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Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast
Ever had something you love dismissed because it’s “just” pop culture? What others might deem stupid shit, you know matters. You know it’s worth talking and thinking about. So do we. We're Tracie and Emily, two sisters who think a lot about a lot of things. From Twilight to Ghostbusters, Harry Potter to the Muppets, and wherever pop culture takes us, come overthink with us as we delve into our deep thoughts about stupid shit.
Deep Thoughts About Stupid Sh*t: A Pop-Culture Podcast
The Beastmaster: Deep Thoughts About Storytelling Conventions, Covert Blood Libel, and Marc Singer's Glistening...Line Delivery
I have my eyes... I have my cunning... and I have my strength.
This obscure sword-and-sorcery fantasy film from the early 1980s was a staple of the Guy sisters' formative pop culture years because it was on regular rotation on HBO (which people jokingly claimed stood for "Hey! Beastmaster's on!"). This week, Tracie delves back into the bizarre five act storytelling choices that animate the journey of Marc Singer's Dar, a prince stolen from his mother's womb by an evil priest--played by Rip Torn in a prosthetic nose--who is telepathically connected to animals.
The Guy girls remembered Dar's animal companions with fondness, especially his little ferret friends, and the over-the-top level of male nudity (it was a lot even for the early 1980s) was certainly, ahem, interesting in ways Tracie and Emily couldn't articulate as small children, but the movie offers some ugly cultural commentary about race, women, romance, consent, and sexuality, not to mention the film's covert reference to blood libel in Rip Torn's big-nosed child-sacrificing religious leader. The Beastmaster also weirdly subverts storytelling expectations by continuing past the third act, making a relatively short film feel way too long. Still, there are many pretty people, cool animals, and fascinating storytelling details to admire in this forgotten 80s cult favorite.
No need for bat-people hearing. Just put on your headphones and listen in!
This episode was edited by Resonate Recordings.
Our theme music is "Professor Umlaut" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Learn more about Tracie and Emily (including our other projects), join the Guy Girls' family, secure exclusive access to bonus episodes, video versions, and early access to Deep Thoughts by visiting us on Patreon or find us on ko-fi: https://ko-fi.com/guygirls
We are Tracie Guy-Decker and Emily Guy Birken, known to our family as the Guy Girls.
We have super-serious day jobs. For the bona fides, visit our individual websites: tracieguydecker.com and emilyguybirken.com
We're hella smart and completely unashamed of our overthinking prowess. We love movies and tv, science fiction, comedy, and murder mysteries, good storytelling with lots of dramatic irony, and analyzing pop culture for gender dynamics, psychology, sociology, and whatever else we find.
There's like these really interesting sort of moments, like interesting world building, and these bat creatures who worship an eagle and eat through or I don't even know if they're eating, but dissolve creatures through their wings and have no mouth. And this movie is told in five acts, which is unusual for films. Like, usually, we only get three acts and as a result, like for the last 20 minutes, I'm like why is this movie not over? You know, I wonder if this would have been like a stronger storytelling movie if somebody had been like you know, don, let's just do three acts and get rid of the bat thing.
Speaker 1:Have you ever had something you love dismissed because it's just pop culture, what others might deem stupid shit? You know matters, you know it's worth talking and thinking about, and so do we. So come overthink with us as we delve into our deep thoughts about stupid shit. This is Tracy Guy-Decker, and you're listening to Deep Thoughts About Stupid Shit, because pop culture is still culture, and shouldn't you know what's in your head? On today's episode, I will be sharing my deep thoughts about the 1982 film the Beastmaster with my sister, emily Guy-Burken, and with you. Let's dive in. All right, em. So I know you've seen this because we watched it together many times, because it was on cable. In fact, in like researching this, I realized that HBO for a while stood for hey Beastmaster's on. So I know of He-Man because muscles blonde hair Tiger, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:There's a lot of He-Man resonance there. Yeah, and I, little baby Emily, approved, because I'm nothing if not consistent. And the ferrets I remember he, I think he was it two ferrets, I think it was two ferrets. Yeah, two ferrets, two ferrets. And remember he, I think he was it, two ferrets, I think it was two ferrets, yeah, two ferrets.
Speaker 2:Two ferrets and they were kind of cool and they were the reason why you were like I would like ferrets. And then I remember learning that ferrets often died in like Lazy Boy Recliners. That's my recollection of him and so all of that is tied up in Beastmaster and I kind of have a vague memory of the love interest, being kind of sassy and that a little that's about it.
Speaker 1:Yeah yeah, this one's like real old and deep.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So, other than like trip down memory lane, tell me why we're talking about this today.
Speaker 1:I don't even know why I picked it honestly like it. It was on the list because it was one of the ones that again was foundational, like we watched it lots of times when we were kids because, hey, beastmasters on on hbo. But I don't even know why right now, I don't, I don't have a good answer except that it was. I was like, oh, we haven't done a sword and sorcery in a while, so sorry, but I am excited to talk about it because in rewatch I'm realizing there were, well for one, mark Singer who played Dar the beast master was like.
Speaker 2:I kind of remember his voice too, like there was something yeah.
Speaker 1:He was ripped. Oh boy, like before, ripped was cool and there was a little bit of a sexual awakening for elementary school Tracy, I think, and probably lots of other people. I'll get into that a little bit. So on rewatch, that's there I want to talk about in this movie, like gender and sexuality and nudity actually, because like there's a lot of nudity, but not just the women. Like after about I don't know, maybe 20 or 30 minutes, like Mark Singer doesn't wear a shirt for the whole rest of the movie, you know, and he's not really wearing pants either, he's wearing like a loincloth and like a belt with like leather fringe kind of a thing. So that's part of why he reminds you of.
Speaker 1:He-Man Totally. So it's not like one of those like sword and sorcery where the men are in full armor and the women are in rags. It's not that. I kind of want to talk about that a little bit. There's also Rip Torn is the bad guy, so like a young Rip Torn in a prosthetic nose, which is bizarre, and that's kind of weird seeing him as a young man, because my head he is Zed from Men in Black and like that's it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like I feel like he sprang fully formed as a 50 year old yeah, no, he didn't, he didn't, and this movie is proof so.
Speaker 1:So I wanted that was an interesting thing to note. But Rip Torn's character, mayax, has these three witches who I don don't know are his companions, servants. I don't really understand. And there's something, really there's some tension there about women's sexuality and the danger of women's sexuality specifically in these witches that I want to get into. I want to talk about romance and what messages baby Tracy and baby Emily were getting about romance from this movie, because it was fucked up, like really Really fucked up.
Speaker 1:I want to talk about race. In this movie there's not a lot, but John Amos plays a very key character, seth, and his race is not remarked upon at all, which is sort of interesting. And then I want to talk about storytelling. This movie is told in five acts, which is unusual for films. Like usually we only get three acts and, as a result, like for the last 20 minutes, I'm like why is this movie not over? You know, and also part of the reason it wasn't over was because I think the director, don Coscarelli, like he had a lot of really good ideas and he wanted to use all of them and he needed five acts to like come all the way back to it, or else there would have been a Chekhov's bat creature, so Chekhov's ferret, yeah, kind of Kind of. So I want to like talk about like all of the good ideas and like maybe Coscarelli could have stood to have like an Ezra Pound of sorts who was like good idea, save it for the next movie or something I don't know.
Speaker 1:This movie came like like right after Conan the Barbarian. A lot of people talk about it as a ripoff. It was not in fact a ripoff, because it was released like three months later, so the movie makers were making them simultaneously. Rather, I think there was something in the zeitgeist that was like into like ripped shirtless dudes and swords and sorcery. So, anyway, that's enough preface. I'm gonna give you the story while I've act, I will do my best.
Speaker 2:I do want to mention I I texted you earlier this week where I was saying like I realized how often, when we do the trying to be concise in giving the synopsis, we'll say, say, shenanigans ensue. I was like, yeah, there's some shenanigans, there will be some. So you can, you know, just cut to the chase with shenanigans ensue, yeah.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about the shenanigans in this movie. So we open with these three witches and they're looking in a cauldron and I'm just going to set that scene. I won't give as much detail for the whole thing, but like from behind these three witches and they're looking in a cauldron and I'm just going to set that scene I won't give as much detail for the whole thing, but like from behind these three women, like looking down into a cauldron and they're dressed very scantily and they are models like the actresses, are very well built and they're sort of undulating in very sexy ways, like it's hot. And then you get up close and you see their faces and they're totally deformed, like like half. They're these weird like masks and like their eyes are weird and they don't have proper hair and they're asymmetrical and just really grotesque. And so I just want to name that up front. That's like how we enter. So these three witches are talking to Maax Riptorn in his prosthetic nose. Witches are talking to Mayax Riptorn in his prosthetic nose and we learn that there is a prophecy that the unborn son of King Zed that's a weird coincidence the unborn son of King Zed is going to kill Mayax and Mayax is like no, he won't, because I'm going to kill him first, right? So you know. That's how all these things start. So King Zed comes in and says I understand, you're going to do a child sacrifice. We don't do that in this, in this kingdom. You're banished and Mayax, like ever the diplomat, is like oh damn straight, I'm going to kill him and it's going to be your unborn son that I kill. So then this really weird thing, like Mayax proves his like power and psychological power by like informing, like just with a head nod, the two priests I'm putting quotes around that, but the two priests of Ar A-R that's the name of the god that he serves, with a head nod from Mayax like hang themselves with these devices that they have. It's bizarre. And our parents, let us watch this Seriously, it's bizarre, anyway. And our parents, let us watch this Seriously, it's bizarre. So Zed's like taken away, like banished Maax.
Speaker 1:Cut to the next scene. Zed and his queen are in bed together and the witches come and magically like paralyze the two people, the queen and the king. The queen is pregnant and then magically move the baby from her, from the woman's womb, to that of a cow that the witch has brought with her. And it's kind of interesting like there's no exposition, but you know exactly what's happening. He did a great job actually of conveying what was happening. So the witch takes the cow the mother does not survive this transfer, by the way so the witch takes the cow off, you know, into the countryside, cuts the baby out of its womb and is going to the baby needs to be branded and then sacrificed to the god Ar. So we're watching from behind and she brands the palm of the child and the child cries. And then this farmer who's like, sees it happening and hears the baby cry, realizes something bad is happening and so he actually, like, kills the witch and saves the baby and then takes him home and raises him as his own.
Speaker 1:So we have some like cut scenes to see the baby Dar is his name growing up and we learn that he has this power, this telepathic connection with animals because of the cow. Maybe they never explain it, but I mean, that's certainly the takeaway I had was that because he hitched a ride in a cow's womb for a while, he has a telepathic connection with animals, but they never say explicitly why so, and his adoptive father tells him he has to keep that a secret. No one should know about his abilities. So fast forward. Again. Now we meet Dar as Mark Singer. He's just this happy-go-lucky subsistence farmer with his family in his village who inexplicably have their houses like up on tall stilts, even though they're not near water or anything, I don't know. Anyway, he's out like hoeing rocks with the other dudes and that is not a euphemism.
Speaker 2:They're literally like hoeing rocks. That's just what they're telling their parents they're doing.
Speaker 1:With the other like young men of the village. When the dog, his dog, toto T-O-D-O I was watching with the subtitles like starts to freak out. I was like what's going on? And it's the Jun, which is like the horde, like the barbarians, and they're heading toward the village and so all of the rock hoers are like running back to the village where Dar's adopted dad like stands to defend the village from this, these barbarians, and dies instantly Like they kill him almost immediately. Everyone dies in the village and dar is like knocked out and the dog who has taken an arrow in the shoulder like drags his unconscious body like away from the fray. So dar survives, the dog doesn't. No one in the village survives. And when dar wakes up, like the whole village is just devastated and like like egregious, not just like bodies everywhere, but like on pikes and stuff. It's really, it's really unpleasant, like I can't believe we were kids watching this.
Speaker 1:They didn't know, they didn't know. So he sets the village in this symbol which is like like the do not enter sign, like a circle with a line through it, which I see in commentary was meant to be the symbol of his village. It wasn't made particularly clear. Anyway, he sets them all in this huge circle with the line and then sets them on fire, but like that's the funeral rite, like the whole village, including the dog who he rests in his father's arms. Very poignant, very poignant.
Speaker 1:And then we have like a good like I don't know 15 minutes of him just like waving swords and sticks around and like running through the desert and like just looking really hot and sweaty, like and hot in both senses of the word I want to say and like waving swords around and like yeah, no, no, he is not Ho and Rox, no, no. So and in that like montage of like Mark Singer looking hot, we also see him sort of telepathically connect with this eagle and he actually can see through its eyes. So that's kind of cool and we actually we see him through its eyes, which today they do with a drone, but I think they must have been using a helicopter in 1982, which is really kind of impressive.
Speaker 1:And then he is like bathing or something, and these two little ferrets come and steal his clothes. I remember that, and so he, like, chased the ferrets were awesome so he chases the ferrets to get his clothes back and like and lands in quicksand and the ferrets save him. But then one of them falls in so he saves it and then he names them their Kodo and Podo. So we had the dog Toto, who died. Now we have the ferrets Kodo and Podo. The eagle doesn't have a name.
Speaker 2:So Dar has has a real great imagination, kodo and Poto the eagle doesn't have a name.
Speaker 1:So Dar has a real great imagination. Well, so we keep going. He's still just sort of traveling, and then he senses you know, his spidey senses tingle and he comes upon this. I think it's meant to be like a leopard. It's actually a tiger that's been dyed black, that is like chained up and these men kind of like I don't know trying to kill it or torture it or I don't know what they're doing to it.
Speaker 1:But he decides he's gonna save the tiger, the cat and the ferrets are gonna help him. So he manages to chase off and or kill like three or four dudes who were harassing this cat, this big cat, and so now he's got a giant tiger thing, that is his companion, who he names Roo, which the subtitles spelled R-U-H, but I think it's meant to be sort of like the sound, like the, you know kind of a sound that the tiger makes. I don't know for sure, anyway, and he has this like very cheesy line like I have my eyes, I have my thieves and now I have my strength, or something like that. I don't know if the thieves is what he calls the ferrets but it's something like that.
Speaker 2:It's really ridiculous.
Speaker 1:All right, Great line delivery there. Mark Singer yeah, he is a really good actor and I was clearly watching, just like dad used to read Playboy for the articles Singer was hired for that just peccable line delivery yeah.
Speaker 1:So, oh man, so he meets. I'm going to get this out of order, it totally doesn't matter. He says he's going to Aruk, which is the kingdom where he was born, though he doesn't know it Because somehow Mayak's the bad guy. The Rip Torn character is like affiliated, aligned with the Juns, the barbarians. It's very unclear how, like maybe it's like a Herod sort of thing where he's just killing everyone, like it's just it's unclear, because he knows, maax knows that the baby lived Anyway.
Speaker 1:So he says he's going to try and find these priests of R and then he ends up in this weird like he follows these like lights that are in these trees and he ends up then there's like a person like strung up in a cage.
Speaker 1:He lets the guy out of the cage and the guy is immediately like enveloped in this creature that's like a man with no mouth and like bat wings, and and he envelops him in the bat wings and somehow like digests him, leaving only bones. And there's a ton of these guys, like like 20 of them, like dar is not gonna survive this, but just then his eagle comes in and lands on his arm. Like the eagle comes and like it's like hey, dude, what's up? And lands on his arm and turns out the bat wings like worship a god. That's like an eagle god, which they make plain when the eagle lands on the god idol. And so the bat dudes are like oh you're cool, except they don't speak because they don't have mouths. The way they say oh you're cool is that they put this like necklace, with a pendant that's an eagle shape, like on his sword, and then he escapes. Remember the Batdudes and the fact that they like eagles.
Speaker 1:Because, it's Chekhov's Batdude. It's Chekhov's bat dude. Okay, so then he meets Seth and Tal. So there's a priest of Arr who they know the unborn kid is now an adult and he's out there and he's coming for Maax. And so they found him. And the priest is like there's a ring with an eye in it which I remembered. I don't know if you remember that thing, but there's a ring with an eye in it that allows Maax to see what's happening at a distance. And so this priest of Arr like tries to kill Dar and Dar manages to like chase him off or whatever there are two of them and the other one like somehow ends up being chased by Rue, the cat. And the cat falls into a trap, like a pit that's been dug and covered over, and the priest is going to kill the cat. And the cat falls into a trap, like a pit that's been dug and covered over, and the priest is gonna kill the cat. But seth and tal, john amos and a young man called joshua milrad, who was like maybe 13 at the time they interrupt this cat killing and actually the priest ends up in the pit with rue, who dispatches him. So then dar like rushes up to try and help his cat friend and finds Seth and Tal and there's like this little bit of a standoff. But then Dar looks in the pit, realizes what happened and says I'm indebted to you. And then the three of them help Rue get out of the pit and they decide to travel together. We eventually learn that Seth, john Amos, is the former captain of the guard for King Zed and is now protecting Zed's son, tal, the prince, who presumably is a half-brother of Dar and oh, I totally skipped a part so he's a half-brother of Dar, which we don't know yet. We also learn that a so-called slave girl that Dar has met is Tal's cousin. So I skipped that part, but it's very important. So I'm going to tell you. Now.
Speaker 1:Dar comes upon two women bathing in a pool with a waterfall, and it's totally gratuitous boobies, you know from both of these women. Tanya Roberts is the actress who plays the love interest Kiri. Dar sends the ferrets to go steal her clothes the way that they stole his. So she comes out and she starts chasing them and she like she had this weird like she covers her breasts is what I'm trying to say and so she's chasing the ferrets to try and get her clothes back. And then she comes upon Rue the black tiger, who's like, threatening her Dar, comes in and is like, stand back. And like you have to show him who's boss. And like saves her, putting quotes around that from the fierce beast of the tiger, and then says you owe me your life, but I'll take this as payment instead, and forcibly kisses her and I'm watching going, oh no, like a salt monster. That's why we choose the tiger, totally right. So well, kiri's like a badass and she like I mean she like flips him and like has her hand on his throat.
Speaker 1:It's like who are you? You know, and he says his name and whatever. And then it somehow becomes clear she's a slave. She's got these like welts on her back from having been whipped and he's like you need to fight back, you know. She's like you don't explain much. What choice do I have? You know? So she's. So we learned she's a slave to the priests of Arr and somehow she drops this necklace, which is like a bunch of medallions all strung together.
Speaker 1:So now back to where I was in the story. He's with Tal and Seth and talking about like he's also going to Aruk because he wants to fight Maax, because Maax somehow controls the people who killed his family, and so they decide to travel together and they talk about the ferrets, because everybody loves the ferrets, and he has this like sack of stuff that the ferrets have stolen and he dumps it out and includes, like the ring that actually has an eye in it. The eyelid lifts up and Tal puts the ring on and includes the necklace with the medallions that had come from Kiri and Seth freaks out. He's like where did you get this, dar's? Like it was from a slave girl. And they're like she is no slave girl, and it turns out she's Tal's cousin, which I'm pretty sure biologically makes her also Dar's cousin, since they're brothers, unless maybe the second wife's, but I don't know but anyway, that is they never talk about.
Speaker 2:Well within, you know royalty norms I suppose.
Speaker 1:So shenanigans ensue. The three guys like they travel together. They end up back at aruk. There's a child sacrifice happening, which dar interrupts by sending the eagle to go snatch the child out of like. They drop the child down into like.
Speaker 2:There's a giant pyramid with the flames at the bottom and they drop the kid down as in like baby, uh-uh, like six or seven year old eagle is big enough to carry off a six or seven year old. So this eagle is big enough to carry off a six or seven year old. That was exactly my thought as it happened. Because I'm just like that's a strong ass eagle, or that is a malnourished kid?
Speaker 1:No, it was a strong ass eagle so, which backfires a little bit, because apparently an eagle is one of the manifestations of the god Arr. And so Maax is like see, arr will not be satisfied until you, you know, give him all your children or whatever. But that means Dar makes a friend because he returns the child to her father, now the father Sacco, who has a cart and horses, which is very helpful later. So it's Chekhov's cart and horses, yeah, yeah, totally. So they continue traveling. They gotta save kiri. She's gonna be sacrificed.
Speaker 1:We don't know why, but she and like five other slave girls are being sacrificed. We don't know why, but they're being, they're being taken like from some place, not the pyramid, like to some place that is the pyramid. Anyway, dar and seth and tal interrupt that travel. They kill the priest, they save the girls, all of whom disappear somehow, except for Kiri, and they decide they're going to go save King Zed, who is still alive. So they get into the pyramid. We meet death guards who the priests somehow like cause like brain damage by sticking like glow-in-the-dark blue goo in their ears and they have like big, like spiky armor on their arms and their legs but no other clothes at all except for like a jockstrap, slash loincloth and they find King Zed. His eyes have been put out and they're like escaping with him, but the ferrets have gone off on an errand and and so they get to this room, which you know is evil, because there's this giant skull that, like, blocks the entryway.
Speaker 2:It goes up and down on pulley system and that is what I want for my garage totally totally, they have to go.
Speaker 1:They have to go. Dar says I can't leave without my little ones, meaning the ferrets, and so everybody goes. But he waits behind and the death guard is coming chasing the ferrets and a bunch of priests, and then it's like very tense. And then Kiri comes back and they managed to escape out the side like with ropes, and it's so exciting out the side like with ropes, and it's so exciting. Okay. So now they're off in a camp.
Speaker 1:Seth has been on his own like trying to gather an army of rebels. They have about 35 people. That's not an army. So zed the king is like we have enough people because we have heart and we're gonna take my kingdom back. And dar's like maybe we should like strategize a little bit. And seth, who was like a really strong and smart dude, suddenly is like just listen to the beast master. He knows what's happening. And so seth says you know, trust the beast master, he's already saved your life. Zed says no, he's a freak he actually says freak who talks to the animals, he's not welcome in my kingdom and like banishes him. So he looks really hurt and like runs away. And when we cut to his face again, there's like like tear trails down Mark Singer's face Native American commercial PSA.
Speaker 1:Kinda.
Speaker 2:But both eyes.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so he's there with his you know, with his animals, and and Kiri comes to talk to him and she's like I'm so sorry. And he's like come with me. And she says I can't, I have a duty. So they like kiss and he goes away, and or she goes away, rather I don't remember what it is that makes him go back, but he does.
Speaker 1:Oh, seth like ends up seeing the eye and realizes that mayax knows all of their plans, because that has just been saying how, like where they're, they're gonna attack the north wall and what they're gonna do. And seth sees the eye and stabs it. And then the witch is like oh, because it was her eye. I remember that very clearly from when we were kids. And seth is like your highness, we can't. He knows we can't do this. And zed's like no, that's what we're doing. And seth goes we are all doomed, and so we skip that. We don't see it happen at all. We just the next scene, like mayax has them all captive and dar comes to get them I don't even remember why, like who calls him back or whatever. But so he goes and like fights everybody off and they're like kind of I mean seth and kiri do help and then, like, once the people of Uruk see that like Maax maybe is going to be overthrown, they actually do also fight. Maax kills Zed and then Dar like mortally wounds him, but he's not dead. And so Dar like saves Kiri and they're like has his back to Maax and Maax is like gonna get him. And one of the ferrets like jumps on Maax and like has his back to Max and Max is like gonna get him and one of the ferrets like jumps on Max and like attacks him and they both Max and the ferret, fall into the fire and the ferret's gone and it's very, very sad and it should have been over. But it wasn't over Because that was only the end of the third act.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so in the next scene or a later scene, we see the surviving ferret like poke her head up out of the little pouch that she lives in by his belt, and then two little baby ferrets poke their heads up too. So she was pregnant when her partner died. So they're like just living in a rook and it's awesome and like things are cool. But then, oh, the djinn are coming, I don't know. So they like the whole town like gets together. They have this moat of like tar, so they cover it with dirt, so it looks like it's solid.
Speaker 1:And the djinn come and they look like something out of like a medieval Mad Max with these like full face masks with like bat wings on them and stuff, and it's badass. They come on their horses and they like fall into the tar, which apparently has some acidic, I don't know. Anyway, like they're fighting back. There's fighting back and forth and it's really crazy. And the portcullis comes down but like Dar and Seth and Tal jump on the other side and then finally they manage to like light the moat on fire and it's an explosion and I'm like why didn't you just use a flaming arrow from inside? And but the djinn, there's just so many of them that they manage to sort of overwhelm, because everybody is inside the gated town except for Seth, dar, tal and, I think, kiri, and so they're kind of like in this like kill circle almost, and then dar calls the eagle, gives the eagle the pennant that the bat people gave him and sends it off, and so things look bad for our heroes. But then chekhov's bat people show back up.
Speaker 1:Deus ex bat people Like yeah, and they do their thing, and so the Jun are defeated and everybody's super happy. And then, oh, tal took an arrow to the chest. He's the kid. And they realize at some point they have realized I think Mayak said it that Dar is the missing baby. And so they talk about who will rule. And Seth is like well, you were Zed's firstborn, you should be our king. And he's like no, you guys already have a great ruler who had a great teacher. And so he declines the throne and sort of sets off into the wilderness.
Speaker 2:And the final scene Kiri has followed him and they're like up on this, like buttete, like kissing with the tiger right next to them an arrow, but he was okay, he survives, he survives yeah, he survives and dar leaves him.
Speaker 1:He has this one fancy weapon that he leaves for tal. And so the final scene is another helicopter shot that would be done, done with a drone now of Kirian Dar kissing on this butte, I guess in the Mojave Desert, I don't know with the tiger next to them, and that's the end. So there's shit that I missed because I can't do this very well, but you got the majority of the shenanigans.
Speaker 1:Yeah, seriously there's, yeah. So let me start by saying this movie does not pass the Bechdel test. Surprise, surprise. I don't even think there are two named female characters, unless you count the ferret Alison Bechdel. Are there at least two named female characters? Do they talk to one another? Do they talk to one another about something other than a man or a boy? No, is the simple answer. So got that out of the way. Let's talk about gender and sexuality. Like from the get, with the scene, with the witches, like today, me was like uh, what? Like I don't. What messages was I getting as a kid with these sexy, these women who were very sexy from the collarbone down, and like fear of the danger of women's sexuality with these witches, you know similar kind of that fear of women's sexuality and the fact that Lucy succumbs to vampirism while Mina does not.
Speaker 2:In Dracula, like that is like recreating this, and a lot of what you were talking about with this reminded me a little bit of that kind of thing. And there's a lot of homoeroticism in Dracula. I believe there's suggestion that Bram Stoker was not necessarily straight and then the like very obvious homoeroticism of, like Mark Singer and all his, you know, rock, ho and glory the sexiness and the nudity.
Speaker 1:Now, remember it's 1982. And, like I said, conan just came out, which again was tapping into something similar in the zeitgeist. But I mean, those were the days where even like, like not bodybuilders were men, straight men were skies out, thighs out, you know, like shorts were short background, like it wasn't the same kind of like covering and modesty for straight men that we have today. And also it's egregious in this movie, like Singer doesn't wear a shirt through most of the movie and he doesn't wear trousers through most of the movie either. Like there's some shots where I'm like, damn, that was his full-on tush. You know, like wow, wow, I've seen a lot more Mark Singer than I expected.
Speaker 2:Well, and that's so. What's interesting is because, like that, fear of women's sexuality is something that it is all throughout, so much literature and culture that we have we have taken in always, and culture that we have taken in always, but at the same time, there's also this like undercurrent of homoeroticism that is unexamined Mm-hmm, that the fear of women's sexuality is overt whereas, like the homoeroticism is covert.
Speaker 1:Right. And that fear is paired with this control, like the manipulation that Dar does to Kiri, which we're meant to just accept, like watching it now, I'm like every time she showed any kind of interest or affection for him. I'm like, girl, don't you remember what he did to you? Because he does it again too. At a certain point they're on a boat and Tal comes and is like you're going to help us free my father right, and Dar says have your cousin come, ask me my sister just rolled her eyes so hard.
Speaker 2:listeners, I'm surprised you couldn't hear my eye roll.
Speaker 1:And so, like there's this fear, like paired with this control and manipulation that we're meant to not just accept, but sort of root for. You know, that is just gross, it's just gross, it's just gross.
Speaker 2:Well, it's just gross. Okay, this is a stretch. But even within the ferrets it's very clear that women's sexuality needs to be channeled within the normative relationship of making babies, that it's not okay for women to just want sex. It's not okay for women to just want sex. It's not okay for women to just enjoy their bodies. They have to be creating babies, and to the point where, like, obviously this is a stretch, but the story of these two ferrets is okay, because whichever one is the female, yeah, pobo Koto, whatever, it's okay that she lost her mate because mate, because she has babies.
Speaker 2:But you know why? Was it the male one that attacked riptorn? You know, like, yeah, so like, this is still like it's. It's this control, this sense of like sexuality is towards a specific purpose which, even then, is controlled, because riptorn is trying to take the babies and kill them. Yep, like. And that the fact that the, the misshapen, sexy women are like the minions of the man who's trying to kill babies, like man. This is out of out of a uh, like anti-abortionist fever dream. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's, it's like it's, it's like the shit that you see where they're. Like feminism has ruined women.
Speaker 1:It's like it's right there yeah, yeah and and like I think they thought they were giving us a strong woman with this, with kiri, you know, because she like takes him down initially, but I don't know anyway and she's meant to be like a warrior of some special like we hear some backstory, it all provides some exposition about how she was a member of this warrior group, and so she wears this like very short tunic with like a leather, like almost obi belt around it, like after she's returned to the temple because it used to be their headquarters or home or something I don't know.
Speaker 2:There's like a lot of these little like pieces you know, you know what that so often like strong female characters are like that where it's like, oh, you can have your cute little hobby as long as you know within the the realm of like serving the male character well, I'm not even sure that the serving is essential, but what is essential is like but you're gonna like it?
Speaker 1:when I come on to you, well, I mean, right, like you can be strong, you can fight, that's cool. But when I come on to you, you're saying, yes, maybe not the first time.
Speaker 2:My high school boyfriend once told me, like cause, you know, I wanted to be a writer but, you know, also wanted kids and didn't know how I was going to be able to do that. And he's like, oh, you know, you'll just finish up a chapter while the baby's sleeping. It's that same shit, it's the exact same shit.
Speaker 1:Oh, man, man, All right, so all right, okay. So I want to let me talk quickly about race. So this is a very white movie, like there's very little ethnic diversity, with one major exception, which is John Amos as Seth. And Seth is a major character and in fact in the credits it's like and John Amos as Seth, you know, like he's called out.
Speaker 1:He's a big deal and in some ways, for what I just said, it does a good job because his race is unremarked upon, his skin color is unremarked upon. That's just who he is and nobody says anything. He's cool, he's tough, he's the former captain of the guard, now sort of like freelance wanderer, protecting Tal and raising him effectively tall and raising him effectively. And the fact that he's Black like it's just the same as the fact that Dar is blonde, it's not a thing. On the other hand, like I said, he starts out as this very strong, wise, like person in his own right, but then once he and Dar hook up like not romantically, you know, when he's sort of arguing with king zed about what to do like he's really just like dar's like pitch man, you know, he's just sort of like no, you need to listen to him, your highness, like he's already saved your life. Like he's like he, let's listen to him. Let's listen. It's not about, like, what seth thinks thinks is right. It's about seth kind of amplifying well and as.
Speaker 1:Dar has to say, as the captain of the guard, he would have like strategic plans you'd think Right, and like I think the implication was that he agreed with Dar, but like he doesn't even sort of say that. He's just like that guy knows what he's talking about and the fact that it yeah, ooh, like that feels not great. You know that they, they, they took this character made in black and he's strong and powerful and his skin color does not come into play, but he is a black actor in 1982, america, you know. And as soon as the like hero on blue eyed hero, with or without quotes, you know shows up, now all of a sudden he's completely deferring and bowing and scraping and that doesn't feel good. So I don't have much more to say about that, but I just wanted to name that.
Speaker 1:And while we're talking about race and ethnicity, I know this wasn't on purpose, but I can't help notice Rip Torn's wearing a prosthetic nose and, according to the commentary that I saw, like that was Rip Torn's idea, he wanted to play it like a turkey vulture, like I'm putting quotes around that Like apparently that's what Torn said to the director. Like it was from him prosthetic nose to have like a beak and then sacrificing children. And I can't help.
Speaker 2:And like there's nothing else about it. That makes it seem like the jewish the hordes are. What was their name?
Speaker 1:the the jones, yeah, I cannot help but see some resonance with blood libel. You know, even the fact that it was done in sort of a religious way and I I don't know it. Just I'm sure it wasn't intentional, but again, it's one of those things like the dangerous female sexuality that's so woven through that I think it like giving him a hooked nose, the child sacrificer, like it came from somewhere. You know, like there's a reason that that felt right. I'm putting quotes around that word and that's a little uncomfortable, you know. So, all right, the last thing I wanted to sort of talk. Little that's similar is by the beast master, by andre norton was, oh, the novel that we, we used to read andre norton, we did, we did, but, according to, like the commentary that I read, very little actually carried over into the movie.
Speaker 1:So it was like the inspiration rather than, uh, like an adaptation source material. Really, yeah, I think so. But there's like these really interesting sort of moments, like, I think, the witches and some of their powers, and like the way that they incapacitate the king and queen in order to move the baby into the cow's womb, like that was actually really clever and interesting and well done storytelling. I think whatever is going on with these different gods and these different like towns, like he's raised as an Emalite, emalite, emalite, I don't know, it's sort of like your name. I think the town is called Emil, like your name, without a Y, and like at one point he says that's who he is and Seth is, like there aren't any of them left and he's like that's right, I'm the only one because. And like these different towns, each with that has like sort of a symbol that represents the town. Like that's kind of cool, like that's interesting world building. And these bat creatures who worship an eagle and eat through or I don't even know if they're eating, but dissolve creatures through their wings and have no mouth.
Speaker 1:That's a movie in itself. But in this movie it's a total screen time of maybe seven minutes and like I wonder if this would have been like a stronger storytelling movie if somebody had been like you know, don, let's just do three acts and get rid of the bat thing, you know? Yeah, like it's really interesting the way that what I'm thinking about right now is the way that we as audiences are trained to know what to expect and what satisfaction we get when our expectations are met. So like it's not actually that long a movie. I think it's like an hour and 50 minutes or something. So it's a normal movie length. But for the last 20 minutes I was like why is this not over which? So it's not actually about how long it was. Like this is not a Titanic situation where it's actually like two, like like actual a lot of time and you have to pee three times. It's about the pacing of the storytelling and about my expectations. My expectation was that when riptorn fell down into the fire and the ferret died too, that was going to be like I was going to have maybe another seven minutes left to wrap things up or epilogue, rather yeah some sort of epilogue, yeah, where you know dar gets the girl and turns down the throne and then it's over
Speaker 1:and instead I had this whole like after mayax and this huge battle with the jun and the return of the bat people and like those things weren't bad. But because I wasn't expecting them, I kind of resented that. Yeah, yeah, and I think that's a really interesting like dynamic that I'm not sure I'm aware of. I know when I'm satisfied by a story, but I'm not sure that I'm aware of like sort of what it is that this like him choosing to do five acts instead of three kind of, is like pointing out to me in this in this moment. So, but he needed five acts because those bat creatures had to come back, he could have easily like well, not easily, I haven't.
Speaker 2:It's been so long since I've seen it, but it's been 40 years. But couldn't he have put the bat creatures like as they were fighting their way into anyway, who knows? But or he could have made it a trilogy they don't actually advance.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, I don't know. It's interesting. They're necessary at the end in act five in order to well, and I be the deuce x batman.
Speaker 2:But I can kind of see where the june being something that hasn't been tied up, because they are these hordes that aren't they're still not.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, yes, yes, and they're still not tied up. It is like it's tied up insofar as, like they've been defeated, but like we never understand what their motivation is, because they're not. It's. It's not like they're conquering and then living on the land, it's not like they're just destroying mayhem, they're just chaos. They're reavers and they're reavers. They are reavers absolutely, and it's unclear like what mayax's connection to them is. It's unclear how, like they say that mayax controls them and if we defeat him then they're going to come, because they'll be, but it's the actual motivation is never explained. One last thing before I sort of wrap up the other thing when I'm talking about resonances like the hooked nose, it is odd to me these priests of R, they're dressed in sort of red robes with shaved heads and they definitely like not resemble like you would mistake them for, but sort of are resonant with, like Buddhist monks or priests.
Speaker 1:Buddhist monks or priests. They're not Asian, they're all white people but there's something there that feels a little bit unpleasant as well, like, along with the sort of blood libel that I don't know what to do with. I mean, they're just sort of exotic, I think, and fanatic Like, I don't know, maybe Har Krishna were informing it, it was the 80s, yeah and they're.
Speaker 1:They're evil and violent. So I that's certainly not the, at least what was in the zeitgeist. I don't think about har krishna, but they also like. The word fanatic is used, so there's something worth noting. So anything you want to say before I try and like remind us of some of the key pieces of the beast master no, no, I, I think I might.
Speaker 2:I don't want to revisit this movie, but I do kind of want to go back and look at screenshots. Yeah, you totally should.
Speaker 1:You totally should the montage when he's like on his own before he collects all of his animals and he's just like waving swords and stuff like like in the desert. Well, you should watch it.
Speaker 2:All right, I have my marching orders.
Speaker 1:So this film, the Beastmaster which is how HBO got its name, apparently, hey, Beastmaster's on which came out in 1982. I have a feeling we were watching it on cable in like 83 or 84. And this film does not pass the Bechtel test and in fact like falls into some pretty gross tropes, including the sort of dangerous female sexuality with the grotesque faces and very sexy bodies of the witches which you named, is also quite old and we saw it in Bram Stoker. So there's, as you named, overt fear of women's sexuality with these witches. And then there's a lot of covert homosexuality with the scantily clad men, not just Mark Singer as star, like John Amos, we see a lot of his flesh, I'm not complaining. So nudity is a thing in this movie, not just. And we do get gratuitous booby shots with Tanya Roberts and her bathing companions. Kiri and another slave girl are bathing when we first meet them and they are topless both of them. So we get a lot of gratuitous nudity. I saw Mark Singer's whole tush. I saw Tanya Roberts' whole tush. I saw Tanya Roberts' boobies, like there's a lot of nudity, which I guess was what we were into in the 80s, you know, skies out, thighs out. So let's see, I also named that there's some really messed up romance stuff because we see dar manipulate kiri into believing that he has saved her and then demands payment from her in the form of a kiss which he just forcibly executes Like he just assaults her effectively, so gross. And she, you know she fights back but then succumbs to the influence, the manipulation because eventually she falls in love with him. I guess there's some really good acting from all of these actors. It's just like they really deliver those lines. I mean, like Mark Singer like doesn't change his tone or affect throughout. So that is what it is.
Speaker 1:I named that there's some interesting stuff around race. So we've got John Amos' Seth as the only non-white character in the whole thing and that's not remarked upon, which is kind of cool. But at the same time, as soon as Dar Williams, as soon as Dar shows up, mark Singer's Dar shows up and kind of becomes a comrade of Seth's. Seth is completely like he defers to Dar, seth defers to Dar, which doesn't feel great since the only Black character kind of has his authority, like chooses to subsume his authority to this blonde-haired, blue-eyed, white dude. Children has uncomfortable resonance with blood libel and these priests of R with their shaven heads and their fanaticism has uncomfortable resonances with perhaps Hare Krishna or perhaps Buddhist monks or priests.
Speaker 1:I also named the storytelling in this like and the expectations of the viewer and the fact that, like I really expected it to be over after the third act and so the fourth and fifth act felt like ponderously long, even though they were quite active, like that's. That's what's curious about it is the pacing feels slow. It wasn't like shit was happening in acts four and five. I just was like why is this not over yet? So that was kind of interesting and also like there, like there were a lot of like good ideas and like interesting moments of world building that didn't have sufficient space and maybe would have benefited from being like one or more of them being removed so that the ones that stayed could have like expanded and had a little bit more breathing room. So those were the things that I remember you also.
Speaker 2:You mentioned that we kind of got a sense of a strong female character in kiri in that she's like this awesome fighter, but it's this like you are a strong female character, but you're still gonna fall in love with the man and so, like, whatever it is that you're strong at, it has to fit within the man's narrative. And then also, like in the same way that your sexuality has to be in service of procreation and not just because you know it's fun.
Speaker 1:Right, and that piece too. Like as a viewer today I'm like every time she showed interest in him after that first meeting I'm like girl, no, back off. Don't you remember you could do so much better. That was certainly not what I was thinking in the 80s. That was certainly not Well, I actually am glad that I rewatched it. It was kind of fun to like remember and be surprised and all the things. And and yeah, mark singer looked great in 1982. He really did so. I mean tanya roberts did too, and seth, I mean john amos. So you know there's there's beautiful people in this movie. We like beautiful people here at deep thoughts. I really do, we really do so what's she bringing me?
Speaker 2:I am bringing you my deep thoughts on the Shawshank Redemption.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, it's a little deeper. That's a very different vibe.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll look forward to hearing it then See you, then this show is a labor of love, but that doesn't make it free to produce. If you enjoy it even half as much as we do, please consider helping to keep us overthinking. You can support us at our Patreon there's a link in the show notes or leave a positive review so others can find us and, of course, share the show with your people. Thanks for listening. Our theme music is Professor Umlaut by Kevin MacLeod from incompetechcom. Find full music is Professor Umlaut by Kevin MacLeod from Incompetechcom. Find full music. Credits in the show notes. Thank you to Resonate Recordings for editing today's episode. Until next time, remember pop culture is still culture, and shouldn't you know what's in your head?