Growing up in Australia, I believe I have to thank MAD Magazine for introducing me to words like "schmuck," "schtick," and "schlep."

I love Taxi and I'm glad Judd Hirsch came off as a good interviewee here. Because he didn't come off at all well in the official guide to the show, Frank Lovece and Jules Franco’s Hailing Taxi. (Long story short: the authors interviewed the cast, except Andy Kaufman who had died by that point, and while everybody else…

Cronenberg's cameo as the snide scientist was the only goof thing about Jason X. His brief appearance makes the first 2 minutes of the film worth watching.

I love Cronenberg's commentaries/interviews. His voice is so calm and collected and genteel that he could talk crap and I'd be impressed. Of course he doesn't talk crap. Cronenberg and Werner Herzog have some amazing voices going.

…what about a trendo redo of The Clash song, "The Equaliser"?

Tony Scott was capable of being more than merely competent, when he had a good script to work with (The Last Boy Scout, True Romance), but more often than not, he filmed from dreck screenplays, and the results sucked accordingly.

He also had a supporting role in the 1982 Costa-Gavras film, Missing. I didn't recognise Szarabajka at first, because I'm used to him being all rough and grizzled. In Missing he's boyish and bouffy-haired. Kinda Spader-ish, in fact. (Young Spader, not latterday porcine Spader.)

It's a little strange that, over the last decade, guys like Denzel Washington and Liam Neeson have gone from Oscar-baity stuff to slumming in dour action movies. Makes me wonder if there's a parallel universe out there in which Daniel Day-Lewis plays an unstoppable killing machine at least once a year.

I've just realised - I think I've avoided watching Denzel Washington movies ever since I read Bronson's Pinchot's Random Roles interview.

That's a good point. I daresay Schrader would be more high-profile if he alternated his pet projects with more work-for-hire studio product. Could be that he's become even more wary of dealing with American studios after he was dicked around by Morgan Creek over the Exorcist prequel. It seems like that film was the…

I think Blue Collar, Mishima, Affliction, and Auto Focus are fantastic. Patty Hearst was an intriguing misfire, and although I totally get why Cat People was criticised for being a slick, excessively-stylized philistine remake, it's got way too much going on to be dismissed (Nastassja Kinski in her slinky prime,…

Would I be right in thinking that Paul Schrader is a) generally underrated as a director, because b) he'll always be regarded foremost as a scriptwriter for Scorsese films rather than a director in his own right? I've seen most of Schrader's directorial efforts, and in my opinion they range from exceptionally good, to…

*puts nerd hat on*

I like how the particular Poltergeist scene you've cited involved Return of the Living Dead alum James Karen. It's all a rich tapestry!

1985 was an excellent year for horror films. In addition to Freddy's Revenge (not widely loved, but my favourite of the Elm Street films) and The Return of the Living Dead, we got Re-Animator, Fright Night, Day of the Dead, Cat's Eye…

I'm guessing it probably was A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge, as both it and The Return of the Living Dead were released in 1985. And if those were the two films you saw that time, then buddy, you had yourself a Clu Gulager double-feature!

I'm re-hashing a comment I made in a previous thread about The Return of the Living Dead: one of the things that makes it a great movie is the way it treats its middle-aged characters. If you look at almost every other 80s horror movie marketed for young people, slasher films and the like, the adults are usually…

…and he fathered Lloyd Dobler's girlfriend!

I can't listen to "Atlantis" without thinking of Billy Batts getting the shit stomped out of him.

After Action Jackson, Carl Weathers starred in another cheesy action film, Hurricane Smith. It's pretty fucking awful. Carl plays a blue-collar guy from the Texas oilfields who visits Australia in search of his missing sister, and he ends up battling evil drug-smugglers. Jürgen Prochnow is the villain, and Cassandra…