407. The Killer Shrews (1959)

A solid episode. The movie has some really dull spots, but J and TB soldier through. I grew up in the late 70’s , early 80’s and Dukes of Hazzard was my favorite show. So, James Best saves this one for me!

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Hey Bruce, can we do 912- The Screaming Skull? I have some fond memories of that one!

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I do have to say that I kinda like the ending escape, even if it does seem kinda silly looking.

Also, in case people didn’t know…nearly 50 years later there was a sequel, and they got James Best back.

Wonder if Season 14 would think about tackling this…

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To me Giant Gila Monster is objectively a better movie – in that it’s not just four or five unpleasant people trapped and drinking in one room together – except for that G***AMNED SONG. When I watch that episode I fast-forward over the sing whenever I sing whenever I sing so (a) I don’t have to hear it and (b) it doesn’t become, god forbid, that day’s ear worm.

So if I were trapped in a box with just one episode to watch and I had to pick between GGM and Killer Shrews, it would be the shrews every time.

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Heh, with this movie, I was going to say “You’re going to have to be more specific” until I read on and figured out which one you meant.

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YOU BURIED THE LEDE

screenshot of preview showing a credit for John Schneider

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Can we fine them for killing the one Black guy again?!

Also, I predict that “Whuut’s hapenning?” will become the That’s absolutely fascinating for a new generation of easily amused slackers.

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Only if he didn’t become to this movie was Busta Rhymes was to Halloween Resurrection had he lived.

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And I’d take the song over Goude’s brain-breakingly terrible diction any day of the week. :person_shrugging:

It’s funny that both movies have a colorless love interest who’s only a foreigner with an accent because some lazy writer or casting person thought that would magically create an actual personality out of nothing. But the French Cipher is still way easier to understand.

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Gila’s foreign lady was at least willing to put her life on the line with Chase during the ending moments of the movie when she didn’t have to. Shrews’ foreign lady was just going through the motions.

Also, Gila’s was noble enough to use her own money for the leg braces for the little girl.

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Chase IS a looker and also not drinking like a fish throughout. By bad movie standards, that makes him worth the risk of explosion in my book. :wink: Of course, after five years at that cushy oil rig job, who knows? :confused:

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Yes I will @Satoris720. I’ve been asked by the mods to post one of these per day. Warrior of The Lost World (1984) just dropped 15 minutes ago. I’ll write that one next and release it into the wild tomorrow at about this same time. If that’s good with everybody. I’ll go watch The Screaming Skull (1958) now to refresh myself.

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It has nothing on The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up Zombies. I get about one out of every three words in that one.

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Ooh… yeah, now that you mention it, that may have Shrews beat.

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Killer Shrews is absolutely a dragging, plodding, uneventful fishbowl movie. I think the only other movie I’ve ever seen with less to it is Hitchcock’s “The Rope” where the entire movie takes place in one living room of a studio apartment (and yeah they drink sometimes) with no external shots, no ‘action’, and nothing but dialog, dialog, dialog. Killer Shrew at least has a few external shots and multiple rooms … even if it ultimately is a lot cornier.

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I love Rope (1948) personally. It is a flick from another time and is essentially a play composed of ten minute unbroken takes that are hard to pull off using the HUGE color cameras back then. It goes against the norms of editing even in the 40s. It is closer to an experiment than a movie yet Rope succeeds in its sophistication, acting, and sly writing on a taboo subject. Rope improves as you return to it and I catch myself enjoying it more as the years pass.

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It’s also a dramatization of the famous Leopold and Loeb murder case, which makes it more interesting to me.

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Seconded. The dramatization sings to those who are game. Where I wrestle is whether James Stewart is inspired casting or miscasting. In my youth, I favored the latter. In my 30s, I started to rethink my reservations. Stewart’s ongoing screen image does clash with his turn here.

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Oh - there is no question that The Rope is the better MOVIE by orders of magnitude. I was only comparing it to Killer Shrew by the standard of “fishbowl” movies where all the action takes place in a very limited setting. Of all the movies I’ve ever seen, The Rope is the most limited in setting. Killer Shrew is also pretty limited, but has more than The Rope. But in terms of quality The Rope and Killer Shrew are definitely not in the same league.

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Fishbowl movie is a term I hadn’t heard before. I read you at first and interpreted it as barren as a fishbowl not a kind of film where minimalism stands out. Lifeboat (1944), Rope (1948), Rear Window (1954), The Birds (1963). Hitchcock loved a challenge and overcoming an obstacle and restriction appealed to his meticulous nature. Rope absolutely is the better picture. You’re on the money Rope is confined to one apartment not a whole island. By that test, Lifeboat is even more cramped than Rope.

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