They Live By Night | Welcome To The Basement

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]So, before we get to the movie, I want to finish telling you the four-star video story. Fourstar Video Heaven is a Madison institution. They're a video rental place that uh even now in 2026 still persists. I found myself in need to get a video from there cuz I couldn't get it anywhere else. Okay.

[00:00:17]>> So, I called them on a Wednesday. No one picked up, but the message said, "Hey, we're now open seven days a week." Okay.

[00:00:25]Well, I guess I'll just go down there.

[00:00:27]They're open, right? So, I go to their new location. They're in this office building. It's not very flashy digs.

[00:00:34]>> Okay.

[00:00:34]>> And I go to the door and there's a sign in the door that says, "We're open seven days a week."

[00:00:40]>> Great. Try the door and it's locked. I walk back out onto the sidewalk and I I don't know what to do. And then I look at their window and it says, "Closed on Wednesdays."

[00:00:51]The look on your face perfectly encapsulates elates the feelings I was having at that time. Seven days a week usually encompasses the Wednesday.

[00:01:00]>> Yeah. Well, I maybe they count Sunday twice >> or there's a leap day, >> right?

[00:01:05]>> I've got a bunch of movies that I've never seen before. None of you know what they are. Every episode, I'm going to spring one on you. It might be good. It might be bad. We'll watch it on the old leather couch and then talk about it.

[00:01:17]Welcome to the basement.

[00:01:20]Welcome back, Doug. Last time you were on the show, we watched The Way We Were Based on a novel about a real life romance between the novelist and the actor Farley Granger. Barbara Stysand played a faximile of him in the film.

[00:01:34]>> I have memories of that. I have misty watercolored memories.

[00:01:37]>> Very good.

[00:01:38]>> So, I thought for our meeting today, we would watch a Farley Granger movie.

[00:01:43]>> A Farley Granger movie? Are we going to be on >> No, not that one.

[00:01:48]>> No. No. No. That's the only Far Lake Ranger movie I can do.

[00:01:50]>> Don't get too excited.

[00:01:51]>> Damn it. Okay, >> I've got what I've got here. And Hitchcock had nothing to do with this.

[00:01:57]>> Oh, damn.

[00:01:57]>> I'm not going to make this any more formal than it needs to be. So, I will remove them from the envelope.

[00:02:06]Now, you'll notice, I know, cuz I know you're sharp. There are two movies on this DVD.

[00:02:11]>> There are.

[00:02:12]>> Which one will we watch today? You are going to decide. They live by night or side street where temptation lurks. Uh, eeny meeny miny. They live by night.

[00:02:24]>> They live by night. It is. Born in 1925, Farley Earl Granger Jr. got his big break in the Northstar. Made at the height of World War II. It praised the Soviet Union and became quite controversial in the 1950s, as you probably would expect.

[00:02:40]>> Mhm.

[00:02:41]>> Nevertheless, Granger went on to star and co-star in many films. There two of them right there. most notably the Hitchcock films Strangers on a Train and Rope. For a long time, Rope was my favorite Hitchcock.

[00:02:53]>> He was openly bisexual in a time that didn't look too kindly on such things.

[00:02:58]And he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1551 Vine Street.

[00:03:02]>> Is there anything else at 1551 Vine Street?

[00:03:05]>> Probably a CVS.

[00:03:07]>> Okay.

[00:03:08]>> I don't think he's a very good actor.

[00:03:10]When I've seen him, I thought, oo, this is like Fred Estair levels of acting.

[00:03:14]Oh, >> but I was impressed with his performance in Rope. So, I don't know when where we're going to land here. Anyway, your gift has nothing to do with this actor or this movie, but it has to do with movies. It's something I know you like, and I hope you don't already have Galaxy Quest.

[00:03:35]>> I know this is one of your favorite movies.

[00:03:37]>> My grandthar's hammer. What a gift.

[00:03:40]We'll creep on through the darkness over to the shadowy old leather couch as we take a look at just exactly how they live by night.

[00:03:53]Is this the trailer? This boy and this girl. What? This is not how movies are supposed to begin.

[00:04:03]>> They live by night.

[00:04:05]>> Begins with a car full of tough guys.

[00:04:07]They've all recently gotten out of prison and they're looking to commit crimes.

[00:04:11]>> And then the car gets a flat and now they're going to have to walk a long way. They left at the Cosmo Nifty's billboard. This young fella can't make it. His leg is hurt. So they tell him to hide beneath this billboard for a product that most of us probably don't remember or never even heard of.

[00:04:29]>> Oh, the ideal playsuit for all occasions.

[00:04:33]>> I'm going to order two. Promise me I'll never see you in a Cosmo Nifty.

[00:04:39]Oh, you'll never see me. No, that's just that's just for me. Okay. He settles himself under there real nifty and waits. There's a little dog. Boy, this little dog maybe is going to become this guy's friend for the rest of the movie.

[00:04:52]Do you think that might happen?

[00:04:55]Finally, after nightfall, a truck comes.

[00:04:58]We're sorry we're late. We had to stop off at Nifties. And there's a girl driving. She doesn't say much. You having trouble?

[00:05:05]>> Could be.

[00:05:06]>> You live around here?

[00:05:07]>> Could be.

[00:05:08]>> Could be.

[00:05:09]>> Could be.

[00:05:10]>> He gets into the car, just him, no dog.

[00:05:13]And they drive off. She knows the fellas that are holed up and waiting for him at the hideout. Who are all these people?

[00:05:20]This guy is Tdub. The young lady is Ki.

[00:05:23]And that old rummy is P.

[00:05:25]>> $1,000. That enough for a used car?

[00:05:28]>> Could be.

[00:05:29]>> This movie is lousy with could be. Now, don't forget the clothes.

[00:05:33]>> We all need extra-L large Nifty suits.

[00:05:36]>> Cosmo Nifties. They've got to be Cosmo Nifties.

[00:05:40]>> We don't want any off-brand nifties.

[00:05:43]>> They're talking about the Zelton job.

[00:05:44]That's going to be a big bank job.

[00:05:46]>> Big brother, stay sober. Oh, I won't touch a drop. Not a drop.

[00:05:50]>> Translation, he will touch all the drops.

[00:05:53]>> Kichi, you'll take care of the station, won't you?

[00:05:55]>> Could be.

[00:05:59]>> Elmo oneey. Don't call him one eye.

[00:06:02]>> Always a one eye stuff. They always got to mention that.

[00:06:04]>> He hates it when you call him one eye.

[00:06:06]>> One eye.

[00:06:07]>> They used to call me Elmer doesn't have three eyes. Moly, but then they changed it. You can call him Chick-aw.

[00:06:15]>> They didn't print a very big piece about us either.

[00:06:17]>> I got to fire my press agent.

[00:06:19]>> Takes three to charge a bank. And we're the three mosquitoes.

[00:06:22]>> It takes a village to rob a bank. That's what I believe.

[00:06:26]>> He goes out and gets drunk and he comes back and he's brought with him Maddie.

[00:06:30]She's in on this bank job because uh well, okay, I'm not sure what her involvement is exactly. She really wants to get her husband out of prison. She's going to use money to do that. I don't know how that works. And this young man, as far as I can tell, is named Bluey.

[00:06:47]>> So on Bluey.

[00:06:49]>> Bluey. His name is Blueie. That's right.

[00:06:52]Bluey. When Blueie was in prison, he killed a guy. Oh, that sentence doesn't sound like a sentence I want to be saying, but in the context of this movie, it's true.

[00:07:03]>> How's it coming?

[00:07:05]>> All right.

[00:07:07]>> I just want to make sure you were okay.

[00:07:08]>> I just came out to keep AN EYE ON YOU.

[00:07:11]>> THERE IT IS AGAIN.

[00:07:13]>> IT'S WHAT THE SUPREME Court of the United States itself said.

[00:07:18]This fell rights about it.

[00:07:20]>> It's written on this ball of lint.

[00:07:24]>> It's jailbait. He's just a kid.

[00:07:26]>> He keeps saying something about a sticky gecko. I don't get it.

[00:07:30]>> Some guys are just dingbats.

[00:07:31]>> Some guys are world class knuckleheads.

[00:07:33]>> Some dingbats think the guy in a car has got a snap.

[00:07:36]>> Some dingbats are cook jobs. The Zelton National Bank. Blueie buys a watch from this fellow and gives him a big bill.

[00:07:43]And so they got to go to the bank. So he goes in the bank and he cases the bank.

[00:07:47]>> Oh yeah, you surprised me. I was just sitting here pondering my lack of depth perception.

[00:07:53]It's time for the bank heist. Robbers come out. Buoie picks him up. They drive away.

[00:08:06]>> They set the getaway car on fire.

[00:08:10]>> Oh, wait. My phone's IN THERE. OH, DAMN IT.

[00:08:15]>> YEAH, I hated that song, too.

[00:08:18]>> What's next? Now we can start strut.

[00:08:20]Boy, the most important thing after a bank job is to call a lot of attention to yourself. They get these cars.

[00:08:26]They're driving the cars. Bluey gets in an accident. Get my truck quickly.

[00:08:30]>> His neck might be broken. Grab him by the shoulders and yank him from the wreckage.

[00:08:35]>> The cops want him to stick around.

[00:08:37]>> Not this time, friend. Listen here, buddy. You'll get in trouble yourself before you know it.

[00:08:41]>> Now, friend, >> that's no way to treat a friend. No.

[00:08:49]I learned that watching Blueie.

[00:08:51]>> I know his vines.

[00:08:54]>> Cut it out, will you?

[00:08:55]>> Every scene in this movie feels like the last scene of a movie.

[00:09:00]>> Don't you worry about the money.

[00:09:01]>> I've got to worry about it, Chicka.

[00:09:03]>> You ki >> me chicken.

[00:09:12]>> Buy yourself a nice Cosmo nifty.

[00:09:15]Keep keep your hands off my nifties. How about something for you then, Zelton?

[00:09:20]>> Do you want it?

[00:09:22]>> Just tuck it right here. Just right in here. That's not how you wear a watch, Matt. That's how Kchi wears a watch.

[00:09:30]Turns out the cops found this gun in his car and his fingerprints were on it, so he's implicated. He's in big trouble. I better hop on a bus and leave.

[00:09:38]>> I'll go with you if you want.

[00:09:43]>> This is skim, right? I I only drink skim. I have my acting career to think of. I'm Farley Granger, by the way.

[00:09:49]>> What? What do you mean it's not in the script?

[00:09:52]On that bus, there's a crying baby. If there's anyone who knows how to plate children, it's Bluey.

[00:09:58]>> He's going to be a good father someday.

[00:10:00]They stop at a diner.

[00:10:02]>> And right across the street from the diner, conveniently, is a 24-hour marriage chapel. Huh? Who would want to do that? Well, I don't know. I'd marry you. Really? They get off the bus.

[00:10:16]And there's this creepy guy.

[00:10:19]>> Do you do the marion? That's my business.

[00:10:21]>> Yeah. You want to get married, huh?

[00:10:22]Well, it's going to cost you some money.

[00:10:24]He sells him a wedding ring.

[00:10:26]>> This one will do it.

[00:10:28]>> She looks like a slimfingered gal.

[00:10:30]>> Gets him married.

[00:10:31]>> We'll put the ring on her finger.

[00:10:33]>> Now, on the wedding night, lay her down real slow.

[00:10:36]>> By virtue of the power, >> I now pronounce a husband and wife.

[00:10:40]>> You may kiss me. This guy can get him all kinds of stuff. He could get him to Mexico. No, we don't want to do that.

[00:10:46]Not yet.

[00:10:47]>> Spent a good many years there once. I made a lot of good friends.

[00:10:52]>> Most of them were painted donkeys, but that's how it goes sometimes in Mexico.

[00:10:56]>> Maybe I could fix you up with a car.

[00:10:58]Maybe >> I know a guy who's selling a car, and if you give me a little kickback, I'll hook you up with him.

[00:11:02]>> How long will it take? If it means money, this part will be over in his night shirt.

[00:11:06]>> He'll come over in his Cosmo Nifty.

[00:11:09]>> So, they buy a brand new convertible.

[00:11:11]They stop at the Lambert. This is a good place to haul up till the heat dies down and to have a nice little secluded honeymoon.

[00:11:19]Hi, it's me, Lambert.

[00:11:21]They meet Mr. Lambert. And of course, Alvin, >> this is my boy Alvin. I'm learning him the business.

[00:11:27]>> Mr. Lambert tells Alvin >> just married people like to be alone.

[00:11:31]>> I should think so.

[00:11:33]>> My little Alvin here knows all about the various sexual mechanisms of adults.

[00:11:38]He's he's an advanced boy.

[00:11:40]>> What's your business, son? None of yours.

[00:11:45]>> Don't mind little Alvin. Just run him right over. He'll bounce back.

[00:11:48]>> Here we are.

[00:11:50]>> Hope you like Silverfish. P goes to the cops. He's mad at Blueie for taking his daughter away from him. And so he's ratting them out.

[00:11:58]>> Remember what Bars and the girl are going through.

[00:12:01]140 million people around them. Money to spend and no chance to spend it.

[00:12:06]>> Are these cops?

[00:12:08]>> Every time.

[00:12:09]>> What's the opposite of hardboiled?

[00:12:12]over easy.

[00:12:14]>> Time passes and it's Christmas. Bluey and Ki are having a real nice time. No more crimes, no more shady stuff. They just want to be husband and wife.

[00:12:22]>> I guess a woman is sort of like a dog.

[00:12:25]Bad dog will take things from anybody.

[00:12:27]>> When I say a woman is just like a dog, I get yelled at. But she can >> dog.

[00:12:31]>> Never mind. Never mind. I hear it now. I hear it now. Chick-awa catches up with them. Hey, Blueie, we need you to come back cuz he and Tdub have spent all their money from the robbery. And so they need to do another robbery. Blue says, "I don't want to do that. I got plenty of money. I spend my money smartly, not like you guys. And you're our partner and so you don't have a choice."

[00:12:51]>> Yes. Yes. This is what we came for. That is some USDA choice. Prime Granger right there. So Blue says to Kiki, Kchi, whatever her name is, I got to go do this thing and then I'm going to tell him I'm done. I don't want to pick up a newspaper and read the Zel and bandits killed.

[00:13:12]>> Now, if that were in a magazine, say like The New Yorker, I'd be fine with that. We cut forward to after the job.

[00:13:19]The job did not go well.

[00:13:20]>> Henry T. Dub Mansfield was shot and killed.

[00:13:23]>> And at this point, we find out that his name is actually Buoie.

[00:13:26]>> Buoy the kid.

[00:13:28]>> I kind of want to just keep calling him Bluey, so I will. He goes back to Ki.

[00:13:34]Their apartment is flooded. A plumber comes in to fix the sink.

[00:13:38]Merry Christmas.

[00:13:40]>> Why do I get the feeling that Alvin's the one who's really running things at the Lamborghin?

[00:13:45]>> Like Alvin's the boss. Yeah.

[00:13:47]>> And he makes Blueie as the guy who supposedly killed this guy. So they got to get out of there real quick.

[00:13:55]>> I'm going to have our baby.

[00:13:57]>> That's right. She's in the family way.

[00:13:59]They drive to another town. Whatever happened to that dog at the beginning of the movie? Why did that dog show up?

[00:14:05]They made a point to show a dog and now there's there's been no dog for over an hour. They find a nice little boarding house.

[00:14:14]>> I'm tired of all this sneaking around.

[00:14:16]We're going to spend a day in town.

[00:14:18]>> They go to a nightclub. This lady is singing a song about a little red wagon.

[00:14:22]>> That's your red wagon.

[00:14:26]>> Cigarettes.

[00:14:28]>> I guess >> cigarettes. Those are my red wagons.

[00:14:31]Buoie goes to the men's room to buy some cigarettes for his pregnant wife. This guy gets the drop on Buie and the John to say, "I know who you are."

[00:14:41]>> Paper say you carry a 45.

[00:14:43]>> They don't know nothing. I carry a 46.

[00:14:46]>> We don't want criminal types like you in this town. You got to beat it.

[00:14:49]>> Just keep dragging.

[00:14:51]>> This lady will not shut up about that red wagon.

[00:14:55]>> Buy and Kchi, they're on the run again.

[00:14:58]Kichchi is real sick. They pull into the Prairie Plaza Motel.

[00:15:02]>> Alvin, what are you doing here?

[00:15:04]>> And inside is a familiar face. It's Maddie. This is her motel.

[00:15:08]>> Okay, fine. You can have cabin 8 way down on the end.

[00:15:12]>> Matty, where's our doctor?

[00:15:13]>> Back down the road about half mile.

[00:15:15]>> Will you get him for us?

[00:15:17]>> Go get him yourself.

[00:15:18]>> Throw me a bone here, Maddie. Okay, I'm under a lot of pressure. My My little red wagon is uh is in trouble right now.

[00:15:26]Now, Maddie still wants to get her husband out of jail, so she goes to the cops and makes a deal.

[00:15:31]>> We'll make sure that your husband gets released from jail if we get Bluey alive or dead.

[00:15:38]>> Perhaps that's our fault.

[00:15:42]>> This guy is a cop miles from the edge.

[00:15:46]>> He He's never even seen the edge with binoculars.

[00:15:50]>> Doctor said you'd be okay. And I'll always be around no matter what happens.

[00:15:55]>> I'll always be around. You're going to die in a shootout in about 10 minutes, but I'll always be around.

[00:16:01]>> Blueie knows they need to go to Mexico, and there's only one way to do it. It's to go back to that janky Justice of the Peace, and he'll take care of it.

[00:16:10]>> See, he goes back to bus stop town. I can't do it.

[00:16:13]>> He's grown a conscience all of a sudden.

[00:16:15]>> He's in the wedding chapel business to sell hope, and he tells Buoie, "You ain't got no hope." Bluey goes back to Maddie. I got to leave. Give Ki this money. He writes her a little note.

[00:16:25]>> Aren't you going to see her just once more?

[00:16:27]>> Why don't you go see her one more time?

[00:16:29]Huh? Maybe you should see her one more time. Huh?

[00:16:36]He goes to see her one more time. And the cops are waiting. Put your hands up.

[00:16:40]The flood lights come on. The gun sharks. The gun sharks.

[00:16:46]He tries to go out. Guns ablazing, but his gun doesn't blaze.

[00:16:51]>> How could they gun down Blueie like that?

[00:16:55]Don't play that clip out of context for your kids. Kichi comes running out, finds the body. And that's the way it goes when they live by night.

[00:17:09]Well, after that, I feel a little bit like I live by night. I guess we all do, really. Yeah, we live at Never. This was a movie that we watched.

[00:17:21]>> I would concur with that statement.

[00:17:23]>> Let's first talk about the merits of the man of the hour, Mr. Farley Granger.

[00:17:29]He's a strikingly handsome man. Yeah, he was pretty good in this. I thought so, too.

[00:17:34]>> He kept it simple. There weren't these big emotional leaps or or anything like that. If you're an actor of limited range, if you keep it simple like that, you can really sell pretty much whatever you're doing. He's got a little bit of James Dean in him. A cintillaa of James Dean, but he really has this kind of lost dog quality, and that's part of his charm. A little bit childlike, but that's not quite it.

[00:17:56]>> It's kind of the classic. He, you know, puts one foot in with bad companions and then just is dragged down.

[00:18:02]>> It just chases him until the end of his short life. Yeah. the plot really goes and fits and starts. It's just kind of all over and then we sort we over here and then we go over here and now we got to go back here and we're back with these guys again. But now now I'm no longer with these guys again. Now I'm back here going from place to place to place. I feel like I've seen this movie before of a guy who gets in trouble legally and then falls in love and then he and the love interest are trying to outrun the past and if they just can't do it. Yeah, there are probably 15 noirs with some variation of that plot.

[00:18:37]>> That's probably what I'm thinking. Yeah.

[00:18:39]>> And there are so many unexplained things like they're in this cabin until Christmas and then one eye shows up.

[00:18:46]>> Sure.

[00:18:47]>> How did he find them? Just little plot holes that aren't explained.

[00:18:49]>> There's a lot of characters that aren't really integrated in the story like Maddie. Maddie seems to be a very important character, but she just sort of shows up and then disappears >> for most of the movie and then she shows up again >> until she's the engine at the end.

[00:19:04]>> It's almost like a day of sex machin kind of thing where it's not an earned plot development. The beginning was so weird with those titles. I've never seen that in a movie before, ever. If you're going to give the movie more credit than it's due, you could say maybe it's a Shakespearean device like two houses both alike in dignity.

[00:19:24]>> But that doesn't work for this.

[00:19:26]>> No.

[00:19:26]>> And and it's not necessary. Maybe the purpose of it is to start off so the audience knows that Bluey, and I'm going to insist on calling, is not a bad guy. Like from the outset, this is not a story about him being a criminal. This is a story about him being in love. They felt the need to let the audience know that right right at the outset which is is also a bit odd.

[00:19:50]>> Test audiences hated the lead and they felt like they had to.

[00:19:53]>> Yeah. And it says another smart thing that noir do. Shooting bank heists is very expensive. So they talk about the heist beforehand.

[00:20:02]>> Mhm.

[00:20:02]>> And then we don't see it when it happens and then they talk about it after. And it doesn't sound like it should work but it always does. It's like a reservoir dogs type thing, right?

[00:20:10]>> It totally works. It leaves more to the imagination. This DVD I did not mention before this was sent to our PO box by a generous viewer. So, thank you for that.

[00:20:18]We watched They Live by Night.

[00:20:20]>> There's a whole another movie on that DVD.

[00:20:22]>> Side Street. Maybe we'll watch that next time, Doug.

[00:20:26]>> You don't know and I'm not telling.

[00:20:31]>> And now, seen it.

[00:20:32]>> Richard Dives 4811 writes, "Seen it, Mrs. Minver. I saw the film recently and I honestly don't see what the fuss is all about.

[00:20:41]seen it >> seen it when you sent me the list of movies that you had seen for seen it and Mrs. Vine, you put in parenthesis, I hate this movie. I was watching it and throughout the whole time I thought, why does Doug hate this movie? It's It's not great, but it's not terrible. Why would you hate it? I've never seen as bad of a tonal shift in the last 60 seconds of a movie. That kind of ruins the whole thing.

[00:21:07]>> I mean, it really does. The entire movie is this tale of kind of the human cost of war and the a bit of the horrors of war and the unexpected casualties of war. And then in that last 60 seconds it takes a 180. It becomes this very jingoistic pro >> patriotism queen.

[00:21:27]>> It's very jarring and it's very tacky and it's obviously studio meddling going in there. This movie has been too much of a downer. We need to end on a note of go America. They're in this church for this wedding and then the camera sort of moves and we see that the church is just half of it's been bombed away. That was a very striking image. This movie's got a lot of good stuff. If someone could just go in and re-edit it and just cut out that last part, you know, it'd be perfectly fine movie. Once again, from Richard Ives 4811. Seen it. The conversation. RIP Jean Hackman. Seen it.

[00:21:56]>> Seen it.

[00:21:57]>> I've seen this movie many times. I'm still not quite sure I understand it.

[00:22:00]>> Okay.

[00:22:01]>> I think the main thing is you're never just doing a job. If you build the computer systems for a company that's killing off all the whales, then you're complicit in that. You're not just doing your job.

[00:22:11]>> Yeah.

[00:22:11]>> That's what Gene Hackman's character realizes in the middle of the conversation. Suddenly, what he does hits home in a really real way and and that sort of throws his life into disarray. His life which is very much not in disarray. Yeah. And that's the other thing. When you're in a job like surveillance, you can sort of get high off your own supply. And once you think people are watching you, then next thing you know, you're sitting in your wrecked apartment playing your saxophone alone and >> with the floorboard, that's all you have left. You know, >> my big takeaway was just how lonely that character was. Even that ugly raincoat, like everything is about having this shield around me.

[00:22:49]>> Yeah.

[00:22:50]>> Dave in the cave writes, "Seen it. How about Silver Streak from 1976?" seen it.

[00:22:56]>> The thing about it that made me mad the most, it was not the shoe polish scene, >> okay, >> which is Gene Wilder and Blackface, >> it's not great, but it's not terrible.

[00:23:05]It's it's it's offensive to our modern sensibilities, but I don't think it's offensive to humanity. Mostly because Gene Wilder is an unwilling participant.

[00:23:13]He's like, I don't want to do this.

[00:23:14]>> Yeah. So, that makes it kind of funny, but not really that funny. Now, the thing that truly offended me was I was one hour into the movie saying to myself, "Where is Richard Prior?" Yeah.

[00:23:28]>> And he shows up. He pops out of the back of that cop car and it's like a breath of fresh air. Suddenly, this rather dull movie is interesting to me. Dean Wilder is running around on top of a train and it was boring.

[00:23:41]>> Yeah. And then Richard Prior shows up and like, "Okay, now now we got a movie."

[00:23:45]>> Yeah.

[00:23:46]>> We have lost so much in the CGI era of Yeah. How'd you get that shot? Well, you CGIed it. But that shot at the end where the train comes through the station wall. The train.

[00:23:57]>> Oh, right.

[00:23:58]>> The runaway train. They ran a train through a wall and there are passengers running out of the path and clouds of dust. That's just a magnificent piece of film making.

[00:24:08]>> And finally, Mr. Puffer, Paths of Glory, because it's my favorite movie and it's excellent. I concur. Seen it.

[00:24:16]>> You just saw this recently. I just saw this for the first time recently and was stunned.

[00:24:22]>> I think it's the best Kubric movie that is the least talked about.

[00:24:25]>> It reminded me so much of Doctor Strange Love in that there's this god-awful military logic that cannot be stopped.

[00:24:36]>> No character has agency over it. It just sort of moves on with this mindless destructive force on its own. It reminded me of Full Metal Jacket because it's basically two movies. It's a war movie and then it's a courtroom drama.

[00:24:50]The hell of war is that it makes humans unhuman.

[00:24:55]>> Yeah.

[00:24:55]>> Not not not just inhumane. It turns them into beasts.

[00:24:59]>> Automatons. Yeah.

[00:25:00]>> We see in that very sad scene toward the end with that young lady who sings this the song.

[00:25:06]>> Yeah.

[00:25:06]>> It's heartbreaking. We see that the beauty and humanity exists in the middle even of hell. Mhm.

[00:25:12]>> And it can bring these inhumans back to kind of rediscover their humanity.

[00:25:18]>> That shot uh before they're going to go over the hill of Kirk Douglas walking through the trench, he knows every man he's walking past has a death sentence.

[00:25:29]>> Yeah. Whenever there's a Kubric retrospective montage, that shot is always in it. Ralph Mer is brilliant.

[00:25:35]He's one of the most unjustly unsung actors of Hollywood uh of all time. What are some other things he's been in?

[00:25:42]>> He was in the Living Theater, which was the group, the New York group with the Kazan was in Kazan and Jack Garfine, who made a movie called Something Wild in the early 60s, which is one of the most astounding movies I've ever seen. One of the tensest experiences I've ever had, ever had watching a movie.

[00:26:01]>> Okay.

[00:26:01]>> Not a date night movie.

[00:26:03]>> Good to know.

[00:26:04]>> By by any means.

[00:26:06]>> Turns out neither is Paths of Glory.

[00:26:08]Anyway, Ralph Mer was in that film.

[00:26:11]Ralph Mer, I think he was most famous for playing Mike Hammer in Kiss Me Deadly, okay?

[00:26:15]>> Which is not a great movie and it's not a great performance, but everything else I've seen him in, he's better than Brando. Be it night, day, or in between.

[00:26:22]You can always go to our website, welcome to the basementshow.com. The entire catalog of episodes is there for your viewing pleasure. And there are also PayPal donation buttons that you can click on to make a onetime or rolling monthly donation to support this show. Your support goes a long way in making the world a better place. All right, Doug will be back next week for unboxing. We are going to open the mail and have more scintillating conversation. We hope you'll be there.

[00:26:53]And now, take a look at this. There's a lot of characters that aren't really integrated into the story, like the dog.

[00:27:01]The dog is featured in that scene and then nothing set up to be very prominent. We wrote this dog into the script and Okay, we did. We just shot the f first dog scene. Uh, the dog ran away. All right, write him out.

[00:27:13]>> Okay.

[00:27:14]>> So long, buie.