Episode 85: “Scanners”

What if we promised that this is the longest synopsis we’ll ever foist on you? It’s dreadfully long – Scanners somehow brought out the worst in us. So we try giving this episode the 1000 cuts treatment and only partially succeed in saving your attention. Meanwhile, there’s dual defecation distracting us from important discussion of our desert-island movie picks. Do we even carry on? There’s no need for that. It’s just internal switching.

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Episode 84: “Gremlins”

What happens when nobody is prepared to pick a movie? We all pick a movie! Gremlins gently reminds us that no one should eat after midnight. Then man boots (boots of men) end up being an unusually lively topic of conversation. Boots, not boobs. And did you know that horses come in different sizes? They put em in cars, they put em in yer tv. They put em in stereos and those little radios you stick in your ears. They even put em in watches, they have teeny gremlins for our watches!

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Crap

It started with vomit. I mean, that was the most likely story – it was a Saturday night.

By Sunday morning, the story had pivoted to decaying flesh. A body was stashed in a lower-level storage unit. Or an elderly resident had passed away without notice.

This is all speculation, of course. I was fond of sewer gas, but my sleuthing was dismissed by the building’s engineer.

The doorman was the real victim in this crap. Sitting there amid the stench, still never opening the door for me. It would have been a breath of fresh air.

Episode 83: “Vampire’s Kiss”

It’s been no secret that one lonely member of the Movie Night™ crew is a big fan of Nicolas Cage. Vampire’s Kiss gives us his trademark manic approach with a slight tinge of regret – is this about mental illness? Is it even really a comedy? These are questions for academia. We’ll take the remainder of our time trading horse tips. But is it easier to ride a horse than to fly a helicopter? It’s all alphabetical. You just PUT it IN the right file! According to ALPHABETICAL ORDER! You know – A, B, C, D, E, F, G!

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A pop fly straight into my addled head

The author at age 10.
The author at age 10.

“Were you a big fan of Dennis Eckersley?”

The Kansas City Royals are playing the Oakland Athletics tonight, a rare instance where baseball brings back honest-to-God memories of my youth. However, it may have more to do with ice cream and design than anything athletic.

Predictably, my girlfriend finds this delightful. I pretend to recognize that big furry caterpillar sitting underneath Mr. Eckersley’s nose, then proudly retort that I was a big Rickey Henderson fan. That’s all I’ve got when it comes to the A’s. Or baseball, for that matter.

I grew up in Kansas, so I should have gravitated toward the Royals. I went to a few games, may have owned a T-shirt, remember my mom’s dad having some sort of affinity for listening to the team on the radio and that was that. I was about to tell you about my signed autograph of Royals pitcher Orel Hershiser, but my memory is apparently a real piece of work and he never played in KC. But I still think I had Hershiser’s autograph, for whatever that’s worth.

A is for Adam.
A is for Adam.

I was the proud owner of several baseball hats. They were for fishing and tennis, never for their original purpose. Most of them were A teams – not A teams as in the best, but teams with the letter A as their logo. The California Angels. The Oakland Athletics. It makes sense. A is for Adam.

And that brings us to ice cream. Dairy Queen ingeniously happened upon a promotion in the 1990s that still elicits knowing nods. Ice cream with fudge + baseball + helmet bowls. I did my best to collect them all, including my beloved KC Royals and Oakland A’s.

What I’m trying to say is that I still love baseball ice cream, even to this day.

Houston, Montreal & Pittsburgh Dairy Queen Helmets

Episode 82: “The Last Man on Earth”

Vincent Price in the house! The Last Man on Earth kicks off the Halloween season right. There’s been a burglary at Movie Night™ headquarters and a frozen dessert treat is missing. That’s usually a cue for conspiracy theorists, so we take an abnormal amount of time pinning blame. It involves window screen installation. Ladies? Let’s get a chipmunk/groundhog/animal update. You’re freaks, all of you! All of you, freaks, mutations!

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Episode 81: “Lilies of the Field”

A surprising pick from Brenda, who has never pulled from the ancient 1960s. Lilies of the Field will ensure that a certain song will be stuck in your head for all eternity. Want to be horrified? Think of one of those giant pin art displays and imagine having those metal pins hitting the back of your throat. Gak. Let’s try to forget that idea. We wonder what happens to conscious thought when in suspended animation. An innocent pair of binoculars becomes a suspicious tool of evil and we discuss forbidden movies (the results aren’t typical.) That’s a Catholic breakfast, ain’t it?

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Episode 80: “Following”

No, it’s not Momento. But Following certainly begat the Christopher Nolan compendium. In his honor, we’ll be conducting this episode/interrogation out of chronological order. What if you were fingered for murder by police when the victim choked on popcorn? Would real food look edible in black and white? A thin man may attempt to play a fat one for Halloween. Go ahead, spill the movie that causes you the most guilt for having never seen. Everyone has a box.

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Episode 79: “Mystery Train”

It’s our first Jarmusch for our humble gathering – Mystery Train. We are in unanimous agreement that Screamin’ Jay Hawkins steals the show. This week’s surprise revelation is that one of our members has never hailed a cab. When will we watch our first pick at an honest-to-God movie theater? It could be ANY WEEK! Car bras and catching coons. “Jiffy Squid”? Turn that damn thing off!

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Episode 78: “House”

This will be complicated. We watched another movie titled House back at episode 64, but this one is different. Still the horror genre, but one decade later. And it’s not Poltergeist either. Maybe we should have watched this on LaserDisc? Finally, please don’t put Mentholatum or Vicks directly on your nostrils. Solitude’s always better with somebody else around, ya know?

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