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TGTPTU goes Old Hollywood this week with Ryan’s pick for his Season 17’s Hacks 4x4 director: Edward Dmytryk.

As we learn this ep, the former Canadian, former movie editor, former son (California courts would emancipate him from an alcoholic father) Dmytryk would rise through the studio system starting off as a messenger in his teens to become a talkies director by age 31. At age 36, he’d dust off old studio rights to a previously adapted Raymond Chandler novel Farewell, My Lovely to make the first and earliest of the four films we’ll be covering this season: MURDER, MY SWEET (1944).

Normally, we’d summarize a bit of the film in this paragraph. A typical cakewalk for yours truly, the task is not so simple this week. Despite various changes in plot (yet in keeping to the spirit of the book), the film’s casual, causal sequences of events and coincidences make little sense. In brief and in the famed detective’s first time appearing as named in film, Philip Marlowe is hired to do one thing, then another; the second thing is related to the first in a reveal at the end of the movie’s extended flashback. Notably, this structure of a bookend opening with the protagonist telling it as it was would become a staple in the noir genre.

This week, Ken does extra research weighing in on Gay Lawrence adaptation; Jack reveals the perfect way to watch the movie while reading its Chandler source material; Thomas wonders if all Canadian directors know each other; and Ryan contributes remotely. Subsequently, tinny microphone subs in for fan fav squeaky chair who is on hiatus for this pincered pairing.

WARNING: Episode contains hot takes on Reese’s peanut butter cups.

BEHIND THE PAYWALL: Unprofessional tax advice for the 2025 Tax Year followed by a breezy seventy-nine-minute primer explaining baseball followed by a lengthier discussion for our platinum tier members.

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THE BODYGUARD

TGTPTU’s first set of four Hack 4x4s concludes this week with THE BODYGUARD (1992), director Mick Jackson’s sleeper hit starring peak Kevin Costner and top shelf Whitney Houston.

Allegedly offered to Jackson the day after the L.A. Story premiere, the plot of The Bodyguard is bigger than you remember or would expect, so if you haven’t seen it or not in a while, do so. Just know the script started with JFK’s assassination as a Steve McQueen + Diana Ross vehicle and, after 67 rejections over 2 years, went through 12 rewrites by Lawrence Kasdan until it landed with Kostner who wanted Whitney Houston and Kasdan wanted out of directing. Hence, Jackson steps in as premium hack. It would become the second highest grossing film of 1992.

This ep, Jack stays scarce, Andi returns bringing Dolly Pardon facts, Ken reminds us Costner would later direct The Postman, Ryan flexes his family’s wealth, and Gen Z Thomas reveals a dark secret of how unamerican (or age-appropriate) his cartoon movie habits are having not seen a single Peanuts movie (NOTE: content may be edited or become exclusive behind the paywall) or 1999’s Oscar-sweeping American Beauty.

Mick Jackson, if we should stay, we’d only be in your way. So we’ll go, but you know, we’ll think of you every step of the way…

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Season 17’s Hack 4x4 continues as predictable as the weather in the City of Angels (no relationship to the previously covered film, and host Ken’s favorite motion picture remake, see S4,E4 for more on the Nicholas Cage movie with this sobriquet for a title) with this week’s third entry in the Mick Jackon canon: L.A. STORY (1991).

Written by and starring Steve Martin at the arguable pinnacle of his comedic film stardom (Father of the Bride would be released the same year), L.A. Story is the flick that immigrated Jackson to the States after Martin had seen Jackson’s acclaimed British dramatic television series subsequent to the success of Threads (S17,E1). Jackson, who had no background in nor ever directed a comedy, initially declined the offer, believing the script too good and having too little knowledge of Los Angeles (and likely the SoCal, California, U.S., & North America regions). Yet Martin and his producer believed Jackson’s latter objection an asset; he’d have an outsider’s perspective on what’s been described as a satirical love-letter to the eccentricities of L.A.

The comedy follows Martin in the role of a wacky bachelor weatherman in a zany Los Angeles full of neon and plastic surgery, and this was the extent of the movie that Thomas (who picked the director and his four for the 4x4) knew prior to this, his first watch. Between its mixture of Zucker Brothers’ and Mel Brooks’s absurdist and sight gag humor with the occasional Groucho Marx-level clever wordplay is a love story between Martin’s weatherman (((“meteorologist”))) and Victoria Tennant’s first-time visiting L.A. British reporter (((“journalist”))) as Martin shows Tennant’s character around L.A., guided by a sentient variable message highway traffic sign (((“WHAT I REALLY WANT TO DO IS DIRECT”))). As this romantic comedy proceeds with Shakespeare references, including an appearance of the sexiest man to ever grace the screen Rick Moranis as a Hamlet-esque gravedigger, but also a rapping waiter, Martin roller-skating through art museums, and a very bouncy Sarah Jessica Parker as SanDeE* (((“Big s, small a, small n, big d, small e, big e, and there’s a little star at the end.”))), Martin’s and Tennant’s characters learn no easy lessons or manifest grand revelations. Rather than have their characters evolve and develop and expiate, the movie has instead adults fairly realistically portrayed with Richard E. Grant as Tennant’s ex-husband wanting to rekindle the flame and a casual take on monogamy.

This episode, no Jack, but guest Andi drops in to mix up her Micks, Thomas his Sarahs, and Ryan his quotes from next episode’s The Bodyguard. Meanwhile Ken quietly reflects on the last Thanksgiving he spent with his cohosts and Kevin Spacey reenters the chat. Before the end of the ep, Ryan and Andi harmonize on a 90s rap classic on their way to a Mick Jackson theme song. Fans of the pod will learn Andi likes a break in them, Thomas isn’t big on this comedy, Ken surprised its comedy’s not cringe, and Ryan’s people once migrated in the summers to L.A. to rollerblade.

That sounds good. We’ll also have a twist of lemon.

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VOLCANO

Expatriated British director Mick Jackson erupts on screen and sets Los Angeles on fire with his latest (to be covered in Season 17 Hacks) blockbuster film VOLCANO (1997).

Suffering from a release date only weeks after another volcano disaster movie hit American movie theaters (Dante’s Peak), Jackson’s big-budget disaster movie flips the script on Threads (covered last week) with competency porn performed by seasoned actors at or some nearing the pinnacle of their career, including Tommy Lee Jones and Anne Heche and Keith David, as well as up-and-coming stars and character actors, most notably Don Cheadle, in this ensemble film reminiscent of the 70s disaster flicks.

The primary focus is Jones’ Mike Roark, a divorced workaholic dad saddled at the start of the movie with a vacation and a tween daughter who, by the end of the film, will be unburdened by both when lava erupts and flows the streets of L.A. This surprising disaster leads Jone’s Roark as the head of the city’s Office of Emergency Management along with his number one Cheadle as the bureau’s assistant director and someone named Gator who likely works with them and might have teleportation abilities to team up with the egghead and infrequent glasses-wearing Heche character to divert the lava flow into the ocean with the help of a second-act David as a police lieutenant and a racist 90’s LAPD cop (not redundant in this film’s world), the LAPD’s demolition team, and a self-proclaimed “volcano version of Rodney King” (and no help from the White kid named Tommy). In the process, the city solves racism.

This week, Jack’s away. Thomas provides alternative tag lines for the film; Ken uncovers information on the 86’ed sequel; and Ryan’s left to speculate.

Spoiler:

We love it!

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THREADS

A new 4x4 starts with a bang (and a lot of whimpers) as the gang begins their Season 17 coverage of hacks (i.e., directors for hire) with THREADS (1984), director Mick Jackson’s pseudo-documentary but fully anti-nuke made-for-TV movie.

Cohost Thomas’s pick of directors to launch the season of hacks, Jackson got his start in film with the BBC in the late-60s as an editor. He saw an opportunity in the early 80s to express his anti-nuclear sentiments through a wry documentary in the guise of a consumer report for the BBC’s science series Q.E.D. (1982 - 1999) on the efficacy—or inefficacy—of fallout shelters and other measures disseminated by the British government for civilian response to a nuclear attack. Jackson sought a use for excess material on the horrors of a nuclear attack, including a chance to popularize a then little-known theory of nuclear winter. When the U.S. television film The Day After (1983) screwed the pooch with its competency of officials and heroic hopefulness (in Jackson’s estimation), he recommitted to his dark vision and the meaning behind the slogan that “No one wins a nuclear war” with Threads.

Made during the highest Cold War tensions since the Cuba Missile Crisis, Jackson’s film shows the thin weave of society unraveling after the British city of Sheffield is nuked as a result of the U.S. and U.S.S.R. in a battle over Iran, developments simmering in the background over radio and preparative actions by the local government during its first 45 minutes. While a range of characters will be killed immediately or die slowly, the central focus of the story is Ruth, a young woman who becomes pregnant by her boyfriend, later fiancé, whom she’ll become estranged from after the blast. Ruth, unlike most, will survive afterwards for over a decade, migrating, scavenging, subsistence farming, selling her body, and trading with the sorry survivors. Her teenage daughter Jane born into the new, post-apocalyptic world survives Ruth only to herself become pregnant and the horror of what leaves her vaginal cavity is what ends this dark tale.

This episode, the Ghost of Maggie Thatcher threatens return; Thomas seethes; Jack puts a cohost on blast (pun intended) for passing notes during recording; Ken talks sidewalk cuisine; and Ryan requests more dance numbers.

Next week, through the temporal pincer movement™️ Threads matches with 1997’s Volcano, a pairing Ken, feeling his oats, entitles “Ash-to-Ash.”

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With Episode 8, our hosts put their Gray Days behind them, wrapping the short Season 16 with THE IMMIGRANT (2013), or as it was a.k.a.’ed during its short development and prior to its delayed release “Low Life” and “The Nightingale.”

James Gray teams back up with cowriter Richard Menello to write a period drama role explicitly for Marion Cotillard whom Gray met through her then-partner director Guillaume Canet during their work together on the oft-mentioned Blood Ties also released in 2013. The story follows the hard luck of Cotillard’s titular immigrant as her likewise Polish emigre sister is confined to a medical ward on Ellis Island during immigration while Cotillard’s Ewa Cybulska is offered an opportunity to remain in the States through the kindness of Joaquin Phoenix playing a pimp and former child immigrant named Bruno Weiss in the actor’s fourth and to-date final Gray film role. Cotillard’s immigrant forms a brief love triangle with Jeremy Renner’s magician and brother-to-Bruno character Orlando The Magician until he ***SPOILER*** runs off to Iraq to defuse bombs as one of the Avengers who just shoots arrows or something. J/k. It’s a Gray film. You know someone is going to die. Maybe it’s the magician. Maybe it’s the sister. Maybe both. Stay awake to find out, or give this episode a listen.

This episode, Harvey Weinstein returns; Ken tries renaming the podcast; Ryan and Thomas are spot on in their estimation of the film; and our boys rank the eight-film oeuvre on The Gray Scale.

Next week, we’re on smoko but will return with Hacks (mild pun intended; Surgeon General’s warning: do not consume the first episode of Season 17 if you’re preggers).

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TWO LOVERS (2008)

For Season 16, Episode 7, writer-director James Gray gets geometric with TWO LOVERS (2008), his third of four collabs with Joaquin Phoenix whom he puts into a love triangle with Gray’s only film to-date starring Gwyneth Paltrow or Vinessa Shaw.

Gray leaves his crime trilogy behind with this contemporary piece focusing on the family and loves of Phoenix’s Leonard Kraditor, a manic-depressive pixie dream boy working for and living with his parents after a suicide attempt. Leonard finds himself caught between his id (depicted by Paltrow’s equally pixie Michelle Rausch) and superego (depicted by Shaw’s Sandra Cohen). Isabella Rossellini in a relatively (slight pun intended) quiet performance plays Leonard’s mother while Israeli actor Moni Moshonov reprises his father-figure role from We Own the Night to play Leonard’s father.

For those enjoying the home version this season, the following Gray Bingo squares may be covered: 1) silent opening, 2) NYC, 3) Jewish family, 4) bare breast, 5) club scene, and 6) failed plan to escape to warmer climates.

Guest Andi joins to betray her Southern roots by speaking when she has nothing polite to say as she ranks the half of Gray’s filmography she’s watched. Host Ken this episode does extra credit, having not only watched two prior film adaptations of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s short story “White Nights” but also researches cowriter Richard Menello and charts multiple love triangles in this film and throughout the films TGTPTU has covered. Cohost Ryan reveals his odd sense of humor. And cohost Thomas provides a list of terms defining people and what they love.

These four on mic this week are split in half for their enjoyment of the film.

Next ep, the stunning conclusion to Going Gray (working title) and the genre reveal of Season 17.

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THE LOST CITY OF Z

Before James Gray hung Brad Pitt on wires and took him to space, he first brought a different blonde to the Amazon (the rainforest) to encounter snakes, torrential rains, and an insect extracted from his ear during the shooting of he writer-director’s first Amazon (the company) Studios distributed film THE LOST CITY OF Z (2016).

Charlie Hunnam is that blonde, the -e is intentional as that’s the more common British spelling and despite an American accent convincing enough to fool Gray, a man of many impersonations, Charlie’s a bloke. His Percy Fawcett protagonist is joined by fellow Brit and future Batman Robert Pattinson as the pair of British explorers (and WWI soldiers) map out the Bolivia-Brazil border in an adaptation of the nonfiction bestseller of the same name (although the Americans, per its author, say the final word-letter as “zee” instead of “zed”). Also cast and a contemporaneous Spiderman is Tom Holland as Fawcett’s son Jack Fawcett, who will take the place of Pattinson’s composite character Henry Costin in Percy’s final voyage back into the jungle to seek the titular lost city.

For this sixth of eight Gray episodes, guest Shannon returns, host Ken stays ill, co-host Ryan gushes, and the lone Gen Zedder Thomas has read the book. Opinions are mixed this week, with guest Shannon believing the proper title of the film should be The Lost City of Zzz (snooze sound) while Ryan’s been Zed-pilled into believing it an amazing film.

Next episode, potentially a very special guest who might have watched that week’s film.

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