- - -
This week guest host Joe McCulloch joins us again to talk anime and bike cops and disney and feminism.
0:00:00 - 0:18:30 - First up Joe talks about his choice to start a new tumblr focusing on anime and manga called Zero Comprehension, and we eventually get around to discussing the first 3 episodes of the new Trigger studios series Kill La Kill. Also: television criticism: not just for people who watch Game of Thrones and -- every single time! -- think that writing about it is beneficial to society anymore. Discussed in this section: Even A Monkey Can Draw Manga, Attack on Titan, Gainax, Neon Genesis Evangelion, Betty & Veronica comics, Go Nagai, Crayon Shinchan, Super Milk Chan, and Lupin 3rd.
0:18:30 -0:34:15 - Next up we talk about the italian polizieschi/bike cop movie Live Like A Cop, Die Like A Man (1976), directed by Ruggero Deodato, written by Fernando Di Leo starring Marc Porel, Ray Lovelock, Adolfo Celi. Watch the awesome trailer. In this section we also talk about other Deodato films, Pier Paolo Pasolini,Edegar Wright's movies you probably haven't seen, The French Connection, The Last Boy Scout, Lucio Fulci, the video for "Sabotage", and Mario Bava.
0:34:16 - 0:48:00 - Sean watched another bike cop movie Electra Glide in Blue (1973), directed by James William Guercio, starring Robert Blake, the band Chicago, Elisha Cook Jr, Billy "Green" Bush, Mitchell Ryan, Royal Dano, and Jeannine Riley. Joe wrote about this film here on this site a few years back. This one has a really great trailer too. We also talk about John Workman comics, Easy Rider, Zabriskie Point, and this film as Will Ferrell's core text.
0:48:01 - 0:51:06 - In this section we talk about the trailers for the new Liam Neeson movie and for Grand Budapest Hotel and how it seems like Wes Anderson is shooting for Peter Greenaway and Mel Brooks which are Joe and Sean's respective film nerd sweet spots.
0:51:07 - 1:08:27 - Both Joe and Sean watched Escape From Tomorrow (2013), directed by Randy Moore, a film shot in Disneyland/World which blew up in film festival circuits a few months ago. Joe wrote about it here. Also discussed in this section: Beverly Hills Cop 3, Westworld, The Simpsons, the Venture Brothers, Iron Man 2, Rabid, Kim Deitch, the Air Pirates, Adam Sandler, Sean won't shut up about Last House on the Left, and the Streisand Effect.
1:08:28 - 1:24:55 - Joe watched The Lords of Salem (2013), directed by Rob Zombie, starring Sherri Moon Zombie, the Geico Caveman, Bruce Davison, Meg Foster, Dee Wallace, Ken Foree, Patricia Quinn, and Maria Conchita Alonso. Also discussed here: The Devil's Rejects, The Devils, Lair of the White Worm, Zombie's Halloween remakes, Dredd, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Shining, Women in Love, more Peter Greenaway, the "Pony" video, the Evil Dead remake, Roman Polanski, The Omen, and The Grudge.
Our outro music this week is: Joe & Sean's Party Jamz
NEXT WEEK: Tucker and Sean and new movies and old movies and whoa how long has it been since we've done a normal one of these?
McCulloch since you're doing anime now you should check these out:
Boogiepop Phantom: You've probably heard of it but a nonlinear mystery tale with a huge cast that is a cerebral mindfuck.
Dennou Coil: "Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex meets Hayao Miyazaki"
Eureka Seven: A somewhat atypical coming-to-age sci-fi story
Bokurano:Mecha deconstructed and man, it's horrible (not excution wise) how it's done
Real Drive: Miyazaki doing Ghost in the Shell
Anything by Mamoru Hosoda
Ghost Hound: Existential ghost story
Serial Experiments Lain: Probably know this too but a mind screw seinen cyberpunk anime.
Planetes: A slice of life about being a garbage collector in space.
And I forget which podcast you talked about Tezuka's star system but:
Hayao Miyazaki, Naoki Urasawa and Hiromu Arakawa are still doing it. It may not be as spread and thought-out like Tezuka but they still use a star system.
Posted by: Larry B Vossler | 2013.11.10 at 21:29
Oh man, Real Drive... there's a show I haven't heard mentioned since 2008, when I watched the first episode and never quite got around to the rest. Never finished Ghost Hound either; maybe it's Shirow? I loved Lain to pieces back in the day; haven't revisited it in forever, though. Boogiepop was ok... I liked the episode on ero games. I've read some of the Bokurano manga (not really my thing, felt sorta 101 genre critique) and all of Planetes, which sagged in the middle but ended pretty well. Dennou Coil is a huge, looming gap I have to correct sometime... Eureka Seven might be good, just never gave it a shot.
Looking forward to seeing Wolf Children later this month... I'm not as gigantic on Hosoda as some people, but I'm ready to be impressed...
Posted by: Jog | 2013.11.12 at 11:04
Ghost Hound is a slow burn anime and its ending is very anti-climatic; that pissed off a good amount of people. But I thought the ending worked well, seeing how the story was going. Also, Ghost Hound was one of those few animes that became genuinely creepy as it went on.
Agree with Bokurano on how it was deconstructed but I give him some credits about the multiple-universes and he pushed that concept to horrifying heights and what a bleak ending... Though not as crazy as his Shadow Star.
Eureka Seven is cool, at times it gets overly cliche but damn, it has some smooth ass animations; that and Xam'd: Lost Memories from Bones, good to great animation.
Lain, oh man. I re-watched it recently, some of it is hard to watched but I still love it. Lain, Ergo Proxy, Paranoia Agent, & Texhnolyze were my go-to bizarro animes back then.
And I finally got around to see East of Eden, pretty fucking cool anime and movies; I dug them and really good animation.
Posted by: Larry B Vossler | 2013.11.12 at 21:00
I love Joe as the guest on the podcast, since he obviously has an affinity for the Italian genre fare. Thanks for the Live Like A Cop, Die Like A Man recommendation. I was unaware that Deodato did a polizieschi, but your review of it sold me on making it my top viewing priority. All of his stuff is at least interesting from the standpoint of how Italian genre cinema of the late 70's worked (his filmography has him jumping all over the map from genre to genre), even if none of it has much artistic merit.
Also -- you both spoke of your love for The House By The Cemetery -- any chance on doing a Fulci retrospective for next year's Halloween episode? That seems a bit out of Tucker's wheelhouse...but it would be entertaining.
Posted by: Troy Olson | 2013.11.13 at 12:33
Also, re: Lords of Salem. I wasn't blown away by it like I was hoping to be when I heard what the premise was (great visuals and some standout acting moments, but he doesn't quite hit the Polanski note that he's trying for). However, Zombie's stuff is at least always worth discussing, even when it's been a bit uneven. Unless I'm forgetting someone, he is one of two director's out there who seem to be true horror "auteurs", who actually have a respect for the genre's history and the basic concepts which make it work (Ti West being the other). Pretty much everything else in the genre is hacky and soulless.
Posted by: Troy Olson | 2013.11.13 at 12:42
Next years halloween special is going to be a scene by scene discussion of Orphan.
Posted by: Sean Witzke | 2013.11.13 at 13:53
Is it wrong of me to anti-recommend Serial Experiments Lain?
The Live Like a Cop I want to see, but like it's got no seeds.
Posted by: Blorg Fleebo | 2013.11.21 at 14:10