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Weekend Discussion Thread: Finding Something GoodAlert reader Jay suggests:
I’ll go with Batwoman’s necklace. Very tasteful. Your pick? 65 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: Finding Something Good”Commenting at Satellite News
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Making “Castle Of Fu Manchu” involved people being employed.
Who got paid for their work.
Presumably.
So, people making money doing what they love.
two minor nominees:
‘Starfighters’ the annoying and creepy senator Liberace’s near emasculating concern for his son’s future.
‘Crash of the Moons’ John Banner!!
Those Finnish/Russian films ‘Jack Frost’, ‘Magic Voyage Of Sinbad’, ‘Day the Earth Froze’ all had wonderful costuming. Can’t fault them in that department.
I actually appreciate Sid Melton’s silly performance in Radar Secret Service. Maybe the comedy falls a little flat, but in a film of mostly forgettable characters, at least Sid was clearly trying.
The music from Soultaker. Karen Lawrence and Kevin Danzig and Diamond provided some truly memorable songs, making a tepidly decent movie so much better. Sometimes I watch the episode just to wallow in the ’80s nostalgia that soundtrack provides; it’s like being wrapped in comfy leg warmers, or toe socks.
Leg warmers from the ‘80s. Now that’s my kind of nostalgia. Thanks DarkGrandmaofDeath!
The creature costume in Boggy Creek II is actually quite well-made, especially considering how it was an indy production.
Alan Silvestri’s score for Mac and Me is much better than the movie deserves.
One part of Mac and Me they did right: The main character (and actor) is in a wheelchair and it’s NOT a main plot point or a Teachable Moment. There are no big speeches about it. He’s just a normal kid who uses a chair to get around. There’s a few passing moments of mom talking about the width of the hallways and comments about the van, but that’s about it. Heck, even Jonah and the Bots seemed more taken aback at this character moment than the people on screen. I’ve worked with children who use wheelchairs in various settings and I have to say — that’s pretty cool.
(and yes, yes, I’m aware of the stupid scene where Eric rolls off a cliff. There’s a host of issues with this movie, but I’m guessing in the history of MST this isn’t even the worst case of an actor’s safety being ignored.)
For REALLY old people, anything from the Fifties to mid-Sixties, set in the U.S, that involves teenagers (and alleged teenagers).
How many of the real low-end productions had actual costume shops to pull wardrobe from, versus how many of those kids are wearing what they brought from home? That’s how my S.O. got into MST in the first place–she wasn’t real sure why I was wallowing in these awful, awful films, but when she stopped watching from between the fingers of her hand that she had over her eyes–“My God, I had one of those sweaters! My God, I made one of those jackets my senior year!” Watching Eegah! with her is amazing–she can name the stores you could buy the swimsuits from the poolside shots.
From the movie Werewolf.. I would have to go with Natalie’s white tank-top during the bar/pool scene.
And as Mike and the Bots noticed it was somewhat chilly on location during the filming
of that particular scene.
I agree so much on this, I love that “I want to be happy today” song, it makes me feel so nostalgic that it borders on melancholy (where’s my meds? lol). On that note (pun intended I guess) I actually like Greydon Clark’s musical choices on his movies, no matter how tacky.
It’s early yet, need more coffee, so for now I’ll go with The Screaming Skull and one of my favorite Mike quotes ever: “At least some oboe player got a paycheck out of all this horse hockey”.
The totally legit 2041 Kennedy half dollar from “Time Chasers”
So shiny!
Two musical choices: The Del-Aires from Horror of Party Beach (I actually like them). And Jimmy Bryant from The Skydivers was pretty decent also.
Megaweapon.
Oh, and the dress Allison Hayes wore in The Undead….and perky Natalie from The Unearthy……and Tanya’s lack of a bra in Boggy Creek 2……(I must stop here).
In The Beast of Yucca Flats — the bunny. That was an unexpected touch, and amazingly subtle compared to the rest of the … movie…. attempt…. thing.
In The Day the Earth Froze — Lemminkäinen’s brief log ride down the river was pretty impressive, not to mention all the great riffs that accompanied it (“Fjord Fairlane”).
The crotchety grocer’s simple hatred in “The Brute Man”.
Creeper. Creeper. Creeper. YOU give me the creeps!
Oh, and the cars. My wife works the clothes, I work the cars. Some of the hot-rod oriented movies emptied out some local builders’ inventory of show rods: Giant Gila Monster comes to mind. Beast of Yucca Flats–the cute little convertible that breaks down about nine minute in, is a Renault 4CV, and the hilarity of the idea of 6’3″, 300-lb Tor Johnson being able to hide in the back seat is doubled if you’ve ever actually SAT in the back seat of a Renault 4CV. John Williams’ stirring tribute to a wire wheel that opens Daddy-O is delivered to an Austin-Healey 3000 (oh, MAMA) that mysteriously disappears and is never seen again. When Mary Peach comes wheeling up to the lab at the beginning of The Projected Man, she’s driving a Sunbeam Tiger, a cute little Brit sports car with the same Ford V-8 used in the original Cobra stuffed under the hood–and nearly collides with Norman Wooland’s red Morgan, and if they’d actually made contact, the angels would have wept in heaven.
This goes on and on, and on. I’m going to be lost the rest of the morning.
[EDIT] And last night, the boss little Subaru 4X4 wagon in The Day Time Ended. What a HOOT those things were, now all lost to rust…
I just endured Atlantic Rim. Sucks, but I give it one thing. The women were competent and appropriately dressed for the task at hand. A very small, un-Hollywoodish spot of decorum in a crap-fest like that.
Beverly Garland.
‘Nuff said.
i say the planes in San Francisco International and The Starfighters. also the US Space Program in Space Travellers.
Ah, you got mine. Anyone who pays attention here knows I think Allison Hayes was a gem–and not hard on the eyes either.
So I have to call out ALL the MSTK films she was in: The Crawling Hand, The Unearthly, Gunslinger, and ESPECIALLY The Undead.
And, as an aside, for me the Holy Grail would be if Jonah & the bots could ever get the chops into Attack of the 50 Foot Woman. Alas, I can’t see that happening. :/
But, ah, Allison: we lost you far too young. God rest your soul.
The band that played California Lady, it grows on you.
I am going to add to pete_plums_drivers_license’s excellent list: Susan’s car, ELVIS, in Attack of the (the) Eye Creatures! Every time we watch this episode, my wife says, “Elvis is just the coolest name for that car.”
You beat me to it! What I love is looking at all the cars in the movies & shorts from the ’50s: the ’52-’54 Ford station wagon that Tor escapes in at the beginning of Yucca Flats, the old Pontiac Colman Francis & the gang tool around in in Red Zone Cuba, all of Design for Dreaming and Last Clear Chance . . . my dream is to find some day, somewhere, a bottle green 1954 Mercury sedan [just like the cab Jim is riding around Caracas in in Assignment: Venezuela] that could be made road-worthy (er, not by me, mind you . . . )
Also, I’ve always liked Lt. Lamont in Space Mutiny: she is the only person on the bridge who actually works–all the others just mill around and orate; without her, that big flying boiler room would have fallen out of space long ago. Plus, I’ve always found her cute [insert naughty armadillo joke here]: why, if she wasn’t living in another dimension and dead, I’d ask her out.
Oh, Jeebus Palomino, don’t even START on Design for Dreaming. Those ’56 GM Autorama dream cars were responsible for the onset of puberty for an entire generation of male baby boomers.
I see an upcoming WDT of Best Cars in MST3K. Have we done that yet? I would be totally on board (no pun intended) for that.
ETA that we have done “Best Vehicle” but let’s really talk cars one of these weeks, shall we?
ULYSSES in Hercules and Hercules Unchained. He is a delight, and acts as a great foil to Steve Reeves’ slow-witted Hercules.
Very good point. I literally braced myself toward the end for the moment when the ugly CGI aliens cured whatever ailed Eric; if they had, I would’ve thrown my computer across the room far earlier than I actually did. I also think the warmth in the alien family is kind of touching . . . well, sort of . . . barely . . . for characters who are clearly artificially generated animated images . . . Actually, forget it: anything good about Mac and his family gets canceled out by that ending, which still has me frothing at the mouth!
“Canned Feud” in the background of “Kitten with a Whip”.
Didn’t think of that–the Del-Aires were an actual group, and have an actual Wiki entry. We also get a rare, maybe the only appearance of the Beau Brummels in a movie in Village of the Giants, and The Birds (not those other guys, B-i-r-d-s) showed up uncredited at the studio in Deadly Bees (Ronnie Wood on guitar, also wrote most of what they recorded). And Rod Lauren (Crawling Hand)…yeah, there’s another WDT, if musical links hasn’t already been done.
I am proud to say that several years ago my WDT idea related to favorite bands featured in MST3K was chosen.
I really like George Nader, especially his voice.
I do not know why but I was fascinated with Dr. Leopold’s (1005 BWDZ) Wheel of Fortune converted to a date planner, work planner and who to kill list. I guess I like the idea that ones day can be determined by a spin of a wheel.
The easygoing fry cook from I Accuse My Parents, and his swingin’ church.
By that point in the story, we just wanted SOMEONE with his head relatively on straight, who wasn’t either lying, drinking, corrupt or just dim, and could be Happy In His Work. :)
…groan…that stupid song (and the other two in the movie) was written by two multi-Oscar winners, the stupid story was written by an Oscar winner, the stupid director was Sam (the Machine) Neufeld (300+ films) , and all they could come up with was pain, remorseless, grinding pain…
The two songs in “The Giant Gila Monster” are not bad, despite that they are wildly inappropriate for the movie.
“I Accuse My Parents” has that nice, jazzy song “Are You Happy in Your Work?” (Sorry, pete plum).
“The Incredible Melting Man” and “Revenge of the Creature” have early, surprising acting roles for Jonathan Demme and Clint Eastwood.
Raul Julia gave a committed, credible performance in “Overdrawn at the Memory Bank,” despite the ridiculousness of the film.
How about Georgianna Carter from Night of the Blood Beast and her hairstyle from the future.
Toblerone. He has two arms. Two legs. He’s just like us! ahahahahaha
Peaches Page jumping rope on the San Andreas fault line.
One word: Klein!!
Jukeboxes- there is one the pretty but talent challenged Michele moves to in Girl in Gold Boots (I can see a photo of The Beatles on it) and, there is one in the drug drenched den of the Hellcats as well. As an old timer- I appreciate this.
The Small Music –
The big numbers were all great and lots of fun. I have a friend who teaches human anatomy to nurses and she used “When I Held Your Brain In My Arms” as a teachable moment. Ha!
However, I have a particular fondness for the small music that tiptoed into episodes now and then. My particular favorite is the “Snow White Dove” interpretation Kevin and company did over the Boggy Bottoms instrumental in Boggy Creek II. Lovely.
The characters in this film are all pretty hilarious, they’re more like students at West Beverly High than Gangsters and G-Men. Love triangles, the “hardened criminal” making sure the other “hardened criminal” didn’t kill the good guy, the lovestruck waitress continually busting the “bad guys” chops over her imprisoned boyfriend, and said Bad Guy coming back at her with a withering comeback instead of a pistol whipping? TREMENDOUS!
This episode has really grown on me over the years, especially thanks to it being one of two episodes Shout has on demand on my cable service. Yes I can watch any episode any time I want but I like going back to these when I’m half asleep. “Only Radar knows what the hell is going on…”
The plane in Skydivers for inspiring all the Petey the Plane riffs. It’s one of my favorite MST3K things.
I agree with Crow re: the music in Starcrash “it’s just so…beautifuuuuuul”. I actually tracked down a copy of the soundtrack.
I also think there’s a germ of a really good movie in The Leech Woman. The idea is there, it’s the execution that’s lacking.
Surprised it hasn’t been said already, but Gene Hackman in Space Travelers. He’s good in anything!
And I legitimately enjoy Thom Christopher. Sure, he leaves no scenery left unchewed, but he always seems to be having FUN. And his interview reflected that philosophy.
I’ve always been partial to Ilya Muromets’ Oven Mitts.
Gare
Since Alert Reader Jay suggested that “Perhaps we could try finding something good in these worst movies, no matter how small?”, I guess the perfect response would be:
“You know, Jay, every year of my life I grow more and more convinced that the wisest and the best is to fix our attention on the good and the beautiful. If you just take the time to look at it.”
Also, Mamie Van Doren. Rowr.
Gare
I also like his omniscience. He knows Jimmy is on the lam, knows he’s holding a gun, knows how he’s thinking about his life back home and wants to go back to clear his name…
Maybe this is like “Quantum Leap”… and Al is God? Or at least Santa Claus.
Gare
Since someone mentioned cars earlier in the thread, what about that gorgeous gull-wing door Mercedes in THE SCREAMING SKULL? How did Alex “Mickey” Nichol get his paws on that for the shoot?