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Piranha (1978) - Roger Corman's Jaws Knockoff That Launched Careers · The Cinematic Flashback Podcast

0:03
Speaker 1: As fur as they pay, whether it's germ warfare, the bomb,
0:06
Speaker 1: chemical warfare, there's plenty of money. Special agencies they pay,
0:14
Speaker 1: they pay a lot better than they do in private
0:16
Speaker 1: research for raising phish. Oh no, it's a matter of genetics, radiation,
0:26
Speaker 1: selective breeding. They called it Operation Rasearch.
0:31
Speaker 2: Chiefs.
0:38
Speaker 3: Welcome to the Cinematic Flashback Podcast. Get ready to hop
0:42
Speaker 3: into the way back machine as we journey through the wild, bold,
0:46
Speaker 3: and unforgettable films of the nineteen seventies. Each episode, we
0:50
Speaker 3: break down a classic movie or we're gotten Jim, seeing
0:53
Speaker 3: how it performed then and now, and wrapping things up
0:57
Speaker 3: by asking did a groof of the decades or did
0:59
Speaker 3: it lose at beat? I am your host, Chuck Brannon.
1:02
Speaker 3: Today we are reviewing Joe Dante's nineteen seventy eight film Perrana,
1:08
Speaker 3: starring Bradford Dillman, Heather Mensies, and Dick Miller. This is
1:13
Speaker 3: our second and final stop in our Jobsploitation Month, where
1:17
Speaker 3: we were looking at two films that are swimming in
1:20
Speaker 3: the frenzy that Jaws left in its wake. Joining me
1:23
Speaker 3: for this adventure again is Matt Sargent, who graciously agreed
1:28
Speaker 3: to spend ninety minutes with a school of genetically engineered
1:31
Speaker 3: killer fish man.
1:32
Speaker 4: How are you doing, sir, I am doing well. I'm
1:36
Speaker 4: just done buckling from the Wayback Machine here and went
1:39
Speaker 4: for a ride to see this film. I'm just back
1:42
Speaker 4: from Canada where I did some fishing, so probably wasn't
1:46
Speaker 4: the best film in the world to watch before we
1:48
Speaker 4: went up there to all that fresh water. And I
1:52
Speaker 4: have my daughter's wedding upcoming in September, so really we
1:56
Speaker 4: have full schedules, as you probably know, Chuck, because you're
1:59
Speaker 4: trying to schedule all around my personal life, and I
2:03
Speaker 4: apologize for that.
2:04
Speaker 3: Well, you know what, last year there were some times
2:08
Speaker 3: where I said, you know, Matt is off somewhere, but
2:10
Speaker 3: you know, I think our best episodes are where we're
2:12
Speaker 3: here together. So I am gonna do my darnness to
2:15
Speaker 3: make sure you're sitting right beside me here in the
2:18
Speaker 3: Wayback Machine.
2:19
Speaker 4: Well, I appreciate it, I really do. You put in
2:22
Speaker 4: a lot of work this year laying out our schedule
2:24
Speaker 4: and putting together these sort of themed months, which has
2:28
Speaker 4: been a lot of fun. Like you said, we saw
2:30
Speaker 4: Orca before, and that actually is a pretty decent FPO.
2:34
Speaker 4: SOO We had fun with that one. Yeah, it really
2:37
Speaker 4: is a good one to watch before we watched Piranha,
2:41
Speaker 4: because in a lot of ways, it couldn't be more different. Right.
2:45
Speaker 3: You know, when I set out jabsploitation, the reason why
2:49
Speaker 3: I did this was because I honestly thought that we
2:53
Speaker 3: were going to get two B style movies.
2:56
Speaker 4: Right.
2:57
Speaker 3: Orca really surprised me because it may not have been
3:01
Speaker 3: the best film, but you know what they stood up
3:04
Speaker 3: to plate They took a swing at the ball and
3:06
Speaker 3: they were going for the fences. Piranha, on the other hand,
3:10
Speaker 3: is exactly what I was looking for. I have been
3:14
Speaker 3: waiting to see this film again, to be honest, the
3:17
Speaker 3: reason is because it's a New World Picture. Growing up
3:21
Speaker 3: watching these movies, I would see the New World Picture logo.
3:25
Speaker 3: I had no idea that this was Roger Corman's film studio.
3:30
Speaker 3: If you look at the logo animation that they did
3:33
Speaker 3: at the very beginning, that was all hand drawn by
3:35
Speaker 3: Joe Dante. It eventually became something much bigger. Do you
3:39
Speaker 3: mind if I once again plug his book?
3:41
Speaker 4: Oh go for it?
3:43
Speaker 3: How I made a hundred movies in Hollywood and never
3:47
Speaker 3: lost a dime. If you don't have this on your
3:49
Speaker 3: reading list. I highly recommend putting it on there. It's
3:53
Speaker 3: a good read, it's a fun read. You're gonna learn
3:56
Speaker 3: a lot about the industry of Hollyoo. You're also going
4:01
Speaker 3: to come across maybe some movies that you might want
4:04
Speaker 3: to see. Of Roger Corman's I want to recommend his
4:07
Speaker 3: movies from the nineteen sixties called The Intruder with none
4:12
Speaker 3: other than William Shatner. It's a low budget movie, but
4:16
Speaker 3: it is right there making a big statement about racial
4:21
Speaker 3: integration in the South, and it's not done tongue in
4:24
Speaker 3: cheek like Prana was. It's a very very good movie,
4:28
Speaker 3: and I have to say that it may be one
4:30
Speaker 3: of my favorite William Shatner roles that I've ever seen.
4:34
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's funny. I have not read the book yet,
4:36
Speaker 4: but it is on my list, and I'm wondering if
4:40
Speaker 4: I can get it as an audiobook, because I typically
4:44
Speaker 4: am able to read a lot more books via audiobooks.
4:47
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm the same way. I will need to check
4:50
Speaker 3: that out if not. If you ever want to borrow mine,
4:53
Speaker 3: I am more than happy to loan it out to.
4:55
Speaker 4: You because you have the actual paper box. I actually
4:59
Speaker 4: have the back. Oh my goodness, it's not even on
5:02
Speaker 4: your kindle. No, it's it's right here in my hand.
5:05
Speaker 4: And in fact, it was d Graves from the Surely
5:07
Speaker 4: You Can't Be Serious podcast who said, Chuck, you need
5:10
Speaker 4: to read this book. It's one of the best ones
5:12
Speaker 4: that I've read. When D gives me a book recommendation,
5:15
Speaker 4: it is one I can usually take to the bank.
5:16
Speaker 4: So this was definitely a good one. Well, Matt, who
5:20
Speaker 4: is talking to us this week? This was posted on
5:23
Speaker 4: our Facebook page from listener and friend of the show
5:26
Speaker 4: James Kirk, for our sting episode back in May. Quote.
5:30
Speaker 4: I enjoyed this episode on what is in many ways
5:33
Speaker 4: a spiritual sequel to Butch, Cassidy and the Sundance Kid,
5:37
Speaker 4: but was astonished to learn that Chuck has never seen Butch.
5:41
Speaker 4: It's my all time number one favorite movie and a
5:44
Speaker 4: must see for any fan of twentieth century cinema. Where
5:47
Speaker 4: do I send the four K disc, Maddie? Thanks to James,
5:52
Speaker 4: I am sure Chuck will reach out with an address. Folks,
5:55
Speaker 4: we are not above receiving gifts and gratuities in order
5:59
Speaker 4: to get your comments read on the air here on
6:01
Speaker 4: our podcast, so keep them coming. I mean the comments,
6:05
Speaker 4: not necessarily the gifts, but we'll take the gifts. Man.
6:09
Speaker 3: This is this is one of my rather flagrant cinema
6:12
Speaker 3: sins that you pointed out to me when we made
6:15
Speaker 3: that recording. So as soon as I received this four
6:19
Speaker 3: K disc from James, I will pop it in and
6:22
Speaker 3: have a watch. Maybe maybe I should do one of
6:25
Speaker 3: those reaction videos like the first time, where I just
6:28
Speaker 3: had the camera watching me making comments and watching the movie.
6:32
Speaker 3: Do you think anybody should be interested in that?
6:34
Speaker 4: I don't know. We should do it together and do it.
6:36
Speaker 4: What is it? A mystery science Theater two thousand in
6:40
Speaker 4: two thousand style with just the silhouettes of our heads
6:44
Speaker 4: in front of the screen. My dad, Oh my gosh,
6:46
Speaker 4: my dad loved that show so much. He used to
6:50
Speaker 4: watch it and just bellow with laughter at that robot.
6:54
Speaker 4: Oh my god, he loved it, and he loved it
6:56
Speaker 4: so much.
6:57
Speaker 3: That that actually makes me glad. I You're dad would
7:00
Speaker 3: have been happy to know that. Right now, they are
7:04
Speaker 3: producing four more with the original actors who played the robots,
7:09
Speaker 3: and oh my god, a guy who played Mike who
7:12
Speaker 3: was the second host of that show. So your your
7:15
Speaker 3: dad would really have liked that.
7:17
Speaker 4: He would have and I'm sorry that he's not around
7:20
Speaker 4: it anymore to see it because he just loved that. He
7:24
Speaker 4: just we used to sit there and he, you know,
7:26
Speaker 4: he had this giant laugh which I've described before, especially
7:29
Speaker 4: when we went to see Young Frankenstein, and he would
7:34
Speaker 4: just bellow with laughter about it. And it's one of
7:36
Speaker 4: my more fond memories of my dad. He just loved
7:39
Speaker 4: to laugh. So he also was really famous for telling
7:43
Speaker 4: shaggy dog stories. If our listeners know what a shaggy
7:46
Speaker 4: dog story is, it's like a dad joke, but it
7:49
Speaker 4: goes on forever, but it ends like a dad joke,
7:53
Speaker 4: you know, with the goofy whatever, and it just it's
7:57
Speaker 4: one of those ones that he would start telling this
8:00
Speaker 4: story like it was a real live story, like it
8:02
Speaker 4: happened to him, and by the end you're like, really
8:06
Speaker 4: really a dentist, a priest, and a rabbi? Why were
8:11
Speaker 4: you in a bar? Dad? Anyway, I have a question
8:15
Speaker 4: for you, Chuck, once you got we know why this
8:17
Speaker 4: movie happened because we're in Jaws Playtation month because obviously
8:22
Speaker 4: everything that happened, but how did this movie really happen?
8:27
Speaker 4: What's the inside Scoop.
8:28
Speaker 3: Well, every once in a while we cover a movie
8:31
Speaker 3: where the story behind the camera is just as interesting
8:36
Speaker 3: as the one on the screen, And I will say
8:39
Speaker 3: the story of how Jaws became the movie that it
8:43
Speaker 3: is is incredibly fascinating. I'll recommend that you read Carl
8:47
Speaker 3: Gottlieb's The Jaws Log, which was released at the same
8:51
Speaker 3: time the movie was, and it is a diary of
8:53
Speaker 3: the production of the movies with lots of behind the
8:56
Speaker 3: scenes stories. I also think Piranha might be one of
9:00
Speaker 3: those movies as well, because, just to set the scene,
9:04
Speaker 3: after Jaws became what is arguably the biggest movie up
9:09
Speaker 3: to that point in history, every studio wanted its own
9:12
Speaker 3: killer animal movie. And it didn't matter what kind of animal.
9:17
Speaker 3: It could be sharks, it could be bears, it could
9:20
Speaker 3: be alligators. Heck, it could even be a swarm of
9:23
Speaker 3: killer bees. If it could eat or kill people, somebody
9:28
Speaker 3: was going to make a movie about it.
9:30
Speaker 4: Everybody wanted the next Jaws.
9:33
Speaker 3: Exactly, and Roger Corman wasn't going to let that opportunity pass.
9:39
Speaker 3: Now when somebody says Roger Corman, what usually comes to mind, uh,
9:44
Speaker 3: low budget drive in movies.
9:47
Speaker 4: You know what we would call b movies, kind of
9:51
Speaker 4: not what we would call now blockbusters. I guess it
9:54
Speaker 4: really wasn't coined by then, was.
9:55
Speaker 3: It by the time this movie? Sure, but yes, you're
9:59
Speaker 3: hitting all of the telltales of a Roger Korman film.
10:03
Speaker 3: He would shoot a movie one week, he would edit
10:05
Speaker 3: it the next, and by the third week, he's already
10:09
Speaker 3: releasing the film. In fact, sometimes as he's filming one
10:13
Speaker 3: movie at a location, he is also filming a second
10:16
Speaker 3: movie at the same time. He doesn't know what it's
10:18
Speaker 3: going to be, but he's getting enough footage, and then
10:21
Speaker 3: he would come up with the idea of a movie poster,
10:25
Speaker 3: and then he would build a movie around the movie poster.
10:28
Speaker 3: That's just a kind of work that Roger Corman would do.
10:31
Speaker 3: But after reading about Urana, about this movie, I am
10:36
Speaker 3: becoming convinced that his real gift was finding talented people
10:41
Speaker 3: before anyone else realized just how good they were. He'd
10:46
Speaker 3: give them a chance, hand them a tiny budget, and
10:50
Speaker 3: just let them go and make a movie. And Pirana
10:54
Speaker 3: might be one of the best examples of that because
10:57
Speaker 3: the director was none other than Joe Dante, but not
11:02
Speaker 3: the Joe Dante who had already made The Howling or Gremlins,
11:06
Speaker 3: or The Urbs or Innerspace. This was the Joe Dante
11:11
Speaker 3: who was mostly cutting trailers for New World and had
11:15
Speaker 3: just finished co directing the movie Hollywood Boulevard along with
11:19
Speaker 3: Alan Arkish in another nineteen seventy six film for Roger Corman.
11:25
Speaker 3: Do you recognize any of those films of Joe Dante, I'll.
11:28
Speaker 4: Be honest with you, I do not, not even Grimlins,
11:32
Speaker 4: not even Gremlins. No, I didn't I know Gremlins. I
11:36
Speaker 4: did not realize it was a Roger Corman or Joe
11:38
Speaker 4: Dante film.
11:39
Speaker 3: Yeah, Gremlins was directed by Joe Dante. So Joe Dante
11:43
Speaker 3: is not a name that you're familiar with, but I
11:47
Speaker 3: was very familiar with him. In fact, there was a
11:50
Speaker 3: movie that was based on the old Twilight Zone series
11:54
Speaker 3: and it was comprised of four segments directed by four
11:57
Speaker 3: different directors. One of them had a very horrible ending
12:03
Speaker 3: in real life, which resulted in people dying, but that
12:07
Speaker 3: wasn't Joe Dante's segment. He had the third segment called
12:11
Speaker 3: It's a Good Life, about this little boy who has
12:14
Speaker 3: unlimited godlike powers. It was really really good and a
12:18
Speaker 3: bit creepy. Now here's another part of this story that
12:21
Speaker 3: I found interesting. Roger Corman had already bought the screenplay
12:26
Speaker 3: for Piranha from overseas. The problem was it just didn't work,
12:31
Speaker 3: so he hired a novelist, not a screenplay writer, a
12:34
Speaker 3: novelist named John Sales with no movie credits, and paid
12:39
Speaker 3: him the sum of ten thousand dollars. That's it, just
12:43
Speaker 3: ten just ten thousand, just ten grand. That's crazy. I
12:47
Speaker 3: read that Sales wrote movies like Piranha, The Howling and
12:51
Speaker 3: Alligator so that he could afford to make the independent
12:55
Speaker 3: films that he really wanted to direct. A few years later,
12:59
Speaker 3: he'd become one of the most respected writers and directors
13:03
Speaker 3: in independent cinema, with films like Mattawan, Eight Men Out
13:07
Speaker 3: About the I believe it was about the Black Sox
13:10
Speaker 3: and Lone Star, earning two Academy Award nominations for Best
13:15
Speaker 3: Original Screenplay. So when you're watching Piranha, you're actually watching
13:19
Speaker 3: the very first produced screenplay by one of America's greatest
13:23
Speaker 3: independent filmmakers.
13:25
Speaker 4: I know I recognized his name, so it seems reasonable
13:29
Speaker 4: that it was an early something he wrote early in
13:32
Speaker 4: his career.
13:33
Speaker 3: Not only early in terms of screenwriting, it was his
13:36
Speaker 3: first Wow Sales could have just written another film about
13:40
Speaker 3: keller Fish. But he also came up with this other
13:44
Speaker 3: idea that Piranhas were part of a secret military project
13:49
Speaker 3: developed during the Vietnam War. So once again, the shadow
13:53
Speaker 3: of Vietnam is overlooming a lot of films, and Piranha
13:57
Speaker 3: is no exception. This is par for the course of
14:00
Speaker 3: a Roger Corman film. Even in his other exploitation movies,
14:04
Speaker 3: it often sneak in a little social commentary.
14:09
Speaker 4: Yeah, but it makes some sense. I mean, given the
14:12
Speaker 4: time nineteen seventy eight or your post Watergate, post Vietnam,
14:17
Speaker 4: it makes some sense that that's sort of what was
14:19
Speaker 4: in the zeitgeist at the time.
14:20
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, but you know what, Corman wasn't done finding talent.
14:24
Speaker 3: I have another name for you, And I'm going to
14:26
Speaker 3: guess you haven't heard of Rob Boutin either.
14:29
Speaker 4: No, I have not.
14:31
Speaker 3: So when you talk about makeup effects artist, the conversations
14:36
Speaker 3: usually starts with a guy by the name of Rick Baker.
14:40
Speaker 3: Rick Baker was brought in to do the makeup effects
14:43
Speaker 3: for the nineteen seventy six remake of King Kong. He
14:47
Speaker 3: also went on to work with John Landis, an American
14:50
Speaker 3: werewolf in London. The next name that you're going to
14:54
Speaker 3: talk about is a guy by the name of Tom Savini.
14:57
Speaker 3: He did the makeup effects for Friday Thirteenth. But maybe
15:01
Speaker 3: a little closer to some stuff you and I are
15:03
Speaker 3: going to be talking about in the next few months,
15:05
Speaker 3: he did the makeup for Donna the Dead. Finally, you're
15:09
Speaker 3: going to talk about Rob Botein because a few years
15:13
Speaker 3: later he had become one of the biggest names in
15:16
Speaker 3: the business with his work on the John Carpenter film
15:21
Speaker 3: The Thing. He also did work on RoboCop, Legend and
15:26
Speaker 3: Total Recall. Here's the thing. At this time of this movie,
15:30
Speaker 3: Rob Botein was just seventeen years old.
15:34
Speaker 4: You're kidding seventeen, that's crazy.
15:38
Speaker 3: While you and I were trying to graduate high school,
15:41
Speaker 3: boutine was already creating makeup effects for a feature film.
15:46
Speaker 3: And incidentally, at the climax of this film, one of
15:50
Speaker 3: his works of himself was actually attacked by the Piranhas
15:54
Speaker 3: and comes floating up at the end. Pretty funny stuff.
15:58
Speaker 4: That's funny. That's good.
16:00
Speaker 3: So I stumbled across one more name, and this is
16:04
Speaker 3: why you stick around and you read seventies credits because
16:08
Speaker 3: you remember that little weird stop motion mutant creature in
16:11
Speaker 3: doctor Hoat's laboratory.
16:13
Speaker 4: Yeah, I wondered if that was ever gonna come back
16:16
Speaker 4: to visit us in any way. It was supposed to.
16:19
Speaker 4: It was supposed to.
16:20
Speaker 3: But that was the work of Phil Tippett, who was
16:24
Speaker 3: an animator working with George Lucas at Industrial Light and Magic.
16:28
Speaker 3: Do you remember the holographic chess scene in Star Wars Classic?
16:32
Speaker 4: Yes?
16:33
Speaker 3: How about those Imperial Walkers and Empire strikes back?
16:36
Speaker 4: Fantastic, so imaginative.
16:39
Speaker 3: That was Phil Tippett's work. And if you look closely,
16:43
Speaker 3: he even has a tiny cameo in Piranha as that
16:46
Speaker 3: unfortunate diver.
16:49
Speaker 4: Everybody was unfortunate? Do you narrow it down? Oh?
16:55
Speaker 3: But you know what, Matt, What really stuck with me that.
16:58
Speaker 4: Roger Corman was assembled the A team.
17:01
Speaker 3: Exactly sure, sure, he was making his version of Jaws,
17:06
Speaker 3: but unknowingly he was giving Joe Dante his shot, John
17:10
Speaker 3: Sales his first screenplay, Rob Botine one of his first
17:14
Speaker 3: major jobs, and Phil Tippett an early chance to show
17:17
Speaker 3: what he could do.
17:19
Speaker 4: Maybe Roger Korman's true gift was being able to see
17:22
Speaker 4: the talent in people before they themselves or anybody else
17:26
Speaker 4: saw it.
17:26
Speaker 3: Piranha might be one of the best examples of just that. Yeah,
17:32
Speaker 3: that is how this film happened. That is pretty darn cool.
17:36
Speaker 3: It does bring in a new light I did in
17:39
Speaker 3: watching the movies. I enjoyed the acting of several of
17:42
Speaker 3: the actors, and some of the special effects were just
17:46
Speaker 3: they were hilarious. They would have been great in a
17:48
Speaker 3: drive in movie. So that's cool to hear some of
17:51
Speaker 3: that backstory, and also to hear these guys go off.
17:54
Speaker 3: You know, Piranha wasn't the anchor of their career. It
17:58
Speaker 3: was the launch point. When I tell you something about
18:02
Speaker 3: Piranha Too, as long as it's not we're reviewing it
18:07
Speaker 3: like I've done this to you once, you're not gonna
18:09
Speaker 3: fall forward again. Piranha Too was directed by James Cameron,
18:16
Speaker 3: who infamously got fired from the movie.
18:20
Speaker 4: I was probably trying to make it too good. That's
18:24
Speaker 4: not in. That wasn't in the budget.
18:27
Speaker 3: Talent was not in that budget. I don't know if
18:30
Speaker 3: that was a Corman New World flick or not. It
18:32
Speaker 3: seems like they sold off the rights. Maybe but yeah,
18:35
Speaker 3: we are about ready to dive into the production details
18:38
Speaker 3: of Piranha, but we need to step away for a
18:41
Speaker 3: quick break. We'll be right back.
18:45
Speaker 5: Flash back and flash back.
18:56
Speaker 2: What if there was something in the water, something small,
19:01
Speaker 2: something deadly, something you couldn't see until it was too late.
19:07
Speaker 2: What if you went swimming one day and discovered.
19:14
Speaker 4: Parana. They're here and they're hungry. Piranha rated are.
19:22
Speaker 3: Welcome back, Matt. We've talked about Joe Dante, Roger Carmon,
19:26
Speaker 3: and John Sales, so let's take a look at some
19:29
Speaker 3: of the other people behind the scenes. The producer was
19:32
Speaker 3: John Davison. After Piranha, he'd go on to produce films
19:36
Speaker 3: like Airplane, RoboCop, RoboCop two, and Starship Troopers. One of
19:40
Speaker 3: the editors was Mark Goldblatt. He got his start at
19:44
Speaker 3: New World Pictures, where he met Roger Corman's assistant, Gail
19:47
Speaker 3: Anne Hurd. She later introduced him to James Cameron, and
19:52
Speaker 3: Goldblatt would go on to edit films like The Terminator,
19:55
Speaker 3: Terminator to Judgment Day, True Lies, and dozens of other
20:00
Speaker 3: action movies. The score was composed by Dino Dinaggio, who
20:04
Speaker 3: had already written the music for Don't Look Now and Carry.
20:08
Speaker 3: In true Roger Corman fashion, Dinaggio met with the filmmakers.
20:13
Speaker 3: They spotted the movie, which means they looked at the
20:16
Speaker 3: movie to see where they wanted to put music in.
20:19
Speaker 3: He returned to Italy, wrote and recorded the entire score there,
20:23
Speaker 3: then shipped the tapes back to California. Whatever arrived on
20:27
Speaker 3: that score they used. The budget for Piranha is reported
20:31
Speaker 3: differently depending on the source, and I'm talking about you
20:36
Speaker 3: could have two people who worked on this film and
20:38
Speaker 3: they reported the amount differently. And when you look at
20:41
Speaker 3: this on Wikipedia or other sources, they're usually giving you
20:45
Speaker 3: a range. But everyone agrees that it fell somewhere between
20:50
Speaker 3: seven hundred thousand and one million dollars to make. Corman
20:53
Speaker 3: wanted to spend less than that until United Artists stepped
20:58
Speaker 3: in with enough money to secure international distribution, and the
21:03
Speaker 3: story goes, Corman took some of that made another movie called.
21:07
Speaker 4: Avalanche, So he took a little money from one movie
21:10
Speaker 4: to do another one. That's classic Corman. He's keeping it
21:13
Speaker 4: close to this on how much they're spending because that
21:16
Speaker 4: helps him control costs. It's like, well, if you have
21:19
Speaker 4: all that money, why aren't you spending more money for
21:21
Speaker 4: the music.
21:22
Speaker 3: This is one of the reasons why Corman never wanted
21:25
Speaker 3: to take New World public. As long as he controlled everything,
21:29
Speaker 3: he could make these movies for whatever he wanted to.
21:32
Speaker 3: He could make whatever he thought would make money. He
21:35
Speaker 3: had actually had a pretty good nose for it. Pirana
21:39
Speaker 3: earned roughly six million dollars in domestic film rentals and
21:43
Speaker 3: another fourteen million from the international market, making it New
21:47
Speaker 3: World's most profitable film up to that point. That is
21:51
Speaker 3: a shocker.
21:53
Speaker 4: Here's what won't shock you.
21:55
Speaker 3: Reviews were actually kind of scarce because at the time
21:58
Speaker 3: there was a newspaper strung Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel,
22:03
Speaker 3: let's just say they were not particularly impressed with the film.
22:07
Speaker 3: But here's an odd pairing on Rotten Tomatoes. Currently, it
22:11
Speaker 3: has a seventy two percent on the Tomato meter, which
22:14
Speaker 3: is what the critics think, and it has a lower
22:17
Speaker 3: rating of fifty three percent with the audience rating. Our
22:20
Speaker 3: last several films that we've been reviewing, it's always reversed.
22:24
Speaker 3: I thought it was kind of interesting that the audience
22:27
Speaker 3: liked it less than those who are critiquing the film.
22:31
Speaker 4: Do you know who did like it.
22:33
Speaker 3: Spielberg has reportedly called Piranha the best of the Jaws knockoffs,
22:39
Speaker 3: and that's a quote that's been following the movie for
22:42
Speaker 3: nearly fifty years now.
22:44
Speaker 4: I mean, we're not exactly talking about a high bar here.
22:51
Speaker 4: It's like, I hear what you're saying. That's cool though,
22:55
Speaker 4: that he liked it.
22:56
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, finally, uns statistic. That still amazes me. Production
23:04
Speaker 3: was scheduled to begin in February of nineteen seventy eight,
23:08
Speaker 3: so they were filming during March, so all those water scenes,
23:11
Speaker 3: those people were cold in the water, but they all
23:14
Speaker 3: were smiling. It was filmed down in Texas, so that
23:17
Speaker 3: definitely helped quite a bit. But Piranha was in theaters
23:22
Speaker 3: that August, so it was signed and sealed and delivered
23:26
Speaker 3: all in nineteen seventy eight. That's how fast he turned
23:30
Speaker 3: around that entire movie in about five months. Consider shortcuts
23:35
Speaker 3: that they had to take with the effects. That kind
23:38
Speaker 3: of starts to play into why some of those effects
23:41
Speaker 3: look the way that they do.
23:42
Speaker 4: Well. I think it's I think it's pretty remarkably get
23:45
Speaker 4: a movie out and that amount of time, you know,
23:48
Speaker 4: they'll be shooting a movie and we're like, Oh, we
23:50
Speaker 4: hope to see it in you know, twenty nine, looking
23:55
Speaker 4: forward to it. Hope I'm still alive.
23:58
Speaker 3: Here's something that I learned while listen listening to the commentaries.
24:01
Speaker 4: Have you ever heard of a Q score before? I
24:04
Speaker 4: have not.
24:05
Speaker 3: Studios use something called a Q store to find out
24:09
Speaker 3: which actors audiences are going to know and actually like.
24:14
Speaker 3: So when they were casting this film, they were also
24:19
Speaker 3: thinking about this film playing on TV, and so they
24:23
Speaker 3: were looking at actors who would be familiar to people
24:27
Speaker 3: who would watch television. So if you can't get Redford
24:31
Speaker 3: or Newman, you can look for other actors that the
24:35
Speaker 3: audience would recognize. And Dante was well aware of this
24:39
Speaker 3: when Piranha was cast. Who do we have in this film?
24:44
Speaker 4: Leading the cast is Bradford Dillman and he plays Paul Grogan.
24:49
Speaker 4: I actually remembered his face, uh huh in this movie
24:52
Speaker 4: and I was like, I know that face. I didn't
24:55
Speaker 4: know his name, but I was like, this guy is familiar,
24:57
Speaker 4: he's been around a long time. Well, his C score
24:59
Speaker 4: was enough for you. Yeah, absolutely, I would have definitely
25:02
Speaker 4: recognized him. I would I couldn't if you said, hey,
25:05
Speaker 4: what else was this guy in you? I might have
25:08
Speaker 4: guessed the love Boat No Escape from the Planet of
25:11
Speaker 4: the Apes. Okay, I think I remember him from that.
25:14
Speaker 4: The love Boat's always a weird one because so many
25:17
Speaker 4: actors and actresses went through the love Boat. It's usually
25:20
Speaker 4: on though they're the epigy. We need to keep her
25:23
Speaker 4: running tally well.
25:25
Speaker 3: Appearing with Bradford Dillman was Heather Menzies as Maggie McEwan.
25:31
Speaker 3: She may best be remembered for the sound of music,
25:34
Speaker 3: but by the seventies she was another recognizable face that
25:38
Speaker 3: fit perfectly into Roger Corman's cast.
25:41
Speaker 4: I really liked her in this film. I thought she
25:44
Speaker 4: was funny, sort of goofy, and sort of skilled person,
25:48
Speaker 4: you know, detective. She's like a detective sort of. So yeah,
25:51
Speaker 4: I enjoyed it. I thought she did a great job.
25:53
Speaker 4: She was great. She was great in this Yeah. So
25:56
Speaker 4: next up is Kevin McCarthy as doctor Robert who.
26:00
Speaker 3: Yeah, most audiences knew him already from the original Invasion
26:05
Speaker 3: of the Body Snatchers, where he gave one of the
26:07
Speaker 3: most memorable performances in nineteen fifty science fiction.
26:11
Speaker 4: Did you see Invasion of the Body Snatchers? I have
26:14
Speaker 4: to say I'm sure, I have that. I cannot remember it.
26:18
Speaker 4: I remember it. If I do remember it, it's really disturbing.
26:23
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, it's all about these aliens they create pod people.
26:27
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, And it was remade in seventy nine, I think.
26:33
Speaker 3: And McCarthy makes a quick appearance in the film as well,
26:38
Speaker 3: kind of his character saying the same things yeah at
26:41
Speaker 3: the end of the original one.
26:42
Speaker 4: So it was pretty cool, very cool.
26:44
Speaker 3: Hey, guess what what we have Keenan Wynn as Jack.
26:48
Speaker 3: We just talked about him in Orca.
26:52
Speaker 4: That's right, that's right. They did this standard killer whale jump.
26:56
Speaker 4: That's funny that he's in two Joss Platation movies. That's funny.
27:00
Speaker 3: Barbara Steele is another Roger Corman regular, and she plays
27:07
Speaker 3: doctor Mengers. She was in the movie Black Sunday, not
27:11
Speaker 3: the one with the blimp, yeah okay, but an older
27:15
Speaker 3: one from the six sies, and she went on to
27:17
Speaker 3: play classics like The Pitt and the Pendulum, which at
27:20
Speaker 3: one point Corman was making Edgar Allan Poe films, and
27:24
Speaker 3: Pitt in the Pendulum was one of them. So casting
27:27
Speaker 3: her was just another wink from Joe Dante about the
27:30
Speaker 3: horror movies that he grew up loving.
27:33
Speaker 4: I got another one for you, Dick Miller, the Dick Miller,
27:37
Speaker 4: and I will have to admit to you, Chuck. Yeah,
27:40
Speaker 4: I thought Dick Miller played both Buck Gardner and the
27:44
Speaker 4: Mayor Vaughan of Jaws. I thought they were the same guy.
27:48
Speaker 4: That's how on the nose this guy portrayed this used
27:52
Speaker 4: car salesman type person. I thought they were the same guy.
27:55
Speaker 3: Oh, if you watch enough Roger Corman or Roger Corman
27:59
Speaker 3: A Jason films, you're going to see Dick Miller. Because
28:03
Speaker 3: Miller started off as a writer for him and then
28:06
Speaker 3: became one of his most used actors in all of
28:09
Speaker 3: his films.
28:10
Speaker 4: I wonder if Roger Corman really work at relationships with
28:15
Speaker 4: these actors because he could really count on them. You know,
28:17
Speaker 4: maybe that was part of his secret.
28:19
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, there's one of the things that that Corman
28:21
Speaker 3: did because when he started directing films, he didn't he
28:25
Speaker 3: didn't start off as a director, but when he got
28:27
Speaker 3: his first chance to direct a film, he realized he
28:31
Speaker 3: needed to understand how to work with actors better, and
28:35
Speaker 3: he took Oh I cannot remember the name of the
28:38
Speaker 3: of the of the actor who he took a course
28:41
Speaker 3: with who he had a school in New York and
28:44
Speaker 3: and actors would come to him all the time. And
28:46
Speaker 3: so Corman took that class, and he had a classmate
28:50
Speaker 3: in there by the name of Jack Nicholson. And Jack
28:53
Speaker 3: Nicholson and Roger Corman became great friends. They worked a
28:57
Speaker 3: lot together. Corman gave Nicholson his first chance to direct films,
29:02
Speaker 3: and that's really where Nicholson hops off at.
29:06
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's interesting, and it really tells a little bit
29:09
Speaker 4: of the story about Roger Corman and how he had
29:11
Speaker 4: these same actors time and time again, because if you
29:13
Speaker 4: were a jerk, if you weren't treated fairly, you would
29:16
Speaker 4: be in their movie again, you know. Oh yeah, and yeah,
29:19
Speaker 4: they're in small roles, and it's certainly a working actor
29:22
Speaker 4: wants to work.
29:23
Speaker 3: But hey, you know one last name I know, I said,
29:26
Speaker 3: Jack Nicholson. Do you remember when we did Chinatown?
29:30
Speaker 6: M M.
29:30
Speaker 3: The screenplay for Chinatown is widely regarded and is taught
29:35
Speaker 3: as one of the perfect screenplays that are out there.
29:38
Speaker 3: Robert Town worked for Roger Corman as well. All roads
29:43
Speaker 3: in seventy cinema seems to run through Corman. It's just unbelievable.
29:50
Speaker 4: That's funny.
29:50
Speaker 3: We have some honorable mentions here. Belinda Bulaski plays Betsy.
29:55
Speaker 3: She is a regular in Joe Dante films such as
29:58
Speaker 3: The Howling and Grim Melody. Thomas Scott plays Laura, and
30:03
Speaker 3: she went on to fame in the CBS daytime soap
30:06
Speaker 3: opera The Young and the Restless. And Paul Bartel played
30:11
Speaker 3: camp counselor Dumont, who is one of the highlights for me.
30:15
Speaker 3: He's hilarious. He was the director of one of Corman's
30:19
Speaker 3: films called Death Race two thousand and He also directed
30:24
Speaker 3: Eating Raoul.
30:26
Speaker 4: I have heard of Eating Raoul, but I don't think
30:28
Speaker 4: I've ever seen it.
30:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think i've ever seen it either, Matt.
30:31
Speaker 3: I want you to reach up on the shelf, flip
30:33
Speaker 3: that case around and tell us what the back of
30:37
Speaker 3: the box was promising the audiences.
30:40
Speaker 4: All Right, Well, I'll do the best I can, but
30:42
Speaker 4: I can't really scare you. Like the picture on the
30:44
Speaker 4: front of the box. I can turn it over. I
30:47
Speaker 4: can just imagine myself taking it down off the chef.
30:49
Speaker 4: It's been rented hundreds, if not thousands of times. It's
30:54
Speaker 4: well worn, the edges are scuffed. People have played it
30:57
Speaker 4: over and over again. I'm sure when we slip the
30:59
Speaker 4: tape in the player, they'll be a little bit of
31:02
Speaker 4: snow and maybe a little striping because it's been played
31:05
Speaker 4: and rewound so many times, and just by peeling up
31:10
Speaker 4: the please be kind rewind sticker, I can read the
31:13
Speaker 4: back of the box and here it is. While searching
31:18
Speaker 4: for missing teenagers, nov Skip Tracer, Maggie McEwan and one
31:23
Speaker 4: of the locals, a town boozer named Paul Grogan, stumble
31:27
Speaker 4: upon a top secret Army laboratory conducting genetic research on
31:32
Speaker 4: purana for the sole purpose of biological warfare. When they
31:37
Speaker 4: accidentally release them from the compound, the deadly school of
31:43
Speaker 4: Eating machines head downstream and devour everything and everyone in
31:50
Speaker 4: their path. Can Maggie and Paul stop the ravenous swarm
31:54
Speaker 4: before it reaches a crowded children's summer camp.
31:57
Speaker 3: Oh man, where is my video card? I am renting
32:00
Speaker 3: this movie tonight. Pull it down, bring it over here.
32:04
Speaker 4: Hopefully it's been rewound.
32:06
Speaker 3: I hope so.
32:08
Speaker 4: So, this seems like a good time to get out
32:10
Speaker 4: of the water. We'll take a quick break and when
32:12
Speaker 4: we come back, we'll dive into our thoughts on Piranham
32:17
Speaker 4: flash back.
32:26
Speaker 3: Hey, this is Matt and I'm dark. We're just out
32:29
Speaker 3: here riding our bikes.
32:31
Speaker 5: Circle and the could a sac talking about the movies,
32:34
Speaker 5: music and TV.
32:35
Speaker 2: Shows that we all love and remember, but just as
32:38
Speaker 2: easily could have fallen by the wayside and been forgotten.
32:41
Speaker 6: These are the tales of creative chaos, last minute miracles
32:45
Speaker 6: and lightning strikes no one saw coming. So settle in,
32:49
Speaker 6: because every legend has a backstory, and sometimes the best.
32:53
Speaker 4: Ones start by mistake.
32:55
Speaker 6: This is where we talk about and discuss the accidental
32:58
Speaker 6: legends and.
33:04
Speaker 5: A manic slash back.
33:12
Speaker 4: Is he still out there? Then you don't have to
33:16
Speaker 4: distract him?
33:17
Speaker 1: Why so I can get away?
33:19
Speaker 3: So you can get away?
33:20
Speaker 4: What about me?
33:22
Speaker 2: All right?
33:22
Speaker 1: Suit yourself. But first you're gonna have to distract him.
33:26
Speaker 5: Well, how would I know?
33:26
Speaker 2: We'll just get him with his back to the opening there,
33:29
Speaker 2: you know, come on to hi. Hi?
33:38
Speaker 3: Uh, nice night, Huh listen?
33:44
Speaker 6: Are you gay?
33:45
Speaker 2: What?
33:47
Speaker 1: Oh?
33:48
Speaker 5: Well, I was just reading this article in this magazine
33:52
Speaker 5: and what did.
33:53
Speaker 4: You ask me before?
33:55
Speaker 5: Up in the sky?
34:01
Speaker 4: Welcome back. From here on out, we're going to be
34:03
Speaker 4: talking about our personal thoughts on Piranha so if you
34:07
Speaker 4: haven't seen it yet, consider this your spoiler warning. We
34:11
Speaker 4: may tell you how it ends, inadvertently while talking about
34:15
Speaker 4: what we liked it didn't like, or purposely purposely. As
34:19
Speaker 4: of this recording, you can watch Piranha for free on
34:22
Speaker 4: twob and Pluto TV. It's also available for rent or
34:26
Speaker 4: purchase through the usual digital services.
34:29
Speaker 3: Also, I have to recommend the Blu ray because it
34:32
Speaker 3: has two really good commentaries. One is with Joe Dante
34:37
Speaker 3: and producer John Davison, and they share their behind the
34:40
Speaker 3: scenes memories about making of this film, and in fact,
34:45
Speaker 3: if I know any bits of trivia on how they
34:47
Speaker 3: made the film, it comes from this particular commentary. And
34:52
Speaker 3: the second is also good because it is an interview
34:56
Speaker 3: with Roger Corman. The movie plays on in the background,
34:59
Speaker 3: but they never talk about the movie. They just talk
35:01
Speaker 3: about his whole career and it is very very similar
35:06
Speaker 3: to a lot of the stories that you will read
35:08
Speaker 3: inside his book. So both of them are really really.
35:12
Speaker 4: Good, nice, So you might have to hook me up
35:14
Speaker 4: with that disc or a similar disc in the future
35:17
Speaker 4: if you have access to it. Absolutely I do have
35:20
Speaker 4: a DVD player here that absolutely never gets used except
35:23
Speaker 4: for to provide the sound from the TV. Well.
35:27
Speaker 3: One of the stories, as we said earlier, that has
35:30
Speaker 3: followed Urana around for decades, is that Steven Spielberg called
35:36
Speaker 3: it one of the best of the Jaws ripoffs. What
35:40
Speaker 3: do you think he was seeing in this movie.
35:43
Speaker 4: I think he was seeing kind of the justifixation of
35:47
Speaker 4: you know, a danger coming down and threatening children in
35:52
Speaker 4: the water, you know, and that threat was them being
35:55
Speaker 4: eaten or basically turned into what looks like a giant
35:59
Speaker 4: blender taken it, Yeah, taken them apart. I think there's
36:02
Speaker 4: that tension of there's somebody in the water at the
36:06
Speaker 4: Prana is going to get them? Is the shark going
36:07
Speaker 4: to get them? You know? Just that was really classic
36:10
Speaker 4: in Jaws, like when it's okay, they're just on the
36:13
Speaker 4: boat in the pond, then a kid starts yelling that
36:16
Speaker 4: the shark is going into the pond. Same sort of
36:19
Speaker 4: vibe in my opinion on that sort of thing. When
36:22
Speaker 4: it finally gets to the point where the children are
36:25
Speaker 4: being threatened, it takes a while to get there. I
36:28
Speaker 4: will have to say, yeah, it does.
36:30
Speaker 3: And I think it's that scene where the children are
36:32
Speaker 3: in the inner tube. Yes, for Spielberg, I have to
36:36
Speaker 3: imagine that there were things in the Alex Kittner scene
36:41
Speaker 3: at the movie that was filmed but he wasn't able
36:43
Speaker 3: to use. Like, for example, at one point the shark
36:46
Speaker 3: was supposed to actually come out of the water and
36:49
Speaker 3: grab Kittner, and that was all filmed. It's just that
36:52
Speaker 3: they couldn't make it look good enough because of the
36:54
Speaker 3: shark at the time. Now you take Joe Dante when
36:58
Speaker 3: it gets to the scene at the camp where the
37:00
Speaker 3: piranha are coming down, I think he just took all
37:03
Speaker 3: of his chips and he said, Okay, here we go.
37:06
Speaker 3: I'm doubling down on what Spielberg did, and I'm going
37:09
Speaker 3: to put all of these children here inside and put
37:13
Speaker 3: them in complete danger.
37:15
Speaker 4: Right Yeah, which.
37:16
Speaker 3: May have been offensive in some degrees that you're putting
37:20
Speaker 3: children in danger like that, But a drive.
37:22
Speaker 4: A movie, for God's sake, I know that's what people
37:25
Speaker 4: were playing to come and see. I will say, though,
37:27
Speaker 4: this is to me, this is the takeaway. Yeah, And
37:30
Speaker 4: we talked about this before. In Jaws. Inadvertently, they did
37:35
Speaker 4: not show the shark very often. Sure very very quick
37:40
Speaker 4: shots of the shark. You never really got a clear
37:43
Speaker 4: shot till the very end of the Shark, And it
37:46
Speaker 4: was for technical reasons, it was for other reasons, but
37:49
Speaker 4: what it really was in the movie, it builds up
37:52
Speaker 4: this app in your imagination. They are far worse than
37:56
Speaker 4: when you actually get the view of the shark. I mean,
37:59
Speaker 4: the shark's pretty bad jaws when you see it. You know,
38:01
Speaker 4: the dolls eyes, you know that whole thing. Yeah, But
38:05
Speaker 4: they show these these piranhas uh huh pretty early and
38:10
Speaker 4: they're just not that scary when you see them, because
38:14
Speaker 4: they're clearly plastic fish tied to someone and the person's
38:19
Speaker 4: then shaking them yep, and then they're putting a bunch
38:22
Speaker 4: of movie blood in the water, haroo syrup and food color.
38:27
Speaker 4: Who knows. It was just terrible. But the funny part
38:30
Speaker 4: is it's like these plastics, they're clearly plastic fish. Yeah, yeah,
38:33
Speaker 4: technically rubber. Like they didn't even have real fish anywhere, Like,
38:36
Speaker 4: they didn't even go to a place that had piranhas
38:38
Speaker 4: and put some chicken in it and and and film
38:41
Speaker 4: them and enlarge them and maybe slow down the motion
38:44
Speaker 4: or something into any of that. So to me, I
38:46
Speaker 4: think they would have been better to not show them
38:49
Speaker 4: almost the entire time. It would have been more horrifying.
38:52
Speaker 3: In fact, they were rubber fish that they had like
38:55
Speaker 3: the old puppeteer stick that they you know, have to
38:58
Speaker 3: trigger the back so that it would flick the tail
39:01
Speaker 3: and articulate the jaws. And of course then they would
39:04
Speaker 3: have prosthetic stumps or legs or arms or whatever that
39:07
Speaker 3: would just pull apart in the water. I said that
39:09
Speaker 3: Martin Goldblack was one of the editors. The other editor was,
39:12
Speaker 3: of course Joe Dante, and the way that he was
39:15
Speaker 3: able to make the scenes very intense with the fish,
39:19
Speaker 3: and also one of the reasons why you don't get
39:22
Speaker 3: to see him quite as good as you might would
39:24
Speaker 3: like to is because he keeps doing these really really
39:27
Speaker 3: fast cuts. Yeah, and there are sometimes though, where there's
39:31
Speaker 3: something where it looks like they maybe had a picture
39:33
Speaker 3: and they kind of animated it swimming towards the screen
39:36
Speaker 3: or jumping out of the water on the camp counselor dumont.
39:39
Speaker 3: Some of those look cheesy, or if they were swimming
39:41
Speaker 3: from left or right. Yeah, you know, as a school
39:44
Speaker 3: that was kind of cheesy. But hey, listen, do you
39:46
Speaker 3: know what other movie was out in nineteen seventy eight
39:49
Speaker 3: and opened up right before this movie. No what Jaws two,
39:54
Speaker 3: there were some strange similarities between Jaws two and piranhas Ample.
40:00
Speaker 3: In Jaws two, children and teenagers are the victims who
40:05
Speaker 3: are in danger of being eaten. Jaws two also features
40:10
Speaker 3: a water skier who unfortunately is eaten. It also features
40:15
Speaker 3: a boat that explodes due to the improper handling of
40:19
Speaker 3: gasoline and flame, and it also has divers that are
40:24
Speaker 3: attacked inside the water. Now, I don't know if somehow
40:29
Speaker 3: John sales knew that this was happening and he wrote
40:32
Speaker 3: these into it. In fact, Universals tried to sue New
40:36
Speaker 3: World to not release that film at that time just
40:39
Speaker 3: due to the similarities.
40:40
Speaker 4: I think it's probably more due to low hanging fruit. Right, Yeah,
40:45
Speaker 4: it worked with Jaws one. You know, the original Jaws
40:48
Speaker 4: that putting kids in danger, and you know anytime you're
40:51
Speaker 4: on water, you're gonna see water skiers because it films
40:54
Speaker 4: real well, yeah, you know it's it's it's action. And
40:58
Speaker 4: again go back to seeing it at the drive in right, perfect,
41:03
Speaker 4: it's a perfect drive in movie.
41:05
Speaker 3: Oh, I agree with you so much. Well, before you
41:09
Speaker 3: sat down to watch it and we were talking about it,
41:12
Speaker 3: did you have any expectations more than a drive in film,
41:15
Speaker 3: and you know at the end, were the expectations more
41:20
Speaker 3: or less met.
41:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, I had a pretty low opinion starting which people
41:24
Speaker 4: might have already gotten that I did not think it
41:27
Speaker 4: would amount to much. And I was pleasantly surprised that
41:30
Speaker 4: it absolutely met my expectations. And how right you were.
41:35
Speaker 4: I felt so smart now. Actually, the part I did
41:39
Speaker 4: not expect is the comedy, because I did laugh out
41:42
Speaker 4: loud quite a few times, sometimes at points where it's
41:46
Speaker 4: supposed to be funny, and some points or maybe it
41:49
Speaker 4: wasn't supposed to be funny. But again, when I was
41:52
Speaker 4: young in high school, drive in movies were really going
41:55
Speaker 4: the way of the Dodo. There was like two in
41:57
Speaker 4: my area, and then there was just one. Before when
42:00
Speaker 4: I was young, we used to go all the time.
42:03
Speaker 4: We would all pile into the car, my brother, sisters
42:05
Speaker 4: and everybody, and we'd all pile into the VW bus
42:08
Speaker 4: because they charged by the car. Back then, we'd have
42:11
Speaker 4: like ten people and we'd bring lawn chairs. Could go
42:13
Speaker 4: set up the lawn chairs down in the lawn chair
42:16
Speaker 4: area and they had swing sets and the whole bit.
42:18
Speaker 4: But when I was in high school, we used to
42:19
Speaker 4: do the same thing. We would pop ten tons of
42:22
Speaker 4: popcorn with the new fangled air popper and we would
42:26
Speaker 4: go and back. Then the drinking age was eighteen, so
42:29
Speaker 4: you could stop and get some refreshing beverages before the movie.
42:33
Speaker 4: And a friend of ours had a pickup truck and
42:35
Speaker 4: we would put park it backwards and you'd sit in
42:37
Speaker 4: the back of the pickup truck and watch the movie
42:40
Speaker 4: and just have a great time. It's one of my
42:42
Speaker 4: best memories. But this is a perfect absolutely would have
42:45
Speaker 4: been a perfect movie for this.
42:47
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I was thinking that this would be a
42:49
Speaker 3: great midnight movie.
42:50
Speaker 4: I have a better idea. There's a thing called a
42:53
Speaker 4: dive in movie. So you basically I saw this. They
42:58
Speaker 4: show movies at the resort where a bunch of people
43:02
Speaker 4: have boats. You take your boat and you go watch
43:06
Speaker 4: the movie. But you also everybody gets out and sits
43:08
Speaker 4: on floats. Now in the water. Now this be the
43:10
Speaker 4: perfect movie for it.
43:12
Speaker 3: Now if you hear a little chittering noise and then
43:15
Speaker 3: all of a sudden, the bubble machine starts starts going,
43:18
Speaker 3: and all of a sudden, red caro SYRP.
43:20
Speaker 4: Just think dive in movie. I think it's perfect.
43:24
Speaker 3: Oh boy, was there any one of the characters of
43:27
Speaker 3: the actors that really stood out for you?
43:29
Speaker 4: I enjoyed the girl who was the detective. Yeah, the
43:32
Speaker 4: skip Tracer's the skip tracer. She was funny. She was
43:35
Speaker 4: so funny in the whole film. Yea, even in the
43:38
Speaker 4: parts where it was like, you know, it got dicey
43:40
Speaker 4: because you know she's in danger and everything, She's still funny.
43:44
Speaker 4: And I enjoyed her, and I'm I'm glad to know
43:46
Speaker 4: that she was in the Sound of Music before.
43:49
Speaker 3: I really enjoyed both the two leading actors. I thought
43:52
Speaker 3: they had a great rapport.
43:54
Speaker 4: The one thing I will say about the film that
43:56
Speaker 4: drives me a little bit nuts is that that guy
43:59
Speaker 4: is a total drum, totally useless, right, didn't want to
44:02
Speaker 4: do anything. Yet he has like this sweet daughter. So
44:06
Speaker 4: that was just that just rang so false. Right. They
44:09
Speaker 4: should have just made it his knee sneeze or something
44:12
Speaker 4: something like that. Or or the old man who came
44:15
Speaker 4: to visitors granddaughter somebody who mattered but wasn't his kid.
44:20
Speaker 3: Yeah. I thought the actress who played that little girl,
44:23
Speaker 3: I thought she was yeah the entire time. I really
44:26
Speaker 3: I really liked her. Was there a particular Piranha kill
44:31
Speaker 3: that you found particularly gruesome.
44:33
Speaker 4: No, not really, I mean the old man. Yeah, that's
44:37
Speaker 4: what I was thinking of. The old man getting pulled
44:39
Speaker 4: into the water, the dog barking. I mean it was frustrating,
44:42
Speaker 4: but he was like, just pull your legs out of
44:44
Speaker 4: the waters with you. Oh, that was such a great thing.
44:47
Speaker 3: You know, he's dragged himself up on land where he's died,
44:50
Speaker 3: and then like his everything below his kneecap is denuded.
44:54
Speaker 3: I think Piranha and jaws have taught us that if
44:58
Speaker 3: you're with a really good life looking young lady and
45:02
Speaker 3: she wants to go swimming, just leave let her, let
45:06
Speaker 3: her do her thing. I mean, don't don't follow her
45:09
Speaker 3: into this water.
45:10
Speaker 4: At that age, I probably would have had a hard
45:11
Speaker 4: time not following that girl in the water. She was
45:14
Speaker 4: she was ready to go skinny dipping pretty much at
45:16
Speaker 4: the drop of a hat.
45:19
Speaker 3: When they first got to the military base at night,
45:23
Speaker 3: and that the young couple goes swimming in the water,
45:26
Speaker 3: they referred to it as a pond, right, yeah, but
45:29
Speaker 3: obviously it's a swimming pool, right, And it looks like
45:32
Speaker 3: it's got all these little cages, which obviously in the
45:35
Speaker 3: light of day turns out to be volleyball nets. And
45:37
Speaker 3: then they have these rusty barrels that they put for
45:40
Speaker 3: set dressing in the back. And then on the ground
45:43
Speaker 3: they took these barbecue grill lids, painted them orange and
45:46
Speaker 3: just stacked them around the place to look like ports
45:49
Speaker 3: that would open up that you can go down into
45:51
Speaker 3: the Yeah.
45:54
Speaker 4: That's actually the funnest part of sometimes, Like, I don't
45:57
Speaker 4: know if I remember. If I told you I might,
45:59
Speaker 4: you might remember. But I worked doing the lighting on
46:03
Speaker 4: a play in college. Oh yeah, yeah, so I was
46:05
Speaker 4: on a lighting crew. And I'll be honest with you,
46:07
Speaker 4: one of the funnest things of doing a play is
46:10
Speaker 4: doing the set dressing and then using the lighting to
46:13
Speaker 4: kind of adjust the mood or make the scene change completely.
46:17
Speaker 4: It's super fun. And I can see in a movie
46:20
Speaker 4: they're like, well, just got a bunch of Weber grills
46:22
Speaker 4: and spray paint the top. They'll look perfect. You know.
46:28
Speaker 3: Growing up, there was a advertisement of AWL who would say,
46:34
Speaker 3: give a WoT, don't pollute. The way in which they
46:39
Speaker 3: are trying to control the fish is by polluting the river. Yeah,
46:45
Speaker 3: whether it's by the military drops in some kind of
46:48
Speaker 3: chemical or Paula is trying to get some sludge out
46:51
Speaker 3: of an old processing plant. I just thought, what a
46:54
Speaker 3: very seventies thing we have Vietnam. We have government conspiracies,
47:00
Speaker 3: we have pollution where pollution is the answer to the problem.
47:05
Speaker 4: So Chuck, if you're good, probably need to step away
47:08
Speaker 4: for a quick break.
47:09
Speaker 5: At flash Back and at flash.
47:17
Speaker 3: Back and welcome back, Matt. I don't know if I
47:23
Speaker 3: have much else to say about Piranha, which means that
47:26
Speaker 3: it's time for the question we ask every episode. Did
47:31
Speaker 3: Piranha groove through the decades or did it lose its beat?
47:35
Speaker 4: Well, this one is not as nuanced as it might be,
47:39
Speaker 4: but I will say that in watching this film, and
47:42
Speaker 4: I did not mention before that this was a first
47:44
Speaker 4: time watch for me. So I can't say much about
47:49
Speaker 4: that film seeing it in the past, but I can
47:53
Speaker 4: relate to the times that it was released in and
47:56
Speaker 4: the fact that I really think it is the perfect
48:00
Speaker 4: drive in movie movie, and I think it grooved in
48:04
Speaker 4: that respect back sure the old days, I think clearly
48:08
Speaker 4: from the money it made, it made money, and thirteen
48:10
Speaker 4: million dollars on a one million dollar budget has nothing
48:13
Speaker 4: to sneeze at. So that's great. It is entertaining to
48:17
Speaker 4: what nowadays, especially when you keep that in mind, you
48:22
Speaker 4: keep that the time it came out of and the
48:24
Speaker 4: Joss plantation part of it, it's entertaining to watch. It's
48:28
Speaker 4: funny in parts. It's not very scary, really, But do
48:34
Speaker 4: I think it grooves now? I will give it half
48:37
Speaker 4: a groove, and it bumps out of the groove every
48:39
Speaker 4: now and again and then bumps back in. So if
48:43
Speaker 4: you have a chance to watch it on two B
48:45
Speaker 4: or one of those others for free and you have
48:48
Speaker 4: a little spare time, it's funny. If you have a
48:50
Speaker 4: pool and a big screen and projector, it's the perfect
48:55
Speaker 4: dive in movie to watch because you could literally get
48:58
Speaker 4: up and get some more snacks and you wouldn't miss
49:01
Speaker 4: a thing. So yeah, I think it grooved in the
49:05
Speaker 4: old days, mainly because it does not take itself too seriously,
49:10
Speaker 4: which is I appreciate that. That contrasts with Worko, which
49:13
Speaker 4: I think took itself a little bit seriously. This one
49:16
Speaker 4: does not do that. So it is what it is
49:19
Speaker 4: and it's proud of it. And nowadays it's fun to
49:22
Speaker 4: watch because it's just so goofy. But would I go
49:25
Speaker 4: out of my way or pay a lot of money
49:27
Speaker 4: to see it. I think maybe no. So I have
49:30
Speaker 4: to say it grooved in the old days, and like
49:33
Speaker 4: I said, it grooves now with the occasional skip or
49:36
Speaker 4: bump out of the groove.
49:38
Speaker 3: Okay, okay, that needle is kind of going eat exactly
49:42
Speaker 3: and you have to kind of ur you have to
49:44
Speaker 3: hit it.
49:45
Speaker 4: You tape some pennies on it. There you go.
49:49
Speaker 3: The first time I ever saw this film, like I said,
49:52
Speaker 3: I think earlier, was that it came on HBO and
49:54
Speaker 3: my dad was watching it and he invited me to
49:57
Speaker 3: come in and sit down and watch it. And then
50:00
Speaker 3: and I think he told me to never tell my
50:02
Speaker 3: mother that he let me watch reasons so it's just
50:08
Speaker 3: between me and you, suh. So up until now, my
50:11
Speaker 3: dad and I have had this secret that is now
50:14
Speaker 3: out in the open. I have to say that I
50:18
Speaker 3: unabashedly love Roger Corman movies. They are what they are,
50:22
Speaker 3: and you know this Jaws cash In is absolutely no exception,
50:28
Speaker 3: even if it was three years too late. But just
50:32
Speaker 3: look at who made this movie. I mean, Joe Dante,
50:35
Speaker 3: John Davison, Phil Tippett, Rob Bouteen, Mark Goldblatt and John Sales.
50:40
Speaker 3: This film does not waste time, and that's not surprisingly
50:44
Speaker 3: because it has a small budget and they had to
50:46
Speaker 3: keep moving and the practical effects for the most part
50:51
Speaker 3: are pretty effective. Yes, there are rough edges, but hey,
50:56
Speaker 3: this is a B movie, you know, and I think
50:59
Speaker 3: it adds something to the charm. It's never going to
51:03
Speaker 3: replace Jaws, and it wasn't trying to. And you just
51:07
Speaker 3: said something about Orca taking itself a little bit more serious.
51:11
Speaker 4: When we first.
51:12
Speaker 3: Started doing the Jaws floydation Monk, my idea was I
51:15
Speaker 3: was going to see two movies that were B movies,
51:19
Speaker 3: and I didn't get that with Orca, and I was
51:21
Speaker 3: a little bit disappointed, but I was also kind of
51:23
Speaker 3: surprised that they really made something like that. This film
51:28
Speaker 3: was exactly what it was that I was looking at.
51:31
Speaker 3: And if anyone was to ask me which Jaws knockoff
51:34
Speaker 3: is actually worth watching, this is the one I'm recommending.
51:38
Speaker 3: It's funny, suspenseful, occasionally shocking, and nearly fifty years later,
51:44
Speaker 3: it still is entertaining way to spend ninety minutes. So
51:48
Speaker 3: for me, Piranha absolutely grooped through the decades. Do you
51:52
Speaker 3: have any final thoughts on this, Matt.
51:54
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's a couple of grandmas out there that have
51:57
Speaker 4: to answer the question, Grandma, how did you spend your
51:59
Speaker 4: team years acting in a Roger Corman film? Wow, you
52:05
Speaker 4: looked really good back then, huh mom, Grandma, I know,
52:11
Speaker 4: I you know, Chuck as usual. You really sum up
52:14
Speaker 4: the film in a great way. And it's not that
52:17
Speaker 4: I don't disagree. I just am trying to be real
52:20
Speaker 4: in terms of, you know, ninety minutes. It's entertaining. Like
52:23
Speaker 4: I said, I wouldn't pay money for it, but I
52:25
Speaker 4: totally agree. It's really cool to see what Roger Corman
52:29
Speaker 4: was doing with these debutante stars and actors and screenwriters
52:35
Speaker 4: and directors, and that's that's really cool. That's one of
52:37
Speaker 4: the funnest parts about doing this podcast is we get
52:40
Speaker 4: to learn kind of those secrets that I would totally
52:43
Speaker 4: be oblivious to in my normal life. So thank you
52:47
Speaker 4: for that.
52:47
Speaker 3: Well, now that we watched both Orca and Piranha, which
52:51
Speaker 3: one did you enjoy more?
52:53
Speaker 4: You know, I actually enjoyed parts of Orca because the
52:57
Speaker 4: you know, and I think we talked about it in
52:59
Speaker 4: the podcast, that the Orca is actually a sympathetic character. Sure,
53:03
Speaker 4: up until the point where he wants to murder everyone.
53:06
Speaker 4: But I would say, in terms of enjoying movies, this
53:09
Speaker 4: one I enjoyed more.
53:10
Speaker 3: I'm really glad we watched both of them. I had
53:13
Speaker 3: more fun with Piranha, but I think maybe I kind
53:15
Speaker 3: of knew that after I watched Orca, was like, Oh, yeah,
53:17
Speaker 3: I'm gonna like Piranha more. But Orca I hadn't seen,
53:20
Speaker 3: and I was really surprised. I thought Richard Harris was
53:23
Speaker 3: great in it. It took a lot of turns that
53:26
Speaker 3: I wasn't expecting. I was surprised. So I think that
53:30
Speaker 3: about does it for this episode. Join us in two
53:34
Speaker 3: weeks as we kick off our Shades of Noir month
53:38
Speaker 3: with Arthur Penn's Night Moves from nineteen seventy five starring
53:43
Speaker 3: Gene Hackman. Then we'll wrap up the month with Robert
53:47
Speaker 3: Altman's The Long Goodbye, featuring Elliott Gould's take on private
53:52
Speaker 3: detective Philip Marlow. Together, these two films explore how the
53:56
Speaker 3: classic film noir tradition evolved in the nineteen sevenies, with
54:00
Speaker 3: flawed detectives, morally gray worlds, and mysteries that are about
54:05
Speaker 3: far more than simply solving the case, we'll talk about
54:08
Speaker 3: Gene Hackman, Elliott Gould, Arthur Penn, Robert Autmann, and why
54:12
Speaker 3: these two films remain among the finest neo noirs of
54:15
Speaker 3: the decade.
54:16
Speaker 4: We want to thank you for taking the time to
54:18
Speaker 4: tune in. If you've seen Piranha, we'd love to hear
54:21
Speaker 4: what you think. Reach out to us on Facebook or
54:23
Speaker 4: leave us a message over at cinematicflashback dot com. Don't
54:27
Speaker 4: forget to subscribe so you'd never miss an episode. And
54:30
Speaker 4: if you enjoy the podcast, we'd really appreciate it if
54:33
Speaker 4: you left us a rating or a review. In fact,
54:35
Speaker 4: review just might get read on the air. If you've
54:38
Speaker 4: been enjoying the show, tell your friends and family about
54:41
Speaker 4: what we still proudly believe is the best podcast dedicated
54:44
Speaker 4: exclusively to nineteen seventies cinema. Join us next time as
54:49
Speaker 4: we climb back into the wayback machine and head once
54:52
Speaker 4: again to the nineteen seventies for another cinematic adventure. Until then,
54:56
Speaker 4: stay out of the water, and if someone tells you
54:58
Speaker 4: the swimming pools perfectly safe, you just might want to
55:01
Speaker 4: think twice. We'll see you next time.
55:06
Speaker 5: Flash Back in the show again.
55:13
Speaker 3: Bob, I'm gonna have to get back to you on this.
55:15
Speaker 4: We've got a we've got a situation down here.