Latest / Houselights: A Film Director Podcast / Moon 44 (1990) - Roland Emmerich | Houselights #185

Transcript

Moon 44 (1990) - Roland Emmerich | Houselights #185 · Houselights: A Film Director Podcast

0:03
Welcome to the ned Party. Welcome back to House Lights, our director discussion
0:23
show here on the Nerd Party Network. We're entering a new house today,
0:27
the house of director Roland Emerick. We will cover all of his directed works
0:33
from the nineteen nineties. While you may think that we'd be starting with nineteen
0:37
ninety two's action film Universal Soldier, the title of this podcast will definitely confirm
0:43
that we found a copy of his first nineties work with Moon forty four?
0:49
Why are there forty four moons? Has Emirates watched Cameron's Aliens on repeat on
0:54
LaserDisc? What's the Star Trek connection among these actors? You will find those
0:59
answers today. I am Galactic Mining Board Member number four, Darren Moser,
1:04
and I'm joined again by my friends, helicopter ace pilot John Mills and his
1:11
trusty, trusty navigator Tristan Radell. Well, the shuttles are leaving, so
1:18
we better start our discussion on this gem of a film Moon. I just
1:23
want to take a second to say that, Darren, you got the assignments
1:26
right this time. It's absolutely correct. I'm the too cool for school,
1:32
cigarettes smoking and a pressurized helicopter on a space Moon pilot very pressurized. Yes,
1:38
And Tristan is definitely the guy in my cradle chair spinning around screens making
1:46
sure that I don't crash into mountains with repeated footage. Yeah, because Heaven
1:51
forbid me, Peter footage. I don't know what you're talking about, John,
1:53
that shot of the mining bucket was. I almost started a shot game
1:59
of like, how take a shot every time you see that? Oh man,
2:01
it's so many Well, I just want to say I want to talk
2:04
to the ergonomics professional at their HR department because I feel like it would be
2:09
a great deal easier if they just put two screens next to each other instead
2:13
of one hundred and eighty degrees from each other in a swivel chair. You'd
2:19
think so, but you know, I have to tell you that I work
2:23
with two screens. I work sometimes even with three screens, and I can
2:25
tell you that I get confused all the time with those screens right next to
2:29
each other. And I think, actually, when I go into the office
2:31
tomorrow, I'm actually going to put the screens one in front of me,
2:35
one behind me so that I can always keep track of what is actually happening
2:38
very efficiently. We'll all be doing that by twenty thirty eight. It's just
2:44
how it is, right, it's the future. We haven't caught up yet.
2:46
It's only twenty twenty four right now. That's the first plan up there.
2:50
Separate the screen, second step, change the pivot point of your chair
2:53
to the ceiling. Obvious, makes way more sense. Brilliance, absolute brilliance.
3:00
You know. I think they just went with it because it was cool.
3:01
Honestly. I mean there's a lot of things in this movie that just
3:06
was it was. It was. Oh man, so Moon forty four,
3:13
Yeah, it's it. You know what, let me jump in. It's
3:19
going to be somebody's favorite movie. Oh yeah, I promise you it's somebody's
3:23
favorite movie, because I'll never forget my friend Jason. We talked. We
3:27
were talking about I think the movie was Firefox with Clint Eastwood and yeah,
3:32
but you know, I was sharing some opinions about it, and he goes,
3:38
no, you don't understand. I know somebody it's his favorite movie.
3:40
And I said what. He goes, what Star Wars is for you,
3:44
Firefox is for this guy. I said, you're not really, So I
3:46
promise you that there is somebody out there that Moon forty four is their favorite
3:50
movie. And it's not even rollandem Rick or Dean Devlin. So okay,
3:53
total tangent to what you were saying with with fire Firefox, right, Firefox
3:59
with Firefox. So my browser based movie, not Chromium or anything like that.
4:04
Right. But my dad and I were at the video stores, just
4:08
the two of us, and we're like, let's let's get a movie.
4:11
Let's get a movie. And we see something that looks like a fighter jet
4:15
film. We're like, this looks action packed. We're big fans of Firebirds
4:19
and Iron Eagle and Top Gun. I bet, I bet you it's going
4:23
to be just like this one. And we watched the whole thing and we
4:27
don't see a jet until the last thirty seconds of the movie. Wow.
4:31
And my dad and I just look at each other like, why that was
4:35
not what we expected. And but Moon forty four was sadly pretty much what
4:44
I expected. Well, you know, I think to start off on a
4:48
positive note, I am really interested as we go into this new house with
4:53
Emeric and the nineties, because a lot of his nineties movies are very big
4:59
name? Are they all the best movies? Will decide in the next couple
5:02
of weeks. But I am really interested in seeing his progression. I'm interested
5:09
in looking at those later films now with this lens of oh yeah, well
5:13
he kind of did that in a poorer way on Moon forty four, but
5:17
then he got it right, you know later on Stargate or something like that.
5:21
Like I really am curious as he is really coming into his own.
5:26
This was his first English only movie, so he had done other movies that
5:31
were in German and also in English, but this one, I don't want
5:36
to say put him on the map, but it's you know, he's going
5:40
in the right direction with this, and it's only a few years later.
5:45
Are we going to get Universal Soldier and then Stargate and then Independence Day?
5:49
So all that to say, yes, Tristan, this is a movie.
5:56
Like I was joking in the very beginning of have you seen Aliens? Because
6:00
I'm sure he has, because man from Evil Company to some of the shots
6:08
on Moon forty four, like I felt like they just took the sets and
6:13
brought them over to this movie. The only reason why I can tell that
6:19
the people who made this movie had ever seen a movie before was because the
6:24
production design was complete ripoff from the Alien franchise. If it wasn't for that
6:29
production design, I would think, like, has this person ever ever ever
6:32
seen a motion picture before and seen how humans talk? Well, I would
6:38
say that also there's a definite flavor of Blade Runner about it as well.
6:44
There's a sprinkle, a whisper of cinnamon if you will. Yeah, it's
6:48
like a you know, the base is Aliens and the you know, the
6:53
sprinkle on top of the whip cream, which is helicopters in space, which
6:57
you have to admit is not something that really, you know, is something
7:01
that I've ever considered as the thing that atmosphere on a moon if it was
7:06
helicopters literally in space bridge too far true True, Also some odd choices in
7:15
terms of the I mean to speak to your point Tristed about you know,
7:21
you're jokingly saying had these people ever seen a movie before? I think that
7:26
the real question is did they sit down and map out the topography of where
7:31
they were going? Because I'd say that is undoubtedly the biggest thing that I
7:36
want to see grow in Emeric's trajectory here, because I remember his movies from
7:42
the nineties and I don't remember him struggling the same way I did watching this
7:46
movie of where am I in relation to anything else happening right now? Because
7:51
basically, wherever the helicopter was flying, what was in front of it was
7:56
whatever needed to be dictated for some shot, as opposed to a sense that
8:00
you know, I'll say whatever else you want to say about like the Phantom
8:05
Menace, you have a sense of the course in the pod race, there's
8:11
a map in your head. You're like, I could find my way around
8:13
there. This doesn't have that map, and I what I want to know
8:18
is like, was that just that Emeric was just dreaming too big for the
8:24
budget that he had? Like is this is there anything about this where like
8:28
you look at the script and you're like, you know, the script isn't
8:31
great, but it's not bad necessarily. Yeah, that's my first question.
8:37
But my second question is like, is this just something where the script was
8:41
so large in their heads that the only way you would have been able to
8:45
make this in nineteen ninety is with four times the budget? Right? Like
8:50
you you have a very hungry filmmaker that just is aching to get the movie
8:54
done and just doesn't have the resources necessary to make his vision happen. I
9:01
don't even see the bones of that, I don't. I think that's a
9:07
very valid question because I think there's a lot of times when you see a
9:11
movie where they're trying to do too much, or you can see that you
9:16
can see a movie with studio interference, or a movie that clearly has a
9:20
lack of budget or clearly ran out of money by the time they get to
9:26
the third act. You know, like, there's there's so many times you
9:28
see that with this movie, I see no redeeming qualities when it comes to
9:33
the script or the acting or the direction. It's just it's the plot.
9:37
I've never it's so rare to find a plot that is so simplistic yet hard
9:43
to follow, you know, like you're talking about the geography of where they
9:48
are in the building, or where they are in the helicopters, where they
9:50
are on the terrain, which I think extremely valid points and something that we
9:54
really like to focus on on houselights, especially when we're dealing with directors for
10:00
or beginning of their first works. We kind of that's a recurring theme that
10:03
I think we've noticed is that from an editing standpoint and from a cinematography standpoint,
10:09
it's sometimes easy to get lost in the geography of the moment, in
10:15
the physical space. I get lost in the geography of the of the script.
10:20
I just I don't understand the point of this movie. I don't.
10:24
I don't get the message that it's trying to say. I it's it's anti
10:28
corporate, It's it's clearly anti corporate at some point. But there's I get
10:35
lost so much in this I have such a hard time caring. I don't
10:39
know who I'm supposed to root for, and and the protagonist is one of
10:45
the weakest protagonists I've ever seen. I'm going off on a tie raide right
10:48
now, but there's this. I'm sorry, I just I can't find any
10:52
redeeming value in this movie whatsoever? Now? And I mean to your point
10:58
on the geography, john and I can think of two anchor you know,
11:03
landmarks when they're outside. There's the dead end where all the crash ships are,
11:07
and there's just outside their compound, like that's it. Everything else is
11:13
you're flying through Johnny quest intro. But I feel like, you know,
11:20
in science fiction especially, it's always really important to have rules that you live
11:28
by. The rules are how ships are governed, how communications happen, what
11:33
can and can't be done. And as long as you set those rules and
11:37
then follow them, the audience is kind of kind of know what to expect,
11:41
know what is dangerous or difficult. I was always trying to figure out
11:48
what exactly the navigators were doing and why this whole pilot navigator thing, because
11:56
sometimes it was like, you can't see around the next so we're going to
12:01
tell you that you need to pull up. And then sometimes it was like
12:05
I'm literally going to target your weapons for you. And it always felt like
12:11
there was also speed two and speed and it just it never it never clicked
12:16
because I was like, and then they're using these terms like, oh,
12:18
a little to your left, I'm like, that is the vaguest direction to
12:22
give a pilot who's flying through a canyon. The thing is, with my
12:28
fear of flying, That's exactly how I think control towers speak to pilots.
12:33
They say little to your left, little too, and they just let them
12:35
sort of figure it out from there. They don't say, like, you
12:37
know, okay, trim four degrees, so you're you know, like whatever
12:41
technical jargon that they have. But but in terms of that pilot navigator thing,
12:45
I you know, what I want to hug the cactus here. I
12:46
want to go right for this, okay, because Key at one point is
12:52
a poor navigator who is abused rather harshly in I don't even want to say
13:00
what they imply happens, and then of course that turns into well, he
13:05
exacts his revenge by making his pilot crash, and then Dean Deviln's character,
13:11
Tyler tries to stop him from from doing it. And that is one of
13:16
those things that I think speaks to the confusion of the motivations of the characters,
13:20
because with what happens to that navigator in the showers, I don't know
13:24
why anybody would stop him from doing what he does to increase the speed and
13:31
make the guy crash. Not only did Tyler stop him, he shakes him
13:37
and screams, why when he's the one that discovered when he's the one who
13:43
discovered me, the one who knows of any of them? Why, if
13:46
anything, I'll go out on a limb. And that seems like a scene
13:50
where they had it written and they did that, and then they maybe changed
13:54
what happened to him later, because we all know they don't shoot in sequences.
13:58
Something happens. He now wants revenge. What what is the thing that
14:01
happens? We'll we'll get to that figure that one out later. Yeah,
14:05
it could be, uh, because the two things just don't line up.
14:11
And the thing that is unsettling to me is simply the fact that the poor
14:18
kid simply being bullied and harassed and pushed around and like tripped in the mess
14:22
hall and stuff like that, that's enough to push him and have him snap.
14:28
What they have happened in the movie is so gratuitously. I remember sitting
14:33
there, I'm watching it. I'm like, are we really doing this?
14:37
Like is that X? And then all the other pilots walk out and I'm
14:39
like, whoa what I am watching this? All of them are complicit and
14:46
what just happened? And so it's it's no longer like two factions who need
14:54
to just learn to get along. Drawn lines have been drawn. We have
14:58
eve evil people m M and then innocent victims, and but then we have
15:07
horrible things happened to the victims. And you have like one I don't know,
15:13
like you have Cookie who like who drugs somebody but then feels bad about
15:18
it, and then like we have this moment when he talks about how,
15:22
you know what what he likes about being a drug dealer to the guy who
15:24
he tried to kill. And then all of a sudden, I'm just like,
15:26
what am I suposed to feel? Am I supposed to feel bad for?
15:28
Cookie? Am I supposed to feel bad for the guy who was drugged,
15:31
who's complicit in the in the rape? You know, like what what?
15:35
What am I supposed to feel? Who am I supposed to root for?
15:39
Well? And and they're it's like they're wanting both sides. They want
15:43
these despicable convicts, these prisoners that you know, have no redeeming qualities.
15:48
They're the dredge of societies. But they they have to to fight, you
15:52
know, to earn time off their sentence. But we also want to empathize
15:56
with them. It's like, but you can't have and and maybe you can,
16:03
you know, like I think with with Brian Thompson's you know, Jake
16:07
O'Neill, his character had the most most arc, you know, he had
16:10
the sacrifice at the end, but they didn't make him the character that like
16:15
you know, rapes his navigator. You know, it's he he has the
16:18
most to kind of arc his plot, but it can't like I said,
16:23
it's like you, you kind of can't have it both ways. They try
16:27
to. Yeah, I just that whole thing. It's so blisteringly unnecessary is
16:33
it to get an R rating? Because there were times during a lot of
16:36
this like maybe a little bit of swearing. But besides that scene, is
16:41
it even like this would be a PG thirteen movie. There's there's blood.
16:45
Really, honestly, it's it's very tame overall. There is nothing about the
16:52
construction of this movie that makes me think they had rating in mind at all.
16:56
You know, like there are movies where you can watch where it's like,
16:59
oh, okay, they did that, or they pulled back on that,
17:00
or they punched that up because they were thinking there's a board sitting sitting
17:03
of ratings. I honestly, the whole vibe I get from Moon forty four
17:08
is this was a group of people throwing this together because there were some investors
17:15
that wanted to make a movie or something like. There's nothing about this that
17:18
feels like a movie that where anybody sat down and said, this is a
17:22
story that has to be told. This is a movie put together that I
17:26
am humble enough to say that if I had been given the chance to make
17:30
a movie at some point in my life. This is probably how it would
17:33
have turned out with the subtraction of the shower scene, because even I have
17:37
limits, and I think that this very much is just a bunch of ideas
17:45
slapped together in an attempt to get a foothold in the American film arena.
17:51
Right, I can put this together, I can manage the project. I
17:53
can have the thing go. And there is a sense because we reference aliens,
18:00
but there is a sense along the same lines of like a terminator where
18:03
it's like, oh, if I can just put this together, I can
18:06
maybe get like a little bit of a cult hit or some sort of like
18:08
some sort of traction where I at least have something on my calling card where
18:12
I can say, yes, I've directed a film of a some sort of
18:17
appreciable budget, where I have some modicum of recognizable talent in it, and
18:23
the production made it in on time, got released and got done and there's
18:29
nothing like the So the whole movie feels just like a business transaction. And
18:33
I think that's sort of what is so empty about the experience. Well,
18:37
because you're in the era of like Enemy Mine, you know, you're pushing
18:42
effects like they're obviously models, but they're decent models. There's like so much
18:48
Hayes, but you know, I guess that's how you hide the seams.
18:53
But you're also right in this time of early nineties where CGI isn't really a
19:00
huge thing yet it's very expensive, like ILM is the only one doing that
19:04
to that level. So you're kind of right at that tipping point of you
19:11
can do pretty decent effects, but they're not going to look as real as
19:17
what's right around the corner and about to happen in cinema, and that,
19:21
you know, it's kind of hampering it to a point on the on the
19:23
effects side. In one sense, I'm actually stunned because I just took a
19:29
look while while you were talking there, Darren, that the budget was fifteen
19:33
million dollars. How because the year before this comes out, Batman, our
19:41
beloved Batman from nineteen eighty nine, was what like thirty two to thirty three
19:45
million dollar budget, which was huge. That was considered a huge budget.
19:51
If I have to that budget, I'm gonna be honest, I would have
19:53
expected better visuals than this. I don't know if that's I don't know if
19:59
that's I don't know who did the effects, like what effects house did,
20:03
and that could be where you put good money. But if you're only as
20:07
good as the effects house, you get for these shots, like there were
20:08
a couple of shots, you know, when the fighters were deploying out of
20:14
the spaceships where I could tell there was like a tiny shadow at the beginning
20:18
of the sequence, and you could tell when it was looping, like obviously
20:22
it's looping, but it just little little things like that. Or you know,
20:26
as we were joking about the giant claw excavator shot that we saw probably
20:33
six seven times at least at least in this well aside from effects, let's
20:41
keep on the people for a moment. Tristan, you're in you're casting for
20:45
your nineteen ninety boardroom and you are lucky enough to get Roscoe Lee Brown and
20:51
his velvety voice of power of command. You also get that weird general guy
20:57
or however he would there was. It was a weird casting all around that
21:02
table. But what were your thoughts on just how they framed this movie with
21:07
that boardroom scene, with you know, it's the far future in Moon forty
21:12
four, they're trying to make us care. But how is that scene playing
21:15
off to you? The general guy was so terrible. I didn't believe a
21:25
single word that came out of his mouth. And you could tell that Roscoe
21:27
Lee Brown was clearly doing somebody a favor. Same with McDowell. Yeah,
21:33
you know, they were clearly his post clockworkrins like McDowell can pick his movies
21:37
at this point, I'm sure. Well, it'll keep in mind McDowell,
21:41
just like any other actor, has a fallow period at one point, right,
21:45
Like Alec Guinness was having his fellow period when he hit Star Wars,
21:49
and McDowell is he had a little bit of a career resurgence in the nineties
21:55
and this is but this is not when he's high end demand actor yet,
22:02
right, he hasn't. He hasn't had that resurgence, as I recall it,
22:04
for four years from generations. So yes, and I think that by
22:10
the amount of screen time, I think that Brown and McDowell were paid for
22:15
about two days worth of work each. Oh oh, definitely if that.
22:19
If that, yeah, it's like, all right, I'm here, you
22:23
get I'm you know what you paid three action shots, that's it. Yes,
22:30
at least one of them got to be calculon and come on and go.
22:33
I don't do two takes. Amateurs do two takes. I I uh
22:40
but yeah, I And that doesn't take anything away from them. Like McDowell
22:44
and Brown, I don't think are giving their most inspired performances, but they
22:48
showed up and they like they remembered their lines and they delivered them as well
22:52
as this movie. Brown was the best thing in that room that everything,
22:56
Like if he was not in there, like you would have lost a lot
23:00
out of that movie, totally, like I and he's delivering all his lines
23:03
like like they're Shakespeare and they're not Shakespeare, but he's he's committed, which
23:10
I have to appreciate. Yeah, it was. Man, I just can't
23:15
I can't get over Michael Pear as Felix Stone. He's just just a charismatic
23:21
void in the shape of a man. I just I mean, he just
23:26
sucked the energy out of the room with whatever scene he was in. And
23:32
he I mean, you start off with a horrible conference room scene and then
23:37
you're like this couldn't get any worse, and then Felix Stone walks in and
23:41
all of a sudden, he's you know, like we're supposed to think he's
23:45
just he's a smart cop because he's on the edge with bullets. Yeah,
23:49
because because he read he reads books. So you know, like I,
23:56
the thing is, pair is not He's not in demand the way a Russell
24:03
Crowe at the height of his career is. He's not like a Christian Bale.
24:07
But he is an actor who consistently gets work in these B movie ranges.
24:11
Okay, okay, no, no, no, no. He does
24:15
not consistently get work in B movie ranges. He consistently gets work in D
24:19
movie ranges. If you look at his filmography, I mean, yeah,
24:25
this guy's a worker. He's made a career out of acting. Kudos to
24:27
him. But you look at his filmography, and the only place you're going
24:33
to find those movies, if you find a physical copy at all, is
24:36
at the bottom of a Walmart bin. That's the only place you're going to
24:38
find those way. He was in The Lincoln Lawyer. That was a movie
24:41
that was in theaters, right, So he was the lead in The Lincoln
24:45
Lawyer. That's true. But that's what I'm saying is you know, I
24:49
listen, he's the type of actor I think that you know, Yes,
24:52
he's got a niche but I think that the director, you know I always
24:59
borrow from Ebert, the director is the one that's responsible for getting the performance
25:03
out of the actor that he needs. And I think that it's very apparent
25:07
that pair got no direction other than okay, sit there, pull the cigarette
25:12
out, light the cigarette like emoting in this entire movie. Dean Devlin,
25:22
I felt like that was the character I probably connected with the most. He
25:26
had you know, yeah, you had to you had. He was the
25:30
only one that had any kind of clear defined motivation. I mean, he
25:33
spelled it out for us, but he was the only one. I mean,
25:37
I think that Leon Rippy's master Sergeant Psykes had a very clear, uh
25:41
motivation to be loud and angry with everybody and listen. I like, I
25:48
like a good old fashioned Leon Rippy performance. I do. I like the
25:52
guy a joy. He is better than this movie, I think, yeah,
25:59
kind of is. Yeah. I think he's one of the few actors
26:03
that you might not recognize. I mean, we're all big sci fi fans,
26:04
so we know who Brian Thompson is. Brian Thompson, he's a worker.
26:08
He shows up, he looks like he's going to break you in two
26:11
and he does his job. He does not cling on makeup. Yeah,
26:15
like he's got that jaw line for days. Big big Brian Thompson fan here
26:21
and like John, like you said Malcolm Midel and Brown clearly showed up for
26:26
the day and said like this is what you got. But Leon Rippy,
26:30
he he has done really great work. And unfortunately we're not going to cover
26:37
Roland Emericks two thousand film The Patriot, but Leon Rippy gives a phenomenal heart
26:44
wrenching performance in that movie. I haven't watched that in a very long time.
26:48
At who stay tuned, everybody, Maybe we do a head fake for
26:51
The Patriot, because I haven't seen that since it was in movie theaters and
26:53
I want to give it another chance because I hated it back in two thousand.
26:56
But anyway, I think that I did. But I like Leon Rippy.
27:00
That's the thing is like a movie like this is not good. Okay
27:06
spoilers from my review at the end of the show. I'm sorry it's not
27:10
good. But if there was a little more of that Leon Rippy vibe throughout
27:15
this this somebody else had shown up with his sense of like I'm gonna just
27:21
absolutely kick this script in the teeth, and I'm gonna make it seem like
27:25
I absolutely have to deliver these lines. I needed one more Leon Rippey.
27:30
I mean, Dean Devlin does show he's trying to do something, so at
27:34
least there's something happening there. He's trying. You can tell Dean Devlin is
27:38
trying. Is he the greatest actor ever? No, but he's there.
27:41
He showed up, he set his lines, he had a memorized He's like,
27:45
I'm here, boss. And that's the thing where I'll give you credit
27:48
with your criticism of Michael pere Is. I needed Leon Rippy energy in that
27:55
Felix Stone character. I didn't need subdued dude. I needed I needed fire
28:02
in that Michael. Michael Pearr was trying to play cool and a loof,
28:06
But unfortunately he is not cool and a loof. Neither am I If I
28:11
tried to play cool and a loof, it would not come off. You
28:12
know it just it just doesn't work. It's not his lane. Maybe he
28:17
developed it later on. Maybe he's like the coolest and most aloof person in
28:21
later movies. I have no idea, but in this one you can tell
28:23
he is betraying himself by there's so many, so many times. And I've
28:29
seen this in student films, I've seen it in I've seen it in theater,
28:33
I've seen it in person. I've seen it in low budget movies where
28:37
the actor tries to play disinterested or aloof and they just come off as sleepy.
28:44
And I think that's what happened with Michael Perem. I'd say that's fair.
28:49
But again, the director could have fixed that, could have given him
28:52
notes and gotten something, because I don't think that even a movie like this
28:56
does only one take for every scene. They have to tried at least twice
29:00
for each go round. And you think that in the course of it,
29:04
Emeric would have said, no, you know what, I need something a
29:07
little more, with a little more oomph. Here, give me something,
29:10
give me something with fire in this And it's completely on a sound stage,
29:12
like there's nothing outside anywhere in this entire movie, So you have control of
29:18
your element. Yeah. No, I I was always thinking about the framing
29:22
device of the I've watched Aliens and the Company and all of that. You
29:27
know, it almost be better if you took all that out, all the
29:33
you know, flash Gordon Crawl of the Year is this and this is what
29:37
mining is, and like all that out and you just drop us on a
29:40
planet and you have two gangs. You have the you know, the prisoners
29:45
that have to be pilots, and you have the navigators that have some you
29:49
know, millennial screwed over contract that they can't get out of, you know,
29:55
being squashed by the man. Just start the story there and you can
29:57
still have one of the you know better than most prisoners discover that someone's stealing
30:06
the shuttles and try to report it up, and like you could have the
30:08
same bones of the story, but just jump right in and spend more time
30:15
with it. That's actually a better like I would think, oh man,
30:18
that's actually pretty good. But yeah, and then you know, don't do
30:22
the double agent. Don't have Stone be a company man cop that we know,
30:26
like, just make him another convict and take it from there. I
30:30
think that would be much more interesting or yeah, I get the point across.
30:34
Well, I completely agree with you have him be a convict for you
30:38
know, I mean, how many times do we see something like the kan
30:41
Air sort of vibe where it's like, I'm a convict because I killed the
30:45
right people because they were the wrong people to be alive or something like that,
30:48
but like and have him delivered there and he shows up, he's been
30:52
convicted. And the only time we encounter with the company is when somebody's trying
30:56
to report up the theft and they were being attacked, and like you said,
31:00
Darren, it's we're claustrophobic, We're trapped on this thing. We've got
31:03
to get out of here because the bad guys are coming. And you actually
31:07
wind up saving a ton of budget and hokey effects by not having that attack
31:11
in the beginning. That's where I mean, honestly, it happens with like
31:17
zero context and you're just like, what Moon, what is happened three being
31:21
destroyed or whatever. It's like, oh, that means Moon forty four is
31:23
next. Okay, that all of that budget spent for dun Dundune their next.
31:29
That's not worth it. It's not it's not good spending of your money.
31:36
But yeah, I think also with this movie, you know, you're
31:40
you're here in the early nineties, You're you're trying to push the story through.
31:45
But again, I'm looking forward to seeing where it's going, seeing Dean
31:51
Devlin, who is going to be a major player with Roland like they're going
31:56
to be partnered up, he's going to be producing many of his films going
32:00
forward, and this is where it I'll started. So I really like that
32:05
fact of this is definitely a chapter we don't want to ignore from his history.
32:10
Is it like, you know, oh, he graduated from film school,
32:15
made this, and everyone was like, he's going somewhere. No that
32:19
this movie does not tell you that, But it is poising him and putting
32:22
people in his life, in his path that are going to pay off in
32:28
dividends in the next in the next decade that we're going to be covering.
32:31
Oh, without a doubt. I mean Devlin and Emerick, they became like
32:37
an virtually unstoppable you know, producer director duo in the nineties. You know
32:43
that the two names are literally synonymous with each other, like all the way
32:46
into the make himself be the lead actor of all those movies, like some
32:52
other directors we've covered, you know what you have to, But honestly,
32:55
you have to give Devlin credit on that because obviously they tried to become become
32:59
an actor, and but then he realizes, well, maybe my path is
33:04
better suited in this other way to come in and I know that's going to
33:07
show up, you know, as we have those discussions on the you know,
33:12
the next batch of movies and everything. But I just, you know,
33:15
it's one of those things where it's unfortunate because nobody ever wants to spend
33:19
time trashing a movie. And like I said, this has got to be
33:22
somebody's favorite, Like this is somebody's Mad Max or something like that, and
33:25
it's just amazing because, like I, I literally would love to sit down
33:30
with somebody who loves this movie and say, take through it. Why.
33:36
I want to understand because I while I was watching this, I got yeah,
33:40
yes, you know, I love Leon Rippy's energy and everything like that.
33:44
I didn't get anything redeemable. I didn't get any sort of music cues
33:47
that I thought was neat. I didn't get any sort of like nifty thing
33:52
that happened, you know, Like I don't know. I just I struggle
33:57
with saying anything really overly positive about the movie outside of it ended. And
34:01
it was over in less than two hours, and therefore I can't hold a
34:06
grudge. It was short, that's true. I will say there is one
34:09
shot that I literally rewound and watched it again, and it was the first
34:15
time they are the first or second where they're they're gearing up to take off,
34:22
I think for the trainings, so everyone's going to their space helicopters.
34:27
And it's actually a really well done false dolly shot where the dollie is actually
34:36
going across. It goes past a pillar, and then you see the bay
34:40
with the helicopter and above it says six and so and so, like you
34:45
know, we see the two guys walk behind the pillar and then the exact
34:49
right timing they come out the other side. They give each other fizz bumps,
34:52
one goes off and gets in his and then we go buy another pillar,
34:54
and then they were in Bay seven and then Bay eight, and I'm
34:58
pretty sure it's the same bay four times with plates swapped out to say the
35:04
different numbers. But they nailed the timing of entering and exiting the pillar of
35:09
it blocking out the shot for an instant that I thought at first, I'm
35:15
like, wait, that's a large set to build. But because of the
35:21
pillar, I'm like that that's telling me this might be a trick shot.
35:23
And then I watched it again and it was a little more obvious, but
35:27
I was really impressed with that that was a really well done like use of
35:32
we only have one bay, but we want to make it seem like there's
35:36
you know four and I think they pulled it off really well. I mean
35:39
that's fair, and that is I guess the sort of thing that we're watching
35:43
Moon forty four, you know, to get, which you know you alluded
35:46
to previously, is like, where do I see Listen, let's not pretend
35:52
like we don't know the movies we're about to go into. It's not like
35:55
we're discovering Roland Emeric for the first time in the nineteen what he's going to
35:59
do next? Ooh, what's Universal Soldier going to be? Like? But
36:02
that is the sort of technical thing that you want to look for to say,
36:07
Okay, is this somebody who at least has the baseline technical skill so
36:12
that when he gets a bigger budget and a little bit more control, you
36:16
know, yeah, like is he going to be able to keep that production
36:20
on the rails, because ultimately that's what it's always about, is getting the
36:24
production to look the best it possibly can't. I just think Moon forty four
36:30
is screwed out of the hatch. I just this is just something that was
36:32
never going to gel the way it needed to. I need to know that,
36:37
Like, I don't think that this is even a movie where if the
36:40
effects were somehow amazing, would have been Like this to me is a I
36:45
got drunk and I'm watching it on UHF on Saturday night because my date fell
36:51
through, right, and I'm just sort of like, wollow, it's nothing.
36:54
It's not making me think, like, like Tristan said, what are
36:59
we meant to think? What are we meant to feel? Who are we
37:00
supposed to root for? And all that's kind of left up in the air.
37:06
And then he doesn't even have the stones to destroy the data tape at
37:09
the end. What a weird ending, right? That was bizarre? What
37:16
a just what a flat just like flat world two dimensional ending that was.
37:25
I'm so there was really no reason for him not to. Like, So
37:30
the dude takes a gun, I don't care if it's loaded or unloaded into
37:32
a boardroom with a bunch of like high powered officials who apparently own parts of
37:37
the universe, and then he walks out after threatening them, and Brown just
37:44
kind of gives him a smile credits yeah, and then it's done. It's
37:49
like it's like, oh, and then we read out a film. Okay,
37:52
it's over. Here's my charge to anybody listening to the sound of my
37:55
voice. I want that ending, redone as a Mento's mercial. I think
38:00
it can be done. I think it can work. Mentos The fresh Maker,
38:07
only Michael Parrot doesn't turn around at the end. He just keeps walking.
38:10
He keeps walking. Or it's like that Lincoln Park meme that was popular
38:15
a couple of years ago. Yes, okay, yeah, but that that
38:22
ending. Yeah, there's just so much about this. It just doesn't mean
38:24
the optimist prime ending of Transformers where they're playing the Is that the one you're
38:30
thinking of? Yeah, the meme I was talking about. Yeah, that's
38:34
yeah. I'm I'm not cool enough to pull that off. I'm sorry.
38:37
No, he gets Mentos and that's it, and he's lucky. Hey,
38:42
it's not a bad way. You wish you had Transformers, you get ahead,
38:47
Oh, Giant Robots, that's only even lose gooder. All right,
38:54
Well, as we're quickly rounding third because we're running out things to talk about.
39:00
Did have music by Joel Goldsmith who is not Jerry Goldsmith, but it
39:07
yeah, it's music again. I didn't I didn't feel like it was directly
39:13
ripping off any other particular sci fi, even though the story and many of
39:15
the other plot points were. But I think all I really know him from
39:22
are other pieces that he had partnered up on other things, I like Stargate
39:28
and so forth. But any other music ness pop out or is this our
39:31
normal check the box movie? There is absolutely nothing special about this music in
39:37
the least. However, the connection is that later Joel Goldsmith worked with at
39:45
least a production company behind this for Stargate SG one and Stargate Atlantis. So
39:50
that's a Devil and and Emeric production sort of thing. So it's like that
39:53
comes back into their life. I didn't watch those shows. Was the music
39:58
good for those shows? Well? But I'm almost wondering because I think he's
40:02
also on on Stargate. I'm wondering if he's also tagged because of literally the
40:07
intro, like which was taken over from the movie. I think he did,
40:13
like you said, some within the episodes, but I think a lot
40:16
of his credit is just the the theme that was reused and and thus you
40:23
know, gets you. It's like, you know, it's like the TNG
40:27
theme. It's like, oh, it's like, well, that's used in
40:29
the movies, but it's also just played at the beginning of every episode,
40:31
so it doesn't really doesn't mean you're there, you know direct? I think
40:37
you're right because he's credited for every single episode. Okay, that it's gotta
40:39
be the theme. Yeah, that's what. Okay, Yeah, but David's
40:44
a theme. I'm not gonna I love it. It's a good it's a
40:46
good theme. But David David Arnold did the movie music, so I guess
40:52
Joel Goldsmith did the music just for the show's theme. I didn't watch the
40:58
show, so I don't know if the theme is the same. So no,
41:00
you're right. He isn'tlisted under the credits for the movie just but it
41:05
could have been maybe a versioning, like where they adjusted and tweaked it for
41:10
television. I don't know. It would take more research than I we don't
41:15
know willing to do. We don't know. That's it. We don't know.
41:17
We don't know. All right, Well, it's everyone's favorite time here
41:22
on House Lights. We're going to be talking about our good friend Lance Reddick
41:27
we've never met. Where are we going to place him in this movie?
41:34
There's a couple obvious choices, a couple of interesting choices. Maybe he's going
41:38
to be Felix Stone at Tristan. Where are you placing Lance in Moon forty
41:45
four? Oh, like you want to put him in like a dignified role,
41:50
you know, like it was something where he could like portray his gravitas.
41:53
So you know, like you want to put him in something like you
41:57
know Brown's role, you know, Terman Hall, Chairman Hall, or you
42:02
know, he could easily do Malcolm McDowell's role, you know, like add
42:07
some sinister feel to it. But because Michael Parr was just so god awful,
42:16
like having the ability to replace him, I'm going to do that.
42:22
Like even in a hypothetical imaginary world, I am putting Lance Reddick at the
42:27
top of this bill. I can't disagree. That's where I was putting him
42:30
too, because I swing for the fences. Let's try to bring some life
42:35
into this thing and let's just make it work. And I think it's the
42:38
only choice you have, Like you have your time machine, and it's like
42:42
this is the one thing you can do to try to fix this movie.
42:44
I'm like, Felix Stone's got to be gotta be Lance Reddick because at least
42:47
that guy. I know that Reddick is going to give me somebody I care
42:51
about where I'm kind of like, Okay, I'm with you, I'm with
42:52
you, and I will forgive more of what's wrong with the movie. If
42:57
I got him in that role, or if I had even more godlike powers,
43:00
I'd make him the writer and director because I feel like he'd do a
43:05
better job probably. So that's a fair point. Fair point. Well,
43:09
yeah, like I said, I was initially leaning towards the very obvious,
43:15
you know, make him chairman Hall. But I honestly I thought Rosco did
43:19
a great job in that. I mean, for what he was given.
43:22
I mean, he was definitely the man of every minute of those scenes and
43:28
mentos, commercials aside. Yeah, on oh, I don't really want to
43:32
rewatch it imagining as Felix Stone, but I'll just use my imagination of you
43:38
know what little I remember from the last ninety minutes, ninety eight minutes.
43:45
But all right, so we have another unanimous Lance Reddick placement as Felix Stone,
43:51
first time putting him as top billing. But you know that's not hard
43:55
to see why. Okay, as we're gonna slide in to our ratings.
44:01
Keep this train going, Tristan, and tell me why it might be a
44:07
one Who knows? What did this one get? This gets a half star?
44:12
Ooh ooh ooh, Okay, okay, this is the first half star
44:17
I've ever given on this podcast. This is a step above bird Demic in
44:22
my in my eyes, this movie is trash. I mean this it has
44:29
no redeeming value. I don't know if I've been koy about it at the
44:30
beginning. I may have been a little sneaky about how I feel, but
44:35
I mean we could have done the ratings at the very beginning. No one
44:38
changed anyone's minds on this for this discussion. There's just there's so much wrong
44:45
with it. Like this, this is one of those films where like a
44:49
one star would be a Walmart beIN half star is how in blue perfect hell
44:54
did this movie get funding? Like, you know, like it's it tried
44:59
to like so American whomever tried to get the step in the door, you
45:02
know, in into the into the American filmmaker's you know, platform, and
45:09
they failed so spectacularly that they got theatrical releases outside of America, but they
45:15
got straight to video in America. So this was your this was your shot
45:20
to get into America, and you wind up straight to video. Now,
45:22
obviously he did something. He got noticed by someone because he got universal soldier
45:28
and like Darren, like you talked about, you know, like this is
45:30
this is the beginning of him getting into like this is the guy the guy
45:35
did Independence Day. You know, good lord, that's you six years he
45:39
did Independence Day six six years. Crazy turnabout. But I can't. I
45:46
don't. I don't see anything here. I don't see I don't see any
45:50
of that here. I I this this movie sucks. I just ah.
46:01
I feel horrible for laughing at that. I really do, Billy feel horrible
46:07
laughing at that. But in a sense, I enjoy your pain. That's
46:12
why I show up every week. And I can honestly say that my rating
46:16
reflects the fact that I just have consumed so many more more terrible movies than
46:23
you have. I think you have, no I know, I know you
46:27
have. I know you. It's one of those things where like if you
46:30
eat enough like hot peppers, eventually over time you're like, I really need
46:35
a ghost pepper to feel pain anymore. Something like this, this is right
46:40
in my alley of bargain basement, like I was saying, can't get a
46:45
date or my date fell through. It's Saturday night. I'm getting a little
46:49
bit drunk to wallow in myself pity. I got a giant bag of Jurritos
46:53
and I'm eating the whole damn thing because nobody can tell me otherwise. And
46:58
if I don't eat dinner, it's not as ad for me sort of thing.
47:00
It's just all gonna be. My calories are the Doritos, and so
47:05
it's a one for me, because no, this is not just one step
47:09
up from bird Demic. This at least has coherent sentence structures. Therefore,
47:15
it is a full star above bird Demic, which is a zero. I
47:21
reserve half stars for My gag always is if they they managed to complete the
47:27
movie and or they did not accidentally kill half the cast, and I'm like,
47:30
well everybody survived so and and it got released. Okay, cool,
47:35
they get a star. Good for them. So yeah, that is a
47:39
one star for me. I will maybe never watch it again, but there
47:44
is a conceivable point where I watch it because I just want to rag on
47:47
something. I would love it if Riff Tracks did this. I was just
47:52
thinking that a riff track will be perfect. This is right well, And
47:57
man, I was thinking, I think muse wise because when I was looking
48:00
up a Joel he did like laser Blast or something, which is another well
48:08
known riff tracks where the guy's got like the giant tube laser arm. Like,
48:15
yeah, DC movies, these are not gems, diamonds in the rough
48:22
anything like that. But yeah, I would I will also give this a
48:25
one. I mean it, I think we're really literally only watching it to
48:30
see where it goes for him. And besides the one shot that I rewatched
48:37
because I was so impressed with it, and the seven times I had to
48:42
watch the other shot because they had to reshow it to me. Yeah,
48:45
there's nothing particularly special it. I mean, I do always try to remember
48:52
the fact that, you know, people don't go out trying to make bad
48:55
movies, and there is only so much you can kind of glean from the
49:01
script in the paper before anything's even shot and anything's even happened. But there
49:07
are also a lot of like especially with the direct copying of Aliens and Blade
49:13
Runner, like do you think that's gonna pay off? Like it's not an
49:16
homage, it's just a worse version of a crappy story like it. I
49:24
don't know, but like you guys have also said, I think you're right
49:28
of if you are given a budget and given a semi decent idea, why
49:34
not throw your hat in the ring if you have that drive. He obviously
49:38
has that drive to be a director and continue on with that. So yeah,
49:43
this is his first step and it I think honestly it is really only
49:49
the pairing of him and of Devlin that saves his career going forward, because
49:55
that is really where it goes of having the right story and being in the
50:00
right place in the right time, because yeah, I'm not seeing anything that's
50:04
like, let's give this guy a bigger budget, because I think that's what
50:08
it's gonna that's gonna make the difference. Like, no, I don't,
50:14
but we'll but we will see. So zero point five, one and one,
50:19
it can barely buy a soda for that cost. But we did have
50:22
a Universal Lance Reddick with Felix Stone. Yeah, a Walmart been for Moon
50:30
forty four. But it does get us started here in this new house with
50:35
Emeric of the nineties. So next week we're going to be jumping two years
50:39
to Universal Soldier. Is that gonna make it or break it. Here on,
50:45
house lights Join the revolution, Join the net Party.