Big Daddy Dispatch: April 2022 (Patreon)

Apologies! I usually re-paste this same day it goes out via email, but I must've been distracted and forgot! Here's your BDD, it's still good!!

Dispatch Sixty Four, March 31st, 2022



Greetings WHM Family!

Welcome to another April with your favorite podcast (Ernie Hudson voice, "paaahdcaaaast"). Things are very busy these days what with us getting ready to go back on the road, head to the cinemas for an emergency episode, and keep up with our regularly scheduled podcast duties and all that bonus content for you lovely, lovely patrons. Not that we mind! Busy is good! It keeps the lifeblood hot and keeps the Reaper at bay. 

So let's look back at a truly raucous March—wherein we surpassed 600 fucking episodes!!—as we look forward to an April that is gonna kick serious ass. 


Banner Credit: We Hate Movies The Big Daddy Dispatch by Felipe Sobreiro

Image Credit:  What If Donna Had Found the Hammer of Thor? by Felipe Sobreiro

LAST MONTH ON WHM

Episode 597 – The Adventures of Pinnochio



We opened the 2022 Listener Request Month chaos rune by taking a long look at Steve Barron’s 1996 interpretation of the story of Pinocchio, the tiny puppet that lies, gets lost, and then nearly gets turned into a donkey boy instead of a real boy. Was this crafted exclusively to give children and adults nightmares? Was the pull of Jonathan Taylor Thomas for one minute of screen time really that strong? Did we need the extended visit inside the whale’s stomach? Next time, attempt to make Geppetto someone you might have half-a-smidge of respect for.

Episode 598 – S1M0ne

Tired: saying you could watch Al Pacino read the phone book. Wired: saying you could watch Al Pacino mumble and yammer at a computer for two hours. You’d be lying by the way, as is proven by this prescient yet insufferable Hollywood satire starring Al Pacino as a director who is gifted the world’s first digital actress. Why do these movies just look terrible and not funny terrible? Does this movie hate Catherine Keener’s character? Can we get more of madman Elias Koteas to spice up this well-done hamburger on toast? Definitely the way you want to follow-up a breakout hit like Gattaca, for sure.

Episode 599 – The Warriors (Patreon Only)



For the special-edition Listener Request Month WLM pick, the guys head out into the streets of New York City to help the titular group of respected ruffians get back to Coney before the murder of a gangland god is pinned on them. Can we possibly make more niche New York references? Are the Baseball Furies secretly yuppies? Can someone throw a bucket of cold water on James Remar? It’s survival in the city, baby!

Episode 600 – Delta Farce 

To celebrate episode SIX HUNDRED of this ridiculous show, the fellas take on the last of the original Larry the Cable Guy trilogy, the much-feared Delta Farce, in which Larry, Bill Engval, and DJ Qualls invade Mexico thinking it’s Iraq, with poor Keith David in tow as their supervising officer. Exactly how many rape jokes are we trying to fit in here? Did Eric run out of space to write down all the lines? Is this Larry’s most boring film to date? Jesus Christ, thank god we only have the Cars movies left to do.

Episode 601 – The Last Boyscout 



Andrew, Eric, Chris, and Steve return to Tony Scott’s world to hunt down Halle Berry’s murderers with an alcoholic cop-turned-private-eye and a pill-popping former football star. Exactly how much are we supposed to hate Bruce Willis’ character in this? It feels like a lot! Should every movie start with a “Football Rules!” song? Is there a possibility that this movie actually rules? FIND THE FISH….OR FIND NEW JOBS!!

Episode 602 – The Last Castle with Justin J. Case



To round out the hellish LRM season, the boys bring back Justin J. Case aka “The 5th Beatle” to tackle one of the most boring films to ever be screened during LRM, in which lifelong murderer and disgraced general Robert Redford faces off against James Gandolfini as the warden of the military prison where he has been rightfully exiled. Isn’t the whole point of this film to show Gandolfini being humiliated? Why is everyone in this prison a nice person once Redford talks to them? Is this truly a geezer pleaser? Really, we just wanted a reason to talk with Justin about Gandolfini.

WHM IS ON THE ROAD THIS MONTH IN THE NORTHEAST



As of this writing we are packing our hopefully-appropriate-for-the-Amtrak bags as we get ready to visit some of our favorite cities in this rotting American empire in just a few weeks! What movies are we bringing with us, you ask? How can we hear you, you ask? Don't worry!!! We'll be talking about Sylvester Stallone movies exclusively for three shows straight! And we can hear you because you really should check your privacy settings.  Here's the breakdown and ticket links:

4/24 - The Escape Plan (2013) at Laugh Boston 

4/26 - Stop! Or my Mom will Shoot at DC Improv

4/27 - Rocky V at Punchline Philly 

You are going to want to get your tickets ASAP because these are cities with a ton of WHM fans (which is why we love them). Don't get left out in the cold on this one, gang! Come hang and hear us go "Euhhh Ergg Euhhhh" and talk about glass tables for about 90 minutes! 

Image Credit:  WHM Live  taken by Amelia Beamish

WHAT ARE WE WATCHING?

This is a space for us to talk about some NON-We Hate Movies related content that we've shoved into our eyeballs in the last month: TV, Movies, Cartoons, and Sports (maybe?). Just about anything that isn't pornography.

Andrew: This month, my watch list was all over the place. I started the month watching a ton of Buster Keaton films, both shorts and features. I caught one of my faves, The General, on the big screen at the Burns with live accompaniment, so that was rad. If you're new to Buster, I'd recommend checking out The General along with some others I watched this month including Steamboat Bill, Jr., One Week, The High Sign, and The Haunted House. Elsewhere this month I was back in Austin for SXSW. Hot damn, it was so, so incredible to be bouncing around that great town seeing movies, eating food, drinking beer, and hearing music again. While at South By, some great stuff I caught that you should keep your eyes peeled for would be Nothing Lasts Forever (an incredibly watchable doc about how the diamond industry is bullshit), The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (Cage is incredible and this is a lot of fun), Master of Light (a beautiful doc about the wildly talented Black classical painter George Anthony Morton, which was the best thing I saw at the festival), The Thief Collector (an entertaining as hell art heist doc), Apollo 10 1/2: A Space Age Child (the new rotoscoped Linklater, it's a lot of fun and beautifully constructed, drops on Netflix any day now), and Slash/Back (a great sci-fi flick that plays like The Thing meets The Goonies, with a fantastic cast made up predominantly of young, Indigenous women who are all awesome in this one).

Oh, and I've seen The Batman twice and it's fantastic. And Everything Everywhere All At Once is right now my film of the year. 

Chris: Here’s a few:

Deep Water: There’s a very potent, eerie mood to this movie at first, which must be credited to Ana de Armas’ giddily diabolic performance and Adrian Lyne’s work with DP Eigil Bryld (In Bruges, Not Fade Away) on creating a certain gothic mood that they never lean all the way into, unfortunately. That’s where something like this might have worked. It’s a bold move to attempt to update the kind of decrepit, haunted feel one might get in the homes from Taste of Fear or even Hitchcock’s Rebecca, but the needlessly convoluted plot takes attention away from building a sense of the setting and place of the movie. And then there’s Ben. Affleck does his best work when he’s sharing the spotlight. When he’s the anchor of the film, that’s often when things go haywire. And these attempts to capitalize on his grimness and apparent exhaustion in some memes through some deeply rotten mid-tier throwbacks (The Accountant, The Way Back, Live by Night) have yielded very few moments of inspiration or invention. If you’re horny, just watch Basic Instinct or Unfaithful again, or porn. If you’re in need of a Ben fix, The Last Duel is right there and features his best work since the Gone Girl/To The Wonder one-two punch.

Ambulance: Speaking of throwbacks, I was able to catch an early screening of this bad boy (ha!) and was nearly weeping with joy by the end of this. My money was not on Bay figuring out a way to bring back the narrative looseness and giddy grossness of top-tier 90s action, but perhaps that was my problem. For all his digital forays, Bay is obsessed with keeping things moving, and when you strip away all the bullshit story that drags down the Transformers films and plenty of other Bay projects, as he does in Ambulance, it allows him to really blow-out a simple premise. It’s out in like a week or two. See it.

The Adam Project: Someone really did walk into Netflix and say “You know what audiences would like? More Ryan Reynolds. You know what audiences would love? A movie centered on a kid who acts exactly like Ryan Reynolds…who meets Ryan Reynolds.” I imagine that someone was almost certainly Ryan Reynolds as well. The man really is making the worst blockbusters on this earth right now. Slow down, my friend. John Krasinski is starving.

Twin Dragons: Two of the best action directors that China ever produced – Tsui Hark the god and the late Ringo Lam – direct double Jackie Chans as twins split up at birth, with one becoming a badass martial artist who also fixes cars and a badass martial artist who is also a world-renowned pianist. They’re also pretty horny, it seems. This era, when Chan was becoming a blockbuster force in the time of the biggest blockbusters, is as fruitful to me as his late 70s run (Drunken Master, Fearless Hyena, Snake in the Eagle Shadow, etc.) This is not the eye-bulging, explosive spectacle that Police Story 3 is, but it’s non-action scenes are actually good, even very funny in 

Eric: It's been a tough month for whatever reason to focus, hunker down, and movie out so I probably watched less than normal. Part of that was Oscar catch-up which is always a mistake. These mostly saccharine movies are always aggressively okay at best. I watched The Eyes of Tammy Faye and King Richard just under the wire to never think about or watch them ever again. Yes, yes, the acting is good and all. 

I was glad though that I revisited Flight of the Navigator for the second time in our COVID life era. The first time I was pretty drunk during the height of quarantine, this time I was slightly more sober! Only slightly. So it's a total creepy classic and I'd love to do a WHM on it one day. It's truly terrifying and I love that the US Government is more or less the villain during the 1980's. Yeah, even NASA. NASA is a bad guy and this film can be found streaming on Disney+. The movie is worth it alone for young Sarah Jessica Parker and Paul Reubens voicing an alien and just doing Pee-Wee Herman laughing. Another rewatch that held the fuck up was Nicholas Meyer's Time After Time. 

Kung fu highlights: Skinny Tiger, Fatty Dragon starring Sammo Hung and Karl Maka is a fun time but a bit overly long for the premise. I'll let that slide due to the fight scene versus a bunch of dudes in Sesame Street masks. Another weird thing I watched was Legend of the Sacred Stone (2000) which is a kung fu plot but using entirely puppets (HEY KEWL!) It kinda wears out its welcome but it's weird seeing puppets try to pull off elaborate kung fu fighting moves. There's also early aught's weird CGI in the movie so it's kinda of a feast for the eyes while a rot for the brain.

Steve:  Quite a bit of watching this month, actually!

There are terrific movies in the theaters right now, folks! Matt Reeves' The Batman greatly exceeded my expectations and was about 20 minutes too long, but that's OK! I wouldn't cut any one sequence per-se, but three hours of anything is kind of pushing it. Pattinson nails a tough as nails, wounded as fuck maniac who actually is a pretty good detective therefore making him a very exciting Batman. He's so exciting the movie is actually centered on him for once! Add inspired work from Colin Farrell, Jeffrey Wright, and John Turturro and an un-fuck-with-able performance from Zoë Kravitz and you've got an all-timer here, folks. Can't wait to get back to it, honestly.

Stray Steve Observation (spoiler): Anybody else think that's Venom Batman is shooting up with in the third act? A pretty sly reference to an excellent Dennis O'Neill story if so! 

I've been waiting for Ti West to make a movie like X since 2009 when Andrew Jupin introduced me to The House of the Devil. Not only did he make a movie like X he made a movie that is better than X has any right to be. You buy a ticket to what looks like a fun, throwback slasher and you'll be happy. What's great though is that West is also interested in sex and the slasher, how much we fetishize watching young bodies grind against each other because ours are just aging and slowly dying. All the more reason to hack 'em up, if you ask me.

Stray Steve Observation: Is this film inspired by MST3K classic, The Touch of Satan? Anyone have Ti West's phone number?

I'm with Andrew:  Everything Everywhere All At Once is my movie of the year until somebody says otherwise. Hilarious, poignant, endlessly inventive and filled with god tier turns from Michelle Yeoh, James Han, and (I can't believe I'm writing this)... Ke Huy Quan!  A family drama masquerading as a sci-fi movie dressed up as an absurdist comedy that absolutely nails the landing. Just a stone cold stunner.

Lastly, I've been listening and re-listening to Southern Gothic by alt rock twosome Mattiel and it's filled with fucking bangers as you younger millennials like to say. Check out their whole catalogue and thank me later.

PATREON MAILBAG LIGHTNING ROUND

Here's a fun space where folks on Patreon get to ask us Questions directly. This month's entry comes from 

Anna from Belfast who asks: 

"Are there any performances in movies that have been critically acclaimed or award nominated that you thought were actually pretty bad? Judi Dench in Belfast is a recent one for me."

Andrew: Hmmm, great question. Well, just thinking of one that came up recently on the show, Sean Penn in I Am Sam because, ya know, yikes. Also, Eddie Redmayne in The Theory of Everything AND The Danish Girl. And Gary Oldman in Darkest Hour, that one really confused me! Okay, one more, Sandra Bullock in The Blind Side... wowza! 

Chris: Here’s my list: Meryl Streep in The Post, Renee Zellweger in Judy, Viggo in Captain Fantastic, Eddie Redmayne…in general, McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club, Jean Dujardin in The Artist, Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman, Juliette Binoche in The English Patient, everyone in Shakespeare in Love, Babel, and The Hours, Don Ameche in Cocoon, either lead in Driving Miss Daisy, Armin Mueller-Stahl or Rush in Shine, and Michael Caine in The Cider House Rules


Eric: Remember when Linda Hunt won an Oscar for playing an Asian man? Weird, wild stuff. Then of course there's Don Ameche in previous episode Cocoon. Anyway, I better stop or this is gonna count as elder abuse. 

Steve:  Chris took a whole lot off the board for me, but I still think that ifRami Malek gave a front facing camera performance you'd see on Tik Tok from someone desperate to be hired on Saturday Night Live in Bohemian Rhapsody, and I'm shocked anybody fell for it. Now we have to pretend that guy's a good actor? Great. Thanks for nothing.

APRIL SCHEDULE

Say what? The Schedule in advance?! It's the least we could do! By subscribing to this newsletter you get a sneak peak at what we're putting out for this April! 

Episode 603 —  Morbius 

Episode 604 —  Junior: Live from Asheville! 

Episode 605 —  Event Horizon

Episode 606 — Max Payne


Patreon Episodes:

Patreon Exclusive We Love Movies — Last Action Hero

Animation Damnation — Spider-Man (1994) "Chapter VI: Morbius" (s2, e6)

The Nexus: TOS: "The Paradise Syndrome" (s3 e3) TNG: "The Hunted" (s3, e11)

Gleep Glossary: The Emperor's Royal Guards

Melr0210: 90210: "Halloween" (s2, e13) Melrose Place: "Much Ado About Everything"  (s2, e1)

Once In A Lifetime: Stalked by My Doctor: Patient's Revenge

Find all this crap and enjoy it legally, just like we do! Now!

PATREON RSS BUG

If you’re having trouble with the RSS feed updating or episodes not appearing in your app, Patreon has acknowledged this bug and they have a fix: "Try un-subscribing and re-subscribing via your app by re-entering the unique RSS feed you were given and is on our Overview section of the Creator page. Or try using a different podcast app or RSS feed reader." 

Please consult this page and contact Patreon Support if the problem persists. We apologize for any inconvenience you’ve experienced on Patreon and truly appreciate your continued support!

UPCOMING NEWS AND PROMOTION




Our Youtube Channel continues to kick-ass folks! You may have noticed we put out a killer LIVE MAILBAG at the end of March. Eric has also put out great clip packages like Toby Jones in Bee Movie, Sausage Claus, David! Muppet Hitchcock Presents, Egg Lawyer, Lak Sivrak, the Wolfman of Star Wars, Michael Biehn at Comic Con, Loose Loomis, and many more! You can also watch the entirety of our Witchboard episode! Complete with visual gags (most of which are almost funny.). You'll find all sorts of cool shit like Mailbags, VHS Trailer Games, Full Episodes like The Sixth Day, The Matrix, and Spider-Man (2002) Like we said above these are great for sharing and introducing folks to the show. There's so much content there we can't list it all here. Just go and subscribe already! 



We just want to let you folks know that the Scanner Cop 1 & 2 collection is back in stock on the Vinegar Syndrome website! Why should you care? Well, A.) Those movies are awesome and B.) Scanner Cop features a synchable, hilarious commentary by your friends at We Hate Movies! Get your copy now before it's off the market! 

This month on Hooked on T.J. Hooker: Eric and Ben watch as Hooker and Jim Brown take down a heroin ring! Listen here!  

If you're a fan of the show and a fan of looking sharp, you should check out our merch on our TeePublic store! We've got awesome designs including our very first piece of MelR0210 Merch by (you guessed it) Felipe Sobreiro! We also have a ton of great designs like The VHS Trailer Game Logo, Egg Lawyer, The Order of the Boop, The Kornkast design and many more, with more to come! 

That's going to do it for this month's Dispatch! See you next month! 

Take it easy,
Andrew, Chris, Eric, and Steve
We Hate Movies