70 Movies We Saw in the 70s

70 Movies We Saw in the 70s: Ep 9—THE JERK

Pick out a thermos, don’t trust whitey, and come join us for Part 2 of our tribute to the late, great Carl Reiner with our salute to THE JERK. Mike, Ben, and guest Kat Ellinger take on Carl’s Steve Martin masterpiece replete with Opti-Grab eye-crossing, Mexican cat juggling, homicidal can hating, Shithead the dog, and, of course, Iron Balls McGinty. So just add your own Pizza in a Cup and listen now!

In the first installment of our two-episode tribute to the late, great Carl Reiner, the mighty Kat Ellinger joins Mike and Ben to keel over laughing in tribute to his shock comedy masterwork, WHERE’S POPPA? With Kat in the UK, it’s an intercontinental orgy of ferocious film scholarship, gigantic guffawing over grievously distasteful humor, and gushed love for Mr. Reiner (and Ms. Gordon, and Messrs. Segal and Leibman). Next week: THE JERK!

On this special "mini" episode, Ben pitches dopey podcast ideas to Mike. We talk Seagal, Bronson, Van Damme, Phantasm, Ernest, Madea, ELO, Fury Road and much more. Plus, listener feedback and just general jibber-jabber, McPadden-and-Reiser-style!

70 Movies We Saw in the 70s: Ep 6—HOT STUFF (1979)

Robust funnyman Dom DeLuise mounts the director’s chair for the first—and last—time with HOT STUFF, a Miami-set crime farce wherein he co-stars with Jerry Reed and Suzanne Pleshette. Together, they play kooky cops who set up a phony fencing operation to bust an array of contraband-peddling oddballs. Oh, does it not work.

What DOES work, however, is UW Cinematheque honcho JIM HEALY joining co-hosts Mike McPadden and Ben Reiser to take on HOT STUFF for a zesty, informative discussion that includes Sydney Lassick and David Carradine (as his prison bride) in SONNY BOY; the Gene Siskel Sneer of Disapproval, what else was playing in Summer ’79; and how Dom’s directorial debut rests at the heart of the Hal Needham/Burt Reynolds/Mel Brooks Venn diagram.

70 Movies We Saw in the ’70s: WHAT’S UP DOC (1972)

Barbra Streisand and Ryan O’Neal run brilliantly, hilariously berserk through San Francisco’s built-for-slapstick landscape, propelled forth by screwball comedy history, cartoon crack-ups, and director Peter Bogdanovich’s superhuman mastery of controlling chaos. Brooklyn boys Mike McPadden and Ben Reiser are also on the scene and you are, too, as we howl the praises of WHAT’S UP DOC!

Episode 4: CONVOY (1978)

“Breaker! Breaker! Good buddy! Smokey! Bear in the air! Um… Is this facacta thing on?” This week, we roll out madman auteur Sam Peckinpah’s novelty song muscularization CONVOY (1978). Kris Kristofferson stars alongside Ernest Borgnine, Burt Young, Franklin Ajaye, and C. Thomas Howell from SOUL MAN—oh, wait a minute, that’s Ali MacGraw!

It’s an open road with glide-in stops that include AM radio story songs; the desperate quest for HBO in Koch-era Brooklyn; Burt Young as a berserk children’s film screenwriter; Ben’s 16mm bedroom Bar Mitzvah; and Mike’s implanted memories of hayseed sodomy via ODE TO BILLY JOE. So roll this truckin’ episode through. 10-4.

70 Movies We Saw in the 70s Ep#3: BENJI (1974)

Fluff your fur and throw your paws in the air as we revisit the beloved canine classic, BENJI. Writer-director Joe Camp’s triumphant underdog story (pun absolutely intended) introduced the world to the supremely talented four-legged scrapper of the title, his elegant lady-pooch Tiffany, and the power of a perfectly cast, expertly executed kiddie flick to continue to captivate, beguile, and inspire all these decades later. In the very best sense, BENJI is our “Dog of the Week”—forever! (Mike’s dog Zelda says hi during the show, too.)

70 Movies We Saw in the 70s: Ep2—“Beware! The Blob!” (1972)

“It’s the movie that J.R. shot!” Ooze back to acid-blasted SoCal ’72 for Larry Hagman’s BEWARE! THE BLOB! A psychonaut revamp the 1958 original, BTB features “Charlie X” from STAR TREK battling the title slime as it threatens (among others) Godfrey Cambridge, Cindy Williams, Gerrit Graham, Burgess Meredith, Dick Van Patten, and Hagman himself amidst a trippy Mort Garson synth score and shockingly good visual effects. Come get Blobbed!

Episode 1 covers CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES (1972), inspired by a beautiful, moving, and mind-bendingly awesome “You-Are-There!” photograph of five-year-old Ben and his grandmother across the street from the Embassy theater in Times Square, CONQUEST’s logo in full blaze behind them, accompanied by quite the head-scratching Judith Crist review quote—“It’s all fine fun!”

That also sums up our mission with 70 MOVIES—to be like CONQUEST OF THE PLANET OF THE APES and present a cavalcade of abandon, grotesquery, lunacy, and savagely learned life-lessons so that you, our listening public, might come away and declare, “It’s all fine fun!”