Strange things occur as a tiny California coastal town prepares to commemorate its centennial. Inanimate objects spring eerily to life. The Reverand Malone (Hal Holbrook) stumbles upon a dark secret regarding the town’s founding. A radio announcer, Stevie Wayne (Adrienne Barbeau), witnesses a mystical fire. A hitchhiker (Jamie Lee Curtis) discovers the mutilated corpse of a fisherman. Accompanying these occurrences is a mysterious, iridescent fog that descends upon the village. Soon, people die.
Happy Carpenter Christmas to us all. The Fog (1980) is a keeper. This one is steeped in nostalgia for both David and me and, though it has flaws, it is a lushly shot mood piece that remains suspenseful even today. Join us as we discuss the reasons Carpenter was so good in his early days and speculate why his brilliance has dissipated with more current films. Listen, as Johnny Has the Keys prepares to celebrate the forty-two-year-old classic for the holidays, hopefully avoiding angry wronged ghosts (or the director himself) seeking vengeance.
SHOW NOTES:
- The Fog (1980)
- Original trailer
- John Carpenter
- Debra Hill
- Dean Cundey
- Halloween (1978)
- The Thing from Another World (1951)
- The Shining (1980)
- The Blob (1958)
- 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (1954)
- Jaws (1975)
- Salem’s Lot (1979)
- Night of the Living Dead (1968)
- The Evil Dead (1981)
- Pirates of the Caribbean (2003)
- Edgar Allen Poe
- E.C. Comics
- Creepshow (1982)
- Play Misty for Me (1971)
- The Crawling Eye (1958)
- The Birds (1963)
- H.P. Lovecraft
- Arthur Machen
- Alison Steele—the Nightbird
- The Abominable Dr. Phibes (1971)
- The wrecking of The Frolic
- The Rime of the Ancient Mariner by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- Howard Hawks
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