Dark Destinations may be end times Night's creature. Why would a few more casually
struggle me because of their blood will join yours a radio drama anthology. You
are wrong how you figure Every mark on Mongo is hunting you down, not
you, your partner, he said, I didn't have a ray gun.
Full cast performances set in the haunted corners of the globe. Darkness is coming
for you. That's the fear that taunts me. Dark Destinations by fatherm Alone
at Weirdingwaymedia dot com weird Welcome back midnight viewers to Anthologies Attack. I'm your
host, Father Malone and with me as always co host Antonio Lapour Buenos Dias,
Father Malone, Buenos Noce is. Depending on where you are in the
world, We're in the same spot as previous episodes have noticed where we're branching
out in the anthology universe. Here stepping away from horror. We're stepping all
the way from horror. Here, we're stepping away from all most in all
genre. Here, this is all just straight up filmmaking, an anthology film
in the eldest tradition of anthology films. Just three short stories here. The
connective tissue is the city of New York. Thus, the filmmakers involved Woody
Allen, Franciscort Coppola, and Martin Scorsetacey. They've all gotten together to tell
us some New York stories. I'm fifty years old. I'm a partner in
a big law firm. You know, I'm very successful, and I still
haven't resolved my relationship with my mother. Zoe. I noticed it's difficult your
father and I. I'm trying to reconciliation. What but I'm moving out?
Where you're gonna go? What can you afford? You don't want to sleep
with me anymore? Hey, I'm a big boy. You don't have to
blot in the street. We're still an employer employee, right. My mother
always humiliates me. She just gives me a hard time. She she's always
telling me that I look terrible. Hi, man, I hope we're not.
Hi. How are you gee? You look terrible? My mother did
it again? How do you suppose I feel with her out there calling me
all those strange foreign names? What's the corva anyway? Oh? It's Jewish
for what? It's a horror Hello, room service, send up a room.
Just kidding, it's me. I'm a little bit in hot water.
Maybe I can help pap going on. We're having a costume party, a
big custom party. Got anything. I'm taking a vacation, so we you're
desperating. You tell me is twelve years old. You should listen to her.
I didn't go to Florida with a girlfriend, like I told you.
Somebody else. I appreciate heard kitty and he's here a scorn split left me.
Okay, o the right. It's just some guy. I said.
You have to go right up in his face to night. It's not him
walking with me and make an entrance with the firepower. Why do you make
me do that? Listen to it? I love him. What are you
doing? I'm speaking with a dead friend of mine. Would you rather tell
privately? Because I couldn't wait? No, no, no, no,
that's not necessary. We're not discussing anything personal. I'm the daughter and you're
the mother. I'm the mother and you're the daughter. Sometimes I feel I
should just quit suicide. This is a time of place. You're right in
the heart of the heart. Put this is New York. It's here for
you. You know his spot That was completely ball too. I'm not completely
cool. It will bait New York Stories. This was released on March tenth,
nineteen eighty nine. As I said, it is a trio of tales
the directors Woody Allen, Martin Scorsese, and Francis Ford Coppola, well three
months before Batman. Ah oh yeah, exactly right. Yeah, that's BB
and AB Right. So the conceit is, I guess, just go make
some movies about New York. Now, Initially the third filmmaker was not going
to be friends Fort Coppola. It was Stephen Spielberg, which makes little to
no sense given how West Coast a human being he is. Nevertheless, once
Francis Ford Coppola became involved, the key dropped out deleteriously. So I would
say, but we'll get to the content in a moment. Let's just start
at the top, And we really are starting at the top. I think
our first tale is Life Lessons. This one is written by Richard Price,
who was pretty much the hottest New York biographer during the nineteen eighties his novels
Clockers. He an incredible voice, an incredible writer, and can't think of
anyone better at that moment to sum up New York City for Martin Scorsese,
it was Schrader in the seventies, but I think right here Richard Price is
doing it. This one stars Nick Nolty and Resent ar Kent. Story about
a painter, Lloyd Dobby, who is he has an assistant, a younger
assistant. He is an old man, he's all Picasso out there, and
this is about him coming to terms with her and his relationship with her and
her relationship to him, and they sort of a weird master apprentice thing.
She's his assistant, his painter's assistant, but she's also his lover, and
they share a loft together, and we get the sense that this is not
the first assistant he's had in the loft, but he is trying desperately to
keep hold of her, and she's trying to branch out on her own.
What'd you think of this one, man, I honestly, I'm not a
fan of pretty much any of these. I found that in this picture,
all the protagonists, all the main characters, were really, really, really
unlikable. In some cases I would say despicable, but go ahead, and
he's despicable. He's just and he's not an old man. He's like our
age. He's like forty nine fifty in this movie, I would say that's
old, but continue Jackson Mary Jackson pollocky. Yeah, thats another who I
thought of. And even it's funny because they mentioned like he's friends with Jackson
Pollock and stuff. I feel like he's not as good as an artist as
his press is making amount to be, and he kind of knows that as
a character. Like I'm watching this movie, I'm like, oh, his
art's okay. You know, I'm a bit of an artist. I'm like,
it's okay. My eyesn't like, oh, this guy's an amazing painter
or anything like that said, okay painter. I feel like he's probably not
as good as he as everyone thinks he is, like I said, and
he's just a giant, fucking asshole. I would have rather seen this story
from her perspective than his. Yeah, I think ultimately you have to think
that it is because well, no, it's not. I mean, this
is definitely his story. You're right, But at the end of the day,
she doesn't suffer at the and she does provide there's the briefest of moments
where Nick Nolty recognizes all of his bullshit right at the end when he's about
to take on the new assistant, where he's sizing her up and realizing,
yeah, she's absolutely right about me. This is just who I am,
This is just the next thing, and yeah, you hit the nail right
on the I feel like Scorsese is kind of working through some shit on his
in this story, because as you see his you know, he's probably about
fifty making this movie, right, and as you can see, his young
girlfriend is playing the friend because that he was with the Iliana Douglass at that
time. It's a cavalcade of Scorsese people in the movie. But yes,
I noticed Leana Douglas right away, and I'm going, oh, look,
there's Scorsese's cute young girlfriend, and here's the guy Doug dealing. So I
feel like there's some a lot of like self reflection going on in that movie.
And it's weird because it's like he's in that period. I think he's
hit middle age because like his movie before this is Last Impatient of Christ,
which really just goes into his whole upbringing as a Catholic, as being you
know, various. I don't know about you, but very similar to mine.
I'm cuban. I know what he grew up with because I the same
thing. I was an older boy and all this stuff. I really liked
the pageantry of it and all that stuff. Like him. That's where I
first acted, playing Jesus when I was a little boy, or you know,
so sure, I was in the May Parade, Irish Catholic here,
so we were all similarly fucked in the head from an earlier age. And
so but then his next movie, then he does this short piece or is
about this middle aged artist dealing with you know, getting older and him still
liking young tale and if he's trying to feel like he's a fraud or not
for that. You know, I always think it's just a question of you
know, you just don't grow up. Artists tend to not grow up,
so you know, they tend to like younger women, I think, and
younger men as far as we can see Madonna and Share and any other number
of successful lady artists too. Maybe that's it. I don't know. Well,
you know, the thing is, what's better than someone adoring you who
hasn't heard any of your old barring stories exactly? Yeah, it's a good
point. And then the next movie is Good Found, which is about the
neighborhood more or less the people he grew up around. You know, yeah,
he wasn't a gangstory that, but he talks about I grew up in
a neighborhood. I knew these guys. So I feel like there's a lot
of self reflection in that time period of his movie making. So maybe that
hasn't to do with it. I think so. I think this one is
actually wildly successful. You know, I'm certainly no stranger, and you aren't
either. Too unlikable protect movies. You know, this isn't Travis Bickell.
He ain't fucking shooting up anybody. This is not charming all. He's for
the from Travis Biglockett obviously, but his unlikable protagonists tend to be have a
charm to them that that you like, see what it is? Oh well,
okay, Yeah, Henry Hill is a jerk, but you know he's
not an asshole. He's very fun to hang around. Yeah, Jesus are
really little nuts, but it's Jesus or you know, hey, you know
his gangsters and casino they're all murderous thugs. But come on, Joe Peschy's
a funny guy. You know, I want to double back to something you
said earlier, This should have been told from Rosanna Arkat's point of view one,
because the story we're being told is not a news story. It's just
it's done in an interesting way. But the idea of the mentor who is
sort of not praying on but you know, just effectively using a younger protege
for their own means there's nothing new to that. I would definitely have enjoyed
the protege's point of view when they're realizing, like what am I putting up
with? Just because this person is talented? What other charm is there?
Because as you said, Nick Nolty's not putting any on display, or they're
not allowing his character to put any on display, because from the moment we
meet him, he's just desperation. Yeah, maybe that's it. Maybe I
just don't know, Maybe that's it. Maybe I'm just viewing into that and
I don't like why am I going on this journey with this guy? I
don't like this guy at all, and not even I'm not joying his train
wreck. That's another thing, you know. Yeah, the characters at Wolba
Wall Street are all terrible people. You don't want to spend any time with
But you enjoy watching their train wreck a little bit. Oh they're fun.
Yeah. I wouldn't want to like be woven into their lives, but I
would certainly sit across the room and watch them. Yeah, exactly. And
here Nick Nolty's just that maybe if you know, you know, de Niro
played this part, I might have it, might have played a little might
have played a little better. I don't know. I like, maybe I'm
gonna believe de Niro more as a tortured artist in that time period than Nick
Nolty. Maybe you think Nick Nolty's an asshole, I don't know. I
think it would have been worse if it been. Actually, I think he
would have played full end too, that desperation, and that's all we would
have gotten. And at least Nick Nolty just seems a bit lighthearted. Lighthearted.
Yeah, I think this might be quitting Tarantino's favorite Martin's Scorsese picture because
of all the time spent on Roseanna or Cat's foot. Oh yeah, which
apparently is a foot. Oh really, she didn't have that cute little tiny
foot. No. She specifically asked or Sacy if she could have a foot
double, which he thought was ridiculous but accommodated. Anyway, there you go,
and Roseanne Arctic they ever found attractive until last. All this movie,
she has a couple of moments where she does this little smile. I'm like,
oh, I see why she draws so many rock stars insane. Oh
it's yeah, it is that smile. Have you seen Have you seen After
Hours before this movie? Yeah? After Hours it is great. I haven't
seen it in twenty years, though, maybe I should go big enough and
watch it again. You one again loved After Hours, man, I saw
like three times in high school, Like I thought it was the coolest movie.
But I was always a big Patrician arc Caet fan, you know,
as as a young man with movie crushes. I always saw Patricia arcat was
just where the Mariars Ain't Gonna dream no more? Or her? And what
was it in the True Romance? Oh my god, yes, Alabama Warley,
Alabama Whorley Wow situation. That is a perfect character portrayed perfectly. But
he wrote, I get the Rosanna Arcata, you know, finally, like,
oh okay, I got it, and she was good and I felt
really just watching the movie. I just felt terrible for her. Maybe it's
just you know, maybe we're watching this in nineteen eighty nine, we're looking
at it. We're going to look at it differently, you know. It's
you know, thirty five years later we were as men. We look at
we you know, evolved a little bit socially, and I think we might
be able to look at things differently and recognize, oh, he's being bros.
You know. But there's another thing though, too. Hey, I've
dated younger women, not a thirty year age gap, but you know,
ten twelve sometimes, I mean the most, and those younger women will driving
nuts. Well, I guess the idea is here that she's just really going
to talk about art and you yeah, well, oh the younger woman driving
nuts is because he had nothing to talk with her about, probably more than
anything. There's no common ground there, so he's just talking at her the
whole time. What are your cultural touchstones with a thirty year span. Yeah,
it's ridiculous, zero, I would say. Yeah, speaking of boyfriends
and girlfriends on screen, Peter Gabriel shows up unannounced too, and so did
Debbie Harry. Oh yeah, yeah, that whole scene, Steve Buscemi,
it should be noted. Yeah, playing a performance artist playing what you know,
he wrote his monologue. His character is giving Steve Buscemi shows up as
a performance artist that he's the he's the man that that Rosanna Archett has been
carrying on an affair with, but now he's dumped her. So it's now
she's stuck back with Nick Nolty and just had some dashing performance artists Steve.
Yeah, and his performance is great. Now, it's my understanding that around
New York at that time he and Mark Boone Junior were basically performing little two
man shows like with monologues. They would like that morning and such. Okay,
that's cool, yeah, part of the whole lan New York Underground.
Yeah, see, I didn't think that. You know, a performance in
an abandoned subway tunnel was interesting with those lights and everything. This episode,
this segment looks great. Yeah, it does look great. And is it
Bajas filming? It was he the DP on it? No, this is
Nestor Elmendros. Oh wow, because it looks like a lot of those camera
moves that Bajas was using and Goodfellas are in there. You know. That's
that that's every time I watch to Martin Scarcese movie. Just all his static
shots are floating, so it's that camera is constantly moving. If he's using
like the same crane guy or the same steady caam guy, then maybe because
there's that thing where it's like there's a pan around Nick Nolty to her or
something, there's that it's an over the shoulder switch and it's done with that,
but it's done like on a crane, and it's that very deliberate that
you'll see Goodfellows all over the place and in Casino too, which is again
they're I guess two different PP's there too, So maybe he's just say a
great guy or something that's called this Corsese kind of like it, and that
push in that he does, it's all there, and it's weird because this
guy's talking about art but he's still shooting it like Goodfellows. And I love
anytime a filmmaker gets to do like an anthology or a short film or something.
I always appreciate where their indulgences are because they will always have some cinematic
trick in their mind from when they were kids that they've never employed. In
this case, it's iris saying, oh yeah, he loves that. He
even the Iris morning he's been using it? Is this where he first started
using it? Here, I'm sure he may have. There may have been
a shot I'm not aware of before this movie, but this is wall to
wall Iris. Yeah. For me, it's I like Iris. I like
the Star Wars Iris, the wipes a lot. That's those are like for
me what I like a lot. And I'm a big dissolved fan. I'll
the short I'm working on, I've got to dissolve the thirty seconds long because
I just love that. So yeah, yeah, and I think you're absolutely
right on these shorts. The guys get to folks, get to experiment a
little bit and try new things and play with stuff. Yeah, because the
couple of segment is really inventive too. Yeah, he's trying stuff in there,
I think. I mean, well, that's a whole other conversation.
I don't want to talk about sports a little bit. More Overall, I've
really enjoyed this one and it made me hopeful for the following two stories.
But at the same time, if I never hear procol Harem's Whiter Shade of
Pale again, it was an amusing song at one point, I just don't
it's enough already there are some songs that I'm just that's enough. Put them
away now, you know what I'm watching this segment specifically, I imagine someone
gen Zer going boobern nonsense, that's what it was, so oh boober this
movie with just the soundtrack and the whole thing. I don't know, And
maybe that's it. This might be just a thing where that was the song
he was listening to all the time, and let's just put that on the
soundtrack because and it's not I'm not saying it's not appropriate for that character and
in this situation in this film. But Jesus Christ, you're right to me,
not even the younger generation. I'm just like this boomer bullshit. Get
it out of the way. Martin Scorsese. You put Devo in the casino?
Yeah, I don't think that may be a budget constraint too. This
is the coolest classic song that we can afford that would fit this ex hippie
guy. You know, we can't afford the Rolling Stones for this movie.
But he has Bob Dylan there, like every time he's furiously painting, we
get some how does it feel by Bob Dylan? Oh yeah? And it's
a live version. It's really good and he paints furiously, So the procol
harum is the artist inspiration and Bob Dylan is his actual artistic motion. There
you go. But the way it wraps up. I did like the ending
a lot, because you know, I like the cycnical ending to it,
like it's just this is just who he is. He figured it out,
He's just gonna do it again, and you're like, what a scumback.
But at least there's that moment of his own acceptance. But I guess I
am just this fucking user. Yeah. I feel like younger folks would not
like this at all. If there are any younger folks out there, let
us know, give us some comments. My younger I mean, anyone under
the edge of forty right, yeah, really, because you know, here
we are talking discussing of ontology film from thirty five years ago. It but
you know, these are three big names, and in nineteen eighty nine,
these guys were the names. You know, they were giants. Yeah,
Copla had won you know, a bunch of oscars. He made The Godfather
movies and like, well, The Godfather I think bought Coppola a lifetime of
goodwill, Like you're Oh. Yeah, he made a godf Right. He
followed it with Apocalypse and Now, which everybody hated, which is too bad
because I think it's his best. I'm sorry, let me go back.
He followed that with The Conversation. Oh yeah, the Conversation is really good.
Fucking great man. He was on a he was on a roll,
a cinematic role. He gets to pass for the rest of his life as
far as I'm concerned. In the eighties he started like sparamenting. In the
eighties he made One from the Heart and that bankrupted him and then he had
to become a director for hire. But nevertheless, he did Outsiders, which
is great. He did Rumblefish, which I fucking adore. He did Peggy
Sue Got Married. That's his director for Higher Thing. People were like,
oh, he's doing this. Watch that movie. It's one of the sweetest,
most affecting movies of the nineteen eighty. Yeah. And he made Tucker
Tucker with his with his buddy. That man had a dream. Yeah,
who that Tiger? Oh my god. Jeff Bridge is in his prime.
Yeah, little Christian Slater, listen, we have to move on. I
really don't want to, but we have to start life without Zoe. This
one is the Francis Ford Coppola segment. This one was written by Francis Ford
Coppola and Sophia Coppola, who I believe was seventeen at the time. Oh
seventeen. Oh okay, that really she was seventeen, because I kept feeling
she was twelve, because a lot of it feels like it was written by
a twelve year old. Well, remember the next year she would be in
Godfather three. Oh yes, I can't fault him for that. He loves
his kid, man, what are you gonna do? Yeah, And this
is one hundred percent that this is a studio saying have some money in him
putting together a family picnic and just enjoying his life and his family and apparently
getting them all a free trip to Greece. Well there you go. So
in that regard, that just makes me love Copola all the more. But
then I only love Copola for the work. And this is not disappointing.
This was it felt insulting. Yeah, I know, and but I and
then again back to another and giving his daughter the best film school imaginable.
She's that bitch parlance of the times. She's that ever respected filmmaker, that
Oscar winner, because her dad took her to work with him, and she's,
hey, you're seventeen, let's write this together. Hey, you know
what, just come me in my movie. I don't care what you know
what I mean? I like because I want to do. He's a great
dad, and I like, you know, I would love to spend just
a lunch with him, just getting to chat with him, because I learned
a lot from Copola. Man, those Godfather discs, the audio commentary on
The Godfather. I got just about as much out of those as that I
did four years of college, five years of college. Man. So but
this I wanted to smack a new little kid. This okay, So here's
the plot. Effectively, this is the This is a let's say, inspired
by the Eloise books of the nineteen fifties, that was a little girl living
in a penthouse of the Plaza in New York, and in the New York
that we get here is sort of from the nineteen fifties because at that time,
like a little affluent girl could probably be protected by and guided by Dorman
and you know, butlers and the general populace of New York. This is
made prested by that creepy holeless guy that grabs her the yeah, or just
spirited away by the cab driver, or any of the crazy nineteen eighty nine
actual perilous situations that this character puts herself into. It's okay, but the
plot is her. She's living effectively by herself. Her father is a famous
floutist, her mother is an actress, performer, dancer of who knows they're
both parents are absent. She's living her rich affluent life, going to a
rich affluent school, uh throwing parties for rich affluent boys. I would,
I'm so sickened by the rich affluents. I gotta say, the whole movie
was just about Each movie was about a rich ass Each little segment was about
a rich asshole, because you know, I don't know any artists that makes
that kind of money that Nick Nolty was making. And that thing where he
owned the building, the fuck artist owns the building, and you know he's
the rich asshole. There this here, rich asshole little girl with a rich
asshole little friends. And then the third one, rich asshole lawyer who works
for a men Manhattan advertising firm, who's a lawyer for a Manhattan advertising firm
or whatever he is, three rich affluents, out of touch motherfuckers. Sorry,
yeah for giving us. We're given three potential stories to sum up New
York City in nineteen eighty nine. Did nobody have Spike Lee's phone number?
Is? He could have done one and it would have been like, Yo,
this is what people in New York actually live like. This is also
the same year that Do the Right Thing comes out there. There's no question
if you want a New York story from nineteen eighty nine, which which Avenue
to take it straight to radio raheem Man to Do the Right Thing as a
fucking masterpiece of absolutely I watched it again like a year ago, and I'm
just like, oh my god, this movie is so fucking good. How
was this not the Best Picture nominee? And then that oh, okay,
well obviously I know all right, but still it's amazing. I remember being
a kid and kim basing her coming out to list the nominees for something,
and you're taking time out of her speech to shout out how good Do the
Right Thing was. I remember just a lot of controversy when the movie came
out because of the ending of the movie because it was not resolved ending and
I'm like, but life is unresolved, and he was making life. He's
here. My art is showing the world that I grew up in, the
world that I live in. I remember seeing mister Lee like defending himself on
one of the late night news programs, saying like, I'm sorry it didn't
end with everybody linking hands and singing we are the world, but that's just
not where we are. That's, you know, the dichotomy of cinema in
nineteen eighty nine, which is, you know, I guess that's around the
year where I had, you know, sexual awakenings, but I had cinema
awakenings. That's around the time when I started paying attention I guess as a
filmgoer and future filmmaker. But the dichotomy look back that year. The two
most important movies in that year are Do the Right Thing Batman and you can't
get a more opposite view of urban life with those two movies, like and
You're Right because Batman ties up nice and neat and the hero saves the rich
hero saves this end of the day. As much as I love Batman and
we don't know, I love Batman, but like the movie starts with Batman
effectively beating up too homeless men. Two yeah, two homelessmen were clearly addicted
to something and cracked out too, because they just looked like, look,
yeah, but that's movie Batman. Oh yeah, Batman is a jerk.
Movie Batman blows up people, and movie Batman beats him homeless guys. Real
comic book Batman would have given those homeless guy jobs at Wayne Tower, at
Wayne at the Wayne Foundation or something, and here he was like here,
you you know, would have might have smacked him around a little bit and
then give him a lesson, like, hey, this is how you can
improve your life. Batman is there to beat up super criminals. He helps
four people. But anyways, and you know what else was going on in
nineteen eighty nine, what else? Life without Zoe? Life without how are
we continuing? How are we getting behind? Life had no Zoe in it.
You know, if you look up the word precocious, my goodness,
every little motherfucker in this movie was precocious. You know, I was starting
to sound like Bernie Sanders a little but going off on like the rich hassle
Dan Pinjin, but like these characters really are little shits, that little the
little chic boy, and oh my god, everybody speaks like they're forty eight
years old. And here's what I enjoyed in this segment, the opening sequence
where she's being awakened by her butler, who's played by Don Novello, the
Great Donovalle as a fellow fank man of the Claw. He's father Grido Sarducci
from seven. He basically did he's he's doing the accent, and he's always
a welcome presence, and here, like it made me wish he was in
more dramatic stuff because he's great at it and he's so charming that the thought
of an entire segment of this guy and this girl sort of doing something in
New York, their New York story was very appealing. But then we go
immediately to girls to the rich kids' school and all the rich kid bullshit,
and the whole thing is completely stylized. I mean, it's it's really like
a comic book. All the girls are, you know, dressed in these
wide brimmed hats and everything. And that's part of what like Coocho likes to
do. I mean, because look at look at Dracula. He does a
very similar kind of movie making there. Everything in Dracula is very very stylized
and very very intentional and stuff. But play Isn'tdracula. It doesn't play here
no as well here No, because the fucking characters are little annoying assholes.
Yeah, and what there's they're they're having that costume party and all of a
sudden, this train of eleven year old little girls. But it's not like
Cleopatrick come in and a whole choreographed thing, and I'm like, I know,
I'm supposed to go this is a fantasy like for kids like Eloise and
shit. But this is just playing really creepy and not playing, you know,
like it doesn't. I don't know. Maybe it's missing that Spielbergian thing.
Yeah. Now, had Spielberg shot this, I think I would have
been better. Had Spielberg shot this, you wouldn't have minded any of this,
no, because he would have picked children who you would have immediately fallen
in love with without them saying one word. Yeah, And the the sort
of halcy and below that that Copola is going for here would have been natural.
Yeah, that's that's definitely it. Because I remember thinking about watching him
like Spielberg, I would have liked everybody. I hate every character here.
I'm going, why, you know what a worked? Had this been Dogavello's
kid instead of the original as the little original asshole. Had the butler's little
girl get stolen the you know, gotten a hold of the Tear of Allah
or whatever the hell it was? That the Mystical Land of Shiraz, the
Australian the delicious Australian Wine. Is that lady the Sheik's wife, the aunt.
Is that the lady for your eyes only, You're goddamn right. It
is Carol Bouquet lighting up the screen. I saw those eyes on that face,
like, oh, hey, I know that, I know that lady.
So there are some charms in this episode, but not really. And
I just want to yell at the actors at the kids while they're filming it.
There's a there's a shot where they're doing like the fake the little press
conference with the kid and came and the girls pointing the camera and the got
pointing like the prop camera. She's pointing it like a hundred feet away from
anybody talking, and I'm just like, oh, come on. What I
liked in that scene was you can control the area you're in, but you
can't really control boats because there's a bunch of people in the in the lake
behind them and who were clearly just staring at the camera. Look picking a
movie. I feel like he probably lets Sophia direct that scene. He let
her create the opening title sequence, Oh yeah, which I thought was neat
in that we only got everyone's first name. Yeah. I like that too.
I've only ever seen that done again. Tony Scott did that at the
end of Domino when he credited all of his actors. It was lovely.
Domedo is a weird movie, man, Yeah, speak, there's a good
movie in Domino somewhere. I I do like here at Knightley. It's just
it's so charming. As an actor, she was always like just like,
can't keep your eyes off of her. Most of everyone in that movie is
charming. You know, he's charming in that movie. Mikey York from the
early two thousands. Oh yeah, man, like he's staying anyway back.
We gotta get back, we gotta finish, back to New York, back
to back, back to fake New York, back to fake New York.
It's just, you know, and not even charming. Fake New York.
This isn't Amali's Paris. You know, that's tail version of Paris. This
is just a sort of glossed over New York like eighties via the fifties.
Some weird moments in this when uh Talia Schier gets dressed down by her daughter
for her shoulder pads, Now that was so bizarre. Now, I gotta
say, by eighty nine, you should not have been wearing shoulder pads anyway.
That was She's that the little girl is correct, but it was just
a weird, out of place thing in the middle of this also weird thing.
You know what, I did like Chris Elliott as the robber. I
did like Chris Elliott too. Yeah, he's just is this from the nineteen
forties or something? Why not? Now listen he had kids. Oh but
the little girl, it's just like her dialogue was well, it was there's
precocious and then there's precocious and yeah, and I know they pointed out,
oh you're not the mom. We I'm the mom. But still it doesn't
like, you know, we're precocious. Works where it plays really well is
many on modern family. That little kid is a precocious little fun and he
drinks his tea to this and he always speaks a forty eight year old,
but everybody is always giving him shit for it. People comment that they know
he's annoying with it, you know, like it's part of the character and
it works and everybody plays off of it, whereas in this everybody is just
kind of precocious and they're allowed to be like that and not the point because
if I talk like that, my sisters would have given me all manner of
help. My mom would have been like they had to, which it translates
into English, stop eating shit, which is a human way of saying,
it's not being an idiot. You more on Yeah, you know, there's
precocious and there's precocious. We deal over on Midnight Viewing Horror Anthology podcast.
You would be not at all shocked to know that every time there's a child
centric episode of an anthology series, they tend to go with the young actor
who can handle the part. The problem is the kid who can handle the
part is also precocious. They're a child trained actor, so it comes off
false and phony. Yeah, I look, it wasn't. In another podcast,
I was talking about goonies. But anyways, they've Mae an interesting point.
I'll bring it up here. You can edit all my thinking out.
The thing about goonies is they're not precocious little kids, even though they because
their foul mouth, they talk really fast. They're always out of breath.
Little kids are always out of breath when they're talking. Man, it's because
they're the tiny little bodies and they're just trying to get the words out.
We're here and it's all this thing, and it's amazing, and like a
party of eleven year olds just that have been like running around like bananas.
Instead they're all like, ooh, let's have high tea and have choreographed dances
and our masquerade ball. You know how this would have worked if it made
those children five years younger, or six years or four four years younger.
If this had been a bunch of eight or nine year old girls, then
it would have been a fairy tale and it would have all been magical.
The fact is, these are twelve year olds who should be acting like goonies,
children who are acting like high society. Yeah. Instead they should be
you know, hilarious and me to each other like twelve year olds are twelve
year olds are hilarious twelve year little girls are sarcastic and biting and just the
meanest little things in the world. They're hilarious characters, and these kids are
not funny at all. No, these characters are you know, reading Paris
Vogue and drinking dakeries. Yeah, I know that's right. They're drinking dakers
is a dakery for a twelve year old. The reason they're drinking dakyries is
because that's what Fredo like to order. And havana and I don't know,
your father didn't trust time in ruths anyway. Oh, by the way,
I think was the homeless guy? Was he was Frank potentially or whatever the
fuck that guy's name is from Godfather too? Oh was it? It'll be
here drinking him a cocktails? Hold on, I think that was the homeless
guy. That's why I love this town. She's why I love it.
I'm looking. Yeah, you know, I've just spoken about him on a
different podcast, and now I cannot remember his name, so I'm gonna have
to cut all this shit out. But I'm hoping you're right here. Life
without Sorry have become James King. He's kind of crazy Italian name, I
know, that is it? Steve Bishemy sounds like Steve. I can't find
the homeless guy listed. That doesn't really matter. I do think I also
noticed the I could be wrong, it sounded the same, but I also
noticed the guy from Goodfellas, the drug dealer with the silencers. Hey,
you want to see helicopters, Ohlstoy helicopters. He's in this course, is
he one? He's in the Coppola one. He's a doorman. We're talking
about Paul Herman. He's in all three, in all three of them,
Okay, yeah, he's he's the cop that Nick Nolty attempts to kiss in
the first. He's dormant here, and where is he in the third one?
I know he's in there side. I think he might be a dormant
in that one. Maybe he's a dormant in that one too, I don't
know, but yeah, I know he had noticed him. He and all
three of them. And I feel like a movie like that needs a pronounced
guy that. Oh no, he's the detective in the final one. Okay,
well that's some. But there's a connecting thread between the three of them,
I guess, is that guy. Yeah, Well, it's my understanding
that they'd all each worked with Paul Herman anyway, sort of previous, so
that they may have cast him independently of one another. If that's the case,
I would really like it. That would be awesome. You know what.
There is a finite number of movie working actors anywhere you go. I
mean, they're just gonna keep popping up again and stuff. Plus, if
you like them and they worked out for you, why wouldn't you get him
in again? You know, I just got eligible for my sag card.
I might start auditioning for stuff. Yeah, all right, that's the last
set about life without Zoe. I can live without life without Zoe. Yeah,
and we're going to oh, you know what, I do want to
point out one other fella here. The gallery owner in the Scorsese episode is
Patrick O'Neil, who we've covered on Midnight Viewing Night Gallery. He's in season
two, episode four, A Fear of Spiders. You can go check that
episode out the back in the feed. We love Patrick O'Neill. He's good
here. I mean, he wasn't really given anything to do other than be
a priggish old gallery owner, but he's great at priggish I feel that's right.
But you know what. One more thing on Zoe is I do think
Coppola again working with the family. The family thing I think is what's neat
about this is, Hey, I'm a to write this movie with my kid,
and I'm gonna like kind of show her the ropes a little bit.
That's neat. I don't like the movie, but I like him and what
he did. Oh yeah, and I'm going to employ my dad and uh
yeah, and my sister who who you know it looks who looks great in
it and is really warm as the mom. I feel like I didn't see
enough Italia Shire growing up, Like every time I saw her in something,
she's great, and I feel like I would have liked to see more of
her. She's ill served here, but it is good to see them in
the context that you're describing, which is just as a Copola family reunion.
This movie works great. Oh and the guy who plays her dad, he's
he's the slimy European guy in a lot of stuff. That's Jim Carlo Giannini,
Yeah, who is effortlessly charming motherfucker like Cassino is he Cassino rials know
what that he's in or I believe so what I'm trying to think of.
I remember him mostly from pret Porte. Yes, he's in Quantum of Solace,
he was on Man Fire, he's in Casino Royal as well. Yeah,
yeah, he's great. I love him. But yeah, it shows
up briefly as her dad, just to complicate the any I don't want to
talk about the story anything. Not going to recommend this segment at all.
I'm going to infect discourage. So now we move on. Oh, it's
a bundle of tics. Okay, here's the premise. Is clever, right,
it's henpecked Woody Allan. It's just Woody Allen. Uh. And he
has to deal with his mother, who's always embarrassing him. Takes her to
meet his fiance's kids at a magic show. She's volunteered to be the assistant
in a magic trick and disappears later, reappearing in the sky where she now
can embarrass him to everyone in New York City, nay, the world.
So this is what his greatest fear writ large. Everywhere he looks, his
mom is just floating up there. Why do you do it? That man?
What was his character's name? Woody Allen plays and Sheldon Sheldon Mills and
it was Mill steamed like he shortened it. That's May Cristelle as mom Betty
Boo herself. This is her best role in decades and decades, and I
would recommend anyone watched this segment if you've only experienced Makee Cristelle as a flagellant
grandma in National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation. It's kind of an ignominious end to her
film career. She's great here because she takes the usual sort of hectoring mother
character and makes her genuinely sweet. Yeah, it's a very weird dynamic.
It's very I don't know. I hate him and this a lot. You
know, I lost my mom a few years ago and I would give that
anything to be listen to her bitch at me again. So like, and
I know it's the whole points go to appreciate his mom and stuff. And
this is probably the most charming one of the least of the three. You
know, I'm not a big Woody Allen fan at all, Nora. I
mean I appreciate what he did. I appreciate the sort of the new dynamic
of what like a romantic leading man could be in cinema. And he's always
been clever and he's always had had good visual instincts in his films. Nevertheless,
he really yeah, that was it. I'm good and there are charms
to each of them. Never let I think Mighty Aphrodite is really funny.
Actually, yeah, everybody wasn't bad. But you know, he's a creeper
and he's a weird. I don't think you like him that mant. I
remember going to watch Manhattan when I was a young guy, going it's about
a forty something year old guy and his seventeen year old girlfriend. I'm like
you, yeah, a stardust memories right right, always believes that, like
always have that like that thing going on. And I guess that again carrying
over that first thing. Maybe it's just you know, guys, like it
would have been okay, it would have been a nice sort of bookend to
life lessons if Woody Allen had I'd been courting a younger girl and that was
the problem mom had. As it is, it's just Mia Farrow. It's
just him courting me a farroh, yeah, which I guess has an annoying
or any mom. But you guys, I don't know. Mia Fair is
pretty Bland here. Yeah, you know she is, And I was always
more of a Diane Keaton in the Woody Allen Leading Ladies. Andy Hall is
a great movie. Is not the best picture in nineteen seventy seven, as
he know, as I'm warring by Luke Skywalker t shirt while doing this.
But it's really well made. It's really interesting. He does a lot of
cool stuff in it, and like you said, he's got an interesting visual
style. He knows what he's doing. I like when he plays with the
conventions of movie making and he Hall's Great's got cartoon bits, It's he's making
the fourth wall. It's all kinds of stuff. It's got not a happy
ending. Nobody stays together like it's pretty cool. But like I said,
I didn't. That's everything I need at him this movie. I do like
the convention of the mom floating above him and like his worst he deserves it.
He's kind of an assholet. But you know, I mentioned Bekos's kids
that we end up running into over at night gallery and such. But another
thing Ninth Gallery trafficked in were blackout sketches where they would just set up set
up something with a monster and then there'd be a joke. All right,
I already gave it the blood bank, you know, kind of one panel
New Yorker cartoons. This is a one panel New Yorker cartoon. Oh wow,
that's really this could have been summed up with just one image. Yeah,
and then it stretched out, not with anything new or interesting from Woody
Allen. In fact, if you've seen one of his movies, you will
get all of this. It's and I got it. Okay. Here's the
one thing I really loved in this segment. The characters at the magic show.
His mother is in the box on stage while the magician is shoving swords
into it. It's that old trick, and the close up of Woody Allen's
face sort of the delight without over selling how delighted he is that he's watching
swords being driven into the box that contains his mother. That was great.
The other great thing was Larry David's hair. Oh god, yeah, there's
Larry David out of nowhere. Hey wait hair, Yeah, that's right.
It made him look like asterisks and obelisk or like early Thor, like a
Thor helmet. But the sheer bushiness of the hair up off of the bald
head made him look like some sort of norseman. He looked pretty good though.
I was gppy to see him. It was like, I guess,
right before they sold seinfilm. Yeah, right around that time, at that
time. Yeah, so it's like they're shooting his nineteen eighty eight. Yeah,
they're probably writing it right now. That's wild, huh. He had
a good year. He's in a Woody Allen thing and then he goes also
so the TV show. Yeah, I think he was in Out Radio Days
as well, So I think those yeah, those two have history. Yeah.
And then he started something later too. Yeah, it was like two
thousand and seven. I think something that I can't remember the name of it.
I should remember the name of it. It's gonna, no doubt better
than Oedipus Rex, which is the name of this segment. Like I said,
I don't really know how to even criticize or discuss the movie past.
It should have been thirty seconds long, yeah, because I don't need to
hear sing sing sing again, you know. I mean, look, I
guess seeing may Cristelle being sort of effortlessly charming while they've posited her as some
sort of villain is really funny. It was nice to see Julie Kavner in
a non Marge Roll on Marg Roll with a really pleasant smile and very warm
I liked her character, you know that, but very kind of manic pixie
girl, I guess. And you know Evilly got you know, a few
minutes of deal with her. But I liked your performance a lot. Another
actor that all you know are about is really Marg but she's a doctor.
I would have liked to see her more since she's saw out of Friends too,
like Meg Ryan friends a lot. Yeah, exactly, yes. And
of course Tracy Ollmans show. She was really good, one sketch, variety
of stuff. She's very, very talented. She's so good, in fact,
that it made me wish that the Mia Farah character hadn't even existed.
Should have just opened with the character at the magic show and he loses his
mom and then meets this crazy psychic who tries to help him get him back.
That would have been fun for thirty minutes. Here's an interesting phenomenon speaking
of the lengths of time. The Scorsese segment is the longest segment at forty
five minutes, and it flew by. Yeah, but they were all too
long. Each one of these there's no reason why they shouldn't have been This
movie shouldn't have been ninety minutes. These things should have been twenty five minutes
long each, twenty two minutes long each, only because there's a short film
like it. Trust me, I've made short films that that are like a
half hour long, and I feel like, even though I like them at
their length and they tell their story at their length, that's a long time
to ask for an audience on the short I think because it's not enough time
to develop the character. You know, I don't know, this is a
weird length maybe, or maybe these stories were just kind of slow and I
just wasn't that into them too. Yeah, because you can tell a complete
story in a few minutes. If you look at movies like Paris tem where
that's a love letter to Paris with dozens of filmmakers, sometimes their stories last
two and three minutes and they're fucking great. They get in and they get
out. Or twenty two short films about Glenn Google, Yeah, there you
go, man, there are ways to do it, and twenty two short
films about Springfield. Yeah. This New York Stories is like, you know,
it's you know, it's a pan too old anthology filmmaking. But it's
about New York in nineteen eighty nine. It should have been dynamic and friends,
it should have been youthful. New York is youthful. And then the
and it was the go eighties, you know, like it was bordering nineties,
like ordering nineties. It was an exciting time. This was New York,
the rebirth, the disnification of Times Square. It was like we were
cleaning up. It wasn't the seventies tenement nightmare anymore. And again I go
back to Spike Lee. There it's nineteen eighty eight, nineteen eighty nine in
New York City. I didn't hear one hip hop beat. Nope, even
possible. How is that even possible? And it's nineteen eighty nine. The
women are still acting like women from the sixties or something in the movie like
it's I don't know, I feel it's pretty dated. I don't think these
guys, none of them are at the top of their game. I think
they're just collecting a paycheck and trying some stuff out for their next round of
movies. So overall, would you recommend this man? It's interesting as if
you're a film completist, and want to see everybody's work complete is only I
agree. Look, if you love Martin Scorsese, you have to see it.
I'm sorry, but he does interesting stuff here. Yeah, he does
some interesting stuff here, and you get I think a little bit of a
peak into him. Yeah. And I think as much as I don't like
that Nick Nolty character, I liked him just as much as I'm like Travis
Pickle. So that story was well told and in for me affecting. Heave
a giant asshole. Yeah, but and he's not super charming as it's an
interesting character. Just don't see what kind of you know guy it is.
Again. But I'm you know, I'm of the opinion I wanted to know
more about the assistant, But that to me was the only one that actually
felt like a New York story. That's pretty interesting because the Little Girl one
could have taken place in London or Paris, or Los Angeles or San Francisco.
Yeah, it wasn't like the whole thing was like this magical thing about
Central Park that they you know what I mean, or the hope it has
to be the plaza in New York. So no, it was kind of
all over the place. And Woody Allen just assumes that he is New York
so we should just go along with it. But sorry, man, I
need a little more than a shot of Tavern on the Green, Always Tavern
on the Green. That's where got it? They went to the Russian tea
room in the Coppola One. Yeah, all the bygone eras on just nothing
about the Yankees and the Mets. There was nothing about you know, Times
Square. There was nothing about Harlem. There was nothing about you know,
things that make New York special. There's nothing about NYU and Martin Scorse.
You could have made a movie about an NYU film student. I would have
liked to have seen that. Youthful Touch was one of the children had in
the Life Without Zoe segment has a folding fan that she's using and it has
Keith Haring designs on it. That stuck out to me right away because everything
else felt so old fashioned that seeing Keith Haring made it immediately current, although
current from fucking forty years ago. I don't see one Puerto Rican person or
one black person in this movie, and I'm just like, been to New
York. New York is a melting pot. All these wonderful cultures mixed into
one, and there's about these three rich white people. Well there it is
all right until next time. Where can people reach you? If they're trying
to find you, mister Lapoor, you can find me at Swamp Media Group
on Instagram and threads that. You can catch us at swampmediagroup dot com or
Space Detective Movie dot com. As for me, you can check out everything
at weirdingwaymedia dot com for the content, including midnight viewing Here. Now,
listen, we've got midnight viewing of the Horror Anthology podcast. We've got Midnight
Viewing Anthologues Attack, and now, my god, we have a weekly we
have midnight Viewing Weekly round Up. That one is hosted by me and the
gorgeous and thoughtful Ripley, my pug. So you're gonna be hearing about current
events and stuff over there, you know, less anthology, more actual things
that people can get in an easy manner. Anyway, Thanks for all,
Thank you all for joining us here at Midnight Viewing Anthologies Attack. Still,
thank you very much. And I will say this before we go. I
think the xenomorph would have never stood a chance against you or Ripley. That's
true, and she does hate aliens, does hate aliens until next time.
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