Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Mini-Ep #7: Night Moves and My Darling Clementine

Episode Date: May 7, 2015

Each week, comedian Gilbert Gottfried and comedy writer Frank Santopadre share their appreciation of lesser-known films, underrated TV shows and hopelessly obscure character actors -- discussing, dissecting and (occasionally) defending their handpicked guilty pleasures and buried treasures. This week: Gene Hackman forays into film noir! Henry Fonda brings order to the Old West! And Gilbert remembers classic movie posters! (but not the name of his own podcast). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Ontario only. If you have questions or concerns about your gambling or the gambling of someone close to you, please go to connexontario.ca. Don't forget to follow us on our Facebook page. Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast. On Twitter, at Real Gilbert ACP, and on Instagram, Gilbert Podfried, P-O-D-F-R-I-E-D. You see, it's kind of a pun on the last name. Ah, never mind. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and I'm here with my co-host, Frank Santopadre, and this is Amazing Colossal Obsessions.

Not Colossal. Colossal. Amazing Colossal Obsessions. Not Colossal. Colossal. Amazing Colossal Obsessions with the Jewish Cary Grant. Okay, you're first this week, buddy. Cary Grant is a Jew. I just wanted to repeat that. I learned so much from you. That's the most important thing.

Yeah, who's Jewish? Yeah. Okay. Jewish. Okay. My pick, it's funny because the last time I was on, I picked The Conversation with Gene Hackman. That's right. Now I'm picking another Gene Hackman film that came out shortly after The Conversation and is similar in mood and tone. And he's playing Harry again. In the conversation, he was Harry Cole. In this, he's Harry Mosby, and he's a private eye.

And I think the blurb on the poster was, maybe he'll find the girl, maybe he'll find himself. You have an uncanny memory. You remember the posters. Yes. You did the same thing on the conversation. You knew the poster, you knew the tagline. I always used to love the blurbs on posters. The taglines, yeah.

Yeah, the taglines. Right, right. Like in space, no one can hear you scream. Yes, yes. Kind of thing, right. Or in Halloween, the night he came home. That's right. Right.

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the water. Yes. Or another one I think was Terror Train with Jamie Lee Curtis. Terror Train. A classic. With N. David Copperfield. That's right. That's right.

A classic. With N. David Copperfield. That's right. That's right. And that was the girls and boys of Sigma Phi, some will live and some will die. You are my idol. Yes. You remember, you walk around day after day in your life, and somewhere in your mind you retain the tagline from the poster for the movie Terror Train. Uncanny.

Maybe Jamie Lee Curtis will do the show now. Oh, and I think there was another one. There was, I forget the name. Blood Beach? No, like The Mangler, I think it was called. It was in that when there was like, you know, 20 slasher films coming out in a week. Oh, that's right. After Halloween and Friday the 13th, there was a spate of them.

And I think the tagline for this was, by knife, by axe, by pick, by bye. I remember that one. I do remember that one. I don't remember the picture, but I remember that one. That's great. So I pick another Gene Hackman film and this was yeah Night Moves yeah which is also a play on words because there's a chess move that's the night move and but there's also the night move like he sneaks

around that night and he's a private eye in the affairs going on and it is a case of very much like his character in the conversation he's someone he can only really deal with people by by also by investigating and uh so it's like he's got an awful marriage that fell apart, and he's sent to go after this girl. It's also similar to Chinatown. I think they were made around the same time. It's Arthur Penn, right? Yes, it's an Arthur Penn who also worked with Gene Hackman in Bonnie and Clyde.

Yeah, and later in a picture with Matt Dillon, I think, called Targets. Oh, yes. Or Targets. I get it confused with the Karloff picture. And it has a teenage Melanie Griffith. And a very young James Woods.

Right. Right. It's also got Kenneth Mars. Sure. Love Kenneth Mars. Best known as the Nazi who writes Springtime for Hitler. Right, or the send-up of the Lionel Atwell character in Young Frankenstein. Oh, yes. Yeah, with the mechanical arm. Nice grouping.

And this actor who used to do a lot of voiceovers. I think his name was Edward Binns. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Is Edward Binns in 12 Angry Men? Do I have that right? I don't know. He may be. We'll have to look that up.

I know George Voskeren. Of course. And Klugman. Jack Klugman. And E.G. Marshall. Yeah. I like Night Moves. Hackman did so many wonderful films in the 70s.

Have you ever seen Prime Cut? Oh, yes. With Lee Marvin, where he's the heavy? And Prime Cut, I think that was later remade by Mel Gibson as Payback, wasn't it? I think so. I think so. Yeah, he's the heavy in Prime Cut, Hackman. Now, was Carol O'Connor in Prime Cut?

I don't think so. A very young naked Sissy Spacek was in Prime Cut? I don't think so. A very young naked Sissy Spacek was in Prime Cut. And I'm trying to remember. I saw it recently downtown at Film Forum, and it was terrific. I mean, so many great Hackman pictures in the 70s. I'm Scarecrow.

Oh yeah, with Al Pacino. Right, and we mentioned the conversation and Night Moves. I love the Poseidon Adventure. It's not a perfect film. It's a camp movie. You hate the word camp, but I like him in it. He's better than the material.

And yeah, it's... I remember there's a line in the movie. I think they're going to see a film by Manuel or whoever. Oh, Boonewell? Boonewell.

I think it's Boonewell. They say we're going to a Boonewell film. And he goes, no, I saw one of his films. It's like watching paint dry. Oh, interesting. So taking a swipe at a classic director. Oh, interesting. So taking a swipe at a classic director.

And interestingly, you mentioned Kenneth Mars, and Hackman and Mars are both in Young Frankenstein. It just hit me. Oh, wow. Because Hackman's playing the old blind man. Yes. Yes, in an unbuilt. Unbuilt. Yeah.

Unbuilt in an absolutely great moment. I love those Hackman pictures, and he's not making movies anymore. But what a run. I mean, arguably the best movie actor of the late 20th century i mean you could put him in with duval and oh yes i mean uh and pacino and daniero and any of them and he and dustin hoffman used to be roommates that's right and i think uh gene hackman either got married or was living with a girl and it was his apartment. So they had to get rid of Hoffman. And so Gene Hackman finally said, I know this other struggling actor and he needs help paying the rent.

So he needs a roommate. And that actor was Robert Duvall. I have heard that story. That's great. That's great. And when we talked about the Goodbye Girl, more weird trivia, that Neil Simon's original version of that story, Bogart Slept Here, was loosely based on Dustin Hoffman's actual life. Dustin Hoffman, a New York actor going out to L.A. to try to make it. But that's a story for another day. Because the Skip app saves you so much time by delivering stuff like your favorite cool treats groceries and bevies you get to spend the summer doing what you really want

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I am going to talk about a movie that I saw on TCM recently. I've seen it many times, but we had Joan Kramer and David Healy on the show a couple of weeks ago, the historians, and we were talking about Henry Fonda. And I got to thinking about Henry Fonda, and my favorite Henry Fonda performance is a John Ford movie called My Darling Clementine, which you and I were talking about before we turned the mics on. It's just a terrific film. Yeah, we have the good stuff before we turn the mics on. Yes. We save the shit for the audience. But they got to find out that Cary Grant was Jewish.

That's gold. Yes, that's the important thing. It's actually an early Buddy movie. It's based because Victor Mature plays Doc Hollis. Buddy's gold. Yes, that's the important thing. It's actually an early Buddy movie. It's based, because Victor Mature plays Doc Hollis. Buddy Epson. He plays Buddy Epson. Buddy Epson as Doc Hollis. I would have loved that.

It's Henry Fonda plays Wyatt Earp, and it's a story of the famous shootout at the OK Corral, the story of the Earp brothers versus the Clanton gang. Walter Brennan is the patriarch of the Clanton gang. There's a famous story. I don't know if it actually happened, if it's apocryphal.

Supposedly, Walter Brennan hated John Ford. And Ford asked him at one point, can you climb on a horse? Do you know how to climb on a horse? And Brennan said, I don't know, but I've won three Oscars. Does that account for anything? I hope that story's true. John Ford, the great John Ford, early in his career when he was working on silent films, he met the real Wyatt Earp.

And according to legend or according to the story, that Earp told him that this is how the story went down. This is how the gunfight at the O.K. Corral. He took some liberties but basically... I think a guy who shot people maybe could exaggerate also. He probably exaggerated.

It's a beautiful looking film in black and white. There's so many great scenes shot by the cinematographer Joseph McDonald who actually was more famous for shooting film noirs, like Panic in the Streets and Pick Up on South Street. So it's a

very dark, expressionistic western. A terrific picture. Gilbert loves this, that Vincent Price was actually considered for the role of Doc Holliday before... Oh, I'm Doc Holliday, and the tingler is loose at the OK Corral.

Scream, scream for your lives. The tingler has gotten loose at the OK Corral. Why did I know you were going to do that? That's brilliant. There's a terrific YouTube video, actually, if you can find it, of Jimmy Stewart and Henry Fonda interviewing John Ford. Wow. And on this, and worth seeing, which I found in my research,

and Ford is talking about how he knew Wyatt Earp, and he based it on what Earp told him about the legend. Great movie. Linda Darnell is in it. Just got a great cast. And John Ford always, well, he was always doing westerns. Yeah. I heard he and John Wayne never got along, really.

And interesting, because I think they were politically aligned. Yeah, yeah. I heard John Wayne was like, he was turning people in during the Red Scare. Well, Ford was very conservative politically. Yes. It's filmed in Monument Valley in Arizona, which was his favorite location. Shot the movie in 45 days. It's just a beautiful Western.

It's a great Fonda performance. Check it out. Henry Fonda, not a Jew, as far as I know. I can't be sure. And, you know, that on his 8x10, it was a picture of him with his hand resting on his chin. And it was Henry Fonda, not a Jew. And that's why they would hire him back then. I didn't realize that.

Yeah, because anti-Semitism was so prevalent, they would hire him. They didn't even know he was an actor. He wouldn't list anything that he acted in before. They didn't even know he had acted. But he said, not a Jew. And they said, let's get him. Hilarious. As a Jewish guy, you get away with that.

Yes. So this week, my darling Clementine. And another film noir with Gene Hackman, Night Moves. Yeah, love that picture. Love Gene. We'll do more Gene Hackman in the future. Yes. Well, I don't know how much more we can do with Gene Hackman.

Yeah, that's true but oh so this has been you still remember the title uh they uh um uh you know you can remember the tagline on on terror train but but but and and the mangler but you can't remember the title of the podcast. Well, I did about 12 episodes of this show without knowing your last name. That's fine. Yeah. At least that's hard to know.

That's hard to remember. Let's see if I remember it. Santo Padre is harder than Colossal. Yes. This has been amazing Colossal obsessions. Beautifully done. If you like listening to comedy, try watching it on the internet. The folks behind the Sideshow Network have launched a new YouTube channel called Wait

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