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163 - Black Christmas (1974)
104 Plays11 months ago
"Ho ho ho sh*t!”
‘Tis the season for some holiday horror, so we’re pulling out ALL the stops this year with our latest “Blackest Christmas” miniseries! First up, we’ve got the Bob Clark classic featuring an unseen, enigmatic killer, calls coming from inside the house, an inept police force, and lots of shots from the killer’s POV! Along the way, the boys imagine Brett’s boundless rage, discuss some deep cut Robin Williams performances, and compare notes on this film’s famously ambiguous ending! So pour some eggnog in your coffee and stir with a candy cane as you sit down and join our discussion of this seminal holiday film!
You don’t have to climb into our attic to see what we’re up to! Just check us out on the following platforms:
- @Disenfranchpod on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, Letterboxd, and YouTube
- Email us your thoughts or requests to [email protected]
- Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts and Spotify!
- Find Stephen at @ChewyWalrus on Bluesky, Instagram, and Letterboxd
- Find Brett at @sus_warlock on Instagram and Letterboxd or @suswarlock on Bluesky
- Find Tucker at @icenine09 on YouTube and Instagram and @tuck_mugs on Instagram
- Join our Patreon for exclusive bonus content, including our weekly What Are We Watching? show: https://patreon.com/Disenfranchpod
- Watch our big screen debut in Circle City Supernatural from our buddy J.P. Leck! You can either buy it on BluRay through his website or buy/rent it through Amazon Prime!
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Transcript
Introduction and Hosts' Banter
00:00:21
Speaker
I'll have a black Christmas without you
00:00:30
Speaker
on the disenfranchised podcast, where that podcast all about those franchises have won. Those films that fancy themselves full fledged franchises before falling flat on their face after the first film. I am your host, Steven Foxworthy, and joining me, as always, the man who's usually a turtle and rarely a zebra, ladies, it's my co-host Brett Wright. Hey, Brett. Ho, ho, ho, Steven. And how are you this merry and bright evening?
00:01:00
Speaker
I've been better, but you know. I'm sorry to hear that, dude. You know, it is what it is. It's at least that. I've grown accustomed to everything. I've grown accustomed to being sick. So. That's not good, dude. That's not good at all. I mean, you have insurance, man. You can you can get that looked at. Well, no, I mean, I actively am. OK, well, that's good. It is what it is. I mean, sure. Identity. Identity.
00:01:32
Speaker
Oh, and also joining us, our own gold-plated whore. It's Tucker. Hey, Tucker. Hey, that wasn't so bad. I'll take that moniker. Before the recording, Stephen was like, I'm going to make fun of you a little bit. Was that that was making fun of me? That was an honor, Stephen. Thank you. Well, hey, happy to help. Thank you so much. I got it's nice because I consider myself a retired whore. Really, more than anything. But I look back on those glory days and.
00:02:01
Speaker
What a wild time to be alive. You tell you what. Yeah. Yeah.
Black Christmas Miniseries Introduction
00:02:08
Speaker
And gentlemen, we are kicking off the holiday season a little bit early this year. Usually we limit our Christmas episode or our holiday themed episode to just one right around the Christmas day time. But this this year we were going a little big.
00:02:27
Speaker
And for our format, Black Christmas is the gift that keeps on giving. It really is. And so we're doing we're doing a Blackest Christmas miniseries and we're going to cap that off with one of the most depressing movies of 2023. So it's just it's it's it's just it's it's a month of celebration all down the line. And so today to kick it all off, we are talking about
00:02:53
Speaker
1974's Black Christmas, the original OG, written by one Mr. A. Roy Moore, directed by the immortal Bob Clark, and starring Olivia Hussie, Kurt Julia,
00:03:10
Speaker
Margot Kidder, John Saxon, the fucking great John Saxon, Marion Waldman, Andrea Martin, James Edmund, Douglas McGrath, Art Hindle, Lynn Griffin. So many more. Gentlemen, what a cast.
Hosts' Personal History with Black Christmas
00:03:24
Speaker
What a picture. Indeed. It's all right. Yeah.
00:03:32
Speaker
So I think I know the answer to this question already, but just for the sake of our listeners, what is your individual, what are your individual histories with Black Christmas? Well, you have to pick one of us.
00:03:47
Speaker
I was just going to I was just going to say at the same time. You want to go at the same time, Tucker? That'll be fun. I'd like to. That sounds like comedy gold, but also as the person who edits this, he might he might not be as inclined. I don't know. I don't know. I'll let you go first, Brett.
00:04:07
Speaker
All right. Well, yeah, because I mean, it's literally zero. I mean, well, I have a little bit of history, but I don't really want to get into that. So fair. Otherwise, pretty much none. OK, there you go. Right on, Tucker. I once dated a woman who was one of her favorite movies. I'll leave it at that. Yeah, that I had a feeling that's what you were referring to. But yes.
00:04:29
Speaker
I'm I'm very familiar with this film all the way up to actually seeing it. Like I've known about it for a really long time and I've understood its significance and I've read essays written out. I have a book that has like an honest to God book that has like essays in it about horror films before. Like this was like in the mid 90s before people were taking horror films seriously, like as
00:04:59
Speaker
as actual art you know and there's a couple essays in there about it so i'm very familiar with it i just i just never seen it i never saw the remakes because i figured well i should see the original you should first and i just never got around to it i never got around to it i think because i saw go ahead
Anthology Film Sequels Discussion
00:05:22
Speaker
I'm gonna go off on a whole thing you finish what you're doing I was just gonna say because I think I saw The original Tales from the Crypt movie the British one from 70s future episode podcast oh I can't wait you guys that's so good and the sequel well you can't it has a sequel vault of horror
00:05:44
Speaker
Is vault of horror a sequel? Yeah, it's I mean, do anthology movies have sequels? Well, yes, you have terror does. Right. And so and creep show. But yeah, there's vault of horror is a sequel. It's like the same company. Like it was I think it was advertised as a sequel. I've always thought of it as a sequel. I'm going to do some research while you talk.
00:06:06
Speaker
Do it anyway. So I saw the classic Tales from the Crypt was later turned into an episode directed by Bob Zemeckis himself. Mm hmm. I don't remember what the story is called, but it's the one where the lady spoilers where the lady kills her husband and then the the psycho Santa guy comes and terrorizes her and her child. Yeah, Zemeckis did it for the Tales from the Crypt to show. Yeah. Yeah.
00:06:37
Speaker
but originally it was part of that original movie and I really wish Vault of Horror weren't a sequel to that because I would love to cover that with you guys because that's one of the first horror films that I ever really attached myself to. Like after I saw Night of the Living Dead and Psycho, I was just getting whatever I could get my hands on and I was like, what? Tales from the Crypt, that's familiar. Oh, I guess I didn't realize Vault of Horror was a sequel. It's totally a sequel, dude.
00:07:04
Speaker
oops that's that's my bad that's unfortunate we can pretend it's not and just do it anyway uh that one that story is called end all through the house yeah and it's pretty like it i like the differences between the uh the british film version and the show version done by uh bobby z
00:07:27
Speaker
Um, because just like we've talked about recently a lot, starting with the Night of the Living Dead remake, like you've seen the original. So you know how you, you know, you think you know how it's going to go. Right. But they kind of, they kind of go the other way sometimes. And I appreciate the differences between those two. I think they're both really great adaptations of that story. Why did I even bring this up?
00:07:53
Speaker
I don't know. Christmas Horror. So it's kind of. Oh,
Olivia Hussey's Career Highlights
00:07:56
Speaker
yeah. Yeah. Like I saw that and then I saw another Christmas Horror movie. It's not Silent Night, Deadly Night. It was something else. I can't think of what it was. Silent Night, Bloody Night. That was probably the one that that's just so dull. One from like the fifties or something. It's so dull. And so I don't know. I just.
00:08:18
Speaker
I feel like I had seen a good one and I saw a bad one and Black Christmas was like, okay, whatever. I don't really care. The only thing that has always kind of made me want to watch it over the years is that Olivia Hussie's in it. And I think she's rad. She's great.
00:08:40
Speaker
She's really good in Psycho 4, even though Psycho 4 is awful and her character is awful and the things that they make her do in that movie are awful. She's wonderful in it.
00:08:52
Speaker
Um, I mean, she's no stranger to controversy, so I'm not surprised that she took that role and kind of gave it her all. Um, but also she was really great in it. Like they didn't use her enough, honestly, in it. We could use some more Olivia Hussey in the 90s. It mini series. We could just use some more Olivia Hussey in the 90s period. Full stop end of sentence. Agreed. Agreed. But yeah, that's fucking phenomenal in this, I think. But yeah.
00:09:18
Speaker
That's kind of the candle that has like stayed lit for me to eventually watch this movie. And now I've watched it. And now you've watched it. It's like a thing I can cross off of things that I've been meaning to do for like over a decade. And thanks to this podcast, you have that opportunity and you're welcome.
Pandemic Movie Watching and Black Christmas
00:09:38
Speaker
I do. Thanks. I'm happy. Happy to be able to do that for you, Brett. And because I've seen this, because I've seen this, it opens the floodgates to the remakes, which are things I've always also wanted to see. Anyway, well, buckle up, you're in luck.
00:09:53
Speaker
Yeah, well, that's that's the weird thing. Like you had known what sort of movie Black Christmas is in terms of its like legacy. I never did. I never heard anything crazy about how good this movie is or how much it like sets the stage for other slashers. Like I didn't I never heard that. So I never thought I just thought it was another one of those, you know, holiday horror movies they made back in the day after Halloween. I never looked into it. I never, you know, thought it was worth watching.
00:10:24
Speaker
But I mean, I'm glad I have and we'll get into it later, but I don't really agree with any of those assessments, but we'll get there. Interestingly enough. Go ahead, Tiger.
00:10:39
Speaker
I would say, interestingly enough, Halloween kind of was born out of I've read recently that Halloween was kind of born out of a conversation between John Carpenter and maybe Bob Clark about what a sequel to Black Christmas would be. Correct. So we would like what other holiday that they would go into. And it kind of like that's it's sort of for good or for ill. The reason Halloween exists in a lot of ways. Yeah.
00:11:08
Speaker
in a lot of ways, but we can. But I'm probably going to agree with some of the things that you don't like about it, because I'm spoilers. I'm
Influence of Black Christmas on Horror Genre
00:11:15
Speaker
pretty much in the middle, which is how this always goes. I mean, somebody is extremely inside, someone's stream the other and somebody's in the middle. That's why I mean, I don't hate us now because Brett and I used to just knock down, drag it out. And now we've got like now there's like one of us gets to be the neutralizing polarizing force, which is always nice. But I think I'm more in line with you. I don't hate it.
00:11:36
Speaker
I'm not on the far end of the spectrum. Like I get it. I respect it. But I got problems with it. So.
00:11:44
Speaker
I think it looks great, you guys. I love the colors in this movie. I love the lighting. I want to live in that world. It's like that reminds me. I know it's the early 70s, but it reminds me of the 80s with like the wallpaper and the yellow light bulbs and the coffee tables with trinkets and big gaudy glass ashtrays on them.
00:12:08
Speaker
and the ornate furniture and the telephone desks. I miss telephone tables and desks because you just have it in your hallway and that's where the telephone was or like by the steps, you know, before you started mounting them on walls, you had to have a little table or something to put them on. Yeah, it was literally just on the on the on the table. Yeah, dude.
00:12:32
Speaker
I first caught this movie in the far flung year of 2020. That was that year you watched all the movies. During a little thing called the COVID-19 pandemic, where I watched over 400 movies over the course of the year. And one day I decided that I was going to try to watch 25 Christmas movies in between December 1st and December 25th.
00:12:58
Speaker
And I got into a lot of holiday horror during that time. And one of the tangents that I went on is I watched all three of the black Christmases. One right after. You're an old hat. You're an old hat. You're the geezer here. I'm something man. Like it just feels weird. The black hipster of the group.
00:13:16
Speaker
that i've reckoned with that you guys haven't um it just feels really weird congratulations particularly because it's an obscure 70s thing so tucker you that's kind of your wheelhouse it's a horror movie that's brett's wheelhouse so i just feel very odd that i'm the guy bringing this to the table going oh yeah i've seen this is great this is another one of those instances where i gotta go do you need my horror card should i turn it in because i hadn't seen it until today i don't know
00:13:41
Speaker
Look, no, because I mean, when I started to get into horror and as you guys know, I and as I mentioned many times, I'm a very late bloomer when it comes to my horror fandom, I.
00:13:51
Speaker
felt that responsibility. And Brett, you actually assisted me with this in 2019, when I started to put together my like list of horror movies that I needed to see for for Halloween. When I was doing my 31 in October marathon, my first one, you kind of helped me craft that list, like what horror movies do I need to see? Like, what are the important ones to see? And in 2020, when
00:14:13
Speaker
no one was doing anything but just watching movies and like sitting around I binged a lot of movies and crossed off like I watched all the Halloween franchise all the Nightmare on Elm Street franchise all the Friday the 13th franchise like I watched all of those
00:14:31
Speaker
as just for the screams. All the screams, I watched The Exorcist for the first time. Like I just, I crossed a lot of have not scenes off my list. So, and Black Christmas was one that I was just like, you know, when it comes to holiday horror, that's the quote unquote, the one.
Contrasting Horror Styles and Filmmaker Analysis
00:14:52
Speaker
So I made sure to put that one on my list and I liked it, but I think I liked it a lot more
00:14:59
Speaker
on this rewatch, just like really engaging with it. I love how it looks. I love how fucking creepy it is, how uneasy that ambiguous ending kind of. And you guys know I'm a sucker for a good ambiguous ending, like just how good that ending is. Like it's it. Yeah, just this this one kind of grabbed me. It went up a whole it went up a whole star rating for me, this watch. Wow. Yeah, that's a stars a lot.
00:15:29
Speaker
Mm hmm. It is for me, especially. Yeah, that's quite a bit. So, you know, I and I'm currently adding this to my Amazon wish list. So they got a 4K. They got a 4K, man. Of course they do. Of course they do. Bringing out the dead doesn't even have a Blu ray. And here we are. Yep.
00:15:47
Speaker
Yep, that's that. That is the hill you die on is the. The bring you guys doesn't have a Blu-ray. I own the perfect example of my bringing out the dead doesn't have a Blu-ray and that's the 4K of God told me to. What the fuck is that movie doing on 4K? I love that movie and I'm so glad it's on 4K. I'm so glad because it looks great. Like it looks like film. It's insane how good that movie looks for a shitty little Larry Cohen movie, right?
00:16:13
Speaker
In fairness, Tucker, I think I own the epitome of the bringing out the dead doesn't have a Blu-ray. Is it Howard the Deck? I own Howard the Duck on 4K. Yeah, dude. Where's my Scorsese, man? Right. Scorsese, Nicolas Cage, Patty Arquette, like, come on. They've got to do that. Criterion has got to remaster that.
00:16:37
Speaker
It's look time's going to tell on that one. I may I may have been waiting for 20 years, but at some point people are going to look at that and be like, oh, yeah, this is fucking amazing. Everyone that I've talked to that revisits it goes easy comes up. Yeah, this is really good. Like everyone that I talked to that revisits that movie is like.
00:16:55
Speaker
Yeah, I like it because because it's not like like Scorsese has a style. Right. He pretty much kind of does things a certain way with with variations on it and everything. But there are a few movies of his like Cape Fear being one of them and bringing out the dead being another where he kind of jumps out of his comfort zone and does something a little out there.
00:17:21
Speaker
for Scorsese, you know, a little out there. And that's not his normal wheelhouse. And that's yeah, it's exciting when he does stuff. And I love I love regular ass Scorsese. But boy, when that boy gets frisky and wild. Mm hmm. That's why my two favorite Scorsese are straight up bringing out the dead and Cape Fear, dude. So those are the ones where he's like, let's let's go bat shit, dude.
00:17:44
Speaker
Let's go nuts. You want to get nuts? Let's get nuts. That's Scorsese. Michael Keaton heard him say that, and he's like, we should put that in the movie. That's what that was. That should be in the movie. Yeah. You guys, let's put that in the movie. Guys, that should be in the movie. Absolutely. No, but Black Christmas,
Encouraging a Rewatch: Black Christmas
00:18:05
Speaker
man. Black Christmas.
00:18:08
Speaker
What a movie. I had a lot of fun with this one. Kind of bummed that you guys didn't have as much fun with it as I did. But you know what? I think this is a movie that stands up to rewatch. I will say that. Just right off the top. I think for me, my expectations were too high. Potentially. Considering how much that I've engaged with it without actually engaging with it for the past 20, 25 years. That makes sense.
00:18:33
Speaker
Um, I was just more disappointed really than anything else. It is good. It's it's great even. And I think that something that gives it more credit is how much influence that it's had on slashers and the horror genre as a whole. Right. Like no matter what my star rating is on the quality of this film, its influence rating is a fucking five with a bullet. Yeah. And I don't think it's very difficult to deny that.
00:19:02
Speaker
Like when most people look at proto slashers, this is, I think, toward the top of the list. I think some would debate whether or not Texas Chainsaw Massacre belongs on the list. I think it does. I think it does. Friend of the podcast. I don't think Psycho does. Peeping Tom and Psycho are the two that most people like point to as like the the earliest of those and Peeping Tom, I would say maybe more than Psycho.
00:19:28
Speaker
Have you guys either of you guys seen Peeping Tom Michael? I have not. No. Oh, it's it's pretty good. That's Michael Powell directed that one and it ruined his career because it was too too edgy for the 1960s for the late 50s early 60s. So but now that movie was three edgy five you.
00:19:49
Speaker
Correct. That's what it was. Damn you. You asshole. You gold-plated whore. That's me. Yay. Sparkle, sparkle. But yeah, we... But no, yeah, I...
00:20:08
Speaker
I don't know. Let's just crack into it, man. I was going to say, I think the reason that I didn't like it as much, it's gotten its own way, I guess. I don't really know how to describe this phenomenon that I've ran into myself and seen other people.
00:20:24
Speaker
run into where it's just you've seen everything that's been influenced by it before you see the original thing. So it's not as, you know, like, oh, my God, this is incredible because I've seen everything that borrowed and stole and was influenced by it. Yeah. So it doesn't hit the same way. And I think for me, that was that was the first watch for me. But when I rewatched it this time, I kind of endeavored to meet the movie on its terms where it was.
Humor and Comedic Elements in Black Christmas
00:20:54
Speaker
And I got to tell you, I had a lot more fun with it this next this last time. It I forgot how fucking funny this thing is. Like it's it's I was I was having a great time. I was laughing. I was like getting spooked. I was I was having a blast, man. The cops are so incompetent. That's what I found to be humorous about their jobs, particularly Sergeant Nash, the lovable doofus, Sergeant Nash.
00:21:23
Speaker
I'm surprised they didn't put in like the goofy like slide whistle and boing boing music like in Last House on the Left when the two cops come in and like all of a sudden it's a screwball comedy when it's literally the most horrifying and disturbing film you've ever seen the rest of the time. Correct. Yeah. And that music comes in big big boy.
00:21:45
Speaker
You like what? It's it's it is kind of almost like a Keystone Cops routine when the cops show up. And fortunately, you've got motherfucking John Saxon to kind of like ground the fucker. But like, God, I. John Saxon, I'd forgotten he was in this movie and he shows up. I'm like fucking John Saxons here. And I just kind of relax because I knew I was in good hands, like presaging the role he would he would become famous for playing by 10 years.
00:22:15
Speaker
Um, did you know that he was a last minute addition to the cast? I did not know that. Tell us more about that, Steven. Um, so they had hired actor Edmund O'Brien Academy Award winner Edmund O'Brien to initially play the lieutenant. And he showed up, he came to the set and, um, or he, he was, they picked him up from the airport and he was in a wheelchair and they were like, Hmm.
John Saxon's Casting Anecdote
00:22:42
Speaker
So like they took him to the hotel and he's, he's, he's able to walk and he's like, you know, gable to get changed, but he's taking a long time with that. Um, and then like they take him out to dinner before the shoot and they realized that he is, um, he doesn't know where he is.
00:23:01
Speaker
I did read about this. He had dementia. He has early onset Alzheimer's. It would take it. He would he would he wouldn't die for another 10 years, but they realized like particularly because they were going to be filming in like the cold Canadian winter. Like we cannot subject to this man.
00:23:19
Speaker
to this because it's going to take him twice as long to actually film what he needs to film because he's not going to be able to remember it. And so they had to cut it in Toronto. Yeah, just probably just outside of Toronto.
00:23:32
Speaker
And they so they I think it was the cinematographer had worked with John Saxon on something before and just called him up and he's like, hey, you've got two days to get to Toronto if you want this part. And he came out, he showed up, he did the part and he fucking killed it. John Saxon always shows up. He does. And I have to believe I have to believe that this movie had a lot to do with Craven casting him in a very similar kind of role in Nightmare on Elm Street.
00:24:03
Speaker
I could see that. I mean, he did do a lot of other stuff and some of those other roles were police people as well. Sure. But I mean, considering the genre, like, I mean, even Nightmare on Elm Street owes a little bit to this movie, so I wouldn't be surprised. And I think and again, this is it presages the slasher genre in a lot of very specific and very interesting ways without fully leaning into all of the tropes that Halloween would crystallize.
00:24:31
Speaker
by being as big and as crazy and as epic as it is. Something very similar to Halloween and Texas Chainsaw for that matter is that there's not... I feel like this is a movie much like those two movies that people remember being a lot more violent and gory than they are. Absolutely. Whereas most everything you don't see it
00:24:51
Speaker
But the way that it's orchestrated in front of you, you don't have to see it. Exactly. It's very Jaws-esque in that regard, like you don't actually see the killer like you see, but you see what he hath wrought.
Thematic Connections with My Bloody Valentine
00:25:08
Speaker
And this movie comes out a year before Jaws, too. So like.
00:25:12
Speaker
You've got kind of all these little like flagposts and all these ways that it influences the genre and other films as well. There's a, I watched a documentary on this movie and one of the people they interviewed is the director of the original My Bloody Valentine, Canadian director George Matalka.
00:25:27
Speaker
And he's I think that's how you pronounce his name. I'm probably getting that wrong. But he he's sitting there talking. He goes, I just kind of unconsciously put these elements in my film. You know, these aren't teenagers. I wanted to do like more adult. And I subconsciously put all these things like the the little sing song by Baby Bunting, like the the minor sing something similar as he's as he's crawling away at the end of the film. Like I subconsciously put all these things in the film. And then I went back and watched Black Christmas after I did it. I was like, oh,
00:25:55
Speaker
I'm just cribbing from this. This is where I got all that. I just didn't realize that this is where I got all that from. It's got quite the reach, and this is one of the highest grossing Canadian films of its day, too. Well, Brandon mentioned in the... Brandon has thrown out some fantastic horror bangers back then.
00:26:17
Speaker
Brett had mentioned in the chat the connections between this and My Bloody Valentine, and I have to agree. It's really one of the more...
00:26:29
Speaker
It's an easy line to draw from between those two films for sure. Though My Bloody Valentine, it does kind of seem like an upgrade in some ways. Not so much. I'm not going to say I will say in quality, but not specifically in quality. But like it took the things specifically the things from Black Christmas and just kind of amped them up a little bit and like fit the pieces together.
00:26:59
Speaker
a little more like what I'm trying to say is to say what you're trying to say that Black Christmas crawled so that my bloody Valentine can motherfucking sprint. OK. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. But yeah, no, this this movie is I thought it was I thought it was great.
00:27:25
Speaker
Maybe I need to break my rewatch rule and give it another shot. Sometimes do it I'm gonna rewatch it just simply because I feel like I had so much baggage Going into this about this film not like baggage in a bad way just like a lot of preconceived notions about this film and I don't know it's like I
00:27:51
Speaker
By the end, I was more into it than I was at the beginning, but I still just, I, it took me a while to get there. And so I kind of want to have that experience where it's like, instead of me being disappointed first and then a little bored and then like, Oh, this is actually really good. And I feel like if I watch it again, maybe it'll just be good.
00:28:17
Speaker
And I think that's kind of where I started with this one, too, when I watched it a few years ago. So I have a feeling this one's going to join the regular rotation club. I think this will be when I revisit maybe annually, maybe every other
Potential for Black Christmas Sequels
00:28:30
Speaker
annually. But yeah, I had a blast with this one. I did. I had a good time. And my partner has not seen it. So I may end up watching it again this year just so I can watch it with her, just so I can show it to her. Because I think she might get a kick out of it.
00:28:43
Speaker
You know, Steven, you are asking the patrons like what kind of Patreon content they wanted for this month. I say a special second viewing of OG Black Christmas. Reassessment.
00:29:02
Speaker
where we all come back and- Record it tomorrow. Oh God, no, that's a bad idea. That's a bad idea. We've got too much stuff, other stuff to record tomorrow. Let's not do that. Nah, here's what we do. Okay. So we do this one and then, you know, whatever other movies we have, no, you already said, we'll do 06 and then 2019. And then we'll do that other movie you didn't mention.
00:29:25
Speaker
But for the Patreon, we'll do rewatch of OG Black Christmas. So we'll have the remakes in our system as well. You see what I'm saying? I see. It'll be like an ultimate reassessment. I will say that the remakes of this one get.
00:29:44
Speaker
end up going in some very interesting, very different directions. I'm excited. I will. I will leave it at that. I don't want to cast of at least one of these. Right. Right. So. There you go. So if you want to hear that, if we end up doing it and you should go to Patreon dot com slash disenfranch pod. And, you know, join our Patreon. If you if you got five dollars, once you lay your money down,
00:30:12
Speaker
Yeah, dude. Because we got a ton of great stuff back there for you. Just, you know, let us know. So what do you say we're about a half an hour into this and what do you say we go ahead and jump into the plot of this mamajama? I like that idea. Sure.
00:30:28
Speaker
Uh, so this is a part of the show we call the plot in 60 seconds. Uh, this is the part where, uh, Brett writes our immortal lore master, uh, will roll the D six of destiny. He has assigned two sides to each of us.
00:30:44
Speaker
and whichever side is rolled, that is the person who will be recounting the plot of this film, 1974's Black Christmas in 60 seconds or less. Brett, who's it going? First of all, remind us whose side is whose, and then let us know who it's going to be.
00:31:01
Speaker
Yes. So I believe I have it written down here, Steven, you're a one and two, I'm three and four, talking about six. As I recall, we had to standardize that because I just wasn't ever rolling me. So seniority. That's what that is. That's the seniority, the pecking order. Yeah. Yeah.
00:31:22
Speaker
and you're higher because this was your idea, so. That's why I always put you in the middle of the mix, Steven, because you're the glue that holds us together. Oh, shucks, guys. Yeah, dude. You're the reason why it sucked when I hosted last week. What did we hit? What did we see? Two. Ah, it's me. Yeah. It's me. That means I can go pee while you do this.
00:31:44
Speaker
All right. Well, that means Brett, you have to put 60 seconds on the clock. Indeed. While Tucker's off making his bladder bladder. Goodness. Can't even talk. This is going to be fun. All right. I have 60 seconds on the clock. You may begin whenever you fucking please. Sounds great.
00:32:09
Speaker
outside of a sorority house in Bedford, Ontario.
60-Second Film Summary
00:32:13
Speaker
A man is sneaking into a Christmas party and the sorority sisters get an obscene phone call with a guy they call the Moner, who's just really being really crass and nasty. And they're all kind of like, ew, gross. And one of the girls goes upstairs and she gets strangled by the guy who snuck in with a plastic bag and he puts her up in the attic.
00:32:29
Speaker
and everyone's kind of leaving for Christmas break so no one really notices that people are going missing until the girl's father shows up and he's looking for her and no one really knows where she is. One of the other girls is pregnant and she tells her boyfriend who gets really kind of like mad and possessive and eventually the killer who's living in the house starts picking everybody off. The inept cops get involved, they figure out the calls are coming from inside the house, they show up to kill. The guy who's there who happens to be
00:32:54
Speaker
the pregnant girl's boyfriend, he gets killed. And but it turns out after all the cops leave and they leave the girl alone in bed, but the real killer is still in the house. 10 seconds.
00:33:04
Speaker
And then you hear the phone ring 13 times because he calls them after he kills everyone. And his name is Billy and Agnes. And don't tell them that you did Agnes. You guys, he says cunt so many. Can I say cunt? I can say cunt on here, right? I don't see why not. I mean, so many times. Yeah, like I love. Look, I love the word cunt. I love it. I think it's great. And if I were a woman, I would feel empowered by that word.
00:33:33
Speaker
But I'm not a woman. I'm not a woman, so I don't really have an opinion on it, but I love that word phonetically. You do have an opinion on it. You're giving us your opinion on it right now. I'm saying, but maybe it's only like a little bit valid instead of like all the way valid because I'm not someone who has a vagina, which is what Cunt is synonymous with. It's a synonym. It's literally a synonym. It's a look in the thesaurus under
Cultural Discussion on Language Use
00:34:02
Speaker
vagina. Cunt will come up.
00:34:04
Speaker
It's a I guess. I don't know if euphemism is the right word, but a slang term. Sure. But it's not that's not how the British use it. No, no. They use it in a completely different way. And let me tell you, Brett, I lived in in the Europe for a while. No big deal in Europe.
00:34:28
Speaker
No big deal. Not just any Europe, the Europe. The Europe, okay. And there's so much looser with sexuality over there. Like it's not taboo. Like sex is just a thing and nudity is just a thing and who fucking cares? It's the human body, you know? So I think that has a lot to do with how they just throw cunt around as well.
00:34:51
Speaker
because like it's just, it's just cunt, man. And for all you people who don't like the word cunt, I apologize. If there's enough of you and you leave comments, I will provide a beeped version of every episode going forward with every instance of me saying cunt beeped out.
00:35:10
Speaker
I don't know that we need to make it a habit to keep saying it, but OK. But I like it. It's such a good word. It's like fuck. OK. Have you ever, Tucker, have you ever seen the vagina monologues? I thought you were going to ask if I'd ever seen a vagina. No. And I'm like, no, what's it like? Have you ever seen eat playwright Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues? Eat, Pray, Love. Is that what you said? Eve Ensler's The Vagina Monologues.
00:35:39
Speaker
Uh, no, but much like this film before I saw it, I'm very, like, adjacently familiar with it. I... So I...
00:35:48
Speaker
Please stop that. These are the vagina monologues. This is me like, oh, no, wait, I'm not ready. I was in my youth. I was in by youth, I mean my 20s. I would I ran tech for a production. You were a theater kid. The vagina monologues. Yeah. And I was I was the lone penis involved in that production. Everybody else in the production was female. I was not.
00:36:11
Speaker
And it is an insanely good play. I learned a lot from that production. But one of the monologues is about a woman who
00:36:25
Speaker
does feel empowered by referring to her vagina as a cunt. And she says that word so many times over the course of just like three minutes. No, I gotta see it. And you're just like, like the first time I heard it, I'm like back on the soundboard, just kind of holding my temples going, what is this? And then by the end, I was just like, fuck yeah, you go girl. Like it's an insanely amazing
00:36:51
Speaker
production or an amazing show. And if you if there is a good production showing near you, particularly if you're male, go see it like there's a lot.
00:37:03
Speaker
But on Max streaming on Max is the 2002 version created and performed by Eva Ensler. So it's the original person doing the thing that she wrote. So I'm putting that on my list. Hell yes. And I want you to watch it tonight so that when we. Oh, no, SNL's on eleven thirty.
00:37:26
Speaker
I mean, so we'll be recording by then. No, we better not be. We bet not be. All right. Now, if we'd had a what are we watching? I'd be a little more lenient, but this does not need to go on for three hours, Steven.
00:37:40
Speaker
Ooh, I still need to watch Blue Beetle. What was I looking for? Oh yeah, vaginal monologues. So we were talking about, yeah, the moner. And I don't think the guy calling at the beginning of the movie is Billy, but I think they think he is. See, that's kind of what sort of confused me during it is because it seemed like they did have just a guy.
00:38:04
Speaker
It's definitely the same actor. It is absolutely still. It is absolutely Nick Mancuso. But do you think it's supposed to be the same character, though? Because I feel like there was a distinct difference between the cunt guy and everything that came after it. I agree. And he wasn't even in the house at that point. Correct. He's he's still coming into the house at that point. Right. But at the same time, I mean, it seems well established that the the the killer
Critique on Mental Illness Portrayal
00:38:31
Speaker
just has multiple personalities and can change his voice at will. So I think you could argue either way, honestly. And that's one thing that I both forgive, but do not that makes me feel kind of easy uneasy about this film is how
00:38:49
Speaker
this person that's doing this is not like a Jason or a Freddie or a Leather Faith or something, this is a severely mentally ill person. And they make that very clear that this person, this is not an evil person, this person is nuts. And in a way that's almost kind of realistic to a fault, that kind of makes me uncomfortable and maybe that's the point of it.
00:39:19
Speaker
I think on some level, yeah, but you also need to remember the end. This is I'm not saying this is right. I'm just saying this is something that I get it. The stigmatization of mental illness in the 70s and even as recently as the fucking 90s or the 2000s is pretty egregious. Well, and while I won't excuse it or condone it, I agree with you. You know, like the more time passes, the more humanity gets less ignorant.
00:39:45
Speaker
Correct. I'm not saying you can't blame them. I'm just saying, you know, that's also what I'm saying. People, then I don't think we're all malicious. Just most of them were just ignorant. Correct. And unfortunately, ignorance is no excuse, really. If I could go back and watch it in the 70s, I would love to do that. But I have to watch it now in the 20s. You ain't got no dial of destiny.
00:40:09
Speaker
No, I wish I did. Or DeLorean. It only takes you the same place. Or a TARDIS. Any other. Yeah. But you want to meet Archimedes. Making all these Indiana Jones references, I don't recognize. You're the only one of us that's seen that fucking movie.
00:40:29
Speaker
I am and I probably like the not even the I'm the least fan. Probably I'm very indifferent on Indiana Jones. I don't want to get off on a tangent on that, though. Please continue, Brett. Yeah. Keep going, Brett. Well, I mean, I was just saying that, you know, I have to watch it in the the view of somebody from 2020 where the world has gotten less ignorant. So I think that hurt the movie, too, because it was my first time watching it and I only had to view it from this lens, not an older one.
Ambiguous Ending Discontent
00:40:58
Speaker
There is a part of me that does try to reset my brain a little bit, but it doesn't always work. And depending on how egregious some of those things are, it doesn't always forgive. It absolutely doesn't forgive. I would not say this is a perfect film, but
00:41:19
Speaker
I will say it's a great one, but I think there are certain things that are holding it back, keeping it from me from seeing it as a perfect film. And that might be one of them for sure. But Billy's portrayal as someone who is very severely mentally disturbed is choice for sure. Yeah. And I.
00:41:40
Speaker
And I mean, I don't know. I don't for the reasons you like the ending. I hated the ending because you know how much I hate ambiguity. Right. You're a lore guy. You want the concretion. And I mean, and that's and I'll get into that's part of that's that's one of the main there's like three main issues I have with the movie. One of them is the mental illness thing. The second one is this that like
00:42:02
Speaker
I'm spending the entire movie trying to solve it like a regular slasher. Like who could that possibly be? And it's it's too obvious that it's her boyfriend. So it can't possibly be him. Right. They make that the reddest hearing possible. Yeah. Come to find out, it doesn't matter. All your detective work was for nothing because he's the common of this movie because he's just a red herring.
00:42:27
Speaker
And he is an asshole, though. Yes. What's that dude doing? But again, man, I think there's a number to do that. This movie is doing really well, is it's it's dealing with issues that like we're starting to come to the forefront in the 70s like.
00:42:44
Speaker
women having autonomy over their bodies and being able to, you know, make career decisions and life decisions outside of a man's approval. And like this movie, I don't know if it was I don't think it was intending to do that. Like I think both Bob Clark and Olivia has you're like, No, it's not really what we're doing.
Women's Autonomy in Black Christmas
00:43:00
Speaker
We're just trying. It's like the bin and the living dead thing where like it has a lot of weight, but it was probably not even intended.
00:43:07
Speaker
just kind of in to hear Bob Clark say we needed we needed something else to happen when people weren't dying. So this is what was happening. Like that's just kind of his throwaway explanation. And man, I love Olivia Hussey. And when you you tell Olivia Hussey what to do with her body, it makes me mad. I agree. I agree. Mad. And then he goes and like he's such a he's such a toddler, dude, like he's you know who that guy is. You know who that guy is? I don't know who that way. Kurt Delia do.
00:43:35
Speaker
or Julia. I've seen him in stuff. You've probably seen him in the movie that Bob Clark saw him in that made him want to cast him in this movie. Stanley Kubrick's 2001 A Space Odyssey. Oh, I knew who he was in that, but no, I don't. He's he is the star child. He's Dave. My God, it's full of stars. Yeah, that's that's him. Only star child I know is part of Parliament with George Clinton. It's only star child I know.
00:43:59
Speaker
I also get this straight. I also know Paul Stanley. And I also know he is a star child, too. A little a little guy named Ziggy Stardust, too. And also Greg Universe from Steven Universe is also a star child. Still have not seen that show. Lots of star child around here. Star child. Star children. Children. We live in a galaxy of star children.
00:44:24
Speaker
But anyway, back to my point. Sorry. Yes. Well, it was a tangent. We're back now. Yeah, yeah. Let me get back on track with what I was saying. Sorry. No, that's fine. So that's another, it's a perfect example of the viewing it from this lens.
00:44:47
Speaker
Like I was trying to solve who the killer was because that's how all slasher movies are now. They weren't led. So like for it to be an ambiguous person, like that was probably revolutionary. But like I spent the whole movie trying to solve it and I got blue balls and it's just, it wasn't fun. Which is why I was pissed off at the end.
Mystery Element Expectations
00:45:07
Speaker
Bob Clark himself would say this is not a slasher. He says he says this is a psychological horror film. Yeah, I think in that lens, it you would probably enjoy it more. But if you're going into it saying slasher, yes, then. Well, no, I mean, I get that point, but I wouldn't just because any movie like this or there's a hidden killer or a hidden somebody, I'm going to spend the movie trying to figure out who it is.
00:45:37
Speaker
like just because that's the fun thing to do. Sure. I don't think too hard about it. You know, as I've gone on record to saying, I just like to sit back and turn my brain off. But it's a lot of fun to try to figure out who it could be. Right. You know, especially when they're throwing you red herrings and like pointing you towards certain people, you think that it's a mystery because they present it that way. Right. Yeah. I view it as part of the fun.
00:46:03
Speaker
Cause I know those people as I go, man, you're such a hypocrite. You said you don't like to solve these things. I mean, I don't, but it's part of the fun of a movie. Like it's, it's, it's a part of the movie engagement is part of it. Yeah, no, absolutely. I'm engaging with it. Yeah. Um, I take good.
00:46:24
Speaker
I was just gonna say it's that thing where if you're presented with a mystery, you're presented with a whodunit, and there's no actual way it's what I love about the the Ryan Johnson Benoit Blanc mysteries is
00:46:37
Speaker
He has the answer right in front of you. You're just not looking at it right. You're just not looking at it from the right perspective, but it's always been there. It's always been right in front of you. But there I think it gets frustrating when you throw in a twist at the end that there was no way anyone could have seen coming. Like the one example that I always go back to is the Batman comic Hush by Jeff Loeb, where
00:47:04
Speaker
There's no way you can tell the identity of the mastermind behind the whole thing because it literally is just something that he tells you on one page of the comic. And then you're just, oh, okay. And that was the answer, I guess. Like it just, it doesn't make any sense until he puts the pieces together for you, but there's no way you could have figured that out.
00:47:24
Speaker
Right. And I guess because that's the thing I kept thinking the entire time, though, was like, there's not enough characters in this movie that fit who could be the killer. And the one that they're presenting as the killer is clearly the red herring. So it's not him. Right. Who else could it fucking be? I kept saying that over and over. Like, so I guess in a way, I could see you saying like screaming that at the television. Yeah, I could see you. I can actually know that you say that. I'm like, I can kind of see him doing that. Yeah.
00:47:53
Speaker
Yeah, kind of. Shaking his fist in rage and getting red on his
Speculative Emotional Reactions
00:48:00
Speaker
face. Shaking and crying, you know. Who the hell's gonna be? Just chugging Ram straight from the bottom. He's screaming his face. It's okay, you can tell us that this movie broke you, Brad. You can tell us that we're all friends here. We're all friends. It's all right. Not nearly that emotive.
00:48:22
Speaker
We like to imagine you that way, though. We do. Yeah, in our minds eyes, probably. That's that's always how we see you in the back of our brains. And also because you're not that emotive, it's really fun to imagine you getting that emotive. That's that's really what it is. It's because you're just such a chill, even kill dude. It's just so fun to think of you like getting just red in the face, angry, just like vibrating from every pore of your body over out of anger of something. It just.
00:48:50
Speaker
And when in reality your reaction is like, damn it, that was probably the extent of your actual reaction. His actual reaction is like, well, who else is this supposed to be?
00:49:02
Speaker
Pretty much. Why is it to be close? Yeah, you know, he gets a little more emotive in his voice. He's not that deadpan, but yeah. No, the voice is where you can tell the emotions. Which is not the face. No, not the face at all. Guys, it's a funny story that reminded me of is I asked my girlfriend the question about like that was going around the Internet for a while about
00:49:32
Speaker
If you were to see me arguing with somebody on the street, what would I be arguing with them about her response? I thought you were asking her how often she thinks about Rome.
00:49:43
Speaker
The Roman Empire. No, that's what she has. The whole thing, right? OK, guys, bullshit. I don't know. No, I agree 100 percent. I'm with you there, Brett. Anyway, I remember Brett texted me is like, am I supposed to be thinking about the Roman Empire? Like, me too. I'm like, I never think about that. Like, I'm not masculine enough. I guess not. I guess. Yeah, maybe that's what it is. God, I love meme culture, you guys. Just just a bunch of fucking beta males over here. But yeah, word. Um.
00:50:11
Speaker
And she said, I don't fucking know. I can't imagine you arguing with anybody on the street. That's like, yeah, that's if there's a correct answer to that question, that would be it. I think I said the street. And Brett will stand his ground, but he'll also avoid confrontation at pretty much all costs. It also helps if you get him behind a microphone on a podcast, then he'll tell you what he really thinks. And I'm comfortable with the people I'm talking to. True.
00:50:41
Speaker
I think I think I answered that question with probably something Ghostbusters related, like probably a bad Ghostbusters opinion, I think was my response to that. And then but I think I promised it with I can't really see you doing that. But if I could, probably something Ghostbusters related, I think was my full answer. But yeah, yeah, which makes sense. You have intimate knowledge of that. True. I've been on the receiving end of an argument on the street about Ghostbusters. So yes, shoot out on the street by Brett up one side and down the other, my friend. Oh, boy.
00:51:12
Speaker
Yes, true. But to the extent that Brett can't even mention Ghostbusters around me anymore. I can't mention Afterlife. I can't mention Afterlife. That's true. You can't. No, we can't talk about that. It's taboo. Right. It's the one thing we don't talk about on my account.
00:51:29
Speaker
Yeah, pretty much or off at all. But some people don't talk about Bruno. We don't talk about after life. Nope.
Possibility of Rewatch and Patreon Content
00:51:38
Speaker
So anyway, back back to my point, I made my own tangent as a nice. You did it in your own. Welcome. What was my point? Oh, that is at the that the the end was was just, you know, a surprise. I guess if you're looking at it from the lens of like
00:51:58
Speaker
Well, it couldn't there wasn't anybody it could be. So I guess the answer was in front of me the whole time. I just didn't want to believe it. Right. Because I knew that answer would piss me off if it was true. Surprise. It did. Hey, see, I don't know. For me, that's that's what kind of makes the pit of my stomach drop out for me. Like when I see that, I'm just like, oh, my like it gets like that much more disturbing and bone chilling for me in that moment.
00:52:23
Speaker
Well, I think that's why a second watch for all of us would be good, because I think it's specifically for Brett. It wouldn't bother him so much because he already knows like there's no reason to spend time or effort on thinking about any of that. You can just kick back and like you say, turn it off and have a good fucking time. Yeah.
00:52:42
Speaker
It's a possibility, which is why I'm willing to break the rewatch rule, you know? So I might, I very well might. Yeah, again, I think it stands up for sure. Like I did not expect to enjoy it as much as I did this time, and I had such a blast with it this time. You're gonna hear a lot from me in the group chat tomorrow about us doing a rewatch and a Patreon episode, because we're gonna be, I think we might be,
00:53:10
Speaker
Depending on our guests, we might be down and what are we watching? So we got to do something else. It's going to depend on what what I will talk to. We can talk about that. I'm just saying we're I'm going to blow up the chat tomorrow and we're going to talk about this because I want to do the rewatch and a Patreon episode about the rewatch. OK.
00:53:27
Speaker
All right Yeah, but uh, so Yeah, I I get because I saw a lot of reviews talking about that because this this was definitely one of those situations Where I immediately went to letterboxed and was like what am I missing right? Um, so clearly i'm missing something And and yes, that was that was a lot of a lot of reviews said that like that the end is is very chilling for that reason and it's very disturbing and terrifying that
00:53:54
Speaker
we it's just a crazy guy and he's still in the house. Right. So yeah, I get that. And yes, I will even admit that like the phone ringing over the credits is pretty creepy. Yeah.
00:54:10
Speaker
Particularly because you've grown accustomed to knowing what that phone ringing means. And what and so the implication of that is ringing along with that sound in your ears. And it again, it's the ambiguity. Does he? Does he not? Is that what happens?
00:54:30
Speaker
This movie was distributed in the United States by Warner Brothers and Warner Brothers hated the ambiguous ending of this film. And so they suggested a more concrete ending to Bob Clark. And I'm just going to pitch this to you, Brett. And I want to I want you to tell me which one that you would rather see.
Suggested Alternate Ending
00:54:49
Speaker
So the the film ends
00:54:54
Speaker
Olivia Hussey in the bed. Everyone leaves the room. Chris is presumably like he's he's in there. The cops leave. Someone is is staying, watching the house. Everyone kind of goes off. And then we cut back to. Is Olivia Hussey character Jess? Is that yeah, that's her name, Jess. We cut back to Jess, who wakes up in bed and Chris is laying next to her and Chris says, don't tell them what we did, Agnes, and kills her.
00:55:24
Speaker
The end. What? Who? Chris was Chris was the Claire's boyfriend, the first guy that the first girl that died, he was her boyfriend who was kind of sticking around the whole movie. Yeah, but that doesn't make any sense because he well. No, I guess he does leave right before Claire dies. So I guess that makes sense. It could work.
00:55:51
Speaker
I mean, it doesn't work with the POV at the beginning, but the rest of it could. Yeah. Wait, are you guys talking about the girl that got suffocated with the bag? Yeah. You're talking about the girl that's up in the attic with the bag over her head. Claire. Yeah. The girl with the bag overhead in the attic. Mm hmm. Yeah. OK. You guys know there's a girl in the attic with a bag overhead?
00:56:14
Speaker
You guys know that this movie wants to keep reminding us every fucking seconds that this motherfuckers in the attic with a bet. We get it. I get it. And then once once our our den mother joins her on the hook, she's just along for the ride, dude. She's just part of that now. Like after every other scene, it's like, hey.
00:56:33
Speaker
Hey, you guys, maybe up in the attic. It's even that's the ending shot of the movie. It's such a it's such a stark and disturbing image that I'm it is why they keep cutting back to it. I get it. You know, I I guess from an artistic standpoint, but as an audience member, it makes me feel like they're treating me like an idiot.
00:57:00
Speaker
Kind of, kind of. Yeah. Now that you mentioned, it's not something that I clocked myself, but yeah, you're right. I just like, I could, if it were less often, like it would be okay, but I'm not kidding you guys. After it happens, every other scene is just there black. Hey.
00:57:21
Speaker
Yeah, after every after every scene that's in the house, they cut to her. And like I said, even the ending scene is a big pull out from that window. And speaking of the ineptitude of the cops, you could see her from the fucking street. Yep. In like cloudy weather. Mm hmm.
00:57:41
Speaker
Yeah. Come on, guys. It's a great segue, which brings me. Come on, guys. Complaint number three. Complaint number three. The end of Brett's trifecta. Yes. There's things in this movie that make zero fucking sense. One, what was the deal with the dead kid that didn't go anywhere?
Critique of Unrelated Subplots
00:58:00
Speaker
It didn't matter. The first victim is kind of what that was my thought.
00:58:05
Speaker
I guess, but I guess it's the same thing as the first caller. Like, is it the same person? Is it not? Right. Why the fuck is it relevant? I think anything else is irrelevant. Yes, is irrelevant. And I guess it seemed like it's it's relevant. I don't know. This is how I see it. It's relevant in terms of setting the stage for everyone just kind of being a little freaked out and a little creeped out already.
00:58:30
Speaker
Well and I agree with that but I think it only works about half the time because I think the people making this film were trying to make it very slow on purpose because they wanted to be very suspenseful and half the time that really works and the other half the time you're sitting in this movie like
00:58:50
Speaker
What the fuck does this have to do with anything? In fairness, you also have to fill out a feature length runtime. Who cares? It's like the opposite of Back to the Future, where like you watch Back to the Future, every scene, every piece of dialogue, every shot moves the plot forward.
00:59:08
Speaker
Whereas in this movie, like sometimes they stop for a bit and it really does work for suspense. But sometimes they stop for a bit and do some shit. It doesn't fucking matter. That is just a waste of my fucking time in this movie. You know, I mean, reaching out. Yeah. The guy likes to get shot at the end. The cop gets shot in the ass at the end. And there's that whole fucking scene because everybody's on edge, man. The whole the whole town's fucking up in arms about this.
00:59:35
Speaker
Well, OK, but that's apparently what the dead kid was supposed to do, too. Why do you got to reiterate it again? I agree with you, Brett. But also, I do love that scene, that old man just being like he would fit right in with the MAGA crowd. That got up your ass sideways. Yeah, it is pretty funny. Well, it's it's great. Yeah, no, he is. Yeah. No, maybe agree with you. Pointless, maybe entertaining. Hilarious. Yes.
01:00:00
Speaker
That's that's one of those moments of comedy that I think this movie that this movie doesn't get enough credit for like that and the the fellatio scene in the in the the police office the first time where Margo Kidder is telling Nash that the the phone number and and he doesn't know what fellatio clearly has no idea what you think he does and then it becomes very evident because you're like oh wait
01:00:23
Speaker
And that joke would be a lot better if I didn't just like loathe her character in this movie. Like I see what they're trying to do and I want to have that relationship with that character. We're like, yeah, we're a sassy bit. No, she's just annoying.
01:00:39
Speaker
It's just annoying. It definitely hits different knowing how she died. So, yeah, a little bit. Oh, yeah. I hadn't considered that. But now that you mention it, right? Very unfortunate that she could not pour one out for her. I mean, do not write down show respect. But yeah, respectfully. Which went to the fellatio point. Yeah. But.
01:01:06
Speaker
Like they said they then they they they could have just let that be a funny joke. Mm hmm. But then later on in the movie, when you might have even forgotten that joke. Mm hmm. They just lampshaded like this. Here you go. We're going to we're going to make sure you knew that was funny earlier and we're going to have this random other detective who we haven't seen before just laughing the whole fucking time.
01:01:29
Speaker
And that is literally all that that character does. That is the only thing that character does is just laugh at inappropriate shit. Like, because when the cop gets shot in the ass, what's he doing? He's standing there laughing the whole that's just that is that character. And I can't if man, if you if anyone out there is a filmmaker and just wants to cast me in a movie as the guy who stands in the corner and laughs at everything, please do.
Humorous Notation of Minor Characters
01:01:54
Speaker
I would love to play that part. I'd watch that movie.
01:01:58
Speaker
The funny thing is, is in the credits, he's billed as laughing detective, I think. But he has a name. He calls him by name in the last scene. His name is Buchanan. I don't know why he wasn't billed that way in the credits. Because nobody would know who Buchanan was, but they sure do know who laughing detective is. They sure do know who that motherfucker is. That's a fair point. This defining trait.
01:02:24
Speaker
Right. Always laughing. Always laughing. Yeah. Like everyone's everyone's got something. He's got laughing. What a what a great character that really added to this film. Speaking of the cops, though, then the final bit of this trifecta of gripes, which I guess is intentional, that the cops are inept, but like you're telling me you don't have a movie if they're not right. Because you're telling me that a major murder happens in a house and they don't sweep the entire place at all.
01:02:54
Speaker
Right. That doesn't make a damn bit of sense. But especially since this the the case that these murders are partially based on was one of the first cases to ever use like forensic evidence to solve it. Mm hmm. You guys heard about this? You seen this? Well, yeah, no, I was going to. That's something we haven't touched on is this is kind of based on the true story.
01:03:15
Speaker
It was also based on the urban legend of the babysitter. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, it's kind of it's a dual thing. But yeah, Tucker, you want to you want to take that? Well, this is kind of sort of based on a dude named Wayne Bowden, who is a serial killer.
Real-life Inspiration for Black Christmas
01:03:37
Speaker
I'm going to admit to you that I'm kind of reading off Wikipedia now.
01:03:41
Speaker
kind of trying to paraphrase to make it sound natural but I don't want to I like to have integrity so I like to let the listeners know when it's not off the cuff you know he was a serial killer and and someone who had sex with people without consent as well and why did we mention that
01:04:03
Speaker
There was a connection. We were talking about something and I was like, well, and based on what it's. Yeah, this is my thing. What was my point? That this was based on an actual case like actual murders that took place in Canada around the forensic evidence. Yeah, I was going to say like the fact they didn't even sweep the house for anything.
01:04:25
Speaker
And just how careless they were at the end and to see that it was based on, again, this guy who was a serial killer in Canada. And the way that he was caught was because he bit the ladies boobs. He was a boob biting guy. To like to where they it was hard for them to get
01:04:50
Speaker
dental imprints, but they got them and they used them to find him and to convict him, which that's one of the first first cases of that being a thing where like forensic evidence in any way, shape or form had a part in convicting someone. And it's kind of it's kind of a landmark sort of deal. And then for the cops and this to just. Like, oh, somebody's dead. Well, we'll get rid of that.
01:05:18
Speaker
buddy there's no body we don't know they're dead it's a missing person wait a minute yeah they're just a little they're a little daffy um and also i raised this question to the urban legend of the calls are coming from inside of the house how the fuck
01:05:40
Speaker
unless you have different lines, separate lines. How the fuck does a call come from the same number?
Critique of Logical Flaws
01:05:45
Speaker
It doesn't. You can pick up the receiver and someone picks up another receiver and you can talk to that person, but you can't call someone over one line in the same house. The call can't be coming from inside the house.
01:05:58
Speaker
This just reminded me of another problem I had I was gonna say they actually do address that there is another line in the house They do address that in the movie. Yeah, I caught that this time. Yeah How Because I can't imagine in the 70s the soundproofing was a thing how if this guy is
01:06:24
Speaker
What appears to be screaming all of these things, especially in one of the last calls, he is very loudly talking on that phone. And Jess is the only one in the house when that call comes in. How in the actual fuck does she not hear him? Straight up not a creature was stirring.
01:06:43
Speaker
And she's the only motherfucker there. Not even a goddamn mouse. And he might he might they might be at the furthest points possible in that house that they can be. But she's still going to hear it, man, to which I would just say it easily. I am willing to suspend my disbelief to that regard. You are not. But look, I you know, I I can I love to spend my disbelief. I do it all the time.
01:07:11
Speaker
to watch pretty much any movie. I was gonna say, yeah. The people who survived in Scream 6, come on, you guys. And we love that movie. We do. Yeah, some of that shit doesn't make sense. Dude gets stabbed a million times in the torso and still lives somehow. Anyway, so yeah, I do that all the time, but I have a limit to that.
01:07:38
Speaker
Like, if something is glaringly, obviously not possible, and they're just doing it for the contrivance of the movie, that's where I take issue with it. Like, you know, give me something to explain how she doesn't hear him. Doesn't have to be much.
01:07:58
Speaker
That's a simple line earlier in the movie about how these walls are really thick and you can't hear your neighbor or something. I don't fucking know. It could be easily explained away. It doesn't have to be a big elaborate explanation. I mean, I get it. I get where you're coming. It's never bothered me. I thought about it like.
01:08:21
Speaker
briefly during this rewatch and just kind of put it out of my head because, again, I was just having a good time and didn't want anything to ruin my good time. Damn it. So that's that's why we talk, man. That's what we're friends. Look, I've ruined plenty of your good times. So you're due or I'm due. But but like I and you know, it's a three story house with an addict.
Iconic Scenes and Their Impact
01:08:46
Speaker
So he's in the action on the ground floor.
01:08:49
Speaker
you know, sounds traveling through multiple floors to get to her. Maybe counterpoint counterpoint that phone table right by the steps. So if it's going to carry anywhere, it's going to carry right down those fucking steps. Now, if she were in some corner hallway or in a room or something, I get that. But no, she's in the foyer. So pretty much anything that's happening in the house, if it's loud enough, she's going to fucking hear it. I don't tell you, it just it just didn't bother me. I don't know.
01:09:19
Speaker
Especially and I just thought of this especially when they go out of their way to cover sound when Barb gets killed Like they go out of their way to make sure she doesn't hear it with the carolers. Yeah. Yes, so like I guess all of his I don't know. He feels like he's whisper screaming like it feels very like stage screamy kind of
01:09:43
Speaker
Yeah, except for that last one. The last one is really what I'm taking up Ridgewith, because it does sound like he's actually shouting straight up. And by that point, like by that point, I think you're just so like I was anyway, I was like so in it that I just didn't it didn't bug me at all. So I don't know, man. I spent most of that scene going, ah, she hears him now. She's going to hear him now. She never heard him.
01:10:08
Speaker
No, she didn't hear him. I was like, oh, this is going to pay off. She's going to hear him now. But she did the thing she she started. Our girl, Olivia Hussey, started the trope in slasher films. Right. Is at towards the end of the movie. The one girl goes into a certain area or several areas, a house of horrors sometimes where she walks in and realizes that her friends are dead. Mm hmm.
01:10:35
Speaker
and they're just like a bloody mess. Like it happens in every slasher movie and it's always like, it's always some of the best parts of some of those movies, I feel like. I think it's one of the best parts of this movie, particularly the pan over. It's one of the best parts of the original Halloween, I think too, is when she's just like finding them all.
01:10:54
Speaker
The pan over to the door, like the crack in the door between the door and the wall in his eye, just that giant brown eye just staring at her. What? So that your boy, he's got a red eye. Like his eye is red. And I was like, what the fuck does that mean? Why is his eye red? That's supposed to imply something? The world may never know. No. Yeah.
01:11:22
Speaker
But yeah, this guy needs this guy needs lower god damn it. He just needs a little. Well, then I mean, one of the two. Wait, wait till next week, Ben, because you're going to get so much fucking lower next week. I was so excited for everyone. Because I hear you all out there going, well, why do you like Halloween so much? Is because he is the ambiguous? Do we know what the fuck he is? Is he a man? Is he even personified? No, we have no fucking idea, but I still got some backstory.
01:11:50
Speaker
And in that first one, in that first one to like, they don't give you a lot to work with. So like, that's even better. Like, don't flesh out a story and then make it ambiguous with Michael Myers. They give you what he was like as a child, what he did as a child. And then boom, 15 years later, here he is as an adult who doesn't speak, who just fucking kills people.
01:12:15
Speaker
which I think this might be the time to talk about the attempts at a sequel to this movie. Were there? No. It doesn't fit the format. Well, I'm gonna pull the Brett argument on this one in that pretty much any horror film pretty much, if it does well enough, is gonna get sequels, so.
01:12:39
Speaker
Well, I'll write that down because that's any movie that doesn't have a sequel. We're going to do that right there. What a horror movie doesn't have a sequel. Horror movies are notorious for it. They are. And the fact that someone didn't take pick up this movie and and make a sequel, especially with the ending. Exactly. I mean, and it's really easy. You pick up like moments later and they're like you basically just solve the ambiguity of the ending.
01:13:05
Speaker
when we're the old Halloween Scott kind of got this ending, too, because at the end of that movie, you don't know what the fuck's going on. Correct. Because he's gone. He shot him six times. I shot him six times. Yeah. But but but Loomis being there and how much like you learn so much about Michael through Loomis through the most of the movie. If you had had a Loomis shout out to buy the mask, if you had a Loomis and an Ahab.
Comparative Analysis with Halloween
01:13:30
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And they have got a half.
01:13:32
Speaker
Yeah, like I might have bought into this a little bit more. And I and I think that that might be one of the more brilliant strokes of Halloween is the addition of that kind of character to sort of build out the threat a little more without making the threat as I mean, the threat is still vague as hell in Halloween, but not making it quite as vague. No. Well, you've seen the guy. You see him.
01:13:56
Speaker
You see him in Halloween. That's the big difference. That's what makes it so that Halloween can do everything that this movie did in the exact same way while it being something completely different. Does that make sense? Did I say something? No. OK. All right. I got it. OK. The so Bob Clark does not himself have any plans to sequelize this, although he did have like the lore of Billy kind of he did. And he is now. Yeah.
01:14:26
Speaker
OK, he said that made it sound like he wasn't in a car accident, too, or something. Yeah, he was in a car accident. He got hit by a drunk driver. Don't drink and drive. But he had never had any plans to make a sequel initially. We'll probably talk about this a little more next week.
01:14:47
Speaker
Wink. Oh, because the executive producer did. He did remake. He is a he is kind of a mentor to Glenn Morgan, who was the director of the suite. I can't wait to see that movie. Yeah. It'll be like a Tom Savini, George Romero sort of. I will. I will warn you in advance. It got Weinstein. So don't get your hopes up too high. But is there like a is there a director's cut? Nope.
01:15:13
Speaker
Release the fucking whoever directed it's cut. The Morgan cut. Release the Morgan cut. Let's make it. Let's make it viral boys.
Bob Clark's Influence and Filmography
01:15:22
Speaker
The so John Carpenter in and Bob Clark are working on a movie together.
01:15:29
Speaker
And Carpenter was like, you know, you ever gonna do a sequel to Black Christmas? And Clark's like, I don't want to do it. And Carpenter, they use actually a lot of the lore that Clark had in his head for Billy gets used in the 2006 film. Not all of it, because some of it, we'll talk about it next week. But a lot of that lore gets used. And so
01:15:49
Speaker
Um, Carpenter goes, okay, but if you did, what would it be? Like Clark's like, I kind of don't want to do horror anymore. I'm kind of done with it. I'm over it. Like he goes, I want to make, I want to make another Christmas classic, but this time about, you know, a little kid growing up in Indiana, who's going to shoot his eye out. Um, that's the movie I want to make. That's his other Christmas movie. That's his other Christmas classic. And then he does another, he does another college movie too.
01:16:11
Speaker
Which he's which takes kind of the other view of like the brutalizing of women, which is porkies. So he's fucking wild. Bob Clark's a man of that man's filmography is fucking insane. It really did a sequel to porkies. You couldn't do a sequel to Black Christmas. Come on, man. So Carpenter's like, OK, if you're going to do it, though, what are you going to do? He goes, I don't know. The next year he gets out of jail and goes back to the house and does it all again.
01:16:40
Speaker
And we call it, I don't know, he gets released at a different time. So maybe we call it Halloween. This is the story that brought you baby geniuses and baby geniuses too. Comes black Christmas too, Halloween.
01:17:01
Speaker
So this is the story that Clark tells, but Clark also is very quick to say, no, he didn't steal anything from me. I mean, he was certainly influenced by Black Christmas, the POV. But they were pals, man, like who cares anyway? Like they're buds. I don't think they even gave a fuck.
01:17:17
Speaker
And Clark is like people ask, Clark, well, are you mad? He kind of so she goes, even still anything like he he created his own story. Did it have some similarities? Was it clearly influenced by it? Yes. Do I care? No. Like sometimes like like in the instance of Bob Clark in this instance and your boy George Romero, you realize when you create a genre. Right. You're like, oh, shit, I just did something like this is a thing now. Yeah. What's that quote about good artist steel?
01:17:44
Speaker
Look at the first half of that. It's good artists borrow, great artists steal. Ah, there you go. There it is. Yeah. And which I mean, you know, which means.
01:17:55
Speaker
There are a lot of great artists who stole, like Bob Dylan stole so much of his early shit. Well, we're all just like doing a variation on the first thing that was ever done. Like musicians. There's nothing new under the sun. You're just doing a variation on the first time a caveman like figured out how to sing a fucking song. Correct. Like it's just a variation on that shit.
01:18:15
Speaker
Yeah, there's nothing more under the sun, man. It's all been done. You've got to be on everything that's ever influenced you. Right. And art. Yeah. And that's, and I mean, in particularly looking around today where all art feels like it's homaging something.
Tarantino's Homage Style
01:18:32
Speaker
I mean, have you seen a Quentin Tarantino movie? I feel like it's. Homage the movie like. I feel like it's it's gotten more blatant over the years. For sure. I mean, I think Tarantino has a lot to do with that. He kind of like the king of lampshading his references. But yeah. Well, I feel like he pushed the envelope and then that gave everybody license to just like open the envelope and take everything out and scatter it all over the table without understanding what they were doing. It became very he's a man who can do it skillfully. Not everyone can do it skillfully.
01:19:02
Speaker
Like everyone sees a Tarantino movie and because he makes it look so effortless, it's like, oh, fuck, I could do that. No, you can't sit down amateur. But I mean, yeah, that's basically what it comes down to like. And so I think there was another attempt at a sequel like after the I'll just go ahead and do this now. I'll probably bring it up again next week. But after the after the remake bombed, Clark does the Wicker Man thing, which is, geez, that wasn't good.
01:19:30
Speaker
Tell you what, I'm just going to make a sequel to the original. And which is what the author of the original novel, The Wicker Man, did. He saw the remake of The Wicker Man and was just like, you know what? I didn't like that. So I'm just going to write my own sequel to The Wicker Man. So he did. He wrote another sequel to The Wicker Man and Clark was going to do a direct sequel to the original film, which I think Olivia Hussey was going to come back to do as like a new house mother in charge of like a new set of sorority girls. And that
01:20:00
Speaker
that he ended up dying before that ever got off the ground. And so the sequel was that was this man way ahead of his time, like figuring out the. Well, they came out after the remake, so this would have been like 2006, 2007, and he died in 2007. Dude out here thinking up what the legacy sequel was before the legacy reboot.
01:20:22
Speaker
I mean, yeah, that David Gordon Green, I think, popularized. He did not originate, but I think he kind of popularized it with the his most recent run of Halloween sequels. But yeah, man, that's that's kind of Tucker sprinting in from the bathroom to make a point. I would argue that H2O was one of the first equals.
01:20:47
Speaker
As it was one of the first two to ignore several sequels and only be a sequel to. The first two. Halloween two. Yeah. Yeah.
01:20:56
Speaker
So yeah, that's all I wanted to say a point. Sorry. That is a fair point. No, I should have. But I sort of wash my hands. There's a little wet. Yeah. Yeah, that's kind of the forgotten Halloween like set there like that. I think H2O is good, but I think that its resurrection comes
Significance of Halloween H2O
01:21:14
Speaker
next. Right. Is so bad. Yes. It kind of ruined H2O retroactively. Yeah.
01:21:20
Speaker
H2O, I think it's kind of a movie like Hook, where every time that I see it, I like the movie less, but I still love the movie. And now in the instance of Hook, we've got Dustin Hoffman's performance that just will make it so that I'll never not like that movie. H2O. I will not stand for this part of Hoskins' erasure, sir.
01:21:49
Speaker
Hey, Bob Hoskins is supporting that performance. OK, they are a duo. Giving one of the best on his own. Man, I'm just saying. And I just can't remember myself. Don't stop me, Smee. Stop me, Smee. Smee, try to stop me. Smee, try to stop me. Smee, what are you doing? Get off your ass and get over here. I can. Oh, my God. Yeah, I love that movie. I can't bring myself to disparage a Robin Williams film like ever. No, I do love Robin Williams. Someone is clearly not seen by Centennial, man, but OK.
01:22:19
Speaker
I'd like it is what it is. And it hasn't someone seen Patch Adams is all I'm saying. I did it today. That's Coppola, too. Ouch. That's it. That's a double ouch for me. Come on, man. Which one patch Adams? Yeah, that's no coping. No, it's not. You're thinking Jack. You're thinking Jack. You never go full. That was that was going to be that was going to be the next one I was going to bring. But also isn't great, but I'm not going to disparage it.
01:22:47
Speaker
You know what else doesn't doesn't sit well with that movie, you know who else is in that movie? That kind of in the in the cold light of day. You're like, oh really Bill Cosby's in that movie The Jack yeah See I made Brett disparage or Robin Williams movie I made you break your one rule and
01:23:11
Speaker
That's why we're going to be doing this dance forever. One hour photo exists. So that like the fact that that's even a thing that's out there, dude could have done 100 like good performances and shitty movies and it wouldn't matter because one hour photo exists.
01:23:30
Speaker
Are you saying that in a good way or a bad way? I can't tell. Yeah, I really can't tell. In a good way.
Overlooked Films and Performances
01:23:33
Speaker
I fucking... Have you guys seen one of our photo? Yes. I was like... No, I have not. What does he say? Are you kidding me, Steven? I'm not kidding you, Tucker. I've never seen one. All right. Podcast over, uh, at this French pod, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Steven's going to go watch one of our photo. Bye, guys. I'm going to bed, bitch. Um... You want to talk about, like, a chilling performance.
01:23:53
Speaker
Are you fucking nuts? Steven, have you not seen? I'm so mad at you right now. I saw Insomnia and he's fucking incredible in that movie. Oh, yeah. That's that's on my list of Nolan movies to watch that people forget about. I just watched the following spoilers for what are we watching? The the this. Oh, fuck, what was I about to say? Oh, no, Insomnia was the first Nolan movie I ever saw in theaters. That's what I was going to say. Oh, nice. I had that on VHS. Steven.
01:24:23
Speaker
One Hour Photo is a thriller. A very creepy one with Robin Williams, and he plays a man who works at a One Hour Photo thingy in the mall, you know? And it's directed by Mark Romanek, which is not how you say his name, but that's how I've said it for the last 20 years before I figured out how it was actually pronounced. So that's how I'm going to fucking say it. Who is my favorite music video director ever.
01:24:54
Speaker
And if you watch this film, Stephen. You're I don't want to oversell it, but your life's going to have a feeling you're already overselling it, but OK. No, Brett Brett Brett's got my back here. I'm not overselling it. This is this is a before and after time. Mr. What Mr. Mr. I will never disparage Robin Williams movie over here.
01:25:15
Speaker
Well, I did. You made me. So I've done that. You break your one rule. I didn't know there was a terrible human being in one of them. So I mean, let's be honest, there's probably a lot of terrible human beings in Robin Williams movies. Well, sure. But he's the one we know about. And Bill Cosby's in a lot of stuff, man. You ever seen Ghost Dad? What a hoot. Leonard part six.
01:25:39
Speaker
Not a hoot. But all those moments you do with Sidney Poitier, man, it makes him again. I will repeat that I'm so disappointed and saddened and just murdered inside. Like a bit of my soul died when I found out who Bill Cosby really was. Because this damn fucking raised me.
01:25:58
Speaker
Have you not seen the movie? No, it's on my list. Steven, you told me I should watch it. You can't do it, man. And I probably should watch it. And I keep passing by it because I can't do it, man. I can't. It hurts too much, man. It hurts too much. That is the documentary that started me on my watching documentaries about terrible people. Grew up on old school AMC where they did kind of the TCM thing.
01:26:21
Speaker
or the TMC, not Texas Chainsaw Massacre, but Turner Movie Classics. They did the TMC thing. No, it's TCM. It's Turner Classic Movies. Same thing. Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Got it. But your boy grew up on AMC showing all those Bill Cosby, Sidney, Bill Cosby, Sidney Poitier movies, of which my favorite is Let's Do It Again. And do you know I haven't been able to watch that movie since? You know how good all those fucking movies are?
01:26:49
Speaker
But Tucker, I think that's why you need to talk about Cosby. Um, look, I do need to, but I'm not ready to reckon with that. I'm not ready. I'll get there. I'll get there. That's fair. But you need, you need to do that. Like, are we kind of doing a bit? Yes. But also it's kind of real. It is. Yeah. Like I do feel this way. Am I being silly? Yes. Is it real? Also? Yes.
01:27:13
Speaker
That's how you know it's really funny because it's rooted in truth. This is why I drink, Bill Cosby. You did this to me. I think you were drinking before that, but OK. Let's play. Not as much. Just be careful you're not drinking around him, that's for sure. Oh, no. Oof.
01:27:33
Speaker
Moving on. You're a bad boy. You're a bad boy and I appreciate you.
Cultural Legacy of Black Christmas
01:27:37
Speaker
Black Christmas. To to call back what I did the intro for this episode, apparently one of Elvis's favorite Christmas movies, he would watch it every year, which is to say he watched it like for the next couple of years after it came out before he died, because he died like a couple of years after that, like in 76, I think.
01:27:57
Speaker
Um, so, but he apparently watched it and liked it so much that his family kept watching it after he died in memory of him. Also, apparently one of Steve Martin's favorite movies. When he met me two times, man, when he met Olivia Hussey on the set of Roxanne, he's like, you're in one of my favorite movies. And she's thinking, oh, yeah, Romeo and Juliet, which is I mean, she was a get for this movie because she had just done Zephirelli's Romeo and Juliet, which was huge.
01:28:23
Speaker
And she's like Romeo and Juliet. Yeah, I get that a lot. He's like, no, Black Christmas. I've seen that movie like 27 times in the 80s. Like he just loved that movie so much. And like VHS even it didn't even exist. Like he had to have had like a print of this. Right. That he watched on like a dirty sheet on his wall. Right. Which I could absolutely see Steve Martin doing. Absolutely.
01:28:47
Speaker
But yeah, like it's and it's become a kind of a cult classic, which brings us to next week talking about the twenty 2006 remake. But like it becomes kind of this cult underground classic doesn't make a lot of money, though it is at the time of its release, the fourth most successful Canadian film of all time. It grosses four million dollars.
01:29:14
Speaker
But it had some competition though I feel like is kind of a big part of that, right? The two Canadian films that outgrowsed at the time were the 1974 Richard Dreyfus film The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz and the 1970 French language film Du Fomme en Ur.
01:29:37
Speaker
I know what I meant was the week that it came out, it had some stiff competition. That's the thing I probably. Yes, it was released in America. Let me check the. We check IMDB here real quick. Released in America on December 20th, 1974. However, the numbers doesn't go back that far.
01:30:06
Speaker
But I can tell you that the number one movie in America that weekend was a little movie in its second week starring Charles Bronson would go on to start its own franchise and a spin off that didn't. Death Wish was number one at the box office and it would be unseated the following week by a little film called The Godfather Part Two. Yes, that was a big one. That was a big one that kind of
01:30:36
Speaker
took away from this film, I think. But in terms of what this one grossed in America, give me a second here, because I actually did have this information pulled up at one point, and I have completely misplaced it. What happened to it, man?
01:30:55
Speaker
Oh, here it is.
Marketing and Release History
01:30:56
Speaker
So it's it is initially released in America under the title Silent Night Evil Night because the studios thought that calling it Black Christmas would make people think it was a black exploitation movie. Yes, because why the fuck else would black be in a title racist 70s motherfuckers? Then they released it the following year and called it Black Christmas and it did a lot better.
01:31:24
Speaker
that yeah, because they re-released it in August of the following year and it grossed a lot more. I think it grossed about 86,340. So it makes about a million dollars in the United States during 1975 from August to December and then grosses a couple million in Canada as well. So it becomes very, it does,
01:31:52
Speaker
fairly well, but it's still just kind of this minor. I think in terms of the overall box office of the 1974, which again, I kind of had to reverse engineer from a bunch of different sources, it's like 90th or like 96th or something on the list of the top 100. It's toward the bottom. The number one film of the year was a little movie called Blazing Saddles.
01:32:19
Speaker
Blazing Saddles was the number one movie in America. Excuse me while I whip this out. The number two film, a little movie called The Towering Inferno, which is actually not bad. Towering Inferno, fun movie. Former nickname to past and future guests of the podcast, JP Lech, The Towering Inferno. Ah.
01:32:42
Speaker
Because he's so tall, you see. He is. He is a tall. He is a tall drink of water, that one. The third highest grossing movie, Young Frankenstein.
1974's Box Office Successes
01:32:51
Speaker
That's right. Mel Brooks has two movies in the top five. I think Stephen, I think that's Frankenstein. Oh, yeah, you're probably right. In fourth place, a little Charlton Heston film called Earthquake.
01:33:05
Speaker
You ever notice how he acts through his teeth? That's why he's so good.
01:33:14
Speaker
No, you really screwed the pooch last night, Harry. Go go listen to our episode on true lies. That was a good one. I like that. Get it. Get it. And then in fifth place in Wayne's World. And in fifth place, a little movie called Airport 1975. So that's two comedies and three disaster movies in the top five. Rounding out the top 10, you've got Murder on the Orient Express. Benji, Herbie Rides Again. The Godfather Part II. Little doggy Benji.
01:33:44
Speaker
Yeah, and Dirty Mary crazy Larry. Those are the. Well, that's a car movie. I like car movies. So we got a couple of car movies in there, too.
01:33:55
Speaker
But Black Christmas. Oh, sorry, I looked it up a million dollars in 1974 equals about six and a half million nowadays. Right. Reference. So. So, yeah, I mean, not again, not the kind of movie that people are like, oh, yeah, let's let's make a ton of sequels to this. It it earns about one point three million total during its theatrical run in Canada.
01:34:22
Speaker
Total against a Bond film, which is worth mentioning. The man with the golden gun is also coming out that week, right? Spoilers, I guess, for what you were about to say. Sorry, Stephen. No, no, no, you're fine. No, I was I was getting ready to move on to the Tomatombre score. So no, that is worth mentioning. Not one of the best Bond movies, though, I will say. I'm not as as as has previously been mentioned on this podcast. Not a big fan of Roger Moore.
01:34:49
Speaker
I just don't give a fuck about James Bond. I wish I did, because it looks like everybody who loves that stuff has a great time. There are some really fun ones, and there's some really not as fun ones. And the more stuff is just too goofy for me. He's just a very goofy
Praising Black Christmas' Tension Building
01:35:02
Speaker
James Bond. And I don't care for that. I like people who have played James Bond. I like Timothy Dalton. Timothy Dalton, my favorite Bond. I just want to throw that out there. Timothy Dalton, my favorite Bond.
01:35:15
Speaker
That's it. My favorite. Full stop. Full stop. Yeah. No, I, I, I've done the same, Tucker, except for GoldenEye. And I just love GoldenEye because I played the shit out of the game with my friends in high school. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So I don't, I don't like it as a movie. I may have seen the movie like once, but you know, the broad strokes of the plot because you played that game so much, both in single and multiplayer mode. Absolutely. Okay, dude.
01:35:41
Speaker
The Tomatometer score for Black Christmas is a 72%. The Critic Consensus, the rare slasher with enough intelligence to wind up the tension between bloody outbursts. Black Christmas offers fiendishly enjoyable holiday viewing for genre fans. I agree. Word. The meta score on this one is...
01:36:05
Speaker
Apparently my all my tabs stop loading and I'm probably frozen right now. That's using Chrome aren't you Steven? I am I have to to get this bloody thing to load I'm gonna start that one up your ram dude. I'm gonna take this again Just like that strip how
01:36:31
Speaker
Did you get it yet, Steven? Yes, I got it. I'm trying to say it and you keep talking. I'm trying to get myself, I'm trying to give you a clean edit point, bitch. I'm trying to help you and it turns out I'm just making it worse. You are just making it worse. That's just making it worse. Don't tell them what we did, Agnes. The meta score on this one is a 65 based on generally favorable reviews from nine critics. That's fair. Right.
01:37:01
Speaker
And the letterbox score, which is also going to take a while to load because oh, and I just closed it because I hate life. Son of a. You son of a bitch. I'm the worst. I'm just the worst person. Golly, no, you're not, man. But like, come on, man. But also, yes, you are. The letterbox is in the new. The letterbox score is a three point eight. Brett's there.
01:37:25
Speaker
Brett, out of five stars, how do you rate 1974's Black Christmas? I'm right there with the average of 3.5. 3.5. Tucker, what about you? Surprisingly, that's a three for me. I really, I did enjoy a lot of aspects of this movie. I think upon further rewatches, my score will probably go up, but as it stands right now, it's a three out of five.
01:37:53
Speaker
Whereas I initially had it at a three point five. And after this rewatch, I bumped it up to a four point five because I just had a fucking blast with this fucking hell, man. Damn. Yeah. That makes me excited. Again, you guys, we got to do that Patreon show, man. I'm not leaving it alone. I'm blowing up that chat tomorrow. Doing it. We got to do it. Yeah, that's that is what we got for. Nineteen seventy four is Black Christmas.
01:38:21
Speaker
Um, you can find us on the social medias. We're the disenfranchised podcast in case you forgot what podcast you were listening to. Uh, you can find us on, uh, most social media platforms specifically. You can find us on, uh, blue sky, Instagram, Facebook, and letterbox at disenfranch pod.
01:38:42
Speaker
You can also find us on Patreon as Tucker mentioned before, patreon.com slash disenfranch pod. Are we going to do that Black Christmas rewatch? Who knows? Who knows? Maybe we're going to have a free week. I feel like we should. Let's find out.
01:38:58
Speaker
And you can also shoot us an email this and French pod at gmail.com. And while you're on the internet, please go to Apple Podcasts or Spotify, wherever you get your podcast. Leave us a nice big old fat, juicy five star rating and review. We really appreciate it and would absolutely love to hear what you have to say about us, provided it's good. If it's not good, just shut up. But yeah,
01:39:21
Speaker
I am your host Steven Fox with you can find me on instagram letterboxd and blue sky at chewy walrus Brett where can we find you on socials these days you can find me on instagram letterboxd and blue ski at sus underscore warlock except for blue sky which didn't let me put the underscore
01:39:41
Speaker
Bastards so it's just sus warlock That's true you are over there like like it's your own personal myspace page man. I love it for you
01:39:56
Speaker
Look man, we're like Yahoo Messenger, where you would just show the status message playing. Yeah. Yeah. Mm hmm. I'm an elder millennial. It is my right to post song lyrics on social media. And like they do that on Instagram, but it doesn't. It feels dirty now. You know what I mean? Like when I go on to my Instagrams, it'll say like who's live and some of those people, it'll show what they're listening to on whatever they're listening to it on. No, thanks. And like, I don't know that felt OK back in the day, but now I don't know. It's just hits different.
01:40:28
Speaker
Hey Tucker, while you're prattling on about that, why don't you prattle on about your socials for a little bit.
01:40:33
Speaker
Well, you can find me as always on the Instagrams and on the YouTubes at ice 909. That's I C E N I N E the number zero and the number nine. Uh, also on Instagram, you can check out a tuck mugs, which is tuck underscore mugs. Uh, this is the world premiere announcement of the next tuck mugs post, which will be sometime this week. Like we want to tell you when it's going to be, but we're kind of still trying to keep that pop
01:41:02
Speaker
up feel you know that real independent vibe and shit you know but this is this is the announcement next week's post we're finally going to get a look at my hand-painted tulips I've been saving this one you guys because my hand-painted tulips
01:41:26
Speaker
It's perfection. You'll see. You'll all see. So I'll show you. I'll show you. No, I have. Look, wait for the post. I'll probably drop like maybe I don't know, Wednesday. That's just an estimation. It depends. So the day before this episode drops, we've been quality testing it and there's still some bugs in the post that we have to kind of work out and figure out. Like we don't want this to affect the end user.
01:41:53
Speaker
You know, we want this to be something that comes out clean. We don't want a cyberpunk situation. You know, we want something that's going to. It's it's going to be good next week, you guys, the tulips.
01:42:07
Speaker
get excited also still need some guest mugs because if you want more than just like a post every three to four weeks we don't need some guest mugs and not only am I talking about the people who are to the people who are listening now but I'm talking to Brett I'm talking to Steven you guys yeah you're the only Steven that I'm talking to right now that's here
01:42:30
Speaker
I don't know who you got behind your monitor, dude. I don't know. I don't know nothing. You can see it's a wall, dude. Look, I can't go any trying to. It's a wall, man. You're a really good. Anyway, the movie you were in, you guys. Oh, stop it, Steven.
01:42:46
Speaker
So guest mugs, you guys, I need one from each of you. I need to have one like in my pocket if there's like a two week spread where I'm like, oh, man, like I'm trying to get this post together if only I had a guest mug. So I need guest mugs from you guys. And I need one guest mug from each listener on my desk by Monday morning at seven a.m. Eastern time.
01:43:10
Speaker
All right, because look, you guys, I'm not running out of mugs. That's not the problem, I swear. I'm not running out of mugs, OK? I did not show too much of my hand too early. I would never do that. Absurd. It's just I'm trying to. Yeah, I said good day. You get nothing.
01:43:36
Speaker
Anyway, don't give me some guest mugs because I really would like to pad out these long stretches. It's just in the winter, my schedule is a little different and the times that I drink coffee are a little different. So the time I use mugs like it's more of a time where I don't really have time to sit and take a pic and write a whole little doodad story about it.
01:43:55
Speaker
Um, so I need some guest mugs to pad the winter out. So calling all disenfranchised listeners. If this is your first time listening to this podcast and you hated every second of it. Great. That's wonderful, but still send me a guest mug, please. That's not great at all. What are you talking about?
01:44:13
Speaker
No, man. What's great about the world is that people be like in different shit, like for different reasons. So if somebody doesn't like our stuff, that's almost as good as somebody liking our stuff, because that means that we affected them in a way, you know, we reached them positive or negative. We spoke to them and they heard us. Yeah. So there you go. There you go. Good job, you guys.
01:44:41
Speaker
Well done. Take us home, Steven. Right on. Well, we'll be back next week with our very special guest. I really hope they're able to record with us tomorrow. Otherwise that's going to be awkward. Um, talking about black Christmas 2006 until then I am your host Steven Foxworthy for my co-host Brett Wright and Tucker until next time. You'll be doing all right.
01:45:06
Speaker
with your Christmas of white, but I'll have a black, black, black, black Christmas.
01:45:39
Speaker
you