Large Marge Sent Us

The holiday season is upon us once again! This week we watched 1989's Prancer, a too real Christmas story that may or may not end in reindeer suicide?! Prancer follows the Christmas season in a small town in Michigan and centers around Jessica Riggs, a precocious 8 year old who lives on an apple farm with her really mean Dad, brother and has just lost her mother to an undisclosed illness. She still loves Christmas though and is pleasantly suprised to encounter a reindeer in the woods one day who seems to have been injured by a hunter's bullet. Is this Prancer aka one of Santa's reindeer?! Various shenanigans ensue and her love of Christmas and belief in all thing Santa inspires the entire town, including her bad dad, and blah blah blah Merry Christmas! We were divided on this one - one of us felt this was warm, cozy, and sweet and the other felt it was depressing and sad! What a toss up! We'll talk about our past memories of Christmas pageants, who are favorite reindeer is, and talk about the true star of this movie, Carol Wetherby's insane mullet! 

It's been TOO long since we talked about Star Wars so we thought we were ready to finally talk about the oft dreaded prequels! So here we are with The Phantom Menace! From 1999, we remember the world being crazy excited for these movies. Coming off the heels of the Stars Wars Episodes IV-VI re release in 1997, we had high hopes for these but let's just say George Lucas went a little bit overboard with the CGI, leaving many to claim, where was the Star Wars universe we knew and loved? Well with tons of time gone by (23 years, jesus christ!), we've learned this movie ain't half bad! Sure, Jar Jar has got to GO, the plot is sort of a snoooooze (trade federation, blockade, waaaaat?!), and little Annakin is cheeseball city, but we enjoyed ourselves! Ya got crazy siths, evil double red light sabers, and Queen Amidala's crazy do's. What's not to love? 

We were in the mood for a Madonna movie, so went with 1990's Dick Tracy. Starring and directed by Warren Beatty it features Madonna as Breathless Mahoney, a sultry red lipped lounge singer, an over the top Al Pacino doing what he does best mobster extraordinaire, and lots of vivid colors and crazy makeup to make all the gangsters in this 1930s era romp looked pretty gnarly and mean. It also feels like a mini musical with the injection of a few original songs by Stephen Sondheim. We struggled with the plot on this one, so apologies in advance, but mobster movies, ooof confusinggggg.  We'll talk about those Warren Beatty lothario rumors (13,000 sexual partners, oh boy!), Sweetie maybe retells an anecdote about being disappointed by Al Capone's Pizza, and we try to play the "What Would Your Mobster Name Be?", but are sorely disappointed with the results.

Tonight we watched Ferngully, the animated classic that taught us all about SAVING THE RAINFORESTS.  Whatever happpened to the rainforests, guys? Are they okay? We liked these non-Disney cartoons enough, but really feel that they just miss the mark slightly in terms of their character building, song choice and plot pacing! We'll talk about all the save the earth stuff we were bombarded with as kids, agree that Robin Williams as Batty Koda is like Genie Light, and profess our undying love for Tim Curry and his wonderful voice! 

In honor of St. Paddy's Day we decided to watch Leprechaun, the 1993 horror comedy that has since become a cult classic and has spawned oodles of sequels! Probably best known for being Jennifer Aniston's first feature film, Leprechaun features Warwick Davis (Wicket from Star Wars, Willow in ... Willow) as a really evil leprechaun who seems to have forgotten about the leprechaun rules and is hell bent on inflicting a lot pain on anyone who steals his gold. Much to our surprise, this movie was super entertaining in the way only campy horrow movies can be! We'll talk about how Wayne's World 2 put this movie on the map for us, how much we love good bad horror movies, and talk all about fun 90s sneakers like LA Gear's and Reebok Pump It Ups.

Holy shnikes! Last night we watched Tommy Boy, the film that launched Chris Farely to comedic fame and yo this movie is still hilarious in every way possible! Written by the same writing team (Bonnie and Terry Turner) as Wayne's World, Tommy Boy joined about 80 other movies that came out in the mid 90s featuring a former or current SNL cast member - the talent was bananas then.  We love Chris Farely's frantic physical comedy and intense outbursts so much but also the straight guy smarmy sidekick played by David Spade.  We'll talk about those sucky tube things banks used to have, how Chris Farely's insane energy wasn't actually all natural (haha no shit!) and how this movie is strikingly similar to Planes, Trains and Automobiles.  Hmmmm.

I took my troubles down to Madame Ruth ... You know that gypsy with the gold-capped tooth ... She's got a pad down on Thirty-Fourth and Vine ... Sellin' little bottles of Love Potion Number Nine! From 1992 and starring real life couple at the time Tate Donovan and Sandra Bullock, Love Potion No. 9 is about two biochemists who stumble upon a potion that makes whoever drinks it unbelievably atractive to the opposite sex! Chaos ensues! This movie is sort of confusing (trying to explain the science behind love potions hmmmm) a bit light on the rom and the com, and if we have to see a smart Sandra Bullock character with frizzy hair, glasses and an overbite one more time, well we're going to hurl! We'll sing/hum some other songs that were used for movie titles, try to remember who Tate Donovan is, and talk about whether we think Volkswagons are cool or for losers?

Since we lost Bob Saget last month, we decided it was time for an in depth discussion of our love for Full House, one of the best sitcoms to come out of the 1990s.  We were obsessed with this show as kids and our little Sweety has become a Full House scholar (she graduated from Large Marge Sent Us University or LMSUU) in the last couple of years! We'll talk about why we loved Bob Saget in Full House and in America's Funniest Home Videos, some of our favorite episodes (DJ has an eating disorder for 3 days, Stephanie dances to Motown Philly, Papooie dies), and how we were shocked to learn that one boring looking white guy wrote and performed the theme song to basically every sitcom in the 90s.  Weird!

As an ode to Sweeti Jimi's last week of paternity leave, we covered Mr. Mom an 80s gender role reversal romp starring Michael Keaton and Teri Garr! Things get all higgledy piggledy when Jack Butler gets laid off from his job and has to stay home with his three kids while his wife takes over the 9-5 responsibilities at a sexist, patriarchal advertising firm. Chaos ensues since for some reason Jack Butler has never used a washing machine, shopped for groceries or driven his kid to school! Written by John Hughes, this movie is big on charm and cute kids and it has been awhile since we'd seen male strippers dressed as astronaunts in metallic g-strings so ... thank you! We talk about car pools, how little Sweetie learned the differnce between being fired and laid off, and how easy it is to get addicted to soap operas.

We couldn't wait to start off 2022 by watching ... Can't Hardly Wait, a late 90s high school movie that has a pretty crazy ensemble cast, a sweet 90s hits soundtrack, and will give you night sweats thinking about how much you loved your JNCO jeans.  From 1998, Can't Hardly Wait is a party movie centered around the night after graduation when Preston Meyers tries to woo the love of his high school fantasy life Amanda once he finds out she has just broke up with her long term, dick faced boyfriend Mike. Chaos ensues! The beer is bad! And is Barry Manilow's song Amanda really about his dog? We talk about our experience with high school parties, take a deep dive into the band Smash Mouth, and talk about other bands and singers we are now embarrassed that we were into as kids.  Where the party at?!

Merry Christmas from the Sweeties! We're only doing one Christmas movie this year and we picked one we're not too fond of but know a lot of people are obsessed with! From 1983, A Christmas Story was (is?) played all day long on Christmas Day and boy did we hate it! We always felt this movie was schlubby due to its 1940s time period and also couldn't give a fudge about Ralphie and pining away for a bb gun. However, we do understand its place in Christmas cinematic history and how if your family was one of the ones who watched it all day on Christmas, you'd have a nostalgic twinge every time you hear "you'll shoot your eye out kid!". We'll talk about our #1 present coveted on Christmas, why we think this is largely a boy movie, and Sweety does a great impression of if Jack Nicholson played the role of Ralphie's Dad! Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night! 

Who knew that Son in Law qualifies as a Thanksgiving movie!? From 1993 and starring 90s cultural icon Pauly Shore, Son in Law is a fish out of water/outsider fixes everyone's problems kind of movie that we are here for! Sure, Pauly Shore's effeminate, hippy/surfer/LA ladies man/gay best friend schtick can be a bit much sometimes, we grew to love Crawl and all his wacky mannerisms. We'll chat about LA in the 90s, mud wrestling, and how Brad from Teen Witch is in this but plays an evil dude.  Plus Kelly Kapowski as the town slut/amateur stripper?! Well, thank god I'm a country boy!     

This week we watched Tim Burton's alien invasion spoof from 1996, Mars Attacks! Starring literally everyone in Hollywood! In the mid 90s, it was all about aliens and Burton capitalized on the trend by creating this kooky film which pokes fun at some of the campier alien invasion films from the 50s and 60s. Basically martians come to Earth and the dumb dumb leaders are confused about their intentions.  We weren't! Anyone with any sense could tell those suckers were trouble, just from their giant exposed brains. We'll talk about some our other favorite alien films, why we think we haven't had an actual alien invasion in the history of the planet (or have we??), and shout out to Sweeti Jimi who chuckled through the entire thing! Ack, ack, ack! 

As our favorite warlock says ... anything can happen on Halloween! And for Laurie Strode, that includes having the worst night of babysitting of your life! John Carpenter's spooky classic rounds out our scary movies for the month of October! Like Freddy Krueger, 80s and 90s kid couldn't escape the visual image of the pale Michael Myers mask nor the 8000 sequels the 1978 original spawned.  The original Halloween is still creepy AF and we're here to talk about it! We'll talk about horror movie tropes and why this movie is borderline tits soup by the end, whether virginity is the only way to beat the killer, and how there is no way in HELL Michael Myers could drive like a champ after being in an insane asylum since he was 6! 

Our second spooky movie for October is A Nightmare on Elm Street, which brought scary AF Freddy Krueger to life, but only in our dreams, right? Wrong! This is about as classic as horror movies get - creepy scary villain, loads of blood, a plucky heroine, and ... Johnny Depp! This Wes Craven classic predates the birth of the Sweeties by a couple of years, but it definitely shaped our and everyone's childhood in the sense that no one could look at a red and green striped sweater the same again.  We'll talk about some of Wes Craven's inspirations for the film, what's the deal with hall passes, and how sweater vests should be brought back now that fall includes 80 degree days where you're sweating your balls off by noon.  

Happy 5th Anniversary to us! That's right ... LMSU has been around for 5 years now and with 275+ episodes, we cannot frickin' believe it! Back in 2016, we were just two sisters with a dream talking about Jurassic Park, so we only thought it would be fitting to celebrate our 5 year with a re-watch and re-record of the dino blockbuster.  Will we talk about the same things we did 5 years ago or will 5 years of wisdom and maturity bring us new insight? Come and find out! As the great Samuel L. Jackson aka Mr. Arnold says ... Hold onto your butts! 

1993 brought us What's Eating Gilbert Grape, a tale of a lonely 20 something mid Westerner (Johnny Depp) living in a go nowhere town with a lot of weight on his shoulders; taking care of his mentally disabled teenage brother Arnie, his recluse mother who hasn't left the house in seven years, an on going affair with the local unhappy married mother of two, trying to woo the new, cool girl that comes to town via RV,  and a really poor hair color choice! Seriously what was with that hair color? Trying to make JD look schlumpy? This is a sweet movie with some themes we totally didn't get as young kids, but we sure do get now! Ahh what wisdom aging brings! We'll talk about how Leo's performance was received by the autistic community, choose our favorite Johnny Depp movie, and go into a sweet tangent about self service salad bars. RIP (Thanks Covid!).

1989's Loverboy is another vehicle for 80s era Patrick Dempsey, who is gangly AF as  Randy, a 20 year old college student desperate to earn money for his college tuition once his dad shuts down the money train after his grades tank.  Randy gets a job at Senor Pizza delivering pizzas and eventually orgasms once he stumbles upon the idea of selling his body and time to the lonely married women of the LA area desperate for companionship since all their husbands are big time losers. Believe it or not, this movie about male prostitution is kind of sweet and silly and the 80s LA vibe is really fun to watch.  We'll talk about the acting career of Patrick Dempsey - from geek to McDreamy, what the point of a negligee is, and randomly talk about the rebranding of the brussel sprout from gross veg to the side dish of the decade! This podcast ain't just about movies, folks! 

What a zany ride St. Elmo's Fire is! Written and directed by Joel Schumacher, 1985's St. Elmo's Fire features several actors of "Brat Pack" fame and delves into the topic of what happens to friends after college when you can still drink like a fish but uh oh, have to hold down a steady job and start to contemplate the meaning of life?! This movie is ridiculous in the best way possible - the characters are all terrible people, there's tons of cocaine, talk of "Arabs", and one friend's big dream is to become a professional saxophone player! We'll talk about how we made this month unintentionally Rob Lowe month, why Kirby needs a serious mental health check (yoooo stalker), and how The Man in Motion theme song is actually about a guy in a wheel chair and NOT Jule's cool convertible jeep! 

1983's The Outsiders is Francis Ford Coppola's film adaptation of the young adult classic by S.E. Hinton and despite an ensemble cast of 80s heartthrobs, The Sweeties had never seen it! Starring nearly every famous movie star guy 20 and under (okay sorry Pat Swayze was 29, old fogie!), The Outsiders delves into the white class divide in 1950s Oklahoma and what's it's like to have to grow up too fast because you're poor AND if you're Dad thought it would be fun to name you Ponyboy. Tough break kid, tough break. Fun fact there are actually two versions of this movie floating around - the original from 1983 and then the updated "novel" version in which Francis Ford Coppola was bullied by his granddaughter to reinstate many scenes cut from the original and that were integral to the book version.  We talk about both movies but also try to unravel the paradox of tough guys who like wrestle each other and cry a lot, whether Ponyboy looks better as a blonde or brunette, and how Tom Cruise's Steve is the most annoying character ever.