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Dr. Cyclops (1940)- Honey, I Shrunk the Scientists
35 Plays2 months ago
Dr. Cyclops was a bit of a wild ride featuring- mad scientists, radium shrinking technology, colonial-nightmare chic outfits, and honestly some really nice design moments. Join us to hear all about it.
Info from:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0032412/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0_tt_8_nm_0_in_0_q_dr%2520cyclops
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0372128/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1
Music: Cassette Deck by Basketcase
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
I'm Melinda. I'm Ariel. This is Hot Set, the movie podcast about costume design.
00:00:23
Speaker
Welcome, everybody. Today, we are discussing the movie from 1940, Dr. Cyclops. Had you ever heard of this movie before we decided to do it? I hadn't. And it's amazing how at the beginning of every single episode, I just kind of like lose my mind. The movie gets introduced. I actually hadn't heard of it before. But as soon as it was kind of on the on the list of options, it sounded like something I should have heard of. Yeah, you know, I think I agree with you on that. um I'm trying to remember, I think I was literally just Googling sci-fi movies from the 1940s, and I hadn't heard of a lot of them, so I was mostly going off of what the internet had to say about things. Yeah, and I think that pretty much any sci-fi or horror movie that's before, well, kind of even going into the 70s, I just expect them all to have
00:01:14
Speaker
doctor something. Any any doctor, I'm going to go, yeah, that's a movie that exists. and I'm sure it was influential in some way, or if it wasn't, there there could have been a moment. I feel like this one was influential, maybe a little bit accident ah accidentally. But in the future, somebody would be like, I want to make that but better and for families. Yeah. I think that i think the the crazy doctor scientist has certainly been a theme that we've you know had ah going throughout all of these movies. And um yeah, it's it definitely a movie that you can see what came after. Certainly not a movie that I think people watch anymore. No, and I don't and you don't think you need to. I don't think you need to. I do think, though, that on our watch through, my relief that we were back in color
00:02:12
Speaker
Technicolor was real. ah It was just like it washed over me like, oh, we're here again. And it was only three movies. But yeah, it is amazing. And I will say overall, I thought the color in this movie looked really good. It looked great. It looked really clear, too. Before we get too deep into the weeds, would you like to describe what this movie is? Dr. Cyclops. Sure, Dr. Cyclops. So this movie is actually about a doctor named Dr. Thorkel. We meet him. He's already in Peru. it I believe the movie takes place like in 1940, essentially. like It's not set in a different time than when it was made.
00:03:00
Speaker
so dr thorkel is in peru he's doing some kind of research um he's described in the summary as a physicist but i i kept throughout watching the movie i thought that he was more like a biologist so now i'm really confused i agree at the beginning there's another doctor for their for care There's a lot of doctors. There's a lot of doctors, but there are three characters who meet in the beginning who are talking about, no, I can't count. There's four characters meet to go find Dr. Thorkel or Thorkel in the deeps of Peru. And I'm pretty sure that one of the doctors is talking about a biologist because there's a conversation about, oh, a bug collector.
00:03:41
Speaker
And then like, yeah, there's like a stumbling block there. So it's interesting. What, what a resume this doctor has to have if he's a biologist. Just a real ah man of all trades. um but yeah sounds Right. Like he's, he's doing research. It's very nebulous what he's doing ah on purpose and he I think he actually asks all of these other doctor scientist people to come and to help him. But then when they get there, all he has them do is have one guy look through a microscope and tell him one thing. And then he's like,
00:04:22
Speaker
Great. Thank you so much. Goodbye. And he wants them to leave. it's It's phenomenal. And their reactions are very, very reasonable. What do you mean? Like, why would we go? Everything out here is crazy. What are you talking about? Yeah. So they kind of just refuse to leave and are just sort of bumming around his camp. And there's also this and like local man, um he's named Pedro, right? In the movie, his character's named Pedro, who seems to be sort of working as like a local guide, fixer, procurer, liaison, kind of like anything you need
00:05:08
Speaker
Pedro can do it, is sort of is the role. Yes, absolutely. So those are our people, that's who's the principal characters in the movie. um So yeah, the scientists stick around, they kind of refuse to leave. Eventually they discover that what Dr. Thorkel is doing is using this massive deposit of radium to shrink different animals down to a miniature version of themselves.
00:05:48
Speaker
For reasons, science. Oh, no, there is actually a reason. um I did see somewhere in one of the synopses that, one of the synopses that describes this movie that Dr. Thorkel is working on shrinking life, like shrinking creatures in order to like save the planet. question mark? Okay, so no noble pursuit? Yeah, he because he wants to shrink all of humanity to reduce its impact. I don't know that he fully gets into that, but there was a moment where he kind of had like a mad diatribe where he's like, I'm going to shrink them all.
00:06:32
Speaker
Yeah, a bit of his like Thanos sort of like, I will destroy the planet to save the planet. And I'm curious if his um technique for doing that will be the same technique that he used on these folks. by asking them to look really closely at a machine. And then, whoopsies, I shrunk you. Yeah, I put the tagline for this movie was, honey, I shrunk the scientists on purpose. I'm a madman. it was You can definitely see where um this like totally influenced a lot of things in, honey, I shrunk the kids. And it's pretty great. And it's actually pretty effective in this movie. like The effects are pretty great.
00:07:18
Speaker
It's a wild watch because it's still we're still in slow pacing land where the story is coming very, very slow, but the effects are getting cool cooler. and um The costumes also seemed to be following this trend of getting more and more purposeful as we go. In each movie that we've discussed, they have been purposeful. You see that there are costume brains working on set and coming up with um designs and and ideas. But on this one, it's a small cast and there's not a lot of change. I mean, there are more changes than honestly we needed. But they're they're very, very purposeful. And I definitely want to talk about the the latter like the end half of them. I've got so many practical questions.
00:08:11
Speaker
I am with you on that. Yeah, so yeah, he, when, when everyone kind of figures out what this guy's doing, he, he shrinks them. And then his intention is basically to feed them to his cat. Oh, yeah. He's like, you, you are all my practical test. So when they're first discovering that he has been working on shrinking biological creatures, the first hint of this is that second doctor in camp, Dr. Bullfinch, who has like a goatee and shellacked hair, all of that stuff. And he's wearing inexplicably a light suit and tie with a handkerchief in his pocket. like He is proper city man. like
00:08:56
Speaker
out of the lab into the jungle and he is clean as a whistle in that light suit. And it's wild. And he's also got very, very shiny shoes. Like he took care of his shoes in the jungle, these leather brogues. He discovers teeny tiny little bones in a pile of rocks that one of the other like more muscly men ah discovered. um And he says, I've discovered a new ah new pig meat, like tiny tiny um breed of pig. And I'm going to call it after me and Dr. Thorkel, the mad scientist with Coke bottle glasses that are so thick.
00:09:43
Speaker
They were so strange. They were so specific and I loved them but they were like so thick and both you and I are glasses wearers. Yeah. And I was just thinking and hoping and praying that those glasses were kind of an optical illusion and that they were not like actually affecting the actor's vision because they made me nauseous. But Dr. Thorkil comes up and he's like, oh, way to go. Way to claim my discovery real fast. You did not hesitate, naps. Then the next discovery is that Pedro's horse has been shrunk. He keeps hearing a horse neighing and he's like, that's Pinto. Pinto, was that the name? like Yeah, he's just like, that's my horse. I can hear him and everybody's like, you're crazy, Pedro.
00:10:26
Speaker
no gitro So crazy, you dirty, dusty little man. He's like, no, that's my horse. And they find him and he's a teeny, tiny little horse. And then the next step, of course, in shrinking goes from you know domestic animals to horses to human beings. yeah And Dr. Thorkel starts trying to measure what's happened to them. Yeah, he's like using them like lab rats based out. Absolutely using them as lab rats that he can have conversations with. And my, okay, so into the costumes at all. We start in more urban area in a city and like yeah America, America, all the busy, busy, busy. And this is where the color of it all was so exciting because immediately where
00:11:10
Speaker
before we're Actually, I'm a liar. Before we're even in the city, we have this little vignette that's two doctors, one who seems sensible and then Dr. Thorkel is like an evil scientist, talking in a lab and the the more reasonable scientist is saying like, you can't do this. And it's filmed in green and it's very creepy. And then Dr. Thorkel kills the first doctor in a way that is kind of inexplicable. Just kills him right up. Just kills him, but like with with like sonic waves, I don't understand. There's like a machine that he like puts him down on and his head is in between these two like receivers or swords. Yeah.
00:11:52
Speaker
not laser things, but something. and's yeah kind of It's like a like a shock treatment kind of thing. And it offers the one and only opportunity in this entire movie for crazy makeup, which is yeah this like goal the Billy Butcherson from Hocus Pocus makeup. where it looks like it doesn't look like teeth like you don't see the skull it looks like his mouth has been roughly sewn shut like with giant stitches yes it's it's amazing whatever i almost forgot about that i know because it just
00:12:25
Speaker
in and out, you're so quick. And then we're in like urban America and pinstripe suits and lady suits that like matching accessories, the hats, the feathers, like all these details that are so nice. Everyone was so stylish. Like everyone looked so good. There were so many beautiful hats in this movie. Everyone's hat is like tipped to the side and very like Casablanca, like coming down over an eye. Everybody looks really handsome. And then We are, boom, we're like in Peru. And yup everybody's got Jodh Purse. Jodh Purse for you, Jodh Purse for you, Jodh Purse for you. Everybody roll up your sleeves. um But they're still wearing ties. Still wearing ties. I like have to say, for some reason that I probably will never understand, when I was a small child, I was absolutely obsessed with Jodh Purse.
00:13:24
Speaker
I loved them. I have like vivid memories of being like seven, eight years old and just being obsessed with the idea of wearing Jodhpur's. I don't know where that came from. That's so good. That's so specific. And it's like, oh, that's so specific. I feel like that sets off my cool lots, like alarm. You know what I mean? Where I'm like, I don't need crazy shaped pants. Why? I do need them. I needed them. It's like one of those moments where you like look back and you're like, oh, I was obsessed with costumes from the beginning. like Teeny tiny. No question about it. Obsessed. No question whatsoever. Yeah. And just like, I don't know because i I didn't really grow up watching that many old movies or things. I feel like the Jodhpurrs are kind of a
00:14:18
Speaker
a stereotype of like the old timey director oh old timey director kind of like colonial english Yeah, in like Egypt. and Oh, yeah, absolutely. though It's like, I think I wrote i wrote it down. It's is colonial nightmare realness. Yes. what All of the white people in this movie are wearing. They look so good, but it is born out of absolute nightmares for the places that they go.
00:14:50
Speaker
It's also born out of like absolute ignorance. It's so crazy because there are Jodhpur's everywhere. and then Okay, so there's Dr. Bulfinch, who is supposed to be our reasonable doctor, goatee doctor. right um Then we have Dr. Mary, and she is our Lady. We have two other gentlemen. um I wrote them down. Oh, good. Because I did not. Yeah, Bill Stockton and Steve Baker. Bill Stockton is the younger man and Steve Baker is a guy who bought like the donkey station that they had pre-ordered
00:15:26
Speaker
some donkeys, like they'd pre-oobered some monkeys and showed up and this guy was like, well, I own it now and I need them for mining, so sucks to suck. And it's this scene where they're just like, I guess in this like little Peruvian village um having this negotiation and that's where the biology bug collector conversation happens. right And that's where we first see Dr. Mary's um Peruvian like outback outfit that just sent me where she is wearing jodhpur's. And then she has a blouse. It's just a, it's like a silk or like a rayani, like very flowy. You can imagine like a soft drapey hand. Oh, it's beautiful. A blouse and it's so beautiful and it's so light. Is it like a light, like blue kind of like a light, like it's, it's this very light color. Yeah. She's kind of dressed in blue throughout this movie. Yeah. It's like blue and teal are kind of her colors. And so it's very light. And she has a scarf that's like tied very nicely. And then she has a jaunty hat that again, second movie in a row reminds me of like,
00:16:39
Speaker
Austrian mountains, it seems that she should be climbing with that hat in a very, very colorful feather stuck in there. And I just kept thinking, all of these people are in a very dusty climate, or like muddy, or you know there's a lot of flora and fauna, and they're going off the beaten track to get to Dr. Zorkel's self-made shack lab like out in the middle of this jungle, and they're wearing crazy clothes. They're just not picking up dirt somehow. they They're like repelling dirt.
00:17:19
Speaker
And I was just kind of blown away by this like they look like they're in like a magazine photo shoot of like I'm an explorer like what he don't look real yeah it should be like sorority girl pose and then like trees behind you like it's just wild like very dapper. Yeah. Oh, it's so beautiful. But what I loved though is then when when they actually make it out to to doctor's camp, he looks like someone who's actually been living out there. Exactly. Like he is wearing this crazy, it's not oversized, but it kind of feels oversized. Maybe it's the placement of the buttons, but he's essentially wearing a suit. It's this very crumply linen suit, which does make sense for being in a hot place because linen breathes so well. And it's also kind of that like khaki color, which you do expect when you're, when you've got characters going on um an expedition in this kind of era, you expect them to be putting on khaki anything so that the dirt and the sweat don't show up as much kind of seems to be the the thinking. And so he's got this like wrinkly linen suit and then a very clean button down beneath it.
00:18:30
Speaker
Yeah, he does look like he's been like he hasn't changed the suit part at least like in a while and it's so funny because I feel like what that is. Trying to communicate to the audience is like there's something wrong with this guy but like it's a huge like red flag that he looks all like rumpled and wrinkly and. slept in and worn out when everyone else looks so pristine and perfect, even though he looks realistic to what would it would actually be like if you were out there. I mean, there's actually, I feel like dirt on the seat of his pants. Like we see him turn around and bend over and do physical stuff, especially when he's um tracking these folks once he, spoiler alert, shrinks them. um And he he actually, it feels like there's sweat in those clothes. It feels like there's dirt and it kind of made me
00:19:20
Speaker
wonder if that actor was pulling a little bit of a Marlon Brando um from that crate movie like where he was like insane. Yeah, doing a bit of a method. I have to yeah i have to live the part to play the part. I'm never going to take off this suit because if that actor wore the suit, even when they weren't shooting, respect. But yeah, he's got this suit, and he's got what we find out are like six or seven pairs of these Coke bottle glasses. When I'm talking about Coke bottle glasses, in case you're not in a place or you're not used to glass Coke bottles, like I'm talking about the bottom of a class ah glass Coke bottle that is really, really thick, just imagine cutting that out and then putting it in rims. In front of your face. In front of your face, just like an inch thick.
00:20:08
Speaker
and And the the lenses are are really small around which like adds to the feeling of how thick they are because it's so tight around the outline of his eye that those glasses are that it just like accentuates it, it feels like. Like teeny tiny wire rim and he's bald and a very big guy. So it's like very purposeful to have this giant man in this big old wrinkly suit with buttons that kind of make it seem a little bit awkward.
00:20:39
Speaker
on the jacket and then these teeny tiny little glasses to give them these predatory little eyes. Oh, and they are so predatory. So predatory. I will say like before we you know before we get to the sort of turning point, the costume that I actually felt the most confused by is the second outfit that we see Dr. Mary wearing when they get there. She's puts on like we see them like it's the next day or something or some time has passed so everyone's changed. And she's in this full on classic 1940 house dress with like a zipper down the front. And she's had she's had a few costumes because there's the one that she arrived in which is the the super drapey blouse.
00:21:30
Speaker
And then I think in between the blouse and that dress, she's got like a short sleeve shirt like to cook dinner in and these like linen pants. Yes. That are like very wide leg trousers. And that seemed a little bit more reasonable, very colorful for being in the wilderness, but a little bit more reasonable. And then yes, bam, we're in this dress that is inexplicable for being on an expedition. Yeah, she looks like she's about to start vacuuming. Yes. It was so jarring to me because everything up until the point has been very stylized and unrealistic in certain ways in terms of- But utilitarian. But yeah, the things you expect to see people wearing in that era in the kind of like, I'm an explorer kind of frame of mind. And Yeah. then she's about ready to base to turkey just just right out of sight behind a tent like it just doesn't make any sense. I just I just kept staring at it because like all the guys have changed too but they're just in like another version.
00:22:35
Speaker
of what they've already been wearing, which is like a button-up shirt that's more of like a utility shirt that's got like pockets and then like maybe some jodhpurrs or maybe some like kind of canvas pants or just something a little bit more. Yeah, and like high boots so that they can get places. it was i couldn't I couldn't figure it out and I just kept staring at it. I couldn't crack it. That felt like something she should have started off in and then been like, oh, I got to change now into my practical clothing. But it seemed like, oh, hey, a reminder, she's a lady and she's going to be shrunk down and she's going to have little tiny lady clothes. like I don't know. That seems like it would be the only purpose is to just be like, hey, remember, this is a woman. Yeah, this is their men. She's a lady. Don't forget. Don't you forget it. It was just wild. And it's like I've talked about how some of these outfits just didn't seem distressed or like they they were in this environment. And that is definitely one of them. Dr. Bulfinch's suit is another where he continues to wear the same suit basically the whole time. And even Bill and Steve, who are the utility more utilitarian guys, um there's one scene in which I think Bill, the younger,
00:23:52
Speaker
Man, I think that there might be some dirt on his utility shirt to like make it seem a little bit more worn in. And I was very excited about it because everybody looks, when you see them side by side, like Bill and Steve and Pedro side by side, they all have these very earthy colors and they're all wearing things that are the shapes of things that you would expect for like practical Western wear. um in any situation that is not like urban. You're like, yes, if you're like lifting hay on a farm, you would want something like this because it would be comfortable to wear. um But there's just no dirt. There's, they just don't feel
00:24:33
Speaker
worn in. It's it's very like shiny for something that should be very useful. Except for Pedro. Pedro seems like he fell off a mountain and then rolled through all the mud all the way down, all the way down, all the way down until he landed in his like outside like hammocky style bed where he hangs out at this doctor's lair. Yeah, and I'm like, okay, are they trying to say something about people that have been out in this jungle of Peru for a while that like both he and Dr. Thorka looked like that and these people coming in just look so crisp because they haven't like really experienced
00:25:15
Speaker
Like I can kind of get there on like what the thought process might be. I think that that's us doing a lot of work too for them because I think that the laziness is just going like this is a Peruvian man. Bomp, bump, bump. Yeah. Did we figure out what that is? No. We just decided this. Decided it. And it was nuts. But we see all this like quote unquote, air quote, like regular wear. And then we start to kind of feel behind the scenes and see what Dr. Thorkel is doing in his experimentation. And we get to see his, his speaking of utility, his utilitarian wear for his science. And could you crack if it was a one piece overall or not?
00:26:01
Speaker
Cause I couldn't quite, I couldn't really tell myself. I thought I saw like an, a line of like where like a bib overall would be. And when there's a scene, so he's like working with some, I have no words. technology outside that he's lifting out of a hole and then he has this like hilarious wrench that's like basically a wrench that was used in like a fast and the furious movie when like let's say Jason Statham and like
00:26:37
Speaker
Vin Diesel no I think that there's actually a scene in one of the Fast and Furious movies where Vin Diesel and The Rock are fighting maybe it's Jason Statham and Vin Diesel. But it's one of those things where I feel like the three of them have contracts where neither one of them can win in a fight because God forbid. but unbeless I think they can't they can't lose. They can't lose yeah they can't lose and so there can't be like a clear winner and there can't be a clear loser so they have to have these like Terminator Avengers ah fights. And in one fight, it's in a parking garage and somebody whips out the craziest wrench from a car and uses that as a fighting tool. And when I saw this wrench, I left my body because it is just so gigantic. And it's so clearly made out of like, I don't know, cardboard and aluminum foil because it's so lightweight. just like tossing it around. Just tossing it, throwing it around, nothing. But while he's working on this piece of technology, he's Dr. Thorkel is wearing this silver like coverall situation that I was actually pretty excited about because it looks very rubbery. Yeah. But it doesn't make a ton of noise. And like yes, they probably had Foley like on the movie, no question. But
00:27:57
Speaker
We're hearing a lot of clothing sounds from him in the scene, but we're not hearing all of the clothing sounds. So I was like pretty excited about how it wasn't so, or like, you know, um exactly super noisy. But um after that scene, he goes inside and he sits down and like leans forward on a table when he's like looking at this teeny tiny horse that he's miniaturized. And I think that it is a bib situation. I think it's like waiters. That's I thought it was hard to tell because it is like all one tone of color. So it it kind of blends and blends really well. Yeah, but when he leans, there's like an excess of fabric or material that I think like popped out from his back that like would be where
00:28:43
Speaker
the back of the bib. Like a strap would be. ah But it was really cool that if it was multiple pieces, it was hard to tell. It felt like one unit and it felt a little bit like a cover all take on that like mad scientist doctor jacket that we saw in the last movie where it like buttons on top of the the shoulder, that kind of thing. Like the shape kind of followed that. I don't know, I thought that they were pretty great. He also has this massive cylindrical helmet oh that he puts on that just has like the two little cutouts for his eyes. The two little cutouts and the x-ray protector ahha for his chest and his back. It was really giving me some kind of like medieval executioner kind of feeling.
00:29:32
Speaker
um I also I don't know why for some reason it also just made me think of the zodiac killer. I don't know. I don't know why. I think i i i I'm with you because the scene where Dr. Thorkel is miniaturizing our other cast members um by really cleverly. I just have to like be in it. They're like, you're insane. You're doing crazy bad stuff. And he's like. You're so right.
00:30:03
Speaker
and ah You're so right. You know what? Instead of leaving, you should stay. And while you're staying, I would love to get your opinion on this piece of machinery that I've built. Well, come, come, come, come, come, take a look. and And he just corrals them all into this room and he's like, isn't it crazy? Isn't it beautiful? Get closer, look a little harder. And then he just like kicks somebody in and shuts the door and just like, just like a helmet on and just blasts them with translation right And the intensity of his physicality when he has that helmet on, it feels like a serial killer enjoying what he's seeing on the other side. Like something that would that like hit me, especially when he was sitting across from the little tiny horse on the table in his like rubber suit.
00:30:54
Speaker
I was thinking of Vincent D'Onofrio in the cell who because there's a there's definitely like a horse that's like a massive thing that happens in there but like Vincent D'Onofrio is like a good way to talk about this actor because Vincent D'Onofrio is a big man and his physicality he uses that like ah the the whole shoulder the mass Yeah, like his upper body he uses and moves in a very specific way. And he's also a very intense actor. So it like really made me think of him. But yeah, he's just watching these people be shrunk down with this like proto Iron Man bucket helmet with like
00:31:31
Speaker
No humanoid features. It's so massive. But you can still feel this crazy madman underneath it enjoying what's happening. And so it's like even though this this again bucket helmet has no like personality to it. It's just, it is exactly what like an executioner would have where there's just nothing to relate to. And it's still like works to tell the story of this character who feels unhinged.
00:32:07
Speaker
this um This moment where he tricks them and shrinks them down, it featured one of the The things that we have to reckon with in movies where people get transported, shrunk, teleported and that is, do the clothes go with them? and It's a choice that every movie has to make and every single time, no matter what they pick, it always seems kind of wrong. yep There's no right answer. There's no right answer. and In this one, I feel like we're closer to a right answer, but there's a definite, why did you fail us?
00:32:53
Speaker
And it's like it feels like a right answer where. Okay, this is a scientist who's been working on biological matter. He's been drinking animals like there's a whole conversation where Pedro's asked. you know, when you first came here with the doctor, you came with all these animals and he like lists the animals that they brought and they're all gone. And we then, you know, conclude that like they were all shrunk down yeah and then fed to the cat. The the massively overweight cat, massively overweight, pissy kitty. And I was like so happy about that cat, except that I didn't want any real animals in this movie. And we got more than we asked for.
00:33:32
Speaker
That is true, because there's also Pedro's dog, which yeah, the dog there's like, there's, ah there's quite a few like animals that that shouldn't be there's like a parrot. I was like holding my breath the whole movie waiting for something horrible to happen to that dog. And I'm really glad that it didn't sell really glad that nothing bad happened to him. He was he was an angel. He was a good boy. But like, these people are shrunk down and ah because he'd been working with all these animals, it makes sense that they would be shrunk down without the clothes. But we don't get to see any of it, which, okay. No, we don't. they There's not really a way. Yeah, they couldn't do it. I'm sure. The effects weren't quite there. But this is where they fail us, is that we then basically bomb bomb into seeing them shrunk and they're already wearing full outfits.
00:34:25
Speaker
They have gotten some kind of white cloth and they have all made themselves a basically a toga to match their personality and clothing that we've seen them in up until this point. It was so striper, which is the even craziest part. i Pedro's look it for the rest of the movie and his little toga briefs, ah I didn't know how to feel about it but I did not like it. I felt like it was a continuation of, it's just like the infantilization of a character that is not from America and is not white and just not
00:35:06
Speaker
technically speak like English as their first and dominant language, but this character is bilingual. He's having regular old conversations with everybody and he's Peruvian. So it's like, come on, he's better than you. That's all I could tell you. But it felt like a very weird kind of like emasculating thing that they were trying to do. I didn't like it. And it was not welcome or appreciated. And so putting a button on that. But yeah, everybody else looks like a little tiny Greek philosopher or a little baby Greek athlete. And it's so crazy because not only are these things fully realized on them with no question, but like we we progress. They're trying to escape Dr. Zorko and like, you know, trying to get out and all these little things are like little mini lab rats just trying to get out of the lab. Going around trying to find little ways to escape. And the doctor puts himself to sleep.
00:35:58
Speaker
with some laudanum or something like that and just knocks himself out with those glasses on, by the way. and I was like, that's going to be horrible sleep. Yeah. No wonder he has to have like seven pairs. It's going to keep like rolling over in his sleep and squishing him. I don't get it. It's also like death by glasses. Those things are a lot of class. But our little tiny lab rat humans get out while he's sleeping and they all of a sudden have achieved costume changes. where they have remade their little outfit. The exact same silhouettes. And they have fashioned shoes. They have created sandals, like little Roman, Celtic, like pre-medieval little shoes. And it's like, okay, they, the costume designers, the people who were doing costume, they came up with exactly a shoe variety that would be doable if you had a blade and you had leather that was supple enough.
00:36:57
Speaker
and that you could make like you know laces out of or whatever. But I was furious that they didn't show us this in a montage. There's like one second when they first cut to everyone in their new costumes that you see Mary like finishing a pair. So we know that Mary is the cobbler of the group. Yeah. I mean, like, what can this woman not do? She is a scientist. She's a doctor. Apparently she vacuums in the jungle. She knows how to make shoes. She is the fashion house in the jungle because it's what ladies do. Oh, my God. I thought the costume change was the weirdest
00:37:41
Speaker
thing in a very weird movie because I did not see how what they were wearing from one to the next was functionally different. The only, only reason that I can come up with them not just making shoes but also making an additional second set of clothing is because they get wet at one point. Okay, I guess that's that's the only reason why I can see that they would change from little white togas into colorful ones. So like three of the men are wearing once they change into their new tiny little miniature clothes.
00:38:19
Speaker
three are wearing like these brown cloth things, which I guess we can assume are made out of their pants or one of their shirts. yeah And then Mary is in teal in her her color. And then Pedro is wearing this like red fabric brief that has these like white patterns on it, which I was like, go Pedro. So I noticed in the Before he got shrunk, he's in um like tan like shirt and pants and with like a sash. I noticed in one scene, I could see a red bandana peeking out of his back pocket. There we go.
00:38:55
Speaker
and i'm That's got to be because it's it looks like a classic bandana print. and That would totally fit. and That's also like, what a cool little detail. Well done. like Yeah. Making it something that you can like pull back to. Maybe Mary is wearing part of that dress that has no reason for being in the jungle or those very, very nice trousers that are very wide legged. There was a ton of fabric for her to pull from. Although though it kind of breaks down because if they were 12 inches tall, the proportion of the textiles would look very different, like the scale of the threads would look so, I mean, we can forgive them, but yeah, it doesn't quite happen. It falls completely under the canopy of magic, just movie magic. Yeah. But like there were little details that were
00:39:51
Speaker
pretty fun where it's like, okay, so the costumers got to like really think about it and like put some purpose into it. And there was like a little bit of differentiation with each character. And that was pretty nice. But it was just like, I would have, I would have been so happy with one montage. that showed you know and somebody finding a leather yeah piece of something that they could cut, and like sizing their feet, and like doing all of those things. like I would have loved that, because boom, they're in fully misthetized white togas, and then boom, they've escaped. And it was literally like they've escaped, and then they're deciding what to do. And then scene change, they are now in brand new outfits.
00:40:36
Speaker
Where was the like musical montage from the animated Cinderella where all the mice make her outfit? Where was that? It just needed to be in there. We already had the dog. We had the Satan cat. We have like some chickens. Come on. We just needed it to happen. I know. so Yeah. and In all caps in my notes, it's okay. Why does this keep happening? I think this is a really great time to talk about the set design um for these characters when they are to to achieve the special effects, the look of them being tiny people in rooms and scenery that we have already seen on like a regular human scale. oh I thought it was beautiful. It was great. Like there's a scene when they first are shrunk and they're in their white tokens and the doctor's like, you can escape. It's okay. It's a natural inclination. Like he is so Hannibal Lecter.
00:41:42
Speaker
about it where he's like so excited to see the process of their fear and how they experience being tiny and how it has changed how they respond to stimuli. And so he's like, go ahead, scatter. So they run to the open door and there's a set of stairs. that are just like, you know, just basic plywood kind of stairs. And so they have to figure out how to climb up them. And the step for that is so great because like they really have to haul themselves up and like haul each other up. And you can see the actors also really trying wearing the yogas and not flashing the camera. Like you can see them really trying to figure out how to ah to do that. And they get at another point, um,
00:42:25
Speaker
yet dodging and hiding behind like buckets. Yeah, there they're like behind like chair legs and at one point they build like a little pyramid of books to climb up to like reach the door handle. They spend a lot of time like hiding inside this big cactus. Yeah, and that's where the honey I shrunk the kids really hits because it feels like the grass when the kids are lost in the grass. like It felt tactile and everything. Like my brain, looking at those little books, looking at the door that they like had to open and everything felt super effective. Like I didn't question it. Yeah, I like still great the level of construction and detail and like color matching and painting and like sculpture. Like it's very well done in a movie that's not really that great. But the
00:43:17
Speaker
the, you know, there there could have been moments like we see the real cactus at the beginning. And then we see like this giant version of it to make them look small. And it looks like the same cactus like it doesn't and maybe both of them are fake. Maybe that's how they did it. Yeah, but it looks really nice. You don't get these kind of jarring um interruptions of like visual which and um and also being like a color movie, I think it just added like to the overall look of the movie was just like a very well done, very polished. It was amazing. and It all kind of filled in too for the fact that especially once our characters have shrunk, they don't really have that many costumes. and so From our point of view that we're looking at this, there's not as much to talk about as there could be in other movies.
00:44:06
Speaker
just it felt real. Except for the lack of a montage on how the costumes get made. And that's why this movie is not the best movie. It's why it's not perfect. That and maybe a couple other things. But yeah, like it the effects that were applied to this, it looked like something that people could have a lot of fun talking about and a lot of lin a lot of fun executing. And um that would be like really satisfying to do. That was pretty rad. And I think that people who have watched the 1933 King Kong will see a lot of similarities in how
00:44:45
Speaker
the effects were achieved. It looked very similar. um This movie was directed by Ernest Shodsak, who there's things I've read online that say that he is uncredited, but did considerable amount of work on King Kong. So it makes me wonder, I mean, that would be a very natural progression if he was working on King Kong and seeing how these effects of creating this difference in perspective and size were done that he could then you know have his team on this movie replicate it um in you know a very sophisticated way. so that That was um interesting. so i think like if anyone I think a lot more people have seen King Kong than have seen this movie. I think King Kong has made a much more lasting impact. Yeah, just a little bit, you know, so. But they they use a similar technique in this movie, which is like a combination of um like when we first see the horse, it's inside this wooden um like travel case, it kind of looks like a precursor to like a dog carrier or something. It's a little mini horse. He has a little mini horse carrier and he like lifts up one side of it and it's very like it's it's obvious that there's like a little screen inside that's projecting footage of a horse standing there. um And i I know that they used
00:46:23
Speaker
techniques like that in King Kong where they would kind of incorporate a screen into the set design that they could project footage that they'd already filmed onto it and record them both at the same time so you can see the actor interacting with the video and it looks like a little bit more realistic. So it's like a combination of of that kind of stuff and then like a lot of like forced perspective, yeah which would have been really fascinating to see like to be on the set for a movie like this where all of that stuff was being done
00:46:58
Speaker
pretty practically and not digitally. And whenever I think about force perspective stuff, I, of course, think about um Lord of the Rings from the 2000s because they did that so effectively and namely that I lines are so good in Lord of the Rings. And so in this one, I feel like the islands were pretty good. I did have to forgive when our scientists group of expedition friends gets shrunk and they're like kind of cowering. It's even before they start speaking again, because they're so in shock, they're cowering away from Dr. Thorkle who's kind of kneeling over them. And he is directly above them looking directly down and they're looking kind of up but at an angle. And so you kind of have to
00:47:48
Speaker
forgive the eye lines a little bit, but you can also explain them away and be like, but that's how he carries himself. He carries himself kind of like a lunatic. So he would look is straight down in the weirdest way. And like, he can't see. That's why he needs these crazy glasses. He's got to be at a specific angle, otherwise those glasses aren't going to do anything. But there's so much cool stuff happening um practically in this movie. And like all of the details really, really, really come together to to be super effective. Like there's a really insane moment kind of towards the end where they they've
00:48:28
Speaker
snuck back into his sort of cabin and he doesn't know that they're there and they're planning on shooting him in his sleep ah with a shotgun. And like you can, you like you watch the scene and you know that there's a giant shotgun set piece prop that these like actors are interacting with and it just was like absolutely insane to look at. It's crazy. And and like it it truly, I did like accept what I was seeing as if it was real, the same way that you can with like some more modern movies that do kind of similar things where you're just like, my my disbelief is suspended because it's been achieved and i I believe what I'm seeing. And so, yeah, thinking about this in a studio and thinking about what this had to look like is pretty great. And there's a lot of opportunities for craziness. And speaking of that shotgun, the Doctor's Oracle
00:49:22
Speaker
Womp Womp R.I.P. murders two of our tiny people. Number one, goatee doctor, Dr. Bulfinch. Dr. Bulfinch is unfortunately killed. R.I.P. um ip He's our first to go. And the second one is Pedro. yeah He gets taken out And I have this is where my disbelief was not suspended, because Dr. Thorkel is chasing our tiny people out, like outside of the cabin there in the jungle. And that is effective where it does feel like tiny little people climbing rocks and all of these different things. Yeah, but this
00:50:04
Speaker
human-sized man has a shotgun. And this teeny tiny little maybe 12 inch, but he's a shorter guy. So let's say like nine inch tall human person is taken out, is moited by a shotgun. And he reacts to the shotgun ah as if it's a Western and he's been shot by a pistol. ah
00:50:30
Speaker
That would have turned him into Pink Mist. You cannot convince me otherwise. Like, he's so tiny that the the velocity and the power of that, like, it's a, is it a double barrel shotgun or is it, you know, like, it's whatever is happening. That's too much firepower for a nine inch tall human. Like, I i hope he had some, like, quail shot in there. Like, I know. I don't think you would know even even birdshot would just create devastating effects and so we do know based on that and the makeup from the very very beginning of the movie that's meant to look like a skull but kind of
00:51:15
Speaker
looks more like Spirit Halloween. oh Yeah. We know that the makeup has not quite gotten to a place where they're going to go. Yes, we can do crazy stuff. It's like it's a little bit more theatrical. And so we have like that crazy death's head. And then we have who ah like, I don't even know that we have any blood, which might also. know Yeah. And I think that that's also kind of like a cultural thing is that we just deaths were pretty like G rated and painless. Yeah, too scary to have like real bloody death. That seems to me like we're not going to get into that for quite a while. It'll be a it'll be a hot minute and then we'll get really into it. So the end of the movie is that they they win over Dr. Thorkel by killing him with that massive shotgun ah in his work. Is that?
00:52:08
Speaker
how it succeeded, I literally just blanked out like that how they did feel all of his glasses while he's asleep and smash them so he can't see. And, oh god, I watched this movie like two days ago. Yeah, and it's already gone. So either way, they win. Oh, he's oh okay. So he's been harvesting his radium from a giant hole in the ground. That's right. And they push him down the hole. Bye-bye, Dr. Zorko! Like he died the way he lived.
00:52:42
Speaker
Covered in radium. Covered in radium. What was like a big thing that he was really excited to watch them kind of suffer through is that this effect of having been miniaturized is temporary. Yeah. And that they were already starting to grow back Pretty like instantaneously, but that it would take some time and that they would achieve full size, which I would have appreciated some of that being explored because that sounds extraordinarily painful.
00:53:17
Speaker
And just sounds really weird. Like it's such a really insane a weird way to resolve the movie. It's a crazy way because these people are then left in this shack lab for a month. For a month. Just growing. and growing And while they're growing, not only are they growing physically, but they are growing emotionally because a relationship develops out of nowhere between Bill and Dr. Mary. And Steve's like, oh, you guys are going to get yourself into a whole new kind of trouble, which is like the end of the movie. But when we see them at the end, we we see them coming back into the Peruvian town that they were in at the very beginning.
00:54:00
Speaker
And they're wearing their old clothes, just regular clothes. And I was thinking, how thoughtful of Dr. Zorkel to have not burned all of their clothing, because his whole thing was, you're gonna die here. Yeah, like I am actually going to kill you all. I'm going to kill you. And even if I don't kill you, you're gonna die anyway. So, like, the whole, I would have, I don't know, expected this character to have, like, erased all I don't know. Yeah, get rid of the evidence so that if anyone ever asks what happened to those people, he could be like, I don't know, they left and maybe they got lost. Yeah, it's like there was busy stuff happening, but he took a lot of time for naps. So I feel like before one of those naps, he could have like started a barrel fire. I don't know. And so very fortunately, all their stuff was still there. So it's like nothing ever happened except, you know, three people died.
00:54:54
Speaker
And they seem um to not have suffered any psychological effects from this ordeal. They seem like, can you believe it? We sure got shrunk. We got out of that mess. We made it. Just nuts. And so it was it was really cool to see the trend of um like more specific design happening for these fantastical movies. And that was really, really cool. like It was cool that they would have the idea to to make little tiny clothes and to make little tiny shoes. like I thought that the little shoes were a little detail that didn't necessarily have to be there.
00:55:35
Speaker
that it was cool that it was and that the specific shoes were shoes that they could have absolutely made with very minimal tools. Yeah, and it's so fascinating that we're getting to filmmaking where we can see the clear storytelling purpose of the design because this movie has no credited costume designer at all. At all. And and you messaged me to tell me that and I just kind of. Yeah. I look. i
00:56:09
Speaker
throughout the internet of any like reputable website that I could find and I could not find a single person's name associated with the costume design or construction of this movie. It seems to be lost to the sands of time. The opening credits do credit the art director who is Hans Dreier and um I looked him up and he was a art director that worked kind of exclusively for Paramount Pictures for like 30 years. Do you you want to guess how many IMDB credits he has for art direction over his 30 year career? Is it in the triple digits? Yes, it is. Oh my God. um Is it in the 200th?
00:57:05
Speaker
Hire. Oh my God. That's where I'll stop is like 200 and something. He has 551 credited movies on IMDB over about 30 years. Wow. so Now as a tired person. Yeah. I just, oo we like that has to be the speed with which you're cranking stuff out. It has to be pretty, pretty crazy. And it's not like we're the first people to discover that about the studio systems or anything like that. Like the studio system, et cetera, nuts, but bonkers. Absolutely crazy. But just over 30 years, I,
00:57:55
Speaker
okay Because we both work in theater, we have known people who've been in theater for a really long time and have a lot of credits under their belt and yeah maybe have crossed over into film, whatever it is. But you have to break down how many projects you can physically be a part of when you're doing anything more than contributing a couple pieces or your name to whatever it is that you're working on. yeah If you are physically a part of that thing, How much can you be a part of it? Okay. So let's take, for example, the year 1940. That's the year that Dr. Cyclops came out.
00:58:36
Speaker
Mr. Hans Dreier has 36 credited movies for the year 1940, I counted them. h So as we know, a year is comprised of 12 months, right? yeah Can confirm? Can confirm. 36 credits over a 12 month period is three movies a month. That's a new movie every 10 days, essentially. I mean, if he is actually doing the work that he is credited to doing, yeah that is absolutely inhuman. I suspect that he was the head of a team of people. Yep.
00:59:23
Speaker
And that would be very much, who's that evil painter that I friggin hate? Pick one. I'm not even, I mean, there's so many. I'm not even gonna go to Da Vinci cause it is a thing that happened like way back in the Renaissance, but there's these like horrible paintings. I'm so sorry if anybody loves these that are Thomas Kincaid, Thomas Kincaid. Somehow I knew in my heart you were thinking it was gonna be Thomas Kincaid. um You can look at my face and you can know that I would love to destroy Thomas Kincaid. But um I hope he's not listening. Oh, I hope he is. Those paintings are so soulless and are not even painted by him. Somebody else slaps on his signature. It's that kind of thing where maybe that's, yeah, how they got away from ah explaining
01:00:12
Speaker
who the team was or that there was a team behind making it. Like, let's put the head of the team's name. Yep. And then that's the only person with any credit for that work. Yeah. Because if it's if he's in a managerial position or he's, you know, making a couple of things or like acting as a designer and saying, here, I've drawn these things and I've designed them and now hands it off to a crew to go make it. That makes way more sense. Right. Even though 36 years. and Imagine doing that every year. you know That's the only way for him to rack up that many movies, but it got me thinking because we don't know who the costume designer of this movie was. It got me thinking about Paramount Pictures because that's who made this movie and I was like, okay,
01:01:00
Speaker
Maybe I can find out who the designers at Paramount Pictures were at this time and we can maybe assume that they had something to do with the design of this movie even if they're not credited for this movie so. I looked up who was working at Paramount at the time, and that's when I encountered, once again, Miss Edith Head. And she has 400 credited costume design.
01:01:38
Speaker
ah movies on IMDB. So that kind of puts her in league with Hans Dreier in terms of the amount of work that she's churning out, or at the very least, the amount of work being churned out with her name on it. Obviously, for anyone who is interested in costume design, she's someone that you should know. She's someone to look up. She's someone to become familiar with. She is definitely one of those big, big, big influential names. Yeah. And it's funny that when you bring up Edith Head, immediately I can go, Oh, I can see how that's possible for Edith Head to have 400 credits. Whereas any other
01:02:16
Speaker
thing that you're working on, it's like harder for me to wrap my mind around, but this definitely holds up the point. If you are a designer, if you are a designer like Edith Head, you are someone who is, and this is without me looking at like a biography or looking at like a book that determines this, but just the practicality of it, you're a designer who is making renderings. You're making renderings, renderings, renderings, renderings. You're sitting in meetings and you're just pumping out these renderings. And if it's not you who's drawing it, you have an illustrator that you are describing things to and showing research to who is doing the drawing for you. And then you are making decisions.
01:02:55
Speaker
where people are bringing things to you that you have said, go out and get XYZ. So you have shoppers, you have all of these people who are out actually sourcing all of the materials that you want. And then they come to you and they show you swatches. And then you are putting swatches on different renderings and putting like a button sample, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And so there are countless hands that are doing the practical labor um of organization of shopping of purchasing of record keeping which is why it's so amazing that there aren't like easily accessible records because there had to be in order for any of this to be budgeted.
01:03:37
Speaker
like appropriately. i know i'm like More for people to be paid. Yeah, like maybe if I read like an entire book on like the history of Paramount Pictures. like I mean, I think that we would have to do some deep research in order, but it's it's kind of crazy that you can't just like Google it in Year of Our Lord 2024, the same way that you can Google like other things, but it's like there's so many people and all of that just sits underneath the name at the top of the pyramid, which is interesting. Like if you're someone at her level like every step of the process people that are skilled at what they do are like curating options for you and doing parts of pieces of the work so that you can sit at the top.
01:04:22
Speaker
and draw a beautiful rendering and hand it to someone who's highly skilled that can and also familiar with you and can be like, oh, I know that Edith likes X, Y, and Z, so I'm going to show her those options. because I don't even need to show her option A. She's not going to want option A. I'm only going to show her the stuff I already know that she's going to want to choose from. So it you create a ah system where your team knows you, knows what you like, knows what your instincts are, and everything gets expedited. But you're the person at the top saying, yes, that, know that,
01:05:08
Speaker
Which is like Devil Wears Prada for anybody who's seen that. If you've seen how that functions, that system, that is what being a designer like Edith Head would be. That you point and you shoot. And I can't remember, I'm having this like half baked memory of being in college and Someone kind of explaining that yes, these designers don't all actually do any of the building. That's like their team. But sometimes a designer might like sew a thing yeah onto something. yes Like they might sew an applique.
01:05:43
Speaker
down or like a brooch down onto something, but they're not, this this I did know, they're not doing most of the construction because that's just not feasible. That's just not how it works. But that there might be the possibility of them sewing a few stitches on something like manually so that they could say, I made this. I did this. And I've definitely been in work environments where people that were building things have kind of like, winked and been like, this is the project that we're going to give to the designer so that they feel like they're contributing. Which is so funny, like us talking about Edith Head and like Devil Wears Prada and like this power, power, power point, point, shoot, yes, no, yes, no. And then
01:06:29
Speaker
Yeah, the real the the the reality is everybody who works in an industry is going to have their own um ladders of success, of or success rather um where there's always going to be somebody who is climbing and who is always going to be like the best at what they do because they have the experience, the knowledge, or the ingenuity, whatever it is. The reality too is that there's always going to be this behind the scenes thing of being like, we'll set this aside so that the designer can can feel XYZ. And even if you love the designer that you're working for and it's a positive work environment, that still happens because there has to be a level of reality. And sometimes that reality is even coming from a compassionate place of this is too much pressure for one person to have to
01:07:24
Speaker
be thinking of every single detail, which is why people have assistance. And so the assistants can go, I know how this needs to be delegated. And so we're going to delegate it like this so that this very important piece that the designer is focused on, they can have input on this and then we're going to worry about the rest. And then sometimes it's very petty. like We're going to make them feel like they're doing something helpful. yeah Because that's just life. It is. life And I think any time I've seen that in like firsthand, it's been from like a compassionate place because it's like, we know that the designer, this particular person does like to make things and like they want to feel like they made something. And I've been that designer where I'm like, I want to make something for my show, which like, I mean, very few times have I been in a situation where I had the luxury of not making everything. Oh, that's the thing too. Yeah. With like where we work in theater. Yeah. We don't have teams to support us unless we're being hired by an institution.
01:08:24
Speaker
that can somehow supplement some assistance that is not volunteer-based. But it is the most luxurious feeling in the world to have people working with you. Incredible. To walk away from a room where people are building things that you designed is incredible. That's the dream. That's what everybody wants. That's literally when you feel like, you've made it. a star I've made it and because otherwise it's just us with crazy cars full of everything because we have no storage and
01:09:00
Speaker
not sleeping because we have to make so many things. There's a show that I designed that took place in the 30s, 40s in like a very specific place in Ireland that had a very specific style of dress because it was a very insular tiny community. And I knitted and crocheted shawls on shawls on shawls and gloves on gloves on gloves. Because I was like, these are the details that you need. And I did research for someone to weave the specific type of belt that was worn by these people at this time.
01:09:38
Speaker
And it's like, you have to do so much work. And just the fact that I could find somebody who could weave that, like I was literally going to weave them myself, but I physically did not have enough time. Being able to go to Etsy was my moment of walking into a costume shop and going, okay, this is what needs to happen. Make it so. Honestly, it's the only way. There's no way for any of this you know work to get done. Even a movie like this that has a relatively contained cast and oh a very contained number of costumes. like You don't have all these giant street scenes with like tons of extras. like There's one wide shot of the village in Peru where you see some like local people
01:10:25
Speaker
I don't even think you get to like see anyone's face. It's like so far away. But there's really not that many characters and at the end of the day, not that many costumes in this movie necessarily. But the only way to get that done in any normal amount of time is for one person to stand on the top and dictate and work with a group of people in various roles, like from an assistant to a maker, to someone pulling stuff out of storage, to like shoppers, to fitters, to like all these people. like It's the only way to get that amount of work done. It's it's wild. And we should definitely have like an episode where we talk about that structure a little bit more in depth, and like talk about all those roles. Because when you don't know, you don't know. And it's like in any shop, in any in any part of making
01:11:19
Speaker
film or theater or anything. There's so many hands and each role has a name. Each role has a name. And there's so much work that goes on behind the scenes. And so yeah, even a smaller feeling movie like this, there's so many effects and so much stuff that has to happen that there are tons of unnamed people. who may or may not have this on their credits, but it's not like there's a central place necessarily to look for that. and like it yeah it's It's pretty amazing how many people have to work in order to make something look small.
01:11:56
Speaker
Yeah. And my guess is because this was made at a time when studios were doing a lot of this type of work in house that it was the same people over and over again. So they're probably just getting like a salary to work for Paramount. And they're just pushing stuff out and pushing it like, here's a rack for this movie, here's a rack for this movie, here's a rack for this movie. And just like, populating each movie simultaneously in order to get them all done. And it's one of those things that I always love ah that moment in if you're watching a movie that's like a movie about
01:12:41
Speaker
movies being made, there's always that moment where they're walking around the back lot and you see people like furiously pushing racks of costumes and then like a bunch of cowboys walk by and a bunch of showgirls walk by and it's like every movie and TV show that has that moment does it the exact same way because costumes are exciting and they're fun and people want to see them and they transport you and seeing the people doing that work is entertaining. It's great. And it like getting a peek into what it looks like behind the scenes is always exciting no matter what that is. And the only thing that I wish that we could add to any of those scenes in any of those movies is showing the frequency with which
01:13:29
Speaker
pushing a costume rack or any kind of clothing rack on uneven ground, how fast that thing goes over and how oh horrendous it is to have to put all those costumes back on that rack because it is so many moving parts. oh my god And we've all, anybody who's been in costuming, anybody who's worked in a costume shop or a warehouse or anything, I'm sure, you've experienced that very humbling moment when costumes have tried to kill you. I had, as soon as you said that, I had like PTSD flashbacks. I watched it happen on your face. I'm like, which time am I thinking of? It's happened so many times. There's just so many times you can almost be killed by a bin of tights, you know what I mean? It's real. Well, thank you.
01:14:18
Speaker
um to our ah hopefully 13 listeners who have gone along with us on this journey for Dr. Cyclops 1940. What do we want to do for our next one? Oh gosh. um
01:14:32
Speaker
Hey guys, this is a little section we're adding into the Dr. Cyclops episode because There was a profound realization made after the fact by Ariel, not by me. So I'm going to let you tell us the thing that both of us missed upon initial reaction. I just want to set the scene. My husband and I are watching like Taskmaster something and I'm just reclining on the couch, cozy as can be. And then
01:15:06
Speaker
It hits me. We spent so much time talking about these little, these little people made these teeny tiny little Grecian, Grecian costumes. And but he's called Dr. Cyclops that they're supposed to look like. little Greek people little who are fighting a cyclops. And I was, I don't know, awash in horror. And like maybe actually I should give the credit to Phil because I think that he asked me a few hours after we had recorded, why is it called Dr. Cyclops?
01:15:49
Speaker
And in the kitchen, I think I was like doing some dishes or something. And I went, you know what? I don't know. I think it's maybe he has to do with the glasses. He's a big guy. I don't know. And then it took even longer for my brain to go. ka um good tongue The costumes, it's related. It's there. To add into that, I wrote in my notes that they discuss Ulysses and the Cyclops myth in the movie. I wrote that down, I noticed it, and I still didn't connect the dots, and I don't think that I would have if you hadn't texted me. I texted the phone and I immediately texted you. We made a grave mistake. God.
01:16:32
Speaker
of error and oversight. I just love that it's like the whole thing we're talking about.
01:16:41
Speaker
Like we are so good at art. This is why we introduced this podcast by really put hammering in and we'll do it again right now. This is not an academic podcast. No vibes podcast. Yes. Hey, we work in the profession, but we're not going to get like too heavy into it. Maybe we will later, maybe more academic stuff, but it's also really hard to have all of our, our, our brains firing. I think in like the oldest movies in this century, just because we're like struggling to like their survive.
01:17:18
Speaker
like i am I am watching the clock. I am glancing yeah in some of these scenes that am just seeing people live their lives outside my window, just reaching gently out there. And then having a really right there realization about the design of these costumes, which is very purposeful. God. I mean, what a testament to the brilliance of the people who were not credited as the designers of the movie. You know what? Snaps to the uncredited costumers who did a really damn fine job and snaps to us for being too dumb to realize. Oh my God.
01:17:59
Speaker
ah is I've never read Ulysses, have you? Yes. Okay. i I'm uncultured. I've never, I've never read it. I read it. I read um a lot of, ah my mom was obsessed with, with Grecian ah mythology, or Greek mythology. And so I read a lot of the myths and I have a book even now that was hers by Edith Hamilton that had a lot of the Greek myths. And then I just like read The Odyssey, you know, read all these different things. And then I think I read them. This is horrible because I'm just like, I'm not meaning to be like, um, actually, like but like I was just reading a lot really young. And part of that was that I grew up an only child and I was socially awkward as hell. And I just loved reading. And I came from a household of of a reading woman.
01:18:51
Speaker
So I was reading this stuff early, and then by the time we were supposed to read it in school, I think I'd already read it and like had to reread it, and it was totally that that A-hole. Actually, this is what that symbolizes, and um all of that has has basically left my mind now. I mean, it's so long ago. You were but a child. I mean, i hate it was it was decades. It was It was decades. Yeah, God. i think I don't think we were ever reading Greek myths in school for me. like i don't
01:19:29
Speaker
If we were, then it's so far out of my brain that I don't even remember that I did it at all. So I don't, I don't know. This has nothing to do with the podcast, but I'm going to tell it anyway and we can decide to cut it later if we want to. and So the teacher who was um my teacher at the time, I believe was Mr. Winkler, I think was his name, and Henry, if only, but he like was the most theatrical English teacher I could imagine. And I remember that in our class, there was this one kid who was buried
01:20:01
Speaker
very hyperactive and just like like to chat and distract. And I won't name him here but um because I know he's going to listen. um But I remember one day our teacher just kind of had enough and he called out the student's name and his voice was very deep and like he really like milked it. And he just calls out his name. This kid's head snaps up like oh you saw me and the teacher goes, I need you to pack up your things and leave my classroom. Oh my god. And if in any case a chasm opens up in the hallway outside the door and you happen to fall into it, that's none of my business.
01:20:47
Speaker
Get out!
01:20:51
Speaker
Oh my God, so your teacher was a mad scientist, basically. He was amazing, and he did it with a straight face. And the whole class, it wasn't one of those like, oh my God, our teacher lost his mind. It was like, whoa, this is the hell of a performance. And even the kid couldn't really be mad about it, because it was oh like, respect. And he was like, yeah, you got me. I was being a i was being an idiot.
01:21:19
Speaker
Like, these are the teachers that we need. Oh, these are the teachers that we will never forget. And it's like, you know, that he had built up to this. This didn't come out of like nowhere. It was like, you didn't turn your homework in for the 30th time. Make Rose back out your eyes. And so you can only imagine how epic. thanks so ah to one Yeah. Oh, wow. Yeah, with a teacher like that, those myths are alive. They are kicking. And so, like, there are things that stuck from from the story, but not all of it. and Yeah, I felt shame when I was on the couch coming to the realization about this movie.
01:22:03
Speaker
So yeah, we wanted to let you guys know. Yeah, we saw it, okay? We figured it, well, no, you figured it out. I am merely witnessing that realization. It's just a teamwork and like six hours of deep thought. but Sometimes things have to percolate, you know? That's the sign of good, beautiful art that you, it sticks with you. You're thinking about it later. Facts. And so this is just a highlight for everybody. Keep following us on this journey because this is going to happen. I'm sure again. Yeah, this is the first of many future additional bits where we're like, oh my god, we missed the giant thing waving in our face. This is the whole thing because we were looking at the detail and not looking at the big picture.
01:22:49
Speaker
Oh, looking in the microscope. Oh my goodness. Wow. Okay, yes. Thanks everybody. ah Yes, thank you so much. Now back to your regularly scheduled programming. Bye.
01:23:05
Speaker
All right, thanks to our hopefully 13 listeners who are hopefully a growing number of people who enjoy listening to us ramble about costumes as we travel through the century. Our next movie is going to be 1950s Forbidden Planet, and we are pretty jazzed about these costumes. It's going to be a definite shift from Dr. Cyclops. I've never seen this movie before, but it's one of those movies that I think everybody has seen images from the movie, even if they have not been aware of it. It's like I'm sure that we've all seen a poster of it. That's even just in the background in a shot in a movie because yeah, it is.
01:23:50
Speaker
we We did look at a couple stills just to refresh our minds and help us choose it. And we both noticed different things that are like, ah, I know this, I know this, even though I haven't seen it. So I'm very much looking forward to it. I hope that you all are too. And yeah, this was fun. Yeah, thank you. Thanks to everyone who's listening. um I'm so glad that we got to watch this really weird movie. And I'm really looking forward to watching Forbidden Planet. So I can't wait till next time. ah See you later. Bye. Bye.