CREATURE FEATURES: A History Of Horror

0:00Creature features boom to the 1960s after the popularity of monster movies in the 1930s. And today we have this massive evolution of monsters and creatures in horror and so many iconic ways. Let's break down the history of creature features, the influence of monster movies on that genre, as well as where it is today. What's up, movie friends. Welcome back to Raiders of the Lost Podcast. The Ultimate Film and TV Podcast, Anthony and James here. It's pretty much spooky season. We're getting there. Pretty much it is. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's December. It's fall. It's a fall. Get your back at school. It's a December. It's a December first. So let's talk about some horror. Let's talk about some monsters and some creatures and as many of you know, we've covered horror so much in the show, but not too much this here because we always save it for the fall. Yeah. We like to save unless a big horror movie comes out like that. Yeah. It's come on already this year. But no, I love creature features. I love monster movies, love horror movies. We've been seeing sort of a resurgence of monsters lately. It feels like the last like five years because obviously horror goes through decades of tropes and styles and a lot of similarities, whether it's an era of monster movies or an era of elevated horror like we saw in the

1:072010s versus now we're getting a little bit back to the creature features. I mean, clay faces can be a great example of a big studio creature feature. Yeah. And the likes we haven't seen in a long time. And I feel like it the Musketi film really made it a new trend in Hollywood again to do the monster movie to do the creature feature because Pennywise was such a big success that first and second film. And then Hollywood followed suit with a ton of monster movies in recent 10 years, I would say so it helped rejuvenate the genre. Oh, I love a rejuvenation. A lot of good reach just like when Frankenstein's are duvetated. And you're going to we're going to talk a lot about old classic movies as well as contemporary creature features and monster movies in store to talk about the most influential ones in this episode. It's going to be a lot of fun. And I'd like to start with a bit history, a bit of history about what creature features are and where they come from to down class. So let's sit down and again, we're going to talk about the differences between monster movies and creature features. So creature features a movie is a movie built around a monster and animal and alien amutant, something non human, a creature that interacts with human characters.

2:13And this is usually horror can be science fiction as well adventure or a combination of all three happens all the time, but there's a pretty common formula here. We have humans interacting with the creature creature attacks humans are trying to figure out what it was to stop it survive it or kill it or try to live peacefully with it sometimes. And now, shape of water. Yeah, shape of water exactly is a creature feature absolutely as well as a monster movie so monster movies existed for decades before creature features were a thing. You know, we have movies like the invisible man, technically a monster movie to an universal is built from monster movies Frank's time 1931 Dracula 1931 brighter Frankenstein all these great monster movies and it's you gotta say that Kong. In 1933 is probably the biggest blueprint of what creature features would become yeah, because Kong was a massive success and audiences had never seen anything like that before and back then. The stop motion looked as good to audiences as the most cutting edge CGI looks towards now. So when you look at old footage of it, you look at it. It's like, oh, it looks kind of cheesy, but audiences had no context of anything like that before.

3:18And so what they saw, they completely believed so that was a huge gigantic movie for audiences in for the genre and I know it's tough sometimes for for people born in the century to go back to older films and see the practical filmmaking back then, which is was astounding for its time and so innovative. But it's guy in a suit running around as miniature set. I always in what I've learned to do with expanding my palette for older film is always try to put myself in the perspective of what cinema was like back then the error that that movie came out and trying to put myself into the audiences shoes of they've never seen anything even close to like this versus we see probably a thousand videos a day for people scrolling other from see see videos with more advanced technology in them than Kong. But if you put yourself in the right perspective, it's an amazing experience. And even some of those movies like the original, the mummy like the invisible man, they still hold up really well, like Jack, Dr. Jack on Mr. Hyde, the special effects and visual effects work in those movies, even though that's almost a hundred years old now, which is crazy.

4:22They still look incredible and those sequences in particular, especially like the invisible man one and the beautiful makeup from Jack on hide, they still look perfect to this day as well as wearable movies. Yeah, I mean monster movies, creature movies were always fantastic with their practical filmmaking, special effects. And it's interesting that a lot of them look a lot better than a lot of some of the spectacles we've been seeing lately, which is so odd because the technology is so advanced, you would think that, oh, there's no way a movie that's a hundred years old could look better than what we can do today. But I think Hollywood's been messing up quite a bit. But Kong was a huge influence on what would become creature features, but at this point in time, creature features weren't a thing in terms of a term. Monster movies were obviously very prevalent and getting so many remakes and renditions of Frankenstein, but they did die out in the 60s and 70s Hollywood was moving away from because what happened was in the 40s and 30s each studio did a different genre. Warner Brothers making extra movies universal made monster movies and and so and so forth. So every studio stuck to a genre to basically build out their catalog and then went from there.

5:28So Universal making all these they did so many sequels and universe building like they were the original cinematic universes, the monster movies and, you know, the mummy and Dr. Jackal, Mr. Hyde or Frankenstein, they would show up in movies together and like Abyn and Costello meet like the wherewolf or something. So they were they made a ton of movies in the monster genre, but then 60s are coming around and every studios working with great independent artists who are making incredible movies in every genre. So that's one that genres exploded and studio stop focusing on just one genre. They start so Universal in particular start opening up their palette of kinds of movies and why were studios specific to one genre because they were using their sets. So Universal would have a bunch of exteriors and interiors that are built around whether it's these creepy towns or medieval landscapes and then they reuse those sets for similar kinds of movies. So you can see a lot of redressing in these old movies whether it's gangster movies or Voron Brothers just reusing a lot of what they had. And so they stick to a genre because it's very efficient and cheap versus just building completely new sets to make a different genre of film.

6:33So that's why they stuck to those specific genres. I love that you brought that up. But like you said, the 60s was a different change in era of tone in genre. But the 1950s were where monster movies were pretty much in their golden age and creature features were about to become a huge thing. We have the beast from the 20th, the 20,000 fathoms 1953, another big Godzilla film in 1954, creature from the Black Lagoon 1954 massively influential, especially for modern filmmakers nor filmmakers like Guillermo del Toro. Them, tarantula, the blob in 1958 as well as a huge influential film. There's been a couple remakes of that film as well as well in plus Stalk Park did a great episode. That was influenced by the blob trapper keeper. Now a lot of these things were monster movies were starting to have more meaning in this era, connecting them to nuclear war, scientific experimentation, humans versus technology, and droids, aliens really bringing in this existential threat, not just a physical life ending threat, but a threat to the way we live our lives in general.

7:37Creature from the Black Lagoon is I think we're one of the most influential for sure because the designer of that creature was really brilliant. They paved the way for not just the underwater filmmaking had never been done like that before, but also the prosthetics work, the design of the creature influenced monsters heavily going forward. And really quick segue, the person who designed that was actually not credited, her name was Melissa and she was an artist at Disney. And she so in Disney back in the day, the animators could only be men who painted the cells, but they had teams of women who did the sketches, and they would collect the paints and basically they would give instructions for how to paint each frame. And they would pass it off to the male animators to paint each frame. So Melissa didn't work that Disney, but she hated not being able to be a credited artist in animator. So she left Disney once universal to start working on their monster movies and again she ran into the same problem where she did a ton of the designs for monster movies, and she's the person who designed the creature from the Black Lagoon's head and mask.

8:40A team of artists worked on the whole body and stuff, but she came up with the design and built it. And then once again, the head make a bodice of that department took all the credit, her male superior, and she received zero credit for it. But in the last couple of decades, the documentary was made 10 years ago to get and showed that she really did everything. And now she's gotten the credit and someone wrote a biography about her. But it's an incredible story because it's really one of the iconic monster designs. That's a really tragic story. Yeah, I remember you told me about that documentary before. I get it. It's the water list. It sounds really interesting. She did all the ghost animations in Fantasia. And like the giant beast with the wings on the mountain of Fantasia, she did all the animation for that and you got no credit. That's how Disney operated. It's pretty messed up. Yeah. Well, it's creature from the Black Lagoon, a movie that's still relevant today, Shape of Water, one's best picture in 2019. Right. Something like that. From Guillermo del Toro, one of his favorite movies of all time.

9:41And you can still see the influence on movies like these creature features or monster movies today. Now, when did creature features become an actual term? That didn't happen until the 1960s through television. So creature feature became a packaging term for TV series and TV shows. So really starting heavily used in 1965. Now stations would run late night, monster and sci-fi flicks. Literally called creature feature, creature double features. One of them famous shows was actually in Boston. Boston's creature double feature. It's a creature feature. Yeah. Yeah. Boston's creature double feature. I get that creature feature. Yeah. Yeah. That creature feature last night. Go grab your Dunkin' Donuts with Dunkin' Donuts. I think. And watch the double creature feature, kid. KTVU Oakland as well as WGN Chicago in WNEU, New York. So these were some of the first cities with their TV programming that started coining and making pop through the term creature features. And so now the 1960s, monster movies are still a thing.

10:45But they've primarily in a big way moved to television where, I at least said, like we have a new infusion of different genres of gangster movies, more musicals, different types of horror films becoming popular in the 1960s, as well as action movies. Yeah. And audiences were craving different things. Yes. Exactly. Because horror monster movies were dominating the decades. And we see the cycle all the time. Westerns in the 50s and 60s took over in a huge way as well. War at X Plus. A lot of more political, satirical films. But then a movie that really made the creature feature very popular genre as well as reinventing the monster movie 1975, Steven Spielberg with Jaws. The greatest. One of my favorite movies of all time. And it's the first summer blockbuster. And changed everything in Hollywood because a lot of great horror monster movies came out in the late 70s and 80s after Jaws. Because when something hits every studio is like, let's try and do something like that obsession. And then you get alien in 78, two years later. So then studios are trying to green light different monster picks.

11:4679. Large scale, you know, with a good budget, with artistic vision, with the great creative team. Not just to have the character in a story and just do it again, but, you know, giving someone like really Scott, great, it's great screenplay to really fly and make something special. And I mean, speaking of alien, it's really Scott made possibly the greatest horror movie of all time. You could argue alien is the greatest. Do you think it's the best? I want to say it's the best horror movie of all time because it's also such a sci-fi experience. And yeah, it's a monster movie. I think it's a top tier one. I think it's like maybe top 10 all the time. But I put, I think I would put the shining up there. I would put the extra cyst up there. More contemporary, you know, I love redditary. I really like get out. A psycho. Rosemary's baby. A psycho could be the best. I actually made a digital journal on things book. I can pull it up and see my list if you want. Yeah, I have a list on. I have some stuff on my tube. So I'm curious. Is it an amazing film science that lambs not just one of the best horror movies ever, but one of the best movies ever? And James Zinders started using this app.

12:47Things book is a digital journal to curate lists and curate collections of all sorts of things. Rankings, your favorite films, your favorite genres. And I made a James's favorite movie list on my things book. And I made an Anthony's favorite movie. And what's cool is it kind of this this app when you have it. It's like you have your own physical media shelf. So it has DVD cases that you get to scroll through. Now my favorite movies list I put a book. I put 27 on here. And this would basically be a great way to know me. You know, if you want to find out who I am, what kinds of movies I like. You know, if you look at someone's physical media shelf, that's the same thing with looking at things book, I would say. And so for me, I mean, the matrix is my number one all time. You know this. Then I have Gladiator. I have Raiders of Lost R. Kill Bill. Harry Potter, Prisoner of Azkaban. Lord of the Rings Fellowship, Interstellar, Heat Goodfellows. And it's fun to be able to like just scroll through this and check it out. Yeah, it's like literally a digital shelf. And it's like it's like a DVD case of your movies. And you also get to rate movies just like other apps. And also you get to write reviews.

13:48And there is like an overall feed where the your followers and the people you follow say you rate a movie or say you write a movie review. It pops up on their timeline. So you can get to interact with other users on the app. People that you follow. So it's become a really interesting way to communicate and collaborate with other film lovers. I like your list. Of course, you got your favorites. They'll be blood. You got Lawrence Arabia. But you also have a Rosetta on here. All right. They're Denver. Brothers. That's great film. One of the first exposures to like real international cinema for me when I was a teenager. Let me hold on. Let me see. So you can leave written reviews in star ratings. Anthony gave Rosetta five stars. A deeply moving portrait of a young woman. Melee trying to get by. You forgot to leave. You left out the waffles. The waffles waffles are central to the first star. She makes waffles. And James, I noticed in years, you put in a movie that I finally watched recently. Ben her and I watched it back to back nights because I watched it for the first time. And I said, I think this is the greatest movie I've ever seen in my life and the best one of the best movies of all time. But yeah, I put Ben her on here.

14:48And what's cool is when you click on the movie, like in your collection, you get to see all the other ratings, all the other reviews people have made recently about the movie, which is great. It's a really interesting way to dive into movies. And it's not just for movies. You can do music on there. You can do books. It's really cool. And I just love the aesthetic. I love the visual. Yeah. The physical copies. And it's like it's an easier way to when you click on a movie or TV show. You can look at the ratings and reviews of other users. We love things book downloaded today. And then the 80s was just filled with big monster movies, like horror, IPs, franchises and things like that. But yeah, like JAWS started it all. And in like a seven year period, we have three probably of the most influential creature features, monster movies of all time, with JAWS, with Alien, and with the thing. Yes. And these movies are very similar. And a lot of them, they're all especially the latter two, Alien, and the thing took a lot of influence from what Spielberg did with JAWS. Obviously, we know the famous story. We all know the shark wasn't working. Originally, the shark was going to be a lot more heavily involved in the screenplay. Movie overshot 100 days.

15:50And Spielberg somehow put together the greatest film of all time, arguably by barely showing the shark until the second into third act sequences. And really hiding the shark, making a lot of suspense from that, from the lack of seeing the monster, the dread you can build, the storytelling you can build. And they fear you can build inside of an audience. Alien, very similar use of the xenomorphs in that film. And the face huggers don't really start seeing the alien, the xenomorphs till about halfway through that film. In a lot of ways, which is really interesting. And then the thing, I mean, you don't see what the things capable of until halfway through. Mostly it's just a dog in the first act of the film, a cute husky. And then you really see what can be come inside the dog cage. They're in the blood tests and the crazy sequences of its body, opening up and biting the arms of one of the characters. And you really get to see the identity of these monsters in big ways. Once we really get into that second third act. And those three movies changed, you could argue the structure of the setting of the stories.

16:52In terms of the isolation of your leads, being basically trapped and isolated and trapped with the monster. Because in a lot of the older monster movies, it was the whole town or big setting. And there's lots of characters and people are going to the creature in some ways. They were never stuck. Your characters are not stuck in a place, except for obviously Dracula, what's his name, John, is going there to do the, the signing over the leaves and stuff. Obviously he gets trapped in the castle for a while. But there's still Dracula leaves and he goes to the other city and there's a lot of characters in all those movies. But in those three movies, Jaws, Alien and the thing, your lead characters are all basically stranded and trying to survive the monster, attacking them. So in Jaws, there's the three guys on the boat, second half of the movie. They're on the water, Jaws is there. How do we, we're just trying to kill them and survive.

17:53But there's nowhere we can go. Alien stuck in the stromo with the xenomorph. You're fucked. You can't go anywhere. All you can do is just try to survive. Blow the fucking thing up. And then the thing, you're on the basin and talk to God. There's nowhere to go and you're stuck there with the thing. And so putting the characters in isolated situations, isolated settings where they are stuck and can't go, they can't escape, created such great tension and suspense that wasn't present in a lot of those movies. A lot of those movies, older movies, they're fun, they're scary, they have great moments, but you never felt like that intense fear and intense dread from the story rather than just the monster. You're just like waiting, you're hoping they survive. What's going to happen in the next scene? So those three movies have that in common. And when I think we're so important about those three films, and there are a lot of other movies too in this era that were very influential, and we'll talk about them as well as starting with Jaws, then going into alien and the thing, filmmaking was shifting to a more grounded realism feel with great, great cinematic quality.

18:56Not that there wasn't great cinematic quality before, but we're in a new era in the late 70s, early 80s. You know, when you have geniuses like Spielberg, John Carpenter, Ridley Scott, the height of their creative powers, resources at their hand to make the most creative vision possible, we're seeing things we've never seen before. Can you imagine just going back or just being born and raised in the 60s and 70s, and you go see not just movies like 2000 on Space Odyssey, but you go see Jaws, you go see alien in 1979. Tell me that it just doesn't change your freaking life. It's crazy. Can you imagine, just try to put yourself in that mindset, the internet doesn't exist, smartphones don't exist, you really only see movies on shitty, tidy TVs in your home if they're playing on cable, in horrible resolution, or you're going to need to go to the cinema and watch film projection every time you go to the movies, which that's all they had. And you see alien for the first time, and the world building of Ridley Scott and his brilliant team, the artistry, the sets, the set design, and as well as the greatest static of the monsters and the creatures and the,

19:56it's just so fascinating too, I think. I think that's why aliens, one of the most influential creature creatures of all time, and you still arguably have the greatest monster of all time, probably with alien, with the xenomorph. There may not be a better creature in all of cinema in horror. Yeah, I think what makes it so special is that, it's obviously like many of the monsters, like, jaws you could argue, but also something that exists in this world, but the design of the creature, the concept of it, everything the lore of it, is so remarkable and unique and brilliant, that ever since it came out, no monster design has, no monster design has ever touched the xenomorph. That's how incredible it is. You can argue a couple of things come close, but nothing comes, I don't think anything touches what they did with that movie, what they did with that design, what they did with that monster.

20:57It was so iconic and such a landmark that they're still making them. I think it is mostly because of the monster too. Yeah. I mean, the lore and the mythology and everything built around that universe is so massive, it has grown more and more, but people are just drawn to the xenomorph. Yeah. They really just want to see the xenomorph more than anything, and that's why aliens really fun and interesting because a lot of these movies, they change the genre in big ways. Jaws was interesting because there's still more of a classic monster movie feel, but changing it up by not showing the monster as much, but alien takes the monster and turns into a slasher movie. Yeah. It's very much a slasher movie being hunted by one monster, one character, which was really fascinating when you take those 60s and 70s horror movies, it feels so much like those, it has that same identity. The thing brings practical filmmaking and obviously body horror to the forefront of filmmaking and popularity, which leads to movies like The Fly, of course, which Kronenberg just was his own auditor when it comes to body horror. Other movies and creature features in this eight era of the 70s and 80s,

21:59booming, Gremlins. Gremlins is a great creature feature. Yeah. It was, but what was different was, it had the horror and terror and dread and gawr of these great horror movies and slasher monster movies, but bringing a huge element of comedy to them and making comedy horror really popular. You could argue that ET is a creature feature. In a way, in a way it is, the thing with me when I think of creature features, I think it's got to be a horror movie. Got to be a horror movie. I think that's what really classifies it. But I mean, it is an umbrella term creature feature, as long as it's focused on an alien or monster, but I always associated with horror. I would say the 80s was the prime time for this creature feature revolution. And there's another one that I do think is one of the great sci-fi films ever and that's Predator. Yeah. And again, there's no more for still number one, but the Predator design was outstanding. It's one of the iconic monsters. Again, still lives on to this day.

23:00They just made another Predator movie. But really what McTiernan did with that movie, like you said, bringing just exceptional, precise filmmaking and direction, having a bona fide movie star, like Arnold delivering such an incredible performance that influenced how masculine actors portrayed for years. But it's also just a really tight movie. It's a perfect script, everything about the suspense building, to the story, to the characters. It's a really brilliant concept and simplicity. But it's the execution, it's the stakes, it's the grounded filmmaking, great music from Goldsmith. It's just on Predator. Jerry, I believe it was Alan Sylvester. Oh Sylvester, yeah Sylvester. Yeah, thank you for that correction. That's correct. Yeah, it was him. And it brought an edge of coolness that that John Erdyn have. And it's still like to this day,

24:02it's up there with those other three too. I think Predator is a perfect movie. I think so too. I think you had Goldsmith on the mind because we saw more alien films so far. Yeah. But yeah, Predator I do put it as one of the best creature features of all time. It's one of the best action movies of all time in general. Great blend of the genres. Again, that was another big creature feature that sort of took it in the action route, the war route. That's a very much a war movie, but with just great masculine campiness, which we all love. The fly is an interesting one because the fly, similar to the thing, was an original from the 1950s, both of them. The thing from another world was the 1950s as well, I believe. Like 1954, but the fly was 1958, then remade by Kronenberg in 1986, I believe. That's one where you establish this great creature in the original, but then Kronenberg takes it to a new level with the body horror. And I think for a lot of horror fans, the fly is a very special movie. I still remember the first time I saw the fly and it blew my hair back. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. It was just so creative

25:03and so fun. And it was able to fuse this great line, and it walked this great tightrope line of, there is comedy in there, but it's just so terrifying what happens to this man, the scientist played by Jeff Goldblum, this horrible accident, which I love about scientific accidents and experiments. It either goes too routes, it either goes into like a superhero, a super villain, or just this horrible monster. And it goes in the horrible monster route, which I think was so fast name, because it took like influence probably from a lot of superhero characters of failed experiments or experiments gone wrong. But instead of being bitten by a radio after active spider, a fly flies into his chambers for where he's trying to transfer matter and the fly DNA fuses with his DNA. And it just becomes the most grotesque version of what that could possibly be. And also you could say it was the most tragic monster movie since the original Frankenstein. 100% a very similar ending where it ends horribly

26:06for the monster and it's not heroic, it's tragic and it's so sad. Like the ending when Gina is crying and begging and he's begging to be killed and then the the the pruser blows his brains out and you're just like, oh my, that's it says it says terrifying is is horribly tragic and sad, which hadn't been done in that without effect before, it was so incredible. Would you consider Planet of the Apes to be creature features? Yeah, I'd say. I'd say, because they're not. They're not. But what I think is so fascinating about those old Planet of the Apes movies is they were pioneering creature effects, creature making. And they're not just apes anymore. They're something more in a way. So yeah, because I mean, you have a shark as a creature feature than he had. It's okay. Yeah, but also what they did was what they did with those films was just astounding. And again, it's one of those things. You put yourself in the perspective

27:07of that era of cinema, that era of filmmaking, what people are used to seeing and it's the most groundbreaking practical filmmaking and creature effects you'll ever seen a film. It's just so stellar where they were able to accomplish with that. So I think the Planet of the Apes absolutely qualifies creature features. But something like the exorcist for me is sort of a coin to us. Like I wouldn't fully deem the exorcist of creature feature because it's more of a demon possession movie. It's supernatural. I don't think supernatural and creature feature can be in the same. I think there has to be some sort of line. Line in the sand. And I don't consider the exorcist to be a creature feature despite having great creature effects. And you can argue that demons are monsters. But the supernatural element, I feel like just doesn't doesn't let you qualify it as a creature feature or like a monster movie. It's a different kind of thing. Yeah. And what also works so well with with creature features, I think why they were so popular and still are to an extent now and coming back in a big ways, I think they were very economically friendly for a while

28:08where you have mostly single locations or smaller locations, not a lot of area for one monster to torment characters. And so they were pretty cheap to film as compared to like something more expansive like a big adventure film or something that were required big sets, like musicals. So I think that's one of the reasons why they boom so quickly because they were interesting but also they were cheap for studios to make back then. Yeah. And another big one in the 80s was American War of and London, which completely revolutionized the War of John Ra and made it so grounded and in authentic and land is did an amazing job, him and his team, with the design of the creature and making it feel scary again because the Werewolf, John Ra, the design often felt a little too, in the 40s it was scary but that design isn't scary in the 80s. No.

29:08It doesn't work. The audience would laugh at it. Yeah, especially if it's just a guy who's feet grown. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. And it was great. They just way more commonly. And they did the dissolve transitions how they took out the effect for some of it. But with this film, it brought the grotesque body horror and true like watching the evolution, watching the growth and for us, for us to the Werewolf that really made it feel dangerous and it was much bigger too. So when you see like the full thing like in the movie theater, like it's full size, you're like, holy shit, this thing's a giant monster, it's a dog wolf, it's just crazy. Rather than a person, then man in a suit. So American Werewolf and London, both the transformation, practical effects, but also rethinking what is a Werewolf, how do we scare audiences in the 80s because that old stuff isn't going to work anymore. That's a good point because there's always an evolution

30:09in the filmmaking. And I'm always so curious where the evolution is going to go the next couple of decades outside of just CGI. But it seems like it has everything been done, what else can you do? But I think what it is is what I think we saw with the Odyssey, you go back to puppet work, you go back to as much practical filmmaking as you can for these impossible large-in-life characters and beings and fuse them with great CGI and fuse them with great effects. And then you get the perfect synergy between practical filmmaking and visual effects and CGI and post-production because a lot of times with creature monsters, creatures and monsters in 1920s and 30s, either if you have a guy in a suit, sure, or you're doing stop-motion with miniatures. Which at the time was astounding and with terrified audiences, but you cannot scare people today with stop-motion. So that's mostly gone outside of a few situations here and there where I think stop-motion lives mostly in family-friendly environments, animated films,

31:10especially like in their movies, which the new one coming out will will will will will while it would while it looks fantastic. But that's where I think stop-motion thrives is for something where children with their vivid imaginations can accept that world and impossibly fast, like right away. Yeah. Adults too when it's done right, but stop-motion, you can't you can't trick people with monsters anymore with that. No. And then they did take a dip in the 90s. Well, I want to stay on that. Oh, yes, yes, so we're going from stop-motion and dudes and suits to do the suits. It's the 1950s. And booming with the dudes and suits with miniatures, you know, we have dudes and suits walking across cities, destroying them. And then 50s and 60s, a big breakthrough, like we said, with plenty of the apes especially in 65 and other movies, makeup, creature makeup, special effects, makeup, really booming new technology, new types of synthetic glues and plastics and materials you can make that didn't exist in the decades before, but because of things like the post-war revolution

32:10of resources were able to make things that didn't exist. Like plastics wasn't really a thing until this era as well. So imagine the things that it opened the doors for for a special things make up artists to do plastics. Plastics, the graduate great one. 1960s, animatronics and puppets become big. Technologies advancing where engineers and brilliant artists can fuse those two worlds together to create. Monsters that are moving off their own accord remote operated, you know, you have creatures that can be operated by someone off screen. Even look at something like Star Wars where you have Yoda that's a mix of puppet and animatronics as well. So you have a character that people resonate with in a huge way that's in our creature future, but it's mainstream because the technology is getting there. It's it's convincing enough to create the illusion of an impossible creature or monster existing. Prostatic body horror in the 1980s. Absolutely booming. Yeah. The thing with John Carpenter, obviously we talked about that Codenberry's films Body Horror is booming in the 1980s. To an extent it's not just in monster movies.

33:10It's in all kinds of movies where body horror gore, blood effects are getting so much more advanced where it just looks better and better. And then 1990s we'll talk about, obviously in a bit we'll talk about Jurassic Park. What that did for creature features being the blockbuster version of a creature feature outside of jaws, which was the original blockbuster. Taking the creature feature and making one of the biggest movies of all time with it with the advancement of CGI ILM over there. And what you could possibly do with CGI rendering of a character in creatures that sort of practical CGI hybrid for the first time in a huge huge huge way. 2000s. And also the abyss in 89 with this early CGI. Yes. Incredible. Right before Jurassic Park. Then also we'll start talking about the 21st century in a bit as well because we haven't even touched it yet. But what happens in the 2000s paranormal films found footage movies you can get away with very cheaply made, efficiently made short films or feature films.

34:10But even a movie like Cloverfield, people forget how big that movie was. You're taking the found footage genre, putting the audience in this new style filmmaking will not completely new, but a booming new genre that makes you feel like you're there. And we then 2000s we have a massive boom of horror found footage films that a lot of people can make cheaply as well as big budget ones like Cloverfield. And then 2010s to now we have monsters coming back in a big way. But creatures are influencing the past like obviously creature features took the monsters and made them mean something. Now you creature features are dominating the rule in the entire story. It's not just a metaphor for something but your entire story centers around what the meaning of that creature is whether it's a movie like a quiet place. A movie like no, but it's these massive, massive metaphors for everything going on. Yeah, and I like the large scale and they're great. The 90s there weren't that as many great ones as the 80s. It definitely took a dip.

35:11They were still getting made. But there was there were two that I think an Italian of the 90s decade that paved the way for the 2000s in 2000s as it came back with Avengers. So there was the mummy Brenn Fraser. I mean, it's a venture movie. The mummy's great monster movie too. Yeah. And then the faculty. Oh, faculty's a good thing. So faculty was number with the box office was a big hit. Great hot young cast because the slashes were really big. Teen movies of slashes was huge. But Rodriguez made a great creature feature. And then I think that really told Hollywood, okay, let's make, let's get back into making some monster movies. And then 2000s we got to see a lot of rejuvenated properties in that genre. Also, I think Iraq, Naphobia. Yep. Was a fun one. That was sort of like a Grandlands S comedy horror store sort of film. Yeah. As well as mimic in 1997.

36:11Mimic I think is a Guillermo for me where would creature features be today without Guillermo Del Toro? He kept them alive. He's probably the most important figure in monster movies and creature features in the last 30 years. I think single handedly, obviously with his great teams behind his films. But his obsession and his passion for monsters for creatures are a reason why it's booming again. And he's like you say, he's kept it alive. Almost all of his movies feature a creature or feature a monster of some kind. Yeah. Sometimes the monsters are humans themselves. And he often portrays humans as monsters just to show they can be more monstrous than the monsters, more monstrous than the creatures and more evil than the creatures. And that's a common motif in his films. But I mean, he started off really just getting these great creature features going. These great monster movies like mimic going in. He's such an important guy. And his love for these movies

37:11are why I think people love horror. What the fuck would we be doing without that guy in this genre? Yeah, Kronos too. Kronos, yeah. Kronos' first film was great. I mean, even look at a movie like the Hellboy franchise and what he did with those creatures. His blade film. Yeah. He always delivers on the creatures, on the monsters. Crimson Pink, whatever it is, Shape of Water, Creature Movie, a creature-featured film about a love story. You know, he takes the films he loves. Fairy Tales, Romance, Films Horror, Creature Movies, Creature of the Black Love Lagoon, fuses them all together to make arguably his Magnus Opus and his best picture when it was Shape of Water. In the 2000s, I will say there were some really good ones, but there was the over-aliance on CGI when he didn't need it. So films were really committing to it. The Mist, Love, Deribont, that's a good movie, but it was so heavy CGI and it just wasn't quite, like, it doesn't, it doesn't, it hasn't aged well. That movie, like that, with the heavy reliance on CGI. The faculty still,

38:12CGI is not great, but it was like, it was 98. You know, you give it a pass because it was so long ago. But the 2000s, there was just an over-aliance on the CGI. And we're seeing recently the resurgence of the love for practical and the love for practical effects. Honestly, horror fans kind of demanding horror effects. Like, we don't want everything animated. Yes, it's important to have visual effects when you need it, but we want as much in camera as possible because it sells the horror. It sells the if whatever effect you're doing. So there were some good movies in the 2000s, but also some of them have an age well because of the over-aliance on animation. But the 90s arguably has the biggest creature feature probably of all time. The influence it's had, the success of it, a franchise that's still going. And this was the first big, big film, one of the first films ever to incorporate photorealistic CGI in a movie. It took I-L-M a while to convince Hollywood

39:12that you can create dinosaurs with CGI that were convincing. And in 1993, Jurassic Park comes out and just becomes more of the biggest sensations in entertainment history. A franchise that's still going today, not very well, still make a lot of money. But a property that's synonymous in everyone knows and recognizes around the world, a property that's so popular with it's just its first film. For the rest of the movies, some of them are really good. Some of them are pretty mediocre. A couple are pretty bad. But still people love them. Still people turn out because we love dinosaurs. And we all just want, I think we're all convinced that we'll get some sort of glints of the original. I think this one is why people turn out is because they love the original and we'll get something. We might get something that makes us feel like we felt the first time we saw Jurassic Park. And, you know, we've done episodes on Jurassic Park. You all know how much we love or we know how much you love it.

40:12But this movie takes the creature feature, creates it, turns into a spectacle, a blockbuster spectacle of adventure, of horror, comedy, everything. Everything that makes Spielberg's movie is great. And when it's a genius at, this is one of the most important films in his filmography. One of the most important films in Hollywood history. And it is arguably maybe the biggest creature feature ever. Yeah, you could say that. Absolutely. And when I think of like the monsters of that movie, it's always the raptors number one. Sure. It's like those like the the scary monsters of Jurassic Park. And 100%. And those honestly, I think the raptors are still more terrifying than any of these new fucking hybrid whatever mashup dinosaurs they do now. Yes, I agree because they're making half the shots are practical. Yeah. A lot of the raptors shots are CGI. Of course, even inside the kitchen scene, but a lot of the shots in the kitchen scene and raptors after that, practical. People and suits running around and raptors suits.

41:14Stan Winston and his team just developing amazing practical animatronic dinosaurs. But even just cutting to the close-ups of like with the raptors in the forest and it's just eyes go like like or you just feel you see it's lips brim clever girl things like that. Like it's just like it's unbelievable. And this way scarier than like this with the new one with the hands whatever it was. And then the one before with like the hybrid mashup of it's like there's not it's not scary like the raptors in the kitchen scary. It's really not. And I mean end of oak sheet to stay on the dinosaur horror genre of the creature feature. It was a fun movie. It didn't scare me though. Yeah it wasn't scary. It wasn't scary at all to an extent which is fine. You know I think I think it was more of a trying to capture the feel of an 80s creature feature in a fun way. For me that's that movie was fun. It wasn't like Jurassic Park where of course Jurassic Park is fun. But man when I was a kid watching Jurassic Park I was shitting my pants.

42:14It's terrifying. My mom our mom would say that whenever we would watch Jurassic Park Anthony and I would always hide behind the couch from the T-rexas on screen. And I still feel that fear when I watch that movie today especially I've seen it in theaters a few times. But because Spielberg is also a genius at horror and suspense building but that movie is still terrifying because of what they did practically what they do on camera. And yes Spielberg is one of a kind filmmaker. You can't compare every creature feature to why isn't it scary like Jurassic Park but Jurassic Park especially because it can scare you and it does. Oh yeah. There's a movie in the mid-2000s that I don't think it has gotten enough love and it still holds up so well and I remember seeing it in theaters and it was so terrifying and it was such a brilliant concept for creatures and that's the descent. The descent is really one of the great monster movies of the 21st century. It's again really simple

43:15a group of friends ghost-belonking go take cave diving they get trapped by rubble and then they encounter human-noid creatures that evolved in this cave system who start hunting them. And the desire of the creatures was so horrifying and unique and tethered to humanity because they were humans you could say but have evolved differently and using echolocation, brutally attacking and slashing and ripping out the roads with their teeth it was a movie where it was I think it's just still one of the scariest movie experiences in a movie theater for me my entire life and it's so brilliant I thought they did such a great job and it really I think is one of the great creature features of the century. It's really aging well. Yeah. I think the descent to movie that in 20 years we're still going to glorify and talk about so so happily and with giddy expressions

44:16of loving to be terrified by these kinds of movies and the descent was so original so unique it's very clever the characters are great yeah it's a really really well written story has a lot of heart it's about grief so it means something overcoming grief but also men they're so great at the filmmaking because they save those monsters man they don't come into play until fucking 50 minutes in-ish if you see that movie for the first time blind you know you don't even know it's a monster movie it's scary before you see the monsters because of the claustrophobia yeah and also they do great things like in the hospital and sequences like that with the lights and the tone is strong it's a well-directed movie it really is and I think that's why it's living on so well and becoming so timeless and becoming a fan favorite among tour people especially when they discover for their first time it's terrific yeah it's so fun and like you said like you said the claustrophobia of a capturing fear before the monsters and then when they monsters do show up

45:18you were just walloped with dread walloped with a shadow you're paying your pants especially we saw that in theaters I remember seeing that theaters man the first for real like when they're all in that like open area and then it's just one of them standing behind one of the girls and it's just like great trailer too that was in the trailer yeah a blend of genres where it's not just the monsters not just psychological horror it's not about just about grief but also fusing in a bit of found footage as well some sequences are shot in the camcorder format and also some sequence just shot in darkness which I think is one of the most terrifying things just a black screen with just auditorium auditorium fear and auditorium sound design to terrify you I love the dissents I brought a racquet phobia earlier Jeff Daniels Jeff Daniels great film tons of fun there's another spider movie coming out pretty soon this weekend and we have the writer of Don't Move James Murray from impractical jokers that freaking massive youtube channel so the impractical jokers I'm just using a lot of their videos and content

46:18so he wrote this novel Don't Move and they adapted it into a film very funny guy those videos every watch those videos for years man they're so funny especially what they do like in real world situations just messing with people interviews are always great and I love how they always do like it'll be someone interacting with someone in public and they're on the other line like alright you get to say this and it's something ridiculous a lot of talk shows have kind of like copied that format for someone yeah definitely which is fun but James Murray is going to join us for a little bit talk about his movie Don't Move so let's cut to James alright now let's welcome to the show James Murray Murray your movie Don't Move is coming out this weekend congratulations how's it feel to have that it's nerve-wracking and exciting you know four years in the making so it's based off a book you wrote right don't move yeah yeah outside of impractical jokers for many years I've been writing like horror novels I got nine out in stores do you know don't yeah and don't move is uh came out five years ago six years ago in bookstores and uh did really well and so we turned to the movie

47:19and it comes out this weekend nationwide I had no idea you were a horror I mean I've been seeing impractical jokers videos since how long you guys have been doing this for years now just two years it's still going a lot a lot of time yes it's I'm just getting older and bolder on TV I'm trying to keep mine my man also hopefully so that's what a journey so that's always been a part of your fascination is obviously the joke in comedy but also the horror as well yeah I mean you know horror is my first love I went to school for like fiction writing and I always wanted right horror novels you know and I love horror as much if not more than a due comedy like we watch a different horror movie every single night no joke you know and so and then one could argue that what they do to me on impractical jokers is horror anyway I mean I've gotten four prostate exams with my nipples pierced my eyebrows shaves last week filming the tv show I stepped foot off the top of the empire state building on the outside hanging from a rope and I was dressed as a mop and I used my own body to clean the

48:20outside glass and repel down the building is that not horror man that must have been nerve-wracking as hell there's a story saying my life what I love about horror and horror writers and horror filmmakers today it seems like a lot of them have a comedy background as well we've been seeing it so much whether it's craggar with weapons coming from what is kids you know barbarian now resident evil coming out curry barker obsession coming from sketch comedy what do you think it is between the mind of a comedian or something comedic and how it has this overlap with horror I think it's flip-flop size of the same coin the tempo is the same like so like in jokers we not just produce the show and act in the show we write the show and it's improvised a lot of it of course but then we are we are involved in every step of the post process every single not a frame gets on tv without our exact you know you know editing notes because in a hidden camera show we're shooting with 25 cameras which means that this 24 wrong ways to cut every moment of the tv show right

49:21so for us and for comedies all about timing it's all about the build up the setup the execution of the jok horror is the same way it really is like editing don't move felt rhythmically the same you know like the build up to the suspense and knowing what camera angles to cut to and then what the sound design is so critical for comedy it's the same for horror you know so i think the skills are really transferable in terms of like timing and tempo and also listening a reaction from the audience in our case with jokers it's laughter and don't move there is a lot of laughter in the movie it's actually funny because the cast is so funny wriggle is hysterical Tom Cavanaugh is hysterical but also there's a lot of tense moments and screams and heart wrenching moments too we'll cry you know so for me it's all about timing and that's exactly what comedy it is and so you said you've written nine horror books now that's wild congratulations that's what we have next year with Arles Stein and let's say yes it's the first book he's ever co-authored with another author

50:21i'm really excited and my lover is one of the serial killer thriller comes out 2028 that's so sick man are they all monster stories creature movies no i i i love like every like almost every genre horror so i've been tackling genre by genre so my first three books were sci-fi horror then i did three sci-fi comedy science fiction comedy book books for kids then i did two serial killer thrillers don't move as a creature feature and i have a paranormal one i want to do i finally had like an idea for that i don't think it's ever been combined in the paranormal space which is a lot of like what great movies or tv shows are like taking things that have never been put together before and suddenly becomes a fresh idea so i finally have a paranormal idea i wouldn't do that in 2029 if i'm alive i love every genre every type of horror yeah i will see what the guys put you through in the next uh 12 months now with don't move in with your writing in general we've been talking about creature features in this episode we brought erachinophobia from 1990 a great spider movie as well

51:26jeff daniel's that brought a lot of camp brought a lot of horror kind of like what gremlins did in the 80s like making comedy horror really bankable really popular if don't don't move has the comedy in horror as well in terms of building the story of a movie like this around giant spider creatures is the story first or is the creature first and you're building the story around the creature idea good good question i know you know don't my favorite horror movies the ones where a couple things happen one where the characters make smart decisions at all times there's no logic flaws in the movie and it's because to get a book published you've gone through that for months and months of writing a book you've worked through every logic flaw every character every line of dialogue is so carefully phrased and worded by time it gets onto shelves in Barnes & Noble or amazon what have you it's a honed piece of work you know so for me my favorite horror movies are the ones where the characters make very smart decisions and sometimes it works out and sometimes they still get screwed over and they

52:29still lose right that's what i love movies like that and then for me also my favorite horror is the ones where like the horror works in multiple levels so don't move it's not just a creature feature the horror is very much like the movie that's sent where the horror is on three levels you've got human versus the other which is the creature this kind of creature that cannot be reasoned with a rationalized with you can't talk your way through it or around it it is an unstoppable force you have to try to think your way through it and sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn't but then as human versus each other the inner conflicts of this church group from Chicago that wanders into the wrong woods and there's inner conflicts between the the characters in our book and in the movie and then human versus the him or herself in our case the lead character the movie Lindsey Fonseca she plays a woman who undergoes this horrific tragedy where she did everything right and a very survival situation and still loses her family in this horrible tragedy at the beginning of the movie and it's like it's unspeakable she goes through

53:33even though it seems so survivable and she did everything right and still her family dies right and so for her she's got a she sets a course on this camping trip with her church group to try to a year later to put her life back together and shit starts going wrong again and she's got to overcome her own inner demons is so for me just like the descent when the horror works on multiple levels and it's not just a creature feature that's my favorite kind of horror movie yeah we've been we're talking about the descent earlier in the episode and I love that film and also talking about blending practical and visual effects and CGI filmmaking to fuse the best possible version of the movie and the creature now obviously there's CGI in the film with the giant spider but there's some practical puppet work going on too right especially I think or am I was there is a ton of yeah yeah because there's a shot that reminded me so much of a shot in alien with

54:34the xenomorph right next to Ripley's as well as the record much in the faculty same kind of thing behind the bleachers at the end the aliens right there so I was like this is a great reference with practical filmmaking creature design that I picked up on right away direct homage alien and aliens are my desert island movies like if I got if I my plane one goals goes down crushes in the South Pacific and I got one movie the rest of my life it's like aliens you know that that shot you're describing is directly an homage to that you know we're it's this a static shot it's a profile shot of Lindsay she's cocooned against the wall and it hangs on the shot too long it's uncomfortable there's no music playing it's uncomfortable for the audience in the theater to see it and then in the last four frames five frames maybe not like not even a full beat right you see a limb move that's blended in perfectly in the background I was like shit man the creature was there the whole time like yeah yeah I love I love moments like that but we I mean we we legit lit people

55:39on fire in the movie the haunted house goes up in flames it was all practical because even though the CGI has gotten really good like there's some things like you can't beat the energy and the re the realism of seeing you know a guide legit on fire you know haunted house at the beginning of the movie and the heat of it and the feeling of it and the energy of it and our actors in the movie Lindsay and you know her family in that scene like their fear is real you can't fake it you know when you're in a haunted house and it is on fire and people in front of you are on fire gosh that translates on screen it really does you know I feel like creature features they changed a lot in the subject we've been talking about how the term really started in the 1960s based off television obviously monster movies are very prevalent the 23rds and 40s but creature features becoming a really big thing in the 60s Spielberg reinventing them with jaws the thing alien these movies John Carpenter and Conan Berg with the body horror and this these different arrows of creature

56:39features and the reveal to me is always more the most important parts of a creature feature whether you're doing in the first act or whether you're doing it later on how do you approach of this decision making of when and how to reveal as much of the creature as possible and when the audience gets to see it yeah I mean the creature has its its great cameo toward the end when it faces off it's the key off of the movie it squares off face to face with our character and that's really where you get the sense of the scale and size of it and how other worldly it is and how it's just an alternate evolution kind of thing like what would you do they get we we we we went the jaws approach very much throughout the movie you know where less is more until you get into it and when the movie truly turns and the comedy slips away and the characters realize the situation they're in then it is relentless in pace more toward the end and the climax and and that's when the creature really gets seen most you know but we saved it just like jaws we saved the the best for last you

57:44know I love a giant spider too man I love yeah she lob in Lord of the Rings I love air a gog in Harry Potter what were the influences and what was the inspiration to I want to do my own giant spider story yeah you know I mean I reckon if only one of my favorite movies of all time but it's not creepy crawly like that you know it's it's it's a it's more of like a big-ass spider you know that you're dealing with and also the top line of like what would you do for real if you were trapped in the woods with this creature spinning a web around you and you once you realize that the vibration you make causes it to be able to hone in on your location so you're literally frozen in place right how do you escape what would your escape plan B how do you think your way through an impossible jigsaw puzzle you know when every movement can possibly get you killed you know that's that's the top one that's what that's fun for that's it that reminds me of always an amazing spider man when he's got the webbing inside the sewer he's trying to get the lizard guy to him and he's hitting that's right you that's cool that's fun I just did a rewatch of it no joke one

58:49week ago because I you know I saw the new one and I went back to the Andrew Garfield and I watched them both and loved them and that scene in the sewers where he's feeling vibration is so freaking cool man yeah what a great scene yeah I think Mark webbed did a great job with that movie and I think he was a really good director too I like I love 500 days of summer and then he was a really good choice for those movies I like the new Spider-Man 2 but I like the new one I think people were expecting to see the Spider-Man with like the eight limbs and turn into a spider which would have been too much that would have been really cool to see but I think we've been seeing we talked about earlier in the in the episode how horror monster movies and creature features sort of dissipated a little bit you know Hollywood goes in trends they come up and down whether it's westerns or horror or action they seem to be coming back in a more interesting way and I love to see it I love to see obviously we have this era of elevated horror really cool supernatural ideas of subtle things whether it's obsession or it follows this sort of like this hybrid of

59:52elevated horror and creature feature but that's a clever example where they didn't have to make a creature they're just using humans humans and airy people to create the creature but I love to see this this boom again of people going back to practical filmmaking but also practical and CGI enhanced monsters because that's really where the fear is that's where the dread is for me when I that was my favorite shot in the movie is when I see the actual fucking spider and the pincer is in the in the fur and the fuzzy's like that's that's the stuff that I live for when I see creature features for sure me too man what would million decisions going to making movie but like the hair was wild and the coloring of the hair you know you never think about these details when you're writing a book and when it gets turned into a movie you're like we literally had endless conversations about what color the hair was on the creature's back so you're really heavily involved in creature design oh yeah I mean the every step of the way every every step of the way and not just the creature design but also the physics of it how does it move how does it you know and then it's wild when you make a movie sometimes there are shots that just we just don't get it right and you have to

1:00:55cut it for movie even though we spent money on it and there are other shots in the movie that are so realistic I have been on set every single moment cannot tell that that creature was not in that shot I'm like gosh darn it man like they nailed it there's some excellent excellent puppy work and CGI some excellent work you know yeah I think it wasn't just the selling of the face but also the limbs in the background like you brought up earlier that selling that movement as well and I thought you guys did a great job with the puppet work is it my I was watching like that's a fucking puppet this is this is fantastic they're puppeteering this right now because we saw puppet work coming back with the Odyssey I mean the puppet work for the the cyclops and infusing that with CGI this is how you sell an audience I think on fear is how you sell an audience and dredges bring back practical filmmaking when the budget allows for it when you can be into the force mode of creativity to create it to give us what we're terrified of because that's how you I think for me this how you sell monsters the best yeah I agree now if you're thinking back to your

1:01:56favorite creature feature movies besides alien and obviously I think the xenomorphs the greatest monster of all time what we're all so big influences on your life as a horror writer and a horror fan man John Carpenter's the thing let's go I mean talk about incredible but also like invasion of the body snatchers is a very clever way to do creature when you think about her you know yeah I mean the thing is the pillar I'd say yeah I like invasion of the body snatchers the first remake they did with Sutherland I like that movie a lot yeah it has the creepiest ending of any movie ever with his big and I love the design of the pods and like the sort of webbing because obviously there's webbing in your movie as well so I felt a little bit of a kinship to invasion of the body snatchers when I was watching it which is very interesting yeah I'll take a huge compliment thank you we won't take up too much of your time but we really appreciate you coming on the show congratulations on the film we love creature creatures great by watching you know it's

1:03:00an indie movie and you know it's like it takes a mountain many mountains decline to get a movie made get finesse for it get it edited paid for shot and launching it theatrically which is the way the movie should be seen so if you have the means go to don't move movie.com and get your tickets today I promise it's a great date night horror movie you will laugh you'll cry you'll scream at many points out the movie but it's just a great date night horror how many theaters is it in do you know I by by time this goes up will be up to about 500 which is that's a lot that's awesome you know when the 500 you came out we started week one in 200 the week two we went up to 800 week three three thousand and then we got shut down by covid you know it was literally the week of covid but I'm too bad so I hope you guys will go out and see it in theaters you'll love it I promise we put our hearts and souls into it I hope you enjoy it all right my thanks for joining the show everyone go see don't move in theaters all right thanks to James Murray for joining us for the show let's talk about more of the 21st century creature features and I think we brought clover feel I think clover

1:04:04feel was heavily influential creature feature yeah I think was really important temporary conge yeah yeah we talked about the dissents talked about the shape of water but let's talk about some more and also the mist you brought up I think the host is a very important creature feature this 2006 came out from Bongjunho his probably his best monster movie his best creature movie which is fantastic it's not just about the monster it's it's a blend of everything it means something it's a connection to it's got great political satire but a connection to talking about the destruction of our environments pollution of radioactive materials which influenced his story of this of these Americans dumping this radioactive sewage I can't remember where somewhere in the sink of the lab in the sink yeah in the lab in the sink that goes into the ocean which creates this monster that torments the city yeah and it's a unbelievable creature design I remember seeing it for the first time I think it was like 17 and it was just like amazing the CGI was so great for the time really cool but also it's the family that you you love the family you love the characters

1:05:09um and it's got such great undertones of of a political conversation talking points in it's so well done it's an epic too and it's like it's it's great the first attack is still I think one of the great monster attacks ever like the big public attack where it's just like running around and it's just incredible filmmaking I completely agree also 2021 century we've got a lot of Godzilla films yes so Godzilla is still prevalent and a lot of young audiences are discovering you got Godzilla for the first time still stomping around whether they're going to the original ones I don't know but they're enjoying it and we've getting what feels like a goodzilla move Godzilla movie every year because we have the competing ones like a Dylan's one then we have one brothers and their mother's universal oh yeah we're WB so we ate quite a few I think Sleather in 2006 was from James Gunner was a really big and important creature feature for independent filmmaking felt very similar to movies like the thing like the blob in those 1980s splatter slash great body horror and that one I really like crawl yeah the alligator one and um on the

1:06:12that one the levy breaks from the storm and just like the Led Zeppelin song when the levy breaks and alligator's gonna come yeah and it's so well done I love how they portrayed the alligators or crocodiles whichever I always mix them up I don't know which someone come in the comments tell us which one they were but it was just like really fun really tight really scary suspenseful just pure survival great use of special effects and practical effects like when she's in the basement and there's two two alligators crawling around in there with her and within the foundation of the home I was like this is fucking terrifying this is awesome they're doing it it was it's such a good movie I don't think it got as much love or success as it deserved I thought they knocked out the park crawl knocked out the park yeah they're alligators alligators giant giant alligators not enormously giant but larger than normal crocodiles are the narrow

1:07:17snouts something like that the alligators are the wider snout yeah attack the block was a cool one two I like attack the block a lot 2011 cool alien designs different environment we saw aliens in London which you don't see very often which I thought was really cool this a fun one cabin in the ones was I think just one of the my favorite horror movies of the 21st century tons of fun leaning into every genre campiness of it exploiting every monster type that's ever existed in a movie was a lot of fun just like that final outbreak of them all in the lab yeah cabin in the woods is a love letter to monsters yeah it really is and itself it's it's so fun and in twist the genre and then subverts everything but at the end of the day drew Goddard wrote just a great love letter to the genre and had so much fun with it it was just a celebration of horror movies and monster movies and also creature features we talked about how it can be an ambiguous genre would you put

1:08:17zombie films and creature features because I wouldn't necessarily consider a zombie's creature features because I think creature features you need just one or a couple creatures or monsters to really consider it one even though Jurassic Park we're talking about creature features but I don't know I feel like zombie movies don't feel like creature features to me it's it's it's I think it's a blurred line because I mean they are creatures they are monsters but when you think of creature feature you know I don't immediately think of zombies but I think it's safe to put them in the in the category so I think yeah you can put them in there I think it's fine it follows for me as a great creature feature it's a creature feature that's unique because you don't really see what the creature really looks like you see different versions of the creature where this character is being followed by this creature this entity that takes on the aesthetic of creepy looking people and walks slowly never stops pursuing you I really like this movie a lot and for me it's a great

1:09:23unique original creature feature of the 21st century but they're they're he was clever davor Robert Mitchell was clever about because he makes this creature feature but they don't have to like design this big monster or this this unique villain and you just you create the eeriness with odd looking people there's a movie that I mean I'm not sure if you would call it a creature feature it's more of a sci fi horror film and it's Alex Garland's annihilation I think it is because it has one of the scariest creatures in recent memory and it's that that evolved the moose bear monster yeah the mutated bear yeah and it's a it's a moment in movies in recent time that really gone under my skin when you hear its voice and how it uses the voice of its victims and the design of it when it enters the the house that they're hiding in and remaining still because it can't see like that's they they did an incredible job with the design of that monster and it's it's just so brilliant and that was so horrifying yeah I would consider annihilation because it's

1:10:29another new style of creature feature where mutation is the monster yeah and the mutation creates monsters I thought I thought I think that absolutely is a creature feature the which I would consider a creature feature as well you know do you do you consider which is or no no I wouldn't I wouldn't throw which isn't there tell me why because they're not monsters they're just witches that's a really deep that's that simple I'm not monsters a quiet place yes great great creatures that's one of the best ones yeah of the 21st century that's so influential these movies are so popular I can't wait to see what krizinski's doing with the new one that I believe is shooting now or if not done with production can't wait I'm so curious where where he's going to take it you know we have characters coming back we've killed him or if you're coming back there's been some BTS photos of him I'm sure Emily blunt will be back with the kids so I'm so excited to see what a quiet place three looks like and I mean we recently last two years got two remakes of classic ones and Frank and

1:11:31Stionos for out to which I thought were both brilliant that they were both incredible new adaptations of the material wonderful creature designs for both of them I mean great visions so different from each other visually both unbelievably beautiful and sumptuous filmmaking and great performances from both performers Bill scars guard absolutely fucking crushed it and Lorty really surprised me with his frankenstein so even to this day the old ones are still still up there sumptuous something was some choice I mean speaking of Bill scars are you brought yeah the eight movies are great creature features as well um you know we also got a legacy sequel of alien with alien Romulus so we got our xenomorphs back we got face huggers back in different ways well as prey we got a new version of predator we there's been multiple versions of predator throughout this century as well but prey is one of the better ones of the remakes and the legacy sequels nope we brought up I think no it's a great creature feature that's kind of just jaws in the sky

1:12:34in a lot of ways no problem but I think that after clay face and you know I think movies like other mom you're gonna be really interesting creature features this year that one I'm looking forward to seeing great trailer great concept great trailer that that will feel very much like a like a creature feature we know from the past um I'm excited to see what this genre goes yeah forward after after 2025 to my six and I'm curious to see if people go back to practical monsters practical filmmaking infusing that with the great CGI to create these creatures but I love these movies I love monster movies yeah I wish we got more of them hopefully they'll be coming back because horror is booming so much right now and I'd love to see more of these unique creatures I love the psychological horrors I love horrors that are only involving humans I really do are even something supernatural subtle supernatural things like obsession you know that's a great story to great script and a great idea but I also miss how prevalent and how common monster movies

1:13:38were how common creature features were so I wish we get more of them soon I agree I love monster I love monster movies they're great they're they're so fun and they they can be so doppelgoking and so terrifying and like they're still they can still work with audiences all right well everyone thanks so much for tuning into our creature features episode to get us ready for spooky season and no more we do tons of horror this year especially in October can we for I mean we got Resident Evil coming out soon that's gonna be a big word for us practical magic yeah practical magic too but you know the things to do to help our show out go to patreon.com slash raiders of the last podcast get bonus episodes access to our discord tons of content there for you exclusively on patreon as well as Spotify Apple iHeartRadio leave those five star ratings and reviews for us shares with your family and friends youtube subscribe comment like instagram take talk same thing our socials are where a bunch of our cool events live you know our interviews with Tom Cruise for days of thunder will be on instagram and take talk so stay tuned on the socials for that follow us subscribe like share us do all the things we appreciate

1:14:39you all so much not take care see you next time