

Reegs: Yeah, we should probably point out. So the line or frost, it goes in search of the Sasquatch who he finds is actually the person who sent him a letter, inviting him in the first place. Cause he wants to be discovered because the Sasquatch is lonely, the titular missing link. He, he doesn't have anybody else.

And he wants to name himself effectively. And in the end he gives himself the name, Susan, after a friendly. Prospector he wants encountered. It's a really minor thing. Isn't it? It was just somebody who flashed him a really nice smile and it made his day sort of thing. And he chose to name himself. Now was Susan a woman?

Howie: this is what I couldn't work out. You just, w w was the Sasquatch asexual.

Sidey: okay. A boy named Sue

Reegs: was it a boy named Susan or was, was this, I didn't know whether we were supposed to think that. This was a boy who chose to identify as a girl, that it was a Sasquatch who was a girl, because how would we know or whether this Sasquatch had got the wrong end of the stick and, and thought that that name Susan was a boys.

You know, I didn't know what that was,

Howie: Well, he was dressed. They dressed

Dan: about the

Howie: that.

Dan: in it? The what, what was her name? Adeline,

Howie: Yeah. Now this is the bit where I thought the puppet came from team America. I thought I faced was very much, very much stolen from the set of that. But apart from that, yeah, so she became like basically the, the witting a bit. Well, it wasn't, she wasn't.

Reegs: subverted. In fact, she was very much, she was widowed. There was a hint that maybe she'd had a fling in the past with Solano, huge Ackman.

Sidey: I thought they had, yeah.

Reegs: But she, I mean, it was one of the things that I really liked about this is that she rejects his advances

Dan: Cause he was at also, he was just a dickhead. Wasn't he? The hallway food to film. It was just, I didn't like him at all. I was watching it with a kid, so I wanted somebody to like, have even the Sasquatch though. So Susan wasn't that nice. I mean, they were like, okay, there was action things in it. I've just, there was so much potential there for this film.

I just. Didn't get me going at all. I didn't have me.

Reegs: I well look how we, I did really loved this. I loved it in a technical sense because I was just marveling at every single sequence because it is breathtaking to look at an and when you know that it stop motion is even more so, but there were some great uses of symbolism in there. So in the beginning, when he's riding the carriage to Lord.

Pig it done speeds club. They're splashing mud onto everybody. And it's sort of reflecting Lionel's tendency to sort of put his own needs at the, in front of everybody. Else's there's they, they, when he makes the deal with Pigott, Dansby, it's next to a roaring fireplace, you know, and it's, it's sort of that deal with the devil motif.

When Salinas rushing down the hall of the club No, sorry. When Ponce bees speeds marching down the hall and he's ranting about the things that threatened his world, the suffragette movement, electricity volution, each of the candles is snuffing out as he walks past them, you know, showing how, how he's snuffing out, you know,

Howie: how pompous and out of touch and yeah,

Reegs: what he's planning, bring the world into darkness and he'd gladly keep the world like that if he could.

And you know, there's just, so there was just so many

Dan: were lots of baseball. I just felt that the human never really hit. Me as an adult and the kids as kids, you know, it was kind of lost somewhere. And for us, we didn't really, you know, find that, that humor where I was laughing at all the

Reegs: Yeah, I mean,

Dan: laugh that, and they will often hit the bits that they should have laughed that and the, the beats, we should all be laughing together. We didn't laugh at Ava.

Reegs: Yeah, I agree. I don't know that it was a fantastically. Funny film. I tell you one of the things that I really, really liked about it was the underlying message about something, you know, sometimes wanting something is better than actually having it. And that was, you know, that was really the message. And I liked that message to, to have that through because we live in such a consumer materialistic society to have that message in this big thing was, was I really enjoyed that.

And then also, you know, that. The Susan's journey that you don't need the approval of others to define yourself that there's a difference between acceptance and friendship. I just think these were like mature themes dressed up in a, in a

Howie: Sorry,

Reegs: demon child woken up Howie.

 Howie: I felt there was some good messages from that. It was like, as you said, rigs be yourself Try and aim for betterments. And the, I felt the character arc a few Jackman's character salon, fros was evident and clear of him just stopping, being so selfish and considering the impact of his actions on others, which is a big thing with my kids at the minute, because they're so.

But I might be a mixture of the containment of the environment we're in and, and, and the, and the focus is very narrow at the minute, but they're not thinking of them. They're not thinking of others at the minute. They're just thinking of themselves. And it's brother and

Reegs: Selfish fuckers.

Howie: They are being selfish fuckers at the minute.

And I'm hoping that things like this kind of gie them along and make them think about the repercussions of things. And I think that's what the, the film endeavors to show, but then there is a positive female spin on it. As we said, she goes at the end of, I don't need to be because you, you, you, you, you think that the easy writing is the three of them go off and become a trio.

And she's like, no, no, I'm going off now. I'm going to go and lead my own life. I'll

Reegs: find myself.

Howie: And I'm going to, I'll keep in contact with you, but that's something completely separate altogether. And just going back to animation, the one thing I thought that was fantastic that bit, I quite like, and I liked this because it reminds me of Indiana Jones films was the maps.

That they always do. I love that. I absolutely love that. And it was a nice, it was a nice sort of montage way between scenes and interlude, if you like between that. And I have to say the Indian elephant scene, the animation sequence is spectacular, absolutely spectacular. The dedication, the effort, the technical ability to have done that.

And I, and that's reflected in the fact that this film. We've got a 50 50 split here, but despite that fact, this film is a bizarre one. It has huge financial losses and it absolutely got nominated to bits as a sleeper film in the Academy awards. So there is an element of justification to the producers that they were on the right path, but, but a mixture of things as clearly not targeted the right audience, perhaps.

And it was released at the wrong time. Cause they, they They did another film previous to this, which I've now forgotten. I think it's, Cuco I

Sidey: Okay. By the two

Howie: Cuba too, which

Reegs: Yeah. And Caroline was also from

Howie: So, so they've got, they've got the, they've got the potential, they've got the technical ability. They've got the innovation and it will be interesting to see where it goes from this.

I, my kids Opposites dance, similar age groups. So it's obviously a, a an objectional thing. If they, they both laughed out loud, quite a lot through and really enjoyed it. They particularly liked the ice scene as well, which they found quite perilous. They normally shy away from peril, if you like and stuff like that, they thought that was fantastic with the ice bridge collapsing.

And they laughed at the end and they loved the music, the music at the end, which they were singing and messing around. I don't see them do that. And it was nice to see them be kids rather than trying to find a clever twist on something. And it was nice. So yeah, again, as we always do, these films reviews are objectional and you can't force someone to like something It's it is what it is.

There we go.

Dan: well, I really liked the message. I thought it was. Good animation. Even before I found out it was stop motion and then it becomes absolutely sick. It is completely fantastic. And if it wins the Academy awards for that, I don't think everyone's going to going to say anything. In fact art moon will have his work cut out.

I think if that's the kind of level that is going to now

Reegs: it's interesting. Isn't it? Cause we had a discussion on the pod a few weeks back. I can't remember what it was we were talking about more for maybe when we talked about how argument may be needed to up its game. And if it's up against stuff like this.

Dan: wow, definitely. You know, I, it just, it just and the, the idea, the adventure exploring Victorian time, it takes all the kind of boxes that I would say, wow, this is actually really good. The story for me, just wasn't the plot. Wasn't. Yeah. Strong enough overall, the characters, I think just annoyed me. I just didn't like him.

Didn't really care for the characters. Yeah, I know. I missed the gags, you know I asked the kids what they, they thought about it and Nellie said it was the fifth best film. Which is same as say like 1 million, if it's. Not first or second, you know, it's like fifth, it's just like a random high number.

And Sonny's eyes hurt. He said afterwards, he he really didn't like this one. So

Reegs: No for

Dan: for, not for, not for us really.

Sidey: Yeah, this is a complete charisma vacuum. It was, there was nothing to like character-wise for me. Visually impressive, but boring story, shitty characters, glad they fucking lost a load of money. Cause they fit me as they won't make another one. Fuck them all.

Dan: wow. It's digging a knife in there.

Reegs: I'm the total opposite. I think it's a real crying shame that this lost so much money. I thought it was big and bright and bold and colorful. And I think that the themes were really interesting. The messages were different. I agree. There weren't many gags that landed. I can see what you say about the characters, but I thought his arc was quite interesting.

Yeah, I really, really loved this and. Honestly go and research how this is made. Watch a few videos on how it was made. Incredible, unbelievable.

Sidey: No mines, move on.

All right. Well, after this week's double Brighton rock. Let's,

Howie: if you're a cynical, old bastard is if you, if you're, if you're a bright, energetic, love film, you can have a whale of a time watching these movies.

Sidey: Okay. We, we hopefully have something decent to watch next week. Rigs, what are we looking at?

Reegs: We've got top five movie cowards.  The main feature is going to be Dallas buyers club, which is on Netflix and Matthew mahogany. Yep. And the main feature is going to be pepper pig. And we're going to have the in honor of Chinese new year, which is on Thursday. So we're going to have the Chinese new year episode of pepper pig.

Sidey: did you say it's on Netflix?

Reegs: Well, no, I don't know where it is. I'm sure we'll find it somewhere.

Sidey: Okay, cool.  Right. Well, I'm going to go and cry myself to sleep after watching two fucking horrendous films this week. Hopefully things will look up in the not too distant future. All that remains is to say side of your signing out.

Dan: Dan's gone.

Howie: goodbye.