Matthew: Alright, so, shall we go ahead? Ian: Mm hmm. Matthew: Hello, once again for an episode of the Intermillennium Media Project podcast, the I double M P. My name is Matthew Porter Ian: and I'm Ian Porter. Matthew: I'm his dad. He's my son and I've made him watch another movie. Ian: Yes, a movie I'd seen before because you'd made me watch it before. Matthew: We revisited it because it was, it was time we talked about this movie on the podcast. It's a director we've certainly talked about before. Ian: Definitely a director we've talked about before. Matthew: One of our top directors on the podcast, and that is John Carpenter. Ian: Carpenter! Once again. Matthew: And it seems Carpenter is best known for a certain kind of movie, but he really has a tremendous range in terms of the movies he's made. Ian: Yes, a John Carpenter film implies something cinematically stylistic in certain ways, it implies something very distinct about the soundtrack to a movie, but it doesn't imply anything about the genre or type of narrative you're going to get. Matthew: He's interested in a broad range of subjects or willing to get interested if he's going to be hired to direct something. Music: Mm hmm. Matthew: And yet there is a style that carries from one of these kind of genres to another. Ian: I'm sorry, this is complete tangent. Matthew: Oh, great. Ian: I want a biopic of Wes Anderson, directed by John Carpenter, and a biopic of John Carpenter, directed by Wes Anderson. Just go with that, run with it, completely separate. Matthew: That would be great. That could be part of a series because I was telling somebody recently, I want a documentary biography of Adam Curtis directed by James Burke and a biography of James Burke directed by Adam Curtis. So we can have these turnabout series. Ian: Oh, absolutely. Matthew: But we're going back to the magical year of 1984 this time. Ian: Yes. Matthew: An important year for me an important year for movies. Ian: And just, just, uh, like, this is an extremely 80s film. Matthew: Oh, I'll give you that. It is very 80s. Ian: Ugh. Matthew: We're talking about Carpenter's Starman. Ian: Starman, starring Jeff Bridges and Karen Allen. Which, my goodness, talk about people that I know from other things. And seeing them here is like, it's you! Matthew: Absolutely. We've got Flynn from Tron Ian: and marion from Indiana Jones. Matthew: Right, right. Ian: It's a very odd, but I don't want to call it a fish out of water story. But it's a road movie. Oh, very much. It's a road movie romance. Matthew: Yes. If you try to figure out the formulas here, this is taking E. T. and combining it With genre romance and I don't mean any of that to be derogatory at all these are a combination of very popular very effective very successful formulas And they come together remarkably well, Ian: very well it's a movie that is not going to grab everyone immediately because it does require a little Bit of that, you know, are you ready for weird space hijinx there's an innate level of awkwardness to the setup, I'd say. Matthew: Yeah. Ian: But it's interesting to see it be done in this sense. And I will say this is a movie that starts out. We've been talking about the famous actors in this and the genre and style, but this is a movie that starts out with probably one of the most famous characters in all of sci fi. Matthew: Oh, yes. Ian: The Voyager 2 Space Probe! I need a list of every movie in which the Voyager 2 Space Probe is a key plot point or character. Matthew: There certainly are other movies, aren't there? Ian: There's so many. Matthew: Yeah, there's one where it tries to come back to Earth and. Yeah. And, and talk to people. Ian: And I know that like descriptions of like, Oh yeah, the gold record disc is like a plot point that other sci fi movies will toss out. It's one of these wild little landmarks in. The way we approached space that we can't ever undo, and it will always be there as a, a plot hook Matthew: and it makes sense because that Voyager monument package, the information in the gold record, that was scientists hoping for a science fiction scenario to come true, trying to do their part to make it happen, to make some kind of contact. Between Earth and other planets with intelligent life out there. So, it makes perfect sense that if you're going to set that up in the real world, and I think that's a beautiful thing that was done with Voyager, absolutely, what stories can flow from that? What can that lead to? Don't know of any, but I'm sure there are stories out there in which it does not go well, in which evil conquest driven aliens see this and say, Oh, look, targeting coordinates, but I can't think of any offhand. It's usually done in the same spirit of optimism in which that record was put on Voyager. Ian: Mm hmm. We start out with the Voyager probe being sucked into a planet. Matthew: I think, and, and I love the fact that we start over the credits over the production studio, the releasing studio logos, we get audio from the launch of the Voyager probe. And then we have the Voyager probe flying through space and we can hear the music, some of the music that is encoded on that disc, like, the Rolling Stones satisfaction. Action. Yes, and I, it's like, it's not diegetic because they're in space and it's not as if they put this on the record so that Voyager would have a soundtrack to listen to on its road trip and yet it is music that's on that On that probe in some way. So I'm not sure how to think about that. I love it. I just love that image. Of Voyager cruising through space to the Rolling Stones as its soundtrack. It's a lovely image. Ian: It doesn't even have no impact. That being there. It's not quite diegetic, but it is kind of diet getic. Matthew: Oh, that's a great term. Ian: Thank you. Matthew: It would be actually in the scene, except. Ian: Except exactly. And we've replaced, we've replaced his diegetic audio with Folger's crystals. Matthew: And I do think it's encountering a planet or I thought that I am not sure. And I might come back to that as we talk about later parts of the movie. Yeah, it definitely encounters a habitat for some other species. Ian: Mm hmm. And it, it is pulled in, it plays its music, a little hatch on it opens, and we zoom into back on earth to continue our story. Yes. Which I take it Takes place a while a little while later. Matthew: I guess so. I guess it's certainly some. Oh it when we also see after whoever's on this Whatever aliens have encountered Voyager. We see them launch something Ian: Mm hmm, Matthew: so they're responding in some way, but you're right then we cut to earth and it must be well It can't be too much later. Ian: Yeah, Matthew: because it seems to take place in the present day of 1984 Ian: Yeah, this is very much a present day movie yeah, but we get a Vessel being engaged by government, planes and shot down immediately. Matthew: Yes, yes. Ian: And a perfect tonal aspect of going from the Voyager 2 space probe optimism to a military locked on target fire. Right. It's, it's intentionally whiplash in terms of its human response element. Matthew: And it's very much a early 80s, high tension, cold war kind of setting and, response where we've got the people in Washington assuming it must be the Russians and it's sort of coming over the pole and that would be an entry path for something from Russia and the Russians say, yeah, they, that they have no idea what this is, so. Yeah, they shoot it down. Ian: And it crashes in Wisconsin. Matthew: It crashes near a cabin where a young woman is getting drunk and watching home movies and being very, very sad. And it becomes clear pretty soon after we meet her that she's watching home movies of her departed husband whom she misses so terribly. Ian: Yep, this is a movie that immediately starts out and tells you, we killed off Jeff Bridges. And I'm like, how could you? Matthew: Right. Oh. Starring Jeff Bridges in the two minutes of home movies. Ian: Exactly. Oh, but yes, her husband is dead. And while she's crying herself to sleep, the blue glowing orb that made its way out of the crashed ship wanders on over. They do an excellent job. They give us a, a first person perspective of a glowing blue orb. Matthew: It's amazing that anything survived because they didn't just shoot down this craft. It exploded. Ian: It exploded. Matthew: And you're right, we got this little blue lens flare floating around. It's like Botticelli's Birth of J. J. Abrams. Great. Uh oh, I think I broke Ian. Ian: Oh, yes. Um, I love the fact that we can tell that this orb is heart. Just by the way they animate it. It doesn't just fly straight. It dips every once in a while. It stumbles. Matthew: Right, it's like it's in the air, but staggering. Ian: Yes, and when we see from its perspective, it's making its way, but there's these little flashes, which time with the stumble, so it's like it's wincing in pain. Matthew: Oh, that's interesting. I always thought of those flashes as snapshots, like it's looking, it sees something new, it records it, it takes a shot of it. But maybe, maybe, I like Ian: that idea. I always thought that was it wincing, it was limping its way over here. Matthew: Interesting. And even though this looks weird and ethereal and it's mostly a lens flare, there is a physicality to it. It gets to the cabin in order to get in. It has to go under the door and through the gap. It can't just go through the walls. It has limitations. It's real in that way. Ian: Mm hmm. And it, it goes in, it kind of looks around the room. I love that all the electronics in the room kind of react to its presence. Matthew: Yes. Ian: Like the TV goes static, the light bulbs brighten and dim or, or pop as it comes through. Its being is pushing on the rest of the room in the world in that way. Matthew: And that was very much a trope at the time. It very much echoes what we see in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. The presence of these aliens and their technology interferes with our technology and our electronics. It's very effective too, because it also shows that that physicality and that impact that they have. Ian: One of the things it finds is the scrapbook. About the dead husband. Matthew: Yes, all the old photographs and recent photographs and baby photographs and things. Ian: I do love how it sees one of the pictures of Jeff Bridges and it just, like, okay, little CGI head of him pops up, spins around, goes back down. It's like, okay, I can, I can, I can review this one. Okay. And one of the things in the scrapbook is hair. Matthew: The little, like, lock of baby's first haircut hair. Ian: Uh, yeah. Matthew: When he was a kid. Ian: But you know what that contains. DNA and insert the creepiest scene. It gets its creepiest scene out early. I'll say it does. I mean, it does. Matthew: It does. This is I don't know if it was the same effects coordinator, but it it's similar enough to some of the stuff we see in Big Trouble in Little China Ian: or the thing. Matthew: That's true. Or the thing. Ian: Yeah, it's like this is some John Carpenter weird. John Carpenter given a rubber mask budget creates some oddities going on here, but Matthew: We get creepy Space Baby. Ian: Creepy Space Baby. Matthew: Which, it's not quite the Starchild from 2001. Ian: Yeah, I was, I was gonna say, is Starman just uh, 2001 in reverse? It, it starts out with a weird space baby, and it ends with someone doing their job. Matthew: And, Karen Allen's character, who we later learn is named Jenny Hayden, she wakes up having, to this noise, having drunk herself to sleep, and she sees Space Baby on the floor with a glowing red head. Ian: Yeah! Matthew: Very creepy. Very creepy. And it's not a smooth, idealized baby. It's a lumpy, dirty, creepy baby. Ian: It's turned, it's rapidly becoming an adult and it's not doing so proportionally or in the right order. Matthew: Yeah. We see this, rapid growth process. It's done with a little bit of modeling, a fair amount of animation, which now looks really silly, but was very impactful seeing this on a big screen in, in 1984. Yeah. And this, as with a lot of this stuff from John Carpenter, the sound design is what sells it, this creepy, groaning, crackling sound of bones stretching. It's, it's the closest we get to full on horror, is this little sequence. Ian: Yes, I will say this is, this is also where I will start talking about the rest of the soundtrack. This is a John Carpenter movie, it has a John Carpenter soundtrack. Matthew: Yes. Ian: It is less heavy of a John Carpenter soundtrack, and it did not put me to sleep this time. Which is surprising. Matthew: Well, the score wasn't written and performed by John Carpenter for this one. Ah. It's very much in his style. Yeah, the music was done by Jack Nietzsche. Ian: Mmm. Oh, and he's known for some other films for sure. Oh, wow. Yeah. Matthew: It's a very spare and simple soundtrack. There are a couple of musical themes that work well together, and they're short loops, but they're very effective because all they do is evoke a certain tone. Ian: Yes, they're they're purely tone additions, the entirety of the sounds here are most of what you get, this weird, odd whirring sound whenever, the Starman does his science magic. It's intentionally well, it's intentionally not defined. It's implied to be advanced psychic powers or technology or something. Matthew: Yes. Ian: But it's not always even Matthew: and next thing, you know, this baby has grown up through adolescence into Jeff Bridges, Ian: Jeff Bridges Matthew: now around the cabin naked And trying to communicate with an utterly startled and stunned Jenny Hayden Ian: Jenny Hayden who's very quick to say something's going wrong here get the gun Matthew: Yes, and meanwhile, he is trying out the greetings in every earth language that was on the Voyager disk You Ian: Which is, okay, Jeff Bridges gets so much fun to play in this movie, Jeff Bridges getting to just, like, This is a movie where he doesn't have a whole lot of lines compared to some movies. Like, it's a, it's a movie where a lot of his acting is physicality and facial work. Matthew: Yes. Ian: And the lines he does say, he gets to put the weirdest emphasis on the wrong syllable sometimes. He gets to have the most fun. And I just want to also see Jeff Bridges practicing how to say Greetings in every language he can. How does he get these right? I want to, I want to kind of watch that behind the scenes features aspect because he changes his tone. He shifts his body language wildly for every single one of them attempting to do things. Yeah. Matthew: He starts, I think with Mandarin, which makes sense. Let's start with the most populous, most, most used language. And go from there, eventually he, when he gets to English, he just repeats the greeting from the secretary general of the United Nations that was on the plaque. This has got to just be utterly surreal for tipsy or drunk, Jenny Hayden. Ian: Oh yeah. Who, who passes out, Matthew: And has dropped the gun when she sees that this space baby has grown into her, uh, her dead husband who's wandering around naked in the cabin now. Ian: And then in a parallel to her drunken watch party of old home video, Jeff Bridges picks up the gun, wanders around and watches the old home videos and sees a little bit more how the English language they're talking in the videos is being used, but also like sees how to move around better and sees how a gun works. And there's this wonderful bit where he doesn't, he looks at the gun that was pointed at him, continues to say greetings, she passes out, he picks up the gun, wanders around, then watches a video of them doing practice shooting, immediately shows proficiency with the gun, fires it, looks at it, then looks back at her, and you can watch, without a word being stated, as the spaceman realizes that Oh, that would have hurt me. Matthew: This is what she was prepared to do. Okay. And that's what this device is for. Okay. Ian: Okay. It's like, there's this context conversation with no dialogue and it's brilliant. Matthew: And we also get our first look at how, how the Starman is inclined to be able to copy and duplicate behavior that he sees. And he's sent here to learn. And so, like you say, bridges on, on the whole movie moves a certain way or. Says certain things. Starman tries them out. He realizes what the gun is. He handles it in exactly the same way that he sees on the home movie. Ian: It's really, uh It's not just monkeys see monkey do, it's, uh, Starman see monkey do. Starman does as well if not better than monkey. Monkey gets scared of Starman. The movie. Matthew: And there's one other thing that we see Starman do, and this might have been before or while Jenny is passed out. Ian: I don't know. It was while he was transforming into a human. Oh. When he, when he, when he stands up from finally having grown a full body. Yeah. He drops them. Matthew: Oh yeah, he drops them at that point. A whole bunch of little blue gray spheres. Little marbles. Ian: Yes. They're, they're, they're not very small. They're, they're kind of like, I'd say like maybe an inch in diameter. Yeah. Matthew: Yeah. Roughly the size of a quarter or so, I'd say. Ian: Dude. Uh, dude, it's, it's 1984, you're, you're so early. The Bakugan tournament isn't for like a couple decades now. You showed up way too early. You brought your own. That's great. But you need to, yeah. Matthew: And uh, so you're right, he drops those as part of the transformation process. And then later on, he reaches out a hand and, and picks them up or they, they, Ian: they've vwoyped up to his hand. Matthew: That's right. They've wiped up to his hand and we see these throughout the movie because these are his spell slots. Ian: Yes. That's a great description. Matthew: He does. We see he does have some what's for lack of a better term magical powers. He has some advanced technology alien abilities, but he is limited again. There's a physicality to this that I like and he has to use up one of these little spheres each time he does something. Ian: I will say what he uses them for is wildly variable. Matthew: Yes, sometimes they seem quite trivial. Sometimes they're, uh, they're plot shattering. Ian: So, we get, the first one he uses though, he is, he is immediately. Taken a human form, understood that he was shot down and had a gun pointed at him, and he now understands what a gun is. And, and first thing he does is call home. Yes. Yes, that's right. This is an E. T. that's smart enough to bring a cell phone. Matthew: As soon as you get there, phone home. Okay. Exactly. I will, mom. Ian: And it is very much a, I'm not having fun at the party, please pick me up. Matthew: But they apparently they they can't pick him up here in Wisconsin. I'm not entirely sure why. Instead, he has to get to. I forget the exact terminology, but like, landing site one. Yeah, I was Ian: gonna say, is there something about Wisconsin they can't use? Matthew: Well, I don't know, they don't have the maps for it. Ian: Yeah, they need flatter terrain, I don't know. So the aliens are lactose intolerant and they can't handle the cheese, I don't know. Matthew: So in this little conversation he has, and all we see are Digital bleepy type noises with with subtitles as he I gather encodes his message into this sphere And he's going to meet them at landing site one in three days Mm hmm. It's convenient that he uses days in his communication with them Ian: they do seem to have an idea of like a day or like a The concept of, you know, orbital mechanics enough to be able to calculate that as a measure of time, which makes some sense. It might, it might just as well be a, positional coordinates over time that translates into days for us, but it's still, we've got a destination, it's across the United States, it's road trip time. Matthew: Yes. Ian: Jenny wakes up. Matthew: Yeah, so Jenny wakes up, she tries to escape. He. intercepts her at the car and he's still got the gun. Yeah. And he gets her into the car and wants her to to to drive him to landing site one. And Ian: she does bring him clothes, at least. Matthew: Yes. These are your clothes. They fit him nicely because they were her husband's. So he spends the entire movie in a red plaid shirt and a pair of khakis. Mm hmm. And he, you know, Shortly after they get started on this road trip, he uses one of the spell spots for, um, uh, for, uh, for MapQuest. Yes! It's like Projects onto the windshield a map of the United States, complete with state boundaries. Again, they've studied maps, apparently. Ian: They have Matthew: and points out where he needs to go and He points at it and she looks it over and says well, this is Texas. That's California This is Arizona maybe and this is where we start to get the humor of his learning language because he says yes You take me Arizona, maybe Ian: yes, and She is, of course, terrified, held at gunpoint, and driving. This is not a great meet cute. Matthew: No. No, no it isn't. Ian: And I will say, from here, the movie takes a lot more of an episodic nature. Matthew: Yes, and we cut back and forth between them and their road trip, and him learning about her, him learning about how to be human about Earth, and the evil government people. Mm hmm. And we have met one less evil government person. Mm Charles Martin Smith plays a, an, an, an academic. I don't know what his scientific discipline was, but he was with SETI, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, but he is essentially on the payroll of the DOD. And he's the, the science expert who's supposed to tell them what they need to know, apparently, what they need to know to blow things up when things need blowing up. But he doesn't really have that attitude himself. He likes the paycheck, but he has moral qualms about it. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: And we see those grow over time. But the, the government people are tracking down this creature that crashed. And they learn more as they recover the spacecraft, which is remarkably undamaged given the fireball that it created when it impacted. Ian: And it's hollow. Matthew: Yes. Ian: Which adds to the physicality. Matthew: Yes, yes, he was some kind of being inside this thing. And in the door pocket of his ride, he's got the gold disc from Voyager. Ian: Which immediately sets all of the SETI team there, the SETI buddies. Saying we invited him. Matthew: Yes. Ian: It's like, yeah, this is an invitation. He showed up to the party. We said we'd be hosting. Matthew: Right. We told him, here's who we are. Come by and visit sometime. Ian: And military guy is like, Nope. Came into our space. Shoot him down. The amount of vitriol our military guy has conceptually is a little bit. Heavy handed. Sometimes Matthew: it is over the top. It's hard to believe somebody would have absolutely that zero to 60. Let's kill it attitude. They don't reject Jekyll in that role. And it's the kind of role that he's, he's good at, but it's, that's the one part of the movie that just seemed so forced. Ian: He never gives a good reason as to why. Right. This is honestly, he is, we, you know, Richard Jekyll playing, agent Fox. Matthew: Yeah, right. Ian: I don't know. There's something about that. He never gets a villain monologue in the right way. I feel he never explains his plan. He never he never has any reason. He just is, which makes him much more a force of nature. Matthew: Sort of in his defense. We do early on, get some reasons to to at least want to take this alien into custody and question it because there are indications that he has kidnapped a woman from Wisconsin. And. That's reason not just to let him go on his way. But still, the fact that from the very beginning it was shoot him down and kill him. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: Because at some point, as they're driving, Jenny just says, you know, I've had enough of it. She causes a near collision with, a van that's going the other way and screams for help and says she's being kidnapped. And that's another time when we see, Starman use one of his spell slots. Ian: Yes! Matthew: Because the guy charges him with a lug wrench and, uh, Starman sets it on fire along with blowing up a tree behind it. Which makes me think it was kind of a directional heat ray sort of thing. Ian: I think it was, yeah. I think he used like scorching ray or something, but he almost scorched ray there and ray runs off. But yeah, and the funny thing is, this entire time, Starman is there holding a woman by the arm with a gun. Matthew: Yes. Smiling and saying, Greetings! Ian: Smile! Greetings! And that's all he's, like, that's what he has. It's this severe disconnect of action and word. Matthew: And this gives, gives me one of my favorite little exchanges in this movie because Charles Martin Smith's scientist has asked the non com who's kind of his, his, uh, Assistant? Army guy? To, to monitor the police bands and just let me know if there's anything bizarre, unusual, anything weird. And he comes up with this report that, there was this guy en route such and such, and he seemed, he appeared to have been kidnapping a woman, and he, uh, he yelled greetings and melted a lug wrench. Ian: Yelled greetings and melted his lug wrench? Matthew: Weird you want, weird you get. I love that exchange. Ian: Oh, absolutely. I don't explain them. I just write them down. It's so good. And that's definitely the kind of humor. It's not quite fish out of water, but it is, non sequitur society humor in some ways. Best, is the best way I can describe it. Matthew: And that works so well for the character that Charles Martin Smith is playing and also this non com. They are real characters. They're taking this seriously. But they are, they understand the, the wonder and strangeness of what they are dealing with. And they appreciate that even as they're dealing with it. Ian: And Starman is kind of a parrot in that sense. He learns situations and responses and pieces being put together. And so every conversation with him is fuel for what he'll have to say and understand in the next one. And there's some fun callbacks where one set of interactions kind of teaches him incorrectly you get response A, you give response B, and that causes the next thing to happen. It is so many dominoes being set up and knocked down in parallel with each other. Matthew: Yeah, he has no sense of what's appropriate, no sense of what is typical, just, oh, humans respond to this with that. Ian: Because he doesn't have the larger context to do anything with it. So as they're going along, he winds up talking with people at the gas station and hearing what they describe and, ticking someone off. So he learns what flipping someone the bird is and things like that. It's also interesting to see him piece together things, which is another instance of Jeff Bridges getting to do a lot of facial and physical acting in that sense, because he will see people talking, but then he watches something being signed and he realizes That we communicate via text as well, and that simultaneously, one of, her attempts at getting a message out, but it also opens up him trying to read signage elsewhere. Matthew: Yes, he, he gains that idea of written language. Music: Mm hmm. Matthew: Makes me wonder, do they not have written language where he's from? Ian: Yeah. Matthew: It's not all speech or telepathy or something. We get a few little hints later on as he's talking with her about where he comes from, and how it's beautiful, and how it's different, and we're all one people, and yet we, we are missing some of the things you have here on Earth. And there's, you mentioned the physicality of, of Jeff Bridges here. There's something about the way he plays this character that's kind of bird like. Ian: Yes. Matthew: The way he moves his head around abruptly. He'll just make a sudden movement in one direction and then stare in that direction. Make a sudden movement in another direction. It's very much, he's scanning the environment, but there is something bird like about the way he's doing it. Which is an interesting way it works. It makes him seem intense. It makes him seem fragile as well. Mhmm. Ian: Mhmm and yeah, the fragility is huge because as we're driving along, we get a little bit more of, we get, it's kind of, their road trip is alternated between a place they stop to do something, and the interactions there, and the conversations in the car. And it's via the conversations in the car that we learn that he has a time limit, not just for when they arrive, but when he will be able to be there. Make it if he's not there in three days. You will die staying on earth. He will kill him. Matthew: This body is not permanent Ian: Mm hmm, and She explains a little how unhappy she is with this and how it's scary how you know Having a gun pointed at me makes him makes her a little bit jumpy And then having to explain, little bit jumpy, and that sort of thing. There's a lot of, you know, say the phrase, then explain the phrase, but it gets them to start communicating. And he shows, I'm not trying to hurt you, I didn't, I didn't want that to be the case. Matthew: And we see him start to put together concepts too, because then he explains, I look like Scott, so you not be a little bit jumpy. Ian: Why did I take this? To make it an approachable face. Right. He needs to get there not to die. He is trying to learn. He's, he doesn't have various of these. Sensations, they're new to him. Being a human is very different and weird. Matthew: So eventually he ditches the gun, explains to her, I mean you no harm, I really do need this help. And he explains it in his limited ability of the English language. Music: Mhmm. Matthew: And, there is a degree to which this movie is Stockholm syndrome the alien kidnapping edition. Intentionally or not. It's it's preloaded with the fact that this is is is her husband is his body. So she is inclined to be sympathetic and And yet she also kind of starts to understand this character of Starman and what he needs, and he needs her help. And she goes from wanting to escape no matter what happens to him, to wanting him to be okay, but wanting out of this. So she tries to set it up so that he's got the car and everything he needs to get to Arizona, and she's gonna take a bus and leave, and that doesn't work out. Yeah, Ian: it doesn't tell him that she's going to leave, but she's trying to give him a map, a credit card, the keys to the car. Matthew: Yes. Ian: Yes. And she's taught him how to drive. Although there's an issue with that. Yes. I, I watch you carefully. Green means go. Red means stop. Yellow means go very, very fast. Yeah. Matthew: It has a lot of these instances of showing us ourselves by showing someone from the outside seeing us. Ian: So, we watch him use another one of his spell slots, . Because at the restaurant that they'd stopped at, outside, is a hunter with a deer he killed. And Starman just can't get over seeing that. Seeing the dead deer is very bothering to him. He, he does not sit right. Matthew: And even the idea of killing another living creature for food, it troubles him. It's probably, it's apparently a concept that is, that is unknown to him. Ian: Mm hmm. But he goes over and resurrects the deer. Matthew: And that, does two things. One, Jenny is literally about to get on the bus to leave and she sees this happening and her attitude towards Starman changes. And at the same time, this also sets up story wise, he is able to restore life to, to what was recently killed. Yes. Seems to take a lot of effort, but, and it takes one of his magic balls, but something he can do, it's within his power. And of course this causes a big, conflict with the hunter who had just killed that deer, was planning to eat it. Ian: Is very upset. Matthew: So she, instead of getting on the bus, she rescues him from that fist fight. And they hit the road Ian: and that does also mean that there's now a bigger incident with police chasing them down, right? Puts them larger on the local police chatter radio, which draws the military closer. So those all feed into each other. Even their small little things. The times they're trying to be quiet and careful don't do much, but they keep, if they get into these larger scenarios, that pulls the, the danger to them faster. Matthew: Yeah. All along the military people have been working with state and local law enforcement, putting out this APB on the orange and black Mustang. That is on the road and is involved in a kidnapping as far as they're telling the police, but this is a big enough thing that the police are already chasing them after this fight in the, in the parking lot and they managed to get away. She's exhausted at this point. He is, and he doesn't really know what hungry is, but when she points it out, says, oh yeah, hungry. We need food. Ian: Oh yeah. Cause that was, yeah. Matthew: Doesn't understand. Tiredness and sleep, apparently, but understands what she's saying when she says they need sleep. He's kind of learning how to be in a human body. So they go to a Howard Johnson's motel and, uh, almost get caught by the police there. Ian: Yes. Matthew: But with the help of some rowdy partiers who happen to be at the rest of the hotel, they get away from the police, but the police chase them. Ian: Mm hmm. And I believe it was somewhere in here as well that we get to get the fun scene of them, uh, going to the restaurant in the diner to have food. Oh, yes. To learn how to eat. And that includes him getting to try Dutch apple pie. Yes. Matthew: Food is a wonderful new experience for him. Ian: A wonderful new thing. And, and, and It's very fun to see this, this child like, also once again bird like, fascination and interest being pulled. He's like, he's presented with the food. I forget what else she orders him, but I think it's vegetarian. Matthew: It's a deviled egg sandwich. Oh yeah. My guess is she ordered something she knew Scott liked. Ian: I'm betting it she did. Matthew: No other basis on which to think what this alien might enjoy, so let's start there. Mm hmm. Ian: But he immediately was just drawn to Dutch apple pie. Matthew: Yes. Like, and she's, it's, it's kind of a typical sort of thing and not knowing the rules and why are the rules like, you know, no, that's, that's the pie. You eat that after the sandwich. Why? Ian: Why? Matthew: I don't know. We just do. Ian: We just do. Matthew: But he loves the pie. Ian: He loves the pie. And getting to see, honestly, just the clip of Jeff Bridges, like, having a, an encounter with God, eating a piece of Dutch apple pie. It's so good. He's just like, Oh, Oh, Dutch Apple, because he was told by the, the waitress. I forget. It's like, it's excellent. Matthew: Yes, this is terrific. Terrific. Now he knows what terrific means. Ian: Yes. He's like, yes. Matthew: Without going into any detail about it, there are things about this performance that now remind me of Emma Stone's performance in Poor Things. Somebody learning to be human, but yeah, it's great to see him experience these sensations for the first time, like eating Dutch apple pie. Ian: And. As they go through these things, the eating together moments, the, seeing him revive the deer, the escape, with the help of the rowdy partyers, you get to see them get closer and closer, which makes them getting close to, uh, to the destination Arizona and running into the police barricade. Matthew: Yes. Ian: So, so heartbreaking. Matthew: And the military, looking at their trajectory that this was on before it was shot down, they figure out where it was probably headed. And we get between that and conversations that Jenny has with Starman, they're headed to the crater, the Meteor Crater in Arizona. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: That's landing site one. Ian: That implies some wild stuff. Suddenly Beringer crater. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Is not just a meteorite. Huh. Matthew: But talking about the barricade, that's probably the biggest action sequence we get. Ian: I think so. Matthew: They're being pursued from the motel. And I don't know what prompts him to do this. Maybe something he saw on TV because he was watching TV most of the time that she was sleeping. He raises the gun. I don't even think it has ammunition in it. I think the magazine is out, but he raises the gun. Later. Ian: Yeah, he dropped the, uh, the magazine out earlier. So this is an empty gun, but he raises it. Matthew: So the policeman in the car next to them fires and hits Jenny. Ian: Yeah, Matthew: and right about this time they get to a police, a big barricade, a roadblock because there is an overturned fuel truck across the road. One of those things that happens a lot more in movies than I think happens in real life. So we get a fiery crash. Ian: Destroys the beautiful car they've been running. But Matthew: before the crash, we see him pick up a sphere and hold it tight and everything starts to glow. And we get this wonderful, iconic shot of him carrying her with this little blue glow around them. Carrying her safely out of the conflagration of this car crash with the fuel truck. Ian: It's a beautiful scene. Honestly, it's a scene that is so excellent, I'm surprised it's not more of the promotional art for this movie. Matthew: Yeah, it was used a bit, but not that much. I think they wanted to focus on the faces of their stars a little more, so we tend to get the two of them, or the two of them looking at a glowing sphere, that kind of thing. Ian: Mhm. Matthew: But it's a wonderful shot. It's, it seems a little hokey, and the, the special effects are not great, but again, the, the special effects not being perfectly accurate, not being perfectly clean, give it that otherworldly feel. Ian: Yeah, there's a, there's that separation. That sometimes the the weird layering actually makes it more effective Yes, because he seems to not just be walking out of the fire He seems to be pushing the fire away because of like the blue edge to it. He seems to be He seems bigger somehow than the fireball around them Matthew: Yeah, you've got that, that blue border which sometimes is a sign of sloppy compositing from that era. Here it works because it appears to be that kind of energy field. Ian: Yes, but they walk out and kind of use the smoke and everything as a distraction. And escape into a house being driven on the highway. Matthew: Right. All the vehicles in and out of this area are being checked, but they are, he's carried her into half a mobile home on the back of a flatbed. Mm hmm. Ian: Mm hmm. And inside there, he uses another sphere to bring her back. Matthew: And the way this is shot, this is apparently something that has taken more effort than anything else he has done. Because we get this montage of shots of this mobile home rolling on the highway through the night, and this red glow that eventually is visible on the outside, through the walls. Ian: But He revives her. Matthew: And she wakes up in the mobile home, wearing his jacket, rather than her torn, blood soaked shirt. And, uh, and she's alone. Ian: Mm hmm. And tries to figure out where he's gone. Matthew: And it turns out they're at a truck stop. He hitched a ride with the cook whose shift ended. An hour ago. Yep. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: And, and then she has to go and, and find him. And he is almost captured at the next roadblock. When they're checking every person very, very carefully. But she and the guy she got a ride from concoct an elaborate, diversion. And she's able to pull him out of there, which is kind of a fun sequence a little bit of more on the ground action sort of stuff Ian: And it's an adorable reversal because we had the restaurant where she was going to abandon him and then decide to not and now we've Got the restaurant she wakes up in and he's abandoned her and she chases after yes It's such Matthew: a Ian: clear distinction as to what's happening, and she also winds up on like a phone call, I think, with our SETI scientist to say that it's not a kidnapping, or is that later? Matthew: Yeah, I think that is around this time at this truck stop, and she's trying to get the police to leave him alone, and he just wants to go home, and he's not a harm to anyone, it's not a kidnapping, and the scientist is sympathetic to that, but can't just let it go. A, he's, he wants to talk to this Starman. Mm-Hmm. and B, he still works for the government and the bad guys. Ian: Yes. And, everything's converging now towards the crater. Yes. And she, helps Starman escape from the roadblock and they hop onto a rail car to head towards the location. Matthew: And, they get there by hitching a ride with a friendly family in a truck and they have a little chat about babies. 'cause there's one of Yes. Women in the truck have a, has a baby use teething and Music: Mm-Hmm. . Matthew: Uh, and she, she and, and Scott wanted to have a baby, but she explains that she couldn't. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: But they eventually get to the train yard and they they hop in a freight car, hop in a box cart. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: Which, again, that seems easier in Hollywood than it seems so much easier than Hollywood. Ian: Yeah. And this is where the romance turns into something more because they have a, a steamy evening. Matthew: Yes, they have to get out of these wet clothes because it was raining. Ian: Absolutely. Conveniently. Matthew: And we get that full on romance story payoff there. Ian: Mm hmm. Matthew: Shot tastefully. Ian: Shot tastefully. Yeah. Matthew: And later on, again, a bit of acting from, from Jeff Bridges. She's still sleeping. He's awake with a bigger smile than he had after the Dutch apple pie. Ian: Yeah. That's Matthew: another experience he's not familiar with from his world. Ian: Mm hmm. But as they get up, he says that, she's going to have a baby. Yes, and she's very confused and it's all yes, but I made that happen I understand that I understood it and I made it made it possible Matthew: and it makes sense if he was doing all this Magic surgery on her earlier. Yeah, a lot of things he could have done to correct any Illness or injury or other things Ian: and it is odd though. He kind of describes that Scott will be the father It'll be Scott's baby. I have Scott's DNA. Matthew: Yes You Ian: It will also have all of my knowledge. Matthew: It'll also be my baby. Ian: Also my baby. And she's, he, he offers like, if this is not what you want, I can deal with it. No, she embraces it and is happy for it. So that's a, and that's a big setup and piece where there's this element where he has not, he has kind of helped make part of the life she was going to have with Scott, Jeff Bridges, First character. Yes helped them have that little piece of their future that they never got because of Scott's untimely passing. Matthew: He also says that, when the baby grows to manhood, he will be a teacher. Ian: Mm hmm. Matthew: And here is where, you know, anytime you've got a benevolent or non malevolent visitor from another world on Earth, there are often those kind of Christ allegories as part of it. Ian: Yes. Matthew: This movie strikes me a little different. It's easy to, and it's not totally inaccurate, to see Starman as kind of a Christ figure. But I don't, I think if we're going to look at that sort of, of, uh, of allegory, it's more like Starman is a Holy Spirit allegory. Yeah, Ian: or an angel kind of figure. He Matthew: comes, he comes to Earth with these abilities. He speaks through another person. Mm hmm ie the clone of scott as as a prophet he Brings about the conception of someone who's going to have who's going to be all of him, but also fully human And yeah, there's a lot to be a teacher Ian: Yeah, the religious aspect here is extremely strong, I would agree. Matthew: And it gives you a lot of different ways to look at it as opposed to, oh, it's a modern day Christ as an alien. Ian: This is a glowing light showing up and saying, Be not a little bit jumpy. Very it's it's it's much more, you know, angel visitation Holy spirit kind of stuff going on. It's much more that for that tone and styling. That is very, very accurate, but they do a lot of kind of telling what the future will be in that sense, which is important for our later questions, I think. Matthew: And the next bit of the movie, it's kind of filler, you could have done without it, but it does serve a function because it lightens things a little bit, gives you a little bit of a break after all of the tense and dramatic and romantic stuff. We get a little bit of weirdness and humor before we get into the tense and dramatic end. And that is, uh, because, well, they were distracted. They did not get off the train at Winslow, Arizona like they were supposed to. Instead, they made it all the way to Las Vegas. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: And he uses some of his power. He's got some ability to manipulate electrical things without using one of his spell slots. Ian: So he does have cantrips. Matthew: Yes, that's right. Ian: But, we kind of saw the same like electromagnetic fuzzy static that they had when he was a glowing ball showing up in the house. He's got a bit of control of, he can, get a car to start with just a touch without turning the key. He can, flicker lights and such, and he can apparently shift the wheels of a slot machine quite easily. Matthew: So a little. A little more obtrusive than she would like. They win half a million dollars on slot machines. And, uh, buy a Cadillac and drive to Arizona. Ian: Mm hmm. I gotta say, they won a lot of money and just buy a Cadillac. They have no driver's license because she lost her wallet on the way. And I'm wondering how much of that half a million dollar jackpot they had to pay for this Cadillac, no questions asked. Matthew: Yeah. Because Ian: there's also like, how much money do you keep after that? All Matthew: right. Yeah, let's make it 20, 000 and you forget the paperwork. Okay. Until tomorrow. Ian: Exactly. But there's something about, about that whole setup that is just very amusing. But they're on their way to finish their journey to Arizona now. Matthew: And meanwhile, our scientist and Agent Fox have a confrontation over the, the emergency lab that's been set up near the crater and the prominent feature in this lab is an emergency field autopsy table with leather tie down straps. Ian: Yeah. We're not Matthew: planning anything, anything polite or pleasant. And finally, the scientist, Charles Martin Smith's guy is, is trying to confront Fox and saying, you know, it's, it's, it's not just about ethical qualms. It's about good manners. We invited him here and we're going to treat him like this. Yeah. He's, that's quashed by Fox just saying, you know, you work for us and you are an employee, and, uh, anytime that becomes too much, you can go back to a community college someplace and, and try to get along in a, an instructor's salary. And, and that cows, the scientist who goes along with it for now. Ian: Yeah. But it's very, very heartbreaking. It definitely sets up how our, our scientist here is going to respond. Matthew: And it looks as if that's going to be it, until he actually meets Jenny and Starman. Yes. Because they make a final stop at a cafe near the, the crater. Ian: Like five minutes away, it's, it's all themed in decor, it's about the, the crater. Matthew: And they're surrounded by military and police, and yet, the first official to get there is the scientist, who goes in and chats with them. Ian: And lets them go. Tells all the other people. No, these are not the these aren't the two that we were looking for. Yeah Matthew: The guy we were looking for is older. Ian: Yeah, Matthew: which I guess is true. I mean, yeah Ian: But that makes Fox very mad. And so Fox orders his fleet of Gun laden helicopters to chase them into the actual crater itself as they work their way down to the center. Matthew: And this is a sequence that could have been tighter. I think if it was edited today, it would have been tighter. We get lots and lots and lots of long scenes of helicopter gunships flying in formation, but it was one of those things. We spent a lot of money on these. We're going to put it on the screen. Ian: Oh, yes. And yet, it costs a lot to get all these helicopters to fly in Delta. Yes, Matthew: and we do get Fox saying, I only want warning shots. I don't think that's because he's suddenly become a nice guy. I think it's because he wants to interrogate and or autopsy or vivisect this, uh, this alien. Ian: Yeah. He doesn't, he doesn't want it injured because he wants to study it. Matthew: Yes. And we do get these shots of Jenny and Starman trying to run down into the crater and Starman's getting weaker and weaker and sicker and sicker as time goes on. And all these gun, this gunfire hits hitting around them, but not really threatening them directly. Ian: Wait a minute, I might understand why Fox was so set on getting Starman alive. Matthew: Oh, why is that? Ian: Because one of the early things when there's a report of, Jenny being kidnapped, yeah, the descriptions matched her dead husband. Yeah. And that was in the report. Right. And Fox asks, is that within our technology? And he's told no, right. Matthew: But we're talking about something that may be a hundred thousand years. More advanced. Ian: He has been told that this alien can clone a body. Matthew: Yeah. Ian: Is Fox trying to get immortality off of the alien? Matthew: Maybe. Ian: By getting himself a replaceable clone body? Matthew: Yeah, maybe. He also knows from the reports that that Starman can melt lug wrenches and explode trees from a distance. Yeah, that's worth something to the military. Ian: That's worth something to military too. So I'm just figuring out those little bits of the why because the amount of force sent is so Matthew: huge. I want every single bit of lethal force we have available brought to bear and nobody should get hurt. Ian: Yeah. Like all of the explosions, all are warning shots, it is a little cheesy how much, how many shots and explosions, how much they peppered, that crater full of, small charges for special effects. I will say, Matthew: yes, and again, you know, they spend a lot of money on this location on all these choppers and we're going to see a lot of that and a lot of, squibs Ian: They make it to the bottom and the giant ship descends from the sky, a giant mirror ball. Matthew: And this is something that struck me in this viewing especially, and I've seen this movie many times, and I always thought one of the really big Errors in this. One of the problems I had with it is the idea that Voyager, launched in 1977, got to some alien planet, and they also had time to get back here by 1984. And that's simply not, that does not math. Ian: It does not math, but it adds to something that they've kind of implied. Matthew: What's that? Ian: That the aliens were already observing us. Matthew: Yes. And I always thought that thing we saw at the beginning with, with kind of a ring, but a very glittery light up ring around it, not a smooth to our eyes, a Saturn type ring. That's very much like what we see descending on the crater at the end. I don't think that was a planet at the very beginning. I think it was this ship. Ian: Yeah. Matthew: They're a nomadic civilization. And like I said, they happen to be in the neighborhood. They've been observing us. They found this thing. They learned more about us. So it wasn't a very long trip. They were able to intercept Voyager long before it left our solar system. And it wasn't a long trip to get them here. So much of the movie, I'm more comfortable with it. It makes more sense to me now that I think that, no, they didn't get to an alien planet. They happen to be in the neighborhood. Ian: Yeah, I do love the, the military all just like, land their ships and stare at this thing. Yes. There's this proper like, I, we can't deal with that scale and that size. This is humbling in that sense. Matthew: There's one shot that like, makes me think something was changed in the, the edit. Because we get, with all the military people and all the government people looking up in wonder and amazement. We do get this shot from inside one of the gunships. Of the crew of the gunship, including the pilot, looking up at this amazing thing as they're headed towards the wall of the crater. As they're flying down within it. I think originally that was either scripted or maybe even shot to have one of these gunships hit the wall of the crater and explode. If that was the case, I'm glad they didn't include that because it would have changed the whole tone if there was any carnage in this last scene. Nobody really gets hurt. Ian: Yeah, no one gets hurt. Honestly, I kind of wish we had a scene of the pilots looking at their controls and being bewildered as they are set down gently. That would be an electromagnetic force. Yes. Outside of their control. Yeah. In this, no, put that away. We're here to pick up our son, and then we'll be leaving. Music: Yeah. Ian: Kind of a moment. We get neither. We just get them all landing and looking bewildered, but it works. Matthew: And suddenly the bottom of this crater in Arizona is in shadow, and there's this red light beaming down, and there's snow. Ian: Yes, and as the snow falls, we watch Jeff Bridges, who has been working, as he gets more and more comfortable speaking, his sentences are longer, we've also seen him, though, Start to fade a little physically. Yes, Matthew: although he picks up a bit when his people show up Ian: Yeah, when when the snow falls, it's like he's just revived a little there's something there that's helping him But he and Jenny, you know have their goodbye kiss and they and he leaves. Matthew: Yes It's a wonderful beautiful heartbreaking farewell scene Really hits all the right notes for a romance story like this He's been telling, she's been teaching him ideas about goodbye and, and love and all these things and they all come together in this final scene. Ian: And it ends with her, just a shot of her as it pans up following her. Watching as we see her watch the ship depart, and that's how it ends. Yes. We have no answers as to what happens to the SETI scientist, what happens to her in the crater, Yes. Surrounded by military, who just lost their target. Matthew: How long she's \interrogated, any of this. Ian: Yeah, it's just, that's the end. Matthew: And it's extra heartbreaking because really now she's lost the love of her life for the second time. Ian: Yes. Matthew: But it's such a beautiful scene. So yeah, we don't know where things go from there. Ian: We don't. Matthew: But I guess, thinking about that is part of our final questions. Ian: Yes. So, before we do that. Matthew: Yes, stay tuned for those final questions. But in the meantime, if you're enjoying the Intermillennium Media Project podcast and you want more of it, please go to immproject dot com. That's where you will find all of our back episodes. It's also where you will find a link to our Patreon, where you can get even more bonus audio content. You can follow us there free. You can join us for 3 dollars a month to start getting bonus content. You can join us at the movie club level and get a surprise DVD in the mail periodically. You can also contact us there on Discord, on our contact page. We'd love to hear from you, what did you think of this movie? What other movies do you think we might want to address on the podcast? So by all means, let us know exactly. And Ian, where can people find you? Ian: I can be found at itemcrafting.com or itemcraftinglive on Twitch. Come see me live stream some games, or paint some minis or work on some craft projects. And how about you, Dad? Matthew: You can find me at ByMatthewPorter. com. That's where you'll find a link to whatever I'm doing. Including my YouTube channel, where I'll have the occasional livestream, but also the Drafthouse Diary. A review of every one of my visits to an Alamo Drafthouse cinema. Ian: Very nice. Matthew: So I think it's time for final questions. I think so. It's a movie, screen or no screen? What do you think, Ian? Ian: I like Starman, but it's not great. I'm actually surprised to say no screen. Matthew: Wow. Ian: It's, it's fun in ways. If it's your side of the thing, great, but I don't feel like it's great to just suggest to everybody because. It really is a tone piece, and if you're not already aware of or okay with its tone, it's not going to resonate with you. Sometimes it's a little one note, is my point. Matthew: It can be. It can be. But I say screen. Unless you absolutely hate romance stories, screen. I think it's well done. It's fun. The stars are very engaging. I recommend it. I've seen it. I enjoy watching it every time I get a chance. And , knowing that it has certain, practices of filmmaking from the early 80s, I think it's very well done, very watchable, so I say screen. Ian: Hmm. Matthew: But that brings up our next question, which is revive, reboot, or rest in peace? Ian: Well, we always acknowledge the ones that already exist. Matthew: Yes. Ian: And this had a. Revival Matthew: it did didn't it Ian: in 86 to 87 there was a sequel TV series a single season of 22 episodes called Starman about the kid Matthew: Starman Jr. Starman Jr. It sounds weird. I can't imagine that being very coherent or engaging without minimizing the wonder of the of the original. Ian: Yeah, and apparently involves the Starman, like, coming back 15 years later to find his now teenage son, and part of the question is where, Jenny is, and the government is once again hunting for the alien and Jenny and what's going on here. And I'm like, this sounds like it could be interesting, but it doesn't sound like it was done well at all. Matthew: Yeah, it, it sounds like it's something that could be interesting if it didn't try to tie itself to this movie, which again was so specific. in its tone and direction Ian: I will also say though, this movie did set up this thing, this show's existence, more than some, movies that get TV show sequels. Because this is about a character that the movie implies is, well, coming soon. This is about a plot point of the film that's not actually, concluded at the end of the film in that sense. It sounds like it does a wildly rough job of it, and I couldn't find much content about it. I didn't find episodes or anything when I looked, but it's, it exists, and it's a thing. It's only got a 34 out of 100 on Metacritic, so that's kind of saying something. Not great reviews Matthew: and in addition to that revival in our terms, there has been talk of a remake and there was some reports in 2016 about, , Michael Douglas, who was a producer of the original, was going to produce the remake and they were talking about casting, more recently, a few years after that, like the early twenties, it was being reported as improbable that at least this remake was going to be made. Ian: Yeah. It's on people's radar though. That means, yeah. Matthew: So as far as as our decision as to whether we would wanna see a revived reboot or rest in peace, I'd kind of be interested in a reboot. Ian: I might be interested in a reboot. Matthew: There are ways that you could take this story and tell it in a little more sophisticated way, a little more modern way in terms of filmmaking, maybe in terms of story structure and characterization. There are things you can do with this idea that the original movie didn't as good as Ian: it could. I would also, I would love to see a. Because I will also acknowledge something that the movie never does. Starman could have actually himself made things a lot better. All he needed to do was broadcast back before he tried to land. Doesn't seem like he actually gave any radio broadcasts on his approach, did he? Matthew: Uh, what do you mean broadcast back? Ian: Broadcast. They have obviously the radio antennas from Voyager and everything. They know we use EM frequencies. He didn't try to broadcast a hello back when he was landing. The idea of like, acknowledge that there's some stuff. I feel like there's these little pieces where the modern world, we are noisier than ever on the electromagnetic frequency. We, I mean, podcasts are being broadcast via Wi Fi and downloaded onto your phone and listened to. That could be interesting. I could see a version with a lot of that newer technology just kind of adding to the communication element, which is a part of this narrative and making that fascinating, but also different enough from this version, where the fact that the communication was kind of the record, one directional and then nothing. I want to see a version that kind of includes the wider variety of our communications and has the attempt and the problem with communicating be a little different. Matthew: Okay, I think I understand what you mean. It sounds like his original plan was, I'm going to go back to landing site one, oh and there's also the implication we get that his people have been here before. That's what the crater was. Apparently they're not very good at landing though if their, if their original visit created that crater. Yeah. Ian: Yeah, Matthew: Sounds like his plan was to go to landing site one in Arizona land and then say, hi folks. I came to visit. Thanks for the invite. And instead he was shot down, but he could have called ahead. Yeah. Thanks for the invite. I'll be there next week. Ian: Exactly. And did you could have, you could have stories with a little bit more of that, but you could also have a story where it's like, I almost want to say, take this story, keep it, be the Voyager two probe. But just extend the amount of time. Matthew: Yes. Ian: Instead of showing up, what, seven years later, it's taken this long. Matthew: Yeah, they could be somewhere out by the Oort cloud, or, I mean, one of the Voyagers at least is past the heliopause now. It's technically out of the solar system. It's nowhere near another star, let alone planet, but at least we've got more time to work with. Ian: And the idea of, you know, okay, shows up now with this old disc, and we are louder and brighter and noisier than we were ever before. He might have a better grasp of, like, language, because there's a lot being thrown at him. But it's very confusing and you could have an interesting like I kind of want that remake as another piece of the conversation that Starman is not but not to replace but to Give us another chapter of assessment, right? Matthew: And I suppose the reason for not announcing his his visit ahead of time that may have had to do with trying to approach this in an anthropological kind of way, they don't want his, he just doesn't want his presence to affect what it is he's observing, he doesn't want to alarm people. So he was trying to do it more subtly. I suppose there are reasons for not calling ahead, but given the fact that it was in response to an attempt at communication by us, it would have made sense to, to communicate rather than just showing up. Ian: Yes. Matthew: Which, which in some ways, and I don't think this is a stretch, the movie Contact. is in some ways another take on the same kind of story. Responding to aliens, who are very different from us, responding to communications of ours that they've intercepted, in that case old TV signals. And eventually communicating to people through simulacra of, people that they know. Ian: Which I guess kind of also says that we don't need a remake of Starman because there's plenty. There are just other movies. Matthew: Yeah. I think there's, I guess, it is a recurring trope and I think some of the more recent, some of the versions of that that came after Starman were probably influenced by it. What we haven't really had is the, the same kind of combination of alien visitation and road trip romance. And I think that's a wonderful formula. So I'd love to see a remake of that. Yeah. Ian: I agree. I'm gonna say one thing if they do a remake. Yeah. Casting wise. A fun decision would be to cast current bearded. I work in Western's, Jeff Bridges as Agent Fox . Just the fun of having him play the bad guy in the remake when he played the Good Guy protagonist in the, in the original, he could play that very well, Matthew: That would be fun. Ian: That could be fun. So Matthew: I'm glad we got to talk about this movie. This is one of those older movies that I showed you long ago, even before the podcast, Ian: but I know it's a movie that you and our lovely producer very much love, but it's also, yeah, it's, it's a, it's not quite perfect, but it's a fun one. Yeah. Just not one that I'd suggest sometimes Matthew: you're not going to recommend to everyone. I get that. Ian: Yay! Matthew: But we'll, we'll have more to recommend, or not. Ian: We shall! Matthew: Because we'll be back in a couple of weeks with more tales of media from the 20th century. Ian: And in the meantime, go find something new to watch.