Weirdhouse Cinema Rewind: Black Lizard (1968)
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Hey, welcome to Weird House Cinema Rewind. This is Rob Lamb, and we have, oh, a fun one. This one originally published 5-31-2024. This is our discussion of the super weird, super stylish 1968 super criminal romp Black Lizard. This is a real gem from weird Japanese cinema.

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. And hey, folks, I said this on yesterday's episode, but I want to say again, if I sound unusual in today's episode, if I sound a little hoarse, it is because I've got a bit of a cold. But a bit of a cold could not stop me from talking about today's movie on Weird House, which is 1968's Black Lizard.

We should have worked it into the picture and said that you sound like you do because a strange woman with demon yellow eyes threw a constricting snake at your neck. Right.

But it's more mundane are the causes here. But yeah, we have yet another cult favorite gem from Japanese cinema today. And it follows the traditions of danger diabolic in that it is another super criminal film full of style, full of visual pizzazz. It's campy. It's bizarre. But also, I think, with a lot of interesting depth as you dig into it.

We're going to be talking about 1968's Black Lizard. Today's film is also notable in that it is entirely centered around a charismatic drag performance. The title character, Black Lizard, or Kuro Takagi, is a stylish female super criminal played in this film by prominent drag performer, really famous and legendary drag performer, Akihiro Miwa.

who we'll have more information about here in a bit. But a true legend, a cultural figure of note. And it's all played out seriously and thoughtfully, never for a giggle and a wink. I've seen descriptions of this film as a comedy. I think the current Internet Movie Database summary, for example,

It says it's a comedy in the summary. And I don't know. I don't think that's 100% accurate. It is a tremendously fun film. It is certainly camp, but it doesn't really seem to play for laughs. But again, it is tremendously fun. Yeah, there are funny things in it. It certainly has an over-the-top sensibility, but...

I would say it plays a lot more as kind of a serious, tragic romance and as a crime thriller, certainly more than as a comedy. I would say it is no more a comedy than Danger Diabolic is a comedy. And also in Diabolic, there are funny scenes and an absurd gratuitousness. They're similar movies in a lot of ways. But neither one really has the moment-to-moment focus on laughs that a comedy usually does. Yeah.

All right. Elevator pitch for this film. I want to approach it two ways. One, I would say it's the forbidden love of a super criminal and an ace detective realized in a stylish 60s counterculture Japanese cinema festival for the eyes. But I also think that there's one line in particular in translation here, of course. We both watched it before.

With subtitles, I don't think a dub exists. And I don't think I would want the dub. I think I would want the subtitles. But there's one great line where our main character, Akechi, the number one detective in Japan, is speaking to Black Lizard, the super criminal, and says, Black Lizard, you are an old-fashioned romanticist.

In this age soiled by corruption and murder, you believe that crime should wear a gorgeous gown with a train 15 feet long, just like the primordial dreams of lizards. Oh, yeah, like those. Yeah, and that's, I mean, if you love that line, you'll love this film. This film perfectly delivers on, like, the glorious poetic weirdness of that statement. All right, now, I wasn't able to find...

what I could 100% feel certain about concerning a trailer, Japanese or otherwise. So what I did find was a trailer that was uploaded by Brooklyn Spectacle Theater, which I've never been to, but it looks amazing. It's a collectively run screening space run by movie loving volunteers.

and they play a lot of just great-looking stuff, including some films that we've covered on Weird House before. Like, just at the time of this recording, I'm like, oh, what are they playing this week at this place? And they were playing Doctor of Doom, which is a wonderful Mexican luchadora film that we've covered in the past. So go check them out. Brooklyn Spectacle Theater. We're going to borrow part of the trailer they uploaded. Again, I'm not sure if this is part of an original trailer, part of a trailer that basically

They made, but either way, it'll give you just a little sonic taste of Black Lizard. I can feel something unusual. Search the dollhouse.

I've never met a detective like you. You're a detective who loves crime and is so romantic about it. I'm only interested in the innocent and kind criminal like the third woman.

All right. Now, if you want to go out and watch Black Lizard before proceeding with the rest of this episode, well, I'm sad to say this one is tragically hard to find right now as of this recording, as of this moment. Despite the film having had an official international and U.S. release, even if a limited one, back in 1969, even though it had subsequent re-releases in Japan and elsewhere,

and abroad over the decades to follow. It might have been released on VHS at one point as Michael Weldon, who loved it, references a tape in his Psychotronic Video Guide book. I'm not sure if he's referring to a legit tape or more of a gray market sort of thing. But yeah, it's a real shame because this is a fabulous film with a cult following. It has cultural significance, historical significance as well, and it deserves to be seen by more film fans in the best quality possible.

If you look around, you can find some sources for it, but I also have to stress that this is the 1968 Black Lizard or Kuro Takagi film, not to be confused with other films titled Black Lizard, including an unrelated Shaw Brothers Hong Kong film titled Black Lizard from 1981, or a 1962 Japanese film titled Black Lizard that is actually an earlier adaptation of the same novel and the same play.

I've seen part of the 62 film, and it's also quite stylish and quite good. I was about like 20 minutes into it before I realized, oh, I have the wrong movie. I need to find, I need to look around a little. I think the 62 one is actually maybe you can stream it through Criterion Collection. So, but it would not be a loss to watch the 62 version. You're going to hit a lot of the same plot points we're hitting here, but we are talking about the 1968 adaptation here today.

Now, when it comes to the 68 version, the director is actually somebody quite familiar on Weird House. That's right. It's Kenji Fukasaku, who lived 1930 through 2003.

He directed 1978's Message from Space. One of the best of the Star Wars ripoffs. Yep, that was one we covered early on on Weird House. And he also directed 1968's The Green Slime, which we covered far more recently. Both very enjoyable films in their own distinct ways.

And also rather different from today's entry. Yes. Now, Fukasako has 68 directorial credits on IMDb. And probably the big one for a lot of listeners, as I've mentioned before, is 2000's Battle Royale, which was a huge late career hit for him.

To the extent that it can, to a casual fan, you might only focus on that. But other films of note include at least the Japanese portions of 1970s Tora Tora Tora. He apparently was brought in after Kurosawa died.

backed out, 1973's Battles Without Honor and Humanity. He directed a number of action, Yakuza and samurai movies, as well as the high-budget 1980s sci-fi film Virus, which featured a host of Japanese and American actors. He also directed the 2002 video game, PlayStation video game, Clock Tower 3, which I think I did play, and in doing so, this was my earliest exposure to Fukasaku's work.

Is that like a horror game? Yeah. If I'm, if it's the one I'm thinking of, there's a lot of like creeping around and trying to avoid, um, like killers, you know, like mass killers that you can't actually directly stand against. So in a way it's kind of a similar vibe to like the alien isolation game that came many, many years later. Um, I don't remember anything about it that where I'm like, oh wow, of course Fukasaku was involved in this, you know?

Anyway, Fukasaka is a director often associated with the Japanese new wave cinema movement of the 60s and 70s. But he was also a big commercial success, highly acclaimed both in Japan and by filmmakers around the world. I've seen the likes of Tarantino, Paul Schrader and others talk about how much they admire his work. All right. Now, in terms of the writing here, there are basically like three levels because the original source for this is a novel.

by Rampo Edogawa, who lived 1894 through 1965. This was the pen name of Japanese author Taro Hirari. Crafted, this pen name, Rampo Edogawa, was apparently crafted to resemble Edgar Allan Poe, or Poe Edgar Allan. So Poe Edgar Allan, Rampo Edogawa. So, and Edgar

Edgar Allan Poe, along with author Conan Doyle and others, were a big influence on Rampo's work. I have to admit, I was really not familiar with Rampo prior to this. I don't know if you'd ever run across a discussion of his work before, Joe. Possibly, but not that I recall. Okay. Yeah, apparently a huge name in the world of Japanese mystery, detective, and horror fiction. Known for such works as The Boy Detectives Club, The Fiend with 20 Faces, and of course, The Black Lizard.

His many short stories include The Caterpillar and The Human Chair. Film and TV adaptations of his work go back as far as, I believe, 1927. And while he did write, I think, just one screenplay, pretty much all

All of the cinematic and TV treatments of his work were adapted by other writers. In the adaptations, I've continued in film and TV and manga and anime. Some of the more famous adaptations include 1969's Blind Beast and Horrors of Malformed Men. So some of these are titles I'm familiar with, but I didn't really know much about the Rampo connection.

and then 2010's Caterpillar. And as previously mentioned, Black Lizard was adapted numerous times as a play, and then two separate adaptations of that play, the 1962 film and this 1968 one. Okay, so that's the original novel, but there's another intermediary literary source, which is the play, which is eventually adapted into the movie. Yes, and the play here was adapted by another writer

rather famous figure in Japanese culture. This is Yukio Mishima, who lived 1925 through 1970. So he wrote the stage adaptation upon which this is based. And there's a lot to potentially unpack here with Yukio Mishima. You could do a whole podcast just on this guy. He's ultimately a very controversial figure.

Mishima was a Japanese author, poet, playwright, actor, and model. He was a highly successful writer. It's said to have fused modern Western trends with traditional Japanese elements, with a general focus on beauty, eroticism, and death. In his private life, and revealed in some of his writings, he was apparently bisexual and often dealt with themes of same-sex love.

He was also a Shintoist and an ultra right-wing nationalist who founded a militia known as the Shield Society. And on November 25th, 1970, this of course is the year of his death, he essentially attempted a coup with four members of the militia, invading a Japanese military base, taking the commandant hostage, and trying to encourage the Japanese self-defense forces to overthrow the government and restore the full rule of the emperor.

Wow. And this attempt culminated in Mishima's own death via seppuku. And yeah, again, he's remained a very controversial figure because of all of this. Though, on the other hand, there's always been a lot of interest in him and his work in and out of Japan. American director Paul Schrader, for example, directed a biopic in 1985 titled Mishima, A Life in Four Chapters, starring Ken Ogata in the lead role.

We were actually chatting about this with our excellent producer, J.J. Possway, off mic before we went in here, because I don't think either of us have seen this particular Paul Schrader film, but J.J. has and said that it's really worth seeing. It's quite excellent. Now, if I'm not mistaken, Mishima appears bodily in Black Lizard as well, doesn't he? That's right. Yeah. Mishima himself was, in addition to all these other things, he was an actor and a model for

He was a noted bodybuilder and has a very memorable non-speaking role in this film. I mean, you could say it's a cameo, but I don't know when a cameo has like this much weight. I don't want to dismiss it as such.

He's the so there is a sequence later in the movie with these frozen human figures. They're sort of described, I think, as stuffed bodies, though there's something almost supernatural implied about the way that they're frozen because they're clearly they're not mannequins. They're human bodies and their human body is just kind of like trembling. You can see them moving a little bit.

And he's one of them, right? He's the one who's like in the middle of a knife fight with another guy. Yeah, yeah. I mean, it's the classic wax museum effect of having people being really still pretending to be models or some sort of preservation of formerly living humans. So it does have that inherent creepiness that we often touch on. But yeah, this is him. It's a very pivotal scene as we'll get to. It's also notable in that, yeah, this can't be...

relegated as a cameo because a lot of times the poster art has Mishima on the poster alongside the star, which generally you don't do with your cameo appearances. Like the detective Akechi, who is in many respects the protagonist of the picture, is not on the poster or not on many of the posters that I was looking at. So,

Yeah, worth keeping in mind. As for Mishima, he has at least some other acting credits, including the 1960 Yakuza film Afraid to Die, in which he starred, and 1966's Patriotism, which he also wrote and co-directed.

All right. And then the screenplay, based on the play, based on the novel, the credit here is Masashige Narusawa, who lived 1925 through 2021, an award-winning screenwriter and director. His films include 1956's Street of Shame, 68's Curse of the Blood. He was active from 1950 through 75, with a final Rambo adaptation airing on TV in 1980.

All right, so that's the director. That's the folks involved in the writing of the picture. But now we have to talk about the true star of this, and that is Akihiro Miwa playing Black Lizard. This is just a fabulous performance. This is one of those performances where Miwa is almost constantly on the screen and is a delight whenever he is on screen. I agree. Miwa makes this movie what it is. Yeah.

So Miwa was born in 1935 and as of this recording is still alive. And it's essential to note that here in this starring role as Black Lizard, the title character, the master criminal, we have one of, if not the most famous Japanese drag performers of the 50s and 60s, if not of all time.

Drag culture does still seem to be going strong in Japan. But yeah, I'm assuming the only Western comparison would be like someone like RuPaul. Like this would be like having RuPaul appear as the title character in your super criminal picture.

Maybe there's a better comparison to be made right in if you've got one. Anyway, Miwa's cabaret career goes back to, I believe, 1952, and he rose to popularity, transcending eventually from stage to film, TV, music, writing, and directing. He put out five albums between 1973 and 1995, all centered around his drag persona. He also became an outspoken voice on political and social issues in Japan.

And he worked his way up to this glorious leading role through often smaller appearances. Sometimes it's like a singer or, you know, background character in a number of films.

And then followed this one up with 1969's Black Rose or Black Rose Mansion, which was also directed by Fukasaku. I haven't seen it, but it's apparently classified as kind of like a dark romantic drama. Now, while there's some additional live action roles after this, Miwa's biggest contributions moving forward after this point are mostly voice roles in animated projects. But boy, do they include some big ones.

He voiced the 300-year-old wolf goddess Moronokimi in Miyazaki's 1997 masterpiece Princess Mononoke. If you've only seen the dubbed version, this would be the character that Gillian Anderson dubs, this big wolf goddess creature. He also voices the Witch of the Waste in Miyazaki's 2004 film Howl's Moving Castle. And for you Pokemon fans out there, he also voiced a Pokemon by the name of

Okay, I'm not sure on this one. Arceus or Arceus? I asked my son about this real quick, and he was like, people might get mad at you. But he was like, they may say Arceus or they may say Arceus, but be prepared to be corrected. So, okay, I am prepared. But anyway, this is like an important Pokemon, like the title Pokemon in the 2009 TV movie, Arceus and the Jewel of Life. Okay.

If people are going to be mad at us, I hope it's about Pokemon. Yeah, I'm always happy to be corrected. But to come back to Black Lizard, Akihiro Miwa is phenomenal in this movie. So much like passion and charisma in this performance. Absolutely. Every scene and also so many costume and hair changes.

This is definitely one of those pictures where we will call out the costume designer because, you know, any new scene with Black Lizard, you're going to get a new costume. You make it an entirely different hair going on as well. It's great. It's also a surprise for like a crime thriller. It is a surprisingly dialogue heavy film. And I think, you know,

that may be based on the fact that it was, uh, this is adapted from a stage play. Um, so there are fewer just straight action scenes than you might imagine. A lot of it's just sort of dialogue and, uh, and, and there is, there are a lot of thrills, but a lot of the thrills are like twists that are revealed through dialogue. Yeah.

That's right. Yeah. So it's talkier than you might expect, but luckily the dialogue is, is often just tremendous. Uh, we already quoted a little of it and it often has that flavor, that weird character to it. And,

And and yeah, and when when we do have punctuations of actual action, it generally is also really weird and jaw dropping. All right. Now it's important to talk about the ace detective. This is Detective Akechi played by Isao Kimura, who lived 1923 through 1981. The interesting thing here is that, yeah, Detective Akechi is in many respects the actual protagonist of the film.

and is essentially Rampo's Sherlock Holmes character, appearing in multiple novels and short stories. So while many viewers may watch this and you just see this sort of, you know, typical noir detective character, you know, a little bit tortured, a little bit jaded, smoking and drinking, trying to solve the crime, maybe falling a little bit in love here and there. So while many viewers might just dismiss that, this character is,

is like the detective figure in Japanese pop culture and was in fact the first recurring detective character in Japanese fiction. So he's a big deal and has been played by numerous actors over the years, including Tadanobu Asano, who of course is the star of Ichi the Killer and also had a really great role in the recent FX adaptation of Shogun. He was in 2005's Rampo Noir.

So Akechi, we are told, is Japan's number one detective. But he also, I don't know, it makes a lot more sense to me knowing that this is a recurring character because there's a sort of prologue in the film that's almost like, well, here I am. I'm in the club now, sucked into this crime. And it makes more sense if this is kind of a character we would recognize. Yeah, and in a way, it kind of gives you more license to let that character out

become secondary because he does have this like iconic place already you know in the same way that you can have a Sherlock Holmes film certainly these days and allow secondary characters to sort of take the forefront yeah totally

So anyway, Kimura here playing the role frequently worked in supporting roles in Akira Kurosawa films, including 54, Seven Samurai and 57 Throne of Blood. Yeah, I think his performance here certainly hits all the world weary noir detective notes that you'd expect.

And I suppose this, in many ways, this helps ground the flashier elements of the picture as well. But he's good. It's a good performance. Yeah. All right. This is all going to center around, in many respects, a damsel in frequent distress. A young woman that Black Lizard tries to kidnap multiple times. Her name is Sane, and she is played by Kiko Matsuka.

And she was born in 1947. She was in a number of 60s and 70s films, including an uncredited role as a diver girl in 1967's Bond film, You Only Live Twice. Her other credits include 1968's The Living Skeleton, Black Rose Mansion, and a Rambo TV series in 1970.

Another important secondary character is the despondent musician Yunichi Amemiya, played by Yusaku Kawazu, who lived 1935 through 2022. This apparently is his best-known role, but his credits include 1961's Killers on Parade, 1993's Godzilla vs. Mechagodzilla 2, and 1998's Gamera 3 Revenge of Iris.

So, I mean, it's a solid performance. This is tragic character in this film, but also props to anyone who was ever in both a Godzilla and a Gamera movie. That's right. Yeah, he this is a very.

sad, pathetic, abject role. And this guy does well with it. Yeah. Yeah. As we'll discuss, like even when he has his moments of seeming bravery, like there's still this wrinkle to them that makes it even more tragic. Yeah. It's all revealed that it's just the ultimate, even more pathetic than you would have thought. Yeah. Yeah.

Let's see, another fun secondary character is private detective Kenichi Matoba, who I guess is, like, he's not the number one detective. Akechi is the number one detective. This is somebody further down the list that has no problem at all with the possibility of making a fool out of Akechi or, you know, coming in to clean up Akechi's mess. You can just see this guy's displeasure with the full knowledge that he is the number four detective. Yeah. Yeah.

He is a rival, stern-faced private detective, played here by award-winning actor Ko Nishimura, who lived 1923 through 1997. Best known for his roles in such Kurosawa films as 1960's The Bad Sleep Well, 61's Yojimbo, 1963's High and Low. And he was also greatly praised and awarded for his starring role in the bear movie Matagi from 1982.

So he was definitely the star of Motagi in 82. But yeah, as for these Kurosawa films, several, some of which I haven't seen and others I haven't seen in a long time. I'm not sure exactly off the top of my head how far up the cast he is in those. But I love his performance here. He's kind of like a Japanese Christopher Lee. Yeah, he's he's very, very stern. Yeah.

Okay, Sané's dad is also important. Iwasa, played by Yun Usami, who lived 1911 through 1981. His credits include 1970s Tora Tora Tora and 1958's The Man in the Moonlight Mask. This is sort of our rich mark, the guy who is targeted by Black Lizard for both the kidnapping of his daughter and the stealing of his precious jewels. Right, and he's rather proud about the fact that he can afford Japan's number one detective title.

So it's a fun, fun role. But he's also like, you know, you're of course you're going to get taken advantage of by super criminals. He also complains immediately about the cost of Japan's number one detective when his daughter is discovered to have been kidnapped. Yeah. Like throw back the blankets on the bed and it's like, oh, it's just a mannequin in there. He's like, you know how much money I paid you to protect her? Yeah.

Yep, yep. We also already alluded to the snake woman with the yellow demon eyes. We'll come back to her. Just not a lot about her, but just to credit the actor, this is Toshiko Kobayashi, who lived 1932 through 2016. There are places on Earth where science and mystery collide, and Skinwalker Ranch is one of the most fascinating examples.

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Oh, okay. So we recently received a listener mail from someone saying, hey, you guys need to single out the costume folks, the costume designers more. Well, this is certainly a movie to do it on. We have so many great costumes, especially for Black Lizard. And the costume designer on this was Masako Watanabe. She's worth singling out in part because, again, the costumes here are amazing. But she's also a notable manga comic writer and artist.

known for such titles that I'm not familiar with as Master of Morley, Jack Riordan's Baby, and Heidi. So if you know more about her and her work, write in and we'll get the full details from you.

Alright, and then finally the music. Oh, we have another huge name here. This is a guy with a number of credits in Japan film-wise, but in general, though, just a musical icon. Isao Tomita, who lived 1932 through 2016.

This is a name that I think is going to register with a number of you, not so much for film, though he does have associations with various films, but this guy was one of the pioneers of electronic music and space music, both in Japan and ultimately internationally as well. Uh-huh.

His work prior to this film included the TV series Mighty Jack, which I believe was featured on Mystery Science Theater 3000. But yeah, the interesting thing is that around the same time of this picture is when, and again, the score for this movie, for Black Lizard, is not particularly, I don't think it's electronic. I think it's very traditional, wouldn't you say? Yeah.

But around the same time as he would have been working on this film, he heard Wendy Carlos's 1968 album switched on Bach for the first time and was reportedly enraptured. I read one account which said basically he's like, give me a ticket to New York and flies to the United States just so he can bring back a Moog synthesizer. He's like, I've got to get my hands on this. He just saw the tremendous potential of

and then started experimenting with synths and goes on to, again, become this pioneer of electronic and space music known for such works as 1972's Electric Samurai, Switched on Rock, which I think was released in the US in 74. 1976's The Planets, which I was listening to while finishing up my notes here. Is that an electronic adaptation of Holst's The Planets?

You know, I'm not sure. I listened to the whole thing and I'm not sure of him. They didn't have Hulse credited on the tracks on Spotify, which may mean nothing. But a number of his works are synth treatments, electronic treatments of pre-existing works. Like I know he did a version of John Williams' Star Wars theme song, for example. Hmm.

Anyway, he's an international legend. You'll find loads of his work wherever you get your music. Again, I don't think we really hear any electronic stylings in the Black Lizard score as I think he flied to acquire his first synth in around 72. But still, it's an amazing connection. So we get like pre-electronic Tomita here. He'd go on to score such films as 2004's The Hidden Blade. And I've read he was apparently Ridley Scott's first pick to score Alien. Would that have worked? I don't know.

But it's an interesting connection. Okay, is it time to talk about the plot? Yeah, let's jump into it. Well, warning, this plot has twists and reveals aplenty. So if you do want to experience the movie without having anything spoiled, I guess you should pause here and go watch it before you listen to this part of the episode.

Now, we open with a kind of prologue before we get into the main caper that will involve most of the movie. There's like a hippie technicolor acid freakout sex party opening. It's like a go-go club. We've seen this in movies.

movies from the 60s before they try to put you right in the middle of a swing-in happen-and-go-go club to get your mind right where it needs to be for the feeling of the movie. And with strong cabaret elements, I think, as well. This is where the counterculture happens. This is where the bohemian vibe is strong. That's right. So it's a feeling of the 60s, a feeling of cultural and sexual energy, but I think also...

Rob, I don't know if you detected the same thing. There's kind of a point of view the camera takes that implies some kind of distance or hesitation, maybe. Like it's celebrating everything that's going on in the club, but it's also a little bit afraid, maybe. It's like this is an alluring, but also a dangerous and confusing frontier of freedom and pleasure. Yeah, as we'll see, there's danger here and there's sadness here as well. In fact, that sort of

point of view of the camera may be the point of view of the character we're about to meet because we go to this man, a lonely looking man sitting at a table overlooking the dance floor in this freak out go-go club and we hear his voiceover. He says, I came here by mere chance. A friend said he would guide me to a secret club. We never see the friend, by the way, do we? No.

He says, this was a world unknown to me until a gaudy crime dragged me into it. And then suddenly everything stops. The action freezes and darkness falls over the go-go club. And then there is somber humming music.

And then we see Black Lizard in three forms. First, the character. So we see Akihiro Miwa in jewels with a cigarette holder. And then the image of a Black Lizard silhouette. And then the title, Black Lizard. Now, I warned there would be spoilers. Technically, the character we are meeting here is not revealed to be Black Lizard, the titular criminal, until a twist that comes later. But technically,

I was in no suspense at all about this. And I wonder if the audience is supposed to be in suspense at all. It seems to me a hundred percent clear from the very first frame of seeing black lizard that, that she is black lizard. I think so. Like from what I watched the 62 adaptation, I felt like it was maybe a little, a little less obvious, uh,

But here it's clear. And part of that may be the fact that, yeah, you have Miwa, this famous individual playing this this title character. And, you know, there are going to be several twists in the film that I think most viewers will see coming a mile away. But it doesn't feel like a limitation in a film like this. A twist may be telegraphed. But what sort of feast will the film make of the twist?

Yeah. So there's a dark, mysterious melody as the credits play. I think this may be Black Lizard singing, actually. I think so. I wasn't sure when I first watched it, but then afterwards when I was diving more into Miwa's musical credentials, yeah, I assume this is his actual singing voice because, yeah, he put out all these albums and so forth. So, yeah, belts out a tune. So Black Lizard, after the credits, Black Lizard navigates the club and comes up to meet the lonely man sitting at the table above.

And Black Lizard says, this is an unusual night, an oppressive night, a night made for crime. I love a night like this. Sleep won't come easily tonight. And you?

So the lonely man tells her he's impressed by her words. He's like, wow, you are a poetess. And Black Lizard says, are you a critic? Because beauty fails to intoxicate you. Your eyes tell me that. And this is a catchy she's talking to. This is the number one detective, right? Yes. But then Black Lizard backs off of a catchy and goes to visit a different man at the bar. She goes up to this

sad looking guy and says thinking of death are you and she then seemingly telekinetically moves his whiskey glass to the edge of the table until it falls and shatters i'm not sure what's going on here but i i like it yeah this is a great weird moment that is important because we we come back to it uh but i guess it's like a it's here as a metaphor or a splash of magical realism because uh

There's nothing else to indicate that this character has any kind of telekinetic powers. I think it's just to convey the charismatic power of the Black Lizard. I don't know, the inevitable trajectory of unobtainable obsessions. The film plays it marvelously vague. But again, it is important because we'll come back to it. Yeah, there's an ambiguous question about the presence of the supernatural in this film. Yeah.

the movie is you know 99 grounded in realism but there are a few things in it that are like wait was that magic or not i can't tell so there's the whiskey glass telekinesis there's the lady with yellow eyes who some the snake lady later who sometimes seems to maybe do magic or i don't know what's going on with her snake eyes uh the statues at the end of the movie which are

people they appear to be frozen in some way that almost suggests magic but it's not clear yeah yeah so there are a few moments like that and it keeps things wild and unpredictable as well anyway the man at the table who was allegedly thinking of death leaves the club with black lizard and then we smash cut to a newspaper headline that tells us a quote despondent young musician has died by suicide and

And then we also see a different article in the newspaper that a corpse was stolen from a medical dissection room at the morgue, right? Yes. Okay. So then Detective Akechi is suddenly there. He is at the morgue looking into it and finds there is a toy black lizard at the scene.

Yeah, peels it right off the floor there. And then also, what is the deal with all these cadavers floating in like a tank of dark green liquid? This is so weird. Yeah, I found this creepy, but I don't know. Like maybe this is actually how it was done at the time. I have no idea. And I have to admit, I was reluctant to go down the ghoulish avenue of researching it. I was kind of like, I don't know. I'm just going to accept it as is. Maybe I'll come back and look into it later.

But at least within the context of the film, this is just where they put recently dead bodies instead of having like freezers, the sort of freezer drawer scene that we're we're accustomed to. Instead, we have the vat scene that we have here. But anyway, OK, so all this is sort of prologue to the main caper of the film, which is the Iwasa kidnapping and the star of Egypt. Right.

I only looked this up just before we came in to record, but the Star of Egypt is an actual diamond. I was reading about it on Christie's. It first appeared on the London market in 1939. There's a listing for it on Christie's. I think it recently sold for several million dollars. So it's a real thing. It's not just a made-up gem.

So we get into Act One here with the main plot, and it is that Detective Akechi has been hired by a rich man named Iwasa to protect his daughter, Sane, who has been threatened with kidnapping. I think they get a they get a note in the mail or something saying that she's going to be kidnapped.

And so they hide out in a hotel room under the supervision of a catchy who intends to set a trap for the would-be kidnappers. That's right. Number one detective in Japan, the most expensive, only the best for this guy's daughter. Now, technically, even though we we said it's clear who Black Lizard is at this point in the plot, Black Lizard is has not been revealed and is in disguise as a woman named Midori Kawa.

And so this is how she's known to Akechi from the club. He knows her as Midori Kawa. And then we go to the hotel lounge where Sine is hanging out. And then also Midori Kawa and a handsome, well-dressed man named Yamakawa are getting to know Sine. They're talking to her in the hotel bar. For some reason, Sine has been permitted to hang out at the bar by herself, even though she's being targeted by kidnappers.

Yeah, yeah, it's weird. It was the same way in the 62 version. So I guess it's straight from the play and or book. Maybe the bar is considered a safe public zone or maybe Midorikawa is just such a longtime trusted client of Dad's that she's perfectly safe as long as she's with her.

But Midori Kawa is being so creepy at Sine. Sine's like, she's like, hey, did you play volleyball in college? I would like to possess your body as a doll. Yeah, she's like, if I told you I had a beautiful body, would you hold it against me if I preserved you in a perfect soulless state? More poetic than that. But yeah, yeah.

Yeah, but Black Lizard is always hitting on folks. Yes. So Midori Kawa and her accomplice, they lure Sine back to a room in the hotel, I think on the promise of showing her like an antique doll. They're like, oh, we have this interesting artifact. And she's like, okay, I'll go look at it.

But of course they kidnap her. They like chloroform her and then stuff her into a trunk. Yeah. And Black Lizard is also like, go ahead and take her clothes off. Yeah. For no particular reason. Well, didn't she, does she change into those clothes? There's kind of an initial fake out that I think maybe initially, uh,

She replaces Sané in Sané's clothes with her back turned to her father. And then they end up replacing her in bed with the very dummy that, you know, would have been the doll in the box originally. That's why it is. Okay. Yeah. But it is also played for, you know, for more alluring purposes here too. So also somewhere in here, Yamakawa is revealed to be Yunichi Amemiya. This was the same guy, the despondent young man at the club earlier, right? Yeah.

Yes. Yeah. This is now Black Lizard's accomplice. And of course, we know Midori Kawa is Black Lizard, but we are to understand that Detective Akechi does not know.

So they pull a clever maneuver. Amemiya takes Sane inside the trunk and boards a train going to some other city while Black Lizard stays at the hotel. And she tricks Iwase into thinking that Sane is totally safe in the hotel room. First, she like throws her voice and poses as her, like pretending to be her from the other room. And I guess Iwase is he's like not.

I don't know. He's not thrown off by the fact that this is not his daughter's voice. Right. Or it's a perfect replica of her voice somehow. I don't know. At any rate, it works. And then she tricks him into thinking that Sene is in her bed in the hotel room. It will later be revealed that it's a huge doll under the blankets.

But he, oh, but Black Lizard has a message delivered stating that Sene will be kidnapped exactly at midnight. So while Iwasa sleeps soundly thinking that Sene is asleep nearby, Akechi stands guard in the living room of the hotel suite, passing the time by hanging out with Black Lizard, not knowing who she is. Mm-hmm.

And this leads to a great dialogue scene where Black Lizard, again, in disguise as Midorikawa and Detective Akechi play cards and talk about crime and love and their, you know, careers and their character. A lot of really fun dialogue here. Just one example is they start talking about like what it takes to make a criminal. And Akechi says, well, consider three women, uh,

A man gives a woman a bouquet of roses. A caterpillar crawls out from between the petals. Disgusted, the woman throws the bouquet into the fireplace. Akechi says, this woman does not have what it takes to be a criminal.

Now consider a second woman. Same thing. She gets the flowers. Caterpillar crawls out of the flower. Instead of throwing the flowers into the fire, she plucks out the caterpillar and throws it alone into the flames. Akechi says she also is not a criminal. But consider a third woman. She sees the caterpillar crawl out of the blossom. She throws neither the flowers nor the insect. Instead, she pushes the man who gave her the flowers into the flames.

Akechi says this woman can be a criminal, but ironically, she is the most tenderhearted of the three. I'd be lying if I said that I 100% understood what the point is here, but I still love it. And I do want to see a line of Black Lizard Valentine's Day cards based on this and other quotes from the film. I think Akechi is making some kind of point about like passion and boldness, that it's like the same thing that

the same thing that makes someone that have the deepest kind of love is also what makes someone the most like violent and dangerous. Okay. So maybe we're getting back into the territory here of, um, uh, you know, of believing that crime should wear a gorgeous gown with a train 15 feet long, both stylistically, but also in terms of passion somehow. Yeah. Yeah. They also talk. So they start playing cards and they, they put a wager up, uh,

Akechi is like, oh, well, you know, you're rich. I can't really bet against you because you've got all this money. And Black Lizard says, well, I'll bet all my jewels, but you have to bet your career as a detective. So I guess if Black Lizard wins the card game, Akechi will no longer get to be Japan's number one detective.

Yeah, this is a great scene. And I love the way it was shot too. They're like playing on a glass countertop, I believe. And so we get some wonderful shots from below up through the card game as it's taking place. And yeah, it's, I believe it's in this scene that we get a lot of contemplation about the idea that Akechi is like the negative photo of a criminal. And in a way, even though Akechi doesn't know that he's playing cards properly,

with the black lizards. Yeah, this is very much a, we're much the same you and I speech that has become a standard trope, but it's constructed in a fresh way. It, it, it has a, a very fresh feeling to it. This, this is better than most. I mean, it,

This comes before things that would make the same point later. I think, you know, this is sort of the same point made in like Manhunter about the Thomas Harris character, Will Graham. It's like that he is able to think like a killer or think like a criminal. And that's what makes him a great detective. And Black Lizard saying the same thing to a catchy here. It's that like in order to be a great detective, you must be able to think like a criminal. Yeah.

Now, is this the place I may be skipping around? I may be thinking about something earlier or later, but there's one part where Black Lizard has an extended monologue anguishing over the fact that beauty must age and that is the ultimate tragedy. And therefore she pines for a soulless existence and the heart made of pure, made as pure and unbreakable as a diamond, both in her in herself, but also in others.

I think, yeah, it might be the scene. Yeah. Either way, the quest for the diamond heart is one of the central themes of the film that we come back to again and again. And this is the scene where Black Lizard and Akechi do seem to be falling in love. Yes. But then remember the thing was supposed to be he's standing guard there until the kidnapping, which is supposed to come at midnight and midnight comes and nothing happens. What gives?

Uh, Sene's absence at this point is revealed. They go in and like pull back the covers on the bed and, oh, it's just a doll in there. But it's a double twist because we find out a catchy new all along. Uh, he lets his men run into the room and he reveals that he knew that Sene had already been taken and he had his men collect the trunk and bring her back.

Yeah. Again, black lizard really does feel like the main character in all of this in part, because we're generally clued into what her plans are far more than a catches like a catchy ultimately ends up being like two steps ahead of even the viewer. And I guess this corresponds to the often observed, uh, soft rule of caper films in that you lay out all the beats of the caper. That's going to ultimately fail, but you reveal the beats of a successful caper, um, in its very real time execution. Uh,

Again, Akechi is essentially Sherlock Holmes here. He is a master, you know, figuring out the criminal scheme and then trying to be ahead of that. And I wonder, too, if that adds to why we might be rooting for Black Lizard, because it's like if you don't know who Akechi is, he's just another detective. But if you know that he's the master detective, then you kind of know the fixes in from the beginning. Like this is an unbeatable adversary for Black Lizard, and therefore maybe we root for her a little bit more.

Yeah. Well, later in the story, they do try to get ahead of that by showing a catchy, like doing something sneaky. And you think that he's being he's being caught getting one over on on Black Lizard and then she gets one over on him. But then there's like a triple twist where it's like, oh, no, he actually was there all along. Yes. Yeah.

But anyway, so Black Lizard escapes this trap by stealing Akechi's gun from his coat pocket, using it to escape the hotel room. And then she gets out of the hotel by disguising herself as a man. Yeah, this is a fun sequence. And I guess really the only nod that we see to me was drag performance, I suppose. Yeah. So on to fight another day.

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So this sort of gives way to act two of the movie. The previous plot, having been foiled, we cut to the home of Iwasa where Black Lizard is determined to strike again. So this middle sequence of the movie involves Black Lizard's second attempt at kidnapping Sine and using the leverage of her kidnapping to acquire the jeweled necklace, the Star of Egypt.

So we meet a large cast of henchmen here hired by Iwasa to protect the family. The gang is commanded by a new private detective, Matoba.

And so there's like a furniture delivery truck that arrives at the house and we see the whole gang run out to like menace them. The delivery guys seem very frightened. But then they decide it's okay. You know, it's a beautiful new futon that Iwasa did apparently actually order. So they bring it inside. They talk about how it cost a bazillion bucks and so forth. And the whole time Matoba is there just looking like he's just a statue. He's great. Just scowling the whole time.

Now, I think at this point we're supposed to believe Akechi has been dismissed from the case, or maybe he actually has been. Yeah, I don't know if he's been completely pushed out, but yeah, Matoba is now seemingly in charge of things. And he seems a little irked that Akechi's even showing up. It's like, no, you failed, dude. I'm top now. But later that night, there is an attack from inside the house.

I think it's Matoba catches Iwasa's housekeeper, Hina, sending secret coded messages to someone via radio. She's like talking into a radio saying like the sea is aflame and stuff like that. But the tables are turned. How exactly is it revealed? Is it that Hina and the big lug henchman guy?

both gang up on Matoba. Yeah, I don't know if Matoba vetted these henchmen, but yeah, it's like they all are in the pocket of Black Lizard, we'll find out. So yeah, everybody's looking, working for Black Lizard here, except for Matoba. And this is the first reveal of Hina's, like,

powers and snake associations. What's the deal with this lady? Oh, I mean, this is again, is it magic? Is it, uh, is it metaphor? Uh, what, what's going on here? I don't know, but it's tremendous because we see, uh, yeah, her eyes glitter, uh, yellow demons fire. Uh, she flings constricting snakes as a weapon, uh,

So we've watched movies with projectile snakes before on the show, namely 1981's Venom, where we get to see Kloskinski struggle with a rubber snake. And it's the kind of thing that can easily look very rubber and fake. But I totally bought her and her snake bolos as a legitimate threat. So she leaps out, cool lighting on her face and eyes, lands this constricting snake right around Matoba's neck.

And the actor Nishimura just sells the living daylights out of it, just thrashing around against the walls, trying to pull the snake off of his throat. Oh, but it doesn't end there, right? Everybody comes out because of the commotion and then they find what they find black lizards calling card here, right? There's the rubber lizard, but it is on the palm of a disembodied hand that is on the couch, which is now bloodied. They're going to have to get rid of that thing. And,

And then they find Matoba in the bathtub, like seemingly dead. I don't know. I can't remember if he still has a snake on his neck or not, but he has a bloody stump. This is clearly his hand out there left on the couch with the calling card on it. But then there's several guys looking in on this scene. And then Matoba rises up out of the tub like a rampaging zombie and comes rushing towards them with the stump and

And they all freak out and slam the door on him as he thrusts his bloody stump out through the door after him. And then he finally busts through into the hallway, slumps against the wall, slumps down and dies. Just a legit jaw-dropping sequence for me. That scene is truly deeply crazy. Yeah.

I don't know. It's really good. Yeah, it's like there's a lot of dialogue, but then when the movie busts out these action sequences like this, it's just they really go for it. But as you mentioned, this is all part of the plot. Of course, the attack gets blood all over the expensive new futon. And in the middle of Sene having been kidnapped again and all that, they're like, oh, wow, well, get this bloody futon out of the house. Yep.

What do you know? And this is, and we know what's up, right? I mean, you can, this is another one of those twists, you know, that they hit her in that couch. Uh, but it, it doesn't matter. Like this, this all plays out like a, like a myth, like a, like a fairy tale and you just follow it. Yeah. So there, uh, is that they're setting up an exchange at the pier. So black lizard promises that Sine will be returned safely. If it was, it gives up the star of Egypt at a drop off point, uh, at the port.

And he does. He shows up with the jewels. But Black Lizard is treacherous and does not return his daughter because it seems like Black Lizard wants Sine even more than she wants the jewels. Yeah, yeah. So she's just going to keep them both. So sorry, you've been double crossed, but Black Lizard gets what Black Lizard wants.

And this leads to a chase with like private detectives in cars and these motorcycle henchmen with smoke screens. These movies of the time really loved a like multicolored smoke screen getaway. That's in Danger Diabolic as well. Yeah, this whole sequence was very Danger Diabolic. But they and this is one of the things we have to note.

They get away, but sort of don't like we have to, again, do all the math of Akechi's scheming and counter scheming versus Black Lizard scheming and counter scheming. The viewer is just along for the ride. So Black Lizard escapes to her steamer ship with both Sine and the jewels. But will Akechi be able to save the day? And here we go to a scene in in Black Lizard's cabin where.

on the boat that is, can you describe this Rob? Yeah. So we know the deal with this futon. This is how they, they just, um, uh, kidnapped her successfully for the second time. Uh, and here's the couch that the futon in black lizards, the chambers, and she begins to realize what we, the viewers suspect that Akechi has hidden himself in that futon.

And so she starts speaking to him in there. She has her gang come in and do straps around the futon so that he can't get out.

And and then she sends the gang back outside and she kind of gets this like this this this tender sequence where she speaks to a catchy imprisoned in the futon. She reveals her love to him as well as her great fear of that love fear for what will change in her because it is all the antithesis of the diamond heart.

You know, it's like if I give in to my love for you, then then I I'm changing in a frightening way and I can't have that, you know, and also you're my enemy. So either way, I'm going to have to kill you. And so that's what she seemingly does. She runs the couch through with a sword from the wall. Blood drips out onto the floor at that up until that point. I wasn't sure I even had anyone in there because that's the thing, you know, a catchy is not in there.

Really, you know, he's a tape recorder or something. But blood comes out and then she has the gang throw the skewered strap sofa overboard into the ocean. We see it like disappearing rapidly into the dark water behind the ship. It's a very evocative shot.

And she's out there on the deck, you know, feeling a bit melancholy by herself. And then a new character emerges who we quickly learn is a trusted hunchback minion of hers. And he kind of like, you know, saunters up onto the deck there. And he apologizes to her for not having been there when all this went down. He says, I was asleep. He offers some comfort. And she's like, that's nice. I appreciate it. But I need some time alone. And.

And of course, this is one of those moments where we're already like, hmm. Yeah. Hmm. About this guy. We're never seeing his face. Like his face is always downturned. Wonder about that. Yeah. So you'll have your suspicions. Those suspicions may prove correct. But again, in this film, it doesn't matter. You're along for the ride. Because if this, if you suspect that this hunchback is actually a catchy, okay, then the question is, when will he dramatically reveal himself? And that's what we're, we're on board for. So.

So we're here at Act 3, where we make it all the way to Black Lizard's fortress of, I don't know, of crimitude. Yeah. So the ship arrives, and Rob, can you describe this place? I would kind of compare it a bit to Scaramanga's lair in The Man with the Golden Gun. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. It is a campy delight that brings that to mind. It brings to mind the various layers of Dr. Fibes, as well as Danger Diabolic. Fibes would very much approve of this because it's essentially a cabaret ballroom where we see the taxidermied or otherwise preserved, you know, the exact science of this doesn't matter, the preserved bodies of the beautiful ones that she's collected on display, these dolls, you

wax figures, however you want to make them. There are all these curtains. We see these often topless figures and

And as always in these films, these are, of course, films, these are, of course, live actors, frozen and still life, which just compounds the creepiness of the situation. So she's like going through here, showing Sine all of these these frozen people. And it's leading up to the explanation that like Sine, I'm going to make you one of my frozen wax dolls here.

Yeah, and we see that one of the main tableaus, because they're all posed in dramatic poses, you know, it's like a wax museum. One of the tableaus concerns a pair of knife fighters with a particularly absolutely jacked combatant, like just, you know, rippling muscles, stabbing his opponent in mid-grapple. The shirtless stabber here is played by Mishima.

And a brief backstory is kind of revealed visually where we it looks like these two men were made to fight to the death for Black Lizard's affections. And I guess both both Victor and the defeated here end up being immortalized as a doll. I didn't know if there was a Victor. It looked like they were both stabbing each other at the same time. Oh, OK. Well, yeah.

in a way, then I guess they both lost and both won because that's the thing. You lose in that you die, but you win to a certain extent in that you are immortalized in Black Lizard's lair. And in this form, without life, without a soul, then you have come as close to the Diamond Heart as possible and therefore are immortalized

deserving of her true affections. Yeah, it seems that men are just sort of like lining up to die for Black Lizard and be preserved as a statue in her lair forever. They're ready for it. Yeah, and women too, I guess. It's like men and women on display. But this is this moment where, again, it's far more than cameo because the jacked stabber played by Mishima here, she moves in and she kisses him on the lips.

And what is, I think, the only kiss that we see in the picture. I could be wrong on that, but it certainly is the most important one. And it's a really powerful moment and a moment that is also very crushing for the musician Amemiya who is watching on because this is what causes him to turn against Black Lizard because he tries to help Sane briefly locking the master criminal in her own cell and

But then we eventually learned that this kiss didn't so much as turn him against Black Lizard. He's not like, oh, I'm really not into you kissing the preserved bodies of dead men. No, it made him turn against Black Lizard because he realized the only way to fulfill his obsession was through death.

A bold action like this, he hopes, will result first in his death and then in his immortalization as one of her dolls. Right. So he's like, now I'm just the unappreciated lackey of Black Lizard. But he realizes that she truly loves her sort of stuffed doll.

statue figures and the only way he can really be loved by her is to make her kill him in punishment for his treachery and turn him into a statue and then he'll be loved by her so that I'm a me a redemption arc enters a very like like even more tragic and weird section because

Because again, for Black Lizard, perfect love is soulless. It's the diamond heart. And the only place she truly knows where to find this is in her dolls as a means of cultivating it as well in herself.

Oh, man. But there are some more twists coming. Now, one of the weirdest choices, I thought, is so Sine and Ememia are both kept in this prison cell. Ememia discloses everything here. He's like, yeah, here's what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to get turned into a statue. Mm-hmm.

And then Sine reveals, I'm not actually Sine. I am a body double. I am a woman named Yoko who was hired by Akechi to pretend to be Sine to keep her safe from Black Lizard.

And I think this is not just for part of the movie. I think this character, the entire film has actually just been this body double named Yoko. I believe so. That's the way I interpret it. Yeah. Yeah.

Also, Yoko, the body double, and Amemiya, they sort of bond over the fact that they are both frauds in some way, and then they fall in love while imprisoned. Yeah, and so then we get the redemption arc more or less back on track.

for our man, uh, MMEA here. But from here, we, we work our way into the big finish. Okay, that hunchback reveal that we saw coming a mile away, it happens. Uh, it is a catchy, it's been a catchy the whole time. The actual hunchback was in the futon and was stabbed through. Uh,

The snake woman goes in for the kill. Okay. Well, also Akechi's men, like the, the fuzz show up there on the scene. I don't know where they came from, but they, you know, backups have arrived. A snake woman goes in for the kill against Akechi, but black lizard stops her and kills snake woman dead. Um,

Black Lizard then retreats into her inner chambers. Akechi follows, he pursues, but when he finds her, she has already taken a fatal poison. And so the two of them lounge together on her couch like lovers sharing a tender moment. And she observes that she has at last found the perfect diamond heart in Akechi because he was able to outsmart her and out double and triple cross her, you know?

And then she dies in this tragic and beautiful Shakespearean moment. And then Amemiya and Sane, or the fake Sane, run off together. They're now a couple. The case is solved.

But we close out with a lot of stylish shots of Black Lizard as the credits roll because it's, you know, we've got to leave everything on a stylish, happy note to a certain extent. I almost took the happy ending for Amemiya and the Sane body double, Yoko, I almost took that as like it was supposed to be funny, the way they're just allowed to run off together. Yeah. Yeah, maybe that is a splash of comedy where it's like, hey, we're both fakes, but we're

but we're in love now. And then, and then they run off together. I'm like, where are you guys going? You're on like a criminal mastermind. I like, you should probably hang around and leave with the police, but I don't know. Well, I thought black lizard was a rollicking good time.

Absolutely. I had high hopes for this film, and it didn't disappoint. I was interested when I read about it in Fukasaku's filmography, when we talked about him previously. And then when I went and rented it at Videodrome here in Atlanta, John, one of the crew there, really talked it up. And again, the film absolutely delivered. Maybe I'm a romanticist, but now I too believe that crime should wear a gorgeous gown with a train 15 feet long, just like the primordial dreams of lizards. Well said.

All right. Well, we're going to go and close it out here. I hope you enjoyed our chat about Black Lizard. And more importantly, I hope you enjoy Black Lizard. I hope you're able to get a hold of it. And I hope that hopefully in the not too distant future, we see an actual like Blu-ray release for this film. It's very deserving of it. And hey, you might be lucky enough to see it at a film festival somewhere. And if you get the chance, make sure you do it.

Reminder that Stuff to Blow Your Mind is primarily a science and culture podcast with core episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays. But we do listener mail on Mondays, short form episodes on Wednesdays. And on Fridays, we set aside most serious concerns to just talk about a weird film on Weird House Cinema. If you want to see a complete list of all the movies we've covered thus far and sometimes a peek ahead at what's to come, go to Letterboxd.com. It's L-E-T-T-E-R-B-O-X-D.com. Our username is Weird House. And we've got a wonderful list there that you can peruse.

and see what might be up your alley and what you want to add to your own to-watch list. Huge thanks, as always, to our excellent audio producer, J.J. Posway. If you would like to get in touch with us with feedback on this episode or any other to suggest a topic for the future or just to say hello, you can email us at contact at stufftoblowyourmind.com.

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