Me, I have to go with the unexplained and unexplainable giddy laughter in “Cry Wilderness.”
Your vote?
Please feel free to suggest future topics, season 11-related and non-season 11-related.
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Weekend Discussion Thread: More Season 11 TopicsThis one is simple: Strangest moment in a season 11 movie.
30 Replies to “Weekend Discussion Thread: More Season 11 Topics”Commenting at Satellite News
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The macarena dance in Yongary rates up there for me. I’m still laughing at the bizarrity.
Easy. Watching the restaurant/dance floor scene in Avalanche with my husband and both of us realizing with mixed horror and hilarity that at various points in the late ’70s, we actually had/wore most of the clothes and hair styles shown.
We’re still recovering.
Two words – raccoon choking.
“Cry Wilderness” is a movie filled with those.
Others:
– The kitchen cheerleader in “Avalanche.”
– The dino’s crazy tongue in “Beast of Hollow Mountain.”
– Electric Eel Boogaloo in “Reptilicus.”
– Any part of the two “Wizards” films.
– “Yongary’s” eternal death scene.
– Random Bigfoot at the climax of “Loves of Hercules.”
Oh, Lord, where do you start? The monster’s rectal bleeding in “Yongary”: both the fact that they would show it at all and the fact that it goes on for so long; the Beast of Hollow Mountain appearing on-screen with about 15 seconds to go; literally all of “Carnival Magic”; the shocking primitiveness of the monster special effects in “Reptilicus” (I thought by the ’60s cinema technology had reached a level of competence available to everyone); the lack of shame of everyone involved with “Star Crash”; the giant white Yeti fifth wheel in the first “Wizards” film; the exploding dinosaur falling off the cliff in “Earth’s Core”; the vision of Christmas offered in “TCTAW” (cynical Italian director vaguely recalling the Dickens he read in school and winging it); Mickey Hargatay as Herc . . . I know I’m going to think of more mondo-bizarro moments from Season 11, so stick around!
When the movie suddenly becomes a slide show during ‘The Christmas That Almost Wasn’t’.
1. Yongary’s rectal bleeding
2. Raccoon wrestling
2. Calling Jim a dumb Indian
4. That app/ chimp stealing a car with hostage and going for a joy ride.
5. The best of hallow mountain, dinosaur Western?
Carnival Magic.
I’m obviously not the only one who thought that Carnival Magic was a fever dream instead of a movie, but particularly struck me was the “romance.” The actors would have been just fine in an age-appropriate story, but the filmmakers went out of their way to make it as creepy as possible (“Bud’s becoming a woman!”) What the hell, movie?
I look forward to finding what hit everybody’s WTF button; there are so many! For me, in “The Beast of Hollow Mountain”, the town’s celebration with the very interesting costumed “revelers”; and then having to deal with a cattle stampede. During one of the times I was watching it, I was thinking how it would have felt to actually get caught in a situation like that. Dancing around in this huge, unwieldy costume, and then to get trapped in the middle of a stampede…damn, this is just not my day!
On a side note, the Comet channel has been mentioned in posts this past week; what a fertile field for possible movies to be riffed in a (hopefully) Season 12! The first movie offering they have on today is “Alienator”! That would be awesome. Please, bring Ross Hagen and John Phillip Law back to MST3K!
Looking forward, as usual, to your thoughts and observations…
Movie; the strange itching ray that caused the newlyweds to start stripping in Yongary.
Host segment; Mark Hamill dressed up and singing as a carnival barker……wtf
. . . Yes, yes, how could we forget noxious lil Icho’s itch ray; his sister’s–um–honeymoon, too; the fact that all the prehistoric cave-dweller types living “At the Earth’s Core” speak English–and that Doug McClure clearly assumes that they will; all the implied property-rights issues in “TCTAW”–who the hell did Prune buy the North Pole from, anyway? I’ll probably be back with more . . .
Avalanche: all of Robert Forster’s hippy wisdom: “I’m glad you were here. It was important.”
Cry Wilderness: The evil guy eating (the stinger).
Carnival Magic: All of it.
I’m going with the Keystone Kops-style emergency services response in Avalanche.
IIRC Santa said it originally belonged to a tribe of Eskimos, who permitted him to squat there rent-free.
All of these are good strangeness. But the strangest bit of all? The Prune Song.
Someone strange had to conceive of that; someone strangely wrote the lyrics; it was scored, which is strange; it was strangely put into the movie. It’s strange that someone choreographed that strange scene around this strange song.
Strangely enough, it wasn’t left to rot on the editing room floor, in any of the languages this movie was strangely translated into.
Ah, yes, now I remember . . . And yet, I will stand by my last post–even in the context of the film, this makes no sense!
How about all the family members in “Yongary” being allowed into the Korean command center during a national emergency? Herc’s two seconds of grieving after the murder of his wife in “Loves of . . . “; the ineptitude of the three wicked wizards in “Wizards II” (that stupid kid should of been SO dead, not to mention his gobby, doughy “mentor” . . .); the total lack of chemistry between the kid hero and his princess bride in “Wizards I”–she looks absolutely miserable at his side in the final, triumphant shot . . . ; the theology implied throughout “Cry Wilderness”–Big Foot, the Chief’s ghost, the hateful but clairvoyant ADHD kid, you can’t choke raccoons, but you can have an eagle tear some guy’s eyes out . . . I mean what sort deity looks over a mess like that?? Yes, Season 11 is clearly a WTF gift that keeps on giving!
The fact that it wasn’t completely adored. (i haven’t seen any of them yet)
It was supposed to be highlighting Denmark’s Clown Prince of…(oh, wait, that’s Victor Borge), as the movie’s comedy-relief, whose bungling sets the plot in motion, until his character seems to disappear for no reason in the second half of the movie.
Even so, with the “wacky” scene of shocking himself, I expected some riff of “He’s trying to do Ernest and Jackie Gleason at the same time!”
And while I’ll agree with
– “What did Gulfax in Wizards 1 have to do with ANYTHING?”,
– the puppet effects for Reptilicus (he’s got not strings, to smash the…well, he does, actually),
– cool mystical Swayze-wannabe guy motivating Gus to bend iron bars, and
– Christopher Plummer serenely stopping the space-time continuum, if I have to pick one, I’ll go with Bigfoot suddenly knowing how to talk, and going to Paul’s school to do his Say Anything routine.
And that’s only because they chopped the “Rewind button” scene out of Time Travelers….Okay, can I change last week’s vote and pick that episode as a favorite? :)
Nothing beats the final scene in cry wilderness.. that damn song and the looks on the actor’s faces. Right up there with the Nuke explosion at the end of Cave Dwellers.
Honorable mentions would be the physical presence of Marlov’s assistant.. and Yongary dancing/dying..
The magical pony future ending in Time Travelers
Here it is Monday afternoon and there are only 20 comments (now 21) on this WDT. I believe that is the least I’ve ever seen, so this counts as strange Season 11 moment for me. How about this for strange? Famous film collector Forrest Ackerman as a technician in The Time Travellers whose only job was to to turn circles into squares. Did somebody visit the local magic supply shop?
Strangest MOMENT ??? How about an entire MOVIE made up of them ?
It is movies like this one, that are largely responsible for Mystery Science Theater 3000 not only getting a start, but remaining a PASSION of many of us here……..Ladies and Gentlemen, the very epitome of absolute strangeness, 1981’s “Carnival Magic”.
Not much commentary, but that doesn’t mean it was a bad topic. It’s such a target-rich environment I’m having trouble narrowing it down. Wilderness, Yongary, Carnival Magic, and both “Wizards” movies provide so much fodder that I’m paralyzed by inability to figure out what’s the STRANGEST moment. And then there’s TCTAW and Core. And Hercules.
I’ve had a lot of fun thinking about it, even if I haven’t posted.
Been a busy week. A lot has already been covered: Yongury’s go-go dance and rectal bleed out accompanied by by a little kid who tried to kill members of his own family with experimental weaponry as a wedding gift (or is that a Korean thing?). The movies Carnival Magic and Cry Wilderness which almost seemed like high concept abstract film student movies they were so inept. The homicidal emergency services that had apparently never driven in cold weather before from Avalanche. The ending of Time Travelers. The warm temperature Yeti in the first Wizard movie. To that I might add the appearance of Dante’s wood of suicides in the Hercules movie.
How about the fact that it’s all Itchy could talk about after Y’s death. Makes me worry what they’ll be discussing when I’m gone. I mean he blew up a ton of just about everything…but no, dancing.
Anything rectal bleeding should be a ringer and automatically disqualified. Because, rectal bleeding.
Well then just wait till you see the reboot, DANCING INTO OBLIVION: YONGARY VS ELAINE BENES.
Word on the street is, the reboot will be dark.
And gritty.
Lieutenant Thaddeus Harris: Well, what went on?
Cadet Chad Copeland: Dancing, sir. Mostly dancing.
Lieutenant Thaddeus Harris: [to himself] Dancing?
Nice Blue Oyster Bar reference.
The whole android assembly bit in Time Travelers was creepy as hell.