"True Romance" (1993) vs. "Natural Born Killers" (1994): Part 2

<v Speaker 1>Hey, this is Rob and I'm Dave from the Totally
<v Speaker 1>Eighties and Nineties podcast. While we check our vector, Victor,
<v Speaker 1>you'll be listening to the Shirley You Can't Be Serious podcast.
<v Speaker 1>And don't worry, Jason and d cannot only fly this
<v Speaker 1>plane if they can also land it. We're about to
<v Speaker 1>finish with five years of doing this and I can't
<v Speaker 1>imagine stopping at any point anytime soon. I want to
<v Speaker 1>keep doing this forever. I hope we never split apart.
<v Speaker 2>Wherever we go, whatever happens. When I look up to
<v Speaker 2>the stars, I'll know you'll be looking at the same ones.
<v Speaker 1>Guys, welcome back, Thank you for joining us. If this
<v Speaker 1>is your first time here, welcome in. We'd just like
<v Speaker 1>to have lots of fun here, and if you're one
<v Speaker 1>of our many returning listeners, love you so cool. I
<v Speaker 1>am here with my Elvis glasses and my Hawaiian shirt
<v Speaker 1>and Jason has his Honeybear bong and he has shaved
<v Speaker 1>his head just for this episode. We are here for
<v Speaker 1>the second part of our comparison between the movies True
<v Speaker 1>Romance and Natural Born Killers, both which were Quentin Tarantino's
<v Speaker 1>original script. All together, all one, all one, script. You
<v Speaker 1>can get the full story on that one on our
<v Speaker 1>last episode. But we are here today, we are jumping
<v Speaker 1>back in. We've got you know, we talked a lot
<v Speaker 1>about Tony Scott in our last episode, and we talked
<v Speaker 1>about him a lot when we talked about Beverly Hills
<v Speaker 1>Cop two, and even more when we talked about Top Gun.
<v Speaker 1>Just the craziness that he was so good and so
<v Speaker 1>incredible at what he did and so well regarded and
<v Speaker 1>just decided to end it all what it's crazy. And
<v Speaker 1>then you've got Oliver Stone, which is a far less
<v Speaker 1>beloved guy. Now we can say he has definitely done
<v Speaker 1>some amazing things.
<v Speaker 2>That's our first time to talk about Oliver Stone.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, our first time because we I mean we've thrown
<v Speaker 1>around the idea of doing full Metal Jacket versus Platoon. Sure,
<v Speaker 1>and I mean you've got JFK should be compared to something.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, he's got Wall Street all kinds of great things,
<v Speaker 1>but not any movies that we've covered so far. He
<v Speaker 1>enlisted for Vietnam, fought in Vietnam, which of course was
<v Speaker 1>the influence for a trilogy of movies, Platoon being the
<v Speaker 1>first born on the fourth of July, being the second,
<v Speaker 1>and Heaven and Earth was the third one. Did you
<v Speaker 1>see that?
<v Speaker 3>No?
<v Speaker 1>But I know of it because Tommy Lee Jones, right,
<v Speaker 1>which maybe that's how he gets to this one. But
<v Speaker 1>he was coming off of that third, not as well
<v Speaker 1>received movie when he decides to buy in to make
<v Speaker 1>Natural Born Killers, and he had his initial intention was
<v Speaker 1>to make it a movie that was more like the
<v Speaker 1>kind of comedic, romantic, still violent movie that Tarantino had written.
<v Speaker 1>But things started happening that just made him and realize
<v Speaker 1>the world is a crazy place and all that the
<v Speaker 1>media seems to do with it is try to make
<v Speaker 1>it even crazier, and so he kind of jumped on
<v Speaker 1>that idea, and in retrospect, going back and looking at it,
<v Speaker 1>Tarantino wrote the lines for the groupies, the Mickey and
<v Speaker 1>Mallory Groupies well before nineteen ninety one. Right, But as
<v Speaker 1>I'm watching it, I'm thinking, these are the same people
<v Speaker 1>who were latching on to the grunge movement. These are
<v Speaker 1>the same kids who are like, I'm tired of what's
<v Speaker 1>gone on before, I want something more real, And they
<v Speaker 1>kind of took that perspective and what if instead of
<v Speaker 1>idolizing these alternative music, rock stars. They idolize killers, mass murderers.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, you know Oliver Stone. His movies seem a little
<v Speaker 2>overly serious to me. Yeah, they're interesting, They're just not
<v Speaker 2>very fun for me. Right, I tell you my story
<v Speaker 2>about Door scorn movies. Right, they are not popcorn at all,
<v Speaker 2>and I think Natural Born Killers kind of wants to
<v Speaker 2>be popcorny.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know.
<v Speaker 2>I tell you my Door story, right. We told you
<v Speaker 2>this a couple of podcasts back. But we get to
<v Speaker 2>the part where there's the sex scene, there's the witchcraft,
<v Speaker 2>there's the drugs, and I'm blood the blood, and I'm
<v Speaker 2>happy to watch this to talk about it for a podcast.
<v Speaker 2>And I get to this part, I'm like, what in
<v Speaker 2>the crap am I watching? And at that moment, my
<v Speaker 2>twelve year old son goes, whoa, dad, what are you watching?
<v Speaker 1>Right? Yes, same actors from a Twilight Zone. Go back
<v Speaker 1>and check that episode out. That's with Amanda Janic. That's right.
<v Speaker 2>So The Doors has Valkilmer, which of course he's in
<v Speaker 2>true romance. Yes, so yeah, there's some crossover here.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Did you like Wall Street?
<v Speaker 2>I liked Wall Street better than I liked JFK, like Platoon,
<v Speaker 2>I appreciate Platoon.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, yeah, I mean these movies are not fun, right,
<v Speaker 1>I mean yeah, I mean I remember watching Born on
<v Speaker 1>the fourth of July just thinking I'd rather get beat up. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>I feel like I'm getting beat up about this. It's
<v Speaker 1>just really long, it's kind of heavy. It's not very fun. Right. So, Gary,
<v Speaker 1>by the way, that's right.
<v Speaker 2>His favorite parts that he's ever played, he named two Lee,
<v Speaker 2>Harvey Oswald, and Drexel Spivey.
<v Speaker 1>Let's talk about the cast four Natural Born Killers.
<v Speaker 4>Okay, before we.
<v Speaker 2>Get to the cast of Natural Born Killers, I want
<v Speaker 2>to throw this at you.
<v Speaker 1>Okay.
<v Speaker 2>Natural Born Killers was named by IMDb as the sixth
<v Speaker 2>most controversial movie of all time.
<v Speaker 1>So do we want to talk about the copy cat
<v Speaker 1>killers at this point before we get into the cast?
<v Speaker 2>Well, do you want to know the five other most Oh?
<v Speaker 1>Of course.
<v Speaker 4>You like that.
<v Speaker 2>This is, according to IMDb, the most controversial movies of
<v Speaker 2>all time. I'm going to go through seven because we've
<v Speaker 2>talked about seven. Number one most controversial movie of all time,
<v Speaker 2>The Passion of the Christ.
<v Speaker 1>Sure, okay?
<v Speaker 2>Number two a clockwork orange understandable? Yeah, Number three Fahrenheit
<v Speaker 2>nine to one one.
<v Speaker 1>I haven't seen it. Number four is JFK really huh? Okay,
<v Speaker 1>just because it's so conspiracy theory based, Yeah, I guess right.
<v Speaker 1>It started up a lot of conversation. Number five is
<v Speaker 1>the Last Temptation of Christ? Wait a minute, what was
<v Speaker 1>the first one? The Passion of the Christ?
<v Speaker 2>Oh, Passion of the Christ? Mel Gibson, Last Temptation of Christ,
<v Speaker 2>Martin Scorsese.
<v Speaker 1>Really the Passion was controversial or controversial?
<v Speaker 2>An R rated movie about the life death resurrection of Christ.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah.
<v Speaker 2>Number six, Natural Born Killers? Okay, Number seven, Last Tango
<v Speaker 2>in Paris. You remember when we talked about that.
<v Speaker 1>Well, it would have had been our Superman episode. We
<v Speaker 1>started talking about Marlon Brando and the fact that he
<v Speaker 1>could not film in Italy because he was wanted on
<v Speaker 1>pornography eature. That's right, the Last Tango in Paris. By
<v Speaker 1>the way, I think the actress involved in those scenes
<v Speaker 1>actually said that she was raped in those scenes. So
<v Speaker 1>pretty controversial, controversial, right, Okay? Okay, so do the cast.
<v Speaker 2>Let's dive into the cast of Natural Born Killers.
<v Speaker 1>Now this is a more like a controversial cast than
<v Speaker 1>we had into Romance. Interesting, like the Trumance, I feel
<v Speaker 1>like they hit it on the head in all respects. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>do you feel that way for natural boar killers?
<v Speaker 2>No?
<v Speaker 1>No, okay, And that you're jumping right out of the
<v Speaker 1>gate with the one that is the controversial question. Right,
<v Speaker 1>you are not going to.
<v Speaker 2>Find a bigger Cheers fan than me?
<v Speaker 1>Right, I love Cheers. Right, this is amazing.
<v Speaker 3>Hundreds of bottles, red and white wine glasses, high grit nogut,
<v Speaker 3>school covers, hot and a brass rail and a big
<v Speaker 3>city bartender with a joe get there ready?
<v Speaker 1>You from out of town?
<v Speaker 3>Okay, I'll bite Yeah, I'm from out of town.
<v Speaker 1>Can I help you?
<v Speaker 3>I went right over my head.
<v Speaker 1>Excuse me. My name's Woody Boyd.
<v Speaker 2>See Woody Harrelson as a crazy you know, homicidal killer
<v Speaker 2>was difficult for me to deal with.
<v Speaker 3>It's just murder, man. All God's creatures do in some
<v Speaker 3>form or another. I mean you look in the forest.
<v Speaker 3>You got species killing other species, our species killing all species,
<v Speaker 3>including the forest, and we just call it industry, not murdered. Right.
<v Speaker 1>But it's like George Michael coming out with I Want
<v Speaker 1>your sex after being in Wham. Sure he was doing
<v Speaker 1>everything he could to break out of the mold that
<v Speaker 1>he was obviously getting stuck in Yes, because he'd also
<v Speaker 1>played that goofball kind of character in Doc Hollywood as well. Right, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>he did. But if not for a natural born kill
<v Speaker 1>where he comes out and he's playing anything but a goofball,
<v Speaker 1>we wouldn't have had a decent proposal. We wouldn't have
<v Speaker 1>had the people versus Larry Flint, we wouldn't have had
<v Speaker 1>What's the True Detective with him and Matthew McConaughey. I mean,
<v Speaker 1>the fact is is that Woody Harrelson has got some
<v Speaker 1>genuine solid acting chops and Oliver Stone was the one
<v Speaker 1>that decided, I think that this guy can play a killer.
<v Speaker 2>Well, so Oliver Stone wanted Michael Madison to play this character,
<v Speaker 2>but the studio said, hey, we'll give you twenty million
<v Speaker 2>extra dollars if you hire Woody Harrelson. Right, But Oliver
<v Speaker 2>Stone looked at Woody Harrelson, saw something in his eyes
<v Speaker 2>and he said, and his dad is actually a killer.
<v Speaker 1>His dad. If you don't know the story, go check
<v Speaker 1>out the podcast Son of a hit Manah, his dad
<v Speaker 1>is serving time in the pen because he was a
<v Speaker 1>hit man and he murdered allegedly a federal judge. He
<v Speaker 1>did shot him in the back. Yes, the podcast does
<v Speaker 1>call that into question. It doesn't make any bones about
<v Speaker 1>the fact that he killed people. They're just saying, well,
<v Speaker 1>I don't know if he killed that guy, but yeah,
<v Speaker 1>Woody Harrelson's dad is a convicted murderer. It's so fascinating.
<v Speaker 2>I saw an interview with Robert Kennedy Junior, and he
<v Speaker 2>and Woody Harrelson are good buddies, like they're friends. Okay,
<v Speaker 2>Robert Kennedy is saying, Woody Harrelson's dad definitely had a
<v Speaker 2>role in my uncle's assassination. And if you haven't connected
<v Speaker 2>the DUTs, his uncle is John F.
<v Speaker 1>Kennedy. By the way, how did you feel seeing Woody
<v Speaker 1>as a natural born killer? I didn't like it at all. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I thought he was brilliant because we talked about Michael
<v Speaker 1>Madson being in that part, and Michael, to me, Michael
<v Speaker 1>Madson is not somebody the groupies are gonna fall after.
<v Speaker 1>He's not. I mean, he's okay, but he's just not
<v Speaker 1>a blue eyed, good looking, chisel jaw guy. He's a
<v Speaker 1>guy who might cut a CoP's ear off.
<v Speaker 2>Michael Madson, though, has a level of minus that I
<v Speaker 2>don't think Wood he has.
<v Speaker 1>I think that's what makes him so great. Okay, born
<v Speaker 1>a natural born killer man. I figured out who I am.
<v Speaker 2>By the way, since we're talking about Bobby Kennedy, I
<v Speaker 2>can't wait any longer. I've got to tell you this nugget. Okay, Okay,
<v Speaker 2>So we got to switch back to True Romance for
<v Speaker 2>just a second. Okay, since we're talking about Bobby Kennedy.
<v Speaker 2>The hotel shootout scene in True Romance, yes, was shot
<v Speaker 2>in the Ambassador Hotel, which has since been closed down abandoned.
<v Speaker 2>Uh huh, but that is the same hotel where Bobby
<v Speaker 2>Kennedy was shot.
<v Speaker 1>Wow. As long as we're on that, I'm gonna throw
<v Speaker 1>a tidbit out here. I mentioned earlier, but we talked
<v Speaker 1>about Val Kilmer being cast as not Elvis but the mentor.
<v Speaker 1>But he's obviously Elvis in this movie, right right right.
<v Speaker 1>Quentin Tarantino did act a bit before he hit it
<v Speaker 1>big as a writer and director. This is the Dulph
<v Speaker 1>Lungern thing. No, although that's a good one, and Roger
<v Speaker 1>Avery worked as production assistance on the Dolph Lunger and
<v Speaker 1>Workout video, right, No, no. After that, he played an
<v Speaker 1>Elvis impersonator on the episode called Sophia's Wedding, Part one
<v Speaker 1>of the fourth season of The Golden Girls, which was
<v Speaker 1>broadcast on November nineteenth, nineteen eighty eight, almost exactly thirty
<v Speaker 1>six years ago today.
<v Speaker 4>News lies.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it was aired. Now here's the interesting follow up
<v Speaker 1>to that. He only got paid about six hundred and
<v Speaker 1>fifty bucks to do it, but because it was such
<v Speaker 1>a great episode, they kept syndicate and so he ended
<v Speaker 1>up making about three thousand dollars in payments syndication money
<v Speaker 1>syndication which kept him alive while he was in the
<v Speaker 1>process of making Reservoir Dogs.
<v Speaker 2>The Golden Girls.
<v Speaker 1>We have the Golden The Elvis impersonator part he played
<v Speaker 1>on The Golden Girls helped him make it through. Wow,
<v Speaker 1>that's cool.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, Okay, back to the cast of Natural Born Killers.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, so you've got Witdy Harrelson.
<v Speaker 4>You ain't seen nothing here.
<v Speaker 2>And then you've got Juliette Lewis.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, I do.
<v Speaker 4>For all eternity until you and I die and die
<v Speaker 4>and die in.
<v Speaker 1>Till death do us part.
<v Speaker 2>We talked about her because she is the daughter of
<v Speaker 2>Jeffrey Lewis.
<v Speaker 1>Who was in every which way but loosen any which
<v Speaker 1>way you can. Right to go check out that comparison.
<v Speaker 1>What a great couple of movies, Clint Eastwood's highest box
<v Speaker 1>office success. Figure that out. But that it is, Go
<v Speaker 1>check those episodes out. That's a couple of seasons.
<v Speaker 2>We love those great right turn client, So Oliver Stone
<v Speaker 2>wanted her to get buff for this movie, right, and
<v Speaker 2>she was kind of pushed back on it. She's like,
<v Speaker 2>I don't really think she's feminine, right right. She's mean
<v Speaker 2>and she's a killer, but she's feminine again.
<v Speaker 1>It betrays the fact that she's going to beat your
<v Speaker 1>ass if you try to mess with her.
<v Speaker 2>She actually could do seven pull ups by the time
<v Speaker 2>that the movie was filming.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so there you go. How many pull ups can
<v Speaker 1>you do?
<v Speaker 2>Probably not seven? Okay, she's great in this movie.
<v Speaker 1>She has that perfect sweet girl next door, not super attractive,
<v Speaker 1>but a little bit crazy behind the eyes.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, she's the type where she might burn down your house.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah. Yeah, her dance moves paint a different picture. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>and she had just only I don't think she had
<v Speaker 1>been in much maybe Cape Fear.
<v Speaker 4>Christmas Vacation.
<v Speaker 2>Oh, of course she plays Audrey in Christmas Vacation. But yeah,
<v Speaker 2>Cape Fear where she has that weird thing with Robert. Yeah, yeah, okay,
<v Speaker 2>you also have a completely drugged out Robert Downey Junior
<v Speaker 2>in this movie.
<v Speaker 1>Why why why why why why? Mickey Miller always leaves
<v Speaker 1>somebody aloft to tell the title we are your camera.
<v Speaker 1>He so he spent time with somebody preparing for this movie.
<v Speaker 1>Did you know this? This is Heraldo Rivera. It wasn't
<v Speaker 1>Heroldo Rivera, although the interview is based on HAROLDO Rivera's
<v Speaker 1>interview of Charles Manson. Yes, but there was a guy
<v Speaker 1>named Steve Dunleavy who was an Australian TV shock jock
<v Speaker 1>guy and he was like Access Hollywood or something like
<v Speaker 1>that shows he was one of those guys, and so
<v Speaker 1>he hung out with him the whole time. And because
<v Speaker 1>he's Australian, that's how Robert and Junior said, I want
<v Speaker 1>Wayne Gailee to have an Australian accent. Okay, you didn't
<v Speaker 1>like the part. I didn't like this movie, but oh
<v Speaker 1>he gave it away. I mean, you know, Robert.
<v Speaker 2>Downey Junior on drugs is still incredibly talented. I mean,
<v Speaker 2>this is after chaplain. I mean, he's killing it. He's
<v Speaker 2>killing it, but his demons are on the surface.
<v Speaker 1>Here.
<v Speaker 2>Now you've got you got Tom Sizemore, who plays Detective Scagnetti.
<v Speaker 1>Right cop in One Cop and the Other Yep, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>and he's kind of He takes off his shirt and
<v Speaker 1>tells him that she wants he wants her to squeeze
<v Speaker 1>his nipple as he kisses her in her jail cell.
<v Speaker 2>When he wakes her up, she like like Juliet Lewis,
<v Speaker 2>actually punches him and breaks his nose in that scene.
<v Speaker 2>And you can hear him say, I think he broke
<v Speaker 2>my nose. That's real.
<v Speaker 1>She actually broke his nose.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, according to him, she really really did. Yes, Okay,
<v Speaker 2>that's interesting. Then you have Tommy Lee Jones as the warden.
<v Speaker 1>Precursor to two Face. By the way, that movie might
<v Speaker 1>be in a What the heck Happened? Not maybe that
<v Speaker 1>movie but the follow up.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I can't wait to talk about that next season.
<v Speaker 2>When he got his haircut for this movie, they said,
<v Speaker 2>how do you want it cut? He said, I want
<v Speaker 2>it to look like a fifty seven Chevy And that's
<v Speaker 2>how his hair looks.
<v Speaker 1>Does have the kind of ends in the back it does.
<v Speaker 2>How about Rodney Dangerfield as Juliet Luce's dad.
<v Speaker 3>Going good No, Jack Nicky's.
<v Speaker 1>Back disturbing, And I mean again, it's this idea of
<v Speaker 1>taking people's real life tragedy, and this is all all
<v Speaker 1>over Stone in the original script. It just kind of
<v Speaker 1>breezed by the fact that they murdered the parrots, and
<v Speaker 1>there was no talk in the original script of her
<v Speaker 1>being molested or the mom abiding while it happened. That
<v Speaker 1>was all Stone and his producers doing that. But I
<v Speaker 1>thought it was effective in its intent to make you uncomfortable. Well,
<v Speaker 1>it definitely made me uncomfortable. Yeah. I want my Rodney
<v Speaker 1>Dangerfield to be funny and sarcastic, and I want my
<v Speaker 1>Woody to be Goofy exactly.
<v Speaker 2>I want Whatdy boyd, and I want al Chirvik.
<v Speaker 1>You know.
<v Speaker 2>Now, Rodney Dangerfield's wife is Edie McClure. She plays Grace
<v Speaker 2>from Ferris Bueller's Day Off nine. She's also the ticket
<v Speaker 2>lady in Planes, Trains and Automobiles.
<v Speaker 1>She was a member of the Groundling.
<v Speaker 2>She was also back to school with Roddy Dangerfield. Oh
<v Speaker 2>that's right, Yeah, she was taking notes for him. Here's
<v Speaker 2>a couple of names I want to bring up. You
<v Speaker 2>have Stephen Wright, the comedian.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, which, by the way, throw back to Reservoir Dogs.
<v Speaker 1>He's the DJ who introduces all of the songs, including
<v Speaker 1>Stuck in the Middle with You on Reservoir Dog. You
<v Speaker 1>have Balthazar Geddy. Oh yeah, because when I saw him coming,
<v Speaker 1>I'm like, do we have another young Guns connection here? Yes?
<v Speaker 3>Too?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, yeah, the Prince of Pistoliers.
<v Speaker 1>Do you know who his granddad is? Geddy the Geddy
<v Speaker 1>John Paul Getty is his granddad. Wow.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, you also have grand l Bush as a prison
<v Speaker 2>inmate in Natural Bar Killers.
<v Speaker 1>Really, I didn't see John's to know the other one. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>that's right. Yeah, huh no, I missed that. Now the
<v Speaker 1>one of the prisoner that I did see, and this
<v Speaker 1>is only because I just watched Austin Powers with My
<v Speaker 1>boys recently. Okay. The guy who the white guy in
<v Speaker 1>the who's got the shaved head, who eventually like gets
<v Speaker 1>riled up and goes and smashes the TV with the
<v Speaker 1>chair in the prison that starts the riot. He's the
<v Speaker 1>Irish guy who does number two work for like he
<v Speaker 1>leaves his lucky charms wherever he goes. Yeah, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>that's the guy from Austin Boer. Okay.
<v Speaker 2>You also have Mark Harmon as Mickey Noggs in the
<v Speaker 2>TV version. You have Adrian Brody in this movie as
<v Speaker 2>one of the cameramen.
<v Speaker 1>Really yes, I did not see him either, yow okay.
<v Speaker 2>And then just on the cutting room floor, you also
<v Speaker 2>have Ashley Judd and Dennis Leary.
<v Speaker 1>Okay.
<v Speaker 2>Kind of full of people in this right, Yeah, that
<v Speaker 2>doesn't for the cast. I did want to mention something
<v Speaker 2>about one of the locations in this movie.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, sure, when Mickey.
<v Speaker 2>Allery get married, they're kind of on the edge of
<v Speaker 2>a bridge and this is big overlook. I have been
<v Speaker 2>on that bridge many times. It's just outside of Taos,
<v Speaker 2>New Mexico, and it goes over the Rio gram and
<v Speaker 2>it is a big, beautiful bridge. You actually get a
<v Speaker 2>good look at it in the movie Twins.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, can we talk soundtrack for just a minute. Am
<v Speaker 1>I going to surprise you with who the guys are
<v Speaker 1>on these two movies? Do you know who they are?
<v Speaker 1>Hans Zimmer? Okay, So, Hans Zimmer is the composer for
<v Speaker 1>True Romance, And let me just play you one song.
<v Speaker 1>It's one song that's his on this one that is
<v Speaker 1>I just thought, this is beautiful and as soon as
<v Speaker 1>the and it starts playing as soon as the movie
<v Speaker 1>comes on, and I immediately paused the movie and I went,
<v Speaker 1>who is the composer on this? Because it's fantastic And
<v Speaker 1>this is Hans Zimmer. He's beginning his career at this point.
<v Speaker 1>He's done a few movies before this. He'd been in
<v Speaker 1>The Buggles too. Yes, yes, but this is one of
<v Speaker 1>his earlier movies that he was composer for. This song
<v Speaker 1>is called You're So Cool.
<v Speaker 4>Yeah.
<v Speaker 1>I love that, man, it makes me feel good. Oh yeah,
<v Speaker 1>it's kind of fun. What is it like a xylophone?
<v Speaker 1>Probably it's called You're So Cool and you know, which
<v Speaker 1>comes straight from the line of the movie. But it's
<v Speaker 1>just the movie starts off with that and has that
<v Speaker 1>kind of it's almost like a calming, reassuring thing in
<v Speaker 1>this movie that's packed with violence and chaos. Now, can
<v Speaker 1>you tell me who the composer was for Nature Born Killers?
<v Speaker 1>I think it's is a Trent Reznor. It is Trent Resnor.
<v Speaker 1>That was correct, So Trent Resnor. I said he watched
<v Speaker 1>this movie fifty times, fifty times to get in the
<v Speaker 1>mood to make the soundtrack to this one. He suggested
<v Speaker 1>to Oliver Stone that they try to turn the soundtrack
<v Speaker 1>into a collage of sound, kind of the way the
<v Speaker 1>movie used music, like making all those fast edded cuts
<v Speaker 1>and adding dialogue and making something crazy interesting rather than
<v Speaker 1>just a bunch of old nails music. Right, what they
<v Speaker 1>ended up with it was a song burn by nine
<v Speaker 1>inch Nails or that one for you. Now, Okay, that's
<v Speaker 1>not that so that's cool. Even like the Hans Zimmer version,
<v Speaker 1>this one plays right into that chaotic makes you want
<v Speaker 1>to kill somebody style. And I have to think that
<v Speaker 1>David Fincher was thinking about that whenever he decided to
<v Speaker 1>pull some music for seven. Yeah, what are we going
<v Speaker 1>to talk about seven?
<v Speaker 2>We need to Okay, I've got just a couple of
<v Speaker 2>tidbits that we haven't covered, Okay, that I want to.
<v Speaker 1>Drop on you real quick. Yeah sounds good, all right?
<v Speaker 2>So for Natural Born Killers. Quentin Tarantino has said many
<v Speaker 2>times that he hates the movie. He hadn't watched it
<v Speaker 2>all the way through. He thought that Oliver Stone didn't
<v Speaker 2>do a great job with it. In fact, he got
<v Speaker 2>to that part where it's like the I love Lucy,
<v Speaker 2>I love Mallory, I love Mallory TV show. Right. He
<v Speaker 2>said he bumped into Johnny Cash one time in an
<v Speaker 2>elevator and Johnny Cash is like, hey, I just want
<v Speaker 2>to let you know me and June we love your
<v Speaker 2>your movie. Quin Turney, He's like, oh really what and
<v Speaker 2>he's like Natural Born Killers, we just love that movie.
<v Speaker 2>Quentin Tarantina's like, thank you very much, but he hates it. Also,
<v Speaker 2>the prison scenes were shot at Stateville Correctional Facility where
<v Speaker 2>Bad Boys and the Blues Brothers was shot. According to
<v Speaker 2>Woody Harrelson, Robert Downey Jr. Was very popular with some
<v Speaker 2>of the inmates. They recognize him switching over to True Romance. Okay,
<v Speaker 2>Tony Scott would slap Patricia Arquette to get her ready
<v Speaker 2>to film her scene. Okay, like actually slapping her around
<v Speaker 2>once again?
<v Speaker 1>Weird acting, my boy? Yeah, right, did she ask him
<v Speaker 1>to slap her?
<v Speaker 2>It's just how they got ready for it. And then
<v Speaker 2>Senator Bob Dole sided both. Roll Right cited both True
<v Speaker 2>Romance and Natural Born Killers as movies that revel in
<v Speaker 2>the mindless violence and loveless set. Going after both of.
<v Speaker 1>These movies, well something to it.
<v Speaker 2>I also read that Oliver Stone wanted Natural Born Killers
<v Speaker 2>to be kind of like an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>I don't see that at all.
<v Speaker 1>No, And it was the Waco Nancy Kerrigan, Rodney King,
<v Speaker 1>oj Simpson, all of that stuff about changed his mind
<v Speaker 1>on it.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, we ready to do final judgment.
<v Speaker 1>Let me tell you about We talked about how life
<v Speaker 1>imitates art, that imitates life, that imitates ore. Yeah yeah,
<v Speaker 1>the copycats. Yeah yeah, Okay, so copycat crime number one
<v Speaker 1>right here. In her home state of Oklahoma, Miscogy, Oklahoma.
<v Speaker 1>March fifth, nineteen ninety five, Sarah Edmondson and her boyfriend
<v Speaker 1>Benjamin Darris, both eighteen, spent a night alone together at
<v Speaker 1>her family's cabin in miscog Y, Oklahoma. They watched Natural
<v Speaker 1>Born Killers. Two days later, they left the cabin, packed
<v Speaker 1>everything into his niece on Maxima, and also brought a
<v Speaker 1>thirty eight caliber revolver. They said they were going to
<v Speaker 1>go watch a Grateful Dead concert in Memphis, Tennessee. What
<v Speaker 1>they did instead was they went to Hernando, Mississippi, where
<v Speaker 1>Daris killed a cotton mill manager named William Savage by
<v Speaker 1>shooting him twice in the head at point blank range,
<v Speaker 1>and then took a piece of the bloodstained fabric as
<v Speaker 1>a souvenir, and then later he just talked openly about it.
<v Speaker 1>I don't know, why did you all the trouble to
<v Speaker 1>drive all the way down to Mississippi just to go
<v Speaker 1>ahead and tell everybody about it. Anyway, But then they
<v Speaker 1>went to Panshuatula, sorry if I'm pronouncing that wrong, Louisiana,
<v Speaker 1>and they shot Patsy Byers, a convenience store cashier. She
<v Speaker 1>survived but was rendered a quadriplegic, and the guy that
<v Speaker 1>they had murdered happened to be a friend of John Grisham,
<v Speaker 1>who then publicly bashed Oliver Stone for being irresponsible in
<v Speaker 1>making the movie. And by July of that year, the
<v Speaker 1>woman and who had become a paraplegic, Buyers sued not
<v Speaker 1>only the people that shot her, but also sued the
<v Speaker 1>Time Warner Company and Oliver Stone. Ultimately, the case initially
<v Speaker 1>got dismissed on First Amendment grounds, and then it got
<v Speaker 1>reinstated by the Louisiana Court of Appeals, and then ultimately
<v Speaker 1>was dismissed not until March of two thousand and one,
<v Speaker 1>on the grounds that there was no evidence that either
<v Speaker 1>Time Warner or Oliver Stone had intended to incite the violence. Okay.
<v Speaker 1>Sarah Edmondson has now been released on parole in Oklahoma
<v Speaker 1>after serving less than twelve years of a thirty year sentence.
<v Speaker 1>Her parole will end next year. Now that was just one.
<v Speaker 1>There was also a nineteen ninety six a school shooting
<v Speaker 1>in Frontier Middle School where the kid was inspired by
<v Speaker 1>national born killers had seen in a bunch of times,
<v Speaker 1>came in like a bandaleero, like guns and straps and
<v Speaker 1>even a duster, and started shooting people. Nineteen ninety seven
<v Speaker 1>another high school, Heath High School shooting in West Pataducah, Kentucky,
<v Speaker 1>and then, of course nineteen ninety nine Columbine High School massacre.
<v Speaker 1>They routinely, in their conversations to each other before they
<v Speaker 1>went and killed their schoolmates, talked about in be kaing
<v Speaker 1>people natural born killers.
<v Speaker 2>Okay, so there you go, and on that happy note,
<v Speaker 2>let's talk about our final judgment.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you ready, I'm ready? Should I go first? You
<v Speaker 1>should go first? All right?
<v Speaker 2>This is absolutely no contest. This is a complete mismatch.
<v Speaker 1>For me.
<v Speaker 2>True romance is a lot of fun. It's interesting, it's violent,
<v Speaker 2>but it's gripping. And thrilling and fun, and it's romantic.
<v Speaker 2>I think it's a very romantic movie. I buy the
<v Speaker 2>love story between Clarence and Alabama. I love them as
<v Speaker 2>a couple. I'm glad that they survive. I feel happy
<v Speaker 2>at the end of this movie. Okay, natural Born Killers. However,
<v Speaker 2>I don't like any of these characters. I despise all
<v Speaker 2>of them. I don't care who survives at the end
<v Speaker 2>of this movie. Uh huh, it doesn't. I'm not cheering
<v Speaker 2>for anybody. When Robert Downey Junior gets blown away, I
<v Speaker 2>don't care. I don't like any of these people. Natural
<v Speaker 2>Born Killers didn't do it for me. Jeff Johnson has
<v Speaker 2>tried to talk me into liking this movie. For me,
<v Speaker 2>this is absolutely one percent true romance, not even close.
<v Speaker 1>When you got done watching this movie, you texted me
<v Speaker 1>and said, please don't ever make me watch this pile
<v Speaker 1>of crap again. Yes, that's it. So I was like, Okay, well,
<v Speaker 1>it's been thirty years since I've seen this movie. Really,
<v Speaker 1>so I guess I need to check again. And so
<v Speaker 1>I've watched it since you described it as a heaping
<v Speaker 1>dung heap or whatever. But I didn't hate it as
<v Speaker 1>much as you did. I could see the point that
<v Speaker 1>Stone was trying to make because I don't think he
<v Speaker 1>has any desire to have people enjoy his movies, Like,
<v Speaker 1>I don't think that's on his to do list. He
<v Speaker 1>could care less about it, right, Ye, Like he's wanting
<v Speaker 1>to make you feel something. Right, Like you watch the
<v Speaker 1>end of Platoon. If you're happy at the end of that,
<v Speaker 1>there's something wrong with you. Sure. Same thing for Born
<v Speaker 1>on the fourth of July. Same thing for Wall Street.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, none of his movies. So if you're walking
<v Speaker 1>into an Oliver Stone movie expecting a you know, driving
<v Speaker 1>off into the sunset, and you're win a bago with
<v Speaker 1>a happy, married couple and two little kids, well you
<v Speaker 1>get that in this movie, you do. It's just that
<v Speaker 1>they happen to be mass murderers who you should not
<v Speaker 1>be rooting for, right. But I thought that his idea
<v Speaker 1>was effective on this kind of juxtaposition of the media
<v Speaker 1>covering these horrific things but doing it in such a
<v Speaker 1>way that they're trying to entice people to listen. And
<v Speaker 1>what spawned from that is true crime is the most
<v Speaker 1>popular podcast format in the world. People love it. I
<v Speaker 1>don't get it. I've never been. I guess I do
<v Speaker 1>kind of to get it, because yes, it has some
<v Speaker 1>interesting me but for people to just be fascinated and
<v Speaker 1>listen to, like I said, that would rip away my soul. Right,
<v Speaker 1>So watching this movie once every thirty years is about
<v Speaker 1>right for me. Right. I enjoyed it For what he
<v Speaker 1>was trying to do. He's trying to make a point.
<v Speaker 1>I think the point was well made. I think he
<v Speaker 1>went too far and did a bit too much with
<v Speaker 1>all of the weird you know them behind a screen
<v Speaker 1>where other things are going on and TV shows playing
<v Speaker 1>in the window. Is there in a hotel room? And
<v Speaker 1>this random headless corpse standing up every few minutes or so.
<v Speaker 1>I just was like, what is that? Why is that
<v Speaker 1>in here? Other than for shock value? Right like? And
<v Speaker 1>I just felt like he was like pushing that too hard?
<v Speaker 1>What can I do to shock you? And so, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I can see it as a monumental movie. Pulp fiction
<v Speaker 1>changed the face of movies at that time, and everything
<v Speaker 1>seemed to start imitating those kinds of movies from there
<v Speaker 1>on out until we hit the twenty first century. But
<v Speaker 1>compare that to True Romance, where you have Tony Scott,
<v Speaker 1>a guy who made his fortune by making rock video movies,
<v Speaker 1>right yeah, And so he took his same bag of
<v Speaker 1>trips and he combined it with a script by Tarantino
<v Speaker 1>where Tarantino's writing himself. And you put all of these
<v Speaker 1>lovable characters together, I mean, even the crappy Tom Sizemore
<v Speaker 1>Cop and Crispin Cop, as slimy as those guys are,
<v Speaker 1>even Christopher Walking blowing away poor Dennis Hopper, there's something
<v Speaker 1>enticing about all of them. And as you've pointed out,
<v Speaker 1>unlike Natural Born Killers, where you're like, I don't really
<v Speaker 1>care if the shark eats them. I'm happy for them
<v Speaker 1>to die, right, I don't care about these people. In
<v Speaker 1>True Romance, he absolutely makes you care about everybody, everybody,
<v Speaker 1>and it's not some sort of I want to punch
<v Speaker 1>you in the gut kind of movie. It's a movie
<v Speaker 1>that makes you want to enjoy the movie. And I
<v Speaker 1>can't even figure out how it was a box office
<v Speaker 1>bomb and Natural Born Killers was a financial success. But
<v Speaker 1>in retrospect, I have to agree with you, True Romance
<v Speaker 1>holds out as the better movie. If I'm going to
<v Speaker 1>sit down and watch a movie over and over again,
<v Speaker 1>it's going to be true Romance. If you want to
<v Speaker 1>make me think every thirty years, then Natural Born Killer
<v Speaker 1>is sure. True Romance is definitely the winner. Definitely the winner. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>I do want to tell you thank you. I had
<v Speaker 1>not seen either one of these movies.
<v Speaker 2>I had kind of a general idea what they were about.
<v Speaker 2>But discovering True Romance would be kind of like the
<v Speaker 2>equivalent of discovering like Beverly Hills Cop. I mean, it's
<v Speaker 2>just a movie that I really liked. I thought it
<v Speaker 2>was really well done. I thought I had kind of
<v Speaker 2>seen everything there was to see at that time period.
<v Speaker 2>So for me, this was a big discovery of a
<v Speaker 2>movie that I really enjoyed.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, so there you go. So, guys, tell us what
<v Speaker 1>you think. Jeff Johnson's going to be hitting us up
<v Speaker 1>telling us why National Born Killers is so good, and
<v Speaker 1>now I'm excited to hear his opinion on it. But
<v Speaker 1>tell us what you think. Have you seen True Romance?
<v Speaker 1>Most people have. If you haven't, go watch it. It
<v Speaker 1>is worth the rewatch. I got one little tidbit for you.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, Ted Dance and Woody Harrelson have a podcast out
<v Speaker 2>right now, okay, and it's called Where Everybody Knows Your Name?
<v Speaker 2>It's great man together, Sam and Woody.
<v Speaker 1>It's a lot of fun. Great you like podcasts, check
<v Speaker 1>it out, love it well, guys, it was It's been fun.
<v Speaker 1>Catch us next week.
<v Speaker 2>Next week we're diving into the seventies d super Tramp
<v Speaker 2>Breakfast in America.
<v Speaker 1>This is an underrated gym and the reason that we're
<v Speaker 1>covering this one, we're going to be comparing it to Yes,
<v Speaker 1>I Know one, thank you. I always want to say
<v Speaker 1>nine O two one of them. But these are two bands,
<v Speaker 1>especially super Tramp, that just absolutely fly under the radar,
<v Speaker 1>Like nobody talks about super Tramp, but you will routinely
<v Speaker 1>hear songs specifically off of this album to this day
<v Speaker 1>on the radio and they just go by and you
<v Speaker 1>just like, oh, I love that song. Right, nobody could
<v Speaker 1>lose in that. Hey, this is super Tramped. At least
<v Speaker 1>that's the way it was for me. And so I'm
<v Speaker 1>excited to cover what I consider these two supremely underrated
<v Speaker 1>bands and underrated albums. Should be fun.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, see you next week.