we're on a mission from god

wendy so i got that going darling

looks like i picked the wrong way to

quit sniffing blue light

of my life we enjoy your films

[Music]

welcome to vintage video where we'll be

reviewing every major film release of

the 1980s in real time

i'm patrick o'reilly i'm jesse bayless

and i'm richard wells and today marks

the 40th anniversary of the release of

american gigolo on february 1st

1980. it was written and directed by

paul schrader and released by paramount

debbie harry's call me was written for

this movie

yeah i i was like wondering boy they

sure are playing this song

an awful lot yeah and various remixes of

it over the course of the movie the

entire score is derived from her

song it was originally offered to

christopher reeves and john travolta

reeves was offered a million travolta

was offered two million and both of them

turned it down

they eventually got richard gear for 35

000

uh plus back end percentage so

depending on what the deal was well i i

think i read too that

travolta was signed on and they had

suits made for him

right and then when he when he left he's

like i'm taking these suits with me

yeah so he was gonna play the character

and

julie christie who wanted to do the

movie with richard gere dropped out

because she didn't want to work with

john travolta and then when john

travolta left the film they couldn't get

her to come back

when they got richard gere back so um so

she stayed gone

um she was gonna play obviously the

michelle part and jessica lange and

meryl streep also both turned down the

michelle roll

i could definitely see jessica lange i

could see jessica when you're doing it i

don't think i don't think it's a meryl

streep role really

but very weirdly so this is a list of

other people that were considered for

julian

chevy chase harrison ford what

shall we chase yeah chevy chase was one

of them this is clearly not

a comedy not only that but he has three

movies already this year so

his schedule was screwed anyway um but

harrison ford who i don't feel like

is right for it either especially like

exactly between star wars and indiana

jones

mel gibson who i could see maybe pulling

it off this was like

around the time of mad max coming out so

yeah he was he was really young at that

point so yeah

and then arnold schwarzenegger and

sylvester stallone were both considered

i don't know if they were ever actually

approached with it yeah no

i actually think stallone is the only

person i can picture in this role see

like honestly i feel like richard gere

out of all those people is the best no

i think gear is the best but but of

these five i think stallone is the only

one that

would would feel right for the character

um the budget

for the entire film was 5.5 million and

uh as recently as 2016 uh jerry

bruckheimer was discussing plans to

adapt it for showtime as a series with

neil labute writing

who i really like nail a butte but um

i don't think it ever happened it was a

5.5 million budget and they were going

to give

two of that well i think the budget

changed when they took travolt out of it

okay

because gear wasn't as big a name and al

also when you lose

julie christie or meryl streep then

you're not it's not going to be the same

thing who's julie christie

uh she was in dr zhivago um

she was in that uh uh what's her name

the uh

sally salt uh the away

away from her or something like that the

movie about the the woman with

alzheimer's

yeah when he said sally salt my brain

just went to sarah paulie and sarah

paulie that's exactly what i'm saying

sarah paulie directed it oh okay

yeah no that i was referencing

adventures okay okay i just wanted to be

sure i thought

though she is also a film director in

her own right of course um

i think it's called away from her okay

and it's about alzheimer's

and she's like it's about an elderly

couple and uh she plays the

the wife um but she's great she has an

oscar but i forget what for

um darling maybe never heard of it

but yeah we we get the call me song

right in the very first shot we're like

basically jumping into a music video for

call me

um as he's just driving around and he

goes to visit annie who is essentially

his pimp

a former pimp i i get the feeling like

he he's kind of semi-independent but

does a lot of favors for people

yeah but then later on she acts like

she's like offended that he worked with

anyone else like

right like she's supposed to have

exclusive rights to him

but their deal seems to be a 50 50 split

but she's trying to

change the percentage and she's like no

no that's not gonna happen

but she has some like super rich person

coming in later in the week and he needs

to learn swedish so that he can talk to

this person

uh i have to say uh sorry just like

taking a step back to the opening

credits

yeah i i have such a hard time now

reading cursive

because i haven't actually had the

recursive one of the names i forget

the uh what was her name nina van palant

i almost couldn't even read it yeah and

it's like it's almost like a

disney-esque

kind of cursive well yeah it's not like

it's actual cursive it's like a cursive

font so it's just a special well it

wasn't it wasn't even necessarily a font

because it was

animating like it was being signed on

the screen yeah so it's like

it wasn't just fading in so that was

making it even harder because it's like

you don't have the whole name to start

with

and it's also black text with a white

outline versus

white text with a black outline which is

a little bit easier to read yeah

uh and i was like i can't i can't read

any of these i don't know any of these i

don't know how any of these people

approved these credits

where you can't read who they are yeah

but i was surprised to see bruckheimer

in there yeah

i wish you right that's like that's like

my second note i was like brockheimer

question mark

yeah because it does not feel like um

one of his movies because they're all

typically like

not as cerebral like action type stuff

yeah what was he making at this time

uh well because like uh beverly hills

cop would be like a couple years later i

was 84 yeah

and that's which is funny because it

came out the same year's ghostbusters

and eddie murphy was gonna play winston

and

he turned it down and ghostbusters went

on to be the second highest grossing

movie of the year but he turned it down

for beverly hills cop was the highest

grossing movie right there

so it's like okay well good choice i

guess but yeah so he's uh he meets with

anne

and he tells her he wants to change the

deal and she says no no it's 50 50 and

keep practicing your swedish and

you're going to meet this woman you're

going to pick her up from the airport or

something

and then he gets a call from leon who is

a friend of his

who needs a substitute well he's not

he's not just a friend he is

he's a former i don't know if he's a

former pimp

but he's someone else he's gotten work

through yeah yeah back when he was

i think more exclusively to the male

yeah

crowd which he is not uh that's not his

his specialty at this point he's correct

he seems to be

exclusively going for older women

specifically like wealthy older women um

and he's made it very clear to leon that

he he's not looking for gay customers

anymore

and he's exclusively women at this point

but he says hey somebody canceled on me

and i need you to

fill in and it's up sorry

i need you to fill in but he needs to

like drive all the way up to palm

springs which is also like way out of

his

right right his territory jurisdiction

right

okay so jerry brookheimer yes uh

this is the first movie on the list that

i've even heard of of his

uh looks like he started producing in

75.

uh i i've never heard of defiance but

that was the same year so that's

heard of the remake wait is defiance the

one that they remade with jody foster

um about that definitely who gets

attacked or is that the one with uh

james bond in the woods yeah that's

james bonds in the woods but that's like

even

i don't know if that's i don't think

that's related no i don't think this has

anything to do with that

um but then uh so this was like this so

this was his first big movie

oh okay and then uh i mean he he had he

had a couple more but

i i hadn't heard of any of these um but

then he did

a flash dance in 83. okay

uh beverly hills cop in 84 top gun in 86

uh days of thunder that was when he

started working with tom scott yeah don

simpson

he also did a movie called cat people oh

yeah that's

that's a remake of uh an old movie and

paul schrader who directed this movie

directed cat people oh did he really

yeah but uh i was

i i have heard of cat people this this

one here from 82

but i always confuse it with uh stephen

king's

sleepwalkers which also has cat people

but like more literal like

anthropomorphic cat people

um ann has another client uh mrs dobran

who needs to be picked up tonight um and

he poses basically as a chauffeur and

takes her to her room and then he's like

oh can i open your champagne

and she's like uh you're gonna get a tip

you don't have to open he's like no no

that's not

that's not what i was doing like i just

wanted to have a drink with you and then

she catches on like

oh she hired you for this so this was a

little confusing to me

because like i figured that most of the

clientele

would know what they've ordered i think

she knew that

she had this coming but she didn't

realize that it was the same person as

her chauffeur

i think that's the implication is that

she's she assumed these would be two

different

jobs that she that people would be hired

for and she wasn't expecting her

chauffeur to also beat the gigolo that

she was getting

okay but then she's like oh well let's

go to a fancy restaurant where all the

celebrities hang out

and so he's like all right well we can

go here here or here

and just throws out some random choices

and then he takes her to the restaurant

we don't see any of their date together

but he basically calls up anne after the

date and says

oh we're gonna meet again tomorrow

afternoon and then he hangs out at the

bar to like try and find

and then at class yeah and he's like

checking out all the

the booths and and there's like one that

has three older ladies in it that are

clearly checking them out

like kind of like uber lyft when you're

just kind of you know strolling around

town

is the light on or off when you're

looking for a ride i don't know well

that doesn't work like that with ride

chair you use the nap yeah

but i thought the light still meant

something it doesn't mean something

it if it's red it means you stop

i think it means you're you're active

and working okay

but yeah so he sees a woman by herself

that uh

is she ordering in french or why does he

assume that she doesn't speak english

right off the bat um

yeah i think she she she makes some or

she orders something in french

and he goes and starts speaking french

to her but because he assumes that she's

like a tourist and that he can chat her

up in her language and impress her

right and talk her into a business deal

is this before or after the ryman

the rhymes before this is this is before

okay so

um he sits down at the table with her

and they chat for a while and then

she meant she starts speaking in english

and he's like oh i thought you were

uh french right disappointed that she's

not because

because it just means that like oh she's

like she's not as

easy a mark as he thought he was gonna

have um and she mentions that her

husband's

in politics and she doesn't get enough

attention from him and he's like all

right bye

like this is not what i thought it was

so i'll talk to you later

because she immediately picks up on the

fact that he's a gigolo and it's like

already trying to like

very like bluntly ask for his services

and he's like no no that's not how this

works

but i don't know why he's turning her

down though is

because he does it for love no no no oh

no he does it for money

why is it in these richard your movies

with prostitutes that everyone's doing

it for love instead of money

uh i imagine it's because she might be

potentially high profile

like if something if so assume she was

nobody and it turned out she's someone

very important yeah like if he's seen

with her

it you know if he could be seen with

random women

yeah um but yeah so

the the next day he drives up to palm

springs the following the following

afternoon

um and it takes him all day to get from

beverly hills to palm springs which

you know if it's a weekday it could um

but and there's like he's on dirt roads

and stuff driving through farmland

yeah there's none of that between

beverly hills and palm springs yeah

because

this was this was 1980 though yeah but

between beverly hills and the freeway

there's not

farm even though i don't know the valley

wasn't wasn't

all well he could have just taken the

one-on-one straight to the five

i don't know either way i think it was

just to give something to look at while

he's driving yeah

um he gets to the customer's house and

a guy answers the door and he's already

pissed off it leon like

okay i said no guy stuff so and no

couples right

that's also a rule was that a rule that

he said with leon beforehand

um i don't know if that was the rule he

established with leon but

he made it clear to the guys like i

don't do couples yeah and the guy was

like it's okay i'm just gonna watch

yeah yeah and he's like yeah that's fine

yeah

[Laughter]

these puns are going to be amazing

so he he walks him into the bedroom

where his wife is like

naked under the sheets on the bed and he

just gets to work

starts grabbing her and still works the

guy's like talking him through it like

step by step like no turn turn her

around no you have to be on this side

now move over here

it's kind of like that scene in true

lies only he's being horrible

yeah it's more like the scene in uh

american psycho

when he's telling the two prostitutes

what to do to each other

um but then he tells her or he tells uh

julian to smack his wife and then we'd

cut out of the scene

that's the last thing we see there um

so the next day uh he

meets leon at some outdoor restaurant

and gives him his cut of

the rate for that um that visit

and uh when he gets home michelle just

shows up at his house

well he but he gets mad at leon here he

does because he was like you know i told

you i told you i don't do

yeah i don't do couples well he said

yeah was it like a dirty trick

or something like that yeah he says that

that he he was a rough

yeah rough trip yeah um and he's like

look yeah i didn't know what was gonna

happen

and we needed a sub at the last second

but you got your money and

we're we're done here it was supposed to

be a lot like i think relative to his

other

gigs right but he was still splitting at

50 50.

um but yeah so uh he gets

he gives leon his cut and goes home and

michelle shows up at the house

apparently she's been following him

since he left the restaurant or at least

long enough to

figure out where he lives well that's

super creepy because you know like she

knocks on his door and you know

he's like how do you find me and and

she's like oh it wasn't hard

and then they like move on with the

conversation and be like no no no no no

no

like hang on i changed my mind i

actually do care yeah

go over those details um and then they

sleep together

with that with very little uh on the way

to that it's just

they have a bit of a flirtatious

conversation next to a bookshelf and

then suddenly they

they're in bed together well she wanted

to engage his services there so like

this was still a professional

transaction he's a very pushy customer

yeah no yeah i think you're right that

the implication of that he's still

getting paid for this interaction

yeah well she and and she uses the f

word

quite a lot to describe it and it seems

like it really bothers him

yeah like he's like whoa this is a

little vulgar

how dare you kiss your mother with that

mouth anyway last night i was slapping

this lady around

at my husband's request

uh and i like the next morning that he's

just like having phone sex

with another client while she's there in

the bed with him

when he orders breakfast it's so it

because it's a matter of fact let me put

my client on hold while i order you

breakfast

go back to my conversation um but yeah

so and the next day he

goes to like a pre-auction viewing

with mrs sloan and uh

he's basically flirting with this woman

over stuff that's going to go up for

auction that night

and uh they bump into mrs lautner who is

played by uh by francis bergen

um and she it seems like

he mrs sloane doesn't want mrs lautner

to know that he's a gigolo

and that she has engaged his services

for this like well yeah

i mean it becomes clear clear later that

like she

she doesn't want her husband to know

about this relationship that she has so

i think she's keeping it private

overall to everyone right but later on

he is a gigolo

for mrs lotner so it's like either

she just straight up told her yeah that

i hired that guy that was with me

because he's on a date with that other

woman is he

okay later i guess i missed that later

in the film but yeah so he's with mrs

sloane

um and they bump into mrs lautner and

talk for a while

but yeah so the next day he's sitting

out in his front yard and he reads that

uh the ryman woman has been murdered

and so this isn't this is the morning

after the murder

but he was with them the previous night

he wasn't there the night that she was

murdered

he was there the night before she was

murdered okay

i don't yeah so i'm totally not

following this so

he so he he goes out with the old lady

and then which old lady because they're

all old

the the one here what'd you show ford

for and then he met

yes he met uh michelle michelle the same

guy

those two were on the that's the same

night and the next day

he goes to the ryman house and slaps

that woman around that's the only thing

he does

that's the only thing he does that night

the next day he goes to the auction

house

yes that's the night that the woman gets

murdered okay we don't see it

but he went home with mrs sloane after

the auction house

and stayed with her the whole night i

thought he stayed with michelle that

night

no he did okay so wait is that the is

that the woman he pretends to be

like the gay decorator with yes okay so

he went home with her that night he went

home with her that night

okay then um the next day

he is out in front of his house and he's

reading that the woman was murdered

and michelle walks up to him in in the

courtyard in front of his building

and they go inside and uh

they have a conversation just about like

she fills him in a little bit more about

her situation with her husband

and that she's still in town and she

wants to continue this relationship um

and then sunday enters and starts

interrogating people first he's

interrogating

uh detective sunday is interrogating mr

ryman because obviously that's who you

talk to first

right and he says well we had a

gigolo at the house like he basically

gets that much out of him because he's

trying to make it clear that no i didn't

do this and they're like well then it

was someone else who had access to your

house who else did you have around

and he says we had this guy come in on

monday night or whenever it would have

been uh sunday goes to find julian and

says where were you on tuesday

and he says i was it with a friend at a

pre-auction viewing which he was

and he stayed with her the whole night

right well he was reluctant to give her

name though

yeah he did give her name but he also

said she's an important woman

and she appreciates her privacy so

let's keep this on the download

basically

so then that night after he talks with

sunday

is the night that he takes mrs lodner

who the francis bergin character that he

met at the auction

to this probably thousand dollar plate

dinner to see the senator speak and

after

they have their meal they actually get

to do like

a handshake meet and greet and when he

goes to shake the senator's hand he

realizes that

michelle is the senator's wife and so

when she said her husband was in

politics she's literally

a senator and not like a state senator

but like a congressional senator

i feel like she lied to him though

because shouldn't she say he was a

senator in new york and now they're

here in california like seems she made

it sound like he was

in a different state i i think she just

said that he was in new york but i don't

know

if that was to be implied that oh maybe

she didn't

because i think he is a californian yeah

they yeah that's what i was gonna say

it's like they he's supposed to be

california's senator but i

i thought she she was like saying that

he was

maybe she implied that either way he

seems caught off guard by it

i think is weird about this situation is

that after sunday

they they like go down to like a

restaurant and have a talk

very frank discussion about who he is

and what he does yeah

and uh he's not

arresting him but he's letting him know

that well he's not part of like the vice

team he's with homicide right

but he's letting him know that you're a

person of interest don't leave town that

kind of stuff

yeah but he's still allowed to like kind

of like come and go as he pleases to

like the senator's wife

knowing that he's being followed yeah

and being investigated it's just like

he they seem to they they're awful

gracious with the amount of leeway

that they get well i think they're

waiting until they have something that

they can actually hold him for because

otherwise you're

you're wasting your your habeas corpus

window yeah

julian basically catches michelle

following him the next day

but there's no payoff to that yeah in

the weirdest possible way

like she's like she's like strolling

down the street in like sunglasses and a

hat like and a couple times he turns

around and looks at her dead on

and she thinks like oh he still probably

didn't see me and hides again

yeah very weird like that that she

thought she got away with that

and that he never really called it out

yeah it's just

she's just following him they go into a

record store and then he's like oh hey

fancy meeting you here and she's like oh

hi yeah i was just

gonna get a record um

do you want to have sex again yeah and

then they do

um and then uh julian

is encountered by sunday while he's like

being fitted for some clothes

or something and he tells detective

sunday to stop bothering his clients

yeah because he's causing chronic he's

getting a shoe shine right yeah

but he's in like a dressing room um

and sunday shows him some pictures of

the scene of the murder

to give him an idea of exactly what

happened and he's obviously horrified by

it

um but then by the time julian gets home

he finds out that the police have

like gone through all of his stuff his

landlady is like

sorry they were here for two hours i

tried to get a hold of you and

but i couldn't stop them they had a

warrant i couldn't stop them

so they totally trashed his home um

and we find out later that they did find

something here yeah they found the

handcuffs that she was

bound with right see but this is again

this is like what i'm talking about how

gracious they are oh we found these

handcuffs

like so well they have mrs ryman's like

blood is like did you find the jewels

no way i'm finding the jewels and like

richard gear's like even damn

like like like it's so casual

and and it wasn't when he says damn it's

for the license plate

yeah but when yeah he's like he's like

yeah i read the paper i know that there

was some jewels still in too if you

didn't find the jewels then

someone out there still has the jewels

and whoever has them that's going to be

the person you're looking for

and that's where he's trying to convince

that this is a frame-up and

well the police may not be convinced

they agree that it's better for him to

be

out there because then whoever's gonna

frame him is gonna

yeah they're more likely to catch him if

they're yeah so um

so julian goes to ann's house

and tells her everything that happened

and she's like well i heard that you

went to leon and that's

kind of your problem basically yeah um

and uh and then he tells michelle

everything because he just wants to get

all the information out there forever

right

he's trying it's he's like a very lazy

detective yeah he's trying to piece

things together but he really is just

giving

information about it yeah um so

uh he gets called in for a lineup

because there was a witness that said

that they saw him

come up to the ryman house um

and so he's in a line up with four other

guys and he lies to one of the guys well

i feel like that's a really

so it's a strange thing when he when he

tells the other guys in the lineup that

he's getting

paid for it like i don't understand what

he he's trying to like

elicit some sort of reaction from that

he just wants to distract the person

who's supposed to pick someone out of

the lineup and

draw attention away from himself because

he did go there

just not the night of the murder yeah so

he's worried that this witness is going

to pick him out of the lineup because he

was there

but he didn't do it so he's trying he

just wants some guy to be

making a scene yeah so after he he tells

one of the other guys in the lineup oh

what

how much are you getting for this uh the

drunk guy's getting 15. i'm getting 10.

sounds like they're paying people

different the wine was getting 20.

you're kidding you ain't getting paid

you're getting screwed [ __ ] what the

[ __ ] is going on here is my lawyer

apparently enough to distract the woman

right because she didn't pick the right

person well she

she picked the right person but then she

changed her mind a couple of times

um but sunday doesn't tell them that

when they first

bring them in they're like so the

witness was able to identify you and

he's like that's impossible

like how could they possibly identify me

i wasn't there that night

and he's like and then she switched to

number one and then she switched to

you and then like she lost track of what

she was doing but

we still you know we have these

handcuffs that we found at your place

and he says did you find the jewels and

did the witness see

a license plate he's like no she didn't

get a license plate on the car and he's

like damn

and because he's really frustrated that

someone is getting off the hook with

this

um although if i were him i would just

be assuming that mr reiman did it

because

yeah well that's what i assumed the

whole time so but everyone keeps saying

oh he's got an alibis like

can we know what this alibi is the

audience needs to have this information

i would like to to write him off as the

potential suspect here

i mean the they don't really imply

they i mean they do sort of imply who's

framing him but they never really say

who actually did the murder right

well they eventually they do but yeah

and this scene

it's still not covered but then um

sunday says that you by the way you the

woman you said you were with

she says she wasn't with you on tuesday

she says that you guys were at that

auction

but that you left early in the afternoon

and the murder happened at 10 so

there's plenty of time for you to get to

the ryman house to commit this murder

and so he's like well that's not true

so he goes to her house right but she's

not going to admit it

right her husband's standing right there

but her husband also knows what happened

and he says you're lying and he says how

do you

he said i know you're lying and he said

how do you know i'm lying if if it

actually happened

and he says because i was here with my

wife the entire night

because he's giving his wife an alibi to

extract her from the situation

yeah because he he knows what his wife

did but he doesn't care

enough to get her entangled in a murder

investigation

right so he's like no no we were here

the whole time you figure out another

alibi

plus this is also spite against him for

right sleeping with his wife is like

you're there's no reason for me to do

you any favors at this point

um so uh now he's walking down the

street again being followed by someone

very

poorly trailing him um but this guy's

like

he's like he thinks he's a pi but he's

being very obvious because he's just

like a senator's aide he's not actually

he's probably an intern but i love that

that the entire like interrogation of

this guy occurs next to the warriors ad

which is also a paramount yeah i was

like oh this is very well framed

i feel like that's in it's intentional

too that there's like a diagonal line of

sorry paint across it because they were

like

is this too much of a poster for our

other movie to throw him up against

let's just paint over it so that it

looks at least like

know it's been stuff goes it's just like

what do we have the rights to what can

we put in the background here i know

this movie

but i also feel like like warrior

specifically is a poster that i would

expect to see spray paint over on

purpose

like right because that's kind of the

aesthetic of the whole movie

um but he throws him up against his

warriors poster

and goes through the guy's wallet to

find out that he works for

senator stratton the guy that is

michelle's husband of michelle

and uh and he says look if stratton

wants to talk to me he could just call

me and he writes his phone number on the

guy's head

and then shoves him towards the sidewalk

but clearly shoved the actor harder than

he meant to

well the guy almost eats it yeah the guy

guy slips and falls down and it doesn't

i mean it looks like it was

unintentional and he legitimately fell

down

but they both stay in character um and

the aid runs off

so we moved to the senator's house

presumably or

some kind of group yeah wherever he's

staying maybe it's the office or

something

um and the two of them are julian and

the senator are having a straight up

conversation where the senator says

i figured out what happened you met us

that night

at the at the benefit and you saw my

wife

and you were being investigated for a

murder so you decided that you would

insert yourself into our relationship

and then blackmail her for money

and he doesn't say no i met your wife a

couple nights earlier

right before the murder even happened he

just he just says that's not it at all

you don't understand what's happening he

said look

like my wife's stupid but i'm not yeah

and how much you never to see her

yeah you you don't come anywhere near my

wife again and i'm not to pay you any

amount of money that you're

going to try to blackmail me um but how

much money

but how much yeah and then he i can just

see richard you're almost doing dr evil

5 000

it's like

yeah even even in 1980s money five

thousand dollars isn't that much

he got he was getting three to go out to

the ryman that's a thousandth of the

budget of this movie

you could make 1 000th of this movie for

that much money

um but yeah so yeah he says stop seeing

my wife

and uh that's basically the end of their

conversation here

and then he goes out looking for leon

because he says okay my alibi fell apart

you need to get me a new alibi

but it's there's it's not an alibi tree

you can't just go to the alibi store and

be like

oh i'm just gonna find another person

who says that you're with them

because the cops aren't gonna buy

because you already gave them your alibi

and it already fell through

but in but in theory like this guy

you know should feel some sort of

responsibility

but he doesn't well he doesn't but and

we know why but yeah

you know but at this point you know

julian's still like

hey you know you made me do this you

need to help me get out of this the

whole point of you being my pimp is

you're supposed to find me like

a hassle-free way to earn the money

that's what you're where your 50

comes from and so if you're not gonna

give me an alibi at least give me the

other half of the money back

because this is not paying off for me um

and uh he says well you know i'll work

on it it's going to take a couple days

to figure something out but i'll try and

find an alibi for you but

he spots one of the new get the new boys

the

little blonde uh guy going up the stairs

i don't know i think he might even just

be credited as like blonde guy

yeah um uh but

uh he sees him again

at his home's parking lot right

and now he's suspecting that that

there's been stuff

planted in his house yeah he starts

ripping everything well

just before that he he meets up with

michelle again

even though he was told very

specifically to leave michelle alone and

to never see her again

and he's like hey why don't we go for a

jog let's go outside where

the senator's aid or camera people might

be even though i was told very

specifically to stay away from you

and they go outside and she says i'm

going away i'm leaving the country

um because the senator is just sending

her out of the country so that this

whole murder investigation can

finish and she can be kept out of any

problems

um and that's when he decides like okay

this isn't gonna happen again and he

goes through the whole house and

basically tears it up ten times worse

than what the police did

before deciding maybe it's not in the

house maybe it's in the car

and then he goes down to the car and

just starts ripping his car apart which

i don't understand because doesn't he

arrive

in his car when he sees the other guy

leaving well we don't know exactly when

things were planted there okay

uh because yeah then he tears his car

completely apart

yeah he's like ripping the engine head

off and then he's like tearing the door

open

he's even like ripping the plastic seal

on the inside of the door it's like

isn't the whole point of the seal that

you would know right been tampered with

i mean i guess you could conceivably

replace the seal but then he gets under

the car

and finds just a bag of jewels taped to

the bottom of the car

which if the cops found it there they

wouldn't be like oh yeah i'm sure he

just

taped a bag of jewels to the bottom of

the car and drove around like that yeah

it's

very odd like they could very easily

just fall off if you hit a speed bump or

something

i feel like i would have checked there

before i started ripping pieces off of

the inside of the

door i don't know where i would have

checked he seems like messed out at this

point he probably hasn't slept in like

three days and he's kind of going crazy

is this the point in which we get the

the sitting on the bed putting on

or taking off the tie scene like not

quite yet okay

um or no sorry yeah he rips it he rips

his house apart and

after he finds the jewels he goes back

upstairs

and he like sits on the bed like super

depressed like taking his tie off

you know really slowly but we know that

it's really really slowly

because the blinds you know are like the

light is shifting through the blinds

like

like time like he's standing there for

three hours very slowly putting on a tie

so his next stop is to go to anne and

say

look i'm in a lot of trouble and i can't

go to anybody else i need your help

i need you to set me up with an alibi

because leon's not doing it and she says

you stood up

my person the big wig the expensive

person that was going to come in and

speak only swedish

she got to the airport she couldn't

speak to anybody and

everything went wrong but i mean it

seems like he legit forgot because he's

got all this

murder stuff he's like i don't know if

you heard what i said i'm being

investigated for murder

and she's like so you stood me up she's

like yeah i could care less about your

murder investigation

well i mean we're seeing now like he

didn't care much about their friendship

and now she doesn't care much about his

yeah so everyone's cutting them loose

yeah so he

decides okay well then i'm gonna go back

to leon but michelle is there at the

restaurant

yeah was like wait what is she doing

she's just constantly following him in

this movie

everywhere he goes she's right around

the corner and it's not a coincidence

because we already know she just follows

him on the street yeah

because she's the worst spy ever but uh

he goes to leon's house

and leon's like i still can't help you

with your uh your alibi and the blonde

kid

goes out the door while they're arguing

and uh

then leon basically admits to everything

like

yeah no i set you up because i don't

like you and uh

and you were frameable yeah it needed to

happen and i got a lot of money out of

it and i'm i don't regret it and there's

literally nothing you can do at this

point because the cops have you did the

rights and you don't have an alibi

and he loses it and pushes leon over a

balcony

he like changes his mind at the last

second and tries to grab him but he

can't hold on to him

and his boots slip through i don't know

if he intended to push him over the edge

of the balcony i think he intended to

attack him

and and kind of just fell over the belt

and that balcony is not regulation

height it was like like a

two and a half three foot balcony it was

like right up to your hip it was like

perfect counter touching someone over

yeah his counters are really weird in

his apartment everything was weird in

the apartment

but it was the 80s yeah it looks very

like

tony montana decorated um but that's the

80s

and uh yeah so leon is dead now leon

falls

from the third or fourth story of this

building and just splats on the ground

and then richard gere looks down and he

sees

his car pull out of the parking

structure presumably the blonde kid is

driving it

and uh he just sits down on the couch

yeah i'm done just gonna stay here now

it's a single jeopardy i've officially

committed the murder that i

i'm accused of and uh then we just cut

to

him uh being walked into a courthouse by

police he's already been arrested

and my other the paparazzi are all over

them yeah

um i love uh so this was like a

like a weird thing did you look up

michelle's lawyer

um the lawyer

uh yes i did actually william dozer yeah

i was like

oh i was just like looking up random

people oh who's this guy like

holy crap so he was the executive

producer of the adam west batman series

okay and the movie but also the narrator

that goes

meanwhile at the batcave

the joker's up to his old tricks will

the cave crusader arrive in time

next week burgess meredith with a new

penguin ploy

yeah it's like is such a random cast

um but yeah so he's that he's in jail

and the cops are like all right we just

need more information we need to know

what's happening why

how is this leon guy involved and why

did you bother go to this place

and he's just not going to cooperate

he's not going to tell them anything

and uh and they don't actually care

about leon anymore because

apparently some someone testified the

maid said she saw what happened or

something like that

and that he was trying to try to save

him yeah

i was like where was this made was she

in was there a maid in the apartment

maybe she was in the next building over

she saw what happened but yeah but the

fact that they're not gonna

you know prosecute the the the leon

thing you know just like

well then you should still keep fighting

this like we're not gonna arrest you for

the murder that you admitted to

we're going to arrest you for the murder

that you claim you didn't do yeah

because now you have the jewels in your

hand

yes but yeah so then michelle goes to

the police

and basically tells them

she's the alibi yeah she says he was

with me that whole night

and uh because she just wants to protect

him because she loves him

and she goes to speak with him uh

in the you know the glass wall which is

weird when he goes when he's being

interrogated by the police he's he's

sitting across

like there's a glass window but it's

only like two feet tall and everything

is completely open on top of it it's

like what is the point of this glass

yeah is this just a sneeze guard because

he could jump over it and attack them if

he wanted to

well and also like doesn't the cop come

to like take him back and

and he says no and the cop goes okay

it's like what is happening but then

when he's actually sitting in like the

booth

holding up the phone like waiting for

his visitor

michelle sits down and says hey i told

them that you're with me the whole night

and i'm prepared to like throw my

marriage and my husband's political

career under the bus

to defend you from this uh murder

accusation

and he's like oh i'm sorry so that it

took me so long to come to you

and that's the end of the movie yeah

that's very unsettling weird place to

end well the whole

the whole second half of the third act

is nothing but fade outs

yeah it just keeps fading out i guess i

guess to show the passage of time

but it feels very like return of the

kingy where you're just like

is that is that the no oh is that okay

so it's going to end with him sitting on

the couch oh no it's not again oh he's

getting arrested okay

oh wait no there's more okay they're

going to another scene and then they end

it where it's like wait

no that's the end i need more now we

need to hear what happened

at least put text up you know all the

president's men's style and

tell me what happened after this richard

gere was killed by exiting prison

i mean i think though i think the whole

their whole relationship

is a little odd too because he's

supposed to be sort of this like

you know really confident you know cocky

guy that's why the people that's why his

pimps don't like him you know

and and then this woman comes along who

just seems really

desperate clingy needy who's like

stalking him

and he seems to be really into it for

some reason

this movie never has

like what i would call traditional

excitement

like the the graph of this is just very

slowly

inclined and then a very slow decline

yeah i was like

why isn't like hector elizondo who plays

sunday like

like i want like this big dramatic scene

but there's no yeah i wanted him to be

like willem dafoe

in just like like reenacting everything

and like

engaging a whole but every police

station full of people everyone is so

cordial yeah to him and he's just

allowed to roam around and do

whatever no matter how much [ __ ] like

richard gere throws in his face he's

just like ah yeah you're right

i do dress stupid i have an ugly face

first obviously you're dressed for [ __ ]

anybody can fix that no problem it's

your face

hey and your thanks what's wrong with

your body

you have back problems you look like on

monkeys didn't it which

by the way this is like the youngest

i've seen hector alexander in anything

and he got better looking with age he

definitely did yeah although it was

funny because when we were watching it i

was like

i don't know if it's just the gap in the

teeth but he looks so much like paul

sheer to me

like i wanted to play paul shearer's dad

in something but i was like he must have

gotten his teeth fixed and then we

looked up a recent picture it's like no

no he still has the gap

but he just like has a very polish ear

shaped face

um but yeah he's great and they are they

are in two more movies after this

uh pretty woman and runaway bride um

hector alexander yeah hector alexander

and richard

um and he's obviously done a lot of

voice acting hector elizondo

i i do have to say though because i've

you know i've seen those other richard

gere movies where he's older

and you know i never really understood

his appeal

and you know now that i've seen this one

i'm like oh no he was really attractive

richard gere yeah i feel like this is

this feels like a david caruso

type richer gear like yeah a little bit

of an [ __ ]

like uh i've never seen richard gere

this mean and he's not even that mean in

this movie

yeah but he's he's never had any kind of

attitude and he's never been short with

anybody

and uh i i liked that though like i

thought like i thought that was a great

like character choice it's more

believable i think yeah um

obviously writer director paul schrader

we talked about uh in our last episode

but he

wrote taxi driver and raging bull last

temptation bringing out the dead so four

scorsese movies

on top of other stuff that he's done um

richard gere obviously pretty woman

somewhere down the line what if that's

eight late 80s early 90s

for pretty woman yeah uh that has to be

90s right or maybe 89 at the most

obviously chicago and apparently he was

in a remake of breathless i didn't

realize that

1990 for pretty wound 1990 okay so we're

in the middle well don't forget that and

i i i i really enjoy the mothman

prophecies

oh yeah that's good the movie's pretty

weird i like will patton in that movie

he's such a weird crazy old man

character actor

um bill duke who plays leon

predator yeah from a predator we had to

bring up his role in predator i mean

that's just

the the anytime yeah what do you see

mack

uh i think he's i think he's mac yeah um

and uh yeah so he's great he's a

character actor

like we were just talking about the

x-men movies pretty recently

and like he played bolivar trask in x3

but then later yeah in x5 if you want to

call

days of future past x5 peter dinklage

like in the same continuity yeah playing

this like

six foot two black guy is being played

by a white dwarf

star because he is a star yeah

but he hasn't shown up yet in the mcu i

don't think they've even mentioned trask

in the mcu that won't be until the

interviews

introduce the mutants probably um

but yeah he's great it always reminds me

of um that

carl weathers bit on saturday night live

when he's like after the successful

governor campaigns of

arnold schwarzenegger and jesse the body

ventura i've decided that i am also

running for office

who am i you ask i'm the black guy from

predator

now i know what you're thinking wasn't

danny glover the black guy for predator

no that was predator 2.

[Laughter]

but uh he's not the only black guy from

predator because bill duke said

that building's also a predator and just

that the whole thing

got built he's so great when he's like

shaving himself dry

he's digging the razor into his face

yeah it's like man this guy's great

uh michelle in this film is played by

lauren hutton

who i didn't really recognize um but she

was aggie maybank and gator

which is that uh the burt reynolds movie

the night people watch the

gator and white lightning double feature

and uh she also plays the countess and

once bitten yeah

which is a weird movie for me i

remember like after what was it 94 when

jim carrey just exploded

yeah i was like okay i have to look up

everything this guy's done like i was

already a living color fan

but i was like i need to watch every

movie that he's ever done and wants

bitten is just one of the weird ones

yeah um but she's great in that and

she's basically playing

like just a supermodel type vampire

woman yeah

um uh nina van pallett who plays

anne the the pimp

is uh i she's eileen wade in the long

goodbye

which is one of my favorite movies of

all time um

and she also has a soundtrack credit on

on her majesty secret service

really um i'm not clear on what she did

for the soundtrack but

i thought that was interesting um

lisa which character is lisa

lisa

lisa lisa williams yeah uh

she was one of uh one of the

clients that he goes to see lisa

williams is

[Music]

maybe it was one of the other girls at

the at the house

maybe it was someone else at the house

because

um i don't think i think we've mentioned

all the last names of the older women

that he had as

clients i'm not sure yeah i don't

remember

who lisa williams was on this but

apparently she was martha kent on the

adventures of lois and clark

and uh she's also in ryan johnson's new

murder mystery movie

knives out yeah so that's cool um and

francis bergen obviously

is candace's mother and she's famous for

appearing in

season one episode nine slow death of

macgyver yeah everyone's favorite series

totally famous for that i think that was

nine

i don't remember the number nine slow

death that but that's the train one

right right hey

you'll only be a hindrance she was like

this woman's mom and she was really mean

and we're going to go on a lot of

mcgregor tangents over the course of

this podcast because

we've watched every episode of that for

a previous podcast um

one of my big things was about this

movie was i really thought that i hated

the soundtrack

yeah but then i loved the soundtrack

i like this soundtrack is amazing 80

cent

and i couldn't like i was like can i get

this on vinyl is this possible because

uh i really enjoyed it i also couldn't

help but sing the lyrics everything well

let's just say they only played the

actual

song itself right at the beginning

otherwise it was just like

mixed instrumental yeah it was

instrumental in the score

and stuff like that and they buried it

depending on the mood of the cd

slowed it down yeah but but you know but

this was the composer who did flash

dance and top gun

yeah giorgio moroder you've got tons of

music credits only because like take my

breath away

uh in the never ending story theme and

like like

all these songs that are just reused

over and over and over yeah

um i feel like if it had stuck it out

and

finished the murder investigation that

i probably would have enjoyed it more it

was it wasn't even that long a movie it

was very slow but it was only an hour

and a half

and if i feel like they could have put

another 15 20 minutes to

wrap up the story yeah i agree gone a

long way you could even have trimmed a

little bit

of the o of the lead up just to get

that ending bit in there i'm thinking of

other schrader movies even like

taxi driver and uh and

raging bull both of them like cover what

happened to the people after the

climax of the movies so it just

it feels like out of character for him

to leave it off here unless that wasn't

his decision in the past yeah

i'm assuming like the big climax of this

movie is leon dying

i mean i guess yeah and and everything

but everything after that is just these

slow quiet he doesn't want to talk he

doesn't even get to see

mrs ryman murdered that has to happen

off-screen

i kept thinking that the twist was going

to be that he did murder her

yeah when the woman's husband like is

like i was

here with her the whole night and then

he's like oh wednesday

like that i did murder that one

uh because he does drugs a couple of

times right and he seems very erratic

for the second half of this movie i

thought like it's possible he literally

like blocked it completely

or even that he just did it and he

wanted to convince people with his

performance and it turns out we're just

watching a sociopath

yeah um but that's not where the film

goes

all of those things would have made this

a more interesting movie yeah

but it it plays out a little bit more

straightforward like um

a little bit closer to a real life

situation

than what we would have wanted um how do

you think this is aged

honestly i i think that it ages fine

as far as just like filmmaking and and

what have you like i don't i don't feel

like oh boy you can't say that now like

i don't feel like anything

if anything it feels like a very

progressive movie yeah yeah

i agree it talks about the gay community

it talks about him

struggling with being formerly

homosexual or maybe he never was or was

he or is he still now

we're not really sure where he swings on

that

like he's struggling with it twenty

dollars is twenty dollars

yeah exactly uh but so i think it i

think it brings up a lot of interesting

ideas

that were probably very taboo in the 80s

and maybe

a little bit easier to swallow nowadays

there's there's multiple voices where

in interviews when asked what drew him

to the role

he specifically said the the homosexual

undertones

interested him because he'd never done

anything like that before and he never

like

he didn't really know a lot about it so

that was apparently what drew him to the

to

the part that i think might have

actually driven

travolta away from the parts yeah that

makes sense

when you're reading off those people i

was just like i don't really see them

being opposed to it but at the same time

i don't really see them being

as comfortable like yeah and i know

travolta like

had stuff like that later in his career

but i think at the time he was coming

off of

you know saturday night fever and grease

and everything and he was like a massive

sex symbol and maybe he thought that

this would like

change his reputation um

but yeah and i think uh in terms of what

we've had so far

in 1980 that the cinematography here is

probably the best that we've had

in anything yeah i'll go with that just

really interesting lighting

so what do we think of this movie is

this worth uh

worth watching i i don't think i'd

bother

actually i don't think so either

actually yeah yeah uh

i'm on the fence but i think i'm gonna

have to give that a no

yeah as much as it did for richard gere

uh in his career

of the gear and schroeder's great but

this isn't this isn't

his best work so yeah i don't i don't

think it's necessary viewing i think

this podcast

has enough information for you just

listen to our podcast don't watch movies

yeah no no who needs movies just listen

to us you can't watch movies on the

freeway yet

as soon as they start those autonomous

vehicles oh no we have to sabotage

self-driving cars so that people will

listen to us i'm going to sell all my

tesla stock right now

you should too listeners um

letterboxed where do you think jess

where does this go on your list

uh i think i'm gonna put it second i'm

gonna put it after

my brilliant career but ahead of simon

uh i have to agree so our list will

continue to be identical

okay well i'm gonna veer off the path

here again

i'm gonna actually put it one step down

just under simon but above

uh to all a good night because uh

i enjoyed more of simon than i enjoyed

of this movie

but i didn't hate this movie but i i

feel like a lot of these are going to be

we're going to be steadily like putting

things under things

because most of the movies that are on

our bottom are going to stay

there yeah that's probably true i i

think that there will be some movies

that make like it

might squeeze in around around them but

i think most things are going to be

above

our bottom three yeah yeah but that's

also because we are

obviously as any year does starting in

january where

everything gets dumped that yeah either

wasn't worthwhile for awards season or

that they couldn't find a solid place

for and didn't belong in the summer

so that's why we have kind of a slog

ahead of us at the beginning of the year

getting into the summer season and then

we'll have like 20 blockbusters in a row

and then it's slow again for a while and

then we have awards season and then

we're back in january um but yeah we

should

we should have started our year in the

summer

well didn't it used to didn't used to

start in our

should have started it at the fiscal

year

uh but i think that's it for this one uh

if you have any thoughts you'd like to

share with us we are vintagevideopod

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you can find each of our full movie

rankings for the year uh please consider

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and if you find the time to leave us a

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vintagevideopodcast thank you so much

for listening and i hope you'll join us

next time when we will be discussing

john carpenter's the fog

which wikipedia describes as a

supernatural horror film directed by

john carpenter

who also co-wrote the screenplay and

created the music for the film it stars

adrian barbeau

jamie lee curtis tom atkins janet lee

and hal holbrook

we leave you now with the audio to the

trailer for

john carpenter's the fog john carpenters

the fog

[Music]

this is k.b antonio bay

stevie wayne here and let me be the

first to wish antonio bay

a happy birthday we're 100 years old

today

and keep a watch out for that fog bag

heading in from the east

one hundred years ago between midnight

and one something

unknown came out of the fog now

it has returned oh jesus

[Music]

one hundred years ago between midnight

and one something

unnatural came out of the fog now

it has returned

[Music]

100 years ago between midnight and one

something

evil came out of the fog now

it has returned

[Music]

the fog antonio bay has a curse on it

we're all cursed there's no water got in

here but something off a coal pin

i think i'll go to vancouver now

[Music]

where's the fog now it should be right

outside my door now

oh there's something different about

this fog damn stay away from the door

someone listen to me

[Music]

get inside and lock your doors

close your windows

[Music]

there's something in the fog

[Music]

stay away from the fog

[Music]

from the creator of halloween the

ultimate experience

in terror and suspense

john carpenter's the fog starring adrian

barbeau

jamie lee curtis john houseman janet lee

as kathy williams and hal holbrook as

father malone

the fog what you can't see won't hurt

you

it will kill you between midnight and

one

it will find you