Welcome to Show #14!
Summer, Joe and David sink their tsais into the 1980 campy cult classic Flash Gordon, starring Sam J. Jones, Melody Anderson, Max von Sydow, Timothy Dalton, and Brian Blessed. The cheese factor is strong with this one.
You can't take this movie too seriously, and you can't completely dismiss it either. It also made them want to dig into the backs of their closets just to make sure that any remaining photos of themselves with big hair and parachute pants were safely burned.
The Ninjas also talk a little about the original Flash Gordon serials, starring Buster Crabbe, and Summer shares what she knows about a kick-ass Flash Gordon novel that was commissioned, but may never see the light of day because of legal wranglings, and perhaps for being too damned good.
If anyone wants to watch some of the public domain Flash Gordon serials, go check out Public Domain Torrents list of old scifi shows.
thumbnail image courtesy of the Richard Amsel website
Movies mentioned:
Promo: Geek Fu Action Grip
Promo: Silent Universe
Link: SF Site: A Conversation with Matthew Woodring Stover (part 2)
Link: SFFWorld Free Flash Gordon! call for petition (petition no longer active)
Link: SFFWorld Questions for Matt Stover (see post #168)
Always nice to have a new KAMN...
Another great show. Have to agree with Joe in that I find the old Buster Crabbe FG series unwatchable these days, although I enjoyed them as a kid, the BBC used to put them on over school holidays. Still remember laughing at my mother as she told me that as a child in the 1940s she used to watch FG at the cinema and found the claymen terrifying...how things change..
A few months ago, I downloaded about ten of those old Flash Gordon serials. While I generally like the rocketships (I'm a geek taht way) the stories are typical serial - lots of running about and fighting, but nothing of substance ever happens.
Listening to your discussion about the most recent Flash Gordon brought back many memories of this film, which I haven't seen in years. Thanks again for a great 'cast!
Love that movie, have it on dvd as well as vhs. Check out this site, http://www.ornellamuti.it/
Pathetic Earthlings... Who Can Save You Now?
Enjoyed the podcast (Flash - a-ah - saviour of the universe) but a question for Mr Moldawer: so at -5:14 minutes to the end of the podast you wondered if "Flash" might have been better received if it had come out before "Star Wars"; if it had come out "A year before Star Wars when "Battlestar Galactica" was on television".
So in your timeline BSG _predates_ "Star Wars"
?
Haha! Krull...Close your eyes and it sounds like Star Trek 3.
Oh, yeah. Princess Aurora was Sylvester Stallone's wife in Oscar. I remember watching it and yelling out "Its Princess Aurora!!" when I first saw it.
Jeremy, I have indeed watched Krull more than a few times, and giggled at the high cheese factor.
While I came to have a grudging appreciation of this Flash Gordon, I don't think I'll ever be tempted to watch it again
Great show guys! Joe I agree while Flash Gordon was pretty darn campy the Adam West Batman movie was well beyond it camp-wise. (and yes you all SHOULD do a show on the campy Batman)
Great ep, but man the sound was strange.
Ninjas,
Great episode, but one correction: The Dune soundtrack was done by Klaus Schulze of Tangerine Dream.
Did you mention the Flash drinking game...? I might have missed that if so. Anyway, the rules are simple: drink everytime someone says (or sings) "Flash!" Be sure you have nothing to do the next day...
Agreed, great show. I will never again use the "it's so bad, it's good" line when referring to Flash Gordon. "Hail Ming!"
Did someone mention Megaforce during the episode? LOL Ah, the chessy romance, the bad puns, the armored RVs, and the rainbow-colored smoke screen... LOL
The lead song from Flash got a 7" release in the UK. I bought it and listened to it many times. It used some great vocal samples including "this is from memory";
"Fire all weapons. (pause). Despatch Warlock and Ajax, and bring back his body!".
Not only was the set design spectacular, the costume design was fantastic! To me, it yet another example of how science fiction films are routinely ignored for costume design Oscars.