Weirdhouse Cinema Rewind: Let Sleeping Corpses Lie
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Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema Rewind. This is Rob Lamb. And this is Joe McCormick. And hey, today we're going to be playing an episode that originally aired on February 10th, 2023. This was our Weird House Cinema on Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, a.k.a. what was the other name? The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue, something like that. That's right. Yeah, it's a sci-fi spin on the zombie genre set in rural England.

but it's also a Spanish-Italian co-production. It's really, really fun. I was, of course, recently traveling in the UK, and occasionally I would see an old church, and I was like, oh man, a few of these look kind of like that church from Let Sleeping Corpses Lie. That sounds wonderful. Yeah, I remember this movie being just filled with beautiful locations and acerbic jerks. All right, well, without further ado, let's jump right in.

Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema. This is Rob Lamb. And this is Joe McCormick. Today's movie goes by many names. It stems from the mid-1970s, and you could easily sort of single it out for a few different things. On one level, it's very British. It is perhaps the most important British zombie film, certainly of this time period.

It's also a Spanish-Italian co-production and has, I think, no actual British people in it.

It's also not only a horror film, but an eco-horror film. All true. This is also definitely a Grindhouse-era picture. It was actually shown in a double feature with Wes Craven's Notorious Last House on the left, which I realize is a 72 film, but I guess it was still making the round by 74 or just hitting certain markets by 74. But at any rate, these two films were sometimes on the same billing. It's interesting to...

realize where different zombie movies come in the course of history because I think of most zombie films as derivative films

Uh, not just of night of the living dead, but of dawn of the dead, the second film in George Romero's, uh, uh, trilogy. But of course, dawn of the dead actually didn't come out, I think until 1978. So like four years after this one, uh, of course, night was earlier. Uh, but it's kind of strange how I would have said this movie was derivative of dawn, but in fact, it precedes dawn. Yeah.

Yeah, it's interesting. I think even at the time, a lot of people compared it to Night of the Living Dead, and certainly it owes...

something to that film as pretty much any zombie film that came after it does. But yeah, maybe it was a little ahead of the curve on some things as well. Now, we keep talking about it. We haven't said the title of the film yet because you kind of have your pick of titles for this film. Again, it's an Italian-Spanish co-production, and the original title in both languages translates basically to Do Not Profane the Sleep of the Dead.

which I guess international distributors didn't go for. They saw opportunities to tap into other areas of fear. It was released under a lot of different names around the world. The two most common are either Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, which is how we have it listed in the title for this episode, but it was also widely distributed as The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue, where it eventually was widely distributed under that name.

That is the title that displayed in the version of it that I watched, though the screen where that title pops up looks very out of place. It doesn't match the visual style of anything around it. Yeah. It's also a strange title. A lot of these titles are hard to...

to really rationalize because a lot of them don't really make sense once you get into the plot. There is not a Manchester morgue in the film as an actual setting, but

We only briefly see Manchester at the very beginning of the film, and then we go out into rural Britain, and that is where the rest of the film is supposed to be taking place. Is the city at the beginning definitely supposed to be Manchester? I couldn't tell if it was supposed to be Manchester or London. It is Manchester. That's what I've read, yes. Other titles that this film had, there was Do Not Speak Ill of the Dead, which sounds pretty good. I mean, that's more or less a...

Translation of the original, even though it kind of implies that what's going on here is like the raising of the dead via slander or something. Yeah.

It shouldn't come as any surprise to anyone out there that it was also known as Zombie 3, at least in some markets. And this is hilarious because a number of films seem to have been released at one time or another as part of the very unofficial Italian zombie franchise, including 1988's Zombie 3, which was a Fulci and Mattei film. So anything can or could be a zombie movie. Wait, now I'm incredibly confused here because...

So, Zombie 3 would mean this is trying to be a sequel to Zombie 2, which was the Fulci film that was not actually a sequel to the original Zombie, which was another name for Romero's Dawn of the Dead, which came out in 78. But this movie we're talking about came out in 74, and at some point it was called Zombie 3. Yeah.

That's the beauty of the, the zombies, the OMBI franchise. Yes. So I guess this would have to be like in like, I don't know, later video releases or something, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think so. Now, another title that's a lot of fun for this one that again, doesn't really fit the movie is don't open the window. Uh,

I love a good 70s don't movie. And we're actually going to hear the trailer for Don't Open the Window for that release of the film here in a bit, just because it's the most, in my opinion, the most amusing of the trailers to listen to in a podcast format.

I don't remember. Okay. So running through these different titles, we do, I think, see a Manchester area hospital as a set used in the movie, but it's not really set in Manchester. Do not speak ill of the dead. As far as I can tell, has no relationship to the plot. Zombie three is hilarious because this movie came out before the original zombie. And I don't think there's anything about opening a window at all. Can you remember any window stuff? Yeah.

I mean, people probably look through windows and maybe there's a scene where somebody grabs through a window, but it's not it's not the centerpiece of the picture. I don't know that any of the don't movies really have that going for it. But when a movie's title say don't go in the basement, I feel like that one really works. Oh, well, this is a movie about something horrible going on in the basement where horrible things belong. But.

but don't open the window. This seems very broad. Like I'm really just not supposed to open the window again. Uh, actually there's one scene where one character, Katie escapes a zombie by jumping out a window. So she obeyed the title of that version. She would have been killed by the zombie. Yeah. A more fitting title would be don't use ultrasound technology. Yeah, exactly. Don't trust science. I think would be the correct title here. And, and in that vein, I'd say let sleeping corpses lie forever.

is probably the most on track of all these titles because it suggests that something is being done to disturb the dead. Like you're kind of meddling in some way that you shouldn't. Yeah.

So the elevator pitch for this one's pretty straightforward. You have youths from the city clashing with authority figures and the living dead in rural Britain. Strangely, though, the dichotomy set up in this movie is not an alliance of like urbanity with the youth. The youths are from the city, but urbanity, I would say, is sort of the villain because that's in this nexus of evil things that the movie would probably group together like communists

Cops, cities, science, the government, and I guess anything that happens in a big building. And big buildings, of course, have windows. So let's go ahead and listen to the trailer for Don't Open the Window, a.k.a. Let Sleeping Corpses Lie. They tampered with nature. Now they must pay the price. See the grotesque invade an unsuspecting village.

See a hospital panic when day-old babies go berserk. See friends turn on each other in a nightmare of horror. You'll cringe with terror when you see. Don't open the window. Whatever's out there will wait. Rated R. See? Now you'll think twice about opening that window, right? I mean, I wasn't going to do it before, but now I'm really convinced.

So before we get going here, you may be wondering, well, where can I find this movie under one title or another? Well, I streamed the movie on AMC Plus on Amazon under the title The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue. Shudder has it as well, and you can rent or buy it digitally. But there's also a Blu-ray release from Synapse Films that features a 4K restoration and looks really great. It has a lot of neat extra features on it.

Now, we mentioned a little bit about the locations. One thing to keep in mind with this picture is that parts of it are definitely shot. There are locations and exteriors that are definitely shot in Britain. And they seem to have done a good enough job where they use just enough of it that, at least to my eyes, it feels like Britain most of the time. Like, there are enough establishing shots to establish that. Occasionally, though, you can tell, like, oh, well, this looks a lot more like an Italian horror film. The hills look more Italian, right?

And and so, yeah, there are plenty of scenes that were actually shot in Italy. Oh, I thought they did an excellent job with the scenery. I was fully convinced about the English landscape. And yeah, I have no complaints whatsoever about the locations and scenery in this movie. In fact, they're they're pretty they're gorgeous most of the time.

Yeah, it's a really well-shot film. So let's go ahead and get into the folks involved in it here. We'll start with the director. This is Jorge Grau, who lived 1930 through 2018.

Spanish director, probably best remembered internationally anyway, I'm not sure about in Spain, for this picture, but was responsible for various romances and thrillers. I think he only did three other horror films, a 1973 Countess Bathory film titled The Legend of Blood Castle, 1973's Violent Blood Bath, and...

1983's Hunting Ground. I think those two 73 films are separate films, but now that I read them out loud, it makes me wonder. Maybe this is the same film. I don't know. Oh, yeah. The Bathory bath, bathing in blood thing. Yeah, I could see that.

But I don't know. I don't have the details in front of me. I think it's two separate films, but they sound a lot alike title-wise. Now, there are four different names that are attributed on the screenplay, two credited, two uncredited, that you find in a couple of the databases. But one of the credited screenwriters is Sandro Continenza, who's...

who lived 1920 through 1996, a tagging screenwriter best known for such films as 1961's Valley of the Lions, 1978's The Inglourious Bastards, not the Tarantino one later, but Tarantino was a drawing on that title, 1961's Hercules in the Haunted World, and really just a long list of thrillers, action movies, horror movies, comedies, and more.

The other name that's credited is Marcello Costia. This is an Italian screenwriter, dates unknown, whose filmography includes work, apparently uncredited work on 1960s Black Sunday, and such films as 1977's Yeti, Giant of the 20th Century, which stars Tony Kendall and a King Kong-sized Yeti.

Wait a minute. This 1960s, that's the Mario Bava Black Sunday, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, that's a fantastic horror movie. Yeah. So I don't know to what degree the screenwriter actually worked on it, but there's at least an uncredited tagging on that.

And then there are a couple of other Spanish screenwriters who are uncredited. There's Miguel Rubio and Juan Cobos. Both of those are individuals who, like Rubio, did a number of Spanish romances, it looks like, and Cobos did various Westerns, thrillers, etc. Now, getting into the cast here, it apparently depends on where it was released, who got top billing, and so forth, but the character...

I guess she's one of our two main characters in this, and that is Edna, the city girl, played by Cristina Galbo. She was born 1950, was a Spanish child actor who later worked in various films, a number of horror films, but also some dramas in there as well.

Her credits include the Western from 1968, Twice a Judas with Klaus Kinski, 1969's The House That Screamed, 1972's What Have You Done to Solange, and 1975's The Killer Must Kill Again. Oh, and then also a 1981 film titled Sobrenatural.

which just looks amazing. It's also known as Return of the Poltergeist. Oh, this is the Verkbeest movie that you shared the cover box, the box art with me on. Yeah, yeah, this is what a Dutch VHS cover that I found here. And I have read some reviews that say don't go into this film, Sober and Natural, expecting Return of the Poltergeist, expecting to get this level of insanity. But it's interesting.

It's supposedly interesting nonetheless. I'm sorry. It was so funny because the Dutch language on the cover you shared has this tagline that says, Zal het boze overwinnen? Which I think means, will evil prevail? I don't know. I haven't seen it. I don't know how it turns out.

But it's got the Vurkbeest standing there like clutching some kind of glowing skull over his crotch. Yeah, or like his belly has a ghost in it or something. It's very intriguing. Yeah. Anyway, the actor here, Galbo, Christina Galbo, quite good in this. As we'll discuss, it's a role that does limit her to a fair amount of power.

screaming and being afraid. But, you know, so it's essentially kind of a scream queen role, but I think she's really good at it.

I mean, I would say that the acting in this movie is good for what the movie calls for, which is not very nuanced performances. The roles in this movie are painted with a broad brush. But in that capacity, the cast is by and large very good. Now, our central, we kept calling him a hippie, but it might be more accurate to think of him as a rocker.

I don't know. There's a lot to dissect there. I've got a note on this later in the plot. All right. We'll get back to this. But this is George. George is played by Ray Lovelock, who lived 1950 through 2017. He was an Italian actor and musician. His father was English. His mother was Italian. But I'm still doubtful he's doing his own English language dubbing in this film because it's very, I don't know, it's very...

over the top, it seemed to me. But I could be wrong on this. Well, it's very loaded with the vernacular markers of British English. So just a lot of

A lot of little, you know, like I don't know what you call it. A little flourishes like like referring to women as birds and stuff. So so I'm not sure on this. And this might be his own voice. I think everyone is dubbed in this film. I think this is one of those pictures where they didn't have they weren't actually recording the sound locally. And then everybody's coming back in to dub it. But I'm not sure if he's doing his own dubbing or not here.

But at any rate, even if it's just a physical performance, he's still pretty good in this. So as a musician, he put out a number of singles in Italy and Japan in the late 60s and the early to mid 70s. And as an actor, his credits include 67's Django Kill, If You Live, Shoot. Also Norman Jewison's 1971 adaptation of Fiddler on the Roof. Oh, who does he play in that Fiddler? Let's see. I have to look it up again. Okay. Let me look it up. Hold on.

Oh, okay. He plays Fiedka, who is a Christian farmer who is the husband married by the third daughter, Hava. Okay. I think I saw Fiddler on the Roof, this version of it with Topal in it when I was a child, but all I remember is just some of the singing.

I always loved Fiddler on the Roof. I think his role in this is sad because when Hava falls in love with Fiedka and they want to get married, that this is what Tevye finally won't accept. And he says, no, no, I will not accept it. Is there a scene in Fiddler on the Roof where someone plays a fiddle on the roof? Yes. Yeah. It's at the beginning. Yeah. I thought... I mean, I had that image in my mind, but I was suddenly second guessing myself. Like maybe...

Since I saw it as a kid and I remember the title, I would just create the memory of Tocqueville singing on the roof. I need to see it again, clearly. Anyway, there are other pictures that Lovelock was in, including the 1974 Umberto Lindsay police thriller Almost Human and the 1975 Jallo film Autopsy. Oh, and he was also in Lucio Fulci's 1984 musical Murder Rock. That's the gory horror musical? Yeah.

Yes. Yeah, I actually have a Blu-ray of it, but I haven't watched it yet. So at some point I'll check that out and see if it's if it is something for Weird House or if it's something just for me. We'll see. OK. All right. We also have an authority figure in this picture, and that is the inspector who is not a rural person.

uh, police inspector. Like he seems to have come in from the city himself because he's staying at the hotel. He doesn't have a local residence. Uh, but this character is played by Arthur Kennedy. Um,

Not a Brit, not an Italian or a Spanish actor, an American actor of stage and screen who won a 1949 Tony Award for his role in the original production of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman and was a five-time Oscar nominee. He worked in a number of Arthur Miller's Broadway plays as well, and he was in such major films of the 40s, 50s, and 60s as Lawrence of Arabia, Bright Victory, Peyton Place, and Champion. He worked a lot in Europe later in his career.

Uh, this is the second, uh, Arthur Kennedy movie that we've discussed on weird house because it was in the humanoid from 1979. That was an Italian star Wars ripoff, right? Yeah. Yeah. The one that had, uh, what's his name in it? Um, Oh, Richard Keel or Kyle Keel. Oh yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He plays the, the titular humanoid, I believe. Yeah. I forgot, uh, Arthur Kennedy was in that.

Well, in this, he's just a snarling fascist police inspector who has absolutely had it up to here with the hippies. Yes. And it's difficult to figure out his accent in this. I was...

I'm guessing since the film is supposed to take place near the Scottish border in what, Cumbria? I was thinking, well, maybe he's going for a Scottish accent here. No. To the extent that he is attempting an accent, I think he's going for Irish, not Scottish. But why? No, it's almost as bad as Kevin Costner in Robin Hood. Just alternating forms.

freely between attempting an accent and not at all. And in the cases where he does actually alter his accent, I do think he's trying for Irish, but there are plenty of scenes where it's just nothing, not even trying. He has a gravelly American voice. I guess it's just his natural voice. And he sounds kind of like, imagine the voice of William Holden, you know, kind of rough, gravelly, core American accent. And I'd say this is what we hear at least half the time.

Yeah. Now, trying to figure out the accent itself aside, I think he is a very convincing screen presence in the film. Again, maybe not the most nuanced character of all time here, but just as an absolute authority figure villain to menace our audience.

free-thinking youths or supposedly free-thinking youths, I think he's pretty great. He's just bristling and snarling every time he's on the screen. Basically, every scene, he's just decrying the decadence and filth of the young and saying, why don't we just lock them all up? Yeah. Why can't I abuse my power more? If only I could abuse my power a few degrees more, then we wouldn't have any problems at all.

Yeah. Let's see some other actors in this of note. Janine Mestry plays Katie, Katie West. This is the sister of,

of the character played by Christina Galbo. So this is Edna's sister. Yep. She's a major, an important character that kind of brings everyone together here. But the actor here was born in 47, Spanish actor whose work seems to lean more historical and more into dramas. But she had a small role as a vampire woman in Jess Franco's 1970 Dracula movie that had Christopher Lee, Klaus Skinski, and Herbert Lohm in it. Hmm.

quite a cast. I mean, you can guess who Kloskinski played, right? Yes.

Wait, are you saying not Dracula? Not Dracula. No, Christopher Lee's Dracula. Oh, Klaus Kinsey. Renfield? Yes, yes. Okay. Makes sense. All right. And then playing Katie's husband, Martin West, you have José Lafonte, Spanish actor with 204, I almost said 2004, 204 varied credits, including 1987's Beaks, the movie. Oh. Is that one you've seen? What, you don't remember us talking about Beaks in the past? No.

I don't. Remind me. I think it came up on the show maybe because a listener asked us what were the worst films we've ever seen. And I don't know exactly how to answer that. You know, it's hard to put all movies on the same scale. You can't consider them all with the same criteria. But I think one of the worst times I ever had trying to finish watching a movie was Beaks.

which is a ripoff of the birds, but it was like excruciating. It had these high pitched droning synthesizer sounds that were just like needles going into your ears and pair that with overuse of slow motion. And you can imagine just the nausea and the pain of, of trying to get to the end.

This was a Rene Cardona Jr. picture, too. All right. Well, now you've been twice warned to avoid beaks. We also have a character that will become important, Guthrie Wilson, who's a tramp. He lives by the river in this rural British setting, played by Fernando Hilbeck, who lived 1933 through 2009. I thought Hilbeck was interesting in this. Maybe it's more in the way he was shot, but interesting.

He almost has kind of George Eastman vibes going on here. Very intimidating physical presence. He was a Spanish actor, mostly character actor, did a lot of work in various genres. One of his biggest international credits is I believe he plays like an evil knight or something in Paul Verhoeven's 1985 medieval drama Flesh. I guess it's flesh and blood, but it's always flesh plus blood.

um, like it's supposed to equal something equals negative fun, I guess. Cause I don't think it's, you never really hear it, um, discussed a lot. I don't anyway, but anyway, he had a great cast, Rutger Howard, Jennifer, Jason Lee, Ronald Lacey, uh, Brian James. So, uh, fun cast. I love, I love Verhoeven. I've never seen. Oh yeah. Yeah. I would, it's, it's on my radar is something I want to check out at some point. Like, cause the, the Paul Verhoeven movies that, uh,

that I'm familiar with. Most people are familiar. It's going to be the RoboCop. It's going to be Total Recall. It's going to be that caliber of film, which is great. Those are perfect films in their own way, but I am curious at times, what are the predecessors to that? What sort of brought him to the international scene? And I just haven't seen any of those.

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All right. We also have, this is a minor character, but I want to mention him because he's kind of, I kept thinking of him as the discount Peter Cushing in this. Yes. Perhaps a lot of this has to do with just the shape of his skull and the way he's presented. But Vincente Vega plays Dr. Duffield.

Dates unknown on the two databases I was looking at, but he's been inactive since 1979. So I suspect he may be dead. But anyway, the actor himself seems to have a fairly had a fairly diverse career and acted in various dramas, even some Shakespeare. I can see why you would say Cushing, because they bring him in to be the kind of thin, angular, clinical, semi good guy. Yeah, kind of has a grim demeanor.

He's almost a good guy in the movie, but he can't fully be that way because he's too closely aligned with science. This is a major problem. Yeah, this film seems to have some definite opinions about science and its overreach. Yeah, we'll get to that in the plot section. Alright, it's worth noting that there are multiple individuals that are credited with the makeup and the special effects, but Gianetto DeRosi is

is credited as makeup artist and special optical effects here. He lived 1941 through 2021. And DeRosi was a big name in both Italian and American films with a noted specialty in prosthetic appliances for gory movies. So,

I mean, this is a zombie movie, so you know what that means. Scenes in which people have parts of their anatomy ripped open or ripped off and eaten by bloodthirsty creatures. I am not really a gore hound. You know, that's not what I usually come to a movie for. But the stuff in this movie is good. There are scenes of...

Zombies like pulling people's guts out and chowing down on them and stuff. And it's quite convincing. Yeah. And I mean, everyone's tolerance level for this is going to vary. For my taste level, I felt like they they gave us just enough for it to be shocking within the context of the film without feeling like the the the camera is really lingering too long, either on the effects or on the like the intended blood and gore itself. Mm hmm.

Anyway, DeRossi's credits are pretty robust. I mean, they're all over the place. And I didn't list all of them here, and I'm not even going to read all the ones I listed. But he worked on The Humanoid, which we already referenced. He worked on 1980's Cannibal Apocalypse, which we've covered on the show. He worked on a film I've never seen, but this title never fails to make me snicker, is 1980's Dr. Butcher, M.D.,

which I don't know. I just always, I'm always intrigued that there's Dr. Butcher MD. But anyway. Well, I like that it's supposed to Dr. Butcher, like Masters of Education or something. Yeah. But yeah, he also worked on Fulci's The Beyond, House by the Cemetery, which we've also talked about, Piranha 2 in 81, Conan the Destroyer in 84. He did the, you remember Andre the Giant is in that as this like big character

statue monster creature. He was responsible for the monster effects there. He worked on 1984's Dune. He was one of the people who brought the Guild Navigator to life. Oh, yeah. Even though the Guild Navigator doesn't really show up in the first Dune novel, but they had to get him in the Lynch movie. Yeah. They were like, we gotta get him in there and let's cart him in. It's a great scene. Say what you will about that adaptation of Dune, it's visually enthralling.

Anyway, he has some other lists that go on up into subsequent periods of motion picture here, including 2003's High Tension, a.k.a. Switchblade Romance, which was a film I enjoyed when it came out. I haven't gone back and watched it again. It's not a film that really...

bears a lot of revisiting, but the first viewing is pretty fun. And it does have some gross gore in it. Sorry, I'm just looking at the credits you listed from the 90s where he did Dragonheart, which is that Sean Connery CGI dragon movie.

Yeah. Oh, man. And then he did the Conan ripoff that had Kevin Sorbo from TV's Hercules in it. Yep. Cole the Conqueror. Yeah. Also, 1998's The Man in the Iron Mask in there. So, like I say, he worked on a wide variety of pictures from low-budget...

grindhouse affair to maybe even worse stuff than that. But then also some big pictures as well. And so any of these films, you know, if you check them out, well, at least they're going to have maybe an interesting gut rip sequence in them or something. A neat monster effect, that sort of thing. Mm-hmm.

Finally, the music on this one, I was really enthralled by. This film has really nice sound design and really nice music. And the credited musician here is Giuliano Sorghini. Dates, I couldn't find the dates for him. I think he's still around, though. Italian composer and keyboardist whose work in this film is really good, in my opinion. It's very creepy and unsettling, definitely electronic music.

This was his first score. And I don't know, it's kind of all downhill from here in terms of the film quality, the quality of the films he was attached to. I'm not even going to list all of these because some of these are really skeezy. But he followed this up with scores for a number of Spanish exploitation films of the 1970s. Some real trash in there, some of it just notoriously so.

But the score for Let Sleeping Corpses Lie has been released on various formats a number of times, and his non-film work is also available on streaming sites. Over the weekend, I was listening to, I was streaming a record titled Oculto.

And it is supposed to be, I believe, 10 unreleased tracks from his archive. So stuff that he was putting together and composing in the 1970s for film that just wasn't used. And it's really good stuff. If you like 1970s cinema synth and the kind of stuff that would show up on a Spanish or Italian horror picture, then this is right up your alley. I've been meaning to listen to it. I haven't gotten to it yet, but I believe you.

Well, I just have to say this. If you do listen to it, Joe, make sure the windows are shut. Okay. Don't open the window. Well, should we let sleeping corpses lie here and just call it an episode or should we get into the plot of this? And I think we should disturb the corpses. Yes. Um, okay. So, uh, let's see. The movie opens strangely quiet. Uh, we, we come up cold, uh, no credits yet in an art shop, uh,

full of pieces, both old and new. And we've got this handsome bearded blonde, a slightly Robert Redford ish looking guy who's closing up. I don't know, maybe somewhere between Redford kind of a,

bearded young Mark Hamill. Then again, the hair beard combination also kept making me think of Kurt Russell, though he doesn't really look like him at all in the face. But this is George. This is Ray Lovelock. And he will be, I guess, one of our two protagonists. So we see him getting ready to leave the store. I guess he's the shopkeeper. And we're panning around seeing all the stuff. The store has everything from antique fertility statues to cubist paintings of fish. Yeah.

And I just noticed when looking back, it goes by very fast. But Rob, did you notice there is a telephone on the desk and then a clay statue of a telephone sitting right across from it? Look at this. Yeah, I did not notice this during my viewing of the film. But yeah, there's no denying it. What is that for?

I don't know. One gets the impression that these are pieces of art from cultures around the world. So maybe this is just a mimicry of a telephone from some culture. The traditional art of Manchester. Yeah.

Maybe it's the first telephone. I don't know. Oh, maybe. Ancient telephones. Yeah. So George gets this ancient-looking fertility statue, and he stashes it in his bag as he's heading out the door. He leaves a sign up that says, close for the holidays. And then I thought this was funny. We get an extreme close-up of the guts of this guy's motorcycle as he is driving away. The camera's right up in the gears and stuff. Now, did you get the impression that he...

was just a shopkeeper at this store or that he owned the store. And in either case, does he have a right to shove this stuff in a bag and take off for the country? This is a good question. I could not tell that it was ever answered in the film, whether he's taking the statue because it belongs to him and he plans to sell it. Uh, and that's fine. Or if he's stealing it. Yeah. I'm not sure. His stories about why he's going into the countryside are also, uh,

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So in retrospect, I'm a little suspicious of George. After he leaves the shop, we get a slow zoom shot through the space where we see more pieces from the collection. All these ominous droning sounds and these little like hollow hoots and crackles play on the soundtrack. And you see a Caesar head and the Holy Grail and then a painting that looks a lot like the poster for Apocalypse Now. Did you notice that? Yeah. Yeah. I know that you pointed out.

But right from the beginning, one thing I love about this movie is the spooky sound design. It's not just the music. There's a lot of just kind of, I don't know, ambient atmospheric sound effects, kind of droning and whirring as if from distant machines or things coming from underground and these kind of drips and echoing sounds that create an ominous feeling. And it's very good stuff. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, you get that feeling of dread even before anything starts dripping blood. But then suddenly there's green rings zooming in through the screen, and we see red eyes on pale faces, and then a title card that looks straight out of a PowerPoint presentation. It says, The Living Dead at the Manchester Morgue. And I'm going to say, this title just does not look like it fits the rest of the movie. It feels kind of inserted hastily. Yeah, if we had more time, it would be interesting to look at

additional title cards for this picture and see which ones felt the most authentic. But yeah, this one feels very spliced in. Anyway, we follow the shopkeeper on his motorcycle and he's buzzing down the city streets in busy traffic. We see roundabouts, double-decker buses. I was trying to pause it and see what the signs on the buses said. One said, Next Stop Magnet Building Society. And I tried to look that up and didn't find much. I think it might be like a name for an old construction firm.

But anyway, I was wondering, is this supposed to be Manchester? Because there are later comments that make me wonder if it's supposed to be London because somebody saying, oh, the way you're dressed, you must have come up from London. Yeah, I noticed that as well. I think this they did shoot these scenes in Manchester. So that leans one to interpret it.

as Manchester, but who knows? Again, this was not a British film, but an Italian-Spanish co-production. So even if it creates a convincing vision of life and unlife in Britain, it's still like from the outside looking in. So George is driving around on the motorcycle, but then we see some bits of green English countryside. Yeah.

But then that intercuts back with smokestacks, heavy industry. We see a man in a trench coat weaving his way through the rush hour crowd wearing a surgical mask. And there are actually a number of images of people wearing masks or scarves over their faces. I wondered if this is supposed to be about air pollution, because there are a lot of images coming really fast in this sequence, and a lot of them...

seem to me to be highlighting some kind of pollution or chemical themes. We see vapor coming out of pipes, steam rising from the sewer, nuclear cooling towers. We see paper waste and just litter blowing through a graveyard. We see dead rats in the gutters. And then there's one, uh, we just see a guy taking pills. Yeah.

They're really shoehorning it all in there. Like, look at the modern world. Manchester is a city of just...

absolute urban decay, right? I mean, it's just like lots of just like black metal things around, like industrial buildings where everything is just so grimy. Yeah. So pollution, a guy's taking pills, and then there's a streaker. I kept expecting to find out what this meant later, but it's never revisited in the movie. There is just randomly a streaker running through a crosswalk while cars and buses wait at the light.

Yeah. I mean, on one level, we can definitely interpret this as just pure 70s titillation and a way to make sure that people kept watching the movie at this time period in this time period. But within the context of the film, I think maybe it's supposed to let us know that that urban England is also a place of sort of gleeful liberation that, yeah, it's polluted and gross and people are wearing masks. But also, hey, here's a naked lady running across the street.

Okay, I guess so. I did not know what to make of that. So George makes it out of the city. He's riding his motorcycle through the countryside. And I guess here maybe is a good place to come back to this flag we raised earlier about what George is supposed to be. Like, what subculture or cultural stereotype are we supposed to understand George as belonging to? Right.

Because, as we will find out later, the movie is establishing a clear divide with George on the one side of it and the man on the other side. And George is supposed to stand in for...

counterculture youth rebellion in some way. The police inspector character, who is our main representative of the man, obviously hates hippies in particular, which would seem to indicate that that's what George is supposed to be because they clash. But then again, this is 1974, so it's a little late for your classic movement hippie.

And George doesn't exactly read to me as hippie anyway. He has long hair, yes, but he doesn't display other hippie visual cues or clothing, nor any traces of like a make love, not war kind of personality. Instead, he is just a he's more just kind of like a middle finger to the world kind of guy. He is a disagreeable, acerbic, sexist, leather clad motorcycle driving jerk.

So what's your take on this? Do you think he's supposed to? Is it just kind of like, is this what the people who used to be hippies are thought to have sort of turned into by 1974? Yeah. So, yeah. So on one level, obviously, when we think of British biker gangs and motorcycles, we instantly think of psychomania.

Yeah. And which would have just been 73. So basically the same time period. He does not feel like he would, this character would fit in with the, the, the living dead motorcycle gang of psychomania though. Oh, you don't think so? I kind of feel like maybe he could be in psychomania. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't think he he didn't care enough. I don't think this guy cares about anything as much as the crew in Psychomania cares about killing themselves and living forever. That's right. Psychomania, you got to be really dedicated to mayhem and destruction. And George isn't like that. He more just like hates authority and hates institutions and just doesn't want to be hassled, I think.

Yeah. I was poking around a little on this because I was thinking, well, I guess maybe he is technically this sort of British biker stereotype of the day, the rocker. Not a mod, but a rocker. And it does seem like motorcycle culture in Britain, from what I was looking at, like you have kind of this earlier version of it where it was seen as quite this independent and refined thing for you to do. Like nice people ride motorcycles.

around the British countryside. But then you get kind of this influx of sort of the American motorcycle gang culture. And then you get kind of like the hippie culture also affects it. And so you kind of get this rocker, a version of the rocker stereotype, this rocker subculture that I guess George is supposed to be a part of. That's my best bet. I should also add that

As of now, I have not seen a British biker film that doesn't have a zombie in it.

Or a living dead creature of one form or another. So this is something that this is a question that might also be answered by just broader exposure to, say, Viking films of the 1970s that are set in Britain. Now, wait, I thought we determined that the undead gang in in Psychomania were not zombies, but liches or something like that. Yeah, they're more like liches for sure. Yeah. OK. Undead, but but not zombies.

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Okay.

Uh, and I was just looking, I love the kind of pausing in old movies to look at all the, I don't know, the, the ephemeral, uh, ads and stuff in the windows. And there was one thing I found here that was a, a pin that said, uh, it's hanging in the windows of the gas station. It says blow up a groundhog today. Uh,

And I was like, what is this? But it looks like it was a promotional pin for a type of British tires called Groundhog Tires. Yeah, there are a number of fun moments in this when they're poking around stores or they're at gas stations that occasionally there'll be some logo or cartoon character that would catch my eye. There's a pink one that shows up later that was like a pink elephant looking creature. Oh, I didn't know.

I didn't see that one. There's something like paraffin, but not paraffin. Oh, wait. Is this what George is going to use later to light his axe on fire? I don't think so. I don't remember it actually playing a part in the plot. It was just me noticing it on a shelf and thinking it was cool.

All right, well, as George is just getting ready to leave, the lady in front of him backs up her car, crashes into his motorcycle, wrecks it, destroys his front tire. She gets out and says, I'm so sorry. I must be a little tired. And, well, his bike is all busted up, and the mechanic says it can't be fixed until Monday.

So George just insists that the lady give him a ride to where he's going, which is Windermere, which is the name of a lake and I guess probably the area around the lake in northern England. Yeah, he's not very easygoing. That's established pretty early on. This guy's fussy and bossy and self-centered, you know.

And it's not all that agreeable. Yeah. He says, like, you'll take me where I'm going. It's the least you can do. And then he she's just like, well, I guess. And then he says, I'll drive. I mean, we don't want to go all the way in reverse, do we? The vibes are instantly weird.

Yeah. And then she goes, actually, you'll be doing me a favor because I have driven all the way from London and I'm a little tired. And he just says, then go to sleep. And he gets in the driver's seat and they drive off. Driving a car, by the way, the approximate size and shape of a Galapagos tortoise. Yeah. Yeah. It's tiny.

And there's so there's a lot of little like character color while they're driving along. At one point, the lady goes to light up a cigarette and he just like yoinks it out of her mouth and takes it for himself. And they introduce themselves. We find out his name is George. She introduces herself as Edna. And he goes, you look a little like an Edna. So I kept thinking of her as Edna for the rest of the film.

But we learn about Edna's mission. She's up from London to visit her sister who has a cottage at Southgate.

And while they're driving along, the dude starts getting mad at the radio because there is a report on there where scientists are talking about how ecological problems are exaggerated and there's no reason to get worked up about them. And he gets very mad at this. He says to Edna, he's like, when we all die, only the scientists will survive. Yeah, I was kind of taken aback that this movie would draw this line.

You know, obviously, it's going to draw a line between the rebellious youths of the day and the aged establishment, the police and so forth. But they just go ahead and heap science in with the man as well. Yeah. And this is not unique to this film. This movie is sort of one of a type. There are other horror movies of this period that have this kind of.

I would say it's a shallow anti-intellectual view of science that doesn't really understand what science is or what it means. And unfortunately, there's still plenty of this thinking in the world today. But it sort of thinks of science not as a word that refers to like the totality of the human effort to understand the world through empirical method and rigorous experimentation, but instead to refer to a cabal of wicked old men who want to do unnatural things with chemicals.

chemicals and radiation. Yeah. And in a way, this harkens back to the mad scientists of older films. But this was definitely a period where you saw, and we've talked about some of these ecological horror films. Sometimes it's the ecological horror going on is pollution or

you know, it's chemical or it's certainly radiation. And then sometimes it's very distant. It doesn't have a face. It doesn't have a mad scientist at the center of it. There's more of this sense of bureaucracy to it. Yeah. And this movie, I would say, is more like that. Like, we don't even know the person who invented the machine in this movie that will raise the dead. We only see some kind of low-level functionaries bringing it out to the field to implement it.

Yeah. And when we see it, it looks nice. It doesn't look particularly suspect, but it is modern and shiny and ultimately poses a threat. Yeah. But again, I think it's funny that the radio broadcast here in the movie is used specifically to introduce us to scientists as...

Like the voices who tell people not to worry about ecological problems or pollution and just ignore it. The irony being that in reality, like if you know about ecological threats, like I don't know, like how did we find out about ozone depletion or like the human health effects of environmental lead from gasoline and other sources?

It's all like paved over. Like, I guess if George in this movie met Claire Cameron Patterson, he would like call him a twisted old geezer and punch him in the face. But it's like, you know, we are often made aware of these ecological threats specifically because of the work of scientists. But anyway, get off the hobby horse. So back on the journey, there is a really funny scene where they get stuck behind a city of Manchester mortuary truck and

And they're weaving back and forth wildly. George is driving, of course, and he performs a hideously reckless passing maneuver, like driving off into the grass. I guess this is to show he's like, he's cool and he doesn't play by the rules.

And so they're going to Windermere. George says it's because he has a house there. Again, his story kind of keeps changing, but he says he has a house in the country. He says it's away from industry and city life, and he likes to sit there and be natural and listen to the grass grow. But this leads to an argument because Edna needs to go to Southgate to meet her sister, to go to her cottage. So they argue, and then eventually they decide, okay, he'll take her to Southgate.

And here, as they're going through, there is absolutely marvelous scenery. I love the locations picked out. I assume most of these are in Britain because they look like Britain. I don't know if some of them were actually Italian. But, for example, they come across this kind of craggy relic of an abbey or something on these green cliffs overlooking a road down at the bottom of the ravine. And I was wondering, I think some parts of this movie were...

were shot at Tintagel, which is like a medieval Cornish fortress down in the southwest of England. And it might have been this sequence, but I'm not sure. But yeah, there are a number of sequences here where it's like a lush green landscape surrounding them and these winding isolated roads. And it's quite beautiful. But of course, the film score, the sound effects that we hear, the droning,

begins to make us suspect that there's something else going on here. There's something underneath the surface of all of this natural beauty. Yes, certainly. Now they get lost, of course. So they got to ask for directions at a nearby farm. And there's a scene where George, he's going to go ask for directions. So he leaves Edna in the car and it looks like he has to like cross a stream and climb a mountain to get to the farm where he's going to ask for directions. It looks like it is a, it is a ways. Yeah.

Oh, and he takes the car keys with him because he's just, again, he's just kind of being a jerk. And Edna is left behind to smoke a cigarette and I'm sure get into no trouble whatsoever.

But at the farm, George goes out, he's looking around. The place seems kind of deserted. And I love the eerie feeling conjured here. There are chickens clucking in the distance, but nobody in sight until a weird droning sound comes in. And George looks up, up through the fields, up the hill and sees a strange red vehicle with what look like people in white lab coats, or I guess they're in white full body jumpsuits.

And so next we jump to them. We're going to meet them and see what's going on here. The vehicle they're working from says, uh, that it is the Midland area agricultural department experimental section. These guys will be a recurring theme in the movie. Rob, do you want to describe what's going on with the ag department scientists? Yeah, we have some, uh, I have a couple of gentlemen here in these white jumpsuits. Uh, and I want to say not your space age jumpsuit. They look very, you know, uh,

blue collar in many respects. And the, the individuals act very, uh, you know, they're very laid back about it. They're not, they're not, they're happy to talk about their work to a random dude who just walked up across the field. Uh, and yeah, they're, they have this big red, um, uh,

It very much looks like some sort of a combine-type vehicle, except you don't see any traditional agricultural tools on it. So that instantly makes you wonder, like, what does it do? It doesn't have a combine on it. It doesn't have any kind of like a plow attached to it. And then one of the dudes is walking around with some sort of scanning device. It kind of looks kind of like a metal detector-type thing, except with some added doodads on it.

clearly monitoring something going on in the soil. Yes. It looks like a big sci-fi weed whacker. And so he's holding it there and George comes walking up to everybody and he's like, Hey, tell me how to get to the Madison place. They're like, wait a second. And the scientist is sure, or at least the, I don't know if these are supposed to be scientists or just the guys who work for the scientists. I'm not sure, but they,

They're showing the farmer how to use this metal weed whacker thing to do something, to either scan something or emit rays or something. And George goes, what is that thing? And they explain, or the farmer does, that it's supposed to destroy insects and parasites. He says it was sent by the Department of Agriculture. And then George goes, oh, I'd send it right back where it came from and keep the insects and parasites nature has given you.

And so they argue about it. They say, no, hold on now. They make excuses for it. They're like, it works by ultrasonic radiation, not a chemical involved. Love that. No chemicals. And then they also explain that it is progress. But meanwhile, so George is trying to get directions from the farmer to the place they're going. And then we see the ag department guys in the background. They're going like, all right, Bernard, let's give it another bash at the main rotator.

Yeah, they're good natured, trusting technicians of this machinery that they've been sent out to test. Yeah, I think so. Now, I don't think it's much of a spoiler to go ahead and reveal. Yeah, this is definitely the science run amok that will raise the living dead later on in the picture. And I do love the localized nature of the premise here. And I think the specificity of it.

works well with the themes here. Our main character will, of course, put one and two together in time and realize that we know what is causing the deep ecological unrest here, and we know exactly what we need to do to stop it, but is the establishment going to let him? Is the man going to let him, or are they just going to accuse him of everything? Well, no, because they are allied with science, and as we know, science is evil, and all it wants to do is do unnatural experiments and cause pain and suffering. Right.

I do like, so again, you have a very specific origin for the zombie menace that's going to come. And I like that it's not the old standby of radiation. It's not chemical waste. Maybe it's a little early for chemical waste cinema. I'm not sure. Electricity is often a frequent pick as well, even in politics.

Pictures from this time period, you get some electricity leaching into the ground and watch out, earthworms are going to come for you. But this one is this is a picture that involves ultrasound as being the source of the unrest. And I'm struggling to think of another ultrasound eco horror film. I'm sure such a thing exists, but I can't think of it.

But I also think it's funny that they can't just call it ultrasound because I think that doesn't sound scary enough. So they call it ultrasonic radiation. Oh, well, yeah. And then you do get to invoke radiation in the picture as well. So, yeah. Yeah. But anyway, so, you know, they're giving another bash at the oscillator and then there's this ominous humming and whirring as the machine spins up.

And again, as I mentioned earlier, the sound design is very nice. In a lot of the scary scenes in this movie, there are these various types of eerie, throbbing, hooting sounds that seem to come from nowhere or from everywhere. Very effective.

Meanwhile, back down at the car where we're here with Edna or Edna. And here's our first zombie attack. It kind of comes out of nowhere. She's just standing there in the road. And then there is. And so there's a nice, beautiful stream going by. And again, I want to emphasize that the location here is gorgeous. So every, every,

You know, it's like this green verdant valley with trees running along the side of the stream and an old, you know, stonewalled cemetery. And then we see suddenly a man just sort of like walking into frame in the cemetery and we get a close up of him and the pupils of his eyes are not red.

round, they're star-shaped, and they're set against red irises. And uh-oh, he's coming for Edna. It's very creepy looking. I think extremely good zombie design. I think so too. Yeah, the zombies in this picture are not greatly decayed. This is not going to be a real, what we might think of today as kind of the Walking Dead sort of zombie that's heavily rotted.

And these contacts are nice. They give them this nice otherworldliness to them. And also the zombies, I think they're just shot well, they're presented well. It can be a challenge

Evidently, you can see this in some of the lesser zombie pictures out there. How do you make a man stumbling around or even lunging, you know, incoherently? How do you make that frightening to people who have all their wits about them? How do you make them a surprise? How do you make them feel terrifying? And this picture, you know, uses a number of different tools to really get that across. A

Not only a distance and angle of the shot, but again, that sound design, which just seems to resonate and also invoke this idea of like sound waves. Yes. And hey, I want to be really I want to be fair to the people who called this movie Don't Open the Window.

There is a part here where Edna tries to hide in the car and the zombie reaches through the window at her. So, okay, I stand corrected. There is a window and the zombie tries to come through it, but it's a car window, which is not what you think of when you hear don't open the window. Yeah, yeah. This was going to be the inspiration for the picture. They just call it don't hide in the car. Yeah.

Anyway, Edna escapes. She meets up with George and the farmer. She tries to explain what happened. She says, that man, he's following me. He tried to attack me. But George looks down. There's no one there. They just see, you know, the peaceful little ravine stream going along. And it seems like George doesn't believe her. He's like, are you certain?

And the farmer, here's the description she gives. It says it sounds like she's describing Guthrie, the tramp who used to sleep down by the river. But he drowned recently, so it probably wasn't him. And then from here we go on to meet some more characters. We meet Edna's sister Katie, the one who she's going to visit, and Katie's husband Martin, who together live in a rustic country cottage with a waterfall in the yard. This is a nice piece of land.

And Martin seems to be like an artist and a photographer. And we learned that Katie has been addicted to heroin. She has, uh, she's been addicted and Martin is trying to help her quit, but she like secretly uses the drug when he's not looking. Yeah.

Yeah. I don't know where she's getting her drug out here in the middle of nowhere, but we see her with it. So she does have some. Yeah. She's like stashing it away and trying to get to it in secret. Right. And then like you say, Martin is a photographer and his particular art photography seems to revolve in

in large part around taking photographs of flowers at night with stupendous artificial lighting. It looks interesting in the picture unless you stop to wonder like what's going on here is, is all the artificial lighting we're seeing in this shot. Is this supposed to be his artificial lighting or is this movie lighting just to make it things look cool? Uh, it was kind of hard to figure out what they were going for here.

Did you show Bonnie the scene? Did she have thoughts? I didn't show her this particular scene. I mean, so I don't know. Maybe I'm wrong, but it seems like this guy's going to a lot of trouble to shoot these flowers. Like, shouldn't he be, if he wants to control the lighting so much, he should just shoot them indoors in a studio. And if he's going to shoot them outside, he should make use of natural lighting. But who am I to tell Martin how to follow his dreams here? Yeah. Okay. So Martin is kind of strange looking, would you say? He's got sort of a

bird of prey face with like metal heavy eyebrows. And whenever I see if it's a zombie movie and they introduce a human character who is visually striking in this way, I often wonder if this person was cast first of all with an eye for what he will look like once he inevitably gets zombified. Um,

And then rather than being cast for the part of the movie where he's a living human with lines and not saying he's bad in the part where he has lines. But I just look at this guy and I think, OK, they wanted him as a zombie and they will get him as a zombie. Oh, absolutely. He'll spend most of his screen time as a zombie. But but first you got to make him believable as a as a non zombified human being.

which they, I guess, mostly do. So we find out he and Katie talk and we find out Katie knows her sister's coming to visit. She deduces that's because Martin is going to try to send her to a clinic so that she can get off drugs. But she she is not ready. And she she has a big emotional breakdown about this. And

And that it leads to a fight. And so Martin just goes off to do his photography by himself. Oh, and then meanwhile, we cut back to George and Edna while they're approaching the house. They're still driving. And Edna is saying, like, I'm not mad, you know, I don't imagine things. And George just goes, me thinks the lady don't protest too much.

Yeah, absolutely does not believe her. I think what he says, like Guthrie must have had a twin brother. That's all it was. No, he hasn't even gotten to that yet. He says that later once he starts a little bit believing her. At this point, it seems like he doesn't even believe anybody actually attacked her. Experience holiday cheer at Tanger Outlets with savings up to 70% off your favorite brands. From fragrances to accessories and the latest styles. Dispensable.

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Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, and my latest interview is with Wiz Khalifa. The craziest part of my life. I can go from performing in front of 40,000 people to either being in a dressing room, being in a plane, or being back in a bed all by myself. He is a multi-platinum selling recording artist, mini-mogul, and an actor. Which among the one, the only, the only?

Did you feel like a big break was coming? I didn't know what that big break looked or felt like, but I knew that what I was doing was working. The gang banging and the drug selling, that's not really for me. But the looking cool, the having girls, the making music, I'm like, I like that part of it. How was that experience for you, losing someone so close to you that you love?

I am grateful that I was able to have like the last moments that I had and to be able to prepare for it. And it's something that I'm still dealing with. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Come to me.

Baby daddy mad because you got a boyfriend? Come to me. Thought you was the father but you're not? Come to me. I can't promise I won't judge you, but I can guarantee that I will help you. As a daughter, a sister, a mother, and an entrepreneur, I've learned a lot in life. So I'm using my own perspective and experiences to help you fix your mess. Send me your situation and let's fix it as a family. Listen to Carefully Reckless on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

AT&T, connecting changes everything. Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast, and we're kicking off our second season digging into how tech's elite has turned Silicon Valley into a playground for billionaires. From the chaotic world of generative AI to the destruction of Google search, Better Offline is your unvarnished and at times unhinged look at the underbelly of tech from an industry veteran with nothing to lose.

This season I'm going to be joined by everyone from Nobel-winning economists to leading journalists in the field, and I'll be digging into why the products you love keep getting worse and naming and shaming those responsible. Don't get me wrong though, I love technology. I just hate the people in charge and want them to get back to building things that actually do things to help real people. I swear to God things can change if we're loud enough, so join me every week to understand what's happening in the tech industry and what could be done to make things better.

Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Check out betteroffline.com.

Good people, what's up? It's Questo, Questlove. And Team Supreme and I have been working hard to bring you some incredible episodes of Questlove Supreme with guests you definitely don't want to miss. Now, one of the things I love about this Questlove Supreme podcast is we got something for everybody, every type of musical upper. We enjoy speaking to the people who are the face of some movements, some people you've seen on stage or TV or magazine covers, but we also love speaking to the folks who are

who were making it happen behind the scenes and they paved the way for those that followed. You know, keystones to the culture. This season, we've had some amazing one-on-one conversations like I'm Pete Bill chatting up with hit maker Sam Holland, Sugar Steve chatting with the legend Nick Lowe, and I've had pleasures of doing one-on-one conversations with Willow, Sonata Matreya, Kathleen Hanna, and The RZA.

These are conversations you won't hear anywhere else. So make sure you go back and you check those episodes out, all right? Listen to Questlove Supreme on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

So, like you said, at the cottage, Martin is like setting up his camera to automatically take pictures of a flower next to a waterfall and with all this artificial lighting. And so, like, what do you know if it's just snapping shot after shot? It's it's going to keep taking pictures as a zombie attacks. Right. How convenient. So, of course, Guthrie, the tramp zombie shows up. I don't know how it beat the car like that there before the car did. Well.

Well, you know, they're shambling when they actually go for the attack because they've been just booking it the rest of the time, I guess. Because, you know, we have all the zombie action going on at locations in this film that are very isolated. Like, this is very rural Britain, we're supposed to believe here. So, yeah, they're traveling from one location to another pretty quickly somehow.

But the zombie shows up. It chases Katie around. Initially, I think she's trying to do drugs and then she gets startled and the zombie chases her. She escapes out a window and

manages to get away, but then the thing comes upon Martin on the banks of the creek and it kills him. And just then George and Edna arrive to find Katie screaming. And then we cut to the next morning and the police are here. They're investigating Martin's death. And so the setup of the movie is complete. And here we are about to meet, I guess, our chief antagonist, other than like science and the zombies created by science,

And that is our vicious fascist police inspector. I don't think he has a name, does he? He's just the inspector. So they're looking at the body and I think the medical examiner is like, I've never seen anything like it. Somebody certainly enjoyed themselves here. And the inspector says, oh, a sadist, huh? And then the medical examiner goes, or a lunatic. But he says one thing's for sure. The attacker was enormously strong because the victims of

bones have been crushed. Every one of them. Hmm. I don't know about that. Yeah. Yeah. But, oh, and then meanwhile, so the inspector is going to go interrogate all of the witnesses. So George, Katie and Edna, and on the way to doing that, he like pulls aside one of the cops there and he goes, button up, man, you're wearing a uniform, not a pair of pajamas. Uh,

So he's that kind of guy. He's a uniform code guy. Yeah, he's just a real ray of sunshine, this guy. But the interrogation is going on, and Katie is describing the zombie who attacked her. And then Edna tells the cops, she's like, oh, I was attacked by that same zombie. And obviously the inspector does not believe them. But then Edna says, why would I invent such a thing? And he says, why? It's very simple, miss, to back up your sister's story.

And I was just thinking, OK, wait, is this correct interrogation procedure? Are you just supposed to, like, explain your theory of the case directly to the interviewee? No, I mean, I mean, likewise, is the inspector just going to sit there and just consider any wild idea that a medical examiner throws out there or or later on? There'll be another scene where somebody just brings up an idea and he's like, yeah, yeah, I think you're right. Yeah. Lunatic. Yeah. Yeah. Broke all the bones. All of them.

I love how this will connect later to when somebody tells him about the existence of satanic cults. Yeah, yes. Yeah, that's the scene. Yeah, so he's just, he's hard-nosed. He's out to finger somebody for this crime. And he doesn't mind telling you to your face, like, yeah, I think you're a killer. And we're going to get you for this one. There's no escaping me. There's no escaping the law in this one. And he has several just, like, brilliant things in the scene. One is that

The inspector finds that Katie's photographer husband had taken naked photos of her. And he's like, explain this. It's like, what is the relevance? And here we get to the inspector's awesome theory that Katie must have done the murder because, as is well known, being addicted to heroin gives people superhuman strength enough to crush every bone in Martin's body. Now, as we're dissecting it here, all of this sounds ludicrous.

But there is something about the way that it's presented in the film, like the authority with it, with which it's presented. And like Arthur Kennedy's character, the inspector here is so sure of himself and so sure of his his his role in the investigation that everything he says is just considered reality is just considered considered a fact.

and the proper interpretation of the evidence before him. Yes, that's exactly right. I mean, he said, I am explaining this in a matter of fact way to highlight how ludicrous it is, but he delivers it with cold, cruel authority. Oh, and then George comes in, by the way, to be like, hey, I'm not part of this. Let me get out of here. I've got a house to look after. And the inspector like grabs him by the collar and he goes, listen, boy, you keep getting on my nerves. I'll give you another house to look after. The kind with lots of bar

Yeah, like he's already like physically grabbing him, even though he's like, I don't think he's really, they've really had a lot of time in the picture yet to really bump up against each other. Yeah, not at all.

So anyway, the police tell George and Edna, you can't leave. You have to stay in the hotel in Southgate until the investigation is finished. And so while they're getting out of there, George steals the film from Martin's camera because they think if they can get it developed, it will prove Katie is innocent. And George says, we better develop it ourselves because cops never like to admit that they're wrong. And if it shows that Katie is innocent, they'll just destroy it.

So they go to a place to get the film developed. It is a place that is a store called Croceries. C-R-O-C-E-R-I-E-S. Maybe that's supposed to be a G, but if there's a bar on it, it is indistinguishable from a serif. But these are delightful looking storefronts. You just want to go in and check out the labels. Freshly made sandwiches.

And then they go to the hotel, which is called the Old Owl Hotel, which has an old owl in it. And I so thought this owl was going to go berserk and attack somebody in the movie due to the ultrasonic rays.

Alas, never happens. Yeah. It looks impressive, though, sitting there in its little perch. And when they're checking in, George is again just a jerk for no reason to the hotel owner. He's like, I don't want to spend any longer in this place than I have to. He hates everything. Yeah. I mean, granted, he's going through a lot in this particular moment, but he was grumpy before all of this. So then we get to the hospital sequence, and there are several things to discuss here. I

one is, okay, so the setup is they find out Katie has been taken to the hospital and George and Edna go to see her. First is the location. I love the location. Again, this hospital looks awesome. It's like a kind of

new gothic style. Yeah, I was reading this as Barnes Hospital for the exteriors anyway near Manchester. But let's see, there are a few things to describe here. Rob, can you explain what's going on with the cadaver freezer boxes here? Oh yeah, so we're introduced to these freezer boxes that they're hauling corpses out in and they look very space age. I guess it's possible that this is exactly what

what these kind of sarcophagus coolers looked like at the time, but they felt a little...

high tech. But the idea here is that, hey, we need to move dead bodies across the countryside. We don't want them to rot. So we have these special cooler coffins for them. And so George is looking at one of these things in the hospital and Dr. Duffield comes across him. This is the Peter Cushing kind of guy. And they discuss, he's like, what is this? And he explains, he's like, oh, well, it's a ways to the Manchester morgue. And so you have to put them in these boxes.

But Dr. Duffield says to George, quite a few people leave their bodies to science these days. Shall I make a reservation for you? And of course, George is like, of course not. I would not leave my body to science. It implies that science is just this ghoulish endeavor. And all it wants is just to desecrate your body for some sinister purposes. Give me body so I can do something evil and unnatural with them. I'll probably put chemicals on it probably. Yeah.

But this gives way to the aggressive babies. Oh, my God. This this was just out of kind of out of nowhere. It's one of these scenes where I guess in the grand scheme of things, they introduce this to further explain how zombies work in this picture. But it ends up just feeling like this sort of side pool of just absurdity and weirdness. That is, of course, delightful. The very kind of thing I love in a picture.

What is the deal with the aggressive babies? Well, it's just suddenly, and this will make sense later on, but all the babies that are being born are born super aggressive. And they're so aggressive that if you get close to one, the baby will bite you and draw blood or scratch you and draw blood. In fact, doesn't it happen to George? He gets a little too close sometimes.

Well, it starts because one of the nurses gets like her eye poked out by a baby. And then the doctor is like, come help me. So he just enlists this random guy from the hallway to come help him with the baby. I guess they're trying to sedate the baby because otherwise the baby is ripping people's arms off. And they do. And yeah, the baby, I think, like attacks George while they're trying to get it sedated.

And they explain, yes, every baby born here from the region around this farm where they're trying out the agricultural device, it's just been born with hostility and aggression. It's like they're all born Bart Harley Jarvis is one of the most aggressive babies I've ever seen. So, Joe, you have a baby. How strong is a baby? They're incredibly strong, but I think not quite as strong as this movie depicts. Yeah.

So, George goes on to share his theory. He's like, hey, wait a minute. All these aggressive babies that have been born, they're all from this area around where they're trying out the ultrasonic radiation device. I wonder if that's making the babies aggressive.

So Dr. Duffield is intrigued, and together, George and the scientist, or the doctor, they go out to talk to the ag department scientists in the field. The ag department guys explain to Dr. Duffield how it works. They say it works by ultrasonic rays, and that the rays are used intentionally to drive insects mad and make them kill all of each other.

And it has destroyed, they say it has destroyed every insect for a mile radius, which to be clear, I think would not be a good thing. No, I mean, imagine the ecological disorder that would erupt.

if you just totally distorted all the insects in a given area. So in a way, it's kind of an interesting concept to roll out in the film, but also one that just seems also unrealistically reckless. Like the scientists involved in creating this strange weapon would have to realize that this is incredibly dangerous.

Well, they say soon they're going to get it working up to a five mile radius. They're proud. They're like, yeah, there's actually one mile. That was yesterday. Five miles is what we're going for today. We didn't hear anything you said about making rage babies. That's ridiculous. Yeah. And they appeal to him. They say to the doctor, you're a man of science. Surely you understand this machine only affects the most primitive life forms like insects and that more evolved life forms cannot be affected. Yeah, that sounds very scientific. Yeah.

Dr. Duffield seems to acknowledge that this machine may be what's causing the rage babies. But unfortunately, he's like he says, like, it's never wise to exaggerate. You know, they would laugh at us. He says that to George. So it's basically like he's saying, I am I, too, am one of the dark envoys of science. So I cannot stop it no matter how much I would like to. I mean, how many rage babies could there be at a given time out here in the countryside?

Experience holiday cheer at Tanger Outlets with savings up to 70% off your favorite brands. From fragrances to accessories and the latest styles.

Discover the best gifts for everyone on your list. Save big at Nike Factory Store, Michael Kors, Under Armour, Coach, Polo Ralph Lauren, Kate Spade New York, and so many more. Unwrap the best at Tanger Outlets. Hundreds of brands, endless gifting options. Plan your trip at Tanger.com.

Hey, I'm Jay Shetty, and my latest interview is with Wiz Khalifa. The craziest part of my life. I can go from performing in front of 40,000 people to either being in a dressing room, being in a plane, or being back in a bed all by myself. He is a multi-platinum selling recording artist, mini-mogul, and an actor. Which among the one, the only, the only?

Did you feel like a big break was coming? I didn't know what that big break looked or felt like, but I knew that what I was doing was working. The gang banging and the drug selling, that's not really for me. But the looking cool, the having girls, the making music, I'm like, I like that part of it. How was that experience for you, losing someone so close to you that you love?

I am grateful that I was able to have like the last moments that I had and to be able to prepare for it. And it's something that I'm still dealing with. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hi, I'm Ed Zitron, host of the Better Offline podcast, and we're kicking off our second season digging into how tech's elite has turned Silicon Valley into a playground for billionaires. From the chaotic world of generative AI to the destruction of Google search, Better Offline is your unvarnished and at times unhinged look at the underbelly of tech from an industry veteran with nothing to lose.

This season I'm going to be joined by everyone from Nobel-winning economists to leading journalists in the field, and I'll be digging into why the products you love keep getting worse and naming and shaming those responsible. Don't get me wrong though, I love technology. I just hate the people in charge and want them to get back to building things that actually do things to help real people. I swear to God things can change if we're loud enough, so join me every week to understand what's happening in the tech industry and what could be done to make things better.

Listen to Better Offline on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever else you get your podcasts. Check out betteroffline.com.

Come to me.

Baby daddy mad because you got a boyfriend? Come to me. Thought you was the father but you're not? Come to me. I can't promise I won't judge you, but I can guarantee that I will help you. As a daughter, a sister, a mother, and an entrepreneur, I've learned a lot in life. So I'm using my own perspective and experiences to help you fix your mess. Send me your situation and let's fix it as a family. Listen to Carefully Reckless on the Black Effect Podcast Network, iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

AT&T. Connecting changes everything. ♪

Good people, what's up? It's Questo, Questlove. And Team Supreme and I have been working hard to bring you some incredible episodes of Questlove Supreme with guests you definitely don't want to miss. Now, one of the things I love about this Questlove Supreme podcast is we got something for everybody, every type of musical upper. We enjoy speaking to the people who are the face of some movements, some people you've seen on stage or TV or magazine covers, but we also love speaking to the folks who are

who were making it happen behind the scenes and they paved the way for those that followed. You know, keystones to the culture. This season, we've had some amazing one-on-one conversations like I'm Pete Bill chatting up with hit maker Sam Holland, Sugar Steve chatting with the legend Nick Lowe, and I've had pleasures of doing one-on-one conversations with Willow, Sonata Matreya, Kathleen Hanna, and The RZA.

These are conversations you won't hear anywhere else. So make sure you go back and you check those episodes out, all right? Listen to Questlove Supreme on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

So there's a scene in the groceries store in town where they're getting their pick. Uh, George and Edna get the pictures developed and then they're like, Oh, too bad. The zombie does not show up on any of the pictures. And they're asking the guy like, could, could anything cause someone not to appear in a picture? And he goes, if they were a ghost, maybe, uh,

And then George says about one of the pictures, good thing the police haven't seen this one. She really looks like she's about to do him in, I guess, talking about Katie. And then just hilarious. The inspector comes right in. He like walks into the store and he's like, got you now.

And then he gives a speech about all you damn hippies. I'd kill you all if I had my way. Yeah, this is a wonderful snarling scene from Arthur Kennedy. This is the you're all the same. The lot of your speech that he gives gives George in particular. Mm hmm.

Oh, but after he leaves, the shopkeeper shows off a newspaper that has a picture of the guy who drowned, of Guthrie. And Edna looks at it and she's like, that's him. I was taken by the fact that here is the local newspaper and above the fold, huge picture of a dead man. Yes, exactly.

Very common. Yeah. Just of a corpse. And she's like, yes, that was him. And George is like, well, it must have been his twin then. He must have had a twin. And that's what you saw. So George decides to take Edna to the cemetery so he can, he says, I'm going to cure you of your fancy hallucinations. And I think the plan is George is going to make Edna look at Guthrie's dead body so that she will know that he is actually dead. Yeah.

Yeah. Again, this is another detail of the picture, a plot detail that sounds ridiculous. But when you're watching the film, like, I don't know, you don't I found myself not questioning these plot choices. I'm like, yeah, this is the logical place for them to go. Oh, of course they would go and look for the body. It's great. And so they go. They're followed by a police officer, by the way. This guy named Craig is tailing them.

And then, ooh, so this goes into one of the big horror action set pieces in the movie, the cemetery scene, which I thought was just fantastic. Really tense, scary, good staging of a lot of the action. I don't know how you felt, but I thought this was a great...

centerpiece of like the action horror in the film. Oh, absolutely. This is one of those sequences that really makes you think about zombie films in general and just realize you don't need a whole horde of zombies to have an effective nail biting sequence. You just have some, some internet, interesting setting, interesting location. And then you only need like one, two, three zombies top.

which is all they have going on here as they end up having to deal with them in this basement here that's serving as... It's not really a mortuary. I don't know. It's wherever. They're preparing... They're casketing the bodies, I guess. Yeah, I don't know. It seems like it's a crypt maybe or something, or it has vaults on the wall. It does have vaults, yeah. Okay, so describe what happens in the cemetery scene here. Well, obviously Guthrie shows up.

He's been booking it this whole time. He knows where his next zombie mauling appointment is going to take place. And so he shows up and we quickly learn that these critters are pretty indestructible.

Yeah. So they're impervious to wounds. Guthrie attacks them in like the basement of this, like the caretaker's house in the cemetery. They go down in the basement and they're there in the crypt and Guthrie shows up and locks them inside. And so they can't get back out the way they came in.

And he's coming at them and George is trying to like stab him with a rail or something, but it doesn't appear to harm him at all. And then we learn that these zombies, the ultrasonic zombies, can reanimate other corpses by smearing blood on them. So they recruit freely from the restful dead and turn them into the undead.

And this was just a whole great tense scene. George and Edna finally escaped by knocking bricks out of a vault wall and climbing up through an open grave. And they meet up with Officer Craig here, the police officer. But then the zombies attack again. They get chased back into the caretaker's room and have to barricade the doors again.

Eventually, Craig, the police officer, is killed while trying to escape and get help. And at the last minute, like the air character seemed doomed until George defeats the zombies. He realizes he can by burning them. It's the only thing that works.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. This this whole sequence is fabulous. Craig, the cop is is so doomed from the moment you start getting to know him because he's like he's like, oh, George, after this, you'll realize not all cops are bad. I'm a good guy. Right. And you're like, oh, this dude is getting his guts eaten by a zombie. Yeah, no doubt about it. Yeah.

So the two interesting things about the zombies that are revealed in this scene. First of all, there is the the ritualistic dabbing of the blood on other bodies to raise them as like zombie, almost like zombie minions that I really liked. And ultimately raises a lot of questions that you cannot answer regarding how zombies work in this picture. But it's very unsettling.

in the moment because it's so unexpected. Also, we quickly learn that these zombies are tool users. While zombies in other pictures might just want to rip and bite at you, they're just going to use their claw and bite attack, these will actively try and hammer you to pieces with a big crucifix. Yes. Oh, and that crucifix will come back in in a minute when the cops arrive on the scene. But anyway, George and Edna escape

And they run off in separate directions. I think Edna is going to maybe try to find Katie or something. And George runs off to destroy the ultrasonic machine at the Lewis farm and

And meanwhile, you think, well, wait a minute though, are all the zombies dealt with? I think all the zombies we knew about have been destroyed. So maybe the nightmare is over, but no, remember Martin? Remember Martin, the guy who had the weird look from earlier, it looks like the rays have powered him up now and he attacks and he eats some cops. Uh,

And then George arrives back at the ag department, guys, and he's explaining what's going on. And they, for some reason, don't believe him. They go like, you talk about the dead walking and cannibalism. It's unscientific, man. And then George says, lots of things are unscientific and they happen just the same. And he grabs a wrench and starts smashing the oscillator on the machine.

Yeah. No, no examples, by the way, of what all these unscientific things that are happening all the time are. I want to know, like, other than the zombies, what does he have in mind? But anyway, back in the scene at the cemetery, the inspector has arrived and he concludes that George is in fact the one who killed officer Craig here and the caretaker and all the zombies. So he's like, okay, this guy is, he's got to be destroyed. Shoot him on sight.

And then he's like, why did they burn the bodies? And there's this new creep hanging out. I don't know where this creep came from, but this guy shows up this late in the movie and he's like, oh, inspector, you need to learn about satanic cults. Yep. Yeah.

So this weird rando shows up to introduce the idea of satanic ritual murder into the inspector's mind. It's like it's a match made in heaven. Well, there is a moment where he's like thinking about it. He's like, oh, you know, I hadn't thought about that. But then instantly he's in like, I bet that's it.

Yeah, I've met this guy, George. He's awful. He's clearly a sex-crazed, drug-using, hippie rebel who hates the police. So it's just one step beyond that to assume that he also worships Satan and is carrying out unspeakable acts for a black mass. It's also... We were talking about this a little off mic. It's fitting and funny that the inspector believes all these things of George, where George doesn't actually...

We never see George do drugs. We never see George have any kind of a sexual interest in anybody like so he's none of these things that he's accused of throughout the picture. He he just is a rebellious jerk. Yeah. No, all he really does is like he's just rude to people. That's his main character trait. Yeah.

As if the film is saying, yes, the youth of today, they do suck, but not for the reasons that guys like this think they suck. It's just because they're selfish and rude and they don't want to be, they want to be off doing their own thing. Yeah, yeah. Not because they're all in satanic cults.

But anyway, so Edna is several other things happen in between here. There's a whole thing where Edna gets attacked by the Martin zombie, but she escapes. She starts to kind of lose her mind. The ag department guys power up the five mile ultrasonic rays. That can't be good because then we cut to the hospital, the Southgate hospital, and we see all these new freezer bodies arriving. Oh, no.

So we know there's going to be a zombie rampage at the hospital. And there is. The police catch George and interrogate him in a hilarious scene where they're telling him, you know, what all the satanic murders he's been doing. And George protests. He says, I've never been to a black mass in my life. Oh, because they find the statue like the antique statue.

that he had in his luggage that he was bringing up here. And they pull it out and they're like, this obviously proves you are involved in satanic cults. And he says, I don't worship that. I just sell things like that. And then he says, it's not my fault, Sarge, that Christ and the saints are out of fashion. Yeah, it's a good scene. I like that his use of these artifacts or having these artifacts on his person, like,

It's come back around to bite him. And now this is evidence being supposed evidence being thrown at him by the authorities here. Also, though, this artifact in no way appears to have anything to do with Satan. I guess it's just because it doesn't look Christian. Maybe. I don't know. Yeah. I mean, I think it it fits with what they're going for here. Like this is a guy who just assumes anything.

that is a little bit foreign or unchristian is just satanic. Clearly, these are occult items, and George is up to bloody business. But the inspector, he has like a rage moment, and he like punches George. He's incredibly mad, and he's complaining to this other guy, the creep who showed up earlier to tell him about satanic cults. He's like, if I just had more of a free hand with these criminals. Yeah.

And meanwhile, George, he escapes out the window and then he runs to the hospital for the final showdown. So you basically know what's going to happen. It's going to be a big zombie showdown with all the characters. And basically all of our main characters get killed by the zombies here. There's a great part where George lights an axe on fire and he's swinging it at the zombies. That's pretty brutal. Yeah.

Uh, and, uh, at one moment you think, Oh, George, is he going to be able to save Edna? But no, he, when he gets her out of the room where the zombies have attacked, she has star shaped pupils now. So it's too late. She's already one of the zombies, uh,

And then in a final brutal twist, George is shot by the police. The inspector guns him down. Yeah, just brutally guns him down, shoots him multiple times. And then he kind of like leans over the body and says something about how he wishes he'd come back to life so he could kill him again in cold blood. So just real, real, real brutal moment. I mean, it's,

I get not unexpected. I mean, this is the mid seventies, but yeah, in the space of just a few minutes, Edna is mauled by her own sister,

And who has become a zombie. She becomes a zombie. And then our last protagonist is just murdered in cold blood. And then we kept it. The only characters who were left are the fascist cops. And so the inspector is like riding around in a car with his sidekick here. And the guy is like, all the papers say you're a hero.

And he says, the inspector says, justice has been a bit slow in these parts. All this permissive rot going on. Maybe people will learn a thing or two from my example here. Yeah.

And so what's going on? Is he going to go into a career in politics now or something? But nope. We then see they drive past another one of the agriculture department machines and the guy comments on it. He's like, oh, they're setting up a new one of those now.

And it's going to, they say it's going to rid all of the apple orchards of pests. I'm just mad about apples. And the cops laugh about this. Oh, apples. But then, of course, you know what's going to happen now that they power up another one of these. The inspector gets to his hotel room in the old Owl Hotel and whines.

Who's there waiting for him but the reanimated ultrasonic corpse of George to get his revenge and the inspector meets his demise and gets his comeuppance. Yeah. So it almost kind of like Tales from the Crypt nasty ending. Yeah. The most awful character in the film survives to the end but then is killed in horrific fashion. Yeah.

And then something that's also quite fitting of eco-horror in general, there's this sense that the threat is far from over. The threat is going to continue to expand. It's still out there, which, you know, isn't just about setting up the possibility for a sequel or something as it

certainly would be in subsequent decades, but just kind of this idea that this is just the starting point and the problem is going to spread and get bigger and bigger. We're going to keep getting zombies and keep getting rage babies. Rage babies and zombies and insects killing. The apples, though, are going to be amazing. We know that much. Though it's funny, I think you could probably come up with a more plausible hard science fiction idea

uh, a film just about what would happen if you literally destroyed every single insect within a five mile radius. So that seems like that would have devastating consequences. Yeah. Like taking out most of your decomposers and, and so forth. Just, just as one example, I mean, it would be dreadful for the environment, dreadful for the apples too.

I'm always pleased when a film like this shows some restraint because this is a film where, yeah, there's some really gory moments. Like the zombie, probably the goriest are the scenes where the zombies eat the cop. And then there's a scene where they tear apart a nurse in the hospital. And those are very gory sequences. But I felt, at least for my taste, they didn't go too far. And likewise, plot-wise,

nobody fights a rage baby. There's not a scene where the rage babies run, run wild. And George has to fight them off with his flaming ax. Uh, there's some other moments in the film too, where I felt like they, they, they showed a little restraint with the premise. Um,

So, yeah, and I think above all, as even though a lot of these plot elements are kind of laughable in retrospect, they are presented with a seriousness and a commitment to filmmaking that makes this probably one of the more entertaining scenes.

zombie films i've seen like i i the night that i watched this i just turned it on just to check out part of it and ended up watching the whole thing yeah i totally agree i thought this was a fairly excellent zombie movie surprisingly compelling action and characters and situation and beautiful looking i i like the the horror design but also just all of the the gorgeous locations yeah

So there you have it. Let Sleeping Corpses Lie, a.k.a. The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue. It's been a cult favorite for years, and I understand why. This one's a lot of fun, so I definitely recommend it to folks who want a bloody good zombie movie.

Now, just a reminder to everyone out there here at Stuff to Blow Your Mind, we're primarily a science podcast and we're pro-science. We don't think science is the enemy trying to turn all our babies into rage babies or anything to that extent.

And our core episodes of Stuff to Blow Your Mind come out on Tuesdays and Thursdays. We do Listener Mail on Mondays, Short Form Artifact or Monster Fact on Wednesdays, and on Friday, we set aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird film here on Weird House Cinema. If you want to see a list of all the movies we've covered in the past, you can go to a couple places for that. I blog about these at SubmutedMusic.com.

And then if you go to Letterboxd, that's L-E-T-T-E-R-B-O-X-D dot com, we have a place where people can create accounts and can essentially blog about movies and add their own reviews to various movies, create lists of movies they want to see or have seen. Well, we have an account there. It's Weird House, and we have a list of all the films that we've looked at on Weird House Cinema thus far, and sometimes we'll have a peek ahead at what's coming along next.

Huge thanks to our audio producer, JJ Posway. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other, if you would like to suggest a topic for the future, or if you'd just like to say hello, you can email us at contact at stuff to blow your mind.com.

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