YOU’RE NO ALIEN! (Warning! Spoilers Ahead!)

Part of Stranger Things’ appeal (notably to Gen-X’ers) is the nostalgia manifested within the world of Hawkins, Indiana.

 

Which is why we scratched our heads at the evolution of the Demadogs (Demagorgon, Mind Flayer, whatever floats your boat), compared to that of the terrifying, sweaty tooth beast from LV-426 (Alien).

The similarities between beasts are obvious:  fast, exponential body growth, shedding of skin, multiple sets of teeth and a quick first step.  The Alien has acid for blood and therefore, cannot simply be shot and killed.  The Demadog doesn’t have a true self-defense mechanism.  Its only protection is Will, who is infected by the Shadow Monster and the agent by which the evil beasts exist.

 

The nitpick being, Stranger Things cut corners and didn’t give us a monster worth its horrifying salt.  

Aside from the look, the Demadogs are a poor man’s replica of the Alien.  They are not monsters as much as they are simply undomesticated pets from the Upside Down running amok, with no passion except for human flesh.  They have no inner life.

In contrast, the Alien has a goal of constantly reproducing its kind, stopping at nothing to ensure its preservation.  They are beings that can survive on their own and aren’t relegated to a world controlled inside someone’s imagination.  Moreover, there is gravitas with direct conflict and not through a supernatural conduit.

 

It also doesn’t wash that the heat-laden exorcism of Will could occur with any sort of time sensitivity.

Just ask Father Merrin when he tried to run Pezuzu out of Reagan’s body in The Exorcist… it’s a real pain in the ass.

A WOMAN ON THE BRINK (Warning! Spoilers Ahead!)

Joyce Byers’s (Winona Ryder) 1976 Ford Pinto* is by all accounts, a piece-of-crap car that is a bumper tap away from total combustion.  

Viewers have come to understand the car as such, which is why it seems to be a proper fit for Joyce as she, like the car is on the brink and a brilliant metaphor for the fragility of life that Joyce endures. 

With some knowledge to the defect in the Pinto, we get a taste of our own ‘Oh, Shit’ moment as she nearly crashes the car into Hopper’s Ford Bronco in a frantic search for him.

A closer look at Joyce Byers is to see a woman doing her best to preserve the last vestiges of a normal family, working hard at the five and dime, living in a house that looks like a composite of paper mache and rotting wood.  All the while worried sick about her son and his frightening condition.

Enter Dr. Owens (Paul Reiser – in a reprise role a la Aliens) who is of no help in regards to Will’s unshakeable hallucinations with the Upside Down.  He suggests to, “Treat him (Will) normally.  Be patient with him and don’t pressure him to talk.”

Joyce balks at this, questioning the expert, but then resigns to the doctor who ‘gets it’ and is ‘on her side’.  As a result, she struggles throughout the series to get clear answers from the experts and suffers the stigma of someone who is out of her league, even though her concerns are rational.

 

It’s enough to drive any mother of a poltergeist-ridden child absolutely bat-shit and moreover, a candidate for careless driving.

 

For the sake of viewers Joyce, please drive safely.

*Note:  The defect on the Ford Pinto was in the rear bumper and not the front bumper, to which Joyce almost rear-ended Hopper’s Bronco.  It’s not an accurate representation of the defect.  But we still yelled “Oh, Shit” when we saw it almost happen.

ARCADE BRAVERY (Warning! Spoilers Ahead!)

The heroism and bravery were replete in Season 1, and this season of Stranger Things is no different.  

We open Season 2 finding our heroes, amassing quarters for their impending usage at the local joystick and button parlor whereby local, acne-ridden youth imbibe in games of chance.

Dustin finds his booty in the living room couch.  Lucas brings his hard-earned, lawn mowing money to the kitty, and Mike takes to his sister’s dresser and raids her piggy bank.

Will meets the rest of the gang at the arcade (thanks to a ride from Mom and her Ford Pinto) and is under no obligation to bring money.  After all, why bug him for quarters?  He has enough on his plate with going in and out of the Upside-down world.

 

Inside the Palace Arcade, the gang surrounds Dustin who is at the helm of a video game.  The editors at Nitflix saw the name on the side and immediately had a flashback.

It brought about of our own days spent riding bikes to Michael’s Red Hots in Highland Park, scarfing down dogs and fries in a matter of seconds before commandeering Dragon’s Lair, the first-ever fully-animated arcade game.

 

We said to ourselves, “We know this game, its characters and the lost time and money that resulted due to our feeble pursuit of a cartoon character.”

We fell of our couches in nostalgic ecstasy.

The object of the game was to successfully complete a set of challenges before attempting to save the smoking-hot Princess Daphne.  A thumb’s move of the joystick in the wrong direction and Dirk the Daring (the hero of Dragon’s Lair) loses a life.  After three lost lives, the game is over and Dirk turns into a skeleton.

The allure to Dragon’s Lair was the challenge of making the correct move, based on a pre-programmed set of ‘correct’ movements of the joystick and/or ‘Sword’ button.  Unlike Pac-Man, you couldn’t simply navigate your way out of a corner and elude the ghost chasing you.  Every movement (right, left, up or down) had to be correct.

 

Perhaps more importantly, it was also the first arcade game to cost fifty cents and it took a stockpile of coins to save the Princess.  Dustin gives the spot-on comment of the game being ‘overpriced bullshit’, kicking it while bemoaning its bias towards the human race, reminding us that our pubescent aspirations of being a ‘Knight in Shining Armor’, were just aspirations and nothing more.

Cue Max (Sadie Sink), a Princess Daphne in her own right, who comes to town in the form of red-headed, skateboard-savvy, California girl.

Oh, and she blasted away Dustin’s high score on Dig Dug.  Now that’s hot.

YOU CAN’T CHEAT A PERIOD PIECE

For any red-blooded American kid who grew up in the 1980s, your required viewing is now Stranger Things.  The editors at Nitflix command you.

The only excuse you have is if you are still in the dark ages and aren’t streaming, or if your budget doesn’t allow for a streaming service.  The latter excuse we can accept.

Season 2 of Stranger Things was released on Netflix today.  Aside from being a great story, Stranger Things’ popularity is due the films from which it draws upon (E.T., Close Encounters, The Goonies, D.A.R.Y.L., etc…), and the memories that are stirred within us as a result.

 

Stranger Things allows us to reminisce of a time where the smartest phones were cordless at best, you could walk yourself to school without parental supervision and Google was known as the local library.  

These are some of the nuanced limitations of the world in which we grew up.  Capturing a time and place as Stranger Things does so perfectly, cannot be cheated.

From the cars and clothing, to the school desks and movie projectors, everything must be accurate.  Nothing can be left to chance for fear of nitpicky bloggers, like yours truly, who will pick at every last detail and make sure that every object, live or inanimate, is temporally up to snuff.

You can’t have a 1990s model Lexus coupe driving through the streets of 1980s Hawkins, Indiana.  Get our drift?

IT SUCKS TO BE ON THE CREW OF THE ENTERPRISE

We broached this subject two posts ago regarding being a 2^nd in command to the main antagonist and how their screen time should be valued, for it is limited.

 

Crew members on the Starship Enterprise understandably know the risk of their commitment to Starfleet and the ship they serve.  For the unlucky crew members that are profiled in brief, their fate is sealed.  They fare a little better than the SOSDF in Grease, but despite their character’s best intentions, they can’t escape their cinematic death.

The Family Guy does a good take on this, admittedly better than us editors.  But we’ll give it our best to expound upon this idea for you.

Exhibit A:  Midshipman 1^st Class Peter Preston (Ike Eisenmann) – Star Trek 2:  The Wrath of Khan (1982).  Scotty’s right-hand man for the training promptly answers to Admiral Kirk’s¹ questions of readiness.  But Preston was not ready for the attack from Khan, which left the ship damaged and crew members wounded or dead, including him.

 

A grief-stricken Scotty claims, “He stayed at his post.  When the trainees ran.”  For all intents and purposes, Preston fulfilled his duty of a Midshipman on the Enterprise and as the crew member chosen to die.

 

Exhibit B:  Fast forward to Star Trek: First Contact (1996) and Lt. Hawk (Neal McDonough) is ordered to accompany Picard and Worf to fix the Enterprise while magnetically grounded to its exterior and avoiding cyber-henchmen trying to... ²

 

The point is, Picard and Worf aren’t getting killed off.  As a result, one of the evil cyborgs lifts Hawk off the magnet and throws him into the vacuum of outer space.

Sorry Hawk and Preston, but that’s the breaks.  Read the fine print on your signed Entrance Waiver to Starfleet³.

¹ In Wrath of Khan, Kirk has now been promoted to Admiral.  He will be demoted in StarTrek 4:  The Voyage Home (the one about traveling back in time to save a whale), lest you forgot.

² Maybe a Trekkie can get up off their mom’s couch and let us know exactly what the heck Picard, Worf and Hawk were doing on the outside of the Enterprise?  Please and Thank You.

³ Does a Trekkie out there have a copy of the signed waivers by Hawk and Preston where it says that The USS Enterprise is always subject to the evils that roam the galaxy and prisoners are not taken?  They have to exist.

HAND-JIVE MANIA

GREASE (1978)

The season has officially changed to Autumn here at the offices of Nitflix, bringing gray skies, cold rain and a touch of seasonal mood disorder.  But we are ready and motivated for curling up under a fleece blanket on the couch, watching our favorite movies over a bowl of burnt popcorn (a benign peccadillo) and a beer.

On one such occasion this past week, I caught Grease just as my favorite guilty pleasure scene comes on the screen.  The Hand-Jive at the Rydell High School dance contest contains a short, but memorable character (whom we cannot accurately verify any credit for via IMDB), who shall forever be called, “Spazzed-Out Sweaty Dancing Fool” (SOSDF for short).

I had to revisit this scene for my own joy and self-maintenance. Right here from 3:42 to 3:46

It’s only four seconds of a guy who looks like a cross between a jam-band tweaker and a death metal fan.  With mouth agape and little if no sound exiting his mouth, the man is committed to his role as the SOSDF.  

This touches a rarely tapped section of our brain that remembers how silly the characters looked to us, even though their cut was kept off the editing room floor.  We refer to this sort of actor as the Camera-Seeking, SAG-Card Earner (CSSCE) and they are the glue that keep our interest.

Feel free to express gratitude upon these actors, asking the heavens for more CSSCE’s and characters like the SOSDF.  Try to remember your favorite CSSCE and reopen the floodgates (through however you stream these days) to your funny bone and ultimately, your happiness.

 

You’ll need some once winter hits.

IT SUCKS TO BE THE 2ND IN COMMAND

To be ‘right-hand man’ to the main villain in 80s action movies is no cinematic cake-walk.  For even the casual movie lover it is known that this individual must die as there can be no resolution to the film without it.

Take Beverly Hills Cop (1984) for example:  Zack (Jonathan Banks) is the muscle behind art and coke dealer Victor Maitland (Steven Berkoff).  He is responsible for the death of Axel Foley’s (Eddie Murphy) best buddy from Detroit.  He is a thug deserving of a criminal’s denouement and subsequently gunned down in Maitland’s mansion.

 The muscle goes down first for the main antagonist to be fated the same way (Foley ices Maitland, too).

 

It’s in the cards.

Eddie Murphy (Reggie Hammond) was part of that same scenario in 48 Hrs. (1982).  He warns Billy Bear (Sonny Landham), cohort of money-grubbing scumbag Ganz (James Remar), “Billy, you’re gonna lose.” Billy approaches with a 12" blade, to which Hammond guns him down.  Jack Kates (Nick Nolte) and Hammond ultimately corner Ganz and eliminate him, ending his rampage. 

There are some exceptions to the order of to the bad guys’ end, though.

 

Should the head honcho get his come-uppance before the 2^nd in command, the rule still applies.

 

In Die Hard (1988), Karl (Alexander Godunov) is the right-hand man for Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) and not only wants our hero John McClane (Bruce Willis) to be more than ‘neutralized’.  Karl wants him dead for all the killings of his terrorist cohorts.  Gruber goes out first, falling many stories to his death from the top of Nakatomi Plaza.

The viewer is convinced to believe that all is well and the movie concludes, until Karl pops up and tries to gun down McClane.  But thanks to Sgt. Powell (ReginaldVelJohnson) and a Twinkie sugar rush, Karl gets the lead poisoning.

What does all this mean?

No matter, when it happens within the story, the 2^nd in command has the life expectancy akin to a random Enterprise trainee on Star Trek.

 

They must value their screen time for they will be toast… count on it.

  

REST IN PEACE, HARRY DEAN STANTON (1926-2017)

Throughout a 60-year career in television and film, Harry Dean Stanton was the pure definition of a working actor, thanks to looks and voice, both of which were unique.

His looks are that of a bony-slim cowboy with deep cracks in the facial edifice.  A train wreck spurned by the world around him and resigned to a fate reserved for the losers of this world.

 

He reminds us of the guy next to you at the local dive, elbows up at the bar and a cigarette burning between yellowed fingers.  He tells stories with a Mason-Dixon dialect; not too Southern to suggest ‘redneck’ and not too Northern to suggest ‘refined’.

 

The editors at Nitflix will remember him most for his performance as in Cool Hand Luke combining into one depressingly beautiful character.  A hang-dog look with a church hymnal voice, as he plays a depressingly beautiful rendition of “Just a Closer Walk with Thee” on acoustic guitar.

Unique, memorable and will be missed.

LIFE IN SIX MINUTES

_{VISION QUEST (1985)}

Thanks to YouTube, we are privy to our favorite inspirational speeches and pep talks from movies, immediately accessible for the exact moment when our emotions need to be lifted, penetrating the window to the soul of our inner hero.

  

The editors of Nitflix implore the reader to screen the ‘Six Minutes’ speech from Vision Quest. 

Some background on the scene:  Elmo (J.C. Quinn) is talking to his co-worker and film’s protagonist Louden (Matthew Modine) before his big wrestling match versus State Champion, Brian Shute.

 

Louden is amazed that Elmo would get all gussied up and give up a night’s pay for “Six lousy minutes on the mat.”  Stoically and eloquently, Elmo shoots down Louden’s minimization of the match.  There’s no rah-rah or metaphors about life.  No talk of winning or losing.  No mention of a life wasted due to time passed. 

“It ain’t the six minutes.  It’s what happens in that six minutes.”, Elmo says.

It’s bone chilling, honest and virtually chastises Loudon (and us) for thinking otherwise.

It gets us every time

THAT’S RIGHT! HE’S GOING TO BE MAYOR!

_{BACK TO THE FUTURE (1985)}

He motivated George McFly (Crispin Glover) to stand up for himself and Goldie Wilson (Donald Fullilove) assured us of his success into local politics way back in 1955, knowing that being a waiter is temporary and with hard work, he can ‘be somebody’.  Marty McFly (Michael J. Fox) reaffirms Goldie’s premonition by saying that Wilson is going to be mayor.

  

Thanks to hindsight, we know this to be true.

The owner of the diner dismissed his prospects, because according to him, who would vote for a ‘colored mayor’. But Wilson remained steadfast to his beliefs, scoffing at the ignorance of his boss and the prevailing ignorance of the times.

 

It was an audacious, yet positive message of a man ready to drive a political energy bus towards a bright, prosperous future.

What should be of more importance to us are Wilson’s dance moves during the crowded diner scene where George professes his ‘density’ for Lorraine.

See it here.  From 1:26 - 1:37

The dance moves display the panache required to handle such a difficult task of running a town such as Hill Valley.  The audacity of hope did not start decades later from the mind of Barack Obama, but with a fleet-footed, political dance machine and the future ‘Hizzoner’.

WHAT WOULD YOU WATCH?

_{BACHELOR PARTY (1984)}

What would be of more interest to you?  A Belly-Dancing Stripper or a Drug-Using Donkey?

This is a tough one as we delve deeper into the psychology and moral progression of ‘wild and crazy’ party scenes from the 80s.

The party scene in Weird Science (1985) was reserved for high-schoolers and represented more of a soiree feel with its use of a fully-stocked buffet table.

Risky Business (1983) had some light drinking, but was more memorable for its deviant display of suburban teenage hormones fused with hookers, certainly upping the ante versus Weird Science.

With a film titled Bachelor Party, the viewer expects to see a stripper do their bit at some point.  A donkey doing copious amounts of pills and blow takes the party up a notch.  It’s subversive and yet honest, as there is always a guest at the party bogarting someone else’s drugs.

We at Nitflix find humor in this and beseech the producers of the film for a re-edit.  Give us more of the Drug-Using Donkey.

REST IN PEACE: SONNY LANDHAM (1941-2017)

Hollywood lost one its perennial ‘bad-asses’ this past week in actor Sonny Landham.  He was 76 years old.

 

Sinister, scowling, black-hearted film roles are what we’ll remember about him the most, namely with 48 Hrs. and Predator.

However, one of Hollywood’s elite gave Landham his due (thank you,Daily Mirror UK).  

Sylvester Stallone touted the late actor as his co-star in Lock Up (1989), which is arguably Landham’s most dramatically-centered role.  He portrays a prisoner who is commissioned by the warden (Donald Sutherland) to make life a living hell for prisoner Frank Leoni (Stallone).

This is evident in the prison yard-football game scene (watch it here).  

The editors wanted to thank Stallone for his acknowledgement of his co-star, as we salute Landham’s performance and his contributions to the silver screen. 

IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING

_{OVER THE EDGE (1979)}

Any self-respecting Gen-X’er has seen the film Over the Edge (trailer here).

The film featured a young, Matt Dillon exuding the long-haired teenage outcast and displayed the precursor to his role in The Outsiders.

The editors at Nitflix has seen this movie on more than one occasion and have always been curious to the character of Tip.  For those that need a refresher course, Tip sells some hash to Claude and rats him out to the cops to take some heat off themselves.

 

Matt Dillon holds Tip at gunpoint attempting frontier justice and exclaims, “A kid who tells on another kid is a dead kid.”  Has anyone figured out if Tip is a boy or a girl?  Their high, raspy voice and bangs are reminiscent of Peppermint Patty, but they have the build of a boy.

The clip is here between 7:21 and 7:46

We urge you to do your research on this, for we have already done ours and know the answer.  

THE SIMPLE PLEASURES OF FLOYD GONDOLLI

_{BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997)}

The line stands on its own.

“I like simple pleasures like, butter in my ass, lollipops in my mouth.  That’s just me.”

It’s delivered so eloquently by Floyd Gondolli (Philip Baker Hall), pleading the case for video as the future of pornography and not celluloid.  The thought of Gondolli submitting himself to such kink keeps the focus on him, or so we think. 

Click the quote to check out The Colonel (Robert Ridgely) on the couch and out of focus in the background; dying of laughter and trying hard not to fudge the scene.  It’s a hard, quiet chortle and a true cinematic moment caught for posterity; the line between art and real life now blurred, leaving us in wonderment.

 

Is the Colonel or Ridgely trying to hold it together?

CUT AWAY! CUT AWAY!

The Ampipe High School locker room from All the Right Moves (1983) exemplifies the sacred yet malodourous, bacteria-ridden home of men.  We find the Bulldogs gearing up for practice, readying for their rival, Walnut Heights.

Gearing up in Ampipe apparently means a dance scene amongst the players; the only scene in the movie tailored for the female audience.  It’s cheesy, but not solely for its absurdity.

The real violation occurs over 14 seconds of a meat-titted, beer body with graying chest hair doing their best locker room jig.  That's 14 seconds of Tank! 

An eternity for a single shot.  An eternity of screen time for that guy.

We, at Nitflix, are not asking for too much when we beseech a re-edit!  3 seconds is the maximum elapsed time we are requesting.  The editors can fill with whatever they want with that remaining 11 seconds.  

NITFLIX PROFILE: JACKIE EARLE HALEY

As the punkish, little league slugger Kelly Leak in the irreverent (and original) Bad News Bears (1976) and the quick-fisted, soft-hearted Moocher in the Serio-comedy Breaking Away (1979), Jackie Earle Haley defined the young, modern American outlaw.  

As Haley got older, he resigned to B-movie jobs and bits on TV, as father time prevented casting into younger roles.  Between 1993 and 2006 Haley found himself directing commercials and corporate videos, until his returning to the screen as a child molester in Little Children (2006).

Since then, he’s been credited with 18 films. 

A transformation from freckles and a toothy grin to a scowl and sinister look, Haley’s professional acting range is evident, with a career renaissance rivaling John Travolta and Robert Downey Jr.  

Any actor worth Haley's salt will always have a job in Hollywood.  

A 13-year layoff doesn’t erase that sort of talent.

REST IN PEACE, MARTIN LANDAU (1928-2017)

Martin Landau applied to the prestigious The Actors Studio in 1955 and was one of two candidates out of 100 to be accepted.  His classmate was Steve McQueen.

Arguably his most complex undertaking as a classically trained actor was in Woody Allen’s Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), where he expertly plays a moral, upstanding doctor, fraught with guilt after he hires a hitman to kill his mistress (Angelica Houston) when she threatens to tell his wife about the affair.  He was Oscar-nominated for Best Supporting Actor, but would end up winning five years later for his role in Ed Wood (1994), for his spot-on portrayal of Bela Lugosi as the aging former horror movie actor-turned-junkie, relegated to the parts he gets in Wood’s slapdash, B-movies.

In the opinion of the editors at Nitflix, he should really have two Oscars and highly recommend Crimes and Misdemeanors.

Goonies Never Say Die!

THE GOONIES (1985)

Back in my ‘Business of Film’ class in college, there was assignment where we had to create a film project on paper.  From writing the script to the marketing and distribution strategy, it was up to us to attain the ‘greenlight’ for production from the professor and thus, a passing grade.

One film project that I deserved the ‘A’ the most was a fellow student’s pitch for a Goonies sequel.  The story starts off where Mikey, Mouth, Chunk and Data have all spent through the booty they pillaged from One-eyed Willy.  Being completely destitute, they plan for a jewel heist, Tarantino-style.

To be perfectly honest, I would clean Steven Spielberg’s house for a year if it meant this movie could get the greenlight.  But I don’t have the heart to steal the idea and I don’t have the time to be a domestic.

Any ideas out there that someone could pitch for a Goonies sequel, other than what’s written above?  Let’s do lunch and get a treatment down. 

You Don't Have A Movie Without...

CADDYSHACK (1980)

Never has there been a better comedic villain than Judge Elihue Smails (Ted Knight).  Smails is a snob, a blowhard, and a golf cheat.  He’s the guy you love to hate. 

It’s easy to see how Knight’s portrayal of news anchor Ted Baxter on the Mary Tyler Moore show gave him the template for such a boorish character, and Knight takes it one step further to a more sinister place.  It’s nothing but brilliant.   In the opinion of yours truly, The Nitpicker, if you don’t have Ted Knight, you don’t have a movie.  A casting director couldn’t possibly find someone else to play this role.

From the reader and film buff, would then come the reply of, “Goodman!  With such memorable comedic talents on the screen together, are you suggesting that the likes of Chevy Chase, Bill Murray and Rodney Dangerfield should be re-cast?  And that Ted Knight is the glue that keeps the film together?”

Yes.  Ted Knight stays in the film.  Here’s a hypothetical casting call below with 3 replacements per role.  Add yours in the comments section.

Ty Webb (Chevy Chase) – Dean Martin, Steve Martin, Tim Matheson (fresh off Animal House)

Carl Spangler (Bill Murray) – Jerry Lewis (w/Dean Martin only), Robin Williams, John Belushi (also fresh off Animal House)

Al Czervik (Rodney Dangerfield) – Danny DeVito, Buddy Hackett, John Belushi (he’s versatile)

The Dirtiest Field Hockey Players… Ever

MEATBALLS (1979)

Little did Camp Northstar know of the fiendish groin injury plot waged by two female members of Camp Mohawk in the women’s field hockey game during the Intra-camp Olympiad. 

This dastardly deed of harmful intent would make Northstar lose ground in the point total and result in the loss of their star player and marathon entry, Jackie.

We see their plan in action as the film cuts away from the action, to find the two future Vassar graduates, standing still, nodding in agreement as their target.  They double team Jackie with a hard knee to the groin, the most gruesome injury caught on camera (with exception to Joe Theissman’s leg-break on Monday Night Football.)

Where were the refs?  Did Camp Mohawk buy them too?  “The Groin Injury Seen ‘Round the Lake”, as it would be called at Northstar for years to come, was as plain as day and would be regarded in most hockey circles (ice, field and floor) as a major misconduct penalty.  

 They should both go to the penalty box and feel shame .