‘Tremors’ with co-star Charlotte Stewart

Film: ‘Tremors (1990)
Rated: PG-13
Directed by: Ron Underwood
Written by: S. S. Wilson, Brent Maddock
Starring: Kevin Bacon as Val McKee
                   Fred Wardas Earl Bassett
                   Michael Grossas Burt Gummer
                   Reba McEntire as Heather Gummer
                   Charlotte Stewartas Nancy Sterngood

By Action Flick Chick

Pre-screening memories:  I love, love, loved Tremors as a little kid. It had everything a girl could want in a movie: big monsters eating people and then people turning the tides and blowing up the monsters. Awesome! It did scare me just a tiny bit… enough that if I had to go outside I would make sure to run to the destination and get off the ground as soon as I could. I didn’t reallybelieve that Graboids existed but I wasn’t going to take any chances… y’know, just in case.

New Memories: Tremorsholds up very well over time. Partly because they didn’t use all that CGI back then and partly because the acting is all so good. I mean, I really believe all the actors in this film. There is not one person who you think, “Hmm, that person’s not so great.” Even the kids who populate Perfection are good. And, since the Graboids were man-made and not CGI, they look great even today, and not cheesy or outdated. So, after watching Tremors again, I still love this movie. This is hands-down my favorite movie to watch over and over and over again.

(Ed. note: We would like to welcome Action Flick Chick to the podcast and look forward to future contributions from this intrepid blogger as she recalls films that made her the action-lovin’ gal she is today.)

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Download the ‘Tremors’ with Charlotte Stewart podcast

Or dig a little deeper and listen to it right here:

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Our featured guest: Charlotte Stewart

During the course of the Tremorsfilm trilogy, Charlotte went from mousy mommy to a Graboid-killin’ machine who saves the day. Charlotte’s career also mirrored this spectrum, playing the schoolmarm Ms. Beadle on Little House on the Prairie for five years while also playing mother to a mutated, reptilian-like “skinned goat” in the cult classic David Lynch film, Eraserhead.

She would again work with the director in his series  Twin Peaks and continued to act in both film and television.

Charlotte also hung with such musical icons as Joni Mitchell, Neil Young and Jim Morrison back in the day. Does she hide some heretofore unexplored musical talent? You’ll just have to hear the podcast to find out…

It may be under construction right now, but you can check out some exciting things at Charlotte’s site, LiquidButterfly.com, where she will features some of her own fashionable creations (with proceeds going to fight breast cancer).

Thank you,Charlotte, from the gang here at Natsukashi, for heading back to Perfection with us for gabbin’ about Graboids.

‘Twin Peaks’ Pilot and ‘Fire Walk with Me’

Welcome to a special, epic two-part magnum opus where we look at the bookended films that encapsulated the ‘Twin Peaks’ phenomenon of the early 1990s, beginning with the two-hour pilot episode and concluding with the oft-maligned theaterical release ‘Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me.’

Film: Twin Peaks (Pilot) (1990) and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me (1992)
Rated: (Fire Walk with Me) R
Directed by: David Lynch
Written by: David Lynch and Mark Frost

Starring: Kyle MacLachlin as Special Agent Dale Cooper
              Michael Ontkean as Sheriff Harry S. Truman
              Dana Ashbrook as Bobby Briggs
              Lara Flynn Boyle as Donna Hayward (played by Moira Kelly in FWWM)
              Madchen Amick as Shelly Johnson
              Sheryl Lee as Laura Palmer/Madeline Ferguson
              Ray Wise as LeLand Palmer

By Joe Campanella of Cinema-Fist

Pre-screeening memories: Growing up I was exposed to many different kinds of films. You see, I had a brother who was 14 years older than me, so naturally I’d pick up on a few things most 10-year-olds didn’t.

While the kids at school were telling me how great Home Alone was, I was raving about Barton Fink. My God, I was pretentious even back then?

As a kid I remember my brother being obsessed with this show because someone named David Lynch was at the helm. (Having grown up and seen most of Lynch’s work I now know why.) Every week, my brother would put on the TV and watch another episode of this odd show about the murder of someone named Laura Palmer.

To be honest, I really didn’t remember much from this show, other than this…

…which made me, at the time, very scared of couches (my brother would often recreate this scene in our living room, throughly freaking me out).

The other thing I remembered quite vividly was Cooper’s dream…

 

…which also frightened me immensely.

Was Joe still having horrific nighmares of The Log Lady, Bob, Laura Palmer, dopplegangers and the Little Person who was actually a disembodied left arm (yes, it’s all as strange as it sounds) ? You can find out about he pilot episode of Twin Peaks here (or listen below),

as Joe and Rob talk about the pilot and the subsequent mania that was Twin Peaks. Then head over to:

 Part II: Where Joe and Rob conclude their visit to Twin Peaks with a look back to Fire Walk with Me.