Alongside Jekyll & Hyde, and Return of the Jedi, no one can ever experience the movie Alien again the way people did in 1979. The characters, against the usual Hollywood practice, died in reverse order of the fame of the actors playing them.
John Hurt was, in fact, the most famous, and definitely the most highly thought-of (belaureled, or whatever), actor in the film, while Sigourney Weaver was entirely unknown, and the only completely unknown actor in the film.
Whoever heard of the only unknown actor in a mostly star-studded film being the only one to survive ? (spoiler, in case someone doesn’t know how the movie ends, and doesn’t want to). It just wasn’t done. So when Sigourney Weaver is all by herself in the ship, for what feels like a very long time, with the countdown playing, OMG, was that suspenseful!
Even if you don’t know how it ends, just the fact that Weaver is now the most famous actor in the film changes everything.
You’d think, wouldn’t you! (And most students do, it’s just that there’s a sizeable minority who don’t.) But “cultural osmosis” doesn’t work as well as you’d think – it’s fairly easy for young people to reach college age without having heard of all sorts of cultural and historical stuff if it hasn’t been explicitly taught to them.
I remember a Scooby-Doo episode that dealt with the phenomena, as well as an episode of Ghostbusters, and if I thought about it for a while, I could probably think of a several other cartoons that used part of the plot.
At the time, I remember thinking that having read the book ahead of time was acting as a spoiler to the cartoon I was watching.
I mentioned the Bugs Bunny cartoon “Hyde and Hare” (1955) above. It’s worth noting that the cartoon assumes anyone watching it recognizes the names Jekyll and Hyde and understands who the characters are without any need for exposition.
No kidding. When my kids were in high school, I discovered that most of their friends didn’t know the songs: “They’re Coming to Take Me Away”, “Wet Dream”, or the Scotsman song. Happily I had taped copies.
Total Recall, I think they made it clear he WAS just getting what he paid for.
I may be wrong as I haven’t seen it since in the theaters…but didn’t a tech at the beginning say something like “Blue skies on Mars…how ridiculous” or something. That pretty much states that after the show, he got up from the table and went home to his wife.
You don’t need to search. The point is, it’s not just your kids who don’t know novelty songs from a specific time period.
(Heck, mine know exactly none of my favorites; they haven’t had the advantage of growing up with Dr. Demento).
So we should reevaluate our expectations. I’m sure there are plenty of weird little songs/snippets/soundtracks to games or memes, that your kids know by heart but you’ve never heard.
Ooh, better example: novelty songs that your parents knew but you’ve never heard of.
My dad would sing just one line of some obscure song from the 40’s … turned out he only knew one line! Something like "I’m the most unlucky fella that was ever born!"
But he would not expect us to know it was from “Pincus the Peddler.” (I just now googled it, and it’s pretty well done)
To note, the relevant “Wet Dream” song is by comedian Kip Addotta, “The Scotsman” is by Bryan Bowers and “They’re Coming to Take Me Away, Ha Ha”!" is by Napoleon XIV. Also recommended in the same vein: “Dead Puppies” by Ogden Edsl and “Fish Heads” by Barnes and Barnes.
So, Dr. Demento wasn’t broadcast in my area. I did hear about it from friends and relatives who lived out of town. I do remember now once visiting relatives in Canada and listening to the show. I wasn’t too impressed. It wasn’t my kind of humor.
Listening to the items above, I do recall hearing at least in passing “They’re Coming to Take Me Away” and “Fish Heads.” Again, just not my kind of humor. The other ones are completely new to me.
The Kip Adotta song was frankly a slog to get through. Even if I had heard it, I doubt I would have remembered any of the dialogue, because, again, just not funny. Seems like second-rate Firesign Theatre type stuff.
“Fish Heads” was excruciating to listen to and the video was painful to watch. Besides, in my family, fish heads were a treasured delicacy, so not really intrinsically repulsive to me.
Napoleon XIV: Again, just not funny to me and physically painful to listen to on headphones.
The Scotsman: Exactly the type of “folk” song that I find repulsive.
So, I guess of all these, I like Kip Adotta the best, because it’s just boring, instead of painful or repulsive.
Except he didn’t. They also made it pretty clear (if it’s all a simulation) that his brain was being destroyed, and that if he didn’t voluntarily exit the simulation, he’d be stuck there until he became a vegetable. That’s part of what made it such a mind-fuck of a movie, the choice to believe one way or another both had irreversible consequences. Believe it’s a simulation and it’s not? Evil wins, the Martian resistance is crushed. Believe it’s real, and it’s not? You’re a braindead zombie.
Unless that was a part of the “experience” as well.
Keep in mind, that if it was “all a dream” he didn’t actually make any choices, he just was given the memory of these events that were pre-scripted.
OTOH, the main argument, IMHO that it was real is that it involved his wife being a bad guy and her being killed. The immersion would be a bit ruined if he gets out of the pod and goes back home to her.
I assume we are talking about the original version, and not the remake anyway, I haven’t seen that, don’t plan on seeing it, and have no comment on it.
There is a movie like that, which I can’t remember the name of either, but I still got what you meant, because it turns out that quite a lot of the angst, and moreover SEARCH for Bunny isn’t necessary. I thought that’s all you were referring to.
My own fault that it was a “twist” for me. I saw it when I was young enough to think that an ending so psychosexually twisted wouldn’t have been made way back when. (Two whole years before I was born.) I must have been in high achool, or maybe a college freshman.