Clash of the Titans

In this episode, Anna and Derek chat about the core memories formed from the Medusa sequence, exactly why Thetis is hanging out on Mount Olympus, and much more during their discussion of the Ray Harryhausen showcase Clash of the Titans (1981).

Connect with '80s Movie Montage on Facebook, Bluesky or Instagram! It's the same handle for all three... @80smontagepod.

Anna Keizer and Derek Dehanke are the co-hosts of ‘80s Movie Montage. The idea for the podcast came when they realized just how much they talk – a lot – when watching films from their favorite cinematic era. Their wedding theme was “a light nod to the ‘80s,” so there’s that, too. Both hail from the Midwest but have called Los Angeles home for several years now. Anna is a writer who received her B.A. in Film/Video from Columbia College Chicago and M.A. in Film Studies from Chapman University. Her dark comedy short She Had It Coming was an Official Selection of 25 film festivals with several awards won for it among them. Derek is an attorney who also likes movies. It is a point of pride that most of their podcast episodes are longer than the movies they cover.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

My lord Poseidon, I command you to raise the wind and the sea. Destroy Agoth! And to make certain that no stone stands, that no creature crawls, I command you to let loose the last of the titans. Let loose the cracker! The kingdom of the creatures must be destroyed as you command.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Hello and welcome to 80s movie montage. This is Derek.

SPEAKER_03 0:36

And this Sienna.

SPEAKER_01 0:37

And that was Lawrence Olivier as Zeus. And real briefly, right at the end there was uh Jack Willem as Poseidon. In 1981's The Clash of the Titans. Oh, I'm sorry, Clash of the Titans. There's no the.

SPEAKER_03 0:51

There's no the.

SPEAKER_01 0:52

It's just Clash of the Titans.

SPEAKER_03 0:54

Lawrence fucking Olivier.

SPEAKER_01 0:56

It's it reminds me a little bit of like Orson Wells as Unicron in the Transformers movie.

SPEAKER_03 1:03

Well, we've talked about that now a couple times. About them grabbing these like lauded older actors for a lot of these 80s movies across genres.

SPEAKER_01 1:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:16

Just to have a little bit of street cred. Although this movie has a lot of street cred, actually. It does. Um which is wild that like a movie like this has so many Clash of the Titans.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

It's it was hard to find. I mean, everyone knows the release the Kraken from from um the remake.

SPEAKER_03 1:38

Like I feel like that line got the two 2010. It's it's not watched it.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

Yeah. I mean, to the extent that there's like the only thing keeping me connected with this one is nostalgia. Cracked. When you take that out, there's like Liam Neeson saying like release the Kraken in a really cool way.

SPEAKER_03 1:55

Which it's like isn't enough for God why Kraken, not Greek mythology. Did like we'll we'll we'll dive into all this.

SPEAKER_01 2:04

Was Medusa a Titan? Was a Gorgon a Titan? I don't think so.

SPEAKER_03 2:08

There's like monsters. Different types of creatures.

SPEAKER_01 2:13

Nevertheless. Uh nevertheless. Maybe that was the clash.

SPEAKER_03 2:17

Well, okay, sure. Sure. Yeah, actually, now that I'm actually thinking about the title of the film.

SPEAKER_01 2:25

No, it meant to say that it was like this um the deuce ahead versus the Kraken. That's the clash. That's interesting. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:31

Okay. Okay. Uh yeah, same with me. This was uh the first time in a very long time that I had watched the entire film.

SPEAKER_02 2:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 2:42

For whatever reason. Don't know if it was on TV a lot. Don't know if I just caught it at a certain point in my childhood.

SPEAKER_01 2:47

It was on all the time.

SPEAKER_03 2:49

Okay. Yeah. Then thank you for saying that. Because like for some reason I was like, why is this one of the movies that I saw so much as a kid? And especially that whole I was saying saying as much when we were watching it, that Medusa sequence is like seared in my brain.

SPEAKER_02 3:04

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 3:04

Like I remember every single moment of that particular sequence. Maybe because it was it was scary as a kid.

SPEAKER_01 3:10

Yeah, absolutely. It was it was like the effects were like really ambitious for the time. They they are pretty comical now almost. Yeah, but like you said.

SPEAKER_03 3:22

But Medusa's probably like the best of like how that actually um during that sequence, when you see the head, the head of snakes in shadow against the wall, it's like, oh my god, like core memory unlocked.

SPEAKER_01 3:38

They did that a few times, like when when Zeus was uh talking about what was it, Calabos?

SPEAKER_03 3:44

The not the made-up son of Thetis. Is that who you're talking about?

SPEAKER_01 3:49

Yeah, when he like they have like all their little uh collectible figurines of their favorite humans, I suppose.

SPEAKER_03 3:56

Favorite and not favorite.

SPEAKER_01 3:57

Yeah. Yeah. And when he was talking about how he was gonna really like disfigure him, it like pans away from the figure to just show the shadow, the animation, which we never saw him as just a human man, right?

SPEAKER_03 4:09

I don't think so. Yeah, we only saw him as like a disgusting creature. It's it's a really interesting movie because like look, I'm very admittedly a little rusty in my Greek mythology, but I've and maybe that's why I saw this movie also as a lot as a kid, or maybe this is why I love Greek mythology, because I'm a little rusty, but I'm also having sat down to watch. You know who else?

SPEAKER_01 4:31

You know who else was rusty on their Greek mythology?

SPEAKER_03 4:33

The screenwriter.

SPEAKER_01 4:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 4:34

Well, that's the thing, is that like, look, I think I've said it before, but the Greek myths are the they're the original stories. You really don't need to mess with them too much. Like there and and the thing is, is that like there are different versions of the same story. So there is there is that. So like there are us there are certain stories where you can say, I'm gonna, I'm gonna pick this lane, but you don't need to just totally make up shit that wasn't even a myth.

SPEAKER_01 5:04

Counterpoint, those Greeks never really took into account how it would look on film.

SPEAKER_03 5:09

Sure. So let's dive in and we'll start with uh not to speak ill of the dead, Beverly Cross. So Beverly is a gentleman just so that you're aware. Okay. Okay, uh he passed in 1998, and he this this was like right up his alley. This is like the kind of I think he was um primarily a prey uh playwright, pardon me, uh, who also did screenwriting. And when you look at some of his credits, it's like, oh sure. And then actually these credits will be repeated uh a couple times over, I think, just because a lot of this crew worked together on like similar properties. So yeah. Some of his other credits include Jason and the Argonauts.

SPEAKER_01 5:55

That's the big one where that's the big one, where there were like a lot of like similarities in the effects and yeah.

SPEAKER_03 6:03

Yep, similar people who took part in that film. Genghis Khan, Sinbad, and Eye of the Tiger.

SPEAKER_01 6:09

Wow. Yes, this gives me like Rocky vibes, even though I know that's not what it's about.

SPEAKER_03 6:16

No, and actually I was like, huh, I've never seen any of those Sinbad movies, but apparently they were popular for a while. And then uh presumably because he originated this material, he has credits on we just mentioned it, the 2010 remake, Flash of the Titans, as well as I did not even know that this was a movie. Uh there was a sequel in 2012 called Wrath of the Titans.

SPEAKER_01 6:39

I haven't seen Wrath of the Titans, but I did see, I did watch the 2010 remake, and like I said, it just without that nostalgia and charm. So maybe people watched it like coming in fresh, and that's like it did for them what the 80s version did for me. I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 6:55

And also just uh, you know, whether or not this is interesting to people or not, many of the people both behind and in front of the screen, like largely British, uh UK-based, had that kind of background. And actually, one thing that's very interesting about Mr. Cross, he is married or was married to one of the actresses in this movie. His wife was Maggie Smith.

SPEAKER_01 7:20

Wow.

SPEAKER_03 7:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:22

Yeah, there was a lot going on.

SPEAKER_03 7:23

There's a lot going on in this uh in this film.

SPEAKER_01 7:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 7:26

And actually, all those things that are going on are more interesting to me than the actual story of the film, if I'm being really honest.

SPEAKER_01 7:34

Well, you probably had to dig a little bit for some of this information as opposed to the exposition, the movie kept Oh my God, exposition up the Wahoo.

SPEAKER_03 7:43

Uh yeah. I mean, I feel bad. He look, he certainly wasn't the only person crazy with exposition, but Olivier's character of Zeus just all he he didn't actually do anything. He just like told us a lot of stuff. Now, I know that during the filming of this film, filming of this film, he was not well. He actually wasn't well for the last like couple decades of his life. So he I don't know if there was maybe an original idea to have him literally do more. Because even all the scenes with the gods, yeah. I They're all just standing there. Yeah. Like nothing, there's no kinetic energy, there's nothing, it's all just them standing there listening to him, or a couple back and forths with a couple of them.

SPEAKER_01 8:32

But I mean, there was certainly room to have the other gods doing more behind Zeus's back.

SPEAKER_03 8:38

For sure. That's how they worked.

SPEAKER_01 8:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:40

That's like how they did things, uh, especially Hera.

SPEAKER_01 8:43

So So they could have done that. It feels like they did what they wanted to.

SPEAKER_03 8:48

Maybe a teensy tiny bit. That's what Athena did because she refused to give up her owl.

SPEAKER_01 8:53

So Yeah, without that, we wouldn't have gotten R2 boobo.

SPEAKER_03 8:57

Yeah, cute, but you're absolutely right. That seemed to me like completely derivative of just we need something that's like R2D2.

SPEAKER_01 9:05

It very much felt like that.

SPEAKER_03 9:06

Like only to the sound, the sound effects.

SPEAKER_01 9:08

A little droid owl that only this guy can understand. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 9:12

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

But damn, I did love that little owl.

SPEAKER_03 9:15

Yeah, he's cute. And that was another like core memory. Um Yeah, like so. I have, like you said, a lot of nostalgia. We'll keep moving forward, but just we're not gonna stop. Can't stop one stop. But uh somewhat, somewhat of a frustrating watch, if I'm being really honest.

SPEAKER_01 9:37

It works really well as a show or movie if uh you're a kid and you just turn on the TV and it happens to be on maybe like 40 minutes in already.

SPEAKER_03 9:45

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 9:46

You're like, yes.

SPEAKER_03 9:47

Yes, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 9:48

But watching it from the opening credits to the very end, I'm like, oh, what?

SPEAKER_03 9:53

Mm-hmm. So directed by Desmond Davis, he too uh and sorry guys, uh another episode where a lot of people have passed who are connected to this film, he passed in 2021. So I am gonna go on record, I guess, as saying that this is probably his most high-profile project. Oh I I think, uh, and going through his other credits, like some of the other ones that I noted, uh, just because I thought this was a very dramatic title, Time Lost and Time Remembered. Smashing Time. So a couple movies all about time.

SPEAKER_01 10:28

Yeah, interesting.

SPEAKER_03 10:29

A nice girl like me.

SPEAKER_01 10:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:32

Ordeal by innocence, and then a little bit later in his career, the chief TV series, and and he also just sprinkled in there did you know, moved around, worked between film, TV series, TV movies, that sort of thing. So Okay. Okay, moving on to cinematography. Probably a name that maybe you're familiar with, or people who are fans of the James Bond franchise are familiar with because he did a ton of them. I did not know that he did all these. He did a ton of James Bond movies, so he too has passed. He passed in 1987. Uh, let's go through I have all films for him. And he was an Oscar-winning DP, but not for any of the James Bonds. I don't I wonder, I wonder um cumulatively how many Oscar noms James Bond films have gotten. I would be somebody out there knows that answer.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

I I wonder, like, hmm. Maybe they maybe there's a couple that would have gotten something for music.

SPEAKER_03 11:36

I think maybe a couple of the songs.

SPEAKER_01 11:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 11:39

Probably.

SPEAKER_01 11:39

In fact, did Billie Eilish get an Oscar for She might have for uh No Time was it No Time to Die, which is ironic because it's the one where he did in fact die.

SPEAKER_03 11:51

Yeah. Okay. Uh so his credits include How to Murder a Rich Uncle.

SPEAKER_01 11:58

That is very specific.

SPEAKER_03 12:00

Very specific. Wow. The trials of Oscar Wilde. And then here we go. So he was the DP on Dr. No, From Russia with Love, Goldfinger, Thunderball, sprinkled in between all these James Bond movies. He gets his best cinematography color, because at a certain point in time they um separated them out between color and black and white. So he got the Oscar win for A Man for All Seasons, which also was the best picture winner that year. He then, more James Bond work, Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die, The Man with the Golden Gun, and then the uh derivative Orca from Jaws. Yeah. Although I'd like to see it.

SPEAKER_01 12:40

Well, it makes it makes way more sense because we know that like Orca's killer are far more intelligent. So if you're gonna try to convince me that like Orcas don't play. Yeah, that this that this thing out in the ocean is really pissed and has a grudge against people. I can believe I can believe it. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 12:59

Yeah. We should do uh we should do a triple header of Orca, Piranha, and then finish with Jaws.

SPEAKER_01 13:09

Yeah. Don't start with don't start with Jaws. It's gotta be all like saltwater creatures, right? Well, Piranha. If we're doing Piranha.

SPEAKER_03 13:17

Pranas are in the Amazon River curl.

SPEAKER_01 13:19

Yeah, so we might have to throw in like uh Lake Placid or some other freshwater.

SPEAKER_03 13:23

No, I did not like Lake Placid. Because she was like feeding.

SPEAKER_01 13:26

You didn't like Betty White.

SPEAKER_03 13:28

She was awful in that. I mean, she was she was an awful character in that movie. All right. Moving on to music by the first of two Lawrences we'll be talking about today, Lawrence Rosenthal. So he is still with us. Uh don't want to jinx anything. He'll be turning 100 in November. Oh my god. Wow. 100 years old. Well done. Yeah. And mostly film for him, but more television as he got towards like the end of his career. So some incredible films that he was a part of. So he scored A Raisin in the Sun, The Miracle Worker. He is he only, um, I don't want to say only, not yeah. No, he never actually won, unfortunately. But he did get a best original score nomination for Beckett. He worked on the comedians. He was not the composer on this film, but he got a best original song score nomination for Man of La Mancha.

SPEAKER_02 14:27

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:28

Rooster Cogburn, the original Island of Dr. Moro, not the Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

Not the Val Kilmer one? No. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 14:37

Meteor. And then he worked for a while on Fantasy Island. Interesting. TV show. Uh and then talk about a pivot, like just with some of the other films I just talked about. He also scored easy money with Marty Danger film. Yes. Yeah. And then um he worked on a ton of the young Indiana Jones Chronicles. So the show and other just like Indiana Jones properties. Um, not not like the the films with Harrison Ford, but just like other works that they did.

SPEAKER_01 15:07

There's a lot of like, hey, remember how we had this like favorite character? What if we had a kid version of him?

SPEAKER_03 15:12

Exactly. And also later in his career, like just a lot of TV movies. A lot of them.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 15:19

A lot of them. Okay, moving on to editing, Timothy Ghee. So he is also with us. He will be turning 90 this June. All right. So good on Timothy.

SPEAKER_01 15:31

I mean, it's not a hundred, but pretty good.

SPEAKER_03 15:33

It's not a hundred. Uh I have all the films for him, not a huge filmography. He has 15 editor credits. So uh this is probably towards the top of like the projects he's known for. He also worked on Long Ago, Tomorrow. Okay. Very dramatic title. I am a Dancer. Father, dear father. The other one is probably the Stepford Wives. Oh, yeah. People know. Yeah. International Velvet and then Salome's Last Dance. Okay, so normally this is where we would pivot into the cast. However, I'm making an exception this time. Okay. Because of everything that you just said a couple minutes ago. What did I say? In terms of special effects.

SPEAKER_01 16:18

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 16:19

So let's take this opportunity, because it's going to be the only time we do, to mention he is credited as creator of special visual effects, Ray Harryhausen. So kind of interesting that so he is incredibly well known within the industry for his contributions in terms of visual effects. He I'm sure has been a huge influence on the technicians who to this day do like practical visual effects.

SPEAKER_01 16:50

Lay the groundwork for a lot of what we see?

SPEAKER_03 16:52

100%. But also just like in a larger sense, I think a lot of filmmakers, Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, uh Peter Jackson, Sam Raimi, uh Tim Burton, they've all gone on record as saying that he has influenced their work. So he's had an incredibly broad impact on the industry. Uh this was his last film. He was like a consultant on Mighty Joe Young, but that was it. So he he also has passed. He passed in 2013. But when I go through his filmography, you'll very quickly understand the type of films he worked on, the way he made his impact, and why a lot of those filmmakers have cited him as an as a influence. So his credits include The Beast from 20,000 Fathoms.

SPEAKER_01 17:43

It came from beneath the sea. How far? 20,000 or different different things.

SPEAKER_03 17:48

Not sure, but the next one is 20 million miles to Earth.

SPEAKER_01 17:52

That's not that far, I don't think, is it?

SPEAKER_03 17:54

I don't know. I am woefully ignorant. Like in a astronomical space distances. I don't even know how far away the moon is, if I'm being very honest.

SPEAKER_01 18:05

I d I don't either. I'm just thinking in in like space terms. Space terms, who knows? 20 million light years, okay. Sure. Now we're talking.

SPEAKER_03 18:13

I mean, I feel like 20 million miles isn't nothing. That's that's some distance, right?

SPEAKER_01 18:20

It's about 20 million.

SPEAKER_03 18:21

Uh he worked on the seventh voyage of Simbad. So he worked on Jason and the Argonauts.

SPEAKER_01 18:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:28

One you are looking up. What are you looking up right now?

SPEAKER_01 18:32

Not looking up anything.

SPEAKER_03 18:32

You're looking something up. Uh that one that has that really iconic poster of Raquel Welch.

SPEAKER_01 18:38

Oh, 1 billion BC.

SPEAKER_03 18:39

1 million years BC, correct? You knew that very quickly.

SPEAKER_01 18:43

Oh, I'm looking at the update. Yeah. It's only two, it's just under 240,000 miles to the moon.

SPEAKER_03 18:52

So 240,000 miles.

SPEAKER_01 18:53

So 20 million, you know.

SPEAKER_03 18:54

Yeah, that's pretty far away.

SPEAKER_01 18:57

I mean, it's pretty far, but it's not that far.

SPEAKER_03 18:59

How far away is the sun?

SPEAKER_01 19:01

Oh my god. I don't know. Okay. It's about eight minutes as far as how fast light travels.

SPEAKER_03 19:07

Okay, so there you go. He also worked on The Golden Voyage of Sinbad and then another Sinbad. And the one that we brought up already, Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger. I did not realize there were so many Sinbad movies.

SPEAKER_01 19:19

There's a lot. Also, one quick note. The other reason why I remembered the uh One Million BC poster from the Shawshank Redemption. I knew you were gonna say that.

SPEAKER_03 19:27

Yeah. Okay. So now we are at the stars of this film. I am just slightly tweaking the credits because I mean, come on. I'm just gonna talk about Harry Hamlin first. He is Perseus. We haven't talked about him a single time yet. No, we haven't. He he is the, you know, it is the classic hero hero's journey. Um that in large part is like all of these Greek myths went on to form um Jose like Joseph Campbell is is the big guy who I think talks about the hero's journey. I mean, he has a book called The Hero's Journey, and that's exactly what this is. Although it's been messed with a little bit. Uh thank you to Mr. Cross for doing that, which I again I don't really understand why. It wouldn't have to me demonstrably changed anything to have just kept kept the myth as is, but okay.

SPEAKER_01 20:24

Who who are we to say?

SPEAKER_03 20:26

Sure. And also it is really funny to me because I think outside of Harry Hamlin and um Burgess Meredith, I do think that like across the board everybody else is like a classically trained British actor. So Burgess Meredith was Ursula Andrews, no, but yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 20:44

Burgess Meredith is the is the like I mean it's comical. Where it just it's it does not fit, but it's but I love it. I love that he's in it. I mean, it's basically like Rocky's trainer training Perseus.

SPEAKER_03 20:58

He has toned it down a bit, though. Yeah. He's much more jovial in this film. He's real chap ass in Rocky.

SPEAKER_01 21:05

He's not like Perseus, this cracking, I'll murder you to death.

SPEAKER_03 21:11

Harry Hamlin, I mean, I do remember being a kid in I this is not like I would say a crush, but I'm thinking, oh, that's a good looking guy. Um he is that what you as a child. That's what you thought. Um so he has had like a very long career, mostly in television, to be quite honest, though. So let's go through some of his credits. So I actually am really um okay, so I haven't seen this film, but I know of this film, and I think it was incredibly progressive for the time. On the heels of this movie, he made another movie called Making Love.

SPEAKER_02 21:52

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 21:53

I'm not sure. I think he is the lover. So basically, it's about a couple, and within this couple, have Couple, the husband realizes that he is gay and leaves his wife, and uh I think he starts a relationship with Harry Hamlin's character.

SPEAKER_01 22:12

So it's one of those movies where like the poster has like a full synopsis on the poster just so you kind of have an idea of what what I remember doing some research on this movie and thinking like wow, that's incre because I think it's like 82.

SPEAKER_03 22:25

It's like incredibly progressive for the time. So uh because I don't think that there are like bad guys in the movie. And I think that like it's I don't think anybody's made out to be a villain for for the way things turned out. It's just a hard situation for everybody. Anyway, he definitely gets his claim to fame for the long-running TV series of the 80s, LA Law.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 22:49

So that's like really where he becomes quite famous. That was a huge too, too, too young to be watching that show at the time, but I know it was a huge TV show.

SPEAKER_01 23:01

Yeah, I you know, I wasn't into that when I was a kid, and it would feel kind of dated now, having like not watched it when it first came out.

SPEAKER_03 23:08

I don't think I ever see it like on streaming anywhere.

SPEAKER_01 23:11

I'm sure there's a channel or a streamer somewhere that makes a big deal out of having it.

SPEAKER_03 23:16

Was it NPC? I wonder if it's on Peacock.

SPEAKER_01 23:18

I don't think it was. That wasn't one of like the Dick Wolf Law and Order thing. That's that's what they've that came later.

SPEAKER_03 23:25

Yeah, you're right.

SPEAKER_01 23:26

Mostly focused on.

SPEAKER_03 23:27

Uh he was in the movie Ally and Me, and then a couple movies, but pretty much all TV. He was on a TV show called Movie Stars. I didn't realize he was on the TV show Veronica Mars. Oh, I didn't either 12 episodes, too. He was in the movie Strange Wilderness.

SPEAKER_01 23:42

Oh man, that movie.

SPEAKER_03 23:43

More TV, Army Wives, Shameless. Did not realize he had a stint on Mad Men. He was in that more recent movie, which I'm like, really, dude? 80 for Brady. He's in that. More recently, Mayfair Witches. And then I was like, hey, where's the show? Because I saw commercials for it. I guess it's because he's credited as himself, so it's not under acting, but uh kept seeing commercials for that show in the kitchen with Harry Hamlin.

SPEAKER_01 24:09

Yeah. Sounds like that's something he'd be in.

SPEAKER_03 24:11

Yeah. And then we just finished, well, it the show's not finished yet. The finale's next week, but his wife is Lisa Renna. So we just watched her on the Traders.

SPEAKER_01 24:21

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_03 24:22

And it is really funny because like she referenced him a couple times and she always just calls him by his full name. She always calls him Harry Hamlin. It's kind of funny. So yeah, and they've been together, I think, for a while, for like um 30 years or so. So it's good on them. Yeah. Okay. Moving on to Sir Yeah. Lawrence. Olivier.

SPEAKER_01 24:45

I'm glad you threw that sir on on there.

SPEAKER_03 24:48

He had a ton of uh what what do you even call it? Like, I was reading about his funeral, and I mean, first of all, it was a who's who at his funeral, and they all carried different like awards and things that he had been given over the course of his life. Like he had a ton of like titles and like um yeah, just awards and acknowledgments, like crazy. And honestly, like I understand why a lot of people would think that his method of acting is quite dated, and I accept that point, not really trying to argue it, but he is truly one of the finest actors ever to grace both the stage and the screen.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

You'll get no argument from me.

SPEAKER_03 25:32

Hands down.

SPEAKER_01 25:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 25:34

So he plays Zeus.

SPEAKER_01 25:36

He did he does.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

And in he has passed, I mentioned that he was not well filming this movie. And uh he he passed away before the decade was out. He passed in 1989. I so honestly, when I was growing up, he wasn't really somebody I was like clocking too closely, but I always and sorry to go on the slight tangent, but I always loved Vivian Lee. And obviously, it's like probably the um I'm using my hand to like indicate r way high up.

SPEAKER_01 26:12

Setting a bar higher.

SPEAKER_03 26:14

Setting a high bar for problematic movies. Oh, okay. Um Gone with the Wind.

SPEAKER_01 26:19

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:19

But but I I watched that film a ton when I was a kid for the the cinematic quality of it. And I always really admired her work. And so I kind of knew about him through her because they were married, that marriage ended, um, she had great mental health issues, and he for a long time was her caretaker because she just couldn't take care of herself really. But so they had quite a tough go of it relationship-wise. But yeah, he was just oh my goodness, a phenomenal actor. And um, I don't know who's quoted as saying it, but somebody made some quote about just how like he's he was basically the only person who could just like speak Shakespeare naturally. Like it sounded like that, that is something he would say. Like it was just so natural for someone like him to be speaking. And when you go through his credits, it's like, holy shit. So let's do it. Yeah. Um, do I have anything? Nothing outside of film. Yeah, he wasn't really a TV guy. That makes sense. That makes a lot of sense. So, and so he Oscar nominated many, many, many times over, one win, which is kind of ludicrous. But his credits include As You Like It, Fire Over England. Oh man, especially since the latest installment of this film is out right now.

SPEAKER_01 27:49

Yeah, it just came out, didn't it?

SPEAKER_03 27:51

Wuthering Heights. Oh man, he is an amazing Heathcliff. Okay. I don't really think about him in a sexy way, but he is. Do you remember watching that and going like, he's kind of a This is me showing everybody where my earliest like Harry Hamlin, Lawrence Blivier. In two very different movies. But yeah, he is he is an amazing Heathcliff in that film. Honestly, probably as badly cast as the current guy because uh Heathcliff, if you ever read the literature, Wuthering Heights, yeah, there are indications that he is probably not a Caucasian man.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

That I've heard. Yeah. Yeah. I've not read the literature, but from what I've seen on the internet, I don't know why I said it like that. But yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:51

But but nonetheless, a great performance. He's also fantastic in Rebecca. Uh so did I mention so he got his first best actor oscaronom for Wuthering Heights. He gets he follows it up with a best actor Oscar nom for Rebecca. He also, man, I'm just gonna be on repeat saying this. He is an amazing Mr. Darcy in Pride and Prejudice. I mean, right up his fucking alley with that kind of shit. Um, and then so this is interesting too, because so no Oscar nom for that. He gets a best actor Oscar nom for Henry V, but then also he gets an so that it is a competitive Oscar doesn't win for that, but he did get an honorary Oscar because he did the whole, like he was Kenneth Brannau before Kenneth Branaugh. Kenneth Brannau wishes he were Lawrence Olivier, but I mean it's so clear that he is that is who he emulates. Yeah. But uh, but Lawrence Olivier, I think he he obviously did not write Henry V, but um acted, directed, probably produced it, I'm guessing. Okay. So he got like an honorary Oscar for everything he did with that movie. Kind of kind of odd, but at the time they did that. So that was in 1947. So finally, he fell on the heels of that because Hamlet won in 1948. He uh gets a best director Oscar nomination, and then he finally wins for best actor for Hamlet. I believe to this day, the only um portrayal of a Shakespearean character who won Best Actor. Wow. I believe. He then follows that up with another best actor oscronom for yet another Shakespeare property, Richard III. He did a lot of Shakespeare. He did a fuck ton of Shakespeare. He then, not Shakespeare, gets another best actor osconom for the entertainer. He had a role in Spartacus. This is another one where it's like, uh, probably should not have been cast in this, but it was the time he played Othello in Othello, got a best actor oscronom for it, too. Alright. So there you go. Uh he was in the 1968 Romeo and Juliet, Nicholas and Alexandra. So a ton of just like very, whether or not it was Shakespeare, very kind of like high literature adaptations, that sort of thing. He gets another best, and then he kind of moves away from that in his later career. He gets another best actor Oscar nomination for sleuth. This is the one with that funny story between him and Dustin Hoffman. I don't know if it's like lore now.

SPEAKER_01 31:29

Is that where like Dustin Hoffman was going like super intense into like this method acting kind of thing? And Olivier's like, why don't you just try acting?

SPEAKER_03 31:39

Yeah. The story at this point, who knows if it what what's truly accurate about it, but like supposedly Dustin Hoffman was like trying to keep hims his self, if I could use my words, trying to keep himself awake for a couple days because he was supposed to be exhausted. And then, yes, to your point.

SPEAKER_01 31:57

Just act exhausted.

SPEAKER_03 31:58

Just act exhausted. So he gets a best supporting act. That's the only one that he got in the best supporting actor category. He got that from Marathon Man. He gets another best actor Oscar nom for The Boys from Brazil. I brought this up because I think it's funny, and he's not the only person who plays this character, but we'll get to him in a minute. He is Van Helsing in the 1979 Dracula.

SPEAKER_01 32:22

Amazing.

SPEAKER_03 32:23

I think he'd be such a fun. I haven't seen that version.

SPEAKER_01 32:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:26

That would have been a really fun uh performance, I think, of Van Helsing. And then his final credit was 1989's War Requiem.

SPEAKER_02 32:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 32:36

Also, preceding that by 10 years, he got. So I already mentioned one honorary Oscar. He got another one for just his total filmography, all the work that he had done.

SPEAKER_01 32:50

Lifetime achievement kind of thing. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 32:52

And I think one of the um another thing that what year would it have been? Amadeus. Um he pr he was presenting Best Picture. He didn't read any of the nominees. He just opened the card and said Amadeus. So there you go. And we've had that conversation about I don't know if you call it ethics or just um yeah.

SPEAKER_01 33:17

Trotting out these older actors who maybe aren't space or morality otherwise Liza Minelli, I think, just recently said like that it in her words it was bullshit and she didn't need to be in a wheelchair.

SPEAKER_03 33:31

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_01 33:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:33

Interesting.

SPEAKER_01 33:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:35

That's the only one that I thought you were gonna bring that up in terms of like the way that her and Lady Gaga interacted with each other gave her some dignity in that moment. But like everybody else, I feel usually it becomes like a really unfortunate incident in terms of like what they're able to do or not do the person in that moment.

SPEAKER_01 33:56

They're matched with just doesn't know what the hell to do.

SPEAKER_03 33:59

Or I think in his case he was up there alone.

SPEAKER_01 34:01

Yeah, well, yeah, no. I mean, the ones that we've seen where the other person just looks like, what do I do?

SPEAKER_03 34:06

Obviously, the biggest one is like with Faye Dunaway and Warren Beatty.

SPEAKER_01 34:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 34:12

And any any that's Lawrence Olivier. Yeah, Lawrence Olivier. So there there you go. I mean, that's going to be the only time we talk about him as far as like him being featured in a film. It is so incredible actor, and actually I'm really, really glad that we did get a chance to talk about him.

SPEAKER_01 34:31

I'm glad I picked this movie.

SPEAKER_03 34:33

Good job. Okay, moving on to the actress who plays Zeus's wife and sister, Hera. As it as it goes in Greek mythology. Uh played by Claire Bloom. So not super familiar with her work, but again, uh, and even just some overlap with a couple properties. Another British actor, she was in Richard III, Alexander the Great, The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm. I'd kind of like to see that. Yeah. Uh, a fantastic film. She's in 1963's The Haunting. Charlie. This is the name of this movie, A Severed Head.

SPEAKER_01 35:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 35:19

Definitely want to watch it.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 35:21

And then she goes from a severed head to Sammy and Rosie Get Laid. I love some of these titles. She's in Crimes and Misdemeanors, so she might come up again if at some point in the future we do that movie, because we can. She was in Mighty Aphrodite, The King's Beech. Uh, more recently, Doc Martin, the TV series. Interesting. And she's also been in a lot of TV movies. She doesn't it's real. This is a very interesting film to me as well. Like, look, I know how it's gonna come across with the well, actually. But like, you know, so she plays Hera's she plays Zeus's wife, Hera. Uh, I don't know if I'd say historically, but in in literature in the Greek mythology, they are constantly butting heads. Actually, there's a very faithful representation of that in what we were just watching, which was like fucking pulled from Netflix too soon.

SPEAKER_01 36:16

Oh, chaos. Yeah. Yeah, that was a really good show, which obviously meant it was gonna get like eight episodes.

SPEAKER_03 36:22

Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 36:23

And then pulled.

SPEAKER_03 36:23

There were some, and I mean, don't get me wrong, there were some things that bothered me about that show too, because they played a little willy-nilly with some of the Greek mythology, but I felt like that was more intentional.

SPEAKER_01 36:32

Because it was like a modernization of it. They weren't very trying to make it a period piece.

SPEAKER_03 36:37

Yeah, very much so. But the dynamic between Hera and Zeus, very accurate to what the mythological stories tell us.

SPEAKER_01 36:46

He just kept fooling around and she did not like it.

SPEAKER_03 36:49

The only thing that I didn't like about where they took that is like to my knowledge, somebody correct me if I'm wrong, I never read anything about Hera having an affair with Poseidon.

SPEAKER_01 36:59

Scandal.

SPEAKER_03 37:00

So so that's the only thing I was like, eh, I don't know about that. But the like love hate. Yeah, very much in tune with like what those stories were about. So, um, but my point is that because we're about to go into the next actress, and like Hera actually gets relatively little to do in this movie in comparison to Thetis. Which is like, yeah, what? Bizarre. What? Totally bizarre. This is like obviously the biggest break from classical Greek mythology.

SPEAKER_02 37:33

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 37:33

Thetis did not reside on Olympus, she was not an Olympian. There are different versions of what she was. She was like kind of a river goddess, kind of a Neread is what they would call them.

SPEAKER_02 37:44

Uh okay.

SPEAKER_03 37:45

Um, I think it's like some so the Nereads, it was like$50,$50,$50 daughters of uh Nereus or Nereid, um, like a river god. Okay. So she just flat out does not belong in an Olympus. And she really like her dynamic with Zeus would be extremely deferential.

SPEAKER_01 38:08

Was there any reason? I don't know. Could you have just taken everything that she did and have and and like have Hera be in that role?

SPEAKER_03 38:16

You could have had any of the actual Olympians, like Hera, Athena, Aphrodite, um Artemis, Artemis lived on or um Demeter.

SPEAKER_01 38:30

It would have made the most sense for it to be Hera, because then you then you like highlight that dynamic between the room.

SPEAKER_03 38:34

She always had jealousy issues. She would have been, and I mean she was ex extremely jealous of any affair that Zeus had, and clearly he did with Danai. Is that how you say it? Um Perseus' mother. That's accurate. He does impregnate her with a golden shower. Um sorry. They used that line so many times, I was like, wait, what? So that's true. But um yeah, okay. So, but yeah, it is it is completely bizarre. And and if you have any interest or familiarity with Greek mythology, okay, so I think I mentioned this off mic. This the that um character that was supposed to be married, I don't even remember his name because he's made up. He this character that is supposed to play uh Thetis' son. Calibos, Calabos? That is not that is not a character. Her her story in Greek mythology is that she is the mother of Achilles.

SPEAKER_01 39:32

Yeah, that's different.

SPEAKER_03 39:34

Very different. And I don't it's like mind-boggling to me why they did this, but whatever. So and also she much more plays the Hera role in this film, which is like the back and forth, which just is completely off from the way that the dynamics would have been set up.

SPEAKER_01 39:51

If you weren't Hera, you probably weren't going that hard against Zeus, never, yeah, never.

SPEAKER_03 39:56

Um, I'm trying to think of who even would get close to to Hera's level of like bickering and that sort of thing, or pushback with Zeus. There's nobody.

SPEAKER_01 40:06

So I get all of my mythology from the uh games Hades and Hades 2. Okay, yeah. Both of those I think are still more accurate than what I saw in this movie, but I enjoyed all three of those things.

SPEAKER_03 40:18

So let's move on to Maggie Smith. So she plays Thetis. She, of anybody that we're talking about today, I think has passed the most recently. She just passed in 2024. Yeah. And there is a whole generation of people who know her for something totally different. But let's go through her filmography. I think that with one very notable exception, I have all film work for her. Also uh double winning Oscar. Oh, yeah, yeah. Uh I don't I wasn't gonna say that correctly. Double Oscar winning actress. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 41:01

I'm like, do they make a double Oscar?

SPEAKER_03 41:03

So she, and this wasn't even the first time she worked with Olivier, because again, all these British actors, a lot of them crossed paths a lot. She too was an Othello. Perfect. She got Best Supporting Actress nomination for that. Her first win, Best Actress, was for the film The Prime of Miss Jean Brody. Okay. She was in the film Oh, what a lovely war. She gets her next nomination, also Best Actress for Travels with My Aunt. So we have How to Murder Your Rich Uncle and then Travels with My Aunt.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

Is there a connection?

SPEAKER_03 41:41

Probably not, but I just like when I noticed that. She was in Love and Pain and the Whole Damn Thing. Okay. I love some of these titles. Murder by Death. We've brought that up before. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 41:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 41:55

Death on the Nile. Is that a I got the Christie?

SPEAKER_01 41:58

It is. I don't know what like the order of the books are, but I know when Fox started coming out with those they had uh murder on the Orient Express, that Death on the Nile just kind of like seamlessly like followed as the sequel. And then I think A Killing in Venice.

SPEAKER_03 42:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 42:16

Was the one that we saw where we watched that one, right? Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 42:18

With Tina Faye, right?

SPEAKER_01 42:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 42:20

Yeah. Okay. So she gets her next Oscar win, this time in the best supporting actress category for California Suite. She follows that up with another best supporting nomination for A Room with a View. We could do that at some point. Uh that I think was um that's the first time she worked with Bellatrix. Oh, really? Mm-hmm. Because she's in that movie.

SPEAKER_01 42:47

Pulling a bottom carter.

SPEAKER_03 42:48

There you go. She's in Hook. She is in Sister Act. She returns for Sister Act 2, Back in the Habit. She was in the 1995 Richard III. So a lot of different I mean, holy shit. Shakespeare, it's I mean, so many different iterations of his works. And then here we go. So a whole generation of people know her. What's the character name? I didn't actually write it down.

SPEAKER_01 43:13

Professor Minerva Minerva Megonegal.

SPEAKER_03 43:16

There you go. Good job. So she's in every single one of the Harry Potter movies, except for Deathly Hallows Part One, because I think that's just when they're on their their journeys. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 43:26

Their journeys. They're just uh being really sad in the cold.

SPEAKER_03 43:29

They are so sad.

SPEAKER_01 43:30

Kind of getting a little snappy with each other.

SPEAKER_03 43:33

Oh, gotta find the horcrates. Oh my god, they're so sad. Um, so she's in that, and then actually, probably um another group of people know her from I I mean, I kind of like feel like they're all connected. Like, so she gets best supporting actress for Gosford Park, but I feel like that's like really close to then eventually she was on Downton Abbey.

SPEAKER_01 43:52

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 43:53

Aren't they all kind of like the same kind of thing? I don't know, I never watched any of that.

SPEAKER_01 43:58

I thought as I assume. Many did that, it was like, what is this downtown Abbey thing?

SPEAKER_03 44:02

I always called it by the wrong name. Yeah. Yeah. So she so it originated as a TV series. And then they're like, you know what? Let's make some movies. And so she's in the film version of Downtown Abbey. And then one of her last credits before she passed was the sequel, A New Era. And then also, I didn't realize that this had, and it's kind of funny. So she was in the best exotic Marigold Hotel. And then a sequel, the second best exotic Marigold Hotel.

SPEAKER_01 44:31

Not as good as the first one, but pretty good. Funny sequel title. Second best.

SPEAKER_03 44:36

Okay. This is so fascinating to me. So Ursula Andris. Yes. So she is Aphrodite.

SPEAKER_01 44:43

Uh-huh. It's very interesting that she was Aphrodite. It makes sense.

SPEAKER_03 44:47

All of one line in this entire fucking movie. Yeah. She speaks once. Once in this entire film.

SPEAKER_01 44:55

What is she like, why is Zeus so upset? Like something something like that. Like, what's the big deal?

SPEAKER_03 45:02

What's the big deal? So she's still with us. She turns 90 in March. So as of this recording, she turns 90 next month. And yeah, I mean, this is what I thought was interesting. I did not realize she's because Dr. No.

SPEAKER_01 45:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 45:22

Okay, so she's a Bond girl, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:24

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_03 45:25

Don't you know? Isn't that how you know her?

SPEAKER_01 45:27

No. Well, I mean, I I I would recognize I I I don't remember her from Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_03 45:34

Cause she's in Dr. No. She plays a character named Honeywriter.

SPEAKER_01 45:38

Yeah, that sounds right.

SPEAKER_03 45:39

But isn't Casino Royale also a James Bond movie?

SPEAKER_01 45:44

It is, but it's interesting because there was like a much older, I think, Casino Royale with uh sellers in it.

SPEAKER_03 45:52

Oh, which then that's what she's part of.

SPEAKER_01 45:54

Yeah, so it she wasn't.

SPEAKER_03 45:56

Casino Royale was one of the more recent films, right?

SPEAKER_01 45:58

It was, and it Okay. Yeah, that's where I got confused. It was the first Daniel Craig one, but it was also like an older, older, like I think that's what I was thinking.

SPEAKER_03 46:07

So it's like, how could she play two different characters? And I was wrong. The other one is just a completely different Casino Royale that has nothing to do with James Bond.

SPEAKER_01 46:15

But well, no, it it did, but it was just like different, and so she actually plays Vesper, which is who um the Penny Dreadful actually, Eva Green, played.

SPEAKER_03 46:26

Oh my god, really?

SPEAKER_01 46:27

So that's the character that she that she played.

SPEAKER_03 46:29

Well, okay. I also thought it was fascinating because she's in a movie called The Mountain of the Cannibal God. And then she's I mean, she did not have quite the extensive filmography as some of these other people. And her last credit, she is probably retired at this point, because it was over 20 years ago, is a film called The St. Francis Birds Tour.

SPEAKER_01 46:50

Interesting. Interest what's interesting is that she was the goddess of love, and her and Hamlin ended up uh having a kid.

SPEAKER_03 47:00

I read that. I'm glad you brought that up because I had forgotten, but that is so fucking random.

SPEAKER_01 47:05

Because there wasn't it it was um not like a 20-year age gap, but she was she was fairly older than him, which just good like he's apparently Harry Hamlin is the anti-Leo DiCaprio.

SPEAKER_03 47:19

That good for him.

SPEAKER_01 47:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 47:21

Good for him.

unknown 47:22

Right?

SPEAKER_03 47:23

Age ain't nothing but a number. But also it helps when it's Ursula Andrus.

SPEAKER_01 47:27

There were apparently rumors that they had been engaged, but they never they never got married, but they did have a a kid. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 47:34

Okay. So moving on to uh Jack Willem.

SPEAKER_01 47:40

That's what I said, right, the intro, where he was just like, as you wish, my lord, to the uh Kraken comment.

SPEAKER_03 47:46

And so he plays Poseidon. Uh he too has passed. He passed in 2001.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

He didn't get a whole lot to do.

SPEAKER_03 47:54

He got like he got like nothing to do.

SPEAKER_01 47:57

And got to pretend that he was floating and looking up in kind of like horror.

SPEAKER_03 48:02

Yeah, and that's the other thing too. It's like they made him look, I'm using my hands again, like a little pipsqueak next to the kraken.

SPEAKER_01 48:11

The scaling was all The scaling was off. Because see, like when you see him underwater, it's like it's like Godzilla coming out.

SPEAKER_03 48:19

He's literally God of the sea.

SPEAKER_01 48:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 48:22

And he looks like Ant-Man next to Ant-Man when he's the size of an ant next to the Kraken. Like it it was just bizarre.

SPEAKER_01 48:34

What annoyed me was the inconsistency of the scaling. Because it's like, well, how big is the thing? Because he looks like he's like a skyscraper size, and then when he comes out of the water, it wasn't quite the same.

SPEAKER_03 48:47

And and I also didn't really understand why he was transformed into a seagull to go up to it's called sea, seagull. Oh maybe to go up to Olympus, like, okay, like I don't I don't know. It just was they did some they made some interesting choices.

SPEAKER_01 49:09

I don't think choices I would have made, but it are you suggesting that a seagull would not have flown from the coast all the way up to the top of Mount Olympus?

SPEAKER_03 49:19

He doesn't need to become a seagull, see a sequel, a seagull to do that. So he he's a god. He can literally just do whatever he wants. Like he doesn't have to like transform. Teleport. And for nobody, like I understand, like in the myths, gods will guide gods and goddesses will also will often transform into things like we talked about the golden shower. But it's it's for the purposes of doing that for a human, yeah. They don't just need to like on their own be like, oh, I gotta get to Olympus. I better turn myself into a seagull. Like it anyway. That's just uh that's just me. But I got nothing. Sorry, I know I'm really harping hard on this film for that kind of stuff, but let's go through his credits.

SPEAKER_01 50:03

Um the real reason they did that because just so they could have the credits roll with something. They did. That's that's why they did.

SPEAKER_03 50:12

It was very uneven. But his credits, I have all films for him and pretty amazing filmography. So he was in Solomon and Sheba, Sword of the Sherwood Forest, Lawrence of Arabia, he was in Jason and the Argonauts. Okay, The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb. Nice. Interesting title here. Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die. Ypes. Uh, he was in A Man for All Seasons, Patton, so like not back to back, I believe, but uh both best picture winners.

SPEAKER_01 50:47

He was also in Casino Royale, by the way, which was Oh, I missed that. I thought it was, but it it's like a spoof. It's like a spy spoof.

SPEAKER_03 50:54

Oh interesting that they used that title for an actual Bond movie.

SPEAKER_01 50:58

Very much.

SPEAKER_03 50:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 50:59

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 50:59

Cromwell. So I just thought this was hilarious. He has an uncredited credit in Annie Hall as God. Okay. He so this is what I brought up earlier. So Lawrence Lily plays Van Helsing in 79's Dracula. He plays Van Helsing in the Monster Squad. Didn't we see that? We did. It is not the I didn't grow up with that movie.

SPEAKER_01 51:25

That was wow. Wow.

SPEAKER_03 51:27

Um, it's one of those, I think you gotta, that nostalgia has to hit you in the right place, and it didn't hit for me because I didn't watch it as a kid.

SPEAKER_01 51:33

No, it was so it was honestly pretty bad.

SPEAKER_03 51:37

But we might cover it at some point, to be honest. And then his final credit was 2001's Blue Shark Hash. Nice. Okay. Um, we still have a couple of the pretty big cast, so sorry. Still got some people to go. Um, next up is Athena. Again, not a lot to do. This was her first film role played by Susan Fleetwood. She too is past, she passed in '95. I mean, I loved it. It looked like a real owl.

unknown 52:05

I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 52:06

Um maybe. It the yeah, and that is that is those not boo-bo.

SPEAKER_01 52:11

No bo boo-boo-boo?

SPEAKER_03 52:12

What is it? Booboo?

SPEAKER_01 52:13

Yeah. But the one that she had at Olympus.

SPEAKER_03 52:16

Her her owl. And and those little touches I love. I love the fact that they show Athena with, I mean, what what do they call it in um Harry Potter? With your animal, whatever. Oh, I don't know. It's like anyway, people know Athena, like the owl is like a representation of her in a lot of ways. So um, yeah, like what was the thing? What do they call it in Harry Potter? Like how the fucking deer was Oh, like, well, that was like his patrona. There you go. Yeah. There you go. That's what I was thinking of. But some of her credits include she did a ton of TV work. I don't have a lot to bring up, but the movie Heat and Dust, she was in the film Young Sherlock Holmes. Oh. And then her final project was the TV series Chandler and Company. All right, moving on to the last of our Olympians. And actually, it's funny because this one sometimes he makes the lists, sometimes he doesn't, of the 12 Olympians, His festis, played by Pat Roach. I know him. Yeah, we've actually brought him up a couple times. So he has passed as well. He passed in 2004. And while he did make a number of TV appearances, I'm gonna focus on his film work. Uh we have him in Barry Lyndon, probably the first time we brought him up. I don't know if we like specifically called him out, but I'm sure we call out the scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

SPEAKER_01 53:49

Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 53:50

So do you wanna explain who he is in that movie?

SPEAKER_01 53:53

He's uh he's the mechanic when they're yeah, they're on the plane. Um Indy is fighting someone, and then this guy, this big guy's like very excited to fight. Yeah, he's like, You want oh, you want to fight? So Indy gets in a fight, he's getting his ass handed to him, but then the plane, like one of the chucks gets moved, and the plane starts spinning around, and yeah, it doesn't end well. Yep. So he's listed as giant Sherpa and first mechanics so I think he's he's also in the he's probably in the very opening, too.

SPEAKER_03 54:25

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_01 54:25

In the bar.

SPEAKER_03 54:26

Okay. He also I don't know who he is, but he has a part in Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. He is in, I mean, when you look at these titles, he was he was a large man, so it makes sense why he why he's credited in Conan the Destroyer as man ape. There you go.

SPEAKER_01 54:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 54:44

He's in Red Sonya. We also brought him up in Willow because he is the Queen's kind of like right-hand man.

SPEAKER_01 54:50

The interesting thing about him being in Conan and Red Sonya is that that's the same universe. Oh, interesting. Same world. And he's two different things, two different characters.

SPEAKER_03 54:59

Isn't Schwarzenegger in both of them too?

SPEAKER_01 55:02

I don't know if he is in Red Sonya, but it's Oh, is Red Sonya Stallone? Somebody's in that. It must be it must be Schwarzenegger, but it's um I thought. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:13

But uh yeah, so Willow, and then he also I'm not sure.

SPEAKER_01 55:17

Yeah, he's in he's in that, but it's not supposed to be about him, it's supposed to be about Red Sonia.

SPEAKER_03 55:21

Okay. Uh Indiana Jones and Last Crusade. So he's in all three of the original indie movies. Uh Robin Hood Prince of Thieves, Cole the Conqueror, and uh that's it. He's so he also He's gonna come up many more times for sure.

SPEAKER_01 55:36

We're gonna we're for like Conan and stuff. And like the never say never Sean Connery Bond movie that he's in.

SPEAKER_03 55:42

So yeah, we haven't done any Bond movies yet. Um he doesn't get a lot to do in this movie, but he is so that is known of this mythological character that he is like uh eh, handyman is really underplaying it. But like he he's very mechanically minded, he's a builder, he's a maker, yeah. And so he makes uh is it boobo? Boobo? Yeah. So he does that for Athena.

SPEAKER_01 56:08

And that's no he's no Daedalus. Daedalus? No. Daedalus? Doodalus? How do you say his name?

SPEAKER_03 56:16

Something about because I hate that word, that's part of that name.

SPEAKER_01 56:21

Daedal.

SPEAKER_03 56:22

No, daed all doodle? I don't like that word.

SPEAKER_01 56:25

I'm not trying to say that.

unknown 56:28

But anyway.

SPEAKER_01 56:28

Doodalus.

SPEAKER_03 56:29

He yeah, and I apparently I read, you know, take this with a grain of salt, but that during the filming, even though he doesn't show up a ton in this movie at all, at one point, um Olivier would like literally lean on him. And because he wasn't well actual support, just to like, yeah. Yeah, so all right, moving on to the humans, uh, again, after Perseus, Andromeda. So the love interest played by Judy Balker, as I'm gonna say that. Uh, I she like looked familiar to me, but I don't think I've seen her in anything else. She I you know, I like her. I like at first she comes across as like a pretty conventional female character and honestly.

SPEAKER_01 57:19

Damsel in distress kind of thing.

SPEAKER_03 57:21

Very damsel in distress. And I will say that that is outside of uh what what's the word I'm looking for? Like taking allowances with the actual Greek mythology component. The other part of this, which is like I get it, that is that is kind of what things were all about back then, but like truly there's this like definition of women being beautiful or not beautiful, and that's like that is pretty much it. If you're beautiful, you're great. If you're not beautiful, you're evil or you're whatever. And um, that's very much part of her character as well. But she does eventually get a little spunk, and I like that.

SPEAKER_01 57:59

Yeah, he tries to uh like Perseus tells her, like, no, you can't come with us, and she's like, actually, you don't tell me.

SPEAKER_03 58:07

Yeah, yeah, I liked that. Like that was cool. So uh she did do you know a lot of TV work, but some of her other credits, um, the film Brother, Son, Sister, Moon, the shooting party, uh, one of those TV series was The Adventures of Black Beauty, and then her last credit, so she's she's probably retired at this point, tells Tales of Albion, and that was in 2016. Okay. Okay, so we have two more people to go. First, Burgess Meredith.

SPEAKER_04 58:39

Heck yeah.

SPEAKER_03 58:40

Who I'm sure okay, so he has come up for one movie. I'm sure he was mentioned when we talked about Rocky IV, even though he's not in that because he has the characters past, but uh, and he and he has passed as well. He passed away in 1997. He plays Ammon. So Amon is he a playwright?

SPEAKER_01 59:01

He says he is. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 59:03

He comes across Perseus, seems to know all about him.

SPEAKER_01 59:09

He yeah, he like they know all about him. He's written a play about him.

SPEAKER_03 59:13

Yeah, so kind of bizarre. Um, and then for his part, Perseus is like, where am I? Who are you? What's this city? Like, he doesn't joppa doesn't really know much of the world at all. And Amon kind of just takes him under his wing and and helps him through this journey, uh, the hero's journey.

SPEAKER_02 59:35

Yep.

SPEAKER_03 59:35

So Meredith, he had an amazing career. You've mentioned it a couple times, I think, at this point. He is most well known as being Mickey from Rocky Mick. And uh but he he I mean he had a long career way before that role came along.

SPEAKER_01 59:52

It's true. That's what I that's what I identify him with, but that's not entirely fair.

SPEAKER_03 59:57

No, it's fine. It's fine. I mean, hopefully that's not something he was ever upset about, but um, especially since he got like a best supporting actor nom from it. But his uh career work includes, and it's it's a little bit of a mix of film and TV, Idiot's Delight of Mice and Men.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:15

Okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:15

He plays Harry and Tom Dick and Harry on our Merry Way. He was in the TV show Mr. Novak. So a whole generation probably knows him as the original penguin.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:28

Yes, that's right. That's yeah. Yep. From the um Adam West old corny Batman.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:35

Correct. Yeah. The TV show.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:38

That's that was that was his thing.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:40

That was his thing. Yeah. And then he did reprise the role for Batman the movie. So that that was like the first iteration. Uh he gets his and he was nominated twice. He gets his both in the best supporting actor category. He gets his first nomination for Day of the Locusts. As mentioned, he did get a nomination for Rocky. He also comes back for Rocky II, three, and then it must be flashbacks. Uh, he's credited for Rocky V.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:04

He also is uh in the movie formerly called Santa Claus the Movie.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:09

That was yes. So we have covered that.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:13

So that is the first time we brought him up, probably. Um, so go check out that episode. Yeah, and you're right. I think that actually even came up in the last, like literally the last episode.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:23

The title just changed on IMDb.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:25

It's so annoying. Just keep it. Santa Claus the movie. What's wrong with that?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:28

They get to call it whatever they want, and you should honor that.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:30

Uh yeah. So he was on the TV show Gloria, and then this is like very appropriate casting. He was in Grumpy Old Men, and then he returns for the sequel, Grumpier Old Men.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:43

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:44

And uh a lot of TV work, but I I kept the focus mostly on film. So finally, finally. I apologize if I am not saying her name correctly. I believe it's pronounced Sean. Oh Sean Phillips. Yeah. So she plays Andromeda's mother, Cassiopeia.

SPEAKER_02 1:02:03

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:03

I love that name. Just rolls right off the tongue. Cassiopeia? Cassiopeia.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:07

It's a pretty cool name.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:08

She too is with us. She will be 93 in May.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:12

So it's not the only time that we're gonna talk about her. She's gonna come up again.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:17

Uh is she?

SPEAKER_01 1:02:20

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:21

Okay, then it's her credit I did not put down. Oh, I know. I know which one you're talking about. Actually, I did put it down. I think I know.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:28

I think so. I think yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:30

Um, another, I think she was Welsh actress. And so some of her credits. I have a fair number of films and a lot of TV mini-series, and some just TV series. So we have Beckett, goodbye, Mr. Chips. She was in the TV miniseries version of How Green Was My Valley. She was uh in the TV miniseries of I Claudius, and also the TV miniseries of Crime and Punishment, and also the TV mini-series of Winston Churchill, The Wilderness Years.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:02

The Wilderness, okay.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:03

Are you thinking Dune? I am. Okay. So, yes, she's in 1984 as Dune, so you're right. If we cover that, we'll bring her up. She was in the film Velmont, The Age of Innocence, and then later in her career, she's still working. Like she has a credit from last year. What? So she she's fucking, she's doing the damn thing. What? Okay. Um, she also has been on the TV show The Magician's House, La Feminikita, and Keeping Faith.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:32

Wow, that's super impressive.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:34

I'm yeah, I mean, keep move it or lose it, you know? Like keep keep doing it, especially if you love it. Alright, film synopsis. Perseus must battle Medusa and the Kraken to save the Princess Andromeda. Sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:49

Yeah. That's it. He has to fulfill his destiny.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:53

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, again, I'm I'm a little bit scratching my head on why the mixed tales why you have to make up the whole Thetis angle. Cause actually, what I if I'm remembering correctly, so Cassapia does do the thing where she talks about like how beautiful her daughter is. In the movie, it's Thetis that gets upset about it. Which I'm sorry about Adrameda is. I mean, I'm not saying like youth is the thing that defines beauty, but she to say she's more beautiful than Thetis is not crazy. I don't know. Um anyway, so she does go on about how beautiful her daughter is, but I think in mythology it's Poseidon who gets upset about her saying that. They all look like a sea creature, it's just not the Kraken.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:52

Yeah, there's not a god out there that takes it really well when they hear a human saying, like, this this person's more beautiful than the god. So jealous. Fucking just don't say that.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:01

Very jealous, very petty.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:03

So yeah, you really don't want to say those kinds of things, but she does. And I think, and then again, why couldn't we have just had Poseidon get upset about it? You still could have had the sea creature, you still could have had all that.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:15

Isn't there like a like a seamstress that that is so um like proud of her work saying that it's like finer than anything they got, and she's turned into like a spider?

SPEAKER_03 1:05:27

Yes. Yeah. Um well that's Androm uh an Anacrid. Okay. Right? Because um That would make sense. I'm I'm not saying the name correctly, but that's where that that's the or origin of that word.

SPEAKER_01 1:05:40

So Well, when I tell you that I get my Greek anthology from Hades 2, there you go. Okay. It's right from the game.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:47

Yeah, I just I don't know. I um this film, look, I'm really glad we covered it because it is one of those like weird childhood movies that like like we've mentioned probably. Parts of it have been ingrained in my brain. But um the nostalgia is what helps me retain my love for it and not much else. The special effects are amazing.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:12

Yeah. We we've we brought up booboo. The it very much was I mean, it's it's we suspected boobo or booboo. It's it's boobo. Boobo. Okay. It very much was introduced to capitalize in the popularity of our two. Well, that's not true. And the name Boo Bo is actually a scientific term for the genus of eagle owls and horned owls.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:34

Oh. So Okay, well I like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:37

Um and the robot was modeled off a different type of owl.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:41

Oh, interesting. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:42

Like they gave you a name, but it like didn't really uh manage it.

SPEAKER_03 1:06:45

The thing too that if I if I may just say very odd to just have that like quick flash of boobage when Denai is breastfeeding Perseus.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:56

Yeah, they showed that, and there was like a few bare ass moments. Even Andromeda had a like a side booby side boob plus bare ass. And then uh, you know, if if it does anything for anyone, there's for sure uh topless shots of Medusa. Sure. If that's if you're into that, it's there.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:15

It just was like, again, a strange choice because like it feels like it's supposed to be kind of a kid's movie or at least a family movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:23

But it was like a breastfeeding thing. So like, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:26

Yeah, sure. And I under I okay, I don't want to, I do not want the pitchfork. They're just asking. There's there's nothing sexual wrong with showing breastfeeding, but they did it because they're like, if we do it like this, then no one can complain. Yeah, that's why I brought up because it's like, okay, I know what you're doing. Yeah. Like, I'm not no idiot, but um This was decades before people started fighting that fight. Sure, sure. I just thought that was odd. I mean, as far as uh I think you kind of answered this question in a way earlier. Watching the movie again.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:59

Yeah, I mean, I bought it just to like have it. And so would I watch it again? Absolutely. Will I watch it from the beginning all the way to the end? Probably not.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:11

That was the other thing too, is that actually um the beginning of the film is fairly accurate in terms of like how her and Perseus get cast off. Like she does effectively like the idea was to to die at sea by the hands of her father.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:30

So And the reason being that the father was so upset that she had this had had that that she had Perseus?

SPEAKER_03 1:08:39

Well, yeah, because there was um what's the word I'm looking for? Uh prophecy that he was gonna be killed by his grandson.

SPEAKER_01 1:08:49

Indirectly.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:50

And so like I think the way that they positioned it in the film is that like, I mean, kinda gross that he was like so jealous of her beauty and didn't want any guys getting with her.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:00

That is kind of Greek.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:01

Real real nasty shit. But um, but like really he in the myths he does like put her in this tower, but it's because he he doesn't want her to get with anybody just because if she should she bear a son, uh he would die.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:15

That would have that would have made made more sense and it would have created some sweet irony.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:21

Very like Oedipus-like in terms of like uh that's why they cast away their kid, because um it was foretold that he was going to like come back and kill his family. So anyway. Uh I say if it's on TV, maybe I'll flip or flip it on for a little bit. I don't know. Um, especially if it's the Medusa sequence for sure. Yeah, that that's it's my favorite part of the whole movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:09:47

That does hold up, I think, when you consider when it was made. Yeah. Like it, yeah, that was really well done. The two-headed dog instead of three heads because it would have taken too long for one more head. I'm like, that's no.

SPEAKER_03 1:09:58

But the Medusa sequence, great atmosphere, great, great everything. Yeah. Uh yeah, I love I love that. So I'm glad I got to see that again.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:07

They needed the whole movie to be like that.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:10

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:11

Somehow.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:12

Yes.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:12

You know.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:13

So if you want to get in touch with us, first I gotta what's the call to action? What's the thing I had earlier that had nothing to do with this movie? I had a call the action. You did? Um, yeah. I was like, somebody knows the answer to that. Oh, um, how many times have James Bond movies have been nominated for an Oscar?

SPEAKER_01 1:10:30

Yeah, that's that's uh that's a good one that makes a lot of sense for this.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:33

Nothing to do with this movie. I'm just curious, like, you know, like I mentioned it's the Medusa sequence that stands out for me more so than the movie on it like in its entirety. And I'm curious for people who maybe saw this as kids, like if there is a certain moment or a certain creature or something that stands out for you that has stuck with you.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:51

I mean, for me, it's just the most obvious call to action, which is what's your preference, the 1980 or the remake? Sure. Sure. Because like, if I'm gonna ask like which was the who is the better Zeus, it's not really fair. Because it's not fair. I mean Because Lawrence Olivier is is like objectively the better the better actor. Like if you look at the career. He just But he was in a tough spot for that for the city.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:16

For multiple reasons, didn't have a lot to do in this movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:19

Yeah, they make Liam Neeson look all like shiny and cool armor and stuff instead of just a bathrobe.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:24

He's I'm sure he wasn't a bad Zeus, but uh reach out to us. We'd love to hear from you. You can connect through Facebook, Instagram, or Blue Sky. It's the same handle at all three. It is at 80smontouch pod in 80s is 80S. Sneak peek. What do we got? So the last episode all romance.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:48

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:49

This is like the antithesis. Although I've never seen it in its entirety, but I feel pretty confident saying that regardless.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:55

No romance.

SPEAKER_03 1:11:56

Romance gone wrong, horribly wrong. Oh. But still comedy. Huh. And it also pairs two actors we've already talked about in a different movie ages ago. And it has the word romance in the title of that other one.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:12

Wait, it's not The War of the Roses? Yes, it is. Is it really?

SPEAKER_03 1:12:16

Good job.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:17

With uh Danny DeVito, because he's in it too, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:12:19

He's in it too.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:20

I think he directs the movie. I don't think I realized it was an 80s movie. It sure is. Wow. Okay. Well, I'm sure I, along with a ton of other people, were fooled into watching this movie based on how quickly it came out after Romancing the Stone, and we thought we were getting into something totally different.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:37

Well, we did get Jewel of the Nile.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:40

But we just pretend that didn't happen.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:43

Yeah, it's not that great of a movie. Um, and this is this is another one of those like talent. We're we're really swinging, we haven't really covered a ton of films in the middle of the decade. We're like swinging from like 80, 81 to 89. This is an 89 movie.

SPEAKER_01 1:12:56

So Well, when we have our James Bond month, we'll we'll be able to cover a lot. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:01

So it's only two. That's uh oh, were there only two in all the 80s that came out?

SPEAKER_01 1:13:06

No, there are many. There are many more.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:08

Okay, I thought I was like, my dad dragged me to more movies when I was a kid than I than two. Um he loved James Bond. So that's what's next up on tap. And in the meantime, just thank you to everyone for making the choice to listen to our podcast. We know you have many options out there. So really appreciate you spending some time with us, and we will talk to you again in two weeks' time.