JFD72: The Pit, Super, 13 Assassins
This week, we tell crime to shut up!
Up first, we're joined by Jon Dieringer from ScreenSlate.com to talk about the surprise gem, "The Pit," from 1981. The film is about young Jamie, a freaky sex pervert kid whose only friend is his evil talking teddy bear. Also, there are subterranean troglodytes!!
Then we discuss 2010's "Super," written and directed by James Gunn, starring Rainn Wilson, Ellen Page, Kevin Bacon and tons more cool people. "Super" is the story of a man named Frank whose wife leaves him. To cope with the loss, he becomes a super-hero and horrible violence and whimsical fun ensue.
Finally, we learn that twelve assassins is theoretically possible, but 13 is silly, as we talk about 2010's "13 Assassins," directed by the controversial Takashi Miike. The film was nominated for Best Film at the Japan Academy Prize.
Direct Mp3 Download.
Got a movie suggestion for the show, want to give your opinion on a movie we talked about or just want to tell us we suck? Drop us a line at JFDPodcast@gmail.com. Or leave us a voicemail: 347-746-JUNK (5865).
Here's another long, late and no doubt unwanted post from only me. I'm sorry the "1 comment(s)" tag might have gotten someone excited at first. Nevertheless...
ReplyDeleteTHE PIT is a video store shelf classic. For some reason, I used to get it mixed up with THE BEING (1983); which is the lesser of the two if I recall correctly, but it's still definitely worth checking out.
I haven't seen 13 ASSASSIANS yet, as Miike is still suspect with me, but it stars one of my favorite Japanese actors of all time, Koji Yakusho; whose multiple collaborations with two of the best contemporary Japanese filmmakers, Kiyoshi Kurosawa and Shinji Aoyama, are amazing! Also, I'm just guessing that extra 20 minutes or so in the International Cut of 13 ASSASSINS is probably extraneous, as Miike tends to bluntly overdo it and seems to have no restraint or sense of subtlety, pacing or rhythm; at least in the films of his that I've seen. Even the Miike films that appeal to me the most (usually his more sci-fi/fantasy stuff like ZEBRAMAN 1 & 2, THE GREAT YOKAI WAR, etc.) get surprisingly dull and flat in parts, even when they are packed with all kinds of wild stuff! They just seem like they are a series of scenes or set-piece ideas, one after the other, clumsily cobbled together. At any rate, I'll still probably give 13 ASSASSINS a try at some point.
This reminds me, have you guy's seen THE WARRIOR'S WAY? It's not a standard kung-fu/samurai Asian action film at all, it's really quite an impressive and fun, wild and weird, stylistic genre-bending achievement. It's definitely in JFD territory.
Also, speaking of PRIEST coming out on DVD, I gotta say that I enjoyed that movie alot. I saw it on a lazy summer weekday matinee in 3D with my girlfriend and had a lot of fun. I absolutely loved the conceptual world of the film, with futuristic priests and religious iconography, an isolated futuristic Judge Dredd/Blade Runner-esq walled mega-city surrounded by post-apocalyptic western world wastelands and filled with horror movie monsters. It's a great pop genre-hybrid. Many elements are really similar to the post-apocalyptic mega-city futuristic fascist world of Judge Dredd, and I really love Dredd and 2000AD comics. Also, I have to say, being a philosophical and spiritual person, I personally really like the religious angle, and although it didn't get as philosophically deep as I'd hoped it would, the religious themes and elements still added a certain spiritual weight for me to the over-all fun pop-genre affair.
It's the kind of studio-made decent budgeted sci-fi/fantasy genre B-movie that in 20 years might be this time period's KRULL, SPACEHUNTER: ADVENTURES IN THE FORBIDDEN ZONE, JUDGE DREDD, TANK GIRL, ICE PIRATES, ZARDOZ, CHERRY 2000, MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE or etc. In other words, it's exactly the kind of as-yet undiscovered otherworldly fun futuristic fantasy matinee movie I went looking for in the Sci-Fi section of video stores on adolescent summer afternoons of years gone-by.
Also, on a rambling side note, I find Paul Bettany's chronologically ordered (both in a depicted historical period and real-world career sense) conflicting theological/philosophically natured coincidental(?) character portrayal filmography kind of fascinating. He first played a questioning fugitive medieval priest in THE RECKONING (2003), moving up to an early 19th century pre-Darwinian naval naturalist questioning doctor in MASTER AND COMMANDER (2003), and then to a mid-19th century Darwin himself in CREATION (2009), up to a contemporary crazed religious secret society conspirator albino monk assassin in THE DA VINCI CODE (2006), to a near-future(?) armed fallen angel in LEGION (2010), and finally on to a conflicted vampire-hunting futuristic Catholic priest in the post-apocalyptic future world of PRIEST (2011). With such a wild, coincidentally dually meta-chronological religiously invested filmography I'd be quite curious to find out what his beliefs in real life are.
Michael, I think I speak for anyone who follows this blog when I say that your posts are never unwanted and always amazing.
ReplyDeleteMissing MP3 file for Download... :(
ReplyDelete- Rustyn242
Thanks! It's fixed now. Sorry about all these weirdo links.
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