‘Poltergeist’ With Bill Simmons and Van Lathan
01:35:10 Share

If you're a fan of the inner workings of Hollywood, then check out my podcast, The Town, on the Ringer Podcast Network. My name's Matt Bellany. I'm founding partner at Puck and the writer of the What I'm Hearing newsletter. And with my show, The Town, I bring you the inside conversation about money and power in Hollywood. Every week, we've got three short episodes featuring real Hollywood insiders to tell you what people in town are actually talking about. We'll cover everything from why your favorite show was canceled overnight, which streamer is on the brink of collapse, and which executive is on the hot seat.

Disney, Netflix, Who's Up, Down, and Who'll Never Eat Lunch in This Town Again. Follow the town on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode is brought to you by State Farm. There's no better feeling than a personal win, and the State Farm personal price plan can help you do just that. Talk to a State Farm agent today to learn how you can bundle and save with the personal price plan. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there. Prices are based on rating plans that vary by state. Coverage options are selected by the customer. Availability, amount of discounts and savings, and eligibility vary by state.

This episode is brought to you by one of my best friends of the 2020s, Pluto TV. You know I love great movies.

I also love free. Pluto TV has thousands of movies and TV shows for free. A lot of them are separated by channel. They have a 90210 channel. I might have perused it a few hundred times. They have stuff separated. Like they have like a crime movies channel. Sometimes I'll just run Godfather marathons on it. Pluto is amazing. Forrest Gump, Catch Me If You Can, Mission Impossible, The Godfather, The Godfather 2, all movies I can't stop watching. All movies we've done on the rewatchables.

We've talked about them on this podcast now. They're all on Pluto TV for free. Watch classics, blockbusters, everything in between. And again, the 90210 channel on virtually all of your favorite devices, all for free. Pluto TV, stream now, pay never.

The Rewatchables is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network, where you can find higher learning with Van Lathan. Absolutely. Find the Ringerverse. Of course. With Van Lathan. What are we Ringerversing about these days? We're Ringerversing about Agatha all along. Oh, Katherine Hahn. Yeah, you like that. Okay, cool. Former BS podcast guest. Came in, no PR person, solo. Yeah, did it on her own. She's a force of nature. And the penguin.

Penguin. You like the penguin. Love the penguin. Love the penguin. If you like the Sopranos, boy, you'll love the penguin. It's officially scary month here in the rewatchables. You know what that means? You son of a bitch! You left the bodies and you only moved the headstones! Poltergeist is next. Don't adjust the television set. Your reception's fine. But in their new suburban home, the Freeling family has tuned into something beyond our world.

Poltergeist. You'll never look at your television set the same way again. Poltergeist, a Steven Spielberg production, rated PG. Now playing at a theater near you, check newspapers. All right, Van Lathan is here. Van, I asked you to pick a horror movie for Scary Month. You sent me a very strange text back with a bunch of different choices, including every vampire movie ever made. Yeah.

But then you said ultimately I want to do Poltergeist. Poltergeist, yeah. Why? Takes up a lot of space. Yeah. A big movie in terms of the movie itself, but also the lore around the movie. Oh, yeah. Everything surrounding the movie, it just took up a lot of cultural space in the 80s. A lot to get to with this one. Yeah, for sure. I'm going to start here. Old school, non-murder spree horror movies from 1978 to 1982. The specific time.

where we get Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Amityville Horror, Alien, Altered States, The Shining, The Thing, Poltergeist, The Entity, and all the Stephen King movies. Yeah. All right, so what does that mean? Something about this era in those movies where it's like the stuff that's inside you that you're afraid of, the being in your house and being like, what's wrong with dad? Yeah. Being in Antarctica and being like, why is everybody starting to act weird around here? Being stuck at the Overlook Hotel.

Like, man, Jack's acting fucking strange lately. What's going on with him? Or in this situation, Poltergeist. I mean, why does our daughter keep talking to the TV? What's happening here? And it's just, this is this era of that. The two movies that, for me, in the 80s, that, like I said, took up the most space were this one

And Nightmare, right? Nightmare won. Now, Nightmare had a whole franchise. Freddy Krueger became, like, the biggest villain in the history of horror movies. But they were both two movies that, like, were about things that were sort of undeniable.

Like, Freddie, you could not not go to sleep. It was just a terrifying concept to me as a kid. Yeah. You fall asleep and he's there. You have to sleep, right? With this one, this was one that, like, the whole family would get together on and

And it would make you look behind the refrigerator, under the bed, what's happening. It just felt like it was really about a family being tormented. And there was something inescapable about the horror. You don't know what your house is built on top of. You don't know who's coming to take your children away. And there were so many different parts of it that are just iconic.

iconic and we would talk about them like during the 80s and into the 90s. Also, we didn't have the reservoir of movies that were made about this stuff. Yeah, it cut off my growth. That really jumped out to me with watching the first half hour of Poltergeist again where

This family doesn't have a history of like, I just watched The Conjuring last week. And I think this might mean this. They're just like, whoa, what's going on here? The fucking chair moved 50 feet. That's weird. She's excited. Yeah. She's like, look how cool this is. Right. The chair. Watch. Let's put our daughter and we're going to put a Rams helmet on her and she's just going to go flying forward. Isn't this neat? Like she's not, she doesn't have the reservoir of evil for movies like this. Right. Because she doesn't know yet.

Doesn't know. She's completely ambivalent to the fact that these ghosts, these are not the fun ghosts. Right. They're in the, we're fucking with your stage. Right. It's about to get dark. Oh my God, the chairs are stacked up. How awesome is that? Yeah. Not awesome at all. It's really a bad sign. But there's no Vera Farmiga or Patrick Wilson there for her to be able to draw from. Well, Nightmare is a good example too because that's another one where the fundamental fears we have are, is there someone in my house?

I can't fall asleep because that thing in the window scares me. I'm scared because I've woken up the last two nights at 315 and now I'm scared that I'm going to wake up again at 315. I don't know what that means. I'm scared someone's under my bed. I'm scared someone's in my closet. Like these are all fundamental stuff. All of these movies from this era, like just, we're like, we're going to hit this hard. Yeah. And this is the ultimate one. Like you're watching this going, just take the clown out of the little boy's room. The clown's scary. Just put it in the fucking attic.

Hey, the tree, you can see it through the window. Just close the curtains. It's funny, when I was watching a movie back now,

There's all kinds of different motifs of basically kind of evil in the room. Oh, yeah. There are Darth Vader posters everywhere, sleeping under Darth Vader. It's an evil Sith wizard, right? There's the tree outside. There's the clown. There's a feeling of safety that they have there. But when you look around it, there's a lot of scary stuff in there. Who the fuck puts a... I mean, this is like, should be a nitpicks, but...

Who has a clown in a chair facing your little kid who's like nine? Like if I did that to my kids, they'd probably Menendez brothers me. Jesus. Is that a verb yet? Let me ask you this. What era, because I have this in the question for you. What era did the clown become...

a figure of fear. Is this post? Or has this always been? This is always. But remember, Bozo was like a huge deal. You used to watch Bozo. I know, but clown, who wasn't afraid of clowns? Yeah. What grown man is like, I'm dressed as a clown again this week. And I'm like, oh my God, that guy's got bodies in his basement. John Wayne Gacy. John Wayne Gacy. Yeah. That's what changed the clown motif. I changed the clown motif right there, John Wayne Gacy. Also like,

You know, let's say my son was seven and you're like, "Oh, I'm gonna get Ben a birthday gift." And you're like, "I got him this really creepy clown." - That just hits the- - Put in his room. Yeah, he's just gonna stare at you as you sleep. - Something else about the '80s themselves. I was thinking about this movie. There was a supernatural aura to the decade. - Yeah.

And it's difficult for me to articulate now. But remember, it was a highly religious decade. The religious right was everywhere. Everyone was talking about things that you couldn't see, couldn't touch, couldn't grab. And it did seem like some of the horror movies in the 80s were kind of like a reaction to that idea. Yeah, totally. Even this movie is like litigating spirits and malevolent spirits.

and like what exists after death. It's not just, it's coming for the children. The beast. The beast, right? Well, think about, so Invasion of the Body Snatchers, that's about, that's more science fiction-y, but it's like we can all be replaced, but it's just spooky. And basically, if you fall asleep, you're in trouble, right? Amityville Horror is something bad happened in this house.

It actually might be coming from the basement. And these people are too stupid to realize it. The dad's starting to lose his mind. And it's just getting creepier and creepier. But that was like one of the first get the fuck out of the house movies, right? And now we've been making those for 50 years. Then you go into Alien and Altered States, which is more of the...

It's kind of the alternate subconscious, or in Alien's case, we're just in outer space and just... We can't go anywhere. Humans can't control this. Right. We're completely out of control. There's this force. The thing is like that too. Perfect killing machine. Yeah. The entity is an interesting one, and it's in this poltergeist world, and it's Barbara Hershey. I don't know if you've seen this movie, but it's fucking nuts. Right. And I don't know how they filmed it in 1982, but she's basically...

getting raped by this evil spirit over and over again and can't fight it can't get out of the house and the thing won't let her leave the house.

That's what you don't have to worry about a remake for. It's not a comedy. You don't have to worry about that one. Definitely don't want to watch that with your girlfriend and her parents. Definitely not. But it's a fucked up movie. And it's the kind of movie that I don't even think it would get made in any form now. Not even like on Shudder. And then all the Stephen King movies. But then Nightmare, I think, was the shift. Where Nightmare is like, how can we take all this stuff that worked...

Let's go a little pop culture with it. Let's go a little more mainstream with it. Let's make this a little more 80s. And then we're off in that direction. But Nightmare is a shift to me. And Nightmare also has like this weird morality to it. Yeah. To where, you know, Kruger was an asshole, son of a bitch. But then he was murdered by all of those people. So you start to like, and even in this one, these horror movies in these decades, they start to like play with

Like, who really is at fault and who really the victims are? You can make an argument that in this horror movie that the ghosts are actually the victims. Yeah. Because they were cooling, right? They weren't doing anything. And then someone came along and disturbed their eternal rest. They just want to take a swim. They just want to chill. Yeah. They just want to chill. They want to take a little skeleton nighttime swim. Like, we've been here. And now you guys are doing this. And so they're saying, get the hell out of here. And they pull the house under at the end. So...

I talked about dipping in your deepest fears. I said some of this already, but is there something under my bed? Is there something wrong with our house? Why do I keep waking up at the same time? What's up with this clown in my bedroom? Why is everyone acting so strangely around me? What happens if the devil is just like, I have now targeted you and I'm coming after you. Right.

How do I get out of this completely insane, possibly supernatural situation? And why is my husband starting to unravel? What other themes are like this that you have? We talked about it a little bit with Invasion of the Body Snatchers. Is this person really this person?

Right. They live. John Carpenter. Another good one. Yeah. Situation like I got to put the glasses on to see that you really have a fucked up face and you're working with the aliens. Yeah. Am I really myself? Oh, that's a good one. Yeah. Like there are a couple of movies later on that play with the actual am I a demon? Am I turning into something? And did I do all of this stuff? And then just like the classics. Yeah.

Is there a werewolf that lives in my block? Fright Night, is there a vampire that lives next door to me? Yeah. Like just the classics like that. The Fright Night remake is overhated to me with Colin Farrell. Yeah. But it does a great job of saying, hey, if there's an all-powerful

like nocturnal beast living next door and they want to hang out with you. Like, what can you do about it? Like nothing. I should have mentioned American werewolf in London in that. Cause that's another one. Definitely in that run for sure. Definitely in there. Definitely in that room. What's happening to me. Yeah. Something shifts after this. I, I think out of all of these, I still think there's something wrong with my house is the best gimmick of all the gimmicks.

Well, because... Because the new house is hope. It's happy. You establish roots. You want it to go well. And you don't know why it's not going well. And it's something that you would...

Hold on to even if something was a little bit off right you're tight You're you're going glass half-full as much as you possibly can this dude is walking around I do a good job of this in the movie. He's selling people on other houses. All right Yeah, welcome to phase four. Hey in town and country this guy put a goddamn jacuzzi in his this is a great place to live Except it's not it's not a great place to live you you need to get away from this place and

But not only are you rooted there, you want other people to come move in there because he's like the greatest house salesman of all time. So he believes in what he's doing.

Can we talk about the summer of Steve Spielberg? Oh, yeah. And this is a big backstory to how this movie gets made. This is one of the best. Who actually made this movie, yeah. There's so much good research with this. I almost couldn't believe it. It was a smorgasbord. It was all I was doing last night after watching this. It was like, oh, my God, I forgot this. Oh, I forgot that. But Spielberg has Raiders in 81, massive hit, directing E.T. and producing this movie, and they end up coming out

a week apart in 1982 and he officially becomes the guy. And that's it. These are, ET is the biggest movie of the year and Poltergeist is the biggest horror movie of the year. We're off.

It's almost like he's making the decision to dominate every potential genre that he could. Right. This was his only real horror movie. And he produced it. He didn't direct it. But as you point out, he co-wrote it. It was his idea. He had an idea called Night Skies, which was supposed to be a sequel to Close Encounters. They wouldn't let him direct it because he had this E.T. contractual stuff. So he found Tobe Hooper. It's Tobe, right? It's not Toby? I don't know.

T-O-B-E. I never got an answer whether it's Tobe or Toby. Probably Toby, right? I don't know. It's with an E though. Whatever. He found Hooper. Where's Fantasy? Fantasy would know somehow. But they collaborated and then there's just a lot of stuff about that Spielberg actually kind of direct this movie. And when you watch it,

It feels like a Spielberg movie. There's a lot of like Spielberg shots and touches and the zoom in closeups or the zoom out or the big wide shots of the suburban neighborhood. And I don't know if you told me Spielberg actually directed it, I'd be like, I believe that. Well, there's, I mean, the stories get to the fact that this movie is coming along at a point to where,

Spielberg is so hot that everything that he's connected with, everyone wants to see it. And at a certain point, he's just not happy with what he's seeing from the movie. So he just kind of like takes it over. And then, but when, if you watch it thinking that you can see his DNA in the movie, the movie, which I did last night. And the first thing that it says is a Steven Spielberg production. That's the first thing that it says. So,

It got so dicey that the DGA got involved and they had to like pay Hooper a fine. Spielberg had had some quote in a,

in a magazine piece about or a newspaper piece tobe toby tobe isn't a take charge sort of guy if a question was asked if an answer wasn't immediately forthcoming i'd jump in and say what we could do he would not agreement and that became apostles of collaboration and all of a sudden the buzz started spielberg actually directed that movie so he actually wrote an open letter in the hollywood reporter the week it came out to hooper

basically saying it was amazing to work with you. But then as the years pass, all these people pop up like Frank Marshall, who's had an amazing career, he's a co-producer. He was like the creative force of the movie was Steven. Hooper was the director on the set every day. Steven did design for every storyboard, was on the set every day except for three days.

And then Zelda Rubinstein who played Tangina. It's a Steven Spielberg film. She said Steven directed all six days she was on the set. It's a Steven... So she just fucking came out with it. Yeah, she's like, fuck it. She's like one of those old wrestlers. It's got children interacting with...

supernatural and otherworldly forces something that we've seen spielberg movies before it's got family it looks like they live down the street from the et people it's like the same way it'd be like a street over yeah it's got it's the same world it's really a supernatural fable like in a way and there's a morality in it in a way and also with this film most of these um

horror type of movies, their job is to scare you. So there's a hopelessness in there. This movie is continuously hopeful as you're calling to your child who is there and you're using the personalities of the parents to try to get the kid to come to the light or not go to the light. A superhero comes in at the end, a little pint-sized kid

Clairvoyant, medium, all of that. It's a very Spielbergian type of movie when you look at it like that. My wife and I were watching a lot. My wife loves this movie. We were watching last night and we were talking about when it gets to the portal.

which one of us would be the one that went in. That's so interesting. And we both immediately agreed it was my wife and not me. Yeah. I was like, you'd do a better job. She's like, I would. Plus, it kind of symbolizes our relationship where I always have to do the tough stuff. Damn. You just kind of. I was like, I can't. I don't have a comeback. I would be holding the rope going, get in there, honey. Bill.

Bill, why don't you have a comeback? What if you just said to her, but yeah, I paid for the rope. Well, I mean, I didn't want to have to go there. But it was like, she's like, when we take the dogs for a walk, I pick up the poop. And I was like, you're right. That's exactly the same as the portal to hell to save our daughter. I got to be honest with you. This was rough for Craig T. Nelson's character in this book. Yeah.

He had a tough one. He had some dad decisions I disagreed with, which we'll be diving into in the podcast. We'll get into them later, yeah. So Oscar nominations, not a lot. They lost to E.T. for visual effects, sound effects, and weirdly best score, which I have some thoughts on later, but this did not get nominated for best picture or anything like that. One huge thing we should talk about with this. So no major stars, right? Joe Beth Williams and Craig T. Nelson is the two stars, but...

Both really good careers, and this catches them at the perfect time. So Jo Beth Williams was on this show called Jabberwocky, which was in Boston. They showed it in Boston. I don't know if it was everywhere. It was a kid's show. Then she was naked in Kramer vs. Kramer, two-episode Arkham White Shadow, and she was in Stir Crazy.

Well, she was the naked girl in Kramer vs. Kramer. She's the one that the little boy is going to pee and sees the naked girl. And then she's in Stir Crazy. She's female lead. And then she just goes on to become a very steady force in the town. Right. So she did Big Chill. Yeah. She did a movie called Adam about a missing kid. That was like the biggest TV movie of the entire 80s. 38 million people. Mm-hmm.

The Day After, which was the biggest TV movie of all time. She starred in that. Nuclear war joint. She was in Teachers. She turned down Murphy Brown in 1988. They gave it to Candace Bergen. She was a big star. And she's really good in this movie. Right. She is actually the driving force of the movie. Yeah, she's fucking awesome in this movie. And then Craig T. Nelson, who was kind of that guy who's an Injustice for All-Star crazy prep, Benjamin, does this.

All the right moves. All the right moves. Steph Djordjevic is a football coach. Great part. He's in Silkwood. Right. Killing Fields.

Bad Guy and Axtra Jackson. A great fucking villain in Axtra Jackson. We'll be doing that on Rewatchables at some point. I actually think he didn't lean into villainy enough because he comes back in the- Turner and Hooch. Turner and Hooch. Bad Guy. Right, Bad Guy. Devil's Advocate, A Little Sleazy. Actually, so maybe I'm wrong. No, he did. He villained it up. He villained it up a little bit more. He did Coach. Yeah. Villained it up. And then has this whole 2000s. He stars in The District. He's in My Name is Earl.

And then he's the dad in Parenthood for like 100 plus episodes. So he had ended up with a five decade career. And he's Mr. Incredible. Yes. Yeah. And incredible. Just incredible. Just incredibly like a recognizable face. One of those guys that when you see him in something, you know, it's probably going to be good. Yeah. So they nailed the actors. And then the biggest piece of this movie that we've not discussed yet. We're going to do it right after a break because we're talking about the Poltergeist curse. Yeah. This episode is supported by State Farm.

Think about your first reaction after you have an accident. What do you do? You scream, oh no, or man, why did this happen? On the flip side, let's say you buy a new car or you lease a new car. Get in there and it smells great and you're like, man, this is awesome.

But just remember, really, the only words you need to remember are like a good neighbor. State Farm is there. They've got options to fit your unique insurance needs. Meaning you can talk to your agent to choose the coverage you need. Have coverage options to protect the things you value most. File a claim right on the State Farm mobile app and even reach a real person when you need to talk to somebody. Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn. As a B2B marketer, you know how noisy the ad space can be if your message isn't targeted to the right audience. It just disappears into the noise. I think the great thing about LinkedIn, it just feels like everybody's on there.

you put something job posting whatever and you have full confidence everybody's going to see it because everyone's on linkedin linkedin ads can help you convert your b2b audience into high quality leads with specialized targeting tools linkedin ads gives you direct access to decision makers 130 million decision makers who matter to your business and in the technology space linkedin ads generate two to five times higher returns on investment

than other platforms. Start converting your audience. Claim $100 credit for your next campaign at linkedin.com/rewatch. LinkedIn, the place to B2B. Terms and conditions apply. - All right, Van, the poltergeist curse.

So both of the daughters in this movie are dead within a couple years for different reasons. Dominic Dunn. Dominic Dunn. Yeah, Dominic Dunn, who's the daughter of Dominic Dunn, gets killed by her boyfriend in a case that really starts a whole bunch of domestic violence stuff in the 80s and 90s, leads to Dominic Dunn's reporting about the OJ trial and the Menendez brothers, all this stuff.

Awful story. And then Heather O'Rourke, the little girl, she's filming Poltergeist 3 and dies of a bowel obstruction, septic shock, like really strange. And she was only 12. There's another guy in this movie, Lou Perriman, killed with an ax by a crazy intruder. And then there was another one in the second movie who died. And everybody has stories from all the movies about just weird shit going on. And...

This is considered probably to be the most cursed movie of all the movies, including there's a Shudder series that's excellent called Cursed Movies, and this is one of the ones they did in season one. This was a very 80s thing. I'm sure it exists in other decades, too, with other movies, too, but...

One thing that the internet has actually done, in my opinion, is that it's depowered the urban legend and given rise to the conspiracy theory. Yeah. The urban legend doesn't exist as much as it used to anymore. I miss the urban legend. I miss the urban legend a little bit. Like Mikey from Pop Rocks. Mikey ate the Pop Rocks and died, whatever that was. The whole thing. Yeah. All of them, right? Yeah. Like the urban legend to where...

people talk about it, but you can't really investigate it that much because there's not as much at your fingertips to look into things. This was one of the biggest cinematic urban legends, conspiracies, myths, whatever, of the 80s. And it was weird. I'm positive it's a myth. I'm not saying it. Yeah, I'm just saying it's like, well...

I don't know that it's, I mean, what would you describe as a myth? It's like, do you think that there's actually a curse over the film that. There's just an incredible amount of weird, like an inordinate amount of weird shit that happened to the people who made this movie as they were making the movie and after. Cause there was other stuff like Jo Beth Williams said she's making the movie and she would come home.

And the pictures on the wall of her house would be crooked again. And they weren't crooked before. See, part of this, though, I used to think part of this... Was like a selling of the movie? Yeah. But there was a point to where...

this stuff will be talked about and like where I'm from, people would be like, all right, that's what you did, playing with spirits. Right. Be careful. Be careful playing with spirits, like calling up all those spirits and spirits will follow you out at TV and follow you home. And then I was wondering about this as we were talking about it, knowing that we were going to talk about it, should I say, if some of the stuff that they said

And to be honest with you, even some of the unfortunate things that happened, if that didn't become a part of the marketing of the film, like this is actually real and these are... But the film was out before I think some of this stuff happened. Yeah. Because there's some other stuff like...

i mean this is stupid but zelda rubinstein said she had a vision of her dog that came to her and said goodbye and then five hours later got a call that her dog was dead she's like that was weird um robbie the little kid has a poster in his room for super bowl 22 which does not take place for six more years in the year super bowl 22 happened the little girl died right around there that's weird um

Robbie got strangled by the clown and they fucked it up and the clown kind of malfunctioned and actually started strangling him and they realized that he was turning purple. I'm getting uncomfortable. And they fixed that. It's on the video monitor. Wait a minute. I'm actually kind of like, as we run through this, I'm starting to feel a little weird. This is the weirdest one though. Carol Ann begins communicating with the afterlife and the channel on the TV is on channel 12 and she died when she was 12. Yeah, see?

It's just like, it's just creepy. It makes me feel like a little, a little teary. And then she actually died during the filming of Poltergeist 3. And once again, it is, there's no way to talk about the movie and not talk about it is a part of the story of the movie. Like there were specials

on TV based around it. There were segments of stuff that talked about it. Lots of shows. Magazine articles. Multiple shows. Multiple stuff. E-True Hollywood stories. All kinds of stuff. A whole nine just talking about the poltergeist story, particularly around Dominique Dunn and the younger girl that passed away. They would talk about her all the time. You know,

As you know, I'm always, I have an open mind with all this stuff. Yeah. I think when you go into the conspiracy corners and you really start reading about it, people are pretty passionate about it. Yeah. It reminds me of The Shining. There's a great documentary about The Shining called Room 237. Did you ever see it? No. I think it's on Pluto. It's all these people, what they see from The Shining, and they all see different things, right? Some people...

Some people see it as like, this is when, when we took, we took America from the native Americans. That's what it's about. Some people think it's about when we went to the moon, but we actually didn't because Stanley Kubrick filmed a fake moon landing and that's what it's about. And he just hits all these different crazy theories and these people like genuinely believe them. Right. They're like, here's what this means. Here's why they did this. And it's all about what they want to see out of it. And, and,

Unfortunately, I think that happened to Poltergeist. I've never asked you this before. If there's one conspiracy theory slash urban legend slash wacky deal that Bill Simmons believes either is true or could be true. Yeah. What is it? First of all, thank you for asking because there's a bunch of them. Okay. I want to know.

Should I go somebody that's in the news? Yeah. I think Sean Combs killed Biggie. Wow. Okay. You're not the only person. That's a really good conspiracy theory that I think I subscribe to because it goes back to the case of who had the most to gain. And if you look at it, it's like he actually had the most to gain because he had the whole library. He had the artist. He didn't leave. He still had the stuff. He was able to vault himself up in the void.

And it's like, oh, that actually makes sense. But like, Big was his biggest... And now we know he might be a sociopath. Right. It seems... Seems like pretty decent evidence that something's wrong with the guy. Why do you say the most of the game when Big was his meal ticket, a lot of people would say at that point? He rode the meal ticket. He cashed it in and vaulted himself up from the meal ticket. When did you first have that thought? Oh, in the 90s. I always thought, I was always like, this is suspicious. This worked out too perfectly for this guy. Mm.

Yeah. Because some people think he killed Tupac and I actually don't think he did. That was a little bit of other shit. That's too easy. Look at that. DJVlad.com. But the JFK stuff is like... The JFK stuff is the easiest for me. It's like clearly they did it and they changed the autopsy. Like there's just no question. There's multiple shooters. Who is the they? They...

Absolutely. Who is the they? They, the doctor. Did you see the Parkland one? The Parkland doctors? I don't think that there was a lone shooter, but my question is. They changed the autopsy. They like sewed up his head and did all kinds of crazy shit. Who is the they? Well, it's probably CIA. Okay. Or the mob. With the mob. CIA with the mob. Okay. I get it. Those are two good ones. Those are two good ones. I believe in Sasquatch.

Interesting. What's your evidence? Well, a lot of it comes from Harry and the Hendersons. But I believe in Sasquatch. I'm the type of person that if, number one, I think it could be true, number one, because it's an animal.

Right. That would have essentially gone extinct. But it's it's a missing link in the evolutionary chain and it would know how to be away from people. Maybe it's nocturnal, whatever, whatever. I the evidence is that I think it could be real.

Sasquatch, Loch Ness, those are my ones. It would make sense there's like one giant crazy something out there. Yeah, that we don't know. And maybe this Sasquatch is nomadic and he travels all around. Maybe we're actually all seeing the same Sasquatch, which is why we don't see him that much. Or maybe it's only like six Sasquatches out there.

Have you ever done a deep dive on the super duper way deep in the ocean weird shit going on down there? Yeah, but that's real. We see that, though. Yeah. Like, there's like, I don't know what's going on down there. It's like all kinds of different animals and stuff. We see that. Yeah. We know they're down there. I want a conspiracy theory that I think as I get older and I really think about it and I think, I just think Jordan got suspended. I'm back. I'm back on that one. There was some, there's a clip of his press conference.

And he says, if Mr. Stern lets me back in the league, like it's just like under his breath. There's just a lot of it. I just, and we'll never know.

Right. We'll never know. And all the excuses on the flip side of it. But I just, it doesn't add up to me that all we talk about is how crazy competitive this guy was. And at the height of his powers, he's just like, I'm good. I'm going to play a sport I'm not good at. It doesn't make sense. I get it. I get it. I get it. Yeah. He's so competitive though. He's just like, I'm good. I won three titles in a row. I've done it. We'll get back to the movie. The only thing I'll say about the Jordan thing. Yeah. Is if they were going to...

suspend him, if they were going to do two years, no Jordan. Two people. Only two people would know him and Stern. Okay. Only two people would know him and Stern. If Stern was going to suspend him, do two years without Michael Jordan. That's such a gamble. He did suspend him is my, is my conspiracy. But what I'm saying is like, you, we can either,

Say I suspended you or you can come up with a story why you're going to take a year and a half off. But just think... But it's going to be one of those two choices I'll let you choose. But think about all what David Stern would have to do to cover for the conspiracy. It seems like he wouldn't do that and hold Michael accountable at the same time. It seemed like either you would actually do it and embarrass Mike, but if you were...

not going to embarrass him, then covering it up for him, it didn't seem like it would make that much of a deal to him. But if you're giving Mike the choice...

I don't know what happened. I'm just saying it's a really good one. I think there's a lot of meat on the bone, man. Yeah, I mean. Just look at all the other super crazy competitive athletes we've had over the course of mankind. And this is the one who's like, yeah, I'm good. Okay. I'll take 18 months off. Those are some good ones. Those are the top ones. We didn't get too crazy. We didn't do Asian aliens or any of that stuff like that. We didn't do the Malaysia flight. Oh, I don't want to talk about that. Let's get back to Volta, guys.

You got to watch Room 237, though. I will. All right. $10.7 million budget for Poltergeist made $121.7 million. That's a hit, baby. 12 tupled its money. Eighth biggest movie in 82. Only horror movie in the top 35 that year. Horror movies were not like big moneymakers back. It really wasn't until the mid-80s that they became. I think this was one of the reasons it started. I don't know why it feels like the golden age of the horror movie, though. It feels like Freddy, Jason, Pinhead. Yeah, the serial killer ones. Yeah. Yeah.

And Roger Ebert, three stars. An effective thriller, not so much because of the special effects, but as because Hooper and Spielberg have tried to see this movie's strange events through the eyes of the family members instead of just standing back and letting the special effects overwhelm the cast along with the audience. Good review.

All right, today's the most rewatchable scene is brought to you by Paramount+. A mountain of movies awaits on Paramount+. A mountain of heart-pounding action blockbusters like Top Gun Maverick, Mission Impossible, Fallout, and Gladiator. You excited for Gladiator too? Yes. A mountain of jump scares with thrillers like Scream 6, Smile, and A Quiet Place Day One. You excited for Smile too?

No. I like Smile. I never saw it. Smile's good. Smile's like unsettling. That's a scary trailer. I don't want to see it. I won't see it. It's creepy. And a mountain of fun for the kiddos with family favorites like If, Paw Patrol, The Movie, Endora, and The Lost City of Gold. Discover something new every week on Paramount+. I'm going to start with the opening scene. Mm-hmm.

Great performance from the dog. I'm just handing out the Brandy Booth Award for best performance by a pet right now to that golden retriever whose name was E-Buzz. Aw. Great job. Just going to everybody's room. He's like, oh, there's some potato chips. Yeah. I think I'll eat those. He brings it throughout the entire movie. Yeah. Great job by him. And then we get to see the little girl staring at a TV, which we knew was coming because we saw the trailer. This movie had a good trailer, by the way. Carol Ann's second TV night.

When she wakes up, everybody, they're asleep in the bed, which they set up really nicely. It's like, all right, good night. And then they get scared. All of a sudden, next shot, they're in the bed. But then everyone's asleep and she goes toward the TV again. And that smoky hand kind of comes out. This is the they're here situation? Yeah. The they're here used to scare the shit out of me back in the day, man. And became the famous line of the movie. They're here. Yeah, the they're here was like, it,

it made snow on your TV scary for a while because TVs don't,

You don't get snow anymore. That's gone. I got that. I had that in What's Aged the Worst. Snow on the TV. I had that as well. It doesn't happen anymore. I didn't even know people called it snow. Yeah. I thought it was just like static. Snow? That was the term people used? Yeah. You're toxically young. Yeah. I'm not even that young. But still annoying though. He's in the cable generation. The TV didn't go static like that. What did it do? It would wave up. What happened when there was no channel where you were...

We never had one. What happened? It was just TV 24-7. Yeah, I actually don't even have a memory of what you're describing. When there was no channel. When there was no channel. But this is antenna, not cable. Once we move from antennas, snow's gone. Okay. That's what happened. Damn. I know it's static. I mean, like, I remember seeing static for various reasons. I just didn't know it was called snow. Oh, okay, cool. They're here. They're here. I have kitchen chairs on the table, that whole scene. Oh, that's a great scene.

Uh-huh. Do you see them? Do you? Because she's still entertained by what, she's still not entertained. That scene is good because in the Spielbergian way, that's still, oh my God, E.T., oh my God, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, oh my God, there's something amazing and unexplainable happening. The movie still has a little bit of innocence there before you know what these guys are up to.

I liked her in this movie. She's great. I was like, that seems like a great spouse and life partner who's like, just how cool the chairs are. Just like really upbeat at all times until her kid's getting pulled into a portal. And even when they do, she still finds a way to have a little fun. Just had it going. Next scene, the tree takes the brother.

Yeah. He's like, must have been a tornado. That was no tornado. And then Carol Ann's gone. Yeah, Carol Ann's not here. They got to search for Carol Ann. That whole scene is super scary. Yeah, when the tree comes in and gets the boy because the boy feels something about the tree. Something's off about the tree. There's something more to the tree. When the tree comes alive and grabs him, then you're like, oh my God, he moved. He climbs the tree because he's like, what's up with this tree? He's like trying to get a feel for the tree and you can't. By the way, the movie does a great job of setting up in their house a

almost everything that will come back to attack them later on. The two scariest, scary movie things from when I was a kid were that tree and Amityville Horror waking up at 3.15 every day and knowing that it was going to turn to 3.15 and that something bad had happened and

Just being like, oh my God, it's going to be 3.15. I remember being a kid after I saw that movie and it'd be like, I'd wake up and it was like 2.59. I'd be like, oh my God, it's almost 3.15. The scariest thing for me in a movie was the nightmare on Elm Street, quick sleep, which was when a character is trying not to fall asleep and all of a sudden they go like this. Right.

And they're awake and you're like, oh my God, they didn't fall asleep. Only they fucking are asleep. Yeah, they don't realize they're asleep. And they don't realize that they're asleep. And they look at their teacher and the teacher's like, okay, now on the next chapter, open up your books. It's time to fucking die. And I'm like, oh my God.

When that happens and somebody becomes like Freddie, that used to scare the shit out of me. That goes back to what we were talking about. The fundamental things we're afraid of is like if I had to stay awake but I was super tired, could I stay awake or would I fall asleep? If I'm lying in bed and I think somebody's under my bed,

Should I check it or should I just lie here? Because if I look under, maybe there is somebody under my bed. Right. All that shit. That's the stuff as an only child who saw too many horror movies. That's the stuff I thought about. Yeah. Maybe that's why I'm so weird. Could be. Could be. My dad took me to see The Shining. I was like 10. Dog. Like, what the fuck? Mr. Simmons. It's like Borderland child abuse. Mr. Simmons, what you on, dog? We saw The Shining. Father and son go to see The Shining. That's tough.

Dr. Lesh's speech I just have as the rewatchable because she's kind of explaining the stuff like about the spirits. They resist going into that light. However hard the light wants them. They just hang around. Watch TV. Watch their friends grow up. Feeling unhappy and jealous. And those feelings are bad. Hurt. And then some people just get lost on the way to the light.

And they need someone to guide them. Very important character in this movie on a rewatch. Maybe they weren't ready. Maybe they hadn't lived fully yet. But they lived a long, long time and they still wanted more life. They resist going into the light. However hard the light wants them, they just hang around. I actually do believe this might be a thing. Yeah. As you know, I believe in some of this stuff. But I could see people being trapped.

and waiting to be released to wherever they want to go, and they're just kind of stuck here fucking with us. Yeah. And they can't get to the next thing. Yeah, so it's like, I pushed over a water bottle today and scared that lady. That's like the highlight of their week. Once again, from the country, from a place where everybody has a ghost story, and they will get mad if you do not believe them. So they watch this stuff, and they think this is just a happening that happened to some family.

If it's happened to you in some form, you believe it from that point on. Right. So. Yeah. As I've told you, it's happened to me. Poltergeist fucks with the paranormal crew. We get ripping his face off steak and maggots guy. We get headphones guy seeing weird shit. I like when the poltergeist is like, let's raise it up a level. Richard Lawson, who was Beyonce's father-in-law.

Oh, interesting. I knew him as the White Shadow teacher who had PTSD. All roads lead back to White Shadow. I know. Well, they had three White Shadow people in this. Richard Lawson was married to Tina Knowles. They actually just got a divorce.

Maybe last year. He's been in a lot of stuff, by the way. He's got a long IMDb. He's like one of those guys. Yep. He's coming up later. Her daughter, his daughter, Bianca Lawson. Long time actress as well. Tangina's speech is the other key speech. I wouldn't have this as the most rewatchable, but she sets it up, does the whole thing about the souls, perpetual dream state, Carol Ann, help them cross over. It's like, okay, I get it now. This is nice. And then she's like, there's one more thing.

A terrible presence is in there with her. And she does that whole part. To her, it simply is another child. To us, it's the Beast. It's like, oh shit, the Beast is here? Yeah. I thought we were just fucking around with some light spirits. I thought it was some ghosts that were up to hijinks. Yeah. We thought we were putting chairs on the table. Yeah. I mean, we know that they're not quite, we know that, you know, they, but we thought maybe they were, they had her in there because they're playing with her. Yeah. But we didn't know it was the Beast. Yeah.

She actually gives the movie that depth when she comes into it. And also, what an eccentric little actress to come in. She looks like she would know some stuff about the other plane or dimension or whatever. Yeah, she's either perfectly cast or perfectly miscast. I'm willing to talk it out later. Run to the light, baby. Tell her to go to the light. No! Follow her. They've been following her for weeks. Not tell her. It's all right. It's all right. Tell her. It's all right.

Run to the light, Caroline. Run as fast as you can. No, honey. No, it's a lie. You can't choose between life and death when we're dealing with what is in between. Now tell her before it's too late. Run to the light, baby. Mommy is in the light. Tell her you're waiting for her. Caroline gets saved. This is when the couple is like, you've never done this before. You're right. You go. And the mom, the mom's obviously going to be the one.

The clown scene is the last one I have. Clown under the bed, mom climbing the wall, we're upside down. Pool with the skeletons. Yeah.

You son of a bitch. You left the bodies. You only moved the headstones. What's happening? They're in the car. He's like, don't look back. You're just fucking getting the fuck out of Dodge. That whole part is my favorite part. When they think the house is clean. And guess what? It's not. And all hell breaks loose. Perfect last 15 minutes. Definitely not clean. She fucking lied. The wife. Did she lie or was it just maybe not a great...

What was her job? What's it called? She was a medium of like a house cleaner of spirits. Maybe she was like not a, you know, a yokage kind of medium. She was more like a Carl Anthony Towns. Explain. Well, just like kind of lower level. Oh, good. Oh, okay. You could win some playoff games with her, but shit, this was her 5,000 in the first half moment. She's like, house is clean. Not a multiple MVP type of, okay, I get it. I get it. By

By the way, I love, just to let everybody know, I love Yoko. She's my favorite player. Love her. It is now. I'm completely reformed. I'm completely reformed. I've gotten rid of that. I can't let discrimination get to me. What's your most rewatchable scene? So, Joe, it says, Joe Beth up the wall. That's the most rewatchable scene. Because, not because of that. Don't try to act like that. It's not where I was planning. It's a small piece of it.

Shit's great. Yeah, not because of that. Just because that scene, like, guys, it's really not because of that. Just because of that scene, you know something is going to happen. You know it's not over. Yeah. You just don't know what. Yeah. And you don't think that there's any way that in the little last part of the movie that they could turn it up any more than what they just did for the last, say, 25 to 30 minutes. And they do. It's so good. Everything gets...

It's scarier and higher stakes. And like Craig T. Nelson's character not being there and nobody else being there, all the protection is gone and it's just the three of them having to figure it out. It really is an exhilarating ending to the movie. I'll just do that nitpick now. I'm not leaving the house for a few days. I'm staying with my family.

Until I make sure everything's cool. I'm not going to be like, hey, I'm going to be gone. It's poker night. I'll do... I'll be back. I'll do another nitpick. I'll be back by 11. I'm...

fucking out. Gone. Are you kidding me? Yeah. It's going to take a couple days to pack. It is? The little small lady said that the house is clean. Okay, cool. So we'll take our time, pack it up, and then go to sleep. I figure maybe Monday we're out of here. I'm gone. Yeah. I'm going to hire some people to do my part to stimulate the economy, hire some people to come box up the house, let them deal with it. I'm

out that's like the old eddie murphy sketch that he in i think he did in delirious or maybe it was the one before that uh when he's about how uh horror movies and he doesn't understand when the people they get into the house and he's like get out yeah and he would just beg i'd be out you could be out in five seconds oh too bad we can't stay like you could have it you could it's your house you got it beast

So we both have that for most rewatchable. And most rewatchable scene was brought to you by Paramount Plus. From action blockbusters to thrillers to favorites for the whole family. You got to watch Smile. It's good. No, you got to watch it. I'll check it out. I'll just be honest with you. That trailer really freaks me out. Find something new to watch every week of Mountain of Movies awaits on Paramount Plus. Plans start at $7.99 a month. Start streaming now. We'll take one more break and then we'll do the rest of the categories.

This episode is brought to you by McDonald's. Sometimes classics, they get a twin. Like Goodfellas, Casino isn't the same type of movie, but you know, they're like fraternal twins. Scorsese did it, De Niro's in it, Pesci's in it. That's what happens. Well, another classic is getting a twin. Introducing the Chicken Big Mac. Oh my God, that sounds delicious. Two chicken patties, special sauce, lettuce, cheese, and pickles.

on a sesame seed bun. Sound familiar? So they wanted me to decide whether a chicken Big Mac is actually a Big Mac. And my take is, yeah, anything that has all of the other Big Mac stuff, but it could be chicken, it could be beef. A Big Mac's a Big Mac. The meat can be interchangeable. I'm in. I'm in on the chicken Big Mac. It's not not a Big Mac.

but you can get it while you can at Participate at McDonald's for a limited time.

This episode is brought to you by Vital Farms. Vital Farms, keeping it bull free. We always wanted our kids as they were growing up to have stuff that came from the right places. Vital Farms is perfect for this. Here's how good Vital Farms is. You can go to vitalfarms.com slash farm and you can get a 360 degree peek at the actual farm where your eggs came from. It's a certified bee corporation. They are devoted to improving the lives of people, animals, and the planet through food,

Great taste. You can do fried, poached, scrambled. Vital Farms bet you can taste the difference. Food simply tastes better when nowhere it came from. Shop the farm that's a certified B corporation and gives their hens the lifestyle they deserve. Vital Farms. Look for the black Vital Farms carton in your grocery store and learn more at vitalfarms.com. Vital Farms. Keeping it bulls**t free.

What's the most 1982 thing about this movie? I have some options for you. Okay. Snow on the TV. That's very 1982. Calvin Klein jeans. Super 1982. Joe Beth is wearing those at one point. Yeah. Those Sony giant box TVs where the dials are on the side of it, almost like would take up this whole wall. Very 1982. The little kid had Clue, the board game, in his room. That's fun.

Gene Shalit was on the TV at one point. Yeah, at the beginning. But my winner is, you got to look for it, but on the TV and the biggest TV, there's an Atari 2600 with some controllers on the top. I got nostalgic. Wow. I had Intellivision and Atari.

I had a friend of mine had the Intellivision almost. Intellivision had better sports. It had the little boxing game with the little stick guys boxing. Football was amazing. Baseball was good. But like right when I started to play the Intellivision a little bit, like I was to the age to where the Sega Nintendo came. Yeah. Yeah. What's aged the best? Staring out your window, being terrified of something that's right outside the window. Eternal. Oh, this is good.

Evil late 70s, early 80s white businessman characters. Like Louis Teague, evil developer. Oh, the guy who just- Yeah, we just moved the headstones. It's fine. Such a capitalist that he'll just- Yeah, we're just going to move the headstones. Destroy a whole cemetery and not care and then somebody- Yeah, nobody will know. Right.

I miss those characters. They couldn't have, you couldn't have that character anymore because people would be like, there's no way this person would be too self-aware. What do you have for what's age the best? I have a bunch of them. What's age the best? Number one, family ghost films. Yeah. Like just the whole family ghost genre was gone for a little while and then just exploded into its own whole universe, which obviously a lot of people- What's the best black family horror film? Black family horror film? Yeah. What's like black poltergeist? Um,

It doesn't exist. So there's a movie that is kind of about a family. The movie is called death by temptation. Have you ever seen this? What, what a, what year range are we talking? 89 or 90. And what it's about is it's like, it's about, um, Samuel L. Jackson, I think is in the movie at some point. It's about, uh, this spirit, uh,

That comes back once a generation to like attack the earth. Oh, and there is this, um, uh, there's the, the lead in the movie is a kid who is the son of like a preacher.

And he is the one that has to kill this spirit in this generation. Kadeem Hardison is in it. Kadeem Hardison? Kadeem Hardison is in it. I think Samuel L. Jackson is in it. And the spirit is like a demon or a vampire, but it tempts you because it's a beautiful woman and it tempts you. I've definitely seen this at some point in my life. It's a succubus. And there's one scene in the movie that's legitimately terrifying. Kadeem Hardison...

is trying to fight. Death by temptation? Death by temptation, D-E-F. And there's one scene he comes home and he comes home and he's on the TV. And everything that's happening to him that you're watching is happening to him on the TV. And the TV, the demon is inside of it and it's talking back to Kadeem Hardison.

It's just a very, very, very scary scene. James Bond III is in this. James Bond III is... I love James Bond III. Bill Nunn's in this? Bill Nunn's in it, yeah. I have some shocking news. You're not going to believe this. What? This movie's available on Tubi. It's not a family horror movie, but... Tubi's like, sign us up. We'll put this in fucking fucked up 80s horror. This kid is like... It's in his family lineage to fight...

this succubus deal or whatever it is. It's 1990 and the IMDB description is an evil succubus is preying on the bitterness black men in New York City. Yeah.

That sounds great. She's killing black guys because they want to have sex with her. I'm watching that this weekend. Yeah, it's good. It's good. I legitimately like it. I'm doing a top 10 black horror movies on Higher Learning. I'm doing a top 10 list and it's on my list. It's good. Would you call that the Van Layton? The Van Layton. Yeah. What's aged the best? The word poltergeist?

It's pretty much, yeah. It's German for noisy ghost. Great word. Yeah. Good job by the Germans for once. I mean, they play good soccer. You know what I'm saying? I like the schnitzels. Right, it's pretty good. Spicy mustard. They're good at soccer, yeah.

They do such a good job. This is what's aged the best of showing a normal three kid family seeming normal for the first 15 minutes. So when weird shit starts happening, it really resonates, which ET does too. I, to me, that's Spielberg. He's really good at setting the table of like, this could be any family, you know, families like this. And then even like her with the joint in, in,

I have that. Smoking weed. Yeah. Age really good. They're just hanging out. She's in the bed. She's smoking weed. The kids come in. That whole little part of it just ages pretty well. She's just hanging out.

That would be a less fun scene in 2024 because she would just be like, I took a microdose gummy thing. It wouldn't even matter. Happy. I just like seeing somebody hold the 1982 joint. Mom in bed as the kid comes in. He can't roll up. He's like, yo, roll up. If you don't know how to do it, he's reading a magazine or a book about Reagan. Yeah. He's reading a book. Yeah.

Reagan, my president. Reagan, my president. Something like that. Yeah. What else do you have for what stage the best? Anything? That's it. I have family ghost films. I have smoking weed. Those are the only things I have. I have this story. Joe Beth said she didn't want to get in the pool with the skeletons. And he said, I'll go in there with you. And he went in there with her for a couple of takes. Who is the he? Spielberg. Oh, Spielberg. Yeah, Spielberg's like, I'll go in there with you. And he went in and stood in the water and she thought it was very sweet of him.

Uh, another would stage the best. They did a direct TV commercial in 2008. That was like a parody of this movie that I thought, um, made me nostalgic for the days when direct TV actually was a decent business. Damn.

Now they just bought Sling and Dish for a dollar and nobody has DirecTV anymore. Yeah. Anyway, it was Craig T. Nelson complaining to Carol Ann that it was bad cable reception and the static on the TV. I remember that. The Fortune 3 Clap Award for most gif-able moment.

It's got to be the little girl staring into the TV, right? Or turning around and saying they're here. So that's a gif-able moment. Another gif-able moment in a disgusting Hollywood way is the guy's face getting messed up in the mirror. Like just as a gif, oh, this is happening to me. Like his face completely coming apart because it looks so 80s and cheesy and disgusting. That would be a good gif as well.

Great shot. Gordor Award for most cinematic shot. It's got to be the skeletons popping up in the pool, right? That's a good one. Anything else? It's so fucking scary. That's very scary. What would be worse? There's nothing worse. I also like the reveal, for some reason, in the movie that...

they're about to build this new phase of this all on graves. And you go, oh, like that's what's going on. And the guys, and that kind of makes, gives the movie some form. Cause you're wondering like, why is this happening to these people? And then you realize that there's a reason. Dana thieves, Benny Hanna where it's seen stealing location. Exactly. You just said the big Kahuna burger award for best use of food and drink. It's the steak and maggots steak. Come on. All right. Butch's girlfriend award week link of the film.

Do you have one for this or do you want me to go? Nah, it's a hard award to give out because I don't want to give it out to anybody. So I have one. I have one. The score got nominated for an Oscar and I don't understand why it's the score for the movie. It's not creepy enough. It's kind of like happy. It feels more like it could have been the score for E.T. I don't understand it. I've never understood it. I think that that's by design. I think that they want to keep this movie alive.

This is a horror film. But they wanted to keep it like a PG family. They want to keep this movie like a family movie. There's fucking skeletons in a pool. Like we're past the point of family friendly. Like this is a scary movie. I don't know. Like the guy who did it, Jerry Goldsmith legend, did Rudy Hoosiers. He did The Omen. Won an Oscar for it. Oh, so it's in his wheelhouse. So it's like he knows how to do it. I just, I thought it was a weird choice. What's aged the worst? Oh, Jesus Christ, so much.

a lot go ahead the obviously the cat calling of the teenage girl by the by the construction crew

The guy from 48 Hours, Billy Bear. Billy Bear. So that whole scene, number one, they're catcalling her. She stands up for herself. She's like 16? She's 16, and then the mom watches it and laughs at it. It's part of growing up. We know she's probably stoned. Right. It's probably so. Snow on the TV.

The catcalling was hilarious. It's funny. No, just that hilarious that that's in the movie, though. It's just a different time. Like, snow on the TV has aged terribly because you don't see the snow on the TV anymore. The effects during the face-melting thing... The light effects are pretty 1982. Yeah, but that's kind of to be expected when you're watching the movie. Yeah. So I have...

They're like, this isn't a haunting. It's a poltergeist. And then as you see it, it's like, no, it's actually a haunting. Yeah, it really was. This movie should have been called The Haunting, not Poltergeist. Right. It's a bunch of people who died and were in graves. And then they knocked down the tombstones and built houses on them. They were pissed off. Decided to haunt some shit. What was the definition of...

Because she, I can't remember, she explained what the difference was between a haunting. She was like, this isn't a haunting. This is poltergeist. This is a, you know, an evil ghost that's coming after you. But it wasn't one ghost. It was a whole bunch of them. To me, that sounds like a haunting. Another one, Sage of Worse, I mentioned earlier, the family not having seen

any there's something wrong with the house movies to be properly scared because those movies didn't exist. Right. So they had no kind of foundation to be like, Hey, this, I, this reminds me of whatever poltergeist team and three. I never liked. I don't even remember them. I don't know that I've seen three. Two is the one with the, uh, they bring in the, the, uh, native American shamans. I don't know that I've seen three.

Being able to change your neighbor's TV with a remote definitely is age the worst. You can't do that now. I didn't even know that you could do it then. I saw that at the beginning. Saints were playing at the beginning.

I have something on that later. Yeah. Really bad edit after the chair sliding scene where all of a sudden they're in the front door of the neighbor's house and there's history behind it. They made a Pizza Hut joke and that was the end of the scene. Pizza Hut got mad and they ended up cutting the scene early to get to the next scene. And if you watch it, it's a terrible edit, which I've always wondered why they edited it that way, but that's the reason. I'll tell you guys something right now. If you're listening to this and you were born...

Basically, any time after like 1985, you don't remember. We talked about this before on the Bad News Bear podcast. You just don't remember the delight of

that Pizza Hut in the 80s was. Right. Just going into a Pizza Hut. The smell of the Pizza Hut. It was a new thing. The Pizza Hut was fantastic. We had Papagino's in New England, though. You've ever heard of that? No. It was kind of a local pizza. Two more things. The 2015 remake that they made, fuck that movie. This movie should not have been remade. Yeah. That's offensive. And then this movie, because of the way they filmed it,

When it was on cable in the late 80s and the 90s, and it was like paint and scan and too close, and it was kind of hard to follow. And now that the TVs are wide, it's way better. But I think that hurt the rewatchability of it a little bit. Of all of the retreading of the horror movies that came out in the mid-2000s to the mid-2010s. Like the Amityville Horror remake, When a Stranger Calls, all of them. Halloween came back. They redid Nightmare. Freddy. All of those.

Were any of them, anybody in the room, were any of them either comparable to, better than the originals? Was there anything that really got a remake to where you're like, this is something that should have been remade and updated for a new audience and it's stuck? Rob Zombie's Halloween, all of that stuff. Great question. Thank you for asking.

I think the When a Stranger Calls remake is really good. And it's a big hit in the Simmons family. We've watched it multiple times. It's just a better version. The original When a Stranger Calls, the first 15 minutes is great and then the movie dies and becomes a bad 70s movie. So they redid it, made it smarter, made it more modern, and it's just better. So I would go that one. I didn't like the zombie Halloweens. None of those I thought worked. I was out on all those.

The Ruffalo Hannah Rubinick Partridge Overacting Award. They knew and they let it happen. Don't you call me lady. I come in here. I give these things to you. Give me all you got. Give me all you got. I treated you like a son. You fucking stabbed me in the heart. Fuck you. Fuck you.

I actually, I couldn't come up with anyone for this. I thought the movie was well-acted. Well-acted and perfectly cast. I thought going into it that Zelda would be the one. No, she scales it down. It's actually less. Yeah. She's eccentric, but it's like actually less. The doctor, I thought, but she's good too. The only one I thought was maybe the little boy. Kind of dials it up, trying to be super scared, but he's supposed to be scared. Yeah, he's terrified. I couldn't have an answer for that one. Was there a better title for this movie? Haunting? The Beast? Haunting.

The Beast could have been good, but The Beast does give the movie a little bit more of an aggressive tone, but The Beast could have been good. The CR thinks Luke Wilson could have been Harrison Ford's hottest take award. Zelda Rubinstein, the actress who plays Tangina, you could tell me she's perfectly cast. You could tell me she kind of sucks. Okay. Wow. Jesus Christ. She's almost like the mascot for the movie. I got to hear this.

She's not positive she's a good actor. Like, she gives that long speech, and I feel like I'm sitting in Barry's acting class watching somebody do a scene with Barry. Like, she's just not that good of an actress. And I think the rest of her career...

Bored out, but she's perfectly cast because she seems like the kind of person who'd be a medium. But I just wonder, like, what happens if they got an awesome actress for that part? Is it a better movie? I think what you needed more than anything—I'm looking for my high stake, by the way. I think what you needed more than anything in that was somebody that looked like they would be a medium. Okay. But it couldn't have been Sally Field with some crazy makeup on?

Maybe. Actually trying to act? But like if you looked at somebody, who looks like they could talk to people from another world? Could have been Shirley MacLaine. Oh, she did it in real life. Yeah. Yeah. I just wonder like did they miss an opportunity to have an awesome actress in that part? Yeah. And just like somebody that, like think of it now. If you're redoing Poltergeist, which unfortunately they did, but I think you would want like a killer actress for that part.

Yeah, or somebody that embodies the same quirky, zany... Like, imagine, like, Viola Davis as the medium. And she comes in and she, like, smacks it down for 15 minutes. Yeah, you like that type of shit. No, does, like, some major...

She's in control of the room. She's fucking scary. I don't know. I got to see it. I mean, it's a hot take just because she's so recognizable. Or Meryl Streep right now is like the old medium coming in. It's too big of a role for them, though. I get it. My hottest take. Yeah. I think the ghost world has reversed racial dynamics. Okay. These ghosts are always fucking with white people.

That's why we don't have black horror movies. These ghosts are always fucking with white people. I think what happens is when you get to the ghost world, it's flipped around.

and the people who have the power in the afterlife to go, because there's a bunch of ghosts back there and they're going, yo, man, we here for a while. We don't have to fuck with these motherfuckers. They think they're going to build a house where I'm sleeping? Fuck them. Take the kid. Take her. Hey, keep her back there. Beast, what you doing? Hey, Big Beast, that's my homie. That is to me, because if you look at it,

Not a lot of movies where black people are being fucked over by ghosts. It's not. These are ghosts of people. They mad and they like, we're going to take our eternity and we're just going to mess with y'all for a little while. This is a great theory. I would say the counter would be that there were no black filmmakers basically in the 80s and 90s because nobody cared about finding them. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And maybe that's why we didn't have it. But what I don't understand is why we don't have more of it now. More black horror movies?

Yeah, well, we've gotten better in the last 10 years. Oh, no, no, there are definitely a lot of them coming. But here's the thing, though, not to get hyper serious for a second, but what happens is a lot of times when there's not a whole lot of investment into different types of films being made or different types of talents, what you really do is you squeeze...

the amount... The same type of thing that's happening. Right. I mean... So, like, what happens is, like, when you get a chance to tell your story, you don't take a chance on your horror story or your sci-fi story. Yeah. And that's changing now. What you do is you kind of give Hollywood... What has happened in the past is you give Hollywood what they want to see from Black auteurs and Black filmmakers. Now, that's completely different. You're seeing great sci-fi, great horror. There was a horror comedy called The Blackening that came out. Right. Like...

very, very funny. You love that movie. I love it. Very, very funny. I watched it on an airplane. It was fine, but I think the airplane heard it. Yeah. So just stuff like that, and you're going to see like that expand a little bit. It's a lot better now than it used to be. Casting what ifs. Spielberg wanted Stephen King to co-write the Poltergeist screenplay. He said no.

Interesting. They originally, instead of Craig T. Nelson, wanted this actor named Joe Spano, who was on Hill Street Blues, which is the biggest drama of the first part of the 80s, to be the Craig T. Nelson part. And the creator of the show would not let him out of the contract.

Do I know Joe Spano? He was like Hill Street Blues guy number six. I've never heard his name. His whole career in life would have been different. Yeah. There's stuff on the internet about Shirley MacLaine being offered a starring role and she turned it down. I couldn't tell if it was true or not. But then this is true. Drew Barrymore was thought of for Carol Ann. Oh, wow. And they decided she made more sense as Gertie in E.T. Damn, think about that.

Good little... What would have been better for a career? Probably E.T., right? For sure. But Poltergeist, that was a huge part. That was a gigantic part. Just not as big of a movie. But E.T. is just... It's minted in film lore. Oh.

The Van Lathan Award. Did this movie need more black people? We only give this out when you're here. I can't believe that one homie, shout out to Richard Lawson, I can't believe he was there as long as he was. That big ass camera walking around. Get the fuck out of this place with these people. We could have stuck in a couple more. Where?

The evil businessman guy who was knocking the headstones, he could have been anybody. That's not going to happen. We're not building. We're not building. The doctor. Which doctor? The doctor who gave the big speech that was with Richard Lawson and that crew.

Oh, she could have been anybody. Dr. Dr. Jess. Okay. I will say this. There's a lot of people out there now. These brothers that are ghost hunters. I did their podcast. We're just getting into that. Okay. So we weren't at that point yet. Okay. We at 82, we have bigger problems than trying to fuck with ghosts.

Like, we're not to that point yet. So, no. I was happy to see Richard Lawson in that bitch. We had two black guys fucking with ghosts in the 80s. He's in there. Yeah, Ernie Hudson and Richard Lawson. Ernie Hudson was there as well. Best that guy award. He's eligible. Zelda Rubinstein as Tangina. Okay. Sonny Landham as the catcalling construction worker who became Billy Bear and was also a predator. The neighbor. Yeah.

Is Zelda Rubinstein Zelda Rubinstein or is she just the lady from this movie? She's the lady from this movie. That's so she wins. Yeah. Dion Waiters Award. I can't give it to Tangina. I don't know if it's like a heat check performance. I got to go with Louis Teague, the evil developer.

Unbelievable scene where he's just calmly explaining and then getting mad at Craig T. Nelson. Right. Tombstones. Nobody will know. Is there any thought about Dominic Dunn for this? Like every scene she's in, she's doing something. She's actually really good in this. That's a good call. She might be in it too much though. She might be in it a little bit too much. Yeah, she's good screaming in this. She has a good, what is happening? With a big hickey on her neck. Recasting couch, director, city.

The little brother's like a C plus. He's fine. He's fine. What more did you want? Can I give you a young Mark Paul Goslar? Oh, wow. Yeah.

Maybe a young Ricky Schroeder. Oh, Schroeder, bro. Can I give you somebody who actually went on to have a career after this movie? Schroeder was in his... Where we'd be like, oh my God, Mark Paul Gossard was in Poltergeist? Schroeder was in his bag at this point. Yeah. Lil' Joy Lawrence, maybe? Yeah, somebody from the 80s that ended up becoming somebody. Schroeder was the man. Yeah. Tony Romo, Chris Collinsworth, or someone else for the director's commentary? I think Chris.

You would say Chris? I can't do Chris. I wish Ciara was here. She just went right into that portal. Al, she wasn't afraid of that portal at all. Went right in. Fell through the ceiling. Oh, my God. We forgot to mention how cool it was that they fell through the ceiling. They did. And covered in that weird...

Jelly, whatever it was. During this time. Why does the afterlife have like jelly stuff? During this time, I was about to say this, even in Ghostbusters, which is my choice for best double feature. Yeah. I had Ghostbusters with this. Right. You know, you have, cause they just needed the Ghostbusters badly. Yeah. You needed Venkman to come in here and get this whole thing right. Why is there goo? There's goo in Ghostbusters. It's a recurring theme.

Particularly Ghostbusters 2, there's goo. Why is there goo on the other side? What's the goo? Never understood it. Half-assed internet research. Spielberg's own fears as a child were a fear of clowns and a tree that was outside his window. Hence the movie. The house is located in Simi Valley, California. Still exists. You can go see it. My son and one of his friends went to the Menendez house a couple days ago to check it out.

Seems like a good idea. They got yelled away. Yeah. Yeah, they were pissed. Apparently a lot of tourists and stuff going by now. How do you feel about the fact that these things that were so ubiquitous...

in the late 80s, early 90s now are flirting with that same ubiquity because of Netflix and stuff like that. I know. They're just playing the hits. Yeah. I remember living through when everybody couldn't stop talking about Jeffrey Dahmer. I remember living through when everybody couldn't stop talking about O.J. It started with O.J. Everyone couldn't stop talking about the Menendez brothers. People are coming up to me asking me questions about the Menendez brothers going, hey, have you heard about the Menendez? I'm like,

Yeah, fucking right I've heard about the Menendez brothers. But they seem to know so much more about it because we were only getting the headlines and the internet and stuff. So the Rams-Saints game is from a Monday Night Football game in 1980. The Saints are your favorite team. Yes. They show one play. It's a pick thrown by the Saints. The Saints lost the game 27-7. Vince Ferragamo threw two TDs to Preston Dennard.

Archie Manning, Saints quarterback for the game. 12 for 26, 92 yards, two picks, seven sacks. Seven fucking sacks. The Saints fell to 0-12. Yeah. So I'm old and I used to know this stuff and now I forget a lot. So I was like, 0-12, what was their final record? I go on Pro Football Reference and they were 0-15. They played the Jets. Or they were 0-14. They played the Jets.

And they beat the Jets by one point. And I'm like, I wonder if this game's on YouTube. And I went and the entire game was on YouTube. And I zoomed through the fourth quarter. They were down 20-14. Touchdown. Got a huge stop. Guys ran on the field celebrating because they weren't going to go on 15 because no team had gone without a loss. Anyway, the 1980 Saints, everybody. Archie, so you know like the Faustian bargain? Yeah. Where you get something and then you –

He's like, I want my kids to be awesome at football and just kick the shit out of me for 10 years. Just kick the shit out of me for 10 years. But both of my sons and then my grandson now, they'll have all the success in the world. I just get awesome mannings. So apparently this story was inspired by an incident in the late 80s in Denver where this whole cemetery thing actually happened in the late 1800s. And then that's it. Apex Mountain.

Spielberg, he could make the case. Raiders, E.T., Poltergeist. Oh, you mean the era? Just this week right here. Yeah. Like, when did he have more juice than this? I mean, this was the making of Steven Spielberg. Yeah, this is it. He could do whatever he wanted after this. Craig T. Nelson. It's hard. Probably not. Probably not. Yeah. Jo Beth Williams, yes. Yeah, for sure. Creepy clowns in a bedroom? That's it. I agree. Portals? Portals.

Portals in a Closet, definitely. Portals in a Closet for sure, yeah. Ghost movies? Family ghost movies, I think. Yeah. I think this is the apex. Cursed real life movies. Oh, for sure. I think it is too.

Hooper also did Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Yeah, no, that's his claim to fame. This movie is probably not as connected to him as, you know. And people also thought Spielberg did it. And then Frantic Escapes from a Fucked Up Haunted House. It's this versus Amityville in the finals and I don't know who wins. He goes back and gets the dog at Amityville Horror Art. They're like, Dad, you gotta get the dog. Mm-hmm.

I would have gone back to get Murph. You would have gone back to get Bozeman. Oh, for sure. Goes back, comes running back with the dog. Yeah. That's pretty good. But this is, him screaming, don't look back. I think that's probably the goat. And to be honest with you, another Spielbergian part of it is, is the very last scene where they put the TV outside. Yeah. You get to have a little laugh. Right. A little bit of heart, like when you leave the theater. Cruise or Hanks? Oh, shit.

Cruz. Cruz? Oh, I think this is absolutely Hanks. This is the most Hanks, easiest Hanks win in a while. It's Hanks, but I would want to see Cruz. I want to see...

He'd have to be the star, though. He'd have to go in the portal. Hanks would let the wife go in the portal. Has Cruz ever done anything scary type? No, because it's a Scientology thing, I think. Oh, yeah, that's true. I don't know why. I want to see him in a scary type situation. I want to see him disheveling and all of that. But obviously, Hanks is the American everyman father type of guy. Craig? Hanks, 100%. Come on, Van. I apologize. Racehorse, rock band, wrestler, or fantasy team name? Poltergeist? Poltergeist.

I'll just go Poltergeist for the horse. Poltergeist? Yeah. Oh, Poltergeist for the horse. Poltergeist for the horse. What a cool name for a horse. Poltergeist. I like it. Picket knits. We covered a lot of these. The biggest one we just have to hit again. The lady says the house is clean. And then they're like, all right. And they take four or five days before they actually get out. That's crazy. And then-

Nobody thinking it's alarming that somebody, chairs can just go across the kitchen. Them not being more frightened by this. It's adorable, but I also don't understand it. I would be way more scared and freaked out. Like, you know what the ghosts are thinking like behind the scenes? The ghosts, as all of this has happened, the ghosts are looking at her and they go, oh, she think we pussy. Why aren't they scared? Like she think, like she think it's a game. Hey, you see what she doing? She didn't put a, a,

a helmet on the child and put the child in the thing. - They're like, "We're taking the kid now." - Yeah, and then, "No, we gotta take the little girl. "She testing us." And then the ghosts take a L and they stay.

And the ghosts are texting each other again. They're like, what are these people on? Like, what's up with them? That's when they decided to escalate. Yeah, man. Let's go. Get the fucking pool ready. Did you ever do the pick and nits? Because I feel like we did all the pick and nits. No, we already did all the pick and nits. Yeah, we did all the pick and nits. Mine was staying in the house. The whole nine, we already did them all. Sequel, prequel, prestige TV, all black cast are untouchable. So they did the remake. All black cast was the natural idea for that. I don't know why they didn't do that. It'd be funny. Like, why not? Yeah.

I'm really mad that they remade it, though, and I don't think they should have. There's a prestige TV version of Poltergeist that I'd be willing to actually hear the pitch for. A prestige TV? Because basically they're doing this with, you know, they've done, like, way more elaborate versions of this. Like, the stuff, what's his face does? Mike Flanagan? Oh, yeah, for sure. And that's, like, Poltergeist 9.0. Yeah. I mean, look, if they were able to, like...

over five, six episodes, kind of give you all of these thrills and chills. How about different houses built over the graveyards? Could be. That would work. Is this movie better with Wayne Jacobs, Danny Trejo, Sam Jackson, JT Walsh, Byron Mayo, Harley Mays, Evil Laughing, Ramon Raymond, or Philip Baker Hall?

I think we have room for Sam Jackson in the Richard Lawson part. If Sam Jackson as the Richard Lawson guy adds a little bit more, no diss to Richard Lawson, adds a little bit more fun, a little more energy. For sure. Just one Oscar, who gets it? Visual effects? You know, I went with the script. The writing, okay. I think the script is really good on the movie. I'd go for 82, the visual effects. Probably unanswerable questions. All right, here's one. So, Jo Beth Williams' character,

I think is the stepmom for the oldest daughter because they say she's like 32 and the daughter's like 16, 17. Something in the police station where it seems like the other two kids are their kids together and then she's the stepmom of the older kid. But then the kid calls her mom. So there's something there. There's some theories on the internet about that, that she's the stepmom. Unanswerable. Did they go after Carol Ann?

Because they were living there for the entire time Carol Ann was there. Did they go after her because she was the first baby born in this forbidden, you took our tombstones. Oh, yeah. And Carol Ann was born in the house. That's what I mean. Yeah. So they wait. So that paranormal video they take of all the spirits with the faces coming down the stairs, how many views on YouTube if that actually exists? Yeah.

Is it more than the best Lonely Island video? Yeah, for sure. If people think it's real, we're going north of 50. Like bigger than the Bruder film? I watched an interrogation video on YouTube last night that had 14 million views. Would Mr. Beast, his number one video, top, just light faces coming down stairs for five minutes. Actual paranormal activity. I feel like that would be the biggest one. It's huge. All those kids are fucked up for life, right? Everyone. Everyone.

Everyone. Like none of those kids come out unscathed. Everyone. Everyone. Dominique Dunn goes to college, her character, like she's just a mess the whole time. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. What percentage of the neighborhood stays after they witness the house collapse into a paranormal dungeon?

Which was done by a little, apparently a little four foot model, by the way. Yeah. They made this whole thing. I think everyone moves. Everyone phase over. Yeah. No more phases. I think they then have to dig up all the, or put the tombstones back, whatever they, yeah, you gotta, or maybe you just do nothing and it's just gone. The whole company shutters, right? The whole construction company probably goes under. Has to. Yeah. Has to. Here's one. Jo Beth Williams was a star. Should she have been a bigger star?

It was a very, very, very crowded crowd right then. We've talked about it before in previous pods. These five-year windows and then you just get replaced by whoever the next Fresh Face is. I always loved her. She was awesome in The Big Chill. She was really good in all those TV movies. I always thought she should have been bigger. She's up against Deborah Winger. She's awesome in this movie. I know, Deborah Winger. She's up against Sally Field. She's up against every single actress of the year.

Young Meryl Streep. Young Meryl Streep at that time. That's a really crowded field at that time. I liked her. She's from Texas. Jo Beth. Best double feature choice. You say Ghostbusters. Ghostbusters for me. I would say E.T. I would do E.T. first, then this. Do the fun, heartwarming version, and then go dark. Andy Red's Watney Award. What happened the next day? I think we covered it. Everyone in the neighborhood leaves. Everyone's gone. Everyone's gone. Here we go. What piece of memorabilia would you want from this movie?

I thought about this. Here's my answer. Not the clown. Not want the fucking clown. There is a Darth Vader head...

They had so much cool Star Wars stuff in the movie, which you kind of feel like now is Spielberg saying what's up to his homeboy, George Lucas. Well, I mean, it was a phenomenon. Phenomenon. So like kind of there's like a there's a poster on the wall, but then there's like a Darth Vader clock or something like that's probably what I would have taken if I'm being for real. Like do you take that for you? For me, that or the fucking TV, the TV from Poltergeist. I think the TV is the right answer for just maximum value.

The Coach Finstock Award for Best Life Lesson. As always, when weird shit starts happening in your house that's really fucking scary and disorienting, get the fuck out. Get out. Just leave. Don't be a hero. Right. Just get out. Leave. Other houses, not other children. Yeah. Like, just go somewhere else. Have a nice weekend. This isn't a who's more macho competition. If I...

came to your crib and you were like, Van, you moved, why? And I'll be like, I'm going to be honest with you. I moved because the paint in my living room kept flipping upside down. And then Bozeman went to a portal. And Bozeman went to a portal. Like if you- Returned five days later. If I tell you that, you're going to be like, that's a good reason to move. Yeah. So like, what's the downside? Who won the movie? Ooh. Well, I didn't do the, the ghost movies won the movie. If one person, if one person had to win the movie,

If one person had to win the movie, I would say it was Jo Beth. So I think it's either Spielberg or Jo Beth Williams. Because her part is just... She's just really good in it, and her part's really good. And it's just a great role. And it's a huge movie. And I feel like she should have gotten more credit for it. Spielberg got all the credit for this movie. It was just that... Because it was just E.T., then this. And it was like Spielberg... He was on the cover of Time and Newsweek. It was like Summer Spielberg. And she kind of got shoved aside, but it was like one of those...

You know, James Worthy in Game 7 of the 88 Finals where it's like, I put up a triple-double and a 35, motherfuckers. When you look at it, they sideline Craig T. Nelson because he starts drinking and whatever, whatever, and she kind of has to hold it together. So, yeah, it's kind of her—it's her show. What do you got, Craig? I had never seen this. I loved it. I thought it was awesome. I thought—I'm not a horror movie guy at all, and I think that's why I like this more because—

Spielberg and horror is an amazing combo. It's like sprinkling like a little like childish magical dust on like something that should be terrifying. Yeah. To me this felt like a Disneyland scary ride at Disneyland. I'm like watching it and I'm like, all right, this is okay. And then the effects are pretty cheesy, but I almost don't even think the, were the effects good in 82? I kind of feel like they weren't even that good in 82. For 82 they were really good. That was good? Yeah. Okay. We didn't have anything in 82.

We barely had cable in 82. I thought it was cool because Spielberg made

the house feel like welcoming and warm the entire time. Every other movie now that gets made that's about like the haunted house, it's the most terrifying scene. The house you want nothing to do with. Throughout this movie, I am still like, I would go in that house. Like I would go hang out with them. He made the whole thing feel like warm and welcoming and this like family horror genre is something I just like didn't really know about. And I think it being dated also makes it a little bit easier to watch now. But did you watch it thinking that it was a Spielberg movie?

Like, did it seem Spielberg-y to you? Oh, my God. He directed this movie. It's all over it. I mean, the way the camera moves. Also, like, his name is everywhere it can be without technically saying he's the director. Yeah. It's at the beginning. It's the last thing you see on the poster. It's, like, the biggest name. The way the camera moves and all of the—I mean, it basically feels like you're watching E.T., which is, like, an amazing combination to see, like, Spielberg mixed with horror. I thought it was really cool.

iconic movie beloved iconic and the acting is great also just like a really good parenting movie a really good depiction of their cool parents yeah good parents and just like the relationships that mothers have with their children and fathers have with their children there's a scene that like directly interrogates that the mom has to go into the portal like I think it's the right call so Liz goes into the portal for you

for Liz goes into the portal for our daughter. Yeah. I think they set up the mother father dynamic really well. So if it was a son, would it, would it then be you that went into the portal? No, no. It goes either way. Yeah. I think it's like the mother's connection. I mean, it's why she, it's why the mom is communicating with her the whole movie. Like it's, it's that like maternal bond and Spielberg has an interesting relationship with her, his mom, I think. And I think it's like, that is, is really hit upon. Well, also most horror movies don't end.

I don't know. It's like even the ghosts in this movie are like, they're not really bad people. They're just upset because they got a house built on their graves. Yeah, you feel bad for the ghosts. You find out in the second one that the ghost is kind of a bad person. Yeah, yeah. They dialed it up. But Spielberg didn't have anything to do with that one, right? Right, right, right. It's very Spielberg-y to be like, the family's great and also the ghosts have a point. Right, the ghosts do have a point. They have a legitimate grievance. Yeah. Only the evil builder is a bad person. Yeah. Louis Teague.

Like it's like horror with a lesson is not that common. And I thought it was great. All right. That's rewatchables. Another, another scary month movie. We got three more coming in October.

I also like that this movie was, this movie could have been 90 minutes, but it was an hour 54. And I think it's because Spielberg was like, we're going to take the time, set up the characters. First 15 minutes is like no horror. And then even at the end, there's like those moments of silence when she's in the tub. I mean, they're sitting there. Those are like three minute scenes cutting back to everybody. There's so much silence in this movie and they really like sit in it. And I think it's worth it to not be 90 minutes. I think like the extra 15, 20 they added to build all that stuff really hits.

Craig always looks at the time before he starts the movie. I do. It's dead now. Every movie's Joker is like what? 225? It's a joke. Oh, fuck. What was the one that was 90 and you were so delighted that we did like two months ago? We did one. It was like 89 minutes and you were like doing backflips. Oh, it was Night Shift. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Night Shift just zips through. Yeah. With a lost art. Van Lathan. A true pleasure as always. Thank you, my friend. Thank you, Craig. Yeah. We'll see you next week in the Rewatch. We'll see you.