It's part two of this year's Halloween pairing, looking at 80s vampire films! For this episode, we move to 1987 and the film the really kicked off the whole teenage vampire craze that's still sweeping Hollywood, director Joel Schumacher's "The Lost Boys!" Written by Jan Fischer and James Jeremias, with screenplay help from Jeffrey Boam, the film follows Lucy (Dianne Wiest), a single mother of two boys, Michael (Jason Patric) and his younger brother Sam (Corey Haim), as they find themselves at the "end of the world," being the west coast, in the California community of Santa Clara. They're moving in with Michael and Sam's Grandpa (the incredible Barnard Hughes), and there's a lot of adjusting to be done by all involved. But the three members of the family meet new friends that all bring complications to their lives. Michael meets David (Kiefer Sutherland) and David's girlfriend Star (Jamie Gertz), who Michael falls for almost instantly. Sam meets the Frog Brothers, Edgar (Corey Feldman) and Allen (Jamison Newlander) at the local comic book store. And when Lucy meets Max (Edwrd Hermann), the owners of the local video rental store, sparks fly almost immediately! But most is not as it seems, and the three sets of relationships collide and sweep Grandpa up in a delightfully original vampire tale that's still entertaining 20 years into the 21st century! Finally, the trio reveal their guilty B-Movie pleasures that'll be making up the next pairing!
It's Halloween time again, and as usual, we've got a pair of amazing horror film reviews for you! First up, arguably the best horror/ comedy of all time, but definitely the best of the 1980s! From writer/ director Tom Holland, it's 1985's "Fright Night!" When a vampire moves in next door, you have to try to destroy him, even if no one else believes you, not even the famous "vampire killer" who hosts the weekly horror movie television program! Starring William Ragsdale as Charley Brewster, the young man who notices the vampire moving in, Amanda Bearse as his girlfriend Amy, and Stephen Geoffreys as their "friend" Evil Ed, the film also features Chris Sarandon as Jerry Dandrige (the vampire), and Jonathan Stark as his live-in... ghoul? Golem? No one really knows, but his name is Billy Cole. And finally, the former "vampire killer" is none other than Roddy McDowall as Peter Vincent! It's a favorite of both geeks and the geek-in-training, so you know it's a great film!
For the second film in our pairing of unabashedly, gleefully whimsical comedies, we move to the opposite end of the 80s for the 1989 Weird Al Yankokvic-written treasure that is "UHF!" Starring Yankovic as George Newman, alongside David Bowe as Bob Steckler and Michael Richards as Stanley Spadowski, the film tells the story of a long-suffering dreamer who gets a dream job: Running a tiny UHF television station! George and Bob, with the help of their new janitor, Stanley, try to figure out how to turn around the failing "U62" TV station. When they unexpectedly succeed, however, they begin to threaten the powerhouse VHF station, Channel 8, run by the cruel and merciless R. J. Fletcher (Kevin McCarthy). Add to this mix Victoria Jackson as George's girlfriend Teri, Fran Drescher as receptionist/report Pamela Finklestein, and Anthony Geary (of "General Hospital" fame) as Philo, the station engineer, and this becomes a "Secret Life of Walter Mitty"-esque comedy with great performances, music, and comedy that'll leave you singing the theme to the "Spatula City" commercial long after you've finished the film! And the trio reveal which two 1980s vampire films made their Halloween pairing for this year!
Our next pairing is pure balm for whatever is causing any stress you're feeling, as they are two comedies that hold nothing back and are just genuinely funny! First up, for Episode 224, it's 1980's classic film spoof "Airplane!" Directed by Jim Abrahams, David Zucker, and Jerry Zucker, the movie is based largely on a 1957 thriller called "Zero Hour," that the three caught on VHS tape by accident! They were so taken with how over-the-top the melodrama was in "Zero Hour," that they decided to turn it into a comedy, and created one of THE comedies of the 20th century! Starring "serious actors" like Peter Graves, Lloyd Bridges, Lesley Nielsen, and Robert Stack, and partnering them up with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Julie Hagerty, Robert Hays, Lorna Patterson, and Stephen Stucker, this movie wove its comedy into the straight-faced performances by its entire cast and created a classic that's just as funny today as it was when it premiered! This film also gave us an absolute treasure-trove of memorable lines to quote from here to eternity! A classic that still makes all three hosts laugh!
Episode 223 is the second of our look at Peter Sellers films with, arguably, his finest performances. Yes, plural. Sellers, in fact, plays three separate roles in the film, all three very different! The film is a perfect satire of cold war paranoia and the military's love affair with nuclear weapons, and features some of the most biting commentary on, at that time, modern military thinking ever captured on celluloid. Directed by Stanley Kubrick, and co-starring George C. Scott, Sterling Hayden, Keenan Wynn, Slim Pickens, Peter Bull, and featuring the very first cinematic appearance of James Earl Jones, this is one of those movies we think everyone should see at least once! And the trio reveal which "balls-out" comedies they're pairing up for the next two episodes!
It's part two of this year's Halloween pairing, looking at 80s vampire films! For this episode, we move to 1987 and the film the really kicked off the whole teenage vampire craze that's still sweeping Hollywood, director Joel Schumacher's "The Lost Boys!" Written by Jan Fischer and James Jeremias, with screenplay help from Jeffrey Boam, the film follows Lucy (Dianne Wiest), a single mother of two boys, Michael (Jason Patric) and his younger brother Sam (Corey Haim), as they find themselves at the "end of the world," being the west coast, in the California community of Santa Clara. They're moving in with Michael and Sam's Grandpa (the incredible Barnard Hughes), and there's a lot of adjusting to be done by all involved. But the three members of the family meet new friends that all bring complications to their lives. Michael meets David (Kiefer Sutherland) and David's girlfriend Star (Jamie Gertz), who Michael falls for almost instantly. Sam meets the Frog Brothers, Edgar (Corey Feldman) and Allen (Jamison Newlander) at the local comic book store. And when Lucy meets Max (Edwrd Hermann), the owners of the local video rental store, sparks fly almost immediately! But most is not as it seems, and the three sets of relationships collide and sweep Grandpa up in a delightfully original vampire tale that's still entertaining 20 years into the 21st century! Finally, the trio reveal their guilty B-Movie pleasures that'll be making up the next pairing!
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