The Video Archives Podcast with Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary

[ska invita]

New podcast with QT and Roger Avary who both worked in the same video shop together - Video Archives
IIRC when the video store closed down Quentin bought all the old stock and sits on it to this day
The idea behind the podcast is they will choose a couple of tapes, watch them , then talk about them. Cult movie chat basically

Pandora

The Video Archives Podcast with Quentin Tarantino & Roger Avary

Quentin Tarantino & Roger Avary invite you to become a customer at Video Archives, the video store where it all began. Joined by their trusty producer Gala Avary, they’ll travel back in time to revisit old classics and discover new favorites, pulled from the thousands of actual VHS tapes that...

videoarchivespodcast.com

Episode one is Dark Star and Cocaine Cowboys
Dark Star is one of my all time favs, havent seen it in a few years though so have downloaded a crisp 1080 version (looks restored to me) and will watch tonight for old times sake
Cant find Cocaine Cowboys sadly

Dark Star (1974) ⭐ 6.2 | Comedy, Sci-Fi

1h 23m | PG

www.imdb.com

Cocaine Cowboys (1979) ⭐ 4.4 | Crime, Drama

1h 27m | 18

www.imdb.com

ETA Cocaine Cowboys is on youtube at basically VHS quality!


I as good as stopped watching films a few years ago but am going to have a go at watching along once in a while - thinking of it as a little film club.
For thread to have legs means people talking about the films that come up.

Am kind of surprised how many people actively dislike Dark Star - am basing that on online reviews, rotten tomatoes etc. RedLetterMedia recently ranked all John Carpenter films and both RIch Evans and Jay Bauman effectively put it at the bottom - philistines!

 

[Ming]

Well Carpenter’s one of my all time favourite directors so i had to see Dark Star for completism. It’s OK for the budget (nothing) and the monster (beanbag) and the surfing ending. I could easily listen to a John Carpenter soundtrack compilation album.

 

[ska invita]

Ive given these two films a watch...Dark Star Ive seen quite a few times and even though the last time was years ago i was a bit bored as there was no surprise element to anything that was happening on screen - and tbh not a lot really happens overall so its easy to remember. The mood was a lot bleaker than i remember though, and I found it less funny than i did in the past. That said its still got so many great qualities and the ending in particular really works.

From the podcast it was interesting to hear some of the production history, namely how it was padded out to a short feature length, and knowing that I would rather see a 40 minute cut without the alien at all, but since the alien is most peoples favourite section it has earned its place i guess. Quentin calls it a masterpiece of its form (ultra low budget scifi) and I cant argue with that.

its a good double bill with Cocaine Cowboys in that the common thread is 70s drug taking drop outs / countercultural impulses infront of and behind the camera. I really recommend listening to the podcast first before watching it as the production background adds a lot to what you see on screen. Without that knowledge it holds up well enough and I was into it enough to make it to the end, and the end is good, but now knowing the background i like it all the more. In short the thing to know is this is a vanity project for the main Cocaine Cowboy singer and he is playing himself and drug smuggling is what he really was up to in real life. And how he met Andy Warhol and why this is filmed in Warhols house etc etc.

Tarantino knows his stuff and thats great but he really talks over Roger Avary and it winds me up. That said Im enjoying this so far

ETA: Factoid! "Of Ukrainian descent, Jack Palance was born Volodymyr Ivanovich Palahniuk"

 

[ska invita]

Next up is a triple bill

Moonraker / Firefox / Delirium​

Blast off to outer space with Roger and Quentin as they go toe to toe on Moonraker! Heavily influenced by the science fiction craze in the wake of Star Wars, Moonraker is one of the most polarizing Bond films of all time. Pick a side as Roger and Quentin debate Bond villains that hit too close to home, baddies that turn into goodies, and Roger Moore’s Bond.

Next, we’ll return to Earth with Clint Eastwood’s 1982 film Firefox. The Soviets have developed a new jet fighter called Firefox, and only one man is up for the job of stealing the plane before it’s used as a first strike weapon. Quentin and Roger think in Russian as they talk about fantastic use of exposition, the bankrupting of Russia, and how PTSD is used to shape character and story.

ive seen moonraker enough not to have to go again, other two I havent heard of though

Firefox (1982) ⭐ 5.9 | Action, Adventure, Thriller

2h 16m | AA

www.imdb.com

And just as a treat, they’ll wrap up with a spoiler-free discussion of Peter Maris’s 1979 film Delirium. Trust us, you won’t want to look up this film before you watch it!

Delirium link on IMDB - though trying not to look, as suggested

 

[ska invita]

Well Carpenter’s one of my all time favourite directors so i had to see Dark Star for completism. It’s OK for the budget (nothing) and the monster (beanbag) and the surfing ending. I could easily listen to a John Carpenter soundtrack compilation album.

this is a best of! (despite being called Halloween)

John Carpenter - Halloween: The Best Of John Carpenter

Explore songs, recommendations, and other album details for Halloween: The Best Of John Carpenter by John Carpenter. Compare different versions and buy them all on Discogs.

www.discogs.com

ETA: scrap that, supposedly this is an album of cover versions

 

[ska invita]

My thoughts on Moonraker: Bond has always been ludicrous and always will be. By this point in the series and in the cultural climate of 1979 I guess they decided: everyone recognises how stupid it is, lets just double down and make it a pantomime - lean in to the stupidity. It's as good as a parody really. Cynical on lots of levels. That said, all Bond films are crap on some levels but they are also all redeemed by having some amazing actions sequences, impressive sets and unforgettable visuals. And Moonraker has all of that, and at points even some of the most iconic ones of all the series. So for me equally shit and brilliant at the same time. Roger Moore was 52 playing Bond here

Firefox was an interesting one. Its a classy film in some ways, the significant majority of it is a Soviet era espionage story and doesn't involve the fighter jet at all. Some of these sequences are genuinely great - the first 20 minutes on Russian soil for example. Supposedly the studio really promoted it a lot and expected a hit here. But for a lot of reasons it falls down - the podcast lists them thoroughly.

Produced, directed and starring Clint Eastwood...he's a contradictory guy really, politically, and there's no getting away from this being a classic example of a film made with US military backing and basically an in the face hammer hit of propaganda - despite having anti-war elements within it - particularly relating to the Vietnam war.

What makes it most worth watching is the story telling speed and narrative. They really try and keep everything moving along at a pace, but it still has an old fashioned novelistic feel that personally I love, and for me is really missing from the majority of modern films. There's a lot to enjoy in this - with a sizeable dose of fail on top. Its reminded me that there are probably a lot of films from that early 80s period that I should take the time to find and watch as i would enjoy them, whereas modern films tend to annoy me more than anything.

 

[ska invita]

going to try one more week of sharing this on urban in case i can encourage anyone to get involved

Next episode is up, triple bill

theres a not best res but VHS style 480torrent - happy to share


on iplayer!!!

The Relic

Suspense thriller about a deadly creature at large in the Chicago Field Museum.

www.bbc.co.uk

amazon stream

Watch Cafe Express | Prime Video

An Italian laborer (Nino Manfredi) foils anyone who tries to stop him from illicitly selling espresso on the Milan-to-Naples train in this entertaining and touching cat-and-mouse tale.

www.amazon.co.uk

 

[ska invita]

Stepping back an episode to Moonraker, Smershpod is a often fun english movie podcast and they did Moonraker, with Al Murray joining in, but dont let that put you off
Full 1hour podcast here

15 minute highlights with Moonraker clips here