Just when you think it's safe to back to Japan that dangnabiit lizard comes out of the water and does... wait, is THAT what our King of the Monsters looks like now? Holy sushi, Batman!

But the real question this time as Toho brings back Godzilla for the first time in 12 years (their longest time without him - even Godzilla 85 was only a 10 year wait), what new can be done with him? Well, what if he/it is not really the main attraction? Sure the big mother-jammer takes up the poster, but what if, say, Franz Kafka had taken a pass at a Godzilla script? Not the full writing of it just, you know, a pass? Um... you get this! Maybe!

Jack and Andrew (the latter of course being a massive fan of Godzilla, with the former being casual) bring you their review of the latest film in this 62(!) year old franchise, which is now in very limited release. Also make sure to give a listen to episode 41.5, where we go deep into discussion on giant movie monsters.

oh, and SPOILERS from 33:17 to about 35:59. Listen at your own peril of being zapped away by the fire-beams coming out of Gojira's dorsals.

Songs:

Godzilla theme

Pharoh: Simon Says

Mommys alright

Daddys alright

They just seem a little weird

Surrender... Surrender... But don't give yourself away (accent on the y in away!)

Anyone remember Over the Edge? Ever seen it? Good, because Jack took a dive into total anarchy and youth rebellion and angst and boredom and ROCK AND ROLL to bring you this podcast. So listen up and know what it's like to go to school on acid, shoot BB guns at cop cars, and destroy and entire school at the end of it all. Hey, Ho, Let's Go with this cult classic from 1979 (actually released in 1981, but we'll get to that too).

Songs:

Cheap Trick: Hello There

The Who: Baba O'Reilly

Van Halen: You Really Got Me

Not always the brightest prospect, is it? A remake of a remake - something that wasn't even that original when the Americans took what Akira Kurosawa decided to make in 1954 as a repurposing of what he thought of as *templates from the Western*. Do we get here Antoine Fuqua doing his King Kong (also a remake of a remake) and having the time of his life, or is it like filtered coffee through one of Vincent D'Onofrio's boots?

Jack and Andrew, no strangers to the Western genre (look at any given one of our episodes for reviews of classic and more modern Westerns), take a look at the newly released take on THE SEVEN SAM- I mean, THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN starring Denzel Washington, Chris Pratt, Ethan Hawke, Vincent D'Onofrio, and an awesome Native American actor playing a character named (no joke) "Red Harvest." Reference much?

(SPOILERS at 36:33 in)

Email us at [email protected] or on facebook.com/wagesofcinema or twitter @WagesofCinema about your thoughts on the film.

(movie features a clip from the film provided for critical purposes, and the Elmer Bernstein 1960 theme and The Clash's "The Magnificent Seven")

Still so much more to talk about- we might even impress Barry Champlain mayhap with such talk: we get back where we left off in discussing Stone's "Vietnam Trilogy" with Born on the Fourth of July, and we go on through with the likes of JFK, Natural Born Killers, Alexander (the *many* cuts), to his latest release, Snowden (which Jack got to see right before recording). It's a big one so strap in.

(Oh, and we finally come to the moment where Andrew cracks up laughing for a minute straight. What did this to him? You have to listen to find out. Let's just say it involves a weird naked Indian...)

Also, please please PLEASE do check out the book that also makes this a "Required Reading" portion of the podcast- Matt Zoller Seitz's magnificent and extra-large (seriously, this thing can be used for added weight lifting at the gym), THE OLIVER STONE EXPERIENCE (link on Amazon: amzn.com/1419717901)

Clips:

Oliver Stone interview by Charlie Rose (1997)

Ben Stiller Show: OliverStoneLand (1994)

The Doors: "Back Door Man" (1967)

JFK (1991) (Warner brothers)

Alexander score by Vangelis

Born on the Fourth of July (1989) (universal pictures)

The world would probably - no, let's put aside probably, most certainly - be different had Oliver Stone not made that decision after Vietnam to become a filmmaker. Hell, the world might be different had he not decided to *volunteer* to go to Vietnam to fight (at a time when that was not the majority way, usually it was 'you got drafted, you go'). Because Stone, for whatever you think of his work, added an extra dimension to dramatic-historical cinema, in a way that's drawn controversy on.... practically every film he's written and/or directed!

So it's with this in mind - as well as returning special guest Romney Rosario (remember him from episode 22.3 on Scorsese?) - that we present our most epic-length podcast yet (until the slew of director's cuts)! This is so big we'll be posting this in two parts; "Side A" is on Stone's early life, going to Vietnam, and then how he became a filmmaker under the tutelage of Martin Scorsese at NYU, started in horror and soft-core exploitation with Lloyd Kaufman, got a screenplay Oscar on his first produced script, 'Midnight Express', and then made a mark in the 1980's early on as a writer of HARD-ASS BAD-ASS MEN (i.e. Conan, Scarface, Year of the Dragon), while also putting out another horror, 'The Hand'. This part stops just as he hits it big with 'Salvador' and 'Platoon'.

Also, please please PLEASE do check out the book that also makes this a "Required Reading" portion of the podcast- Matt Zoller Seitz's magnificent and extra-large (seriously, this thing can be used for added weight lifting at the gym), THE OLIVER STONE EXPERIENCE (link on Amazon: https://amzn.com/1419717901)

Clips featured:

Themes from PLATOON, THE DOORS (Break on Through), ALEXANDER, SCARFACE (Push it to the Limit), JFK and TALK RADIO (intro)

One of the most successful films not just for Disney (actually it's their top-grossing non-Pixar movie not counting inflation but whatever), but of all time, FROZEN is still looked at as the 'how the heck did THAT happen?' It's kind of a miracle the film turns out the way it does, as a crowd-pleaser about sisters and love as an open door and trolls that sing songs while a comic relief snowman looks on. It's madness, I tell you! And yet.... does it make *sense*?

Andrew dived so deep into Frozen for this Cinema Immersion Tank episode you may be surprised just how... no, no, those aren't tears forming, you're not going to make us cry, not now... darn it!

Used for fair-use purposes:

Songs: "Do You Want to Build a Snowman?" and "Let it Go" by Kristen Anderson-Lopez and Robert Lopez; Score selections by Christophe Beck

WELCOME BACK!!

We open with a response to a listener question on our facebook page! (check www.facebook.com/wagesofcinema for the full question). Next, Jack asks what is up with (the brilliant) Tony Zhou and his critique of Marvel's cinematic movie scores. Andrew brings up a video too - about HR Giger and the Alien design. And then Jack discusses two films that served a double feature he dubbed "Wombhouse" (When the Bough Breaks and The Light Between Oceans, both from 2016).

References:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vfqkvwW2fs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4Zzag7MusM

We now continue with our regular scheduled Porpoise... Sorry, what, oh, Purpose, but the Porpoise can stay too. So what happened when the Marx brothers went to MGM via the figurehead Irving J Thalberg? A little known comedy called A Night at the Opera came to be, and then A Day at the Races. Then Thalberg died. What were the brothers to do? Do you sense we have too many questions going on here?

Jack and Andrew continue and conclude their discussion on the oeuvre of Julius, Leonard and Adolph (or, sorry, Groucho, Chico and Harpo) in their eight films after Duck Soup. Get ready to sing, dance, get shot out of a canon or fall out of a plane, whichever you prefer! And Jack has some trivia for you all as well, including what happened to the Marx brothers when they were made to wait for Thalberg. You won't want to miss it!

Films discussed:

1) A NIGHT AT THE OPERA (1935)

2) A DAY AT THE RACES (1937)

3) ROOM SERVICE (1938)

4) AT THE CIRCUS (1939)

5) GO WEST (1940)

6) THE BIG STORE (1941)

7) A NIGHT IN CASABLANCA (1946)

8) LOVE HAPPY (1949)

(clips from A DAY AT THE RACES, AT THE CIRCUS and A NIGHT IN CASABLANCA)

In the West, a gun was about as necessary as having a Western-Cowboy hat, or spurs, or whatever those things are on the edge of a belt, what are they called... oh yeah, holsters. In 1950, Anthony Mann, from a story by Stuart N Lake, made one of the essential Western films that has as its focus not necessarily one character (though it's filled with tired heroes, unapologetic villains, and a tough dame, not to mention Wyatt Earp, Sioux Indians, and shoot-outs and bank robberies and a whole ball of Western Wax), but a rifle - the Winchester '73. Why is it so? Jack watched it so many times that he dreamt Jimmy Stewart saving him from impossible perils!

Ok, maybe that last part's a stretch. But he went into the Tank and got this episode for you to find out why it matters still over half a century on.

(clips from the Winchester 73 trailer)

For about the first 29 minutes of episode 60, Jack takes some time to try and figure out what Kevin Smith is all about with his Reaction-to-Negative-YOGA HOSERS-reviews video on YouTube (note: neither hosts have seen the movie yet), and Andrew is amazed by the specifics of how Ryan Reynolds dedication how DEADPOOL got made. Then, some movie talk (oh, and they are both still flabbergasted over the new trend of directors/actors "Thanking" audiences in video form right before the movie begins in theaters this summer):

1) DON'T BREATHE (2016)

2) DE PALMA (2016)

3) THE MERMAID (2016)