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TMR 054 – Kung Fu Cult Master

Release Date: 01/18/2021

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, we go to the suck. Steve develops a thousand yard stare reserved for veterans of nightmare wars and mediocre podcasts. Ryan chalks up another point in the Irresponsible Father column, reflecting on his father’s prudent decision to let him watch this vision of insanity at a tender age yet again. If you listen to this episode, you can go to my house and fornicate with my sister. Full Metal Jacket (1987) d. w. based on his novel Starring: as as as as as as as Stanley Kubrick's take on the Vietnam War follows smart-aleck Private Davis,...

TMR 065 – Harold and Maude

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, we watch the first Manic Pixie Dream Girl ever on screen, who is not a girl at all, but is most decidedly a woman. It’s the perfect post-2020 movie, and not just because of the constant suicides. It’s twee and precious and we absolutely loved it. Harold & Maude (1971) d. w. Music by: Starring: Cult classic pairs Cort as a dead-pan disillusioned 20-year-old obsessed with suicide and a loveable Gordon as a fun-loving 80-year-old eccentric. They meet at a funeral, and develop a taboo romantic relationship, in which they explore the tired...

TMR 064 – The Neverending Story

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, we learn that while some stories never end, mothers do, and that’s the beginning of how a serial killer is made in this unflinching look inside the mind of one disturbed little boy. Hang in there with us, listen to this, and watch it again and try to tell us you didn’t witness a psychotic break as this poor boy retreats inside the dark fantasies of his mind. The Neverending Story (1984) d. w. , Music by Starring: as Atreyu as Bastian as The Childlike Empress as Teeny Weeny On his way to school, Bastian ducks into a bookstore to...

TMR 063 – Wild Things

Total Movie Recall

Ah, the good ole days of passing around R rated spank tapes. This movie is so trashy, it gave Charlie Sheen HIV. (1998) d. Starring: When teen debutante Kelly fails to attract the attention of her hunky guidance counselor, Sam, she cries rape, igniting a scandal that results in his arrest. Sam appeals to Ken, a hack personal-injury lawyer who has never handled a case that couldn't be helped by a prop neck brace. Soon, a second victim, Suzie, comes forward, and Detective Duquette discovers that the unfolding case is far from what it seems. Things discussed in the...

TMR 062 – From Dusk Till Dawn

Total Movie Recall

Remember the innocent 90s, when white directors thought they had the N-word pass for some reason? What do you think their “woke” movie would look like? Probably like this, where the N-word is replaced by horrific rape and Mexican jokes. This proto-edgelord movie was looked at as such a good time romp that it was considered the perfect vehicle to transition from the hit network show ER to the big screen. What a simpler time… From Dusk Till Dawn (1996) d. w. (story), (screenplay) Starring: On the run from a bank robbery that left several police officers...

TMR 061 – Napoleon Dynamite

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, we try to decide whether this is a charming, unique film about staying true to yourself, or a nightmarish descent into the insanity that comes with living in a barren, desolate landscape like rural Idaho, where the Uncle Ricos of the world keep subterranean dungeons for unsuspecting Debs. This might say more about where our heads are at right now than about this beloved comedy. Napoleon Dynamite (2004) d. w. , Starring: In small-town Preston, Idaho, awkward teen Napoleon Dynamite has trouble fitting in. After his grandmother is injured in...

TMR 060 – Dolemite

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, these two born-insecure honkies break down the seminal Blaxploitation movie of 1975 and do a pathetic job of trying to reconcile its progressive vision of black empowerment with the misogyny of the pimp game. It gets complicated. Dolemite (1975) d. Story by: Starring: Dolemite is released from jail after being wrongfully convicted to take on rival pimp Willie Green, corrupt police officers who framed him and even the mayor! With the help of his friends: Queen Bee (the madame of his brothel), Creeper (the heroin addict Hamburger Pimp), Reverend...

TMR 059 – Who Framed Roger Rabbit

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, things get Freudian as they did for every little boy who stared confusedly at Jessica Rabbit and wondered what was happening to them. Handsome, chiseled leading man Bob Hoskins soldiers on in spite of the bleeding ulcer all that booze gave him, and Christopher Lloyd goes to eleven with his unhinged, terrifying performance. Did hentai exist before this movie? Because it sure as hell did after it. Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988) d. Starring: Down-on-his-luck private eye Eddie Valiant gets hired by cartoon producer R.K. Maroon to investigate...

TMR 058 – The Princess Bride

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, we take a hard pivot from all the toxic masculinity of weeks past and Steve shows his gentle, romantic side. Somehow, Ryan makes this about his sad sack heartache but in the end, everybody calms down and moves on with a nice mutton, lettuce, and tomato sandwich. The Princess Bride (1987) d. w. Starring: A fairy tale adventure about a beautiful young woman and her one true love. He must find her after a long separation and save her. They must battle the evils of the mythical kingdom of Florin to be reunited with each other. Based on the...

TMR 057 – Heat

Total Movie Recall

This week on Total Movie Recall, Ryan stares out the window of his furniture-less modernist home at the endless, uncaring ocean while Steve sleeps on the floor with his hand gripped around his pistol. The pseudo-philosophy of this movie seems deeper than it is because it’s endlessly reflected in all the glass buildings of Michael Mann’s uber-masculine vision. Sure, it may be pretentious, but that’s the point, and if you’ve got a problem with that, I will take you down, because we ain’t exactly doin’ thrill-seeker podcasts with “Born to Lose” tattoos on our chests. (1995) d....

More Episodes

This week on Total Movie Recall, Steve and Ryan discover that there’s actually an antidote to getting punched really, really hard. The cultural divide proves too much for Ryan in this wild, fantastic, hallucinatory Kung Fu epic of many names. The story is incomprehensible, the fights are nonsensical, but Steve still finds it defensible, while Ryan finds the editing reprehensible. There’s no reason for this rhyme.

Kung Fu Cult Master (1993)

d. Jing Wong, Sammo Kam-Bo Hung

Starring:
Jet Li
Man Cheung
Chingmy Yau

Set during the Yuen Dynasty, many sects compete for possession of the two golden swords which contain the secret to dominance of the world of martial arts. The first faction, led by Shaolin, consists of Shaolin, Wu Tang, Ngo Mai, Kun Lun, Hung Tung and Wah Shan. The second is the Ming Sect, otherwise known as the Fire Sect or Evil Sect, led by branch leaders Queen of Purple Dragon, King of White Eagle, King of Gold Lion and King of Green Bat. A student of Wu Tang, befriends Gold Lion and marries the daughter of White Eagle. He is killed for the secret of the location of the missing sword. His infant son witnesses this and vows revenge on the heads of the sect. Unfortunately he has a jinx which prevents him from learning martial arts.
Brian Rawnsley <[email protected]>

Things discussed in the show:

Tom Clancy & Jack Ryan vs World War 3

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan (Carlton Cuse, Graham Roland, John Krasinski, Wendell Pierce, John Hoogenakker)

Wargames (John Badham, Matthew Broderick, Ally Sheedy, John Wood)

Breakfast Club (John Hughes, Emilio Estevez, Judd Nelson, Molly Ringwald, Paul Gleason, Anthony Michael Hall, Ally Sheedy)

The Night Porter (Liliana Cavani, Dirk Bogarde, Cha r lotte Rampling, Philippe Leroy)

Deutchland 83 (Anna Winger, Jörg Winger, Jonas Nay, Maria Schrader, Ulrich Noethen)

Operation Able Archer

Wind of Change podcast (Patrick Radden Keefe, The Scorpions)

Wong Kar-wai

Raise the Red Lantern (Yimou Zhang, Li Gong, Jingwu Ma, Saifei He)

The Great Wall (Yimou Zhang, Matt Damon, Tian Jing, Willem Dafoe)

American Factory (documentary, Steven Bognar, Julia Reichert, Junming 'Jimmy' Wang, Robert Allen, Sherrod Brown)

The Queen's Gambit (Scott Frank, Allan Scott, Anya Taylor-Joy, Chloe Pirrie, Bill Camp)

The Thomas Crown Affair 1968 (Norman Jewison, Steve McQueen, Faye Dunaway, Paul Burke)

Casino Royale (Texas Holdem, Martin Campbell, Da n iel Craig, Eva Green, Judi Dench)

Get Shorty (Barry Sonnenfeld, Elmore Leonard (novel), Scott Frank (screenplay), Gene Hackman, Rene Russo, Danny DeVito)

The Lookout (Scott Frank, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Jeff Daniels, Matthew Goode)

Minority Report (Steven Spielberg, Philip K. Dick (short story), Sco t t Frank (screenplay), Tom Cruise, Colin Farrell, Samantha Morton)

A Walk Among the Tombstones (Scott Frank, Liam Neeson, Dan Stevens, David Harbour)

Godless (Jack O'Connell, Michelle Dockery, Scoot McNairy, Scott Frank)

Auteur Cinema

The Witch (Robert Eggers, Anya Taylor-Joy, Ralph Ineson, Kate Dickie)

Emma (Autumn de Wilde, Eleanor Catton (screenplay by), Jane Austen (based on the novel by), Anya Taylor-Joy, Johnny Flynn, Mia Goth)

The New Mutants (Josh Boone, Maisie Williams, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Heaton)

Love Actually (Richard Curtis, Hugh Grant, Martine McCutcheon, Liam Neeson, Thomas Brodie-Sangster)

The Maze Runner (Wes Ball, Dylan O'Brien, Kaya Scodelario, Will Poulter, Thomas Brodie-Sangster)

Leonard DiCaprio & Liam Hemsworth

The Vow (NXIVM, Anthony Am e s, Sarah Edmondson, Bon n ie Piesse, Mark Vicente)

Leah Remini: Scientology and the Aftermath (Leah Remini, Mike Rinder, Mary Kahn)

The Raid Redemption (Gareth Evans, Iko U w ais, Ananda George, Ray Sahetapy)

Kung Fu (NES video game)

Double Dragon (video game)

The Night Comes For Us (Timo Tjahjanto, Joe Taslim, Iko Uwais, Julie Estelle)

The Raid 2 (Gareth Evans, Iko Uwais, Yayan Ruhian, Arifin Putra)

Apostle (Dan Stevens, Richard Elfyn, Paul Higgins)

Lovecraftian horror / Folk horror

Gangs of London (Gareth Evans, Matt Flannery, Ray Panthaki, Joe Cole, Lucian Msamati)

Gangs of New York (Martin Scorsese, Leonardo DiCaprio, Cameron Diaz, Daniel Day-Lewis, John C. Reilly, Liam Neeson)

Peaky Blinders (Steven Knight, Cillian Murphy, Paul Anderson, Helen McCrory)

The Warriors (Walter Hill, Michael Beck, James Remar, Dorsey Wright)

The Heaven Sword and Dragon Sabre

The Shaw Brothers & Hong Kong Cinema

Wu Tang Mountain

Takashi Miike

CINEphile Video Archive in Los Angeles (Shoutout to Paul!)

Ghost Spy (Image Comics, Steve Albertson, Jacob Elijah aka Oh Oozi, Puppy Grenade)

Tai Chi Master (Woo-Ping Yuen, Jet Li, Michelle Yeoh, Siu-Ho Chin)

Once Upon a Time in China (Hark Tsui, Jet Li, Rosamund Kwan, Biao Yuen)

Dragon Ball Z (

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