Bishop73

3rd Sep 2018

Alpha Dog (2006)

Question: There is something I don't get about the bad guys. Why would they kidnap a teenage boy?

Answer: If you're talking about why they kidnapped Zack, Zack is the younger brother of Jake. Jake still owed Johnny money, but when Johnny and his gang go look for Jake, they can't find him. They see Zack and kidnap him, essentially for ransom, until Jake fully pays Johnny back.

Bishop73

It's also important to remember that this is a film based on true events, the kidnapping and murder of Nicolas Markowitz. All the names in the film have been changed.

Why did they murder Nick?

Although this should be posted as a different question, in real life, Jesse (the one Nick's brother owed money to) had decided to let Nick go home. However, Jesse found out what kind of legal consequences he'd face for kidnapping Nick and decided to have Nick killed instead (obviously thinking he could get away with murder and deny any kidnapping allegations).

Bishop73

Answer: In the original script, both Jeanie and Ferris are listed as being 18. However, the Buellers also had 2 other children (a 7-year old son and 12-year old daughter) who were cut out of the film.

Bishop73

Answer: Probably, yes. From dialogue, Ferris is about to graduate, and he and Jean seem to be at the same school, so either she's actually the younger of the two (which seems unlikely - would parents give the younger child a car but not the older?) or they're in the same school year. On the assumption that they're in the same year, the most likely scenario is that, yes, they're twins. The only other possibility is that they were born less than a year apart (putting them in the same school year), with Jean probably being the older of the two.

Tailkinker

Or Ferris had repeated a year of school sometime in the past and Jeanie had caught up. The gifted car vs computer is a key point of resentment for Ferris throughout the movie, suggesting that Ferris may not have been trusted with a car, and got the computer instead.

Answer: Or Ferris may have skipped a year and is now caught up to his slightly older sister.

Shipper

Answer: Twins (even fraternal twins) are usually much closer in temperament to each other. Jean, on the other hand, seems very uptight and even envious of Ferris. Could be that Jean is an adopted child, same age as Ferris. There is typically some friction with adopted kids.

Charles Austin Miller

30th Aug 2018

Cast Away (2000)

Question: I have a problem with the scene where Chuck makes a fire by rubbing sticks. While it is possible to make a fire by the rubbing sticks, don't you need to run the stick against bamboo for the trick to work?

Answer: The point of the scene is that he has no idea what he's doing.

Chuck is using the fire plough method. A very established method. This and the fire saw method probably resulted in early sailors bringing back stories of."natives rubbing sticks together" to create fire.

Answer: You can use any wood (although technically bamboo is a grass and not wood), it just should be very dry wood. He's employing the fire trench method where the friction is created by rubbing one stick at a 45° angle against a trench in a wood plank (his trench looks to have been created because the plank was slit).

Bishop73

Actually, I looked up how to make a fire by rubbing sticks because asking this question, and I misread it as suggesting using bamboo. It was actually suggesting using coconut wood.

Question: Is it really possible to keep a person warm by putting him inside the body of a large animal? That's what Han does with Luke in the movie.

Answer: There are real life stories of people using horse carcasses for warmth and shelter. There were even old stories of shepherds using their camels in the exact manner as Han does for Luke, although I can't attest to their validity. (DiCaprio does a similar thing in "The Revenant" with a horse). There is residual heat in these animals. Most large animals have an normal temperature over 100°F (a camel's temperature can rise to 104°F during the day). However, what is most likely keeping them relatively warm is using the carcass as a heavy blanket while at the same time blocking the cold winds (creating a small tent) and not using the guts to warm themselves up.

Bishop73

Answer: In the Mythbusters' Star Wars episode #208, Adam and Jamie created a tauntaun and an analog Luke and simulated the same frigid conditions to test whether this was possible. They concluded it was "plausible."

30th Aug 2018

Safe House (2012)

Question: After they escape the safe house, Weston calls the CIA and says "no chance of an SDR, I've picked up a tail." What does SDR stand for?

The_Iceman

Answer: "Surveillance Detection Route." It's what you do when you think you're being followed (drive a specific route to detect if you're under surveillance or not). Weston says "I think I might have picked up a tail", so he was unsure if he was actually being followed or not, but had no time to try and determine if he actually is being tailed or not.

Bishop73

30th Aug 2018

Kangaroo Jack (2003)

Question: Who is the actress playing the flight attendant that listens to the guys in the bathroom with disgust?

Celldweller55

Answer: Lara Cox is not the flight attendant. "Cute Girl on Plane" was the 2nd girl to enter the scene and overhear the boys in the bathroom. I was unable to find who played the flight attendant and she may have just been a featured extra. I suspect Lara Cox is a member of S.A.G. and that's how she got a credited role and the other lady is not a member and was just hired as a background actor, which is why she's not credited (most extras are not credited).

Bishop73

Ah, good looking there. ^^ I was going by the best that I could find.

Quantom X

Answer: If I'm able to figure out who the correct person is by the IMDb listings, I think she's credited as Cute Girl On Plane, with the actress playing her being Lara Cox. That's the closest thing I could find in the IMDb listings to a flight attendant, as I don't think customs officer counts.

Quantom X

Question: At the end of the film Blondie, sitting on the horse, turns around, aims his rifle, fires, and severs the rope with a single shot. Lets face it, that rope would be a very small target, and difficult to hit with precision, even from ten or twenty feet, and Blondie is now so far from Tuco that he would no longer even be able to see the rope. Could anyone hit such a small target from such a distance with such incredible accuracy?

Rob Halliday

Answer: There's a show called "Hollywood Weapons: Fact or Fiction" which dealt with this exact question (s01e03). Blondie is roughly 200 yds away. In the show the host didn't hit the rope, but only missed by an inch on his first attempt. I definitely think an expert Sharps Rifle shooter could make the shot. The issue however, is the bullet would most likely not actually slice the rope apart as seen in the film (they fired the Sharps at point blank and the rope remained partially intact still). They also tested shooting a hat off someone and (as expected) the bullet just goes right through the hat without lifting the hat at all.

Bishop73

That was another thing that puzzled me. On several occasions in this film, Tuco is suspended from a rope, and Blondie cuts the rope by firing a bullet at it, (I think Clint Eastwood repeated the trick in "The Outlaw Josey Wales"). But if you fired a bullet at a rope holding a (rather large) person like Tuco (or a similarly heavy weight), even at close range, would it really sever the rope? I will have to look out for "Hollywood Weapons Fact Or Fiction." I hope they only used a dummy or a model to re-create the shooting feats. I don't think I would have liked to have been hanging on a rope while somebody fired bullets at me to see if this would sever the rope, or to stand there while they fired bullets into my hat to see if they could lift it off my head.

Rob Halliday

Answer: Probably not, but remember...this is a movie, a western at that and they typically have over the top action to excite audiences. Kinda like how it's impossible to shoot someone's hat off without harming them. It's all for show.

Dra9onBorn117

15th Oct 2017

That '70s Show (1998)

Baby Fever - S3-E7

Question: What is the song played during Donna's pole dance. Is there somewhere we can download it?

Answer: It's just incidental music written for the show and wouldn't be available to download as a song.

Bishop73

Question: During the movie when a viewer can make decisions, I chose to honk the horn twice which saved Frankie's life. Later in the film, Frankie is being arrested by two officers. The scene pauses and a question appears asking if it was right to save his life. I chose "yes" and because of this he is seen being taken away. If I had chosen "no", what would have happened to Frankie?

Answer: The movie just continues without showing any additional clips.

Bishop73

Answer: In the choose their fate version, it shows clips from Frankie's camera diary.

Question: In the end of the first movie Paul is safe in the hospital, so why has he come back into the forest and gets hit by a truck in this movie?

Answer: Spoiler Alert: At the end of the first movie, Paul was not safe at the hospital. The doctors inform the sheriff that Paul needs to be transferred. We then see Deputy Winston take Paul, but instead of transferring him, Winston dumps Paul on the side of the creek. In the 2nd movie, Paul is alive, but just barely as he's badly infected. He's trying to get help and finally manages to make it to the highway, where he gets hit.

Bishop73

17th Aug 2018

General questions

There's an horror film, 80s maybe, with a weird bald dog, with bulging eyes. It looks revolting but the cast don't treat it as a threat until it bites someone, and they kill it. I thought it was Brain Dead, but haven't got a copy to check and can't find an image which matches it.

Answer: So there is an Australian film called "Braindead" (that was re-released in the U.S. as "Dead Alive") where a creature's bite would turn people into zombies. But I don't think it was ever treated as a non-threat. But it wasn't a dog, it was a Sumatran Rat-monkey. But it's an ugly, bald creature that could look like a dog. http://non-aliencreatures.wikia.com/wiki/Sumatran_Rat-Monkey Here's a link to a page that has a picture of the creature so you can see if it's what you're thinking of.

Bishop73

25th Jul 2007

Evan Almighty (2007)

Question: Can anyone tell me where to find a list of ALL the music used in the movie? I'm looking for stuff that's NOT on the soundtrack.

Answer: All the music is listed in the ending credits of the movie.

Answer: When using IMDB, make sure you are using the "full site" and not the mobile version. At the top, above the movie/show title, click "more." Under "did you know?" click "soundtracks" (this list all the recorded songs used in the film, not just the songs on the soundtrack album). However, it often does not include incidental music, which is the background music or song created just for the film to create a mood, tone, or theme. Although often theme music that is later recorded and released will be listed on IMDB's page even though they didn't appear in the original credits, the same way (uncredited) actors are listed on the site.

Bishop73

Answer: You can also find the titles of the songs at IMDB. An online movie database.

14th Aug 2018

Saw IV (2007)

Question: Just wondering, usually a sequel takes part after the previous movie (eg Saw II is a sequel to Saw I) and a prequel is before the previous movie (ie Star Wars episode 1 compared to Star Wars episode IV) but to me Saw IV is set at the same time of Saw III, is this called a samequel?

oobs

Chosen answer: I believe the term for two storylines taking place simultaneously is "paraquel."

Answer: A mid-quel?! an "equal"?.

dizzyd

"Equal" gets my vote. :-).

Answer: The way I understand it, Saw IV takes place after Saw III, not at the same time, so it would be a sequel. Detective Kerry and John Kramer die in Saw III and are dead in Saw IV. Although, when sequels do show flashbacks, that doesn't mean it's set in the same time as the previous film. A film that takes place during the same timeframe as a previous film in the series is called a midquel. A film that is centered around the same event as a previous film, but shown from a different perspective can also be called a "twin film."

Bishop73

Jeff's game from "Saw III" and Rigg's game from "Saw IV" are happening at the same time.

Phaneron

14th Aug 2018

South Park (1997)

Show generally

Question: I have no idea what episode where this is from, but during one conversation all the boys have at the school lunch is talking about Terminator and Skeletor with Butters exclaiming "Skeletor is real?" I'm assuming that Terminator is Arnold Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver being Skeletor. I don't understand the joke or the conversation of Maria being Skeletor?

Richie

Answer: In S15 E04, "T.M.I, " at the start the joke is that Maria Shriver, prior to getting together with Arnold, was hot; and now she's all bony (time code 00:00:40).

Answer: I believe this is from s15e12 "1%." Many people, especially on the internet, say that Maria Shriver looks like Skeletor because of the bony features of her face. She has very high cheek bones and a broad, flat, square jaw that resembles Skeletor's jaw (the mandible). Sometimes she appears to have sunken in eyes too.

Bishop73

13th Aug 2018

Incredibles 2 (2018)

Question: Evelyn in this movie immediately struck me as looking exactly like Roxanne from Megamind. Seriously, look at each character. Is there some sort of hidden connection between them? Or is this purely coincidence that Evelyn and Roxanne look like twin sisters? Or... possibly Roxanne being a descendant of Megamind considering Incredibles 2 is set in the past.

Quantom X

Answer: I think the fact that Evelyn from Incredibles 2 and Roxanne from Megamind bear some similarities is purely coincidental. The idea that there may be a hidden connection between the two is unlikely and the idea of them being related is even more unlikely. It should be noted that Incredibles 2 is a Pixar production, and Megamind is a Dreamworks production, so the two aren't even made by the same company. Perhaps, her design was inspired by some features of Roxanne, but the idea of the two being connected or related is pretty doubtful.

Casual Person

Answer: It seems to just be a coincidence, or more likely the limitations of the 3D animation style used. Of course, in real life there are unrelated people who look-alike. However, it's unlikely the characters are suppose to be related since "Megamind" was created by DreamWorks, which is a subsidiary of Universal, which is a division of NBCUniversal (formed by the merger of GE's NBC and Vivendi Universal). Since 2011, NBCUniversal has been controlled by Comcast until they owned it outright in 2013. "The Incredibles" films were created by Pixar, which is a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is owned by The Walt Disney Company. Plus, I don't think there's been any significant individual who worked with both animation studios who would have influence on the character development and hundreds of people are involved in the animation processes.

Bishop73

Question: When Brian is about to be crucified, soldiers arrive with news of his release. The soldiers ask for Brian, and everybody shouts "I'm Brian." Is this a parody of the "I'm Spartacus" episode in the Kirk Douglas/Stanley Kubrick film of "Spartacus"? If so, would this support my feeling that Life Of Brian is primarily a parody of classical/biblical 'epic' films?

Rob Halliday

Answer: Actually, no, the primary goal of "Life of Brian" was not to parody biblical films. Terry Gilliam has stated that the "important" objective of the movie was "to offend a lot of people," particularly "Jews and Christians, because they're easy to push around." Gilliam further said that, at the same time, they were "very cautious not to offend Muslims, because they're the dangerous ones." Both Gilliam and John Cleese have also said that, while the Pythons took care to avoid blasphemy (not directly mocking Jesus of Nazareth, with whom the Pythons had no quarrel), they fully intended that the film be heretical (in defiance of Catholic Church doctrine and dogma). Make no mistake, "Life of Brian" is not supposed to be a lighthearted parody of biblical films; it's supposed to be a sharp stick in the eye to the Roman Catholic Church.

Charles Austin Miller

Answer: The scene is a parody of the scene in "Spartacus" (although they are saying "I am Brian" for completely different reasons.) However, the film is meant to be a satire on religion itself and not a parody of epic films. The Pythons did a lot of research to try and accurately portray 1st century Judea, which is why it may look like a biblical epic, but I can't recall any biblical epics they parodied. At the time it was considered blasphemous, and not a parody, and banned in several areas in the UK and some countries. Although the Pythons argued it's not blasphemy but heresy.

Bishop73

Answer: You are indeed correct. It is a parody of the "Spartacus" scene but mostly of religion.

raywest

Perhaps not so much a parody of "Spartacus" as a tribute to Stanley Kubrick. Monty Python writer Terry Gilliam was very much a fan of Kubrick films and became friends with Kubrick in the 1980s. Gilliam claimed that Kubrick had even spoken with him about making a sequel to Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove" (with Gilliam as director). Chances are, the "Spartacus" allusion was part of Gilliam's contribution to the "Life of Brian" screenplay, a tip-o-the-hat to Stanley Kubrick.

Charles Austin Miller

9th Aug 2018

Twilight (2008)

Question: What does it mean when Bella's dad moves his hand in a circle around his head? (01:17:55)

Answer: Bella asks her dad to be nice to Edward. It looks like he was making a halo over his head, meaning he'll be an angel (he'll be nice to Edward).

Bishop73

Question: Could somebody tell me once and for all why every mutant in these films have nicknames?

Gavin Jackson

Chosen answer: Because just like in the comic books, all super heroes and villains have names that are a representation of either the abilities they possess, paraphernalia they use, their personalities, and/or the circumstances of their origin. Magneto is a much more compelling and memorable name for a character than simply calling him Erik. Presumably it also avoids confusion if there are several mutants with the same "regular" name, to have a unique nickname for each one.

Phaneron

Answer: In addition to what was said, the nicknames also provide the individual mutant a way to identity more closely with the fact that they are mutants. As Mystique said in "X-Men: The Last Stand" when addressed as Raven, "I don't answer to my slave name." Many mutants are rejected by their parents when they find out they're mutants, so the "nickname" serves as a way to distance themselves from those that rejected them. In addition, at times their nicknames are called "code names." In this case, it would be a way to address a mutant without using their real identity, in essence a secret identity that's common in almost all superheroes and super villains.

Bishop73

Question: Do we know the human casualties by the end of the war?

Answer: No such numbers are ever discussed in the novel or in the subsequent radio and movie treatments. What we may surmise, however, is that the human casualties were comparatively minor. Once the Martians were exposed to earthly microbes, they were wiped out pretty quickly.

Charles Austin Miller

Voiceover by Morgan Freeman at the end of the movie: by the toll of a billion lives.

Morgan Freeman says "By the toll of a billion deaths, man had earned his immunity, his right to survive among this planet's infinite organisms." He is saying that Mankind evolved with microorganisms for countless generations on Earth, making Mankind immune to most of those microorganisms. Perhaps a billion humans or more died of bacterial and viral plagues throughout human history; but, as a species, we gained immunity. Freeman's quote has nothing to do with the number of Martians that died because they had no immunity.

Charles Austin Miller

Answer: The ending dialog states a death of 1 billion.

The billion deaths spoken of don't refer to those that died in the alien attack but the billion deaths from the microorganisms that killed the aliens. "By a billion deaths man earned his immunity."

Bishop73

I feel that he meant that the organisms that killed the aliens killed a billion humans first before we got our immunity from them.

They are saying that.

lionhead

You are correct that he means humans, over tens of thousands of years, naturally gained immunity to many disease-causing organisms after billions of other people had died from them. The aliens had no immunity whatsoever and is why they died.

raywest

13th Oct 2014

The Departed (2006)

Question: Who did Frank execute in the beginning of the film? Was it the shop owner or just someone we don't know?

Answer: They were "Guineas from the North End" who tried to tell Frank what to do. (Guinea being a racial slur for Italian-Americans). It's most likely just two unknown people because they are credited in the film as "Executed Woman" and "Executed Man."

Bishop73

Answer: Someone we don't know.

I believe the couple Costello and French killed on the beach were Sullivan's parents.

I would disagree, Sullivan is Irish and the couple French and Costello murder are "guineas" (a derogatory term for Italian-Americans).

Answer: It was Leonardo's father and girlfriend killed out by the airport.

No way.

Italian mob boss and wife?

Answer: It was Matt Damon's parents.

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