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

i thought they smelled bad on the

outside

[Music]

welcome to vintage video where we're

re-watching the 80s so you don't have to

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

heartbeat on april 25th

1980. it was written and directed by

john byrum

based on a novel by carolyn cassidy and

released by warner brothers

tomorrow jordana brewster and channing

tatum will both be born on april 26th

1980. wow the character of ira in this

film was a stand-in for alan ginsberg

whose estate would not

allow him to be represented in the film

uh carolyn cassidy was was reportedly

very disappointed

in the final product but happy with

susie spacex's portrayal of her

i am not surprised by that yeah

uh we start the film with a nuclear bomb

exploding yeah

uh this is another one of those cases

where i go into the movie blind

yeah and i go oh okay what's this what

about

this is this how they created godzilla

is this an alternate history movie

starring jack kerouac where the bombs

landed in america right where they built

track housing i thought i thought that

they were building

the test neighborhoods oh okay

for for bum for bomb because they show

the one

like detonating in the ocean right and i

was like oh so these are these are going

to be like the neighborhood tests next

but then people start living there i was

like no

don't do that get out of there oh my god

somebody's got to tell them but no the

nuclear bomb is just to indicate that

this is

immediately post world war ii so we're

talking late 40s

um into the 50s a woman's voice

is sort of setting the stage as far as

the time period she introduces jack

kerouac who is a struggling author

and neil cassidy who is the son of a

denver wino she doesn't indicate what

his talent is yet

um that seems to be i don't know they

ever indicate what his talent i think

it's stealing cars

well although he did go to jail for it

so yeah i mean that's what's in this

in the story but like that was one of my

main complaints about this film

was that like we're just we set up these

characters in a way where we don't

show and barely even tell the audience

why

they're supposed to be cool or

interesting

or well i think especially at the time

people knew for jack kerouac

just because i mean as popular as he is

now

a household name he was even more so in

1980 specifically

yeah but i i guess my complaint is less

about

jack kerouac because at least right that

guy i've heard of

right you know his pal here was his name

neil

neil cassidy neil cassidy i you know i

didn't know who he was

and you know and i don't know why he has

any appeal in this film because they

sort of introduce his character in a way

that it's just like

there there didn't seem to be anything

special about him so why does he have

any appeal to

you know to the uh sissy's basic

character

throughout the film i have no idea sure

i i believe it's

i believe what we're supposed to believe

is that he's a non-conformist

right but he's he's also kind of

kerouac's muse yeah

sorry no well and when we meet [ __ ]

spacek

she is very conformed right she's even

getting ready to marry a guy that she

doesn't even like

because that's what you do basically

neil cassidy is the main character of

the on the road book

yeah i got that from you know but he

wasn't a famous by the end of the film

but like

i feel like you need to set that

character up better because there's

really no setup for him as like

he's he's an awesome guy and he's

definitely there's a reason why he's

appealing no he's not an oscar he's a

jerk he's a jerk and i don't think there

is more to that character there

unless you want to like give him laser

vision or something and change the story

a little bit

like he was just he'd never really

amounted to anything he wasn't even

famous

like after the story took place other

than being the inspiration for this

character in this book that

that sold like gangbusters but

we start with the two of them apparently

they already know each other they met

through

ira who uh we understand now was allen

ginsberg

and uh basically jack kerouac is played

as like the square

and neil cassidy is the one who's like

teaching him to stop being such a nerd

and uh but he realizes when he gets

ahold of some of his writing that jack

is actually a pretty talented guy

and he totally believes in his ability

to like sell a

massive book and become a super famous

author jack and neil decide to go on a

road trip together

where they meet stevie who becomes

neil's girlfriend in iowa

yeah and before his goodbye kiss to his

mother

was just a little bit too caroux yeah

it was like a little bit too passionate

i was like

[Music]

this is uncomfortable but yeah this this

road trip that they go on becomes

the the impetus of the book

it's it's the story that he's writing

about originally but changing characters

names and then

sort of embellishing them um but while

they're on the road jack and neal

are essentially sharing neil's

girlfriend sexually

because he's just like oh well i'm all

about free love and if you're interested

yeah go for it i don't care and we just

cut to like them having sex in the car

while neil's sitting on the side of the

road

uh just totally no problem with it and

stevie's apparently cool with it

the woman narrating the story thus far

introduces herself

uh she is carolyn she is on a date with

dick who is an old friend of niels and i

don't know if they're just going to him

to get money

because he pulls out money and just

starts just saying just tell me when to

stop

right like he doesn't even he knows why

they're there they're not there to see

him

yeah he's like the baron and oginski

that's just like all right

you guys are artists i'm gonna write the

check um

but uh she says in the narration that

this is the last time she

saw dick implying that she became

celibate here in this scene know that

this is

that she's going to leave this guy and

go off with these two

men that she just met yeah carolyn

actually hasn't entered the scene yet

but

this is the two of them are sitting

across the table from dick when she

walks in

right and she basically looks like

claire

that the ghost of christmas future shows

to frank cross

and scrooge she's got like this hat

sitting on the side of her head she's

wearing

a lot of makeup and like a fur coat as

she wanders over to the table

she looks very fancy and very proper and

she fits right in with the dick

character that's on the other side of

this table

that they're like high society people

that have you know

business intentions and they're not that

they don't care about philosophy or

about

life and how real people live i feel

like art students in

1950 must been really different than art

students now because i've never seen an

art student dress like that before

like which person like caroline like

yeah yeah she's supposed to be studying

painting at the university there and

she's dressed like she's yeah like

debutante yeah the business woman then i

i assume

she's getting her money for her wardrobe

from

dick who she is currently near near to

marrying

right and uh she mentions that uh they

basically that neil and jack ran out of

cigarettes

and spent the rest of the night staring

at the smoking butts in the ashtray

and that she was kind of flattered and

disgusted at the same time because it's

like

i knew that these guys were both poor

enough that they would take a cigarette

butt out of this ash tray and smoke it

because they don't have anything else

to like they they don't have anything

else to smoke and they can't afford more

cigarettes but they're not doing it

because they both want to impress her

with their ability to not smoke

the three garbage it did somehow they

won her over

just by not smoking garbage and the

three of them go on a series of

of triangle dates um

neil takes every opportunity to talk up

jack's talent

but when she's alone with jack he tells

her about

neil's past with men the relationships

that he's had that his sort of ambiguous

sexuality

and uh he asks carolyn promise me he'll

never take his word for anything

multiple times neil reminds women that

it is not their place to think

the first time he's saying it jokingly

to carolyn you're not supposed to think

who throws it right back in his face but

the second time he basically has his

girlfriend stevie by the neck

in bed and they immediately make out

afterwards because she's like that's

cool i don't want to think

um in an art gallery carolyn announces

that

she is trying to choose between marrying

an [ __ ] and accepting a job in los

angeles

i think the [ __ ] is dick here yeah i

think it's important to bring up a point

about the art gallery

yes well they uh so they they sort of

talk her into los angeles in this scene

by telling her that

everyone's [ __ ] and her [ __ ]

boyfriend's an [ __ ] and she shouldn't

go to school because they're all

[ __ ]

but all the art that's hanging in this

gallery was actually painted by the

person playing the artist in this scene

and that is david lynch in an uncredited

role

oh really yeah so he's standing in the

gallery and he actually painted all

these things you see hanging on the wall

which is just like it's like a white

canvas with like half circles and lines

painted on them it's very simple

yeah but it that is very much the art of

the time period right

yeah and and it was actually done by

david lynch

jack decides he's going to knuckle down

and finish his book

he writes the whole stupid thing on a

big roll of paper and keeps it on a

spindle when he sends it to prospective

publishers like an idiot would

yeah he's mailing them the only copy of

his book

wound into a big tube yeah i was really

confused by this because

he takes this tube to all the different

publishers and i was just like

why did he roll up these pieces of paper

because i didn't realize that it

i missed the part where it was one long

continuous sheet of paper like i didn't

realize that i don't

i think it was even more so i think it

was paper towels it was like a roll

it wasn't a paper towel it was like

teletype paper but

he kept it all on the roll because he

was like i'm gonna finish this whole

thing in one go i'm just gonna sit down

and finish this whole book so he took a

bunch of drugs

and sat down and finished the book in

one sitting basically well and i pulled

up a

i pulled up an old interview with him on

youtube and he talked about it and

you know having to go to a stationery

store and get this special paper because

he doesn't want to be

interrupted in his thought process when

he's writing a narrative

and there i've seen pictures of the

rolled up story too like that's

literally how he wrote the first draft

of the story and the first draft is the

one that he sent to all the publishers

so he was literally mailing out his only

copy of it so he was very lucky to keep

getting it back

neil and carolyn moved to california by

cover of night

uh sort of in secret jack kind of

catches them loading up a car and

speeding off in the rain

he decides he's going to meet up with

ira in new york

and go door-to-door selling the book

that all the publishers keep referring

to as a spare tire because it's

a big cylinder look we could just see mr

ugg

he told me to tell you we don't accept

unsolicited spare tires

they don't have a lot of luck selling

the book because

somehow their reputation has preceded

them as being extremely rude angry

gentlemen

and no one is interested in doing

business with them

ira and jack basically have a falling

out and ira decides he's going to move

out to san francisco to be with neil and

carolyn

uh ira is insufferable yeah

he shouts his not great poetry

uh as loud as he can in a restaurant

moments in whom i am

cognizant without matter like dripping

out of the sun

moments moments son of night mamas

invisible coalitions deranged

industrialists

ghosts nobody else seems into it but he

keeps going and he's very impressed with

his own work

and you know carolyn tries to stand up

for like more contemporary

and he insults her and insults

neil as well like basically you know

saying like why are you kind of why are

you with this person

i and i don't think it was even

necessarily uh

more contemporary poetry but it was like

she's more like romantic poetry like she

likes like t.s eliot

and uh this is very offensive to ira who

tells her that she's basically wrong

and that you know he says something

along the lines of like

vomit that drives to hobo's faces is

more poetic than anything

elliot has ever written or something

because he's just trying to be

provocative and mean

but as the scene unfolds it becomes

clear that ira's basically

just trying to piss carolyn off because

he's madly in love with neil

and they are in a relationship a

long-term relationship now

and so he doesn't like that because he

doesn't get his meal time

and he basically just blurts out well

i'm in love with neil

and he's in love with you and then she

says am i supposed to feel guilty about

this too neil

and gets up and leaves at which point

neil says

hey yeah i'm kind of in love with her so

you're gonna have to get hip to that

bye and walks away uh somewhere on the

street in the city neil

sees stevie apparently she made it to

san francisco

and she's inviting a sailor into a hotel

room

he follows her inside and like listens

to all the doors in the hallway until he

finds the room that they're in and peeks

over the top of it to make sure he's

not before not before he kicked in

somebody else's door

yeah three seconds

and it's funny because they they're just

like oh please close the door oh please

not like

angry like what the hell are you doing

get out of here like please don't tell

anyone what you saw oh my god i don't

want anyone to know that i

have sex but uh but he turns around and

he finds stevie's room he kicks that

door in and he throws the sailor down a

flight of stairs

even though he's not in a relationship

with stevie he broke up with her to

leave

for california with carolyn but uh

he's still very possessive of her

obviously

in the room they talk and he admits to

her you know

when i said i was just coming out here

that's not really true i'm completely in

love with carolyn and she says

i don't care who you're in love with i

just wanted to have sex with you because

i'm crazy about you and they officially

begin an affair

um and he's like habitually late to

things with carolyn because he's off

sleeping with stevie

jack is taking a series of odd jobs on

the road

uh he works in the galley of a ship for

a while he works in some fields yeah i

i think he's in mexico and then he's

like just like

writing in the bathroom while some guy

comes in and starts puking his guts out

yeah

carolyn but he still manages to give his

mother a forwarding address

right he gets he gets a birthday card in

the mail from her

i was like how how where are you or even

are you that you have an address

yeah but the vomiting guy there was

actually pretty supportive

yeah you know so and he also gave him a

hot tip on some good opium but

he didn't take it up because he said his

writing is really good [ __ ]

so uh carolyn comes home for work and

finds neil ira and stevie all in bed

together

and sobbingly announces her pregnancy

and neil is completely tone deaf about

it and just jumps up like oh my god i'm

gonna be a dad this is great like

hugging and picking her up and she's

just like slapping i'm like

no you don't get it this is a terrible

thing that i've just walked in on

but she's not gonna talk any sense into

him and she immediately

forgives him and then they buy a house

together yeah they basically like settle

down

um after a very quick conversation they

move to the suburbs and get

you know move into the track housing we

saw after the explosion at the beginning

and uh he basically tries to prove

himself by being

as decent a father as he can he's like

you know rushes in when the kids are

crying at night

and uh but he also has a problem with

the temptation of like

attractive women in his neighborhood

where he's constantly like noticing

other women and

still gonna have some issues with uh

infidelity probably

carolyn invites some of their new

neighbors over for a dinner uh

bob and betty bendix bendix there you go

bob and betty bendix um and they're

super nerdlingers and neil is not

having fun talking to them so he gets

more and more awkward and

intimidating until they like freak out

and leave basically

uh there's a great shot though when he's

outside that kind of like encapsulates

his whole

like pressure where he's sitting and

like smoking a joint on a set of swings

but you see like

every house is identical behind him and

they're all watching the same tv show in

each window

right and as you can just the whole

neighborhood is just

filled with audio because everyone's

watching the same thing at the same time

so it's all in sync and everything

yeah and and it's just like each house

is just a copy and you can't tell

anything

and i really thought it was great

because it just i get now

i can feel that pressure on him i

understand

what that he's trying to blend in like

she wants because he

cares about her but he also like is

completely disgusted by

the conformity um

jack reluctantly takes work on a ship to

san francisco it seems like he's been

specifically avoiding the city right

because he's not ready to confront them

but it was like you know you don't have

to see them while you're there yeah but

i guess maybe he just couldn't resist it

was the temptation

yeah i think that's what it was but he

goes there

and knocks on their door some i guess he

managed to keep a forwarding address for

them too

right but he figures out where they live

knocks on the door and invites neil out

to go binge drinking

i did like the line from neil when he

comes out the door he's like my god this

is great

i can't bear to drink alone in my

condition what condition

i'm broke need somebody to pay for my

drinks

um so they don't come home until

the next morning it seems like sometime

in the night

carolyn realized that he left and had

not come back all night so she's already

pretty upset

and the kids are all asking her for help

first thing in the morning because dad's

not there

and uh they come into the home yeah they

bring a woman home from there

from their escapades and uh while they

were out at night though

neil is is confessing a little bit about

marital problems in terms of like

he feels like she doesn't respect him

because he doesn't provide enough or he

doesn't care enough about what she's

trying to do

and he says he can't even look her in

the eye anymore and

uh you get a quick line from jack how

does she look like i haven't seen you

guys in forever does she is she's still

hot basically is what he's asking

and i like neil's answer is like like a

married woman

don't don't ask me what my wife looks

like because that's irrelevant to you

right now oh really i didn't take that

line to mean that

yeah i didn't i i took it more that that

she just looks worn out

oh yeah i took it to i took it to mean

she looks like she's the mother of

several children and she's

not that she's not the hot chick anymore

she's a mom

i thought he was saying like it's

irrelevant what she looks like

you shouldn't be asking her i don't

think that's i don't think yeah you're

right

that's not him he's saying she's not hot

anymore

that's true that's what he's saying but

she looks the exact same as she did at

the beginning of the movie because this

is probably weeks later if not earlier

but yeah they're sneaking this woman

into the house because uh

neil basically decided oh well we have a

room in the attic so you and this girl

can go up in the attic

and stay in that room and i'll just

explain to carolyn sometime during the

day that you're here and you're our

guest um

but i guess the woman goes home because

they get caught in the act of trying to

sneak them into the app yeah

so i guess the woman just leaves it was

her car anyway that they came home in so

i'm sure she'll be fine driving home

yeah she seemed like

totally not drunk at all neil and

carolyn decide they're gonna let

jack sleep off the night in the attic by

the time he wakes up

neil has gone off to work and he

explained earlier that

the work that he does on the trains that

sometimes he's gone for like days at a

time right and he was like oh this is

great you can stay at the house and you

can help take care of carolyn

while i'm out of town because that she

won't feel lonely and you can like help

around the house the way that i don't

um and so when he gets up probably less

than

10 minutes from waking up in the attic

and coming downstairs they're already

having sex

yeah uh he literally just walks into the

kitchen while she's

ironing with her daughter he starts an

argument with her and starts to

manhandle her in front of her child

and she turns around and talks about how

neil doesn't respect her and how neil is

terrible

and then immediately they're making out

and then they're like all right let's go

have sex

except then the my most favorite moment

of the entire movie

they walk off to the bedroom together

and then she stops and comes back

and unplugs the iron because literally i

was sitting there thinking like you

can't go off and have sex right now the

iron's still on you have children in the

house go on

and then she comes back and unplugs it

i'm like oh my god that's so great it

was it was a fun

fun little detail to include and i'm

sure it was because

when she was doing that scene she was

like oh i wouldn't i wouldn't leave that

on

yeah i'm gonna go back in the plugin and

they just left it in uh carolyn invites

the bendix's over again

and jack makes a considerably better

impression on them

uh he's very he's a good host and

uh it seems like he's like made all

these domesticated recommendations for

like

products they could use around the home

that'll make their lives more efficient

and they're

they're very flattered and interested in

everything that he has to say and

he's already like made arrangements to

like meet up with them later for things

outside of this

although i think it would still be weird

to be invited to a dinner date with a

woman and her husband and then to a

dinner date with the same woman and a

completely different guy

well it gets even better yeah it gets

weirder from there

neil comes home and i guess the whole

time he's gone he's probably been

thinking about

jack and his wife being at home and he

realizes

that she probably likes him a lot more

than she likes me and i should be less

of a jackass

so he comes in and makes what appear to

be routine promises that he's going to

get better

and she even says like oh he promises

this all the time and

this is all in front of each other like

it's not like they're

keeping secrets he says oh i'm going to

be better and he's like oh

it's it seems like he's really going to

be better oh no he says this all the

time i do say it all the time but i mean

it this time

jack basically tells neil i got it i can

handle

your life the life you started you

should go off to mexico like you've

always wanted to

and he's like why don't you go on the

trip to mexico he's like i don't want to

go to mexico

this is this is what i want and he also

probably just came back from mexico

they all start apologizing to each other

sort of but

carolyn's apology is i guess i just

expected too much of you and then neil's

response

both expected too much which is

basically the same

saying i'm really disappointed at you

and then saying oh no we're both

disappointed

[Laughter]

so i never read on the road i i don't

know

really much about you know the

the beat movement or anything like this

but it just seems

weird that this whole movie revolves

around jack kerouac wanting to just be

domesticated

yeah i i feel like um i had a vision of

who jack kerouac was in my head that he

was like the

just like improvises everything and

doesn't ever have a plan it doesn't want

to be like

nailed down yeah he wants to like just

constantly be on the move

from what i'd heard about on the road

i've never actually read the book but i

watched the movie today

and he's kind of the character that's

supposed to be jack kerouac is kind of a

nerd

in in the movie and i assume the book

also

but i was very weirded out the whole

time when he's like

oh my plan is to just write a really

great book and then get a lot of money

and be super famous and buy a house and

live with a woman and have children

somewhere and i was like

that's not what i thought jack kerouac

was all about at

all yeah but yeah i agree that this kind

of changed my perception of who jack

kerouac for sure

historically uh depicted as but yeah

after they

uh express how disappointed they are in

each other

as as complementary as they can

uh neil and jack decide to basically

uh split their the husbandly duties all

of the husbandly duties

um and they're just getting the start of

the co-parenting movement right

they're just they're both living in the

house this whole thing just reminded me

of small circle of friends

when they're yeah making the lobster

dinner and just throwing food all over

the place it's like

this gonna be a montage of this it's

less obnoxious yeah though

but um i did like the the point where um

because they go through a montage of

like oh it's just a house with two dads

in it

and there's a moment where uh neil's

lying in the bed

and then you see jack walk through and

he's like i can't heal and he's like

good night jack

and then jack walks up the stairs to go

into the attic and then you see

carolyn come in and you're like oh okay

i guess she's with neil tonight like it

wasn't just a permanent switch and then

she's like

good night neil and she goes and walks

up the stairs to the attic like she

doesn't want to sleep in the master

bedroom she's

sleeping in the attic with jack um well

i think that

she she picks and chooses that's going

to be yeah

i think the implication is that she

trades off all the time but i thought

that scene was going to be like and here

she's back with neil and it's like no no

she's still she's still with jack she's

just going upstairs

one one quick thing here there is a shot

of neil

uh teaching jack how to work on the

trains

like he tried to get him a job at the

same place where he works

um you saw that or no i don't recall

that but

there was a scene where they were both

on a train in uniform and it seems like

he's talking him through the basics of

the job like

he got him a job doing the same thing so

that he can bring in more money or

whatever

but it just seemed counterintuitive to

the point which was like oh i'm not home

enough because i work all the time

so let's get a second husband and get

him the exact same job working the same

shift as me

it's like no they would work opposite

shifts so the days that i'm home

but you're working and then i'm working

for that scene they were clearly working

the same shift

but yeah maybe that was their intention

that they were going to be alternating

or something

they invite the bendix's over again for

the third and most awkward i loved this

scene

i thought this was great i love the way

that they're sitting around the table

because it's like a pentagon of chairs

and you have the bendixes

next to each other and then you have the

two husbands and then the wife in the

middle

and uh they seem like they're not as

weirded out by this as they were by

neil alone yeah until they leave

when they leave the face that they make

it's just like oh my god

yeah but they seemed terrified when they

left after neil was like

oh i see what's going on like they just

freaked out and started talking at the

same time like panicked

but yeah it seems like they're i almost

got

the impression that betty was a little

bit jealous of her situation

she's like oh she's got two men like

taking care of everything

um wait two men taking care of

everything

i mean maybe that was her perspective

but this is definitely not what she has

yeah no but they're getting twice as

much done even if they were both doing

that they're getting twice as much

not done yeah the planting pot

in the neighbor's yard not even in their

yard they were planting it across the

street right

now it was their house was it their it

was their house but they they kept

waving to the neighbors

while they were doing it yeah um they

read in the paper that ira

was arrested for a poem which actually

happened to allen ginsberg it's

i think it was howl right that that's

what the movie is about is the poem that

he got

arrested and put on charges for but

basically it caused such a

nationwide uproar that this this poem

could set people off enough that someone

would be arrested for it

that suddenly the public was clamoring

for more of this type of work

and all the publishers who had said no

to on the road decided like oh we gotta

find that guy because he was friends

with ira

and his stuff's probably like that guy's

stuff so let's call him up

and uh that's when jack gets the call

hey

we have a publisher for you and it's

like the first publisher they went to

who was like the meanest to their faces

the one who repeatedly referred to it as

a spare tire

and they talk him into not only

publishing the book but going on a whole

publicity tour for it

which jack is very excited to do and

also goes against the grain of what i

expected from jack kerouac just

from what i thought i knew about him but

uh

he goes on television to kind of defend

his work because the host of the show

played by john larroquette here is just

ripping into him and his whole

philosophy on life very aggressive

yeah um he's basically just trying to

embarrass him on television and

embarrass the whole movement

and uh they're watching it on tv

uh neil and carolyn are but they're

they're like oh you look so great oh

it's wonderful no it's great it doesn't

everything's fine and jack's not upset

about it at all in fact he's like

out at a fancy restaurant with the host

of the show and they're all they're

being all buddy buddy

and he tells the host like oh do you

want to talk to moriarty because the

character in the book

is named moriarty that that neil is the

inspiration for

and uh he hands the phone to the host of

the show and

neil tells him to [ __ ] off or something

we don't hear what he says yeah

hello hey you must be one kooky

character mister listen listen i really

love the scene in the book when you

good god

what'd he say what do you think he said

neil's kind of disappointed with jack at

this point he kind of feels like he's

sold out that he's pretending to be

friends with all these like

gross people that are pushing the the

whole conformity agenda on

the people that he lives in the

neighborhood of he decides he's going to

go to a poetry reading because he wants

to kind of get back into that world a

little bit

but he's very disappointed by how things

have changed because it's all

stuff that's like derivative of iris

work and jack's work

and it's it's that very the beat nicky

kind of

yeah everyone snaps their fingers when

it's done and right

and everybody's talking like that they

don't even serve like

liquor the way he wanted it at the bar

it's like yeah you know we have beer and

coffee and he's just like oh this is

great

it's like steve buscemi's character and

uh the hot sucker proxy

right um but now these uh

these people who know him from the

neighborhood are like oh this is the guy

who that mor

moriarty is based on and that the

character in itself is a celebrity

and all these people are like oh then do

you have any boot or what does he call

it

boo boo boo do you have any boo and he's

like i don't know what that means

boo t mary jane yeah and it's the second

time they've referred to it as tea which

i did not pick up the first time they

were talking about driving around texas

tea

yeah no that's that's gold or no that's

oil

black gold texas texas tea

yes the only reason that we know is

because of the beginning of

beverly hillbillies yeah but um

but yeah so all these people are like oh

you're not moriarty moriarty would know

every up-to-date code word for marijuana

it's like

no it's not how it works you don't just

like automatically get updates

on your phone people don't have phones

that they carry around yet

um but a guy asks him like if he wants

to hang out

yeah and i couldn't tell if he was if he

was just talking

about drugs or if he was like uh

intimating a romantic outing or what was

going on but

either way neil's like yeah let's let's

go man

um and they start driving and already i

was like

freaked out by this guy because they set

him up as being kind of like

creepy a little bit and he's like

follows him out all

creepily and uh and i'm like this guy's

gonna like beat him up or something and

take all this stuff like this is gonna

be

this is gonna go wrong and they get

probably a half mile down the road

and neil has just handed him a joint and

i was like okay well he's got a joint

now so maybe this guy's not going to

turn on him because they're

friends here but then it turns out the

guy's an undercover cop yeah

and he pulls a gun on neil and there's

already a police car behind him

and neil ends up going to jail for it

that makes so much more sense now

because that line is such a

such an undercover cop thing to say like

i'm just gonna list

all the names of marijuana in a row

well he wasn't the one who was saying

all that stuff oh it wasn't and that was

a different guy at the bar but he was

listening in and he was like okay oh

this guy's from kerouac's book he's

definitely like a drug user like

if i hit him up on his way out we'll do

drugs together and then i can get him

arrested

but jack finds out that neil got

arrested and he's like well i got to do

something about it and his publisher's

like you're not going to do anything

about it because that's career suicide

and it's his own problem and you can

send him money if you want to yeah

you can't go help him it doesn't matter

because he goes to jail

right yeah um possession

but we don't see any of him in jail we

kind of cut to him

already out of jail yeah jack did

nothing to help him

and neil is now driving just a hippie

bus

like a commune bus around and we're to

assume that carolyn's been alone this

whole time

right because jack is still away

and yeah he's either in new york or he's

like splitting time between new york and

florida but he decided to hop in a cab

and go visit carolyn

and uh so neil pulls up to a pay phone

and he hops out and he calls carolyn to

make sure that she's getting

her checks her alimony right and she

says oh yeah like

they seem like like they have a good

relationship even though they're

officially separated at this point she's

like oh yeah i got the check

everything's great

you're all good and she's like by the

way someone's here that i think you

should talk to

and he thinks she's talking about a kid

at first because he's like he's like oh

no i gotta go sweetie i'm sorry

and she's like it's jack and he's like

oh

yeah i don't want to talk to him either

yeah i got i gotta i'm sorry i gotta go

you know how it is

and uh and just leaves um

and then jack leaves too and then jack's

like all right cool then i'm out

it's like it wasn't about and either one

of them ending up with the girl it was

just

it was just they they had this one last

opportunity at

connecting with each other and they both

she wanted him to know

she she wanted neil to know that jack

wasn't doing well that he's

looking not well right and she got that

message across i think

um yeah but implying like this is your

last opportunity you react with this guy

yeah and then we get the narrator voice

back which i honestly feel like the

movie could have done without completely

um but the narrator voice comes back to

say

uh what i think they're saying the

conclusion of the story is

which is that neil thought that

compromises were the end of the world

and so he refused to engage in them

where jack thought

that they were you had to constantly be

compromising and that was both of their

fatal flaws

and then we get the worst most annoying

line in the whole movie

then it's the last line of the film

which was very disappointing to me but

she says

i decided that compromises are like

dental appointments

you're damned if you make them

and you're damned if you don't and

that's the last line of the movie

it was really awful that you could

literally replace the word dental

appointments with

anything any noun and

no one in this film had any dental work

done like i don't understand

where that word came from for this i bet

you that that is

straight out of the book i'm sure it is

yeah

yeah and dental appointments in like the

60s early 60s were probably

more important

i don't get it i i i'm not saying it's a

great choice no

i'm i'm i'm desperate to find some way

of defending i just feel like there

there has to be

something like something related to

on the road or beat poetry in general or

these two men specifically

that fits here better than dental

appointments which have no bearing on on

the story at all

but that's where we end the film yeah

we're moving out of the neighborhood and

the three of them are officially

separated probably never saw each other

again

and uh dental appointments are important

but painful

so it only

just occurred to me that the beat in

heartbeat is referring to beat poetry

it's the title of the book it's super

super cheesy

yeah but i feel like it was a condition

of the adaptation that they had to keep

the title

yeah i wouldn't have done that yeah i

wouldn't have either

um i feel like there's probably even a

better beat pun

than heartbeat that you could have done

i'm you know i'm not uh

coming up with one right now but this

has got to be one there definitely is

nothing beats dental appointments

that's it beats by dr dre beats by dre

writer director john byrum he directed

racer's edge a few years after this

which i love

and i definitely recognized locations

from that film in this film

and he wrote some stuff too uh he wrote

a movie that i really like

in 2000 called do it i thought it'd be

good if we said it at the same time yeah

uh it's a weird little movie but it's

got a good cast

that's all i have to say about duets

yeah it's it's like huey lewis playing

gwyneth paltrow's dad

yeah it's but it's directed by gwyneth

paltrow's dad

yeah bruce paltrow yeah

um i haven't seen that movie but i

remember my mom watching it and liking

it a lot yeah it's it's got

like i said it's got people that i love

in it and uh

it's it's a nice little story how is

huey lewis

the only work i've seen from him acting

wise is his cameo

and back to the future he's good yeah he

he

it's a it's it's all about karaoke and

singing yeah and he plays a karaoke

hustler

yeah that's what the kid the summary was

on imdb i was like what does that even

mean is there

money involved in karaoke somewhere uh

well there is because there's a big

there

it's about three groups of people i feel

if you're aware that we're going into

the plot of duets but it's fine it's

about three

i'm gonna get that far on this podcast

three groups of people going through

different problems but ultimately that

everything that they're doing is leading

them to this

competition okay that sounds cute

um the dp on this film was laszlo kofax

who i love

he has lots of really really great

credits too many to go through but

a couple uh special ones to me

um he was the dp for ghostbusters five

easy pieces

easy writer paper moon multiplicity just

a lot of really great stuff that i love

and watch

close encounters um there's too many

there's there's no way i'm not leaving

off

important ones and he's also one half of

that

laszlo and vilmos i was gonna say i i

became

familiar with him when we were working

at laser and they

brought that documentary in laszlo and

bill moss i think vilmos passed away

before

they finished the documentary or before

it came out that sounds right to me

apocalypse now and a bunch of other

stuff

uh the music here was uh jack nietzsch

who has an oscar for officer and a

gentleman

for the uh for the song up where we

belong

he also did the score for one flew over

the cuckoo's nest and

uh composed the music for move on rouge

and then we get into the cast here nick

nolte was neil cassidy

um he was in the 48 hours movies he was

in tropic thunder i love him in traffic

um and he very recently did a voice on

the mandalorian i will take you to them

i have spoken it's got that voice it

never

changes yeah and he was the the go-to

hollywood mugshot after a dui arrest on

pch up until uh mel gibson's arrest and

then

and then he was home free um [ __ ]

spacek here was carolyn cassidy

who earlier this year obviously

portrayed loretta lynn for coal miner's

daughter

you know her as carrie and carrie or hot

rod's mom

yeah uh apparently it's one of the

trivia things that

she was told that she didn't get the

part right yeah i saw that she was

apparent i guess she was holding a wine

glass at the time and she was so upset

that she just

crushed it in her hand yeah and i was

like what

yeah like did it love wine in it i i

i'm trying to picture the the scenario

where she was clutching a wine glass

because this

generally i mean i think it was probably

like a weirdly shaped glass

like i got the impression that it was

not an average wine glass because okay

i don't know how you would break it that

way but then they gave her like

when they gave her the part because they

were surprised that she cared that much

about it

they gave her like another like

celebratory glass that said like that

clinched it or something like that

because she broke the glass in her hand

i i don't know when i when i read that

even when i was reading that story i was

like

this never happened someone dropped a

glass at a party and they were like

oh you'll never believe what happened

tonight [ __ ] basically broke a glass

because she was so angry and then they

gave her the part

yeah it's not why you give someone a

party it's not like dicaprio and

django when he slaps his hand on the

table didn't realize that their

the glass was there yeah or that other

really famous

like hollywood history moment from to

all a good night

when she hands him the glass and he goes

to put it on the nightstand and it

shatters off screen

um everybody remembers that john hurd

was jack kerouac

i don't think of him as a jack kerouac

type at all

i i did not know he did too many things

before big

like it's like big and home alone is all

i got

he's always mr mcallister for me i

thought it was a weird choice

until i looked up the interview with

actual jack kerouac i'm like

okay it's not that weird okay the

performance is simple yeah he's

he's just really kind of like subtle

and reserved and um i don't know

he he did a decent job i think of

portraying the character which

i at first i thought it was like he

wasn't actually doing a very good job

but i looked it up i'm like oh that

wasn't bad acting that was actually

really good actually yeah that's just

what jack kerrack is like

well i felt like i was when he was at

his most compelling was when he was

getting angry when he would yell at neil

yeah or ira or whoever and he would just

shout these lines and

and you could really feel the anger like

it's more work than i've that i've

ever seen john heard get like in the

home alone movies it's just kind of like

oh you just toss off a line and then you

move to the next scene

how many scenes is he really in he's in

the beginning and in the end

there's like interstitials throughout

not really because once catherine o'hara

leaves him

it it's he's right that's already in act

three by the time they separate and she

goes with the polka polka polka team is

that act three because she's like

traveling all over the country before

she yeah they're at the airport for a

long time arguing over different flights

but

yeah because she doesn't get in that van

with john candy until like

48 hours before yeah but that's after

long after she left them

because she because she stays at the

airport well then they cut back to the

family with the kids i just know that

the dad's still in it for a significant

portion of the movie probably as close

to

as much as catherine o'hara is but yeah

he um

he's great and he did a guest spot on uh

the macgyver reboot shortly before

passing away i think he passed away one

or two years ago

that's too bad he was good and he was

paul and big was the character

yeah the the guy who was with the girl

that tom hanks kind of steals away he

was the baxter in that movie yeah

um ray sharkey is ira um

who we know was supposed to be alan

ginsberg and

we will see more of ray sharkey later

this year and willie and phil

and the idol maker uh ann dusenberry was

stevie

she played tina and jaws too yeah i

don't like

i couldn't think of who that was there's

so many girls on the on the raft

yeah at the end of jaws too so i don't

know which one she was

um she was also valerie duran and

cutter's way which we will get to

tony bill was dick here

the rich guy at the party or on on the

date with

uh carolyn when she's introduced academy

award winner tony

yes he actually produced the sting um

and he also plays terry hawthorne the

president of warner brothers and

peewee's big adventure

who he talks to about like getting a

movie made about the bike being stolen

um and he directed fly boys most

recently yes

yeah that's not that recently 2006 is

like yesterday yeah

yeah richard last a few years ago yeah

yeah yeah yeah during the coma

[Laughter]

when i think of fly boys i just think of

this is the animal james freak

this is my gun from fly boys i keep all

my props

like keeps pointing at himself a little

bang bang it's like okay you're really

funny jonah we get it

he'll also be back later this year as

niles in the little dragons

so absolutely for that one richard's

really excited

do you know who directed the dr the

little dragons movie no because

the only copy that we have is like this

really bad youtube rip of it it looks

like

sub vhs like yeah like if they sold kids

vhs minis or something like that

that's what the quality of the picture

but it's curtis hansen directed it

what so it just it's uh it does not

compute but we'll get to that one when

we get to it

uh kent williams was ogden that was the

very insulting

uh publisher um he plays cabot in war

games

he was also clinton ferris in season

seven episode 12

off the wall of macgyver yeah and if

any of you phoenix foundation listeners

will recall he was married and divorced

from

two love interests of macgyver both

played by women named robin

robin pierson-rose who played his

landlord

at the beginning of the second season

and robin curtis

who played his love interest in the

gauntlet i believe

and then came back for a clip show

very interesting to everyone not just

macgyver fans yeah no

uh louise contreras was the mexican

junkie

that was throwing up into the toilet and

uh giving him life advice he's a king

junkie

that's what he's credited to say i

didn't really

[Laughter]

kylo ren and the dead don't die and adam

driver he's like i have a great affinity

for mexicans

i love him he's great um but uh luis

here was uh one of the bikers

in pee-wee's big adventure uh jenny

o'hara was betty bendix

she was the old woman from devil yeah

hey

really yeah i didn't recognize her jesse

has a credit with her

so funny two credits with her because

she's also joel's secretary in extra yes

she

is so that's fun um

which is my credit with her because me

and you both have credits in that movie

um don brody was the dispatcher no idea

who that is but he's an uncredited voice

in pinocchio as the carnival barker yeah

uh the dispatcher

the only person that kind of fits that

profile was the guy who was telling jack

kerouac

about the ship he's the only oh that's

possible because his voice

like was like oh man that that guy's got

a voice for radio yeah and i thought i

recognized him too but i didn't know any

of his other credits so

tom runyan played a c-man

uh he was a bartender and tom horne yeah

he

uh will be a bartender in every which

way but loose

or no that's the first one so we won't

cover that one we'll cover the sequel

but uh yeah he was a bartender in the

first one and uh he was also in

uh the getaway and convoy um john

laraquette was the tv talk show host

obviously

night court is probably the first thing

people go to yeah this was his first

screen

big screen appearance right he had done

a narration for something

uh oh it said he was the narrator for

texas chainsaw massacre he's the one who

reads the words at the beginning

i can only assume i've only seen the

movie once the film which you are about

to see

is an account of the tragedy which

befell a group of five youths

in particular sally hardesty and her

invalid brother franklin

it is all the more tragic and that they

were young huh

um and never again uh but that's my

favorite horror movie of all time

i can't do it but everything else was tv

movies

interesting until until this and yeah

again i couldn't agree more that night

court was like he won emmys

for that um but uh

he was great on boston legal and he also

comes back about a year from now

as captain stillman in stripes which

will be fun when we get there

um he also took over as the dad in the

beethoven series after charles grodin's

two movies and judge reinhold's two

movies

so he was started in the fifth one i

don't know how many he stuck around for

um and then the last credit i have here

to mention is sunshine parker

yeah as the gas station attended uh he

was like

redeemed from tremors he only wears that

one damn jacket

he's also emmett in roadhouse he plays a

hobo

in pee-wee's big adventure alongside

patrick cranshaw from private eyes

and he will be back later this year for

a pair of sequels

oh god book 2 and any which way you can

so that's exciting i'm

excited for more sunshine parker i

wanted to bring up some other people of

note

what do you got

her last name i'm sorry nasa tear um

she's only credited as first

receptionist

this is one of two movies she was in oh

that was probably ogden's receptionist

this just smiling at them after he

insults them

she's in this and then no because

ogden's secretary is another

another person okay it says first

receptionist so she's in this movie

and then she's not in another movie

until uh

the mummy tomb of the dragon emperor in

2008.

is that the third one uh yeah with uh

brandon frazier and jet li yeah those

are her only two acting credits but

she's executive producer

on a ton of stuff including the big

chill and vertical limit

oh that's weird oh i remember that now

because she actually had a picture but i

was like

there's so few acting credits here why

is there why does she have a picture

yeah

like an up-to-date picture on imdb yeah

just the two credits

um uh there's this name i

feel like i know this name but i didn't

recognize any of his credits

john hostetter uh he's in two episodes

of macgyver as sergeant rudley

okay and he's the beat nick that walks

off the stage yeah

um but there's like stuff with like his

imdb profile page has like muppets on it

and i was like oh yeah i saw kermit on

there was anyone one of the muppet

movies i don't remember

but i thought that was interesting um uh

the bartender

uh played by bill cross uh not a lot of

credits but

his miscellaneous crew credits were

really interesting where he plays

assistant to nick nolte in farewell to

the king

everybody wins in another 48 hours and i

was going to say doesn't he have an

acting credit in 48 hours

or yeah yeah i think he has got an

acting credit one of those two um but

he's also an assistant

um to power's booth in frailty which i

thought was

uh kind of another interesting credit

speaking of the miscellaneous credits

here the guy who goes through a list of

various words for marijuana that guy

doesn't have a lot of acting credits but

he directed a bunch of episodes of

mighty morphin power

that was my next one that was my next

one

and was accredited writer on the howling

the howling the

joe dante yeah it was him and john sales

oh interesting uh it was a and it was

andy

john sales so i thought

am i messing that up no that sounds

right john sales has a bunch of good

stuff i didn't know that he co-wrote

that

sorry i just want to verify yeah

yeah john sales okay cool based on the

novel

by someone else uh sorry so yeah that

was my next for terence

oh because i also loved his last name of

winkless uh

uh got sunshine parker uh obviously

steve allen

who had placed himself it was his one

like peek in the room scene and walk out

yeah um and i i just wanted to bring up

his most notable credit of

bart simpson's electronically altered

voice

[Laughter]

in which episode uh the episode's called

separate vocations where he's bartending

bart tending bart descending uh for for

fat tony

oh okay principal skinner goes missing

and and

it's like a it's like a testimony of

bart simpson

and it's like the the voice of bart

simpson has been electronically altered

to sound like steve allen

i saw mr bonton there seal the late mr

palacio in an oil drum and roll him off

the pier

i kill you

the only other person the last person

i'm going to mention is only because

it's connected to

your cinematographer michael hoover

played bar patron

oh okay he's a visual effects artist a

miniature and motion capture

artists and i mean in like like stop

motion capture he did

he did things on ghostbusters 2010 the

gate

the abyss and spiderman too oh the gate

that's there's some good

stop motion in the game oh my god i just

watched it recently that

they do this really amazing transition

of this kid trying to climb out and it

pans down to his leg where the miniature

guys are pulling it is

pulling the leg it's just it's seamless

yeah from from a full-sized

scale to the miniature scale of guys in

suits

it's like how the hell do you do that

it's been too long since i watched that

movie that melting phone scene gave me

nightmares when i was a kid

um that was it there's like a rain a

bunch of rain no that's good i like

touching on that stuff

uh i did look it up and verify it was uh

laszlo

that passed away before the documentary

came out oh was it laszlo

laszlo died in 2007. okay almost died in

2016

and the documentary came out in 2008.

okay

i've got it mixed up then what do we

think up or down on this one jess

uh down and it's gonna be down for me

yeah it's

it's a down for me i i actually my

problems are more with the direction

than with anything else um i thought the

performances were fine

um i think john hurd actually surprised

me

with his performances here but uh the

script is a little weird

the the direction and editing are both

odd like um

scenes especially in the first half of

the movie seem to end

prematurely or fade to black very

suddenly i don't like the voice over

all the way through it and that last

line takes a bunch of points off for me

because it's just so random and weird

that no one was like

let's just cut that one off i feel like

this is not the only time that i've had

this problem like i feel like i had the

same problem with um

niginsky but they're they're based off

of books

written by people in the stories in the

books

and uh you know or love interest in the

story

and i think that they don't focus on the

most interesting parts of the lives of

these people

that i'm like i read the i read the

wikipedia page about jack kerouac to try

to

you know prepare for this and i'm like

yeah a lot of interesting things

happened to this guy

this is not any of them yeah that's

weird

well i thought it was weird in oginski

too that they never cover what happened

with the brothers specifically like they

hint at it a couple of times

and then there's no flashback scene of

to explain the references to it

it's like i could go look it up if i

wanted to but you're the one making a

two-hour movie about this guy maybe you

put a scene in there

the same thing happened with tom horn

like oh yeah

i'm like tom horn had this crazy life

and like you focused on the last five

last and you know the end of his life

where nothing really interesting

actually happened you could probably

make a trilogy out of tom horton's life

though

yeah i mean he he's definitely the

anti-hero

yeah um richard why don't you start us

off where does this go in your litter

box uh i think i'm gonna put this

it it it it passes the winner's

threshold

uh but uh i'm gonna put it just above

nizinski which is just below simon okay

i am putting it in a very similar place

it it does just barely

pass the windows threshold for me i am

putting it below

saturn three and above

uh north sea hijack or what it was

called uh

folks folks call it whatever you want

and i'm so glad i forgot that that

saturn three past year window threshold

i was like oh good good i don't have to

disown her as a friend

um for me um

i think that this goes just above

uh what is it little miss marker

i almost said a little my sunshine

because these posters are so small now

yeah um it goes just above little miss

marker and just below don't go in the

house

for me i think that's everything for

this one if you guys have any thoughts

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vintage video podcast thank you so much

for listening and i hope you'll join us

next time

when we'll be discussing where the

buffalo roam which imdb

calls a semi-biographical film

based on the experiences of gonzo

journalist hunter s thompson

you