Dennis the Menace (1993)

Matt (00:00:00):

Yes, yes. It’s the long awaited Dennis the Menace episode. That will be Dennis the Menace, the 1993 movie starring Walter Mattou. Walter Mattou, I, Mr. Where should I catch Dennis? He’s a menace. That movie also, Christopher Lloyd, who’s playing kind of a hobo slasher villain. I think a very good hobo slasher villain. I wish I could have seen a hobo slasher movie starring Christopher Lloyd as said slasher villain. And the person who could have directed it, could have been the person who directed this movie, Nick Castle, who of course played Michael Myers in Halloween, 1978, directed by John Carpenter. He was John Carpenter’s friend. There are a lot of strange illusions references to Halloween in the Dennis the Menace movie from 1993. Laci loved this movie so much when she was a kid. This is a legitimate load-bearing beam for her. I have never seen it in my life until I watched it twice over the past few days, and we are bitterly divided over this movie.

(00:00:50):

She still loves it and I think, don’t get it. I don’t see what she sees, but you’ll get to hear our therapy session where we try to work it all out. Will our marriage survive? Will our podcast survive? You’ll have to listen and or watch to find out. We also cover the immense history of Dennis the menace in comic strip form in tv, sitcom form, cartoon form, dairy queen mascot form, and finally, the live action movie from the nineties. That’s all in the history segment. If you want to skip past all of that, look in your episode description and you will see movie discussion. Scroll on to that part of the episode and you can hear Laci and I talk about Dennis the Menace from 1993. I hope you enjoy. Hey, it’s load bearing beams. I’m Matt Stokes.

Laci (00:01:56):

And I’m Laci “The Stinker” Roth.

Matt (00:01:59):

With your slingshot always up to mischief.

Laci (00:02:02):

Does it sound like I said “the sneaker?”

Matt (00:02:04):

I know you said stinker.

Laci (00:02:06):

I’m a bit of a stinker. Let’s

Matt (00:02:07):

Go ahead and read. Give me a clean read. Laci, what are you a stinker

Laci (00:02:13):

I’m up to mischief.

Matt (00:02:16):

A very wholesome mischief though. And we know you mean well,

Laci (00:02:19):

We mean you just cause hundreds of dollars in damage and ruin people’s esophagus probably.

Matt (00:02:25):

Yeah. And then I’m like, I’m the bad guy. If I complain about

Laci (00:02:28):

It, I’m the fucking carwash solution winning my anus. I’m the bad guy.

Matt (00:02:32):

If I’m telling the dad like, listen, I’m not saying beat the shit out of your kid, even though that’s what we would’ve done back in my day. I’m just saying this is objectively your issue and you need to not let your child just go and enter my house without permission.

Laci (00:02:47):

And if there was a kid to beat, it’d be yours. I’m just in a Minecraft. Just say that’s

Matt (00:02:53):

Parody. Parody. This is what Walter Madhouse, parody.

Laci (00:02:55):

Parody. Don’t make me to be some kind of grump.

Matt (00:02:57):

Mr. Mitchell. Yeah, it’s in Minecraft. Okay.

Laci (00:03:01):

His face is made out of putty. He’s never been more putty faced than this movie Mouth Out.

Matt (00:03:08):

Do you want to go out there and say that definitively we’re talking all the great Mathau performances. This is the Puttiest…

Laci (00:03:14):

I don’t want to do you. You’ve set that up.

Matt (00:03:18):

Let me ask you something. This is something I genuinely don’t know about you is as a child, did you read the

Laci (00:03:23):

Funnies? Yeah. If you’re forced at a place where they’re going to make you eat breakfast at a table like a bunch of weirdos, it’s the only thing to do except for to read the back of the cereal boxes. So it wasn’t like something I did all the time. I just was drawn to the colorfulness of it.

Matt (00:03:42):

Yeah, I think I was the same way. It didn’t hook me. There are people who have very detailed opinions about all the comic strips that they grew up with,

Laci (00:03:50):

Even

Matt (00:03:51):

Though I would like, oh, it’s a newspaper. I’m going to flip to the funnies.

Laci (00:03:54):

Exactly. I was like, this is the kid section. Like that one aisle in Walgreens.

Matt (00:03:59):

Right. But it’s not like anything hooked me and became part of my personality.

Laci (00:04:03):

Guess I wasn’t following it. I mean, I read it when it was around

Matt (00:04:07):

And I did later get into Garfield, but in book form compilations of the comics. But Dennis the menace still runs to this day, so I thought, let’s just take a look at today. September 23rd, 2025. Is Dennis the Menace panel?

Laci (00:04:20):

You not fooling.

Matt (00:04:21):

No fooling. So here’s what’s going on is Dennis the menace is talking to Mr. Wilson who is

Laci (00:04:26):

Laying

Matt (00:04:27):

Down.

Laci (00:04:27):

He’s just right on his chest invading all the space,

Matt (00:04:31):

And he says, Mrs. Wilson said, you are gathering dust. Did you sign up for this job?

Laci (00:04:37):

The end.

Matt (00:04:38):

Let’s take a look at yesterday’s.

Laci (00:04:40):

Okay, wait, is it a comic strip? If there’s just one?

Matt (00:04:43):

It’s a single panel comic.

Laci (00:04:44):

It’s a comic panel.

Matt (00:04:45):

On the weekends though, it’s two. You get two full. I forget what the terminology

Laci (00:04:49):

Is. Is this because of the recession?

Matt (00:04:51):

Yeah, of the recession. There used to be so many more, but then omics took over. Thanks a lot.

Laci (00:04:56):

This is Adult Highlights magazine.

Matt (00:04:59):

So then yesterday, Dennis is walking with another child and three different people in the neighborhood are looking at him with a look of suspicion and resentment. And Dennis says, I said, I was well known in the neighborhood, not popular.

Laci (00:05:12):

He is such a character.

Matt (00:05:14):

And finally, let’s look at this weekend where we get to follow the adventures of Dennis’s father. Oh, this is the Sunday edition. So we get six panels. So he’s

Laci (00:05:24):

Peter Church,

Matt (00:05:24):

His dad’s name. What’s his dad’s first name?

Laci (00:05:26):

Mitchell.

Matt (00:05:26):

What’s his first name?

Laci (00:05:28):

He just calls him Mitchell.

Matt (00:05:30):

Alright, so Mr. Mitchell is at work and another person comes, oh, he’s right here. Henry. Henry. So his coworker says, Hey Henry, and did you hear the news? What’s up? The boss is thinking about giving us the option of working from home. What do you think of that? It’s

Laci (00:05:43):

Timely.

Matt (00:05:43):

Mr. Dennis’s father thinks and thinks of Jan blowing a horn, black proof proof, and the dog barking by going rough. Rough. And he says, I’ll pass.

Laci (00:05:53):

Wow. This is some classic fucking garbage. There’s no way. This isn’t chat, GPT Ideas,

Matt (00:05:59):

Comics. It’s a fascinating world where these old men clinging to it until they’re dead writing it every day and then their sons take over. In the case of Dennis, it was Hank Ketchum, the creator of Dennis’s the Menace, who used his own son for inspiration, handed it over to his assistants.

Laci (00:06:20):

Wait, okay, so it’s not Dennis taking over then.

Matt (00:06:23):

So his two assistants took over and then eventually another son, but not Dennis, who he was estranged

Laci (00:06:28):

From. He was a fucking menace and clearly was on the spectrum. That kid who just had, I mean, he’s feral walking around, going into places where he shouldn’t go. He doesn’t realize he’s doing the wrong thing. He’s not trying to break any rules

Matt (00:06:41):

And I don’t want to be that guy. I don’t want to be like, because I was trying to research this movie and I found like there’s a Psychology Today article that I’m going to quote from that’s like we have to talk about Dennis and the medicine, A DHD. Clearly this child is undiagnosed a DH adhd and that’s why he’s doing all this shit.

Laci (00:06:57):

At the very least he has. Yes. And a ton of energy.

Matt (00:07:00):

Well, I mean, we have a child who is autistic and would do all the shit Dennis does, but Dennis is not coded as being on the spectrum at all.

Laci (00:07:11):

No, he’s just a precocious kid that’s too smart for their own good, but randomly super capable, has ideas he knows are bad, but needs to do them anyway. So there’s definitely an impulse control issue here, and that is oppositional defiance disorder. I mean, that’s all on the spectrum. The kid needs medication and he needs to go to gifted classes

Matt (00:07:36):

Immediately. Well then it’s like, but why do we always jump to, we need to medicate them Because at a certain point, wasn’t this just boys being boys?

Laci (00:07:43):

No, it was that kid being that kid. He, he’s a fucking menace. He’s hurting people on accident. He’s a lovable, adorable little scam Mrs. Martha. Martha. Martha. Yeah. Yeah. She deserves a nice boy and she loves Dennis.

Matt (00:08:01):

Wait, no, Martha is

Laci (00:08:03):

Oh, farts.

Matt (00:08:03):

Yeah. Is Mrs. Wilson,

Laci (00:08:05):

That’s who I mean.

Matt (00:08:07):

Mrs. Wilson.

Laci (00:08:08):

Yeah, she’s adorable. Loves Dennis. She deserves a nice, healthy husband. He shouldn’t be slowly killing your husband with Draino.

Matt (00:08:20):

I guess because our son would do something like put Draino in our toothpaste or whatever

Laci (00:08:25):

To fix it.

Matt (00:08:26):

And just because

Laci (00:08:28):

Bottles are neat.

Matt (00:08:29):

Nothing. Yeah, no calculation ever enters it

Laci (00:08:32):

Right

Matt (00:08:33):

And has no understanding that this is wrong or it’s just like, that’d be super fun to do.

Laci (00:08:38):

For instance, he is very infatuated with eyeglasses. I take full responsibility. I did not wear them for the majority of his life, and then I started needing them and I think he thinks it’s a funny choice I made.

Matt (00:08:48):

It’s

Laci (00:08:48):

A good bet. So he laughs every time he sees me wearing them and he would try to get them. But that has now translated to him ripping the glasses off of anyone. Everyone. And as we all including children, and as we all know, glasses are expensive.

Matt (00:09:01):

My teacher’s in on this fun joke too.

Laci (00:09:03):

Where’s the fake nose and the, yeah, but so he grabs Dennis, grabbing the dentures, using them as a way to talk. That’s funny. A kid would do that, but you lose teeth out of a thousands of dollars medical device. I don’t know. And for the first time also, I realized that to me, Mr. Wilson is clearly also on the spectrum. I mean, he only loves Martha that says the only person, he has no use for children. He’s very blunt. He’s into collecting coins. He’s obsessed with his flowers. He’s not social enough to even smile at his social club. He gets up and goes, he’s so awkward. He’s only comfortable around her. And he stems,

Matt (00:09:51):

Alright, maybe. But then I feel like every single man of this generation was also that because you had a boring ass hobby like chips in a bottle.

Laci (00:10:00):

Sure, sure, sure. But he’s really regimented about his and they’re his, he does them Malone. He does them in private. What’s interesting is he’s a gardener, right? But Martha’s not, and you would think the woman might,

Matt (00:10:13):

That’s woman’s work.

Laci (00:10:14):

Not that it’s something they do together. It’s not he has to let her into his garden. I mean, she’s just completely accepts him and I think that that is why she also has a big heart for Dennis. I think she sees her husband in him.

Matt (00:10:28):

I don’t know anything about the Dennis, the Menace comic strip and TV series universe other than what I’ve crammed over the past three days. But the once in its pitch is, but Mr. Wilson secretly loves Dennis and it would fit in with what you’re saying is he’s just a grownup Dennis and feels this connection, but also

Laci (00:10:45):

Possibly sees a rambunctious kid that he used to be, who used to get hit for it, not get to just do what he wants. It would make perfect sense that he would be aggravated

Matt (00:10:55):

With that. And now these kids don’t have to go through what he went through. They don’t have to get hit. It’s like they get to

Laci (00:11:00):

Just be

Matt (00:11:01):

The woman corporate lawyer who’s like, I dealt with all kinds of sexual harassment. Just shut up and deal with

Laci (00:11:06):

It. Wear your pantyhose. Keep your vagina safe.

Matt (00:11:08):

Exactly. Is that why you loved this movie?

Laci (00:11:11):

I so Badly wanted to be a precocious child. I already was you that was loved by the hardest man it ever was to get to love you, my dad. So yeah, I related hard to this movie. I find it lovely. It’s pretty to look at. It’s really sweet and I mean, you have to get past the first scene. I’ve always hated the first scene. It’s all so cute. Oh, he’s shook. He needs to get an as spring. Oh, when they give Dennis one-liners, I don’t like it. I just like when he’s being more natural. That’s when the movie goes a little for me is when it’s like, don’t feed the kid the line. Just let him say it.

Matt (00:12:02):

I guess.

Laci (00:12:02):

God, you hate this

Matt (00:12:03):

Movie. We haven’t been this divided on a movie

Laci (00:12:05):

At all while in a long time. And I was like, oh, Matt’s going to be so proud of me that I log this letterbox thingy immediately and I’m like, I’m not going to look in mud.

Matt (00:12:13):

We watched separately, although Laci kept popping in this movie’s. Great. You’re going to love this. Oh, it’s so good. You even said it’s so well shot, which I

Laci (00:12:20):

Agree it’s, it’s a beautiful scene with Christopher Lloyd on the bridge at night. Anyway, but it feels John Hughes, it feels like, is there a William score to this? Because it sounded like one.

Matt (00:12:32):

No, it’s Jerry Goldsmith. Just absolutely slumming it.

Laci (00:12:36):

There wasn’t enough famous people in this movie for you, this movie stacked. No, it’s not. It is a little weird that the two friend kid actors in this, Marla and Joey maybe don’t go on to do anything else in acting, or at least that’s what their IBS look like. Just Dennis the menace. It’s like what kind of fucked up things were happening on this set?

Matt (00:12:59):

That’s how it should be. You shouldn’t get to keep going.

Laci (00:13:01):

No, you shouldn’t. But I’m saying they were so scarred by producing this movie. Maybe the director in their face was like, do it cuter. Make your dimples. Go dimply more. Martha.

Matt (00:13:12):

The things I couldn stand Marla were when it’s the three kids by themselves. Because when it’s a kid interacting with this very good cast of adult actors, the movie has a little bit of juice. But the movie didn’t work for me on any level other than it is just like, yeah, it’s competently made. It does look pretty good. I agree with you. It is well shot. And like Walter au and his wife are kind of, they have, they’re

Laci (00:13:40):

The anchor.

Matt (00:13:41):

Yeah. They have some lovely little moments, but it’s the John Hughes of it all, and you have to accept John Hughes and especially this portion of John Hughes’s career, which I want to focus on in the history segment where Home Alone made him realize like, oh, that’s the perfect,

Laci (00:13:57):

And I did see Home Alone in Marv with that whole scene of him alone with Christopher Lloyd.

Matt (00:14:04):

Yes,

Laci (00:14:04):

It’s all very him and Marv,

Matt (00:14:06):

But he knows that. Okay. But the reason Home Alone, it feels so special to kids and adults is because we’ll have the scenes, Kevin’s mom, mom in the truck with John Candy or the old man and Kevin in church. You got to

Laci (00:14:21):

Have the heart. No, you’re right. You’re right. The part I did not remember at all is the wink and blinking and nod part where they’re all looking at the same moon and that mom is so sad, is so sad to be alone from her. It worked on me in the moment, especially our kid was so into the movie and I thought, I don’t know. Okay. I felt sad for Dennis. I remember what it feels like to have to go stay over because your mom’s gone. It’s different from going to have a sleepover and your mom’s there if you need her, but especially if it would be with my Memaw and ppa, their stuff smelled different. Their TV was different. It only had five channels. They had weird food. They don’t know how to talk to me. My mom does. If Paw got mad at me or something, then I went to bed, I’d fucking kill myself. I mean, he’s just so sad in that moment. So misunderstood. And his parents, for their faults do get him.

Matt (00:15:20):

I guess once again, we come to this difference in how we watch movies where you want to relate to the

Laci (00:15:25):

I watched as a kid though.

Matt (00:15:26):

Well, yeah, and I’ve never seen this movie.

Laci (00:15:28):

Yeah,

Matt (00:15:28):

I remember the trailer and I remember him going, Hey, Mr. Wilson. But I’ve never seen one second of this movie. But I was just going to say,

Laci (00:15:36):

You

Matt (00:15:37):

Look to identify with characters and you can project yourself into the movie. And I’m kind of the opposite. I’m like all Mrs. Parents, but have I really have they earned me believing that this kid loves his parents, even though you should just accept it. But I don’t, for whatever reason

Laci (00:15:58):

In the way they treat him, I mean, they just get him. The dad likes to do some discipline theater, but I mean, they just know he’s a lot and they like him that way.

Matt (00:16:11):

I mean, nothing. This isn’t a terrible movie. I think what really frustrates me is that there’s absolutely nothing that I think is remarkable about it or special about it. And I cannot extract the knowledge of John Hughes cynically pivoting to just chugging along, making all this family stuff in the nineties, Beethoven, he wrote Beethoven one year before. There are identical scenes in Beethoven, like the scene where Charles Broden thinks he’s talking to his wife and he’s talking to the dog and goes and like, Hey, honey, want to do mouth sex with you? And then no, it’s a dog. Ooh. The exact same scene as here too. And it’s just all of John Hughes’s tricks.

Laci (00:16:51):

You’re really kind of shitting on this for me. I was hoping I’d bring it up for you instead of you. Shit.

Matt (00:16:56):

Well, maybe you will. That often happens when we discuss scene by scene and frame by frame the movie. Alright, let’s learn about the history of Dennis the Menace.

(00:17:34):

In 2018, Matthew Smith, PhD wrote For Psychology Today, much of Dennis’s popularity arose in the fact that he was such a recognizable figure. Kids like Dennis were on every street in the burgeoning American suburbs during the 1950s tearing around corners on their tricycles or hitting baseballs, kitchen windows. They were thought to be normal boys doing what boys did, or were they? Within a decade of Dennis and the menace first appearance in an American newspaper, his exuberant mercurial tendencies were beginning to be seen in a very different light. Instead of being perceived as a precocious, enthusiastic, and energetic, boys like Dennis were increasingly being described as impulsive, hyperactive, and inattentive, and being referred by school counselors to physicians for medical treatment. They’re right.

Laci (00:18:15):

Were right.

Matt (00:18:15):

Instead of being seen as part of the fabric of American society like Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn, boys like Dennis were being diagnosed with what we now call attention deficit, hyperactive activity disorder.

Laci (00:18:24):

I’m sorry, what did Tom in Huckleberry Finn do? Go out on it alone. Go out on their own fucking way.

Matt (00:18:30):

I mean, Huck, to be fair, had a much more dangerous life than Tom.

Laci (00:18:34):

I’m saying they’re hard to be around just like fucking calamity Jane. I’d sprinkle Adderall on her too. She’s fun to watch. That doesn’t mean they’re having a great time. I think people mistake people with lots of energy as being lucky to have that energy, but we have experienced firsthand how it isn’t fun when you do want to power

Matt (00:18:56):

Down. I think, yeah, I love medication. I want everyone medicated for whatever it is they want to be medicated for. I do understand there is a little conservative Mr. Wilson in the middle of my body screaming, but are we not? Maybe not with kids, with kids being so rambunctious because the kid is miserable. And I guess that’s what we are not seeing here with Dennis is Dennis is very, very happy

Laci (00:19:24):

Loving it. Right? The movie doesn’t totally get the assignment

Matt (00:19:27):

Because E is not when they’re writing this movie. And when Ketchum wrote his newspaper trip, he’s not thinking this child has pathological things wrong with him. It’s just all of us. Boy,

Laci (00:19:37):

Everyone knows one

Matt (00:19:38):

Handful, right? Yeah,

Laci (00:19:40):

Yeah. Everyone knows one and hates that fucking kid. You know who I was thinking of immediately, especially with the breaking and entering

Matt (00:19:47):

Our old next door neighbor? Yes. Because I was a Mr. Wilson to this child.

Laci (00:19:50):

Cause anyone would be was setting small fires. He slapped our kid, but none of it was his fault. Yeah,

Matt (00:19:55):

Yeah, yeah. No, and none of this is Dennis’s fault either. That’s why I said he needs to, well, all you can do is move away. Mr. Wilson. I’m sorry. Which is what we had to do.

Laci (00:20:05):

He’s very attached. The things he says to Mr. Wilson, he means,

Matt (00:20:09):

But there is a thing. I remember reading on the Road by Jack Kerouac. You go back and read these beatniks and stuff, and it’s like, I’m just going to fucking travel around America and just live my life. You read it now and you just think, oh, you were just bipolar or manic depressive. You needed a pill for that. Are we though ultimately losing a part of the human experience by just sanding down every

Laci (00:20:33):

And leaving people miserable? I mean, I don’t care.

Matt (00:20:39):

I guess the point is

Laci (00:20:40):

Maybe there’s less creativity in the world if that’s what you’re worried about. Maybe.

Matt (00:20:43):

I guess so. Yeah,

Laci (00:20:43):

Maybe. But if there’s more contentness and people not feeling just dreadful about themselves, I think that’s the better side of things.

Matt (00:20:53):

So Hank Ketchum created the first comic strip, Dennis the Menace in 1951. He wrote it and drew it all the way till 1994. He began his career as an assistant animator for Disney working on Pinocchio and Fantasia. He based Dennis on his own four-year-old son named Dennis. Now, the origin story is, which I’m sure is not true, is he was in his home studio working on some cartoons, and his wife came in, she said, our child has wrecked his bedroom. Or no, their son was supposed to be napping, but instead had wrecked his bedroom. And what she said is, your son is a menace. And he’s like, oh, okay. So the first dentist, the menace comic strip, which is kind of blurry, so we can’t actually see it. Who’s

Laci (00:21:35):

The cool guy in the fucking mobster suit or who broke out of jail? A fancy jail.

Matt (00:21:41):

Also, I think this is the other Dennis the Menace. So by a weird coincidence in Britain, another comic called Dennis the Menace debuted the exact same day in 1951.

Laci (00:21:51):

Shut up with a slingshot.

Matt (00:21:52):

Yeah. And that’s because Dennis the Menace, what? Well, Hank Ketchum didn’t invent the phrase Dennis the menace. There was a British singing town hall, like bunch of drunks get together. Like Dennis, the men and the Queen and the bup. I don’t know. So Dennis, the menace in Britain is called Dennis the Menace and Nasher in America, and our Dennis the Menace is just called Dennis over there. So yeah, Hank Ketchum wrote the Dennis Strip until 1994 when he passed it on to his assistant Ron Ferdinand and Marcus Hamilton. And then in 2020 2010, Ketchum son Scott also joined. The Strip continues to be produced to this very day. Okay, so the real dentist Ketchum. Well, he had a learning disability that his father didn’t understand. The real dentist said he wished his father would spend more time with him instead of the other dentist. The real dentist.

Laci (00:22:45):

I got it.

Matt (00:22:45):

The real dentist’s mother died of a drug overdose in 1959 after his parents had divorced. And his dad didn’t tell him that his mother died until after the funeral. And then the real dentist went to, here’s I got the perfect place for you son. Troubled young man Vietnam.

Laci (00:22:59):

Oh my fucking God, man.

Matt (00:23:00):

And afterward, he had difficulty finding steady work, was married and divorced multiple times and rarely ever spoke with his dad.

Laci (00:23:08):

Perfect.

Matt (00:23:08):

In the 1950s, they made a Dennis the MENA sitcom, airing on CBS between 1959 and 1963. And it was made in response to the success of Leave It to Beaver on a BC. Jay North played Dennis sort of legendary child star. And then as an adult he started a consulting business to help child stars navigate the business.

Laci (00:23:31):

That’s nice. As long as he wasn’t consulting

Matt (00:23:33):

Them

Laci (00:23:34):

Into

Matt (00:23:34):

Abuse. I want to know what kind of consulting was going on.

Laci (00:23:38):

I mean, I think he’s just acknowledging it’s toxic as fuck. You have no power as a child and your parents don’t either because the one making the money for the family.

Matt (00:23:48):

Yeah, I hope so. I hope it wasn’t okay. The first thing is give my company Power of Attorney. Just like, okay. The show ran in syndication forever. It was a huge staple on Nickelodeon in the eighties and nineties before Nickelodeon switched to original programming like Doug. And hey, if you would like to learn more about Doug, check out our Patreon load-bearing beams.com/no patreon.com/ load-bearing beams. And we have a Doug episode. Did you ever watch this Dennis the Menace sitcom

Laci (00:24:15):

On accident if we were on and there was nothing else.

Matt (00:24:20):

Yeah. Nickelodeon in the eighties was just Dennis the Menace. And Lassie.

Laci (00:24:24):

And Lassie.

Matt (00:24:24):

That was it. Because they

Laci (00:24:26):

During the day?

Matt (00:24:27):

Yeah, during the day.

Laci (00:24:28):

Then it got good at Nick and night.

Matt (00:24:30):

Alright. But as we were brainstorming about potential subjects for a mini series, if we wanted to pivot to doing more miniseries, I think we could do a thing on the nineties work of John Hughes after his run of, when we say John Hughes movie, an image is conjured in your head. The Breakfast Club, weird Science 16 Candles, Ferris Bueller. But in the nineties he was mainly a writer in producer, and I feel like we could cover that stretch.

Laci (00:25:02):

That’s interesting. Yeah. He’s such a cherished figure. However,

Matt (00:25:09):

And we haven’t covered a proper John Hughes movie, I don’t think, since

Laci (00:25:14):

Tom Malone.

Matt (00:25:15):

That wasn’t, he didn’t direct it.

Laci (00:25:17):

Oh God. I always think he does

Matt (00:25:19):

Since episode three of Load Bearing Beams in 2017 on the Breakfast Club.

Laci (00:25:23):

Oh really?

Matt (00:25:23):

Yeah. We’ll probably revisit the Breakfast Club at some point.

Laci (00:25:28):

He deserves it. It’s a huge part of my life.

Matt (00:25:32):

He only I deserve it. He only had eight movies that he wrote that he directed 16 candles, breakfast Club, weird Science, Ferris Bueller, plane Trains and Automobiles. She’s having a baby Uncle Buck and Curly Sue. But both before and during this run, he was also a very successful screenwriter on the National Lampoon Vacation movies on Mr. Mom. He wrote Pretty and Pink wrote some kind of wonderful and the Great Outdoors

Laci (00:25:54):

That Man Gets Me.

Matt (00:25:56):

But then there was a major turning point in 1990 when he wrote and produced, but did not direct Home Alone, which was the biggest hit by far of his career, one of the biggest movies ever. And I also think, I feel like this is based on nothing that he made Macaulay Culkin happen. And so maybe he was determined to make it happen again and again with other kids.

Laci (00:26:16):

He thought he found a formula. I hate when I think I find one I’m never right.

Matt (00:26:21):

I just wonder if that’s something he was trying to do. Because the casting for Dennis the Midis was enormous.

Laci (00:26:27):

It had to be. I don’t know where That kid is so cute. He, he’s, yeah, he’s cute fucking adorable. When he talks is cute. It’s just that it sounds like an adult is feeding him lines. And that’s weird.

Matt (00:26:39):

But that’s the Macaulay Culkin difference is Macaulay Culkin could have made this actually work because you have to be a real actor. And this kid just wasn’t, no offense to him.

Laci (00:26:53):

I guess that’s kind of what made this kid more endearing to me. I don’t think I needed a Culkin in another fucking movie like this. My girl plus Uncle Buck plus this. It’s just too many little blunts stinkers around. I can’t,

Matt (00:27:06):

Yeah, I’m not saying we literally needed kin, but you needed somebody who could act.

Laci (00:27:13):

Yes. But the more we talk about it, the more I think that the movie misunderstands what Dennis is altogether. And it almost doesn’t gel mentally a kid that carrying that smart and then also doing all these things.

Matt (00:27:26):

Yeah, I guess

Laci (00:27:27):

Whatever. It’s a weird ask.

Matt (00:27:29):

Whatever magic McCaulay Culkin had in home alone was he could make you believe that he’s smart enough to do all this stuff, but also an innocent, and you feel sorry for him and you think he’s funny and you think he’s cute and he can pull all that off at the same time. Whereas what’s frustrating about Dennis the Menace is he has no agency at all. He’s just a reactive character to me.

Laci (00:27:52):

But you’re absolutely right. McCulley Culkin is sympathetic because what happened to him, he did not do. We feel sorry for him instantly. And he’s scared. We feel scared for him. All that works where Dennis seems to just feel like he can’t just be in a house and he wants to touch everything and fix everything. And maybe he’s gotten in trouble enough to know, don’t ask for help for this. You just got rid of all the medicine that’s in the squeezy bottle. Just fix the medicine. It’s hard to know. It works for me. I really didn’t think this was one of those, you had to see it when you were younger movies. Damnit.

Matt (00:28:32):

No, it might not be because it being, I was feeling his lack of active role in the movie.

Laci (00:28:42):

Okay. Oh, like all the choices are being made behind the scene. He’s being fed these choices. Is that what you mean?

Matt (00:28:47):

Yes. But also because he doesn’t understand what he’s doing because he thinks he’s helping Christopher Lloyd at the end, but actually everything he does is just torturing the guy more.

Laci (00:28:58):

I see what you’re saying

Matt (00:28:59):

That that makes it less interesting. Even though there’s a million movies I love Beavis and Butthead, for example, which we’re very divided on where the whole joke is that they don’t understand anything that’s happening to them. And that’s hilarious.

Laci (00:29:11):

Failing your way up.

Matt (00:29:13):

Yeah. So it’s all in the execution.

Laci (00:29:16):

Well, I mean, we need to remind the listeners that you hate children.

Matt (00:29:21):

I do not hate children.

Laci (00:29:23):

You fucking hate ’em, Mr. Wilson. Yes, you

Matt (00:29:25):

Do.

Laci (00:29:27):

You like your children and you like other children that please

Matt (00:29:31):

You. You please me. This child doesn’t please me. Get this child away from here.

Laci (00:29:37):

I don’t know what the magic sauce is.

Matt (00:29:39):

No. I mean, yeah, I find it less interesting if you’re showing me kids on screen who are just being cute. Even as I’m like, yeah, I get it. He’s cute. And you can feel their parents right off beneath the camera being like, okay honey. And now I want you to look a little look like you’re angry. Now give me that pouty lip. There you go. Alright. So home alone, the major turning point. And so he only directs one more movie, curly Sue, and then he pivots to being a full-time writer and crucially producer on all kinds of movies that I didn’t know he was involved with. So Dutch in 1991, Beethoven in 1992, home Alone, 2 19 92, Dennis the Menace, baby’s Day out. Come on. Miracle on 34th Street.

Laci (00:30:29):

I hate that fucking movie.

Matt (00:30:30):

101 Dalmatians, which is him going back to the home alone. Well, again, you have the two robbers who are being tormented by the dogs.

Laci (00:30:38):

Correct.

Matt (00:30:38):

Flubber home alone three. So he is just so to me, very cynically, recognizing the formula and just chasing that home alone dragon again and again, and again and again.

Laci (00:30:49):

Sure. Or being asked to give him that special home alone magic, won’t you, Jo? It may not always be his fault, Matt.

Matt (00:31:00):

Okay.

Laci (00:31:03):

I don’t know why I’m taking up for him.

Matt (00:31:04):

Yeah, he’s fine. We’ll have to do a seance and ask him, was it your choice to write babies? Dad is. Yeah. He died night 2009. What’s frustrating is you can feel the John Hughes formula, which even includes the good stuff like the scene where Mrs. Wilson recites the poem to Dennis. It’s a little strange, it’s a little unusual. And then you realize this is literally also a scene from Home Alone too. But it works on the individual level. The actors are very good and sweet, and this is so unlike anything else in the movie.

Laci (00:31:35):

And I feel safe and I am a kid who’s in a strange place, and all of a sudden I feel understood again by this woman.

Matt (00:31:42):

And that scene is good because that poem is weird. It’s such an old sounding poem, but for whatever reason, it gets through to the kid without him understanding it and puts him to sleep. And that’s what’s really nice about that scene. John Hughes hires as his director, Patrick Reed Johnson, who will go on to Direct Baby’s Day Out, but they clash. And so he fires him and hires Nick Castle, who had previously directed The Last Star Fighter would go on to direct major pain. But the most interesting thing about Nick Castle is that he is Michael Myers. Hey, look at him. He’s literally was the shape in the original Halloween. He was buddies with John Carpenter.

Laci (00:32:19):

Okay. So he was just a guy. Was he in the industry besides,

Matt (00:32:23):

Yeah, he was John Carpenter’s friend. He was helping him out on the movie and trying to learn like, oh, so how do you make a movie? And I do think this movie looks pretty good, at least the way it’s shot looks pretty good. The cameras in

Laci (00:32:34):

Interesting places. It seems to consider everything that’s in the frame. And you’ve kind of taught me to notice when movies are doing that, just everything looks like a little postcard kind of.

Matt (00:32:44):

Yeah. And

Laci (00:32:45):

A sense of place. Sorry, there’s a real sense. I understand where everything is in this movie in the town,

Matt (00:32:49):

And it’s doing that very intentionally to construct this sort of idealized version of suburbia that could be a

Laci (00:32:56):

Yeah. And of course, me and the kid were both not a black child in sight.

Matt (00:33:00):

Oh, nowhere, anywhere. But however, I think there’s one, well, Paul Winfield plays the cop.

Laci (00:33:05):

There’s that.

Matt (00:33:05):

And it’s interesting because that scene feels like a racially inverse interaction between a cop and a black guy because he just profiles Christopher Lloyd is like, you look like you’re up to no good.

Laci (00:33:16):

Well, and the way Christopher Lloyd is choosing to speak, and you’re giving me the breeze, it’s very seventies talk of hip. He’s being hip in a non old man way.

Matt (00:33:34):

I mean, what do you think of Christopher Lloyd in this movie? I think

Laci (00:33:35):

He’s great. I think he’s scary as fuck. Weird. I mean, I’ve never seen more Uncle Fester than I did. The Face is the kind of grossness of it. How disgusting he will get the teeth. So I mean, he just always scared the shit out of me. I’ve always had a soft spot for anyone with a cocked eye. So when he takes that apple from that fucking child, and if that child doesn’t know how to go ask for another Apple, I’m so sad about that. Anyway, I find him very effective. I think his costume is interesting. The Healed Boots.

Matt (00:34:12):

I was reading Roger Ebert’s review. He gave it two and a half stars out of four, said that the parts his least favorite parts of the movie were the Christopher Lloyd parts because he felt like this character is way too menacing through the movie. And I agree with that, even though I would say that’s kind of why I like it.

Laci (00:34:28):

Yeah, me too.

Matt (00:34:29):

But I do see how special it is the job that Joe Pesci specifically did in home Alone. One who could be just menacing enough to also feel like you belong in this part of the world. Whereas Christopher Lloyd here does feel like he’s imported from a different movie, and I don’t think the chemistry is there with the kid.

Laci (00:34:52):

Yeah. I mean, that kid has chemistry with Mr. Wilson, with Martha. Am I saying that? Is that her name?

Matt (00:35:00):

It’s got to be

Laci (00:35:01):

Because the mom’s name. Is it not Martha too?

Matt (00:35:04):

All women were named Martha for a long time. George and Martha Wilson. Alice Mitchell, Leah Thompson is Alice Mitchell. Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

Laci (00:35:11):

But it’s really the acting of the, I just love that actress who plays Martha.

Matt (00:35:16):

Yeah, Joan Plowright.

Laci (00:35:17):

I love her. She just has such a way, and me and our kid both loves the little touch of the handkerchief tucked into the watch. My Memaw would do that. She always had a drippy eye. So it’s just right there if you need it. And I don’t know, there’s something, anyway, she might be selling all the chemistry here. It could be the big grownups in the room. So the fact that there isn’t any with Christopher Lloyd, I don’t know. I just always filled in safe hands with him. Again, I’m being, my opinion is diluted because of the nostalgia, because I’ve already accepted it for all that it is that I can’t imagine it a different way. And I didn’t realize I’d seen it so many times, but I’m like, oh, this. I don’t know why. I feel like I’m very in touch with those movies and I waited a really long time to bust out this one, and I don’t know why, which is me with, I’ve clearly seen it a million times.

Matt (00:36:13):

That’s me with Beethoven, which I watched

Laci (00:36:16):

Another one of mine

Matt (00:36:16):

To scout for the show. Would this be a good movie for us to talk about? I knew I watched it a lot as a kid. Every second of the movie is ingrained in my brain, the score. I was like, oh my God, the score. That’s

Laci (00:36:27):

So weird.

Matt (00:36:28):

The names of the kids, certain shots, certain line deliveries. That Big Nose. Yes. Rice. Exactly.

Laci (00:36:33):

Fucking Kid Rice.

Matt (00:36:35):

The giant nose on Charles Groins office building because he sells air fresheners. But because I watched it so recently, I was also noticing, oh, John Hughes is at it again. It’s Nickelback how you remind me of someday you can just play these songs at the same time and the same things will happen at the same moments. On the script, on page 18, there’s got to be an incident. So this movie, yeah, Mason Gamble, he was one of 20,000 actors who auditioned for this role. He would go on to work a little bit more. He was in Gatica. He has a small role in Rushmore as Dirk as Max Fisher’s friend Dirk. He retired from acting in the two thousands. The movie was a nice little hit. It got $117 million worldwide on a $35 million budget and a sequel. They assumed there would be a sequel. Walter Mattau was signed on for a sequel, but sort of unexpected career resurgence for Walter Macall in 1993. Yeah. Gru Old Men. Grumpy Old Men was later that year. Yeah. Grumpy and my fellow Americans. And they did an odd couple sequel,

Laci (00:37:40):

But I feel like this kicked it off. I mean, I didn’t know who he was until this movie and then he was so iconic to me.

Matt (00:37:46):

So you’d never seen JFK when you were a kid?

Laci (00:37:48):

Not at that moment

Matt (00:37:49):

When he was playing Senator Russell Long.

Laci (00:37:52):

What year did this come out?

Matt (00:37:53):

93.

Laci (00:37:54):

Okay. No, I hadn’t seen it. I was eight.

Matt (00:37:57):

They had signed him on for a sequel, but it never materialized. So they do a direct to video sequel with none of the cast back. Don Rickles plays Mr. Wilson.

Laci (00:38:04):

This looks fucking horrific.

Matt (00:38:05):

Carrot tops in it. Dennis the Menace strikes again.

Laci (00:38:09):

Who is that kid? Little JTT wannabe.

Matt (00:38:11):

Some kid,

Laci (00:38:12):

Some fucking guy. The dog’s aren’t even as good.

Matt (00:38:16):

That dog sucks. And also that dog’s dead. Well, this was 1998.

Laci (00:38:21):

The dog’s dead. Damn.

Matt (00:38:22):

Be a remarkable dog if it’s still alive.

Laci (00:38:24):

Is that Betty White?

Matt (00:38:25):

Betty White, yes. Jesus Christ.

Laci (00:38:27):

I mean, I’d fuck with it, I guess. Give it a whirl, but

Matt (00:38:32):

Alright, we’ll do that. We’ll do that.

Laci (00:38:34):

No, I don’t actually want to, I

Matt (00:38:35):

Don’t want, you’ll turn into me, I guess I’ll do a Feng Gully two video. Okay. Oh, I made a 25 minute video about Fern Gully two.

Laci (00:38:43):

Just the idea of Don Rickles having any sexual love match, any kind of chemistry. Excuse me, Martha and George. Fuck. You can tell they are into each other. What do

Matt (00:38:54):

You think Mr. And Mrs. Potatohead do?

Laci (00:38:58):

They take their penis out of their back of their butt.

Matt (00:39:00):

It comes out of the flat because that what can do. But he’s horny as hell for his wife Don Rickles place. Mr. Potatohead, you just went with it. You were just,

Laci (00:39:09):

I was just going to tell you how potatoes, fuck. I don’t know.

Matt (00:39:12):

Alright. Well that’s the history of Dennis the Menace. There

Laci (00:39:15):

You go.

Matt (00:39:15):

Alright, we’re going to talk about the movie now.

Laci (00:39:18):

Okay.

Matt (00:39:53):

Dennis the menace opens with Bugs Bunny. When Bugs Bunny appears in the Warner Brothers Shield, does it activate something in you, Laci?

Laci (00:40:01):

Yeah, I felt safe and like, okay, masculine like this just because of this.

Matt (00:40:06):

Oh, bugs buddy. I know him

Laci (00:40:07):

Well. No, just you love old nostalgic openings of things, credits that aren’t just Disney morphing into someone’s asshole.

Matt (00:40:15):

Yeah. When a studio is honoring its own history. But Warner Brothers right now stripping itself, selling the copper wire off. So we might not be seeing Bugs Bunny for much longer. Just

Laci (00:40:26):

Drug addict just living in a tusk.

Matt (00:40:28):

I was looking, trying to find out if this movie played in theaters with a Looney tune short before it, and I could not find an answer to that. So if anyone knows, let me know. But look, the point of this is The Bugs Pony opening is great. I was kind of shocked. We don’t have a cartoon opening, an

Laci (00:40:49):

Animated opening. Oh, got gotcha. A nod to the comic ness that it started from,

Matt (00:40:53):

Because the logo is very cartoonish, but

Laci (00:40:55):

It’s very Beethoven. It looks the same. It reminds me of the Beethoven

Matt (00:41:02):

And I just watched Beethoven and like I said, these movies, you can play them right next to each other and the exact same stuff happens at every single moment.

Laci (00:41:09):

Rice is such a character. Okay. I’ve never loved the opening scene. He’s the kids too precious. This would not happen. I mean, I know a lot of it wouldn’t happen, but I just don’t think it’s setting us up for success. But the rest of the movie grabs me. I also don’t like that he’s wearing overalls. No show underneath. I tried that. Look for this podcast. It was inappropriate. So I don’t know why this little boy thinks he can do it.

Matt (00:41:43):

It’s a challenge you have because you have this character who exists in the eternal 1950s, and the movie opens by showing the idyllic environs of whatever town this is. Any town USA, any town with a treehouse in the woods and a train track and a beautiful little arch bridge. It was a John Hughes production. So of course it was filmed in Evanston, Illinois, also Hinsdale, Illinois. And we first meet Mr. Wilson, Walter Mattau. He comes out, he smells the sweet air, he’s content with his life. And then he hears it and he hears.

Laci (00:42:16):

But wait, there’s a crucial moment. He gets mad at the paperboy because the paper lands right in the bush, which is perfectly parallel to where it’s gets to, but that’s cement showing Hal, he’s grumpy. He thinks people don’t do things his way are poof.

Matt (00:42:34):

Well, you mentioned that you think Mr. Wilson might also be on the spectrum. I know he is like Dennis is. I know he is. It is just kind of a law. This is also in Beethoven, which John Hughes also wrote and came out the previous year where Charles Groden also has to be, even if they didn’t think, they didn’t write it as, this is a man who is on the autism spectrum. The dynamics of these movies require a very uptight and regimented man,

Laci (00:43:00):

Precise way. There is a way we do things. This is how,

Matt (00:43:03):

That’s where you get the comedic tension and friction because it’s just a law. Everything needs to be in its right place

Laci (00:43:10):

In Beethoven. That’s the same dad from the Martin Short movie I made you watch.

Matt (00:43:16):

Yeah, that’s Clifford. Yeah.

Laci (00:43:17):

And he plays the same guy there. I mean, that actor just is that, oh, he’s,

Matt (00:43:20):

He’s one of cinema’s

Laci (00:43:21):

Grip drums. But he is neurotic, right? He’s just perfectly, he gets an A tizzy in just the best way. It works every time for me.

Matt (00:43:28):

Also, Charles Groton’s character’s name is George and Bonnie Hunt, his evers suffering wife is consisting George

Laci (00:43:35):

Beethoven’s

Matt (00:43:36):

Pretty. Oh, George, come on. Beethoven means well and we all love Beethoven.

Laci (00:43:41):

It’s just a fluffy mutt. And then they went and made Marma Duke and that fucking dug.

Matt (00:43:47):

The challenge though of the movie is like, we got a kid. It’s 1993. Kids aren’t exactly out roaming the streets they were back then. But this kid is at a time, he’s wearing these suspenders. He’s a slingshot in his back pocket. He has baseball cards on his bike spokes for whatever reason. And he’s trailing a string of tin cans. It’s

Laci (00:44:08):

A safety thing.

Matt (00:44:10):

I thought that they were going to be doing a, I thought one direction the movie could be going is like a Brady Bunch movie like this Kid’s from the fifties, but the world is treating him. It’s the nineties. And I’m glad it doesn’t, but there’s a couple of ways it suggests it could be that, because Dennis does kind of seem like he was plugged out of the 1950s.

Laci (00:44:27):

Oh shucks. Like that.

Matt (00:44:29):

And kind of has like, oh, Mr. Wilson, come on, will you wise guy, eh,

Laci (00:44:34):

Give me a break you, I’m nailing this.

Matt (00:44:38):

So in his wagon that he is towing, he is, he’s gotten giant locusts, a steak,

Laci (00:44:48):

The most disgusting beast.

Matt (00:44:51):

And this kid spreads fear wherever he goes. Cats scatter just of the sound of him. Who knows what he’s doing to them.

Laci (00:44:57):

There’s

Matt (00:44:57):

Also this underbelly, undercurrent of madness of the world that Dennis just kind of suggests, or that the movie suggests that because later Christopher Lloyd’s tying him up and he’s like, I get tied up all the time. Right. Whoa.

Laci (00:45:10):

Okay. Whoa. I got to show you how to do it. There’s a good tie. There’s a bad tie and there’s always a safety word.

Matt (00:45:15):

But Mr. Wilson, he has to run into his house and hide. And he goes upstairs, gets under the grabs, all of his medications, gets under the covers and pretends to be asleep. And Dennis the menace just fucking invades the house on uninvited, walks up the stairs. And I think watching the movie a second time, I think it’s very deliberate that Dennis the Menace is walking up the stairs in the Michael Myers posture as directed by Nick Castle comes on screen. And yes, I did this just by putting the Halloween score.

Speaker 3 (00:45:46):

I know you did

Matt (00:45:46):

Under the Dennis the Menace footage, but that’s when it really unlocked. Oh my God. This is visually Halloween. Dennis the menace is the shape. He is Michael Myers. He’s evil incarnate. Come to collect his dew,

Laci (00:45:58):

Myers the menace.

Matt (00:45:59):

So Mr. Wilson has to play the most elaborate games to hide from this fucking kid, rather than just waking up and being like, get the fuck out of my house, and scaring the shit out of him. Just do that.

Laci (00:46:11):

Right. That hint that there’s a sweetness in him.

Matt (00:46:15):

I think that he has the exchange with Dennis’s dad where he says, I don’t want people to think I’m an asshole. I don’t want people to think I’m a grumpy old man. Although there’s something to that title, and I know I’m in the right. I like this neighborhood. I like kids. I like everyone. Your kid though is really, really?

Laci (00:46:34):

Yeah. But then there’s the scene where the two girls hide behind his fence and he stands up and goes, girl does he like kids. Get out of my yard.

Matt (00:46:42):

He wants kids to be a certain way.

Laci (00:46:43):

He wants parallel kids like our kid. Parallel play.

Matt (00:46:47):

Yeah,

Laci (00:46:47):

Play over there. I like the scenery.

Matt (00:46:50):

Yeah. Good pepper, good spice in the soup. It’s not necessarily what I want, but you can be over there.

Laci (00:46:55):

But

Matt (00:46:56):

He does intervene in the hide and seek game. So he is like,

Laci (00:46:58):

That’s what I’m saying, to the two girls that hide behind his fence. Oh, you’re saying the other thing where he just totally messes up the scam Dennis has going.

Matt (00:47:07):

Yes. So Dennis starts poking and prodding. Mr. Wilson. Oh, poor Mr. Wilson must be sick. That’s why you don’t wake up. That’s why you don’t wake up so good. It’s

Laci (00:47:16):

Awful.

Matt (00:47:16):

Shit. I better give him an aspirin. And he just slingshots the aspirin down his fucking throat. And Mr. Wilson shoots up and nearly dies in Dennis f Flees for his life. That’s the opening.

Laci (00:47:28):

Yay.

Matt (00:47:28):

Why do you hate this so much?

Laci (00:47:29):

I don’t like Dennis’s performance in the opening. I think he’s up too much mischief. I don’t know why. It’s never worked for me. I think I could feel, even as a kid, I can see the strengths. He’s too precious. And then you were saying he’s just not a professional actor, but he’s getting so much mileage out of being adorable and tiny and cute in the face and all that. And even as a kid, though, I was not buying it,

Matt (00:47:57):

Roger Ebert says in the opening to his review that the problem with Dennis the menace has always been that Dennis has to be too, he has to be at an age where he should know better,

Laci (00:48:09):

But he says he’s five. And I keep thinking that’s not a 5-year-old.

Matt (00:48:13):

This is like a 7-year-old playing a five-year-old.

Laci (00:48:15):

Yeah.

Matt (00:48:17):

But I think that that gets to what was unsatisfying to me about the movie is unlike Kevin from home alone, he has no agency. When Christopher Lloyd goes through all the traps, Dennis doesn’t set them up and doesn’t even aware of them happening. And so you don’t get the satisfaction of this guy’s being outwitted by a kid who’s deliberately trying to outsmart him. So they’re just not satisfying.

Laci (00:48:44):

And he’s not even being a stinker. He’s not even fucking with this guy. He thinks it’s cool to be a hostage. He’s just kind of enamored with, he’s never seen anyone quite like this man. I don’t know. Let’s get there.

Matt (00:48:58):

I guess so

Laci (00:48:59):

We can wait for that part.

Matt (00:49:00):

Yeah. We meet Leah Thompson and Robert Stanton as his parents are like, Hey champ, what you been doing? They certainly haven’t been watching their kid. What’s been going on? Then there’s another tension of the movie is it’s the nineties. Parents are obsessively following their kids everywhere.

Laci (00:49:15):

But look at how they have Alice dressed. I mean, she’s meant to look like Leave it to Beaver. He looks, they all look out of time.

Matt (00:49:23):

And the dad is specifically styled to look like the sitcom actor. And also Hank Ketchum, the creator of Dennis.

Laci (00:49:28):

And this Yes. Is when you showed me the illustration of him on the sofa. Well, that’s just exactly, I don’t even know who that guy is outside of this movie.

Matt (00:49:35):

I He’s been in stuff.

Laci (00:49:36):

Well, good for him. Obviously I know who that is because the reality of having a child like this means you’d have elaborate locks on every door and something goes bong when he leaves it. The reality of this is not, we completely trust our five-year-old to cross the highway, go up a tree, cross, collect seven year locust type bugs that will surely bring a plague upon her house and have the dog just with them.

Matt (00:50:09):

You would be what if it runs away? And if these are like yuppie parents, yuppie parents we’re the most neurotic of all. Even if they’re not good parents, they are like, oh, we got to get ’em into the best school and also got to have all the locks and got to be warned about Stranger Danger. Don’t talk to anybody. They’re all trying to molest you.

Laci (00:50:25):

They more seem like hippie parents, right? They’re just super loving and accepting of their kid. They want to give him the room to grow and blossom and be whatever weird, quirky thing he is. They seem like they’re from the generation before who dodged the war and went to hate Ashbury instead,

Matt (00:50:42):

Which would be a better world when people are nostalgic or the boomers are nostalgic for the fifties. Read any Stephen King book and kids could just be a kid and walk around town when your bicycle to the town square,

Laci (00:50:53):

But also look at any Stephen King movie and they were being molested left and right by their own parents, and there had no resources

Matt (00:50:59):

There. There is that. There’s the flip side of the

Laci (00:51:02):

Coin. They didn’t want to be at their house because of all the molesting,

Matt (00:51:05):

But it actually would be indeed be a better world if you knew your neighbors very well. Yes. And there was more of a community like, oh, that’s my neighbor’s kid who I also have a relationship with and I will look out for him. And

Laci (00:51:18):

Just a general attachment to everybody, but not a super attachment to anyone. Because that’s always the fear is if you get the overly clingy neighbor that you can’t shake, if that’s an adult, it’s different. If it’s a kid, you shut the door. If it’s an adult and you’re always kind of have that fear of becoming friends with the neighbors.

Matt (00:51:35):

Even as I know that my life would be better if I was not just for practical reasons, but I would be more fulfilled and happier as a person.

Laci (00:51:42):

You would just walking by going, oh, hey Jim. Just knowing their name

Matt (00:51:46):

There it comes trouble.

Laci (00:51:46):

I mean, and you wouldn’t mind being the lovable grump, but you’d be the lovable one. Not just, oh, there’s that fucking guy that won’t turn his head or

Matt (00:51:54):

Wave. How’s life treating you stoked? Like I slept with its wife. Oh, there he

Laci (00:51:59):

Goes. I get no respect as the wife.

Matt (00:52:02):

Toast shouldn’t have bones.

Laci (00:52:05):

That’s a good one.

Matt (00:52:06):

My wife’s a bad cook. That’s the setup to that.

Laci (00:52:09):

Right. But I’m, to be clear, I’m a great cook. I add the bones. I add the bones. Yeah. No, it’s a little perk.

Matt (00:52:16):

You got to have bone and toast. So this town is this idyllic fifties place and Christopher Lloyd is this interloper who sees it. He is like, oh, I’m going to corrupt this town. And Paul Winfield the cop is like, Hey, you look like a scary presence. And I’m the cop who’s supposed to enforce rules around here and kick out any invading, funny looking people. So there’s that weird undercurrent of this movie that nothing is done with it at all.

Laci (00:52:43):

True. I mean, it is supposed to be like a, is that what you call a bedroom community? I never know that what anyone means by that. A sleepy town. You know what it is? It’s the town in Civil War that isn’t affected by the Civil War and still is. The shops running. They’re going to go try on a dress while there’s a cartel everywhere else in the United States. Yeah. I mean, you’re kind of mad at the town right away. I am as an adult, but as a kid, I’m just like, wow, chillers, gee, buttons. Really? The bike’s in this fucking place button. I dunno.

Matt (00:53:17):

Leah Thompson, there’s this thing about her having to go back to work, which was also a thing in Beethoven with Bonnie Hunt. I don’t know if I’m ready, Charles. Oh, you got to go back to work. And he’s

Laci (00:53:25):

Fucking five years old.

Matt (00:53:27):

I know.

Laci (00:53:27):

Are you still breastfeeding?

Matt (00:53:29):

And in Beethoven it was. I have three kids. The oldest is 16 years old. We need a babysitter for all three of them.

Laci (00:53:34):

Is it really that? It’s not that.

Matt (00:53:36):

I mean, she’s probably 14.

Laci (00:53:38):

Oh, by the way, everyone listening. Happy birthday Matt.

Matt (00:53:41):

Thanks.

Laci (00:53:41):

Are you 38 or three? Nine or four?

Matt (00:53:44):

I’m 38. I believe

Laci (00:53:45):

So. In two years we’ll have a celebration.

Matt (00:53:50):

We’ll go on a twister. Woo. So Leah Thompson’s got to go back to work just like in Beethoven or she is going back to work, but she’s struggling because what am I going to do with my dentist?

Laci (00:54:01):

Is it not odd that the first thing we see her do at work is she’s giving a board meeting? I guess we can assume she had a career before and then she’s just going back to her place. But really, were there companies that did this for five years? Let you just go away and what are you selling commercial space? Or do you work for a company that’s buying a commercial space?

Matt (00:54:24):

And then she goes from that presentation, which seems like it doesn’t go well. She keeps bringing up, I have a child.

Laci (00:54:29):

Hi baby.

Matt (00:54:29):

Do you have to have mansion that you have a child in this meeting? I don’t think we want to hear about that. And so the meeting doesn’t seem like it goes very well. Next we see her, she’s in an office pool, like an open floor plan,

Laci (00:54:41):

A cubicle,

Matt (00:54:42):

But not even a cubicle. So it’s like, did she just get demoted between

Laci (00:54:45):

Scenes? No, I don’t think she ever had an office.

Matt (00:54:49):

Okay. And Dennis’s dad, he’s the big office guy. You’re blah, blah, blah.

Laci (00:54:56):

They never say where he is going or what he does.

Matt (00:54:58):

This is just John Hughes’s whole thing is the

Laci (00:55:01):

Family. He has a name badge, so he is clearly got clearance. He’s going to severance. He doesn’t even know that he has a

Matt (00:55:07):

Wife. He’s going to the SD floor. So they get a call from the Wilson’s and Leah Thompson talks to them and then she goes, Dennis, Dennis did you should aspirin and Mr. Wilson’s mouth. And he is like, yes. Dennis’s dad is like, you have to go sit in the corner until you think you feel sorry for what you did. And Dennis says, well, great. I already feel sorry.

Laci (00:55:27):

Logical.

Matt (00:55:28):

Right. That’s where I think that the signs are there and they’re showing he didn’t do this out of Malevolence. He is just a dumb little kid who thought, Mr. Wilson needs my help. He needs a pill. And then when he finds out he did bad, he instantly feels bad about it.

Laci (00:55:42):

Yeah. Oh yeah. I’ve never taken him to be a little shit. He just takes a lot of things upon himself. Does not ask for adult help or ask questions, except for when he’s being that kid that asks too many questions. He kind of switches between the two. There’s multiple scenes where, and then what does this do? And then how does that work? He’s a very curious kid and I think he takes things literally like, okay, I know when I have a fever, he’s saying all the things his mom says. Right. That’s what’s cute about the opening scene is he’ll catch his death a cold. He’s not saying things he would normally say he’s doing what he thinks his own mom would do. He’s got a fever. You need an aspirin. And so it doesn’t matter how you get it out the bottle or in into his mouth. Sometimes you got to trick people to take the medicine. Especially children. He’s doing what he thinks a mom would do.

Matt (00:56:35):

Right. Like that. I like that you pointed out. Yeah. You can hear him just repeating the mom stuff,

Laci (00:56:39):

All of it, and poor little lamb. And I’m like, oh, I get that from here too. I get lamb from two places

Matt (00:56:45):

Because Laci calls her children Lamb. Oh, hello Lamb.

Laci (00:56:47):

That is morphed to Lamby because I’m neat.

Matt (00:56:50):

So then Mr. Wilson is outside and he catches Dennis’s father and he is like, oh, see, see Mitchell come and talk to me over here. Why are you saying it like that? I was trying to, what are doing? He is doing a big sort of, oh, where are the Martha? Where are the GD blonde garden lanterns?

Laci (00:57:11):

Matt’s been working on his impression all morning to try to get this right and he’s caught onto a tick of his voice. That is funny. But I don’t know that you’ve really gotten the,

Matt (00:57:22):

Well, damn

Laci (00:57:22):

The Majesty. You had a couple other ones I liked better.

Matt (00:57:25):

Well, early Homer Simpson is an imitation of Walter Mathau when he talked like this Co, come on Marge, let’s go to church. Oh

Laci (00:57:34):

God. Early Homer Simpson really gives me the creeps,

Matt (00:57:38):

As they say on Doughboy all the time. The Early Simpsons episodes were about a family that goes to church and drinks milkshakes and does their homework. And that was when it was the most popular it ever was. Hello fellow Christian. Are you going to be in Sunday services?

Laci (00:57:54):

Just about how normal families fuck up constantly and are degenerates, but they go to church and fix it.

Matt (00:58:02):

Well, Mr. Wilson is confronting Dennis’s father. You got to take care of that. Dennis. He’s a rascal. He is and a

Laci (00:58:09):

Menace.

Matt (00:58:09):

And Mr. Mitchell’s like, well, he’s just being a fucking wiener about it. He’s not taking any responsibility

Laci (00:58:15):

To be fair. The time to catch a person and have a real talk with them is not when they’re rushing out of the door to go to work. You were with the postal service for 42 and a half years. Mr. Wilson, you punch, you leave because it’s time to leave.

Matt (00:58:29):

But back in his stop me. Everyone wasn’t in such a hurry back in his day. Did you see? And if you needed to have a man to man talk, you had one. And the man wasn’t like, oh geez, I got to get to my job.

Laci (00:58:39):

Oh no. I think he just realizes there’s no fixing my kid. My kid’s just like this.

Matt (00:58:45):

He’s not playing it like that. He’s playing it. He’s not aware that his kid is being annoying

Laci (00:58:49):

Because it doesn’t annoy him.

Matt (00:58:50):

Yeah. But Mr. Wilson, it is very important to him that he not look like the bad guy. I’m not the bad guy, Mitchell. I’m the victim.

Laci (00:58:59):

I’m the victim. And as a kid, this conversation would really piss me off. Like, what a fucking dick. He wants to not let that boy do what he wants to do. And he wants to be a nice guy. What teas? So watching it as an adult, I’m like, that’s an insight He knows he can be perceived in a way. He does not mean to project. He’s probably his whole life. He’s been taken for something he does not mean. And he’s got resting bitch face

Speaker 3 (00:59:29):

And he

Laci (00:59:29):

Sounds like this biggest rest of a bitch. So he knows, he puts people off. He doesn’t want to also put off the children. And we meet, oh George,

Matt (00:59:39):

Mrs. Wilson played by Joan Plowright, the great British actress.

Laci (00:59:44):

I need a wide ber here.

Matt (00:59:45):

Alright.

Laci (00:59:45):

Oh, George. No. Oh, now I have an orgasming. Oh, fuck it. I’ll get to it later.

Matt (00:59:52):

Yeah, it’ll come over the course.

Laci (00:59:54):

She will.

Matt (00:59:56):

So Bonnie Hunt is constantly saying, George, and in the Simpsons, when George HW Bush moves in across the street and Bart Simpson becomes his own, Dennis the menace, Barbara Bush keeps going. George Bart doesn’t mean anything by it. So today’s an important day because Mr. Wilson is going to go potentially win a flowering prize at the Garden Society. And he’s talking about this flower. It’s a marvel, Martha. It opens before your eyes in the I except just like it opens before your eyes in the light of the full moon. Okay, now you want to as fuck. Shut up.

Speaker 4 (01:00:30):

Who else has a night blooming muck, orchid flowering this year? It is an awfully, humbly looking clown. George. Hang the looks of the face. It opens before your eyes in the light of the full moon. It’s a marble. Martha,

Matt (01:00:45):

I meant to look up this flower like what is this flower? It’s like, it’s an investment of 40 years for a ten second payoff. I mean, all right, there’s, there’s something very beautiful about that, that you spent four decades of your life for this thing.

Laci (01:00:57):

He’s a nurturing man. I think that’s a sign that it’s his cat, right? He doesn’t have one, but he has this beautiful garden and you have to nurture those things to grow. God knows I’ve killed a many, many green thing,

Matt (01:01:10):

And it’s a change from the comics that they are childless. That adds a dimension to them. In the comics, they have adult children. I don’t know which version is more interesting. Like, well, I raised kids too, and this is not what they’re like.

Laci (01:01:27):

The version in the movie to me is more interesting.

Matt (01:01:30):

Well, yes, it certainly adds a lot of pathos to them. So he has to go to his friend Margaret’s house. Margaret is this little bossy pants little girl. Also over there is Joey. We got our central trio. We got Joey, we got Jason, we got Martha. And Martha plays a mean trick on Joey where she’s like, close your eyes and kiss me and then puts a baby doll’s naked ass in front of him and makes it, kiss it, go on, kiss it, kiss

Laci (01:01:52):

Baby rump, kisser,

Matt (01:01:53):

Kiss my baby’s

Laci (01:01:54):

Ass. Oh God.

Matt (01:01:56):

I don’t know. This really struck me. I was like, oh, this is not okay. Get this off

Laci (01:02:01):

My screen. Funny. It’s funny, as a kid,

Matt (01:02:03):

What do you think of Joey and Margaret?

Laci (01:02:05):

I think they’re cute. They work for me. But it’s also helpful that they’re not around much.

Matt (01:02:10):

They’re not around much. And most of the time it is the individual kid staring dead eyed into the lens and reciting lines like that’s a mommy does. Don’t you know that?

Laci (01:02:21):

Yeah, it’s a lot. Shot shot. You taught me that when the actor needs a lot of shots or a lot of coaching, it’s just them and the camera in the frame. Because that can be edited. They could do that a hundred times. So with The Rock and Jason Statham, it’s like Jason would’ve been fine, but the rock needed to just be in his own frame for a while.

Matt (01:02:40):

This is shot exactly like Bob’s and Jaw back and forth.

Laci (01:02:44):

It’s here’s a tit. There is a

Matt (01:02:46):

Tat. You’ve got a small dick, Joey. Oh yeah. Well your mom sometimes. Sometimes it’s a creative choice. Sometimes you got to do it by necessity. Also with kid actors, you only get so much time with them each day, so you don’t want to waste both of them at the same time. So get as many single shots with one kid as you can

Laci (01:03:07):

Waste both of their asses. Right? We only need you guys together when you’re climbing up the tree. And that’s true. They’re probably not even in the same garden together most of the time. I do think the other two kids help to normalize the world. Dennis is in. Dennis makes a bit more sense and seems a little more normal when you see the precocious of both of these children. I mean, all the children are just a little too, can you imagine the teacher that’s to teach these fucks,

Matt (01:03:31):

These fucking, they’re babies. They’re toddlers who then leave their house where they’re supposed to be being babysat. Just leave and go to the

Laci (01:03:38):

Woods. Right? I have an arrangement. I’ve made an arrangement. Are you going to fuck Mr. Margaret? You going to fart on Margaret’s dad? Is that the arrangement or does it just mean you’re going to be the carpooling person all school year?

Matt (01:03:53):

Is that what he’s into Mrs. Mitchell?

Laci (01:03:55):

I mean, just why keep saying it three times? She says arrangement. Are

Matt (01:03:59):

You paying them? So they sneak off to the woods to build themselves a fork because there’s an abandoned tree house in the woods that they’re going to remodel.

Laci (01:04:06):

Doesn’t sound like they’re building shit.

Matt (01:04:07):

Alright, well, the Garden Society where Mr. Wilson, oh George. Mr. Wilson’s going for a giant, the biggest day of his life, the Garden Society. And I like that they then have to correct. It’s the selection committee. It’s a subcommittee of the Garden Society and the subcommittee is played by Bill Irwin and Billy Bird. They were also a couple at the airport and home alone.

Laci (01:04:28):

I love them so much.

Matt (01:04:29):

She’s got lots of earrings, big dangly

Laci (01:04:32):

Ones, dangly ones. But it is cute that they always fuck up on the word. That would be the most prestigious little moment for George. And then who won the switch glasses? George Wilson

Matt (01:04:46):

Damnit. We present him this plague. So he is very pleased to have won, but he still just scowls at

Laci (01:04:55):

Everybody soup till that’s so autism coated, so excited. And he aggressively smooches his person, his one and only person, Martha. And then he knows socially he’s expected to address the crowd. He just, he’s so painful for him. That’s why gardening is a one-man job. If you wanted to be social, it’d be a, and even that’s kind of

Matt (01:05:18):

One

Laci (01:05:19):

Man

Matt (01:05:20):

That night. There’s just a billion kids playing at hide and seek in the street. Oh God. Did I want to do that? We did do that a lot

Laci (01:05:27):

When I was a kid and there were mosquitoes and it was hot. What I want to do is I want to do it there.

Matt (01:05:31):

Okay. Yeah. In Evanston, Illinois. But yeah, hide and seek outside at night was a thing that we would, if there was a block party, the kids would go play hide and seek. But this is just a normal night.

Laci (01:05:41):

It’s like with all the adults are getting drunk. You would run around. You didn’t have parents.

Matt (01:05:45):

Yeah, yeah. But most of the time you had parents who were like, no, no, you can’t just go run around outside. They would

Laci (01:05:51):

Get run over. No, same. Every New Year’s, all the parents would get drunk. But because we’re all at the same house, kids do whatever the fuck

Matt (01:05:57):

Thing. And as we see the police cars in this movie, they will just speed into a yard. This could happen at any moment. But yeah, a billion kids are playing hide and seek and the Wilsons are just sitting on their porch watching and taking it all in. And Mr. Wilson sees that Dennis is collaborating with a little punk named Gunther or no, yeah, Gunther, who’s cheating on his behalf. And Mr. Wilson’s like, oh, I got to go intervene in the game. I can’t abide any cheating in the hide and seek game there, Martha. And so he tells Dennis or no, tells Gunther. Gunther, I just spoke to your father. He wants to take you over to the ice cream shop. You’re going to get some yummy ice cream. Dear Gunther and Gunther’s like, oh boy, ice cream. And he runs home.

Laci (01:06:38):

No. Gunther only knows how to say one word at a time. Nope.

Matt (01:06:43):

You know this movie a lot better than I do. My apologies.

Laci (01:06:45):

Okay, wait, let me do Gunther.

Matt (01:06:50):

So Mrs. Wilson is like George, when he gets home, his daddy isn’t going to know about the ice cream. He’s going to be so disappointed. And Mr. Wilson’s like Martha, he needs to learn disappointment. His life is going to be filled with heartache and tragedy, a foot short for his age, and

Laci (01:07:06):

You just sound like Dr. Evil now.

Matt (01:07:09):

So we meet this, he

Laci (01:07:09):

Gets fricking she with the fricking laser and his fricking hit

Matt (01:07:12):

Okay. But then we meet

Laci (01:07:14):

The dirtiest man,

Matt (01:07:15):

Switchblade Sam, Christopher Lloyd and Laci. I mean, he’s just an afterthought in this movie, you think?

Laci (01:07:21):

Because I think they thought they were cooking. I know with his high heeled boots, and I mean, I love his wardrobe the whole time. The weird long underwear under his stripey shirt from the Gallagher attire for smashing a watermelon shirt. That’s what he looks like. You can’t tell me there’s no place to wash your face off. I feel like Christopher Lloyd was like, this is how I’m really going to get into this character. I need to be filthy.

Matt (01:07:50):

He too is a bandit out of time. He’s a hobo from the Great Depression

Laci (01:07:54):

Off a train.

Matt (01:07:56):

And he’s like, oh, oh, watch this town over here. Okay, but there’s so few. Every time we’ve talked about Christopher Lloyd, there are so many fewer Christopher Lloyd movies than you think. They just loom so huge in your memory that each one is so special. And you mentioned, what about Dennis the Menace? And now this just doesn’t do it for me good. But the movie doesn’t know what to do with him, and he is menacing and terrifying until he actually gets integrated with Dennis and then it just becomes goofy little kid comedy farting and beaning and

Laci (01:08:27):

He doesn’t know how to see, it’s not that he doesn’t know how to share the goofy, the goofy chalice because when he is with Gomez in the Adams family, they’re a fucking delight and he’s got chemistry with the kids in that movie. So I think he just needs to be around a pro. And what you’ve got here is a puppet child that’s been hand selected out of 600 children, not for anything about acting, just he looks just like Dennis the menace. Now act your ass off around him.

Matt (01:09:00):

You know what? Yeah. Okay. Yes, that’s a good point. If there was only Joe Pesci in home alone, if he didn’t have Daniel Stern to be the goofier one to play off of, he would be a lot more menacing. But it would also be like, this doesn’t fit in this movie. He’s too scary.

Laci (01:09:16):

You guys aren’t doing tit for Tad. Doesn’t make sense here. You need to be reacting to actions and not each other’s words because when the adults are actually speaking to him, it’s like, oh, you don’t know what you’re nanny nanny boob. I don’t know. You can’t have a rabbit attack with a child.

Matt (01:09:34):

He’s good. He’s giving a good performance.

Laci (01:09:36):

Yes,

Matt (01:09:37):

But it doesn’t cohere with the movie.

(01:09:39):

And I think I have no reason to believe this. I just blame John Hughes because of how convinced I am that he’s like, no, there is a formula. I know exactly. I did this with Home Alone. Hughes is exactly how it has to work. And I present to you to make my case that the original director of Beethoven was fired for creative differences with John Hughes and the original director of Dennis the Menace was fired for creative differences with John Hughes. And I bet it was like, John, this can’t be exactly like home alone. This just isn’t working so well. Christopher Lloyd isn’t making sense tonally with this. And he’s like, no, I know what I’m doing.

Laci (01:10:12):

I bet it’s that the selection process for Dennis the Menace was it takes a special actor to act around what this kid can’t give. And I think Christopher Lloyd realizes there’s a void and he’s trying to fill it and not bring the kid in, but just I’m going to do hi. I’m a hijinx man all around him, and if he acts really big, it will suppress that. That kid’s not giving him anything.

Matt (01:10:42):

He’s trying. But in home alone, Kevin doesn’t have that much FaceTime with Harry and Marv. He feels like he does, but he actually doesn’t. They’re very rarely in the shot together.

Laci (01:10:52):

And when, oh God, and I love home alone, but the stupidest things that Culkin says is when he’s talking to them, oh, are you thirsty or are you hungry for more? Whatever the fuck are you try and get Mecu. I don’t know any of the words, but it’s all a bunch of horses asses. Right? It’s all very like, it’s Dennis Menace. Yeah. How did they pick McCulley Culkin?

Matt (01:11:17):

Well, he was an Uncle Buck, which was directed by John Hughes.

Laci (01:11:22):

Okay.

Matt (01:11:22):

Now I don’t know how he got that whole acting family. I don’t know. So I think that this was a huge national casting call because it’s like, oh, John Hughes is looking for the next Macaulay Culkin. So it was probably so much bigger and more high profile.

Laci (01:11:38):

Well, and I think John Hughes really, really thought it had to be a esque person. I don’t know that it was huge. It was huge because John Hughes made it way too important.

Matt (01:11:50):

The villains in Beethoven are also too scary for that movie. They’re like, we want to get animals who we can shoot and inject with chemicals and see what effect will this poison have on a St. Bernard and they’re playing it and there’s a villainous veterinarian. Why

Laci (01:12:06):

Am I picturing a Natasha in a

Matt (01:12:09):

Boris? He has two henchmen, Stanley Tucci and Oliver Platt who are being very, very silly.

Laci (01:12:15):

And

Matt (01:12:15):

I guess maybe if Christopher Lloyd had two hobo henchmen, that too would make it make a little more

Laci (01:12:19):

Sense. Right? He’s like, Hey, hey, hey, to keep it cool, we’re trying to blend in here. Funny. They’re always fucking up. It’s like they’re still dirty, but they steal some clothes off the lines and they’re trying to dress like this city that doesn’t exist. A person who actually makes more sense to the real world coming in there and a little pipe, Hey, officer, and that’s stealing from you. That’s more interesting. Then you get yourself into the garden party and then Dennis is the one that finds you out. That’s more interesting.

Matt (01:12:47):

Yep. You just made the movie 30% better. Yeah. If you had Otis from Superman, gene

Laci (01:12:53):

Hackman’s,

Matt (01:12:54):

Lex Luther has, he’s the smartest man in the world, but he keeps these incompetent people around. Then says why Genius people always need somebody who they can feel superior to.

Laci (01:13:02):

Yes.

Matt (01:13:03):

So where are we? I think we’re two minutes into the movie Fuck sink.

Laci (01:13:10):

This is why we’re the best met.

Matt (01:13:11):

The three kids are going to their fucking tree house and they start talking about where do babies come from? I know where they come from. They come from a man has to install them. How do they do that belly button? But first time I left in the movie, they’re in the tree house. Dennis is making his stupid friend hold the nail, and he’s like, okay, here I go, 1, 2, 3. And you assume, oh, he is going to nail the shit out of the kid. No, he does it perfectly.

Laci (01:13:37):

Does it perfectly Twice until he says, okay, now Joe, you take the hammer and Margaret, you hold the net. Why are you switching it up? I

Matt (01:13:46):

Dunno, but that’s

Laci (01:13:46):

Good. She’s going to die. Yeah.

Matt (01:13:48):

That’s smart comedy filmmaking right there, you guys.

Laci (01:13:51):

Good job. And it’s off camera,

Matt (01:13:52):

Which

Laci (01:13:52):

Makes it more confident. I guys give us a call

Matt (01:13:57):

As they’re up in there. Tree house. Christopher Lloyd walks by, he’s like, oh, sorry. And could all go ahead and snatch his snatch.

Laci (01:14:05):

That’s screaming value.

Matt (01:14:07):

I know

Laci (01:14:07):

That. Haunted Annabelle.

Matt (01:14:10):

So yeah, he steals haunted Annabelle, and then Martyr comes down. She’s like, you guys took my dolly. And they’re like, no, we didn’t. We swell.

Laci (01:14:16):

But she’s very upset because it is antique. It was like her grandma’s or something.

Matt (01:14:20):

She’s actually very funny. And she goes, I’ve been

Laci (01:14:23):

Robbed.

Matt (01:14:25):

But they say, no, there’s no robbers in our town. This did remind me the looming threat as a kid of robbers, which just such a stupid word, robbers.

Laci (01:14:36):

It had to have mostly come from a Christmas story, just the ding.

Matt (01:14:40):

But then that was coming from 1950s. Cowboys or cops and robbers, cowboys and Indians. Just

Laci (01:14:48):

No low income families allowed in our space here.

Matt (01:14:52):

So Christopher Lloyd is just casing the neighborhood, smoking a cigarette just like Harry and Marv looking for, oh, then that house, we can get into that house. Leah Thompson, we mentioned her giving her anecdote at work or her presentation at work

Laci (01:15:05):

Pointing to a painting on the wall for some fucking, and this painting, it’s like she had someone like Sal from Mad Men work her up some drawings just based on her five minute pitch of you put the milk in the back of the store because everyone needs milk,

Speaker 3 (01:15:21):

So

Laci (01:15:21):

You make ’em walk all the way through. It’s like, Leah, this is an understanding that anyone who’s ever organized a store already knows.

Matt (01:15:30):

Yeah, but she’s telling them if you put the toy store on the third floor, is that what she says?

Speaker 3 (01:15:36):

Yeah.

Matt (01:15:36):

Then everyone else will want to rent the first two floors. Their kids are going to make you go up to that third floor and they’re like, Mitchell, if you could stop being on your period for a minute and sit down.

Laci (01:15:46):

Very pointedly though, it is the only other woman in the room and in her mind she has worked hard and not had children so that she could rise up in the ranks and she’ll be god damned. If someone who got to do all of it gets to come in here and be smart, I feel for her.

Matt (01:16:02):

Which one?

Laci (01:16:03):

The one that didn’t get to have any kids. Clearly she wants them or feels as society feels she should. Instead, she’s a cold career woman. And now here’s this fucking leave it to Beaver. Beaver walking up in here and trying to be smart. That’s French Bun Roll Woman’s, what do you call it? That’s French twist woman’s job. Look at Buzz. What the fuck’s buzz doing in here? Sorry,

Matt (01:16:27):

What are you talking about?

Laci (01:16:28):

It doesn’t matter. No. Okay, next scene. And now we need a babysitter. Why do we need a babysitter overnight?

Matt (01:16:36):

It’s just, it’s not overnight. It’s just, oh, we’re going out to the orgy. I don’t know. So we need a babysitter. So they hire Natasha Leone, who’s just chewing so much gum.

Laci (01:16:45):

Very tough on me. Matt going to Matt is going to have a

Matt (01:16:46):

Gum heavy

Laci (01:16:47):

Movie time.

Matt (01:16:48):

Okay. Natasha Leone like, Hey, I’m spunky and I’m Natasha Leone esque. You’ll be seeing me in movies for 40 years.

Laci (01:16:55):

Good.

Matt (01:16:56):

Yeah. Also, AI is the future. We need to embrace it Way to beat the odds. She owns an AI company, so she’s like a big evangelist for that. She’s

Laci (01:17:03):

Fucking smart

Matt (01:17:04):

Laci.

Laci (01:17:05):

She was going to get left behind, beat ’em at their own game.

Matt (01:17:07):

She brought a helmet. She’s like babysitting. Dennis is dangerous work. I heard

Laci (01:17:13):

Bring a helmet and wear pants.

Matt (01:17:15):

We’re caught between a lot of shit. Dennis has spilled paint in the garage, so he’s vacuuming it up and then he squirts paint into the air and it lands on Mr. Wilson’s barbecue pit, but he doesn’t notice. And there’s paint all over his chicken.

Laci (01:17:26):

He’s barbecued paint and he doesn’t smell any fumes.

Matt (01:17:29):

And then he eats it. He’s like, I think Martha, I think I’m eating paint in my chicken here. And he’s like, paint. And meanwhile, Mickey, who’s played by Devin Rat Ray Buzz McAllister shows up. I do like that. They’re like, he’s a stud.

Laci (01:17:43):

And I like the Dennis is like, no, he’s fucking not. And I never noticed this as a kid, but as an adult, I’m like, I’m sorry. The boyfriend is giving Dennis a bath and that’s the more appropriate thing because I guess she’s a girl. So Dennis wouldn’t feel comfortable with her doing it, but I mean, they would not do this in a movie now. But number two, me and our kid both found it so fucking sweet that this boyfriend would do this and he can’t read. He’s having a hard time reading the book. This is a cute scene to me

Matt (01:18:14):

Because he’s like, his girlfriend is duping him, getting some free babysitting out of it with the promise of sex or whatever. Hey, we’ll make out on the sofa with gum, but you got to give this kid a bath. Now, here’s the thing. If Dennis is so regimented that he needs his bath every night, fine, but parents baths are not that big of a deal. He doesn’t need to constantly be taking a bath every time there’s a babysitter over. Not to mention the most elaborate bubble bath with the bubbles stressing me the shit out, going over the top, over and over again. But here Buzz is just reading to him from a book. He’s got a learning disability just like the real Dennis. And he’s like, he can’t read these words. And then

Laci (01:18:56):

He’s over analyzing the book that he’s reading, even though it’s a child’s book.

Matt (01:19:01):

And I guess this is just more evidence of the literal minded way that Dennis reads the world. It’s not thinking more deeply into anything. It’s like, well, the lesson from this is you got to listen to your parents when they tell you what to do. Not like, well, there’s a reason you need to be listening to your parents or Right,

Laci (01:19:19):

Right. You just listened to him. The rule is that,

Matt (01:19:22):

So Mr. Wilson is like, I’m going to sneak over to Dennis’s house and investigate, and I’m going to prove that he shot paint into my barbecue chicken. I just know he did Buzz and Natasha Leon making out on the sofa. Dennis sees them. He’s like, oh, gross wolf. So he goes outside and rings the doorbell and runs away, and they’re like, oh no, what’s going on? Some dang kids are pranking us while we’re trying to make out.

Laci (01:19:46):

I will say that Ding Dong ditch or whatever was quite the thing when I was growing up.

Matt (01:19:54):

Yeah. Yeah. I was aware of it. I think I probably tried it a few times, but it was more a thing from tv.

Laci (01:20:01):

I did it.

Matt (01:20:02):

It’s great fun. Everyone should try it now. Everybody’s got their ring cams

Laci (01:20:08):

That

Matt (01:20:08):

Try to do what? Weapons. If you’re a kid listening to this, try that tonight with your friends. See? See what happens.

Laci (01:20:13):

Fun. Does everybody run out like that? Just that’d be the best flash mom ever. Just a few people could organize doing it at two 17 in the morning.

Matt (01:20:20):

We, but make sure you shout we. So he keeps repeatedly interrupting their make out with the doorbell. While Mr. Wilson sneaks around. He is looking at the vacuum cleaner, which is sucked up a golf ball, and then it shoots a golf ball into his anus.

Laci (01:20:36):

He’s like the GD waiting pool. The weight.

Matt (01:20:38):

Oh, he steps into the kid’s pool. It’s the kitie pool and all the GD waiting pool.

Laci (01:20:44):

Waiting pool. All the kids are waiting these days. Just

Matt (01:20:46):

A waiting about, yeah, that’s the opposite of waiting. You can’t do any waiting. This is a sitting pool. It’s a sitting the gosh darn sitting pool. So Buzz and Natasha are like, we’re going to prank the kids back. So I’ll go up to the second floor with a bucket of water. You go onto the first floor with a bucket of flour, like powdered flour and I’ll dump the water. You dump the ha ha ha. We’ll get them.

Laci (01:21:10):

And the tack,

Matt (01:21:11):

Oh, and a thumb tack pointy and out on the doorbell,

Laci (01:21:14):

Very home alone,

Matt (01:21:15):

Mr. Wilson rings. They throw the flour onto him. Oh no. I’ve been pranked with water and flour and then I’ve

Laci (01:21:24):

Been battered. It’s a batter. He literally was battered,

Matt (01:21:28):

Assaulted and battered. Whipped. I really like Devon Rat Ray’s reaction though. He sees that he’s done this to an old man and he’s like, alright, well goodnight. Let’s shuts the door. Are 40 minutes into this movie. This movie has just been vignettes. There’s no engine to this story whatsoever. It’s just a bunch of shit happens. Dennis then has to go to Mr. Wilson’s house to give him an, I’m sorry for fucking up your life card. But Mrs. Wilson’s like, Hey, just go up. He’s still sleeping. He’s an old man and old people love to wake up early, but he’s still asleep that old bastard. So just leave the card. I’m just a dumb old woman who doesn’t know that you’re going to go fuck up everything. So go leave the card in his bathroom. Alright, I will. But then once up at the bathroom, he sees Mr. Wilson’s false teeth. Ha ha, I got to play with these and then loses two front teeth down the drain,

Laci (01:22:17):

The most realistic fake teeth I’ve ever seen, even with gold fillings. Really? They just took what his teeth would’ve been.

Matt (01:22:27):

I got those gold teeth down in Siam in 1944.

Laci (01:22:33):

Don’t want to lose that character.

Matt (01:22:37):

Oh, Dennis is like, I got to fix these dentures. And he replaces them with

Laci (01:22:42):

Chiclets.

Matt (01:22:43):

I can’t even say that word. So we see Mr. Wilson pose with Moses. It’s truly horrifying.

Laci (01:22:50):

I mean, I know it’s a big reveal and that’s the thing, but why is he not opening his mouth or saying anything to anyone while he goes through and by the, he’s very much hiding his teeth.

Matt (01:23:02):

He’s acting like he knows and he’s hiding.

Laci (01:23:04):

He’s acting like he knows it. So why not just,

Matt (01:23:06):

You don’t have to make that face while you smile. Smile.

Laci (01:23:09):

It’s like just because you’re being forced to smile big doesn’t mean you have to just remove your teeth from, show me those Trumpers.

Matt (01:23:19):

Get the scene where Christopher Lloyd is hanging around a playground and Paul Winfield the cop, the only black character in the movie,

Laci (01:23:25):

Die Hard. No farts. I’m racist.

Matt (01:23:28):

No, he’s in a Terminator one.

Laci (01:23:31):

That’s it. That’s it.

Matt (01:23:32):

So he sees Christopher Lloyd and I mean, I don’t know if this is intentional, but it is like the black character who’s invaded the white suburb and the white cop comes up to the black kicker. He is like, what are you doing here?

Laci (01:23:45):

I think the

Matt (01:23:45):

Movie’s like Any Trouble about it, the

Laci (01:23:46):

Movie’s like We Need Someone Black.

Matt (01:23:49):

So they have a black cop to show like, no, this isn’t a racist town. Well, this is a town that hates hobos. Hey hobo, get out of here

Laci (01:23:55):

Euthanize. Yeah.

Matt (01:23:56):

He says, I run a nice clean town around here clean, so why don’t you just get lost? And Christopher Lloyd says, well, I was going to breeze on out of here until you

Laci (01:24:05):

Stopped me. No, si on. He said I was going to get out of here until you stopped and gave me to Breeze.

Matt (01:24:11):

My mistake.

Laci (01:24:12):

Yeah, no, it’s like my favorite thing. He says the whole time. So it’s kind a baby. Meanwhile, the mom is dressed like fucking Polly Pocket. What is her hair? It turns out that both mom and dad have a business trip on the exact same one night. Just one night. So they have a fun little montage of them calling absolutely everything, everyone in existence except for any sign of a family member. Are they both orphans? I don’t get

Matt (01:24:40):

It. They’re estranged from their family. They don’t talk to them. What if

Laci (01:24:42):

Uncle Buck, what if he were available this nice little callback?

Matt (01:24:46):

Oh, hey, I’m Uncle Buck. I sound just like your neighbor. Dear Mr. Wilson.

Laci (01:24:50):

Perfect. Yeah, but just Dennis has really run through the town

Matt (01:24:56):

Because Leah Thompson has to go on a business trip to Oklahoma City and her bitch coworker is like, Hey, you know your big trip to OKC? I hear you’re trying to snag off of it. Well, you better not because I won’t be able to cover for you, and it’s not fair that you’re woman who has a child who gives a shit. That’s what I’m here to say.

Laci (01:25:16):

Right? Well, but it’s like, okay, so what? This is a woman’s trip. We are the only two. There were a lot of men at that fucking

Matt (01:25:23):

Table. No, I think it’s just the other coworker flexing her

Laci (01:25:28):

Seniority

Matt (01:25:30):

Or just showing it. I don’t have kids.

Laci (01:25:32):

I get to live

Matt (01:25:32):

It up. You better or not expect that I’ll be able to go just because I don’t have kids. But you do. That doesn’t mean your free time isn’t more important than mine.

Laci (01:25:41):

I’m with her

Matt (01:25:44):

Because this happens. You see that Leah Thompson, it’s more important to her that she needs to go on this trip to Oklahoma City to nail the big,

Laci (01:25:53):

God forbid anyone figure out she has kids.

Matt (01:25:56):

And then this coworker even says, I don’t have kids, but I do have a life line for line verbatim. Also a line in Beethoven, David Duffy and Patricia Heaton as the yuppie investors at Charles Groton’s company. They say that, do you have kids? No. We have a life. And they’re also making a lot of jokes about where can I get a good espresso in this town?

Laci (01:26:18):

They just sound like a poor man’s Todd and Margo, if you ask me from Christmas vacation, who are the best yuppies next door?

Matt (01:26:28):

Yes, I remember. Oh, Julia Louis Dreyfuss and that guy. Yeah.

Laci (01:26:31):

Now why is the carpet all wet? Todd? I don’t know. Margo. I don’t know. Margo signed Todd is my next tattoo right there on my shoulder.

Matt (01:26:42):

Great. So the look

Laci (01:26:44):

Forward to that

Matt (01:26:44):

Parents, they’re like, we’re going to find a babysitter if it kills us. They go through the whole Rolodex. Every babysitter hangs up terrified. There’s a visual joke where every single teenage girl they call has a different weird, fancy phone. This phone, see-through this phone’s shaped like a hamburger.

Laci (01:26:57):

I had a see-through phone.

Matt (01:26:59):

And then eventually they land on the only people in town who they haven’t called yet, the Wilsons.

Laci (01:27:06):

They say Yes.

Matt (01:27:07):

Now the movie starts where Dennis has to be babysat by the Wilsons and he says to Mr. Wilson, Mr. Wilson, if I can’t be around my mom and dad, the only person I’d want to be around in the whole world is you and Walter. Meth is so funny right here. He just stares at him for a minute. I can’t tell you how deeply moved I am.

Laci (01:27:25):

I think it’s such a sweet thing to be told and for him to be such an asshole in response. But

Matt (01:27:31):

No, who gives a shit? You’re a dumb kid. You don’t know what you’re saying.

Laci (01:27:36):

Five year olds remember things.

Matt (01:27:38):

Not my problem.

Laci (01:27:38):

He’s online.

Matt (01:27:40):

So then there’s seating in Mr. Wilson’s office and Mr. Wilson is just looking at it, the cold coins he owns through a magnifying glass. Okay? Yeah, this one’s gold

Laci (01:27:48):

Too. He’s a collector

Matt (01:27:49):

And Dennis is just asking him questions and Dennis Wilson says, how come you ask so many questions? And Dennis, my least favorite thing in the entire movie, he goes, I’m only five years old. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t know which God, you could hear Kevin McAllister saying that, Mr. Wilson, I’m five years old. There’s a lot of stuff I don’t know.

Laci (01:28:10):

Right? In fact, that is how he kind of talks to the lady who asked him if he’s alone at the store. Lady, I’m eight years old. Do you think that I’m actually at the store by myself?

Matt (01:28:22):

Gross.

Laci (01:28:22):

Gross.

Matt (01:28:23):

It makes me want to fucking puke.

Laci (01:28:24):

I hate that you’re making me come to you on this movie when I was, I really loved it.

Matt (01:28:32):

I love he’s doing the asking a billion questions, which is this something a kid on the spectrum would do. We only know our own kids?

Laci (01:28:45):

Did our oldest do this? Because that would be the another type of person on the spectrum.

Matt (01:28:51):

Never the why questions. No,

Laci (01:28:54):

Not over and over and over again. I think this is a trope that they say kids do.

Matt (01:28:57):

Yeah. Which I’ve never seen, but I’m sure it exists.

Laci (01:29:00):

I mean, this kid is very intelligent, so he’s very curious. Curiosity is a huge sign of intelligence. And I mean, if he can’t do, he’s going to ask. So he can weaponize those things later.

Matt (01:29:12):

And he asks him about his, why is your safe? Why does your safe look like books? That’s because I need to keep the crooks out of my safe books. What’s your code to your safe? Is it just your address and the look of horror on Mr. Walter’s face? Like, well, gosh darn it, it is just my address.

Laci (01:29:32):

It’s very familiar.

Matt (01:29:33):

So later, Dennis is just going fucking apeshit in the bathtub, splashing and splurging everywhere and just endlessly singing around the mountain. Then she comes, and this is when I thought, oh, he is our child, our 9-year-old who also sits in the bathtub and just sings over and over and over again the same thing

Laci (01:29:51):

And splashes. And in fact, the point is to splash the water out of the tub.

Matt (01:29:55):

Yes. And I do love Mrs. Wilson. She’s the best character in the movie. She’s in the next room, hears him, joins in just under her breath.

Laci (01:30:03):

She’s

Matt (01:30:03):

Coming around. Oh, this’s a good

Laci (01:30:05):

Song. She’s not just letting him do his thing. She’s enjoying that. He’s doing his thing. So

Matt (01:30:09):

Sweet. It is sweet. But then his bath is over again. These parents must be obsessed with cleanliness. Make sure he takes a fucking bath. Mrs. Wilson. My God. So he comes,

Laci (01:30:23):

He is a dirty child. I mean he spends his entire day in the woods

Matt (01:30:26):

And shit, who give the shit what’s going to happen? He going to get parasites dirty. The

Laci (01:30:30):

Linens.

Matt (01:30:32):

So Dennis is just left on his own in the bathroom and he is like, whoops. Do we sue? It’s over here in the medicine cabinet, starts mixing all these tonics

Laci (01:30:40):

And no, he squirts nose spray. And it’s fun because it does squirt straight into the air and he says, old faithful. Oh, ne old faithful, old faithful. The guys are, look at it. Gosh.

Matt (01:30:54):

And then starts mixing like aftershave and mouthwash and fucking

Laci (01:30:57):

Doesn’t mix anything

Matt (01:30:58):

Arsenic. And

Laci (01:30:59):

He does not mix anything. The nose spray is empty, so he knows he needs to fill it. So he fills it with mouthwash and then he is like, oh shit, the mouthwash is empty. I’ll need to fill that. So he fills it with bathroom cleaner. It all makes sense.

Matt (01:31:11):

Look, I know it makes sense.

Laci (01:31:12):

It makes sense.

Matt (01:31:14):

Six, it’s not your fault, Dennis. It’s your parents’ fault. They need to be arrested. But then the best scene in the movie, Mrs. Wilson is tucking him in. How about if I recite my favorite poem from when I wish your age? And he’s like, all right. Poetry’s kind of lame, but, and she’s like winking, blinking and nod one night and she just recites just this old fashioned British poem about some fucking people.

Laci (01:31:38):

It’s not people, it’s your face winking, blinking,

Matt (01:31:41):

Nod. Oh, okay. I thought those were just British names.

Laci (01:31:44):

No winking his left eye, blinking his right eye. Nod is your

Matt (01:31:47):

Head. I thought it was a nod to Mr. Wilson, like Mr. Wakin. So she says this and I don’t know, it’s sweet. You feel the cynical reproduction of stuff that has worked in earlier John Hughes movies and even in the bad movies that he writes, he will always have the moment where you’re like, you really did just nail something really real about the way it feels to be a kid or the way it feels to be poor, the way it feels to go to high school or whatever it is

(01:32:15):

That makes me forgive all the shit that’s annoying about you, John Hughes, but you’re now really cynically repackaging it, even as I think this individual scene works, not so much, which when we see that Dennis is looking out at the moon and then we go over to downtown Chicago where Dennis’s dad, he’s in his hotel room and what’s he doing? He’s looking at pictures from his wallet of his family. Oh, I miss my family. And then we go over to Oklahoma City to the travel lodge by the airport and Dennis’s mom, Leah Thompson, the way we see her, she’s staring down at her wedding ring and the way this is set up is like, is she about to take that off so she can have an affair that is seriously what I thought was going to happen, just the way shot she going to fuck Howard the duck right here? Is that what you’re telling me? She’s going to fuck Duck Different movie, the Duck

Laci (01:32:59):

D movie. It’s a whole different movie now.

Matt (01:33:01):

But no, she’s just looking at her wedding going, I remember that I married and I miss my family.

Laci (01:33:07):

Great family,

Matt (01:33:07):

But we’re all under the same moon,

Laci (01:33:10):

Even that criminal.

Matt (01:33:12):

And then in this great little moment, we transition over to the fakest looking moon on the fakest looking

Laci (01:33:18):

Set. It’s beautiful though.

Matt (01:33:19):

Well, yes. It’s like a magical realist moment. It reminds me of the movie Night of the Hunter. It has sort of a storybook feeling. This is a terrifying movie, but I also can kind of feel like I’m in a fairytale.

Laci (01:33:32):

Who he also reminds me of is the villain from the box trolls. There’s something very long fingered, and I think that guy, the one that loves cheese, wants to be a part of the White Hat Club. Do you remember this character? I

Matt (01:33:44):

Don’t remember that movie.

Laci (01:33:45):

He wears the same shoes as him. He’s got weird long hair. Anyway, I know box trolls is much later than this movie,

Matt (01:33:54):

But I think they’re going for this primordial sort of a

Laci (01:34:01):

Witch. There’s something about the fingers and the teeth and all that

Matt (01:34:05):

Of some sort of nature-based creature.

Laci (01:34:08):

And really all it is, is someone aging someone poor

Matt (01:34:11):

And our fears of those things.

Laci (01:34:13):

Exactly. Or bad hygiene,

Matt (01:34:15):

And how can we turn them into something that it’s okay to make fun of and discriminate

Laci (01:34:18):

Against. Yeah, exactly.

Matt (01:34:20):

So that’s this. And so that’s this Mrs. Wilson gets,

Laci (01:34:26):

That should be your sign off when you have a talk show later. And so that’s this.

Matt (01:34:33):

And the magical realist notes are even playing on the score. And Mrs. Wilson, when she gets done with dinner, she gets a little misty eyed and she goes into Mr. Wilson’s room. Well, she’s having these beautiful little moments.

Laci (01:34:43):

She goes in the Mr. Wilson’s room, it’s not hers.

Matt (01:34:45):

She’s having these beautiful little moments of self-discovery while Mr. Wilson’s just tripping on his, oh no, my dick, I landed poorly on the floor.

Laci (01:34:54):

Martha, my dick.

Matt (01:34:58):

Well Martha, my penis Martha, come look at what happened to my old dick. Oh, and Dennis gets woken up immediately by his dog barking. So he goes to sneak over to his own house to get the dog to come over. I guess

Laci (01:35:10):

He’s homesick.

Matt (01:35:11):

And Mr. Wilson’s in bed. Mrs. Wilson gets in and he is like, I think the little rat put mouthwash in my nasal spray and toilet cleanser in my mouthwash.

Laci (01:35:20):

You nailed it. You fucking nailed it.

Matt (01:35:22):

And she says, George, why would he do that? Because his little rat bastard, I told you. And then she says, I read him blinking, blinking and I did not read it. Excited. You’re a vulture today.

Laci (01:35:36):

No, I want you to get it right. If I can help to do that,

Matt (01:35:39):

You go ahead

Laci (01:35:41):

Reading a poem line by line to him, the way her mother used to read to her made her nostalgic and misty and realize how important that poem must have been to her as a child and made her feel like, oh, I just passed something on. I just gave a five-year-old exactly what he needed and maybe when he’s 60, he’ll remember this poem. And that it was comforting to him. And just that feeling of like, I would’ve been a good mother. I know how to nurture. I am patient. How could I not be patient? I’m married to this fucking guy who’s got so many damn rules and she lets him be him. And part of that is not overwhelming him with her thoughts and feelings. And so in the rare occasion when she has one, he should fucking listen to her. She asks for so little, she is the beard for him, then makes him look somewhat normal to the rest of society. Your a little respect.

Matt (01:36:34):

And he assumes, she’s like, George, why did we never have kids? Was your urethra’s fault or whatever. That’s not what she’s saying.

Laci (01:36:42):

No, just that that was nice to get to do it this way.

Matt (01:36:46):

And she says a pretty cutting line to him. The problem is I feel something very good and I’m not allowed to tell you about it now I’m going down to get some liver oil cup of tea. If you never had kids, it’s not that she regrets never having kids, but it does mean if it does make you feel a little connected to a lineage, I’m a part of something bigger that is going to live past me and connects me to the things that came before me. My mom told me this story. Her mom told her this story. Now finally I get to pass it on. I didn’t realize that that was a thing missing from my life.

Laci (01:37:24):

Also, when you don’t have kids, you’re very acutely aware that you will never have grandkids. And so she never thought there would be a time in her life where she could be so physically close to a child because she lives next door to him and he’s so comfortable with her that she could have that thing that you can’t miss it if you’ve never had it. And now she’s having it and glad she does.

Matt (01:37:48):

This actress would later go on to be the nanny in the John Hughes 101 Dalmatians movie.

Laci (01:37:53):

You have these puppies. Na.

Matt (01:37:58):

So

Laci (01:37:58):

Mr. Wilson puppies. The puppies, I’m good at her.

Matt (01:38:03):

No, you’re very good at her. You’re very good at

Laci (01:38:05):

Her. Thank

Matt (01:38:06):

You so much. So Mr. Wilson’s like, oh darn it. I better go down and deal with the old rife down here. And so

Laci (01:38:11):

She only needs to tune up every 25 million miles.

Matt (01:38:16):

So he goes down, he thinks he’s seeing her sitting in the chair. He sees hair coming from beneath the chair. Oh, there’s my wife. I’ll talk to her. I suppose, Martha, I’m not terribly good with emotions and feelings. I just as soon not discuss serious things. I could have never been a father because I have no fatherly feelings within my soul. Let me give you a big old smooch now.

Laci (01:38:40):

No, you’re missing the sweetest line, but all that I am is for you or something. All that I have that is love is for you. You bring it out in me and it is all with you. Now smooch me with my eyes closed because I’m a teenage girl, doesn’t want to see the kissing.

Matt (01:38:59):

It would be pretty oppressive to be like the life partner of a person who says, I don’t have much love for human beings. I exhausted all on you, so you better

Laci (01:39:08):

Be worth it. No, I’m not. That’s not what he’s fucking saying. He’s saying that against all odds, she saw something in him that he didn’t even know was in him, and she brings it out in him and she’s enriched his life. If she weren’t in his life, he would be the loneliest, saddest man on the block. He knows that and she does not ask for much, and he appreciates that. So when she says something like that to him, he’s like, well, fuck, I need to fix this because this is not a kind of woman that rings this bell often.

Speaker 3 (01:39:37):

It’s

Laci (01:39:37):

Nice and lovely and you can’t fucking make it cynical, Matt, by not understanding it. You fucking Wilson type.

Matt (01:39:43):

Well, I like all of that. I think that everything, you

Laci (01:39:46):

Totally find a way to miss it though,

Matt (01:39:48):

To I’m just trying to be funny and entertaining and move things along.

Laci (01:39:51):

No,

Matt (01:39:52):

No. This is going to be an over two hour episode.

Laci (01:39:54):

I didn’t like what you said there.

Matt (01:39:56):

Well, everything that is good about this movie is these two performers and how they interact and their chemistry together. I like them a lot. I wish the movie was just about them. So he starts making out with the dog, which is the exact same thing that happens to Charles Groton in Beethoven. He gets in bed with, he thinks his wife Bonnie Hunt’s like, oh honey, yeah. Oh, let’s Beethoven. Oh, no, no, no. Same thing. This

Laci (01:40:22):

Dog turned me

Matt (01:40:23):

Gay. No, no, the same thing. He doesn’t turn him gay. The same thing happens in both movies. The wife then comes in while he’s talking again and says like, oh, what do you do in there, George? Because they’re both named George. So Mr. Wilson kicks the dog out of the house, which is reasonable. It’s not their dog. How did it invade in the middle of the night

Laci (01:40:42):

He was being a good dog. Where are the GD garden lanterns?

Matt (01:40:47):

It’s just an interminable scene in the attic where Mr. Wilson’s just fiddling around with stuff. And Kevin, sorry, Dennis

(01:40:54):

Is like, Hey, Mr. Wilson going to get tormented with shit in your attic. But he does have the great line, Martha, where are the GD Green garden lanterns? And Dennis’s mother calls like, Hey, I’ve gotten delayed at the airport and Oklahoma City. Will you please watch Dennis one more night? I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry. Of course we were dear. But the garden party tonight is happening tonight. It’s the most important night of their entire lives. Will Dennis ruin everything? We’ll have to watch and find out. And there’s this shot. There’s this shot where Dennis goes back to his house and the way that this is shot with him walking down the street, him jumping through the hedges and then going into his own driveway, the camera then lingers on the driveway and Christopher Walken steps up from behind the hedges. And again, this movie was directed by

Laci (01:41:48):

Christopher Wakin.

Matt (01:41:49):

You know what I mean? Christopher Lloyd, thank you.

Laci (01:41:52):

Oh no, I didn’t know what the fuck you meant. I’m like, wait, really?

Matt (01:41:56):

And I’m here too. I’m in this movie.

Laci (01:41:58):

I mean, I know you’re about to make a fucking Michael Meyers reference right now, but I was like, I didn’t catch that.

Matt (01:42:05):

And if you’re watching on YouTube, I will have it on the screen for you.

Laci (01:42:09):

Matt made a little thing

Matt (01:42:10):

And it has to be deliberate the way that Christopher Lloyd steps out. And it is scary. And you feel like, okay, this is all building to a final confrontation that’s going to be just the pinnacle

Laci (01:42:23):

Look. It even zooms in. It doesn’t just linger. It goes

Matt (01:42:25):

In. Yes. Just very overt references to Halloween, which did make me my pleasure. Centers were tickled a little bit. Oh, I love Halloween. One of my favorite movies. Speaking of Halloween, my favorite movies from the seventies. Another favorite movie of the seventies of mine. Jaws one of my favorite movie period. As you all know.

Laci (01:42:44):

As you all know,

Matt (01:42:44):

You all are well acquainted. And our great friend past and future guest, Jen walks into walls. Jen got me these great bits of merch got me this.

Laci (01:42:52):

She has the world. She lives in Orlando, Florida. Sorry for doxing you. She has just cool shit. In no exception is her movie theater. And they’ve always got the best popcorn buckets. And this one is an actual pale and a buoy.

Matt (01:43:10):

The buoy that they use to shoot the shark and slow him down. And this is just a great idea for a crop, for a cup, a very worn down looking buoy that you can drink margaritas out of, which I will be doing well. Hell, I’ll do it tonight. It’s my birthday. And then this popcorn bucket, which is from the Amity Island 50th annual Regatta, which I a tale, which would love to attend. I would just love it. The

Laci (01:43:34):

They both came together. They were a set.

Matt (01:43:36):

Yes, it’s the’s the billboard from the movie, but with the graffiti added of the shark and the woman going Help shark.

Laci (01:43:44):

I love it.

Matt (01:43:44):

Thanks too. Now that I look at it, I guess, did they alter her face right there? I dunno. What’s the story of this bucket? That’s for another podcast.

Laci (01:43:53):

Oh good. An entire,

Matt (01:43:54):

It’s the garden party.

Laci (01:43:55):

It’s a garden party

Matt (01:43:56):

Party and be just a thousand geezers descend on this house.

Laci (01:43:58):

And a part of me every time I watched this as a kid and then it happened again as an adult. A part of me hoped that he’d see the flower this time, he’d see it.

Matt (01:44:09):

It’s funny. All of these fucking old people who look like the oldest fucks on the planet. I mean, Walter Vet was only 72 at the time. But it is funny, that

Laci (01:44:16):

Old, he’s 72.

Matt (01:44:17):

Yeah, that’s old. But old people now are just not that old.

Laci (01:44:21):

Right. They don’t wear those, they don’t wear curtains and doilies,

Matt (01:44:26):

The centerpiece of the event is the blooming of the 40 year flower. Dennis has to, Hey, sit there in the corner there, Dennis, and shut the fuck up. But he’ll be in a nice little suit as the party is going on. Christopher Lloyd is sneaking into various houses to steal stuff. He’s a robber after all. But Dennis’s. Oh, needo a garage door opener. Whoa. No, I broke this. I made the spread. The great party spread

Laci (01:44:50):

After it’s announced that that’s all he has to offer is dessert and coffee. And there’s a waiter. I mean, they hired a catering company. It’s expensive. It’s all on the ground.

Matt (01:45:03):

He ruins that. But they punish him by making him go back inside and change into his dentist the menace costume and just watch from the window. And he’s pouting. I’m not allowed dear. But the night’s not ruined because they’re still sitting around very patiently waiting for the flower to bloom.

Laci (01:45:19):

Bored. Bored waiting. They don’t have anything to eat or drink and there’s no entertainment. It’s meant to be like, okay, well we’ll just fucking sit here.

Matt (01:45:27):

I say they’re all patiently waiting because I’m just thinking of mattau and it’s like this is paradise for him. Everyone’s sitting here and shutting

Laci (01:45:33):

Up. Yes, but that’s not what they came to do. Just wait to

Matt (01:45:36):

See my thing. But Switchblades Sam, Christopher Lloyd is in the house robbing the safe and Dennis hears it, sees that the safe has been opened. And so he shouts Master Wilson. And everybody looks exactly as the flower booms.

Laci (01:45:51):

You’ve been robbed.

Matt (01:45:52):

And then Matt now turns around and looks at, huh? Oh, and the flower just wilts right there. I missed it.

Laci (01:45:58):

That’s little flower. Penis is still sticking up. So there’s that

Matt (01:46:01):

Going to fucking videoed it. That’s what

Laci (01:46:04):

I said.

Matt (01:46:05):

They hired a caterer, hire a videographer. Think of all the money you saved by not filming like christenings and stuff.

Laci (01:46:14):

Well, and I just feel like if only he’d had the internet, he wouldn’t even need this flower. He could just watch it bloom.

Matt (01:46:20):

Wouldn’t need to do anything.

Laci (01:46:21):

No.

Matt (01:46:22):

40 years down the drain. And he smashes the flower. I hate this flower now. And he goes up to Dennis and he says, I wrote it all down. And it very, he is saying it just the most poison, but also

Laci (01:46:36):

Hurt

Matt (01:46:37):

To show you. I don’t even want to think of you, you’re nothing to me.

Laci (01:46:41):

You’re not a

Matt (01:46:42):

Brother, you’re not a friend. When you visit our house to see our mother, I want to be notified in advance so I can be far away.

Laci (01:46:49):

Where is that from?

Matt (01:46:50):

That’s from Godfather too.

Laci (01:46:50):

Oh,

Matt (01:46:51):

You’re a pe I a selfish, spoiled little boy. And I have no use for,

Laci (01:46:56):

And I

Matt (01:46:56):

Have no use for you, for you. You took something from me that I could never get back. Something that means more to me than you ever will. I don’t want to see you. I don’t want to know you. Get out of my way. And he just goes in and Dennis is left and he’s like, I’m sorry, Mr. Wales. And he cries.

Laci (01:47:13):

It’s rough.

Matt (01:47:14):

And then he runs away on his stupid bike,

Laci (01:47:17):

Running on that bike.

Matt (01:47:19):

Leah Thompson arrives home, sees the cops at the house,

Laci (01:47:22):

The worst possible thing you would want to fucking see when you just my nightmare. And then she comes running out and Wilson and Martha both look up at her and they don’t say anything. It was like, it’s your turn. It’s your, she’s looking at you wondering where her kid is. You don’t just go,

Matt (01:47:39):

Well,

Laci (01:47:40):

Hi there. I don’t know. It just bothers me that they don’t say anything.

Matt (01:47:43):

I don’t think they know that Dennis is gone

Laci (01:47:45):

Yet. They just give a knowing. Look, they don’t.

Matt (01:47:47):

No, I think the cops are there because they’ve been robbed. It is now that they realize that Dennis is missing, the movie is smart to not linger with any of this because that would be like, oh my,

Laci (01:47:58):

Too sad.

Matt (01:47:59):

Just, yeah, my kid has been kidnapped or whatever. But we get some very Spielberg shots of Dennis riding his bike through the woods and the moonlight until he runs into Christopher Wilson. Christopher Lloyd and Mr. Wilson is

Laci (01:48:14):

Really sad.

Matt (01:48:15):

He’s very sad. He’s observing Dennis’s mom make calls, and now he has regrets. He’s flashing back to three minutes earlier. I think you’re a pastor and I have no use for you,

Laci (01:48:24):

But he flashes back to all the things he said to him throughout the whole movie.

Matt (01:48:28):

But I think this is, I know this is an annoying complaint to just make about the script, but he should be, we should see him be worried about Dennis for reasons that are totally removed from his own, because kid disappears on your watch. Your life is over. You’re forever ruined. So he’s personally, I need that kid to be safe so that my life can go on.

Laci (01:48:56):

Right.

Matt (01:48:57):

If it were, oh no, something bad happened to Dennis, it had nothing to do with me, but I just suddenly realized I love that kid and I miss him, then it means something a lot more powerful.

Laci (01:49:05):

Yeah, you’re right.

Matt (01:49:07):

And then how did they miss the biggest layup of all time, which is Mr. Wilson saves Dennis from Christopher Lloyd. How did they miss that?

Laci (01:49:16):

I don’t think that’s interesting. I think Mr. Wilson needed to see how capable and what Dennis, he only sees Dennis as doing mischief. He doesn’t seem him as capable and smart when that kid pulls up with a wagon with a fucking crook on it. He has the biggest look of, I do have a use for you. You are a useful child. You’re fucking smart. You’re a pain in the ass. But God damn it, you tied up a damn a whole man. You burned his butt.

Matt (01:49:48):

Okay. So to Mr. Wilson, the only value in the world is your utility. So if I see that you are of use, then okay, jump into my arms. You lad.

Laci (01:49:55):

He does not respect Dennis and I don’t know anything, don’t respect, and you’re laughing at it. Children deserve respect. He doesn’t see any use for a kid like Dennis. He just sees him as someone who will always bother him. And then he realizes all in that one moment like, fuck, you’re smart. I don’t know what you’re going to be when you’re older, but I want to be there to see it.

Matt (01:50:14):

Alright.

Laci (01:50:16):

You don’t get it.

Matt (01:50:17):

I don’t get it. That’s why we’re so divided on this movie. Look, even though that’s right, that makes sense. You projecting all of that onto the movie that’s not there.

Laci (01:50:26):

It’s all in Mr. Wilson’s face when he sees what’s on the goddamn wagon.

Matt (01:50:30):

I agree with that. But if you would put a gun to my head, Hey, what’s going to happen at the end of this movie? I would say, well, there’s no way. Mr. Wilson does not save Dennis, the medicine ends.

Laci (01:50:40):

Do you think that’s boring? Because Mr. Dennis, I mean, Mr. Wilson is not the person who needs to redeem himself. I know the movie sets it up like that, but to me, Dennis fucks everything up and they were nice enough to keep him. Dennis owes a debt of gratitude to Martha. I think he goes and chases after the crook because it’s him who needs to make it up to the adults. He even does the wrong thing by leaving and not telling ’em where they’re going. That’s fucked up.

Matt (01:51:03):

But he doesn’t do anything. He bumbles his way into getting the crook. It’s not like he makes any active choices. Everything that happens to Christopher Lloyd is an accident on Dennis’s party. He doesn’t intend any of it and the movie,

Laci (01:51:19):

That’s not true.

Matt (01:51:19):

This is why where my negative opinion of the movie really comes from. It’s not true.

Laci (01:51:23):

It’s not true because yes, all of it is just happenstance and the most important things happen. While he is not aware that this man is bad and he should be trying to turn him in, but once he discovers Mr. Wilson’s gold in his sack,

Matt (01:51:36):

Okay, that’s true.

Laci (01:51:37):

He realizes that and then he brings him to the cops.

Matt (01:51:39):

That’s true. You’re right.

Laci (01:51:40):

Yeah. Right.

Matt (01:51:43):

But this is a 30 minute sequence of the movie with Dennis and Christopher Lloyd with Christopher Lloyd. This is the home alone traps. He’s just falling into one home alone, trap after another. None of them anywhere near as fun or inventive or funny as home alone.

Laci (01:51:57):

Also home alone lumps same makeup person. Just the hugest lumps on this man.

Matt (01:52:02):

Yeah, the lumps, the whelps.

Laci (01:52:04):

You can’t show blood just lumps.

Matt (01:52:06):

But we did a home alone two episode last year and we had the same reaction, which is the traps go on so much longer in home alone, two than they go on in home alone. One home alone, one, they’re over so fast, but they linger in your imagination Home alone. Two, they realize the kids love the traps. So we need to give 30 minutes to the traps. Well, they lose their power then. And here it’s even worse and it’s even less interesting because Dennis doesn’t mean for any of it to happen. So it’s just Christopher Lloyd falling. Oh, oh, my back. Oh my ass.

Laci (01:52:37):

Oh, what’s the thing he keeps landing on in the water? It’s a door. It’s not a door, Matt. Or to go underwater. It’s clearly a storage bin. It seems like half of a container metal. It

Matt (01:52:49):

Could be a door, a container.

Laci (01:52:50):

It’s not a fucking door at all. There’s no handle. It’s a shed or something

Matt (01:52:58):

For someone who can’t remember anything River shed. It’s just one of those shed, you’ll find the river. So

Laci (01:53:05):

Well, it’s like a canal on a river. I don’t fucking

Matt (01:53:09):

Know. For someone who doesn’t remember anything you love to be pedantic and correcting.

Laci (01:53:13):

Wait, but this is my movie and yes, yes I do. He needs to find the key because he showed him the best way to tie up a child because he’s been tied up a lot that Dennis and the savvy criminals like, yeah, they’ll go along for this explanation. Okay, go ahead and tie me up then. So yeah, put the handcuffs. I feel like by this point I understand what you’re going to do. I don’t know if you need to really put this in second handcuff on, but then it happens. And then when you know it, oh, I lost the key in the beans. The only way to fix this is to make you eat all the beans. So now this is like a fucking scene from the movie seven. He’s engorged and sweaty being force fed just, and this is another one, a literal moment with Dennis. He has clearly been told We have to finish your food. You can’t waste it. Which by the way, I fucking hate when parents tell this to their children, it fucks them up. Anyway. He’s been given that advice and he’s going to take it. We shouldn’t waste the food.

Matt (01:54:17):

And Christopher Lloyd, God bless him, trying his damnedest to make this work, one of the most gifted physical actors ever. When Dennis is bringing the ladle to his, here comes the airplane, and Christopher Lloyd just backs up onto the ground and falls onto his back. He’s wonderful. But this is just not funny at all. This movie is just out of steam and I’m angry and tapping my foot. Get over, get it over with. But finally, Christopher Lloyd’s about to kill him with a knife. Share your prayers. I can’t, didn’t take my bath yet because he’s

Laci (01:54:48):

A little regimented

Matt (01:54:49):

Kid. But then the robber is fell by a train, which is attached to a rope, which is attached to Christopher Lloyd’s ass.

Laci (01:54:55):

And I’m like, is this man about to explode in half? Is he going to be forced through a pipe? And I forgot this happens. What is the, and then no, he just,

Matt (01:55:03):

Oh,

Laci (01:55:04):

False.

Matt (01:55:05):

I used to have a colon. So it’s the next morning. Mr. Wilson slept on his porch waiting for Dennis.

Laci (01:55:12):

That’s how you do it. A moment that shows growth in Mr. Wilson because the paper boiler he does every morning throws the paper in the bush and he happily takes it out of that. He’s got bigger fish to fry. And something about Dennis has let him be less rigid. The man slept on the fucking porch.

Matt (01:55:29):

He gets the paper out of the bushes. That’s like local boy missing. Local man. A pariah doesn’t sing that. It didn’t even make the news. But in the distance he hears Dennis’s stupid little tin can bike. Oh, is that Dennis? And then he hears the dog it be, and Dennis is driving his bike, touching, pulling on a wagon. Christopher Lloyd, look, I used to pull our 20 pound child around in a bike. I know damn well it destroy me. Yeah. So this 20 pound kid can pull Christopher Lloyd, it’s fine. And Dennis hops out of his bike and Mr. Wilson just opens his arms and Dennis knows I will jump into his arms. And I do love the way Walter Mathau plays him. Doesn’t go like, I’m so sorry. I’m so

Laci (01:56:15):

Sorry. No, I just want to hug you.

Matt (01:56:17):

Yeah, just hugs him. And then Dennis is just like, guess what? And he just goes, what? I got your coins back. That’s that. They bond over silence. Beautiful, beautiful stuff. Real powerful.

Laci (01:56:29):

You’ve got a use for me now, Mr. Wilson.

Matt (01:56:32):

So the cops come and the cops are very reckless about pulling into the yard. But I think that this,

Laci (01:56:37):

It’s like it’s not an emergency just

Matt (01:56:38):

Come. Something’s finally happened in this town. We got to get to it,

Laci (01:56:42):

And they just got driveways last week. They don’t even know how to use them, right?

Matt (01:56:48):

That’s what those are for. But I do think this redeems, an unsatisfying part of both home alone is that Kevin’s family never gets to find out what he did. And he can see mom and dad, I’m a hero and the cops think so too. And they gave me my own star, but they do it here, even though Dennis doesn’t seem to give a shit. And then Dennis is still being a little dumb ass. He sees Christopher Lloyd getting put in the cop car and he’s like, Mr, you forgot you switch played. And Christopher Lloyd’s like, great, I’m going to fucking kill you.

Laci (01:57:15):

Just shank you right here in front of your family.

Matt (01:57:18):

That’ll add.

Laci (01:57:18):

That’s what never made sense about home alone is that these petty criminals, these robbers would also want child murder on their right. It doesn’t make sense. These movies just lump criminal into all the bad things. It’s stupid. This guy’s got got a thing he does. He goes from town to town. He steals what he needs to make it to the next town. He doesn’t stab children.

Matt (01:57:41):

I like that. It is just the kid’s idea of a criminal. It’s a robber, and a robber will also kill you or do whatever it takes

Laci (01:57:49):

From the seat of a cop car.

Matt (01:57:51):

Well, because with the wet bandits, it doesn’t matter how many years, 40 to life, that means nothing to me. I’m just going to escape. I know how to escape, be a

Laci (01:57:58):

Sticky bandit. And the guy doesn’t even get in trouble for trying to shank the kid because the cop just shuts the door and the knife and he goes, ah, drop my knife.

Matt (01:58:07):

Then the Mitchell’s arrive like, oh, our kidnapped child’s back. Great. The good news, I don’t have to travel for work anymore. And they’re building a daycare at my office. And Mr. Wilson’s like, that’s nonsense. She stays with me.

Laci (01:58:20):

The boy needs a yard and run around. And then it’s very nice. You never see the Wilson’s at a social event where they’re socialized. You see them at events, they talk to no one including at their own fucking home. But then the next scene is them at a barbecue hanging out with two people that they kind of feel are like their adopted children and grandchild. And the fucking kid fucks it up

Matt (01:58:45):

Again. But the intergenerational bond is nice. These people are 35 years older than us, but they can be our friends.

Laci (01:58:53):

But I like that the movie ends it with something realistic or at least real to the reality of this movie. Dennis is just Dennis still, and Mr. Wilson’s still Mr. Wilson. So you get a flaming fucking marshmallow shot at your head and you’re like, nevermind. He can go to your work.

Matt (01:59:12):

Not happy about this.

Laci (01:59:12):

Well, that’s why the next scene is Dennis at work. Haha. He didn’t stay with us.

Matt (01:59:17):

Does anything happen beyond Dennis being at work? Because I didn’t launch the credits.

Laci (01:59:21):

Oh yeah. The mean lady is in the copy room. He’s just sitting in the copy room. I dunno why he’s not in childcare, but that’s probably because he was a menace

Matt (01:59:30):

Kicked out of

Laci (01:59:30):

Child care. So he is just sitting there in the copy room kicking his feet, and the lady comes in is a giant green print button on the copy machine. And he’s like, can I push the button? And she says, no, you can’t push the button. You don’t even know which one it is. Such a cartoon. And he goes, this one. And he points in and her little tie that she’s wearing just sucks into the print machine and just sucks her onto the thing. And it’s just copy, copy. And it’s just a million copies of her struggling to not die on the copy machine.

Matt (02:00:04):

The end the comic possibilities. How many panels can we get out of? What will Dennis get up to at work? These things write themselves. It’s great.

Laci (02:00:13):

It’s still to this day, I think I gave it a four and a half.

Matt (02:00:34):

You did. When I saw that, I thought, oh, oh no,

Laci (02:00:37):

We’re getting into, oh no. What, Matt, you have to not respect me.

Matt (02:00:42):

No, actually, I very much respect that you love this movie so much, but you get mad at me when I don’t like things the way you like them.

Laci (02:00:48):

That’s not true. That’s not the premise of our podcast. We’ve had so many, Matt.

Matt (02:00:52):

It’s

Laci (02:00:52):

The premise of our podcast.

Matt (02:00:55):

You want to go first?

Laci (02:00:56):

You have talked me into the flaws. You stupid. Fuck. I’ll give it a four.

Matt (02:01:02):

All right. Anything else?

Laci (02:01:04):

No. I still really enjoy the movie.

Matt (02:01:08):

Yeah,

Laci (02:01:08):

I’d watch it again.

Matt (02:01:09):

It doesn’t work for me.

Laci (02:01:11):

Oh my God, really? Are you not a fucking 5-year-old child? You can’t push the button. Matt.

Matt (02:01:16):

I enjoyed Laci describing the scenes that I didn’t watch more than I enjoyed the scenes in the movie. I like Walter Mattau and Joan Plowright a lot. I think they are very sweet and lovely together. Christopher Lloyd’s performance is good but doesn’t belong in this movie. I think the actor plays Dennis is annoying. I don’t enjoy much of this movie and I think the traps, the home alone traps and just following the home alone formulas so cynical that I resent it

Laci (02:01:42):

And you give it a two and a half.

Matt (02:01:44):

No, two stars.

Laci (02:01:45):

I have given such a great performance here.

Matt (02:01:47):

Explain two and a half stars

Laci (02:01:49):

On a five. Yeah. We’ll,

Matt (02:01:50):

Not enough to recommend it, but I bumped it up one half star.

Laci (02:01:56):

I got a send semi.

Matt (02:01:58):

So what’s coming up next? Well, it’s a spectacular month of October begins. Huh? I’m so startled, careful there. Got a whole month. We have five Fridays in October this year. So we have five of the scariest movies of all time. Starting

Laci (02:02:12):

With time, the dreamy interview with the Vampire.

Matt (02:02:15):

A redo.

Laci (02:02:16):

Fucking love

Matt (02:02:17):

A redo. We covered this back in the Old Testament days of our program.

Laci (02:02:21):

I remember being a good episode.

Matt (02:02:23):

Yeah, I think so. I enjoyed, I don’t remember much about this movie. I remember thinking, it’s great when Tom Cruise is on screen. Kind of boring when he’s not because I think he disappears for a long stretch. But it’s been a long time. I started reading the book. We’re going to learn all about Ann Rice. I watched

Laci (02:02:39):

Book

Matt (02:02:39):

Queen of the Damned

Laci (02:02:40):

Book. I’ve read that book.

Matt (02:02:41):

Really?

Laci (02:02:42):

I’ve read all of Ann Rice.

Matt (02:02:44):

All of Ann Rice. She has so many books. That’s really

Laci (02:02:46):

Interesting. All of them that existed up until seventh grade when I stopped going to the library

Matt (02:02:52):

After

Laci (02:02:52):

School.

Matt (02:02:53):

I think that she wrote a lot of books early in her career and then converted to Christianity or something and then started writing a lot more vampire books. So that’s like a recent development.

Laci (02:03:02):

Well shoot. Okay, so everything from 1998 and No, no, no. I was in high school. When did I stop going to the library? Whatever. I read all the ones you just said.

Matt (02:03:16):

So interview with the Vampire Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Kirsten Dunt, directed by Neil Jordan. That will be October 3rd, 2025. And we’ll go ahead and announce all the movies we’re covering in October. We’re covering first saw, we’re covering Captain in the Woods, the 1990 TV movie of it, which is also a redo and a little movie called The Shining. Ever heard of

Laci (02:03:35):

It? Ever Fucking it. You’ve always been here at this podcast.

Matt (02:03:41):

You’ve always been a Patreon subscriber since day one. And that means you can listen to our episode about Doug.

Laci (02:03:47):

You know what, it is like that because if you become a Patreon subscriber right now, it’s like you did it from the first time you could have because you get all of it, baby.

Matt (02:03:56):

That’s such a good

Laci (02:03:56):

Point. It’s not behind a paywall anymore.

Matt (02:03:59):

Yeah, there are no walls. Once you pay for the wall,

Laci (02:04:02):

There’s tits maybe in there. What if that’s what we,

Matt (02:04:05):

That’s if you’re a $10 Paton,

Laci (02:04:07):

What if that’s what putting Matt’s tits?

Matt (02:04:10):

Yeah, I would would. So Doug, me and past guests of the show, Patrick and Wade,

Laci (02:04:17):

It’s really good guys.

Matt (02:04:19):

Thank you.

Laci (02:04:19):

You’re welcome. I will not be replaced.

Matt (02:04:23):

Wade. Do the history of the Nickelodeon show, Doug, and then reviewed two episodes.

Laci (02:04:27):

We’ve kind of got our own little Doug outro because it’s just a man saying stuff from his mouth. That’s the song, dude. Because Wade, our outro song is just him 2, 3, 4. You’re

Matt (02:04:38):

Right. He’s making the noises. He’s drumming on his stomach.

Laci (02:04:41):

Yeah, on his chest. This is the chest whatever Manly chest.

Matt (02:04:45):

Also coming out on the Patreon next week will be Mulholland Drive with Austin from the Fright Mayors podcast. Two hours of us breaking down. I think one of the scariest movies that is in a horror movie. Mulholland Drive. So subscribe, load-bearing beams, Patreon load ringings collectors edition patreon.com/ load-bearing beams. Catch me on letterbox Max Stokes nine.

Laci (02:05:04):

If you can

Matt (02:05:05):

Catch Laci on letterbox load-bearing Laci,

Laci (02:05:07):

You can

Matt (02:05:08):

Catch. I have a bonus video coming out about the movie Quest for Camelot. Catch that on YouTube.

Laci (02:05:12):

Hit or Miss.

Matt (02:05:12):

My band is rural Route Nine. And I wish you a fond adieu.

Laci (02:05:18):

And I wish you, “Okay, I love you, goodbyeeeeeee.”