The Letterboxd Show 2.26: Joe Dante and Josh Olson

Episode notes

[clip of Elf plays]

STORE WORKER It’s time for the announcement. Okay people, tomorrow morning, 10am, Santa’s coming to town!

BUDDY [screams] SANTA!!!!! OH MY GOD! Santa? Here? I know him! I know him!

[The Letterboxd Show theme music Vampiros Dancoteque by Moniker fades in, plays alone, fades down]

GEMMA Hello and welcome to Gemma—that’s me—are ed by a Letterboxd friend—or two today—for a chat about their four favorite films. As you listen along, we have links in the episode notes, so there’s no excuse not to add these films to your Letterboxd watchlists. Today, though, in a special Christmas crossover episode, for those who have ever shaken the Letterboxd app after midnight, our guests are Joe Dante and Josh Olson from the Movies That Made Me Podcast.

SLIM Josh Olson is the scriptwriter behind films such as the David Cronenberg directed A History of Violence. He wrote and directed the 2002 cult sci-fi, no budget horror Infested. The audio drama Bronzeville, with Laurence Fishburne, and he’s just wrapped on a new feature film Trigger Warning starring Jessica Alba. Joe Dante is Christmas royalty around Letterboxd having directed Gremlins and Gremlins 2, along with The ’Burbs, which has already been a favorite this season on the podcast, Small Soldiers, Piranha, The Howling and one of the more beloved animation hybrids, Looney Tunes: Back in Action. We’re pretty—[Slim in Larry David impression] pretty pretty—excited about this Christmas crossover episode, which is still in the four-faves format. It’s just that each of us have chosen one favorite Christmas film. Gemma, can you reveal those four films?

GEMMA I can. I can indeed. Joe’s pick is Scrooge from 1951, also known in parts of the world as A Christmas Carol, one of the many. Slim’s pick is National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. Josh’s pick as We’re No Angels starring Humphrey Bogart and Peter Ustinov and Gemma—that’s me—I have chosen Elf, with a little side of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

SLIM Welcome to the show, first of all, Josh and Joe.

JOE Thanks, guys. We’re not used to going off our home turf. [Gemma & Slim laugh]

JOSH Literally as we speak, I’m making my private movie-night lists public on Letterboxd.

GEMMA Yes!

JOE It’s so that all the copyright owners can track him down. [Gemma laughs]

JOSH That’s right.

GEMMA Which makes The Movies that Made Me podcast. You know, your podcast has a Letterboxd, but do either of you have a Letterboxd? And Joe was like “No.” And Josh was like, “No—wait—no. Wait. Ah, I think I do.” So, there you go.

JOSH Yeah, actually, I’d forgotten I had done this.

GEMMA Before we start, if you’re not on Letterboxd, Joe, then you may not know something that every other person on Letterboxd does. Do you know about anything involving Letterboxd and Gremlins?

JOE No, enlighten me.

GEMMA Okay. Do you know if you shake your phone after midnight when you have the Letterboxd app open, a Gremlin pops up?

JOE No!

GEMMA What!

JOE Is that true?

SLIM Many people have dropped their phone accidentally after midnight and get the shit scared out of them when the Gremlin pops up in the app. [Slim & Gemma laugh]

GEMMA They pick up the phone and then they’re like—we get people tweeting at us, emailing us going, “I dropped my phone and then I gave myself a heart attack thanks to you guys. What the hell is this?” And they sort of don’t realize at first that it’s an intentional Easter egg.

JOE How whimsical! [Gemma laughs]

GEMMA Whimsical! Whimsical was not the word I would have used for scaring the shit out of our after midnight. But if Joe Dante says it’s whimsical, it’s whimsical. That is beautiful. I mean, the thing is that Gremlins is one of the ultimate Easter-egg movies. And so we had to go there.

JOE Can you say “Easter egg” at Christmas? [Gemma & Slim laugh]

SLIM We’re setting the rules right now, Joe. This is our show. We can do whatever we want right now. Now you guys have Movies That Made Me Podcast, have amazing guests. I’ve listened to Jim Cummings in the past, the Josh Ruben episode and Jason Reitman was just on a recent episode for [Ghostbusters:] Afterlife, I believe. And there was one call out on that episode in particular where Jason asked, in creating movies, both of you heavily involved in making films, and he asked a great question. He talked about movies that he had done, where maybe the studios didn’t really help him out when the movie came out. And he posed a question to you both like, “Have you ever had that where you made something that maybe didn’t get the respect you deserved?” And Joe mentioned The Second Civil War, which I had never heard of, as one thing that kind of jumped to mind. And that was an HBO made-for-TV movie. So I tracked that down this week and watched it. And what a cast on that thing! Holy moly! And also—

JOSH Oh, it’s terrific.

SLIM How insane is that movie is essentially real life right now? [Slim laughs]

JOE I know. It’s like Idiocracy. You know, sometimes these things just happen the way they are in the movies.

SLIM It’s like the original Idiocracy. So if anyone wants to feel, watch a dark satire that unfortunately comes to life, by all means, check that out. I think you can rent it today. But also check out the podcast. The filmmakers that come onto the show that talk about the deep connection they have with movies with you guys, I think it’s a real treat.

JOSH Oh, thank you. It’s a lot of fun. I was gonna say, I just saw Don’t Look Up, the new Adam McKay film, which is A, fantastic and B—Joe, have you seen it?

JOE Oh yeah.

JOSH It’s kind of a sequel to The Second Civil War.

JOE It reminded me of stuff that I—it’s my kind of humor. [Josh laughs]

GEMMA There’s the double feature for this week.

JOSH They would make a great double feature.

JOE It’s a very interesting movie. And of course, it’s controversial because some people think it’s junky, but in fact, it’s actually quite clever.

JOSH It’s so good. It’s so good.

SLIM For this episode, somehow Gemma has picked like ten movies on her list for Christmas. [Gemma laughs]

GEMMA What can I say?

SLIM Can you explain how this happened, Gemma?

GEMMA I mean, I had a really hard time narrowing a favorite Christmas movie down to one and I think it’s because I don’t have one single favorite Christmas movie that as a whole encomes what I want in a film around this season. What I do have are favorite scenes from in the heart of Love Actually, where I actively hate the rest of that film. But I will watch Rowan Atkinson wrap a Christmas present and Emma Thompson cry over a CD until the end of time. So but then I just sat down I thought well, no, what is the film that we do watch every Christmas again and again? And of course now I have a five year old. I introduced him to Elf for the first time this year and yeah, he loved it.

JOE Well, there are a lot of Christmas movies. It’s not surprising that you couldn’t whittle them down because there’s so many of them. In fact, on the Hallmark Channel, as we speak, there are more Christmas movies being gestated than there were in Gremlins. [Gemma & Slim laugh] It’s just one Christmas movie after another and they’re all basically the same movie. They all seem to have the same cast. But they just proliferate. And this Christmas it’s particularly odious how many new Christmas movies there are.

GEMMA And you’re sort of waiting for ones that do something different and they’re coming. I don’t know if you’ve seen Camille Griffin’s Silent Night, which has just come out this week. Have you come across that yet? It stars Keira Knightley and Matthew Goode.

JOSH I have not, I know of it.

GEMMA It’s basically a classic wealthy British Christmas where everybody’s arriving in a lovely house for Christmas. Except that there’s also a toxic cloud heading their way and everyone in Britain has been issued suicide pills.

SLIM God.

GEMMA Yeah!

JOE Kind of like Don’t Look Up.

GEMMA Yeah, but I do like the Christmas films that bring a bit of that. But I have to say that your two picks I’d never seen before this year, and I’m really excited to discuss them because I loved them both. So shall we dive right in with the earliest one. And Joe, I’m really interested in how you pick this particular Dickens adaptation. Brian Hurst’s 1951 Scrooge.

JOE Well, for my generation, this was an ubiquitous movie on Christmas. The Million Dollar Movie, which was a show in New York that would run sixteen times every week. We’d constantly program it. And for a while, it just wasn’t Christmas, if there wasn’t a viewing of—it’s called A Christmas Carol in America, but it was shot as Scrooge everywhere else. Because it was the Christmas mood for us. And this story, which is the original Dickens story, it’s pretty durable. It’s been filmed over 21 times. I’m a big Dickens movie fan anyway. I mean, one of the only Dickens stories that have been filmed almost as often as A Christmas Carol is Oliver Twist. And there is something about Dickensian London and the Victorian trappings that is very—it travels well with audiences. And this particular picture, which is not especially expensive to make, has a secret weapon, which is that the miser Ebenezer Scrooge is played by Alastair Sim, who was at the time a big star in Britain and was a renowned stage actor, and brings to the character so much depth and so much humor that it’s really the best characterization of that character that I have ever seen in a movie. And we’re talking about movies that starred heavyweight actors like George C. Scott and Albert Finney and The Muppets and Mr. Magoo. I mean, that story has been retold so many times that … you tend to think well, do I really want to see that story again? Well, if you haven’t seen the story told in this version, then you really haven’t seen it.

[clip of Scrooge plays]

FRED Why don’t you come and see for yourself if you won’t take my word for it? Come and dine with us tomorrow.

EBENEZER No, thank you.

FRED Why? Why?

EBENEZER Why did you marry against my wishes?

FRED Because I fell in love.

EBENEZER You fell in love with a woman as penniless as yourself. Oh, good evening.

FRED We’ve never had any quarrel I’ve ever been party to. I asked nothing of you. I came here in the spirit of bright goodwill, and I won’t let you dampen it. So Merry Christmas to you, anyway.

EBENEZER Good evening.

FRED And happy new year!

EBENEZER Good evening! Bah! Humbug!

JOE And one of the reasons the picture succeeds is because it has this very dark, Dickensian mood to it, it’s incredibly atmospheric, and it is essentially a horror movie. It’s really not the sweetness-and-light versions that you’ve gotten from all the other adaptations. This is really a dark portrait into a man’s soul, which has a gloomy music score, which is very effective. And a great ing cast that just takes the story to its limits. And I know some of the other movies, the later ones, they’re in color and they got a lot of production value and a lot of big special effects, and all that kind of stuff, and this picture is fairly primitive in that regard. But it is an experience that really, I really never met anybody who saw it, who didn’t think that it was the best adaptation of that story that’s ever happened.

GEMMA It’s really incredible. I wrote those words down. The first words I wrote down were, “This is a horror movie.” And it’s that shot from the very top of the stairs looking all the way down, that long shot while he’s locking himself in his house the first time we see him return to his home after he’s basically kicked the blind guy to the side and ignored the carol singers and just generally been the meanest person you’ve ever met in your life. And that lighting and the ghost starts haunting him, and he’s kind of disbelieving it at first and you sort of with someone so brilliant, like Alastair Sim playing bad so well, a lot of the success of the story rests on the ghosts, right? On how—

JOE Yes, because they might just be an undigested bit of beef. [Gemma laughs] A fragment but underdone potato. There’s more gravy than… Because he doesn’t buy it! He doesn’t believe it. But I believe it! The guy is terrifying. And then he opens a window and there’s all these lost souls outside his window lamenting and it’s really hellish. And I don’t know, it really stuck with me and as I said, it really doesn’t seem quite like Christmas without that movie. And there is, by the way, a famous blooper in the picture, if you ever happen to see it. Toward the end after he has been redeemed, and he’s hilarious, when… he’s even more funny when he’s nice and when he’s happy than he is when he’s miserable. And there’s a scene where he looks in the window and in the mirror at himself to sort of pep himself up. And right over his shoulder, twice, a crew member leans out into the mirror and looking at what’s going on on the set and then moves back and then he leans out again. And it’s something that once spotted, can never be forgotten. [Slim & Gemma laughs] And you just keep thinking, people were so enamored of Sim’s performance that they didn’t notice that there’s a guy looking over his shoulder. But nonetheless, it’s not emblematic of the way the movie is made. And it really is a terrific picture, and I recommend it to anybody who loves Christmas, and I recommend it to people who don’t like Christmas and also!

SLIM Josh, where does this rank up on your list?

JOSH I’m a fan. I actually I think Joe is annoyed by this. My favorite, finally, after all these years is Michael Caine in The Muppet Movie, The Muppet Christmas Movie. It’s not true, though, I didn’t see it as a child. But the one that was most around when I was a kid was the Albert Finney musical version, which was my introduction to the story. And then I sort of went back because I loved it so much. And I love Joe’s, it’s fantastic.

JOSH That’s the only one where the same actor plays him as a young person and as an old person. In all the other versions there’s two different actors.

GEMMA Ahhh.

SLIM It’s funny you say that, because I was questioning myself watching this, when Young Scrooge was on screen, I was like, ‘Is this Alastair Sim?’

JOE No, that’s George Cole who actually became a very good friend of Sim’s and they were devoted for all those years and I think he was with him when he died.

SLIM Wow.

GEMMA That’s beautiful.

SLIM Yeah, they were both amazing.

GEMMA I was hoping someone was gonna bring up The Muppet Christmas Carol a bit more. Thanks for that, Josh. I love it.

JOSH Joe is so annoyed with me right now.

JOE No, no, there’s nothing wrong with it.

JOSH He’s just so good! He’s so good in it.

GEMMA Yeah, so good. But I was thinking that you were talking about how this one extrapolates out some of the characters a bit more and it really does in of the nephew. I feel like the nephew in The Muppet Christmas Carol, he’s just a bit of a wet fish. I don’t know, he doesn’t even really need to be there, just make him another Muppet. But the storyline of the nephew in this 1951 A Christmas Carol, really, really helps flesh out Scrooge’s life story itself, doesn’t it?

JOE Yes. And when he finally does go and makes up with his nephew and they’re playing Barbara Allen on the soundtrack, it’s really moving!

JOSH Here’s the thing with Joe too, Joe did not research that, he did not dig anything up to refresh his memory. It’s deeply intimidating. [Gemma laughs] I had to go to Wikipedia and IMDb.

JOE Just opened up one of those drawers… it’s in there.

JOSH I had to go to IMDb to remind myself who stared in my movie. Joe’s got running times. It’s crazy.

JOE 86 minutes, actually. [Slim laughs]

JOSH Joe, how long is We’re No Angels, the original?

JOE Well, there’s two of them. I think it’s almost two hours.

JOSH It was, yeah.

GEMMA Slim, it’s your turn. Are you shitting bricks or shitting rocks about your Christmas choice?

SLIM I don’t know because for those that are listening right now, Gemma messaged me last night. Gemma said, “I’m excited to record tomorrow. I effing hated your movie.” And it was National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation. 1986. 3.6 average.

JOE Currently playing at the New Beverly by the way.

GEMMA Oh great!

JOSH Is it? I’m a big fan of that. I think the first one and the third one, that’s the third one, are great films.

SLIM So my backstory with [National Lampoon’s] Christmas Vacation, my family and my brother specifically, grew up, he was always playing Fletch, the earlier Vacation movies. So a lot of my humor, for better or worse, probably comes from those early Chevy Chase films, from the heyday, so to speak. So I have probably some nostalgia fog clouding my brain a little bit when it comes to [National Lampoon’s] Christmas Vacation. So I’d be curious, well, I’m not curious, I already know… if Gemma watched this for the first time. I’d be curious to know what people who watch this for the very first time in 2021 think of this and we’ll hear shortly from Gemma.

GEMMA I don’t wanna hear from me at all on this. [Slim & Gemma laugh]

SLIM Yeah, I saw a two-star rating on Letterboxd from Gemma. But there’s so much in this movie that I still kind of resonate with. You know, dreading going to a family event, having family over for an extended period of time, family ragging on you during those events if something goes wrong. All of that happens to Chevy in this movie. And there’s one moment that I always really connect with in this. It’s when he’s trying to get the lights working in the yard and everyone’s out there. He’s gonna make a big spectacle of it and it doesn’t work. But Audrey, his daughter, stands up for him.

[clip of National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation plays]

S Talk about pissing your money away. I hope you kids see what a silly waste of resources this was!

AUDREY He worked really hard, Grandma.

ART So do washing machines.

SLIM In front of all the relatives, all the in-laws. And it’s just one of my most favorite moments in a film because as a father—and I don’t want to do the “as a father…” comment on a podcast—but that’s like a moment that you dream of. Having one of your kids stand up for you in that moment. She’s like, “Oh, he worked real hard on this.” I love that moment in the movie for sure.

GEMMA To be fair, Slim. National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation pops up in a couple of important Letterboxd lists. One is the GDCU which stands for the ‘good dads cinematic universe’. [Slim & Joe laugh] And the other is ‘movies my dad likes more than he likes me’. [Gemma & Slim laugh]

JOSH I actually love that film. But it does a thing that it just gives me so much anxiety in movies and I hate it because—any time in a movie a character goes out and spends money that they’re certain they’re going to get from something.

GEMMA Oh god.

JOSH In Chevy Chase’s case he knows he’s getting that bonus.

GEMMA Is there anything more horrifying than that?

JOSH Have you never seen a movie? I wouldn’t do that in my life! And it’s because I’ve seen all these movies. It never goes well! There’s never a moment where someone goes “Hey, I wanna get this big bonus” and the movie ends with them getting a bonus. What’s the—this is such a tangent, the Ryan O’Neal gambling movie that—Fever Pitch. I actually haven’t seen it in a thousand years, but Fever Pitch I’m gonna spoil it. It’s a movie about a degenerate gambler who at the end of the film risks everything on one big bet. You’re like, ‘Oh, dude.’ And then he wins and learns nothing. And that’s the movie.

GEMMA I mean, have you not seen Uncut Gems? [Gemma & Josh laugh]

JOSH That doesn’t go well for him, ultimately. But Fever Pitch really does build to that moment where he’s supposed to lose in a normal movie, and he wins and everything’s great, it’s the end of the story.

GEMMA Our friend Sean Fennessey, who’s been on the pod and you probably know, writes that [National Lampoon’s] Christmas Vacation is “an insightful critique exploring the plight of the shrinking middle class in post-Reagan suburban communities at the expense of encroaching globalization and billionaire brain poison.”

JOE I’m sure that was exactly the writers were trying to do. [Slim & Gemma laugh]

GEMMA Yeah, but then, on the other hand, russman writes, “They didn’t even go on vacation.” [Joe & Gemma laughs]

SLIM That’s true.

JOE They went to Wally World, they don’t need another vacation.

SLIM I love the three movies. I mean, it’s such a strange franchise looking back. The only characters that stay the same for the most part are Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo in these films and their kids—

JOSH Right, don’t they have different kids in every movie?

SLIM They have different actors playing their kids in the other movies. It’s just such an interesting franchise to look back on. There’s no modern-day version of a struggling family going through the trials and tribulations of owning a home or going on vacation. That just doesn’t exist today.

JOE That’s true.

JOSH Yeah. That was the thing. And then there was also, sort of Moving would fall into that. The funnier-than-it-has-any-right-to-be Richard Pryor movie.

GEMMA Hmm. Yeah!

JOSH But yeah, there were a spate of those kind of films.

SLIM So Gemma, what was your vibe on [National Lampoon’s] Christmas Vacation? Your first viewing? Let’s hear it from a first time view.

GEMMA Well, look, first of all… [Gemma laughs] My husband kept popping his head up to see if I was alright, because I was lying on the couch watching it going, “Ugh! Ugh!” [Slim laughs] “How much longer?” But here’s the thing. I am the [Griswold] father at Christmas in my family. I am that person. I am the “Nobody can open presents until we’re all in the same room together and we’ve got the champagne open and we’ve got the eggnog warm and everything has to be perfect and you know, my Christmas tree’s in the other room, it’s been up for weeks.” I am that family member. I get it. But I think I just, what I don’t get and keep in mind that I am the one non-American male in this group of four. It’s just the whole Chevy Chase-ness of it all. I never quite understood the National Lampoon humor. The opening scene where he’s driving the family and starts to have a bit of a competition with the truck and then the bigger truck and is putting his family in danger. And they’re all saying “Please stop”. That was triggering to me! I’ve been in cars with those dudes. And you know, these things don’t end well. And I understand that it’s all in service of getting the biggest Christmas tree possible to make Christmas perfect, but I didn’t like it. I didn’t find it funny, at all. It was just deeply anxiety making.

JOE But you know, if you had been around at the time, you would realize that his very superciliousness is in fact, what was supposed to be appealing about him. And that was his appeal. And it follows him from movie to movie, which made it very difficult for him to transition into other parts. They say certain actors, John Wayne and Cary Grant, and people like that always played versions of themselves. But that’s true of Chevy Chase. And he’s also playing a version of themselves. And I know people who worked with him who were not enamored of that experience. And it’s partly because he was that character. He was expressing who—that was his personality. And he made it work for him. And he got a career out of it and everything, but I’m not sure that it wears as well over the years as maybe some other comic characters.

SLIM My other review for this recent watch, my son who will be eleven, came in while I was watching it, and it was the ladder scene. And he walks in and he’s like, “Is that Ryan Reynolds?” [Gemma & Joe laugh] Which I thought was like a deeper comment that he ever really meant to say, because I was visibly shaken at such a suggestion. Because I mean, you could kind of see some parallels… y’know Ryan Reynolds has this strict personality and most of his films, and I’m curious what we’ll think of Ryan Reynolds, the character, in 20, 30, 40 years.

GEMMA It’s interesting, isn’t it? Because, I hear you Joe, that if I’d been watching at the time, I might have more insight into it. But by the same token, it took me a long time to get around to watching Planes, Trains and Automobiles. For the same reason I thought it was from a specific period of time and a specific type of American male comedic humor and performance that I—and this all leads into Will Ferrell I guess—that I thought I wouldn’t like and then I finally gave into watching Planes,Trains and Automobiles and John Candy is just the most beautiful human in the world in that film, and they don’t really compare I guess.

JOE No, they don’t. John Candy and Chevy Chase are two different mountains of comedy.

JOSH Oh god, yeah.

JOE And I knew John slightly and he was a lovely person. And a very sad loss at his age because I think he had great things in him. But his persona was likable and inoffensive and Chevy’s was the opposite.

JOSH Even on SCTV when he was playing these sort of gigantic assholes—

JOE He did a great Orson Welles, him Orson Welles? It was hilarious!

JOSH But even Johnny LaRue or whatever on SCTV—

JOE Well everybody on SCTV was an asshole. [Gemma laughs]

JOSH I mean there was a vulnerability, you liked him! You were rooting for him.

JOE Of course, they were loveable assholes.

SLIM We’re No Angels is Josh’s pick for Christmas. 1955. We’re back 3.5 average on Letterboxd. Only seven fans on Letterboxd. Only six other people have this in their faves on Letterboxd.

JOE You know, that’s not an easy movie to see.

JOSH It was for a long time, it was hard to find any kind of good quality, just came out in the last year or two on Blu-ray. And yeah, I was very excited to get that. It’s a beloved—I stumbled across it as a kid on TV. And I just like my schmaltz to have to kind of sneak into the back door. We’re No Angels, it’s Humphrey Bogart and Aldo Ray and Peter Ustinov play three convicted felons, I don’t think they’re all murderers. Bogey is—actually think he’s the only one of the bunch. But they’re all pretty cavalier about killing people. And they’re interned at Devil’s Island and they break free and this is what like turn of the century, turn of the last century. And they fall in with a hapless French family that runs a store that is owned by their wicked uncle played by Basil Rathbone who is the perfect Scrooge. And it’s lovely. It’s such a shame talking about a movie like this that people haven’t seen because you end up giving away so much. But they end up using their, let’s say criminal and murderous skills, to the great advantage of this family. And it’s lovely. There’s a killer snake. There is a murder. One of the things I really love about it, I guess I will spoil a little bit, is there’s a young couple in the film. There’s the daughter of the family, who’s, Joe—

JOE Gloria Talbott.

JOSH Gloria Talbott, who’s quite lovely and innocent. And she is in love with the nephew of the evil uncle who’s one of those just gormless, young leads that would be the male love interest in a Marx Brothers film and you couldn’t wait to get through those scenes or something. And he’s played for the first part of the film, like that character and they clearly know that we all hate those characters, always, because he turns out to be a dick. And he does get what’s coming to him via the three gentlemen and it’s lovely, it’s lovely. But it’s a very heartwarming Christmas experience, even though it’s set in the tropics, even though there’s murder and death and mayhem.

JOE And snakes. [Joe laughs]

JOSH And snakes. But it’s sort of a redemption story as these three characters who sort of find this family so irresistible and charming that they have to sort of sacrifice their own freedom to help them out from their situation. And I love it. It’s— Michael Curtiz directed it, who’s the great journeyman director. Casablanca and Adventures of Robin Hood and 500 other phenomenal films.

GEMMA White Christmas. Another Christmas movie.

JOSH White Christmas, yeah, Mystery of the Wax Museum. All the great Christmas films. And it’s just got this sort of breezy charm and the three of them together have so much chemistry. They’re so fun to watch together as they go about their bits of mayhem. Just a lovable, lovable movie about murder. [Gemma laughs]

SLIM The tone of this movie is so crazy to me for a first time view. And one of the Letterboxd review that Jack spotlighted from Anthony, “God Damn, I wish three psychopaths would break into my house with the intention of killing me but then decide to make my life better because they like me. I could really use a win like that right about now.” [Slim & Gemma laugh]

JOSH Exactly. Haven’t we all been there? Yeah! They overhear [that] three convicts escaped last night, they injured a guard.

[clip of We’re No Angels plays]

Are they dangerous, did you hear?

Yeah they try to kill a guard.

Tried? He isn’t dead? I must be losing my strength.

It’s the prison food, don’t worry, you’ll be yourself again.

JOSH That’s the humor of the film. You know?

GEMMA It’s so dark. I found myself—so this happens every week on this podcast, somebody will bring a film that I haven’t seen before and I’m just like thank you for bringing this into my life. And this week as much as I did love the 1951 A Christmas Carol, this is the one for me. We’re No Angels is, I mean I might become the eighth Letterboxd member to put it in my favorites. [Slim & Joe laugh] I absolutely loved it. And I was also sitting there as listeners well know, a hardened feminist going, ‘Am I falling more in love with this film every time these guys joke about murdering their wives? Wow!’ [Slim & Gemma laugh]

JOSH Or doing other things that are—yeah, yes.

GEMMA Yeah! And then it turns into at the end, I swear, a full-on, by-the-book, meet-cute rom-com. It’s incredible how the tone just shifts over the course of the film. And I also found myself, I mean, I love Peter Ustinov. In New Zealand, we tend to grow up more with British culture than American. We definitely had Elf and Family Ties and all of that. But we had The Goons and we had Peter Ustinov and we had Peter Sellers, just like that whole gang. So I love him. Every single piece of dialogue that comes out of his mouth is just delivered so perfectly.

[clip of We’re No Angels plays]

How’s our client this morning?

Still dead.

It’s the way it is in the midst of life, etc, etc. I forget the rest of it. I hope he looks alright.

Looks fine.

I think he looks better.

Yes, yes. He was too pale when he was alive.

GEMMA But I’m afraid I just found myself thirsting hard for Aldo Ray. [Slim laughs]

JOSH Ah, yes!

GEMMA Is this wrong?

JOSH One thing many things I like is I mean, Also Ray has this wonderful screen presence. But those two guys, I mean, Ustinov is obviously a genius. And Bogey is a bonafide movie star who just knows how to own the camera. And Aldo Ray holds his own with those two. He is among equals in that film.

GEMMA I just love how funny Bogey—like, Casablanca, my sister picked me off to see it when I was a fifteen-year-old visiting her at college. And that was pretty much the start for me of going to see non-mainstream movies at non-mainstream cinemas. So it’s always, obviously it’s a huge film anyway, but it’s always had a special place in my heart. But Bogey, he’s so funny in this.

JOSH He’s funny. Oh my god, he’s funny in Casablanca. Are you kidding?

GEMMA I know, it’s true.

JOSH You know, “How would you feel if you saw the Germans marching down your beloved—” Or what’s the line? He’s like, “Well, certain streets I’d tell them to avoid.” [Gemma laughs]

SLIM Joe, what did you think of this film when you first saw it?

JOE Well, I didn’t see it, when I saw it, I didn’t see it in theaters. Because in ’55, I went to movies like Tarantula, so I didn’t see it until later. I saw it on TV. And I thought it was very good. And then I was just sort of racking my brain trying to who played the Peter Ustinov part in the remake.

JOSH Remake isn’t the sort of thing, I mean, it’s almost nothing like this. Is it?

JOE No—

GEMMA Are you talking about the Neil Jordan one where they’re playing nuns, or is it completely different?

JOSH Yeah, it’s called We’re No Angels and they kept saying it was a remake, but it bears no resemblance, because it’s De Niro and Sean Penn.

JOE No, I thought it was very funny. And of course, there’s a connection between the two movies that Josh and I did, because Leo G. Carroll plays Marley’s ghost in the original 1938 A Christmas Carol. And he’s also the head of the family in this picture, and the kids always liked him because he was playing Topper on the TV series. He played Cosmo Topper and everybody knew him from that, even though all his other Hitchcock stuff, they didn’t really know about that. But he was sort of a beloved character and so when he would pop up in a movie, and everybody was like, “Oh wait, I know who he is!”

JOSH He’s so perfect as a hapless—I mean, he’s just lost. He’s trying to do right. He’s trying to run this business. He can’t. His heart is too good. And he’s got his wife is wonderful, sort of standing by him and sort of urging him to be his better self.

JOE But they’re not particularly French. [Josh & Gemma laugh]

GEMMA No. But I did, on that note, have to look up, because I thought surely this is based on a play and of course it is. It’s based on a French play, because it’s a parlour, it’s a parlour play really. I was thinking like 20 or 25 minutes into the movie when the guys we’re still up on the roof eavesdropping on all of the different details of the family’s woes. I was like, are they going to come down off the roof at some point? And is there going to be some action? But once you settle into its particular rhythm, it is absolutely delightful. And let’s not spoil the ending, because that came out of nowhere.

JOSH But also, I mean, you’re absolutely right, it is a play. And actually, I did check it. It’s based on a British play that’s based on a French play. And it’s hard to tell how faithful any of them are. But one of the things I also love is in spite of that, it takes you to this other place. And you know, I only watch it around Christmas and even in LA it’s cold around Christmas, and it’s just, it’s a nice break from all the snow and everything. It always makes me feel warm to watch it. It’s so well shot. It doesn’t feel like a play, even though yeah, as you say, it’s in three sets I think.

GEMMA There really is a mythology of Christmas that has been built up by the movies. The movies are very, very responsible for that snowy, Christmassy vibe. Because Josh, like you, I Christmas in summer. And apart from the ten years I lived in Brooklyn, we Christmas in summer. Spending days cooking turkeys and eating Christmas pudding just doesn’t vibe with it being 80 degrees out. And so I guess when it came to my pick, that’s sort of what I was looking at. In a way I do like the edgier Christmas movies and I absolutely adore We’re No Angels, but if you have to ask me to pick a favorite, as I said at the top of the show, it’s going to be something that has the North Pole, that has Santa, that has reindeers, that has a sleigh, that has a grumpy person who needs to learn the spirit of Christmas, that has some innocence in it, you know? And in the case of Elf—2003, directed by Jon Favreau—it is the elf himself, Buddy, as played by Will Ferrell who is this innocent man-child raised by elves who was thrust into the busy streets of Manhattan to track down his birth father, played by none other than James Caan. [Gemma laughs] Who is just brilliant. I mean, it seems to be a bit of a thread running through all of these films around the nature of men and capitalism, needing to undo their love of money and how that has impacted their familial relationships. And this is the most recent film of these four, 2003. Yeah, so it’s got a 3.5 average on Letterboxd which I’m not mad about because that is my sweet spot. [Slim laughs] I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, 3.5 out of five, is a perfect movie, in my opinion. But I’m interested to know are you all Will Ferrell fans, do you fall on the side of this doesn’t work because of him? Or this does work because of him?

JOE I never saw anything that didn’t work because of him. He’s obviously a talented guy. And he’s pretty smart in the roles that he chooses. I mean, look, this is no Santa Claus Conquers the Martians, ittedly. [Gemma laughs]

JOSH That was— a personal story, my friend Cale Boyter, who was a studio executive at New Line, who was the guy who invited me to come in and pitch A History of Violence was, and I , and we all used to knock—not that Will Ferrell wasn’t great, but it did not seem like this guy was gonna be a movie star. And he’d already done that Night at the—

SLIM Roxbury?

JOSH That had not worked out. And Cale was upset. He was like, “This guy’s gonna be the biggest thing ever.” And we’d all go, “Yeah, right, Cale.” And he’s the guy responsible for making sure Elf happened with Will Ferrell. To his credit, he won’t rub it in your face every time you see it. But yeah, it was 100% right that this guy was gonna be a massive movie star.

SLIM It does feel like the perfect Will Ferrell movie. When I was watching last night with my wife, it just feels like this is the right movie at the right time. With the right cast. They couldn’t have planned it any better looking back on things. It’s like, of course Will Ferrell is an adult elf trying to find his father. Oh my god. Yeah, it sounds like a genius idea. And I’m sure there were around that timeframe, there was probably a million of those pitches to Will Ferrell and his team that were along those lines and he made some of them. You know, like Anchorman was probably one of those pitches at one point.

GEMMA But there weren’t a lot of pitches because he was still Saturday Night Live-ing and wasn’t being the movie star that he is today. And also the script itself apparently went through quite a few changes when Jon Favreau came on board because—and it was originally pitched at Jim Carrey, who then went on to become the Grinch. So he didn’t want to get tied to another big Christmas film. So it lands in Will Ferrell’s hands and Will’s interested in doing a family movie because he’s, you know, becoming a family man. And so they G’d it up from PG to G. I don’t know what was PG about it. But honestly I just adore it. I seeing it at the cinema in 2003 and thinking ‘That is a perfect Christmas movie’. And then coming out and a lot of other other friends who are with me going, “That was stupid.” And I was like, well yes, obviously. [Gemma laughs]

JOSH That’s not a valid critique of some films. I’m sorry.

GEMMA That’s not a valid critique of a human man who was raised as an elf and then walks around Manhattan in tights and a cute little coat. What I didn’t know at the time was how much they had pulled from the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer stop motion from 1964, for the production design, for Buddy’s outfit and also for the whole sense of Buddy being an outsider in the North Pole, because of course there’s Hermey, this sweet little elf with the lovely blow-waved hair, who doesn’t want to make toys, he actually wants to be a dentist. And the way he bonds with Rudolph to be accepted as outsiders. Elf doesn’t quite have anything quite as scary as the abominable snowman from Rudolph, which is frankly, one of the—

SLIM Horrifying.

GEMMA Horrifying, it’s absolutely horrifying.

SLIM Also technically, Santa is also horrifying in Rudolph in my opinion. He’s so mean to everyone in that movie, he’s the villain.

GEMMA Yeah, this is so true. But I just love the balance of physical humor. I love the balance of the wordy-dialogue humor and the balance of visual humor. Like again, for every punch line, you then get another visual punch line, which is great. And this is weirdly, I just worked out, this is the third movie in a row of these four favorites, where someone goes out to get a very large tree from somewhere they’re not allowed to have it from, and brings it back into their house. [Gemma laughs] It happens in [National Lampoon’s] Christmas Vacation. It happens in We’re No Angels, they go and steal a tree from the governor’s mansion. And it happens here. And it’s got a Texas switch in it as a result, you know that Christmas-tree scene, it’s got everything. I just love it.

SLIM This movie falls into the camp of if you didn’t watch it when it came out, you could have been overhyped for this. So when I grew up, I didn’t see this in theaters. And I had a group of friends that were just like, “This is the greatest comedy ever made. And I’m never going to shut up about it.” And so every year, if I didn’t see it, I’d be like, ‘Oh, god, it’s Elf season. We’re gonna go through it all over again and not care about this movie.’ But it is a good movie. I watched it this week. It is good. I put my previous teenage emotions aside and I had a great time with my family watching it. It just makes me reminisce, you know, Will Ferrell had a run, like an amazing run of movies. I think a couple weeks ago, we’re talking about Jim Carrey’s decade, that sort of almost ended around Eternal Sunshine [of the Spotless Mind]. He also just had an insane filmography where you just turn out hit after hit after hit and people were lapping it up.

JOE Until he until he got to The Grinch. [Slim & Gemma laugh]

SLIM That was it. I think that might have been the last nail in the coffin for that run.

GEMMA I would say if I have any small critiques of Elf—

SLIM The shower scene. [Gemma laughs]

GEMMA No! Well, sort of, yes. Related to the shower scene. It will be a critique that applies to 99% of Hollywood films, which is that we’ve got a couple of, or three, three female characters actually. The brilliant Amy Sedaris, who plays the receptionist at James Caan’s publishing agency. You’ve got Mary Steenburgen, fantastic, just completely wonderful. And I love that they write—and we don’t know what she does for a living, but we know that she works for a living and that she’s got a job to do so somebody else has to babysit Buddy. I love that. But Zooey Deschanel who’s obviously a gifted singer. That’s all we know about her character Jovie, and I just want to say singing is not a character trait. It’s a skill. It would have been nice to have a little more for the ladies, is all I’m saying. Hey, so there is a list on Letterboxd that Elf falls into. It has a long title for a list that only has two films in it. And you can guess the other one when I read you the title. “An Overly-Friendly Religious Extremist Who Is Bad at Cussing & Talks to Animals Harbors Unrequited Love for Financially Successful But Creatively Bankrupt James Caan and Spends the Winter Making Gross Spaghetti and Helping Him Get a Book Published”.

JOSH Elf is on that list?

GEMMA Yes. [Slim & Gemma laughs]

JOSH With Misery?

SLIM That’s it.

JOSH Okay.

SLIM Which I think is getting a new 4K release in the near future that I might pick up.

GEMMA What? Elf is?

SLIM No, Misery. [Gemma & Slim laugh] Where does Rudolph fit for you, Josh? Is it in a yearly rotation? Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer from 1965?

JOSH I have not seen it. So I’ve seen it I’ve seen the Mad TV Martin Scorsese version far more often.

GEMMA Oh, Raging Rudolph.

JOSH Yes, Raging Rudolph which is fantastic. I don’t know, for some reason, that one sort of missed me in my childhood. I don’t know why. I was a big Grinch guy, but the original [How the] Grinch [Stole Christmas] of course.

JOE I agree about The Grinch, which I think is much more interesting than the Rankin/Bass stuff, which is awfully cutesy for me.

GEMMA Although, Marna Larsen writes: “If Burl Ives were to narrate my life and give the 30+ years of bullying and alienation some kind of meaning, I might feel better.” [Joe & Slim laughs]

JOSH It always bugged me too, the whole notion of doing a theatrical version of The Grinch and then having to give them a backstory to explain the way he is.

JOE They did that with Willy Wonka [& the Chocolate Factory], you know? , his father was a dentist who didn’t—

JOSH But it’s The Grinch! We know his problem! His heart is three sizes too small! Done. I don’t need 20 minutes of backstory.

GEMMA Joe, I just got a message on our internal message system here at Letterboxd, from our booker, who is watching this chat, who noticed a cat walk past in the background of your shot recently, and wanted to know is your cat called Gizmo?

JOE No. [Gemma & Slim laugh] I’m proud to say. [Joe laughs]

GEMMA Proud to say.

SLIM See, if we open the podcast like you guys open the podcast that question and answer would be like the intro to the episode and the music would play. [Slim & Gemma laughs]

GEMMA Alright, so we need to know the cat’s name in that case.

JOE Walter.

GEMMA Walter!

JOE And the other cat over there is Vlad, named after Vlad the Impaler and you can imagine why.

GEMMA Alright, well, look, we’d be remiss not to have a bit of a chat about Gremlins, given her love for it, and given that it is the season. I actually saw you, Joe, a few Christmases ago in Brooklyn, you came to BAM to have a chat. They screened the film and had a chat. And I love how, although this is made in 1984, you still front up whenever asked to just talk about those production details that we still can’t get enough of, even though we’ve probably heard them all.

JOE I guarantee you’ve heard them all. [Gemma laughs]

SLIM So according to Jack’s facts, this first one actually hits the all-time top 250 horror movies, and it ranks at 203. And I rewatched this earlier, it reminded me of the conversation we had about Jaws in a previous episode, where Jaws is now kind of, you could say it’s considered kind of like a family-ish movie, because there’s adventure, even though it’s a shark movie. There’s adventure, there’s whimsy, music that’s fun, but it’s also very scary. And Gremlins fits into that. And I don’t know if it was just this time capsule, but I can’t think of modern movies that can be dark and scary, but also be considered a family fun adventure movie.

JOE Maybe it’s the Spielberg effect.

SLIM It could be. Amblin’ ambiance that revolves around this movie. Josh, what do you think about that aura around these films?

JOSH I’m on with Joe. Yeah, it’s a kind of specific thing. I haven’t seen a horror film that was fun for the whole family as well in a long time. [Josh laughs]

GEMMA I don’t know. I mean, The Babadook? No, no, it’s not fun for the whole family. [Slim laughs]

JOE But there’s a Christmas horror movie called Krampus which is actually a fairly family-oriented kind of picture.

GEMMA Yeah, it’s actually good. That one keeps coming up again and again. I just want to say that we’ve seen this film so many times, or I think we’ve seen it so many times. We’ve seen scenes from it so many times, and I’m sure you’ll find this too with your own experiences with movies and with your guests experiences with movies, is that your relationship to films and to characters with those films changes over time. And so of course on this rewatch, and it had been a few years for me, I’m completely and utterly with Billy’s mother in this particular rewatch. And I think this is the first time that I’ve stopped and watched that kitchen scene, fully rewound it and gone back and rewound and gone back. And Billy’s mother goes so hard in that scene. And it is the best ad for kitchen appliances in the history of cinema. And I just wanted to praise you for that because it could have been so easy to draw that female character as a screamer, and a helpless screamer, and of course she ends up under the Christmas tree with gremlins. Oh my god, that’s so terrifying. But it’s just such a brilliant scene and maybe if you’re going to tell us anything, it would be a little bit about what it was like to direct her.

JOE Well, she was great. s Lee McCain was her name. I had met her, or not met her. But I edited a friend of mine’s film called Tex with Matt Dillon. I was called in to do some editing and I edited a bunch of her scenes and I thought, ‘This actress is really good.’ And so when it came time to cast the mother part, we saw a lot of people, some of them were really good. But there was just something about her that was, I thought, sort of extra special. So she was great to work with. And obviously, we wanted to get away from the idea of the woman who runs away and falls down and screams and gets up. And in the original version of the script, she gets killed and the Gremlins cut her head off and bounce it down the stairs.

SLIM Jesus Christ! [Slim laughs]

GEMMA Oh my god! [Gemma laughs]

JOE So that wasn’t the movie that we ended up making. And I’m not sure she would have signed on for that one. But the idea of using the accoutrements of her own life to be able to get revenge, it’s not unlike somebody trying to rid their kitchen of cockroaches. I mean, this is the way you do it, you know?

GEMMA Yeah, and it’s the way she knows where everything is. That it’s plugged in, if it’s not plugged in, how to reach to plug it in. Iit’s just the attention to detail on—I love it when you can see a character’s thought process writ large.

JOE Her brain is stimulated because as you saw she was making cookies before. [Gemma laughs] She’s in creative mode.

GEMMA Is this one of those films, Slim, that you would hire from the local VHS store over and over again? Because it was for us.

SLIM Oh yeah, absolutely. I mentioned this in a previous episode, Spaceballs, I would use usually play over and over again. And when I was younger, that was when I first realized that movies that came before I was born, or when I was way too young had different rating systems. You know, there was curse words in Spaceballs that I didn’t even catch until my boss caught it when I was playing on the TV in the video store. But this one, I think I tried to get my son to watch this one a little too early, maybe a couple years ago, when he was maybe seven or eight. I might have also tried [The] Exorcist.

JOE The Exorcist?! Are you serious? [Slim & Gemma laugh] You’re lucky they didn’t show up at your door!

SLIM I think the staircase scene was probably the end of that experiment, unfortunately.

GEMMA Can we take a moment to talk about the wonderful actor who plays Mr. Futterman? Can we take a moment on Dick Miller? Because he’s no longer with us, but we have his films. We have his performances. And what a gift to cinema Dick Miller was.

JOE I’m sure that Dick would have liked to hear that while he was alive, because he didn’t hear it that often.

GEMMA What is wrong with people?

JOE Well, he was one of those actors who other filmmakers liked and kept rehiring even though the public at large, was only vaguely aware of who he was. “Oh, it’s that guy again. Yeah, I love that guy.” Certain actors have careers based on the fact that the audience enjoys seeing them. And even when they don’t know who they are. And Dick managed to trade on that, because so many in different generations had grown up seeing him in these pictures, sometimes in small parts, sometimes big parts. It was one of those kinds of actors who could carry a picture if he had to. But also would lighten up a scene to a point where people ed the scene better than they ed the actors. I mean in Terminator, he gets shot by Arnold in the gun store, and I don’t think the scene could run more than 90 seconds. But it’s very indelible. Because he’s the first victim and his inability to understand what’s in front of him, sort of sets the stage for the rest of the movie. And he became a friend of mine and I just enjoyed working with him and so I always would get a script and first thing I would do is, ‘Do I really want to do this?’ And then if I even considered maybe doing it then, ‘Okay, where am I gonna park Dick? Where is a part for him?’ And he was in every picture I ever did except for Amazon Women on the Moon, which he got cut off, which he actually did a very funny bit as the guy who’s a ventriloquist, is switched at the Paris airport with a French dummy that only speaks French. And John Landis thought that that was too intellectual a concept for a sketch in a movie. And so we took it out, but I think it’s available on the Blu-ray, as an extra. But Dick was very funny in it. As he always is!

SLIM We mentioned it earlier at the top of the show, I had not seen The ’Burbs when we talked to Jim Cummings.

JOE What! How did you put one foot in front of the other for all these years?

GEMMA I know!

SLIM I don’t know how I lived!

GEMMA It’s hard to find!

SLIM Is is! That was the reason we talked about it on the show.

GEMMA It’s hard to find, yeah.

JOE It’s not! It’s very popular! There’s all these video versions, it’s on Amazon.

JOSH Eighteen different versions that they’ve got.

SLIM I think there’s a Shout! Factory DVD release, I guess we should amend ‘it’s hard to find’. It’s not easily streaming. I think we were falling into the trap of—

JOSH That’s what these kids mean these days, Joe.

JOE You gotta these movies are in packages and just like when they used to sell them [to] the TV stations, they sell them to the different streamers and the streamers have—Amazon has a lot of stuff, really. But Netflix tends to only want modern stuff. And now they’re into foreign TV shows and things and so there’s lots of stuff on Netflix, but it isn’t necessarily stuff from before the ’90s, whereas the other streamers and I believe Shudder and all those kind of places, they all— the problem is they said that well, you know, when streaming comes you won’t have to have your TV set you won’t need so many channels. Well, your problem is that now you have to subscribe. You have to pay to get rid of paid TV because you don’t want to subscribe to see TV. Okay, so, now you have to pay this for streamers to get the same stuff you used to get but you got to go to different streamers for different things, owned by Disney, owned by Fox, owned by Warners. And it’s all specific. So it hasn’t solved the problem at all. It’s made it worse.

SLIM It’s a pain in the ass, is what it is. Pain in my ass.

JOE And yet there’s more stuff available than there ever has been before. But now you’ve really got to dig to find it.

GEMMA But The ’Burbs is so much fun and it holds up so well. And when we were talking to Jim Cummings about it because it’s his favorite film. We were likening it to one of those, these days, one of those Facebook community groups where people start winding each other up about how loud they’re playing the music or who’s burning some rubbish in their yard.

JOSH More like the dude from nextdoor.com.

SLIM Oh god, even worse.

GEMMA Yeah, exactly. It’s like we need an updated version of The ’Burbs for the 21st century. [Slim laughs]

SLIM I’m sure Jim would love to play the lead.

JOE Jim could do it.

GEMMA He could totally do it. I think he would want to do it. Josh, what is the best thing you’ve seen this year? Or the thing you’ve seen this year that you can’t get out of your head?

JOSH Oh, wow. That’s tough. I’ve seen some really great stuff this year. I really did like Don’t Look Up a lot. The Wes Anderson film. People keep bagging on it, I don’t know why. The French Dispatch I thought was amazing. Pedro Almodóvar’s film Parallel Mothers.

GEMMA I haven’t seen it yet. I’m so jealous.

JOSH Yeah, it’s incredible. It just cracks me up, just Ridley Scott is going around doing his like, ‘Fuck you. I’m a genius, you pieces of shit’ tour and Pedro Almodóvar is like, ‘Here’s another masterpiece. Here’s another masterpiece. Here’s another masterpiece.’ Yeah, it’s marvelous.

GEMMA What a year for movies.

JOE But it all happened in the last several months. The previous part of the year was kind of like, eh, you know? Because nobody was releasing anything because of Covid. They had to pull it back. I mean, the James Bond movie was almost two years old at the time and came out.

GEMMA The first part of the year for me, I think, an extraordinary run of really small but stunning indie features like Test Pattern by Shatara Michelle Ford, and—I’m trying to think what else? Yeah, a bunch of stuff that was out of South by Southwest and Tribeca. Swan Song, Todd Phillips featuring Udo Kier, which is just, again, whimsical and dark and equal measure and has one of the best needle drops by Robyn in a movie this year. And then you’re right, things started sort of ramping up once the big festival season hit.

JOSH Yeah, Joe, have you seen Red Rocket yet?

JOE No, I haven’t.

GEMMA Ohhh!

JOSH I loved it. Loved it.

SLIM It’s great.

JOSH He’s got an edge. He’s got a world.

SLIM Yeah. Joe, what about you? Have you got any big picks from the past year?

JOE Very often the big picks that I like, didn’t make any money. Like Last Night in Soho, which I thought was a terrific movie that no— just laid there. Nobody went to see it. And I like Belfast, which I know is considered a little mainstream.

GEMMA Who cares!

JOE It’s a lovely movie, and the black and white is gorgeous. And I’m a big black-and-white fan anyway, which seems to be in some strange way coming back.

GEMMA Have you seen The Power of the Dog by Jane Campion?

JOSH I was gonna add that to the list.

JOE No, I haven’t seen that because I’ve been told that it takes five minutes for Kristen Dunst to fold some sheets in it and that didn’t sound very appealing. [Gemma laughs]

JOSH Joe! Joe! Joe!

GEMMA Joe!

JOSH Jane Campion, Joe!

JOE I have to tell you, I will see the movie, but I know I won’t like it. Because it just looks boring to me. [Slim laughs]

GEMMA Wow!

JOE Everything I heard about it sounds boring.

GEMMA Wow.

JOE So shoot me. But I haven’t seen it so it’s all hearsay.

JOSH Joe doesn’t like directors. I think it’s weird. Because I kept thinking of, I saw Spencer a while ago, which I thought was terrific. I was so happy to have seen it—

JOE You’re the only person I know who thought Spencer was terrific.

JOSH Oh, it’s lovely.

SLIM Didn’t you guys just have the director on the podcast?

JOSH Yeah, we had the director on the show. [Gemma & Slim laugh]

[The Letterboxd Show theme music Vampiros Dancoteque by Moniker fades in, plays alone, fades down]

GEMMA Thanks so much for listening to The Letterboxd Show and thanks to our guests, Josh Olson and Joe Dante. Please consider listening to their podcast HQ page on Letterboxd using the links in our episode notes

SLIM Thanks to our crew, composing dynamos Sophie Shin for the episode transcript. And to you, for listening. The Letterboxd Show is a Tapedeck production.

GEMMA Um… I haven’t worked out what I’m gonna say. [Gemma & Slim laugh]

SLIM I think that should be the outro.

[The Letterboxd Show theme music Vampiros Dancoteque by Moniker fades in, plays alone, fades down]

[clip of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer plays]

SANTA CLAUS That beautiful, wonderful nose! Rudolph, Christmas is not off and you’re going to lead my team!

RUDOLPH I am?

SANTA CLAUS Yes sir. You and that wonderful nose of yours.

RUDOLPH My nose, Sir?

SANTA CLAUS Ho! Ho! Ho! From what I see now, that will cut through the murkiest storm they can dish up! What I’m trying to say is, Rudolph, with your nose so bright, won’t you guide my sleigh tonight?

RUDOLPH It will be an honor, Sir. [cheering]

[Tapedeck bumper plays] This is a Tapedeck podcast.