THE GATE - We Accidentally Summoned Demons

In Episode 46 of Secret Level, we dig into the demonic hole of doom and talk about the classic 1987 horror film The Gate! This was one of our favorite horror movies as kids, and revisiting this crazy movie was a blast! So, we accidentally summoned demons who used to rule the universe to come and take over the world, and recorded this podcast! There were some fun details we learned about the making of this movie, and we were especially impressed with how they pulled off some of the visual effects. We had a lot of fun talking about this flick and we hope you enjoy the show!

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Transcript

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And this guy walks into the mortuary where my mom works, and he is claiming to be Freddy Krueger. He's referring himself to Freddy Krueger. He's, doesn't have like the knives or anything, but he does have knives. And I believe he had a gun. I don't remember. It was so long ago when my mom worked at this place. I was just a little kid. But he, Held my mom hostage at this mortuary Um, okay, and I don't remember how many people were with my mom small staff though I remember it was a small staff, maybe like five people. I want to say five Okay, but it's just so crazy that My mom was actually held hostage by a guy who claimed to be freddy freaking krueger at a mortuary Yes for like a whole day Sounds normal to me What are you talking about sounds normal? I mean, the minute Freddy Krueger shows up with, you know, the knives on his hands and a gun Well, he didn't have the knives, he had knives with him. Oh, just knives, they weren't on his fingers? They weren't, no, he wasn't like, he just referred to himself as Freddy Krueger. The guy's just a complete freakin nut bar, right? So he comes in, and he's just like, threatening to kill people. Like, this is crazy. I'm almost more scared of the guy claiming to be Freddy Krueger without any of the actual Freddy Krueger accruchamones, um, the guy who's just claiming it scares the crap out of me. Yeah, but that was just one of those weird things from when I was a kid that I remember like my mom going through, like, that was crazy. Yeah. I don't see your mom really being that scared though. Well, I, you know, I should ask her. You should I should act like it's it's been a while since like we've really talked about this like I've never really asked her about it I just remember hearing about it and so it might be interesting to like get some insight on that I don't know This is the woman that drove in the breakdown lane on the freeway when we're stuck in traffic because we're gonna be late to a movie I so I'm not I'm not really concerned about her being scared in that situation You She ate, well, in one of her duties at this mortuary, this is when they first moved out to California, but one of her duties there was she would, she would dress dead bodies, like, that was her job. That was part of her job. Gross. Yeah. She said they would make sounds, and they would like, when you were, like, their eyes would move, she would tell me, tell us these things, like, uh, When, uh, she would dress they would let out like a sigh, like a, uh, you know, just stuff like that. Weird stuff, man. I don't even know, dude. That's icky. Yeah. Yeah. Didn't your wife work in a mortuary? She worked in a mortuary for like four years. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It was, uh, she did more of the planning part of it. She never really had to do the dressing part of it. Okay. Surprisingly, she only said there was one place that she worked at that was haunted. Um, and the boss would require them to go home before it was dark, or stay in pairs if it was after dark. But, I thought all of them would be haunted, you know what I mean? I'm just convinced that every graveyard, every mortuary, I'm convinced that the mirror in your parents front room is haunted. It was haunted, yes. 100 percent was haunted. It is haunted. It's still there. It is still there. No one lives there anymore. Well, we don't live there. Other people are being haunted now. Scary place. Yeah, so, um, on to lighter stuff. I saw that sales of, uh, Captain Lifeface have gone up since our last, uh, Yes, they have. They've exploded. Man, the money that we're getting from that is insane. You know what I mean? I can retire. Right, just being the first sponsors of Captain Life Ace. I mean, we're doing this for fun now. We don't even get paid anymore. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, so yeah. That was pretty fun. It was great. It was great. Yeah. Oh. You ready for this? Let's go. Let's go. Alright. Here we go. Three. We got it. Two. Hello! I'm Joey Parr, the host of Secret Level. And joining me today is the brutal, the behemoth, the boss man himself, Billy Bisher! And I just wanted everybody to know that Ducky Momo. There you go. There you go. So, what's on the agenda today, bud? Oh, I'm so excited about today. Today we're going to talk about the 1987 classic horror film for me. I don't know about the rest of you, this is just one of those movies that I loved watching as a kid. The Gate. Dude, okay, so when I, when I first saw this when I was younger, I was actually scared of this movie, but watching it as an adult, I, it has filled a gap that I've had in my brain for years. What do you mean? Like, what do you mean it's filled a gap in your brain? Explain. Explain yourself, man. Uh, when you watch Army of Darkness, there's a scene where, um, Ash falls down and breaks into a bunch of ashes, right? Yeah, when we watched it, I'm like, that's from a different movie. And I realized it's from The Gate. The Gate. It's, uh, yeah. Yeah. When the big monster falls, it splits into a bunch of little monsters. And I was like, oh, that's it. Finally. So yeah, it just, it helped cement something in my brain. It was very nice. Alright, alright. I dig it. I dig it. This is a movie that my grandpa, my cousin and I, When we, when we were dropped off my grandpa's house where parents were doing stuff, we were like, let's go see a movie at the Dollar movie theater. Because back in the day we had a dollar theater man, and I remember going to the gate for the first time at the dollar movies. And was completely just blown away by how awesome this movie was. And we made my grandpa take this, take us to this movie, like three or four times. Bless his heart. He did. But it was so much fun. It was just, it's such a fun, playful horror movie that is also like a lot more terrifying than I remember when I was a kid. Kid, I don't know, I'm like, I'm, when I'm re watching this movie, I'm like enjoying the nostalgia, the, the, the nostalgia of it. And at the same time, I'm like, I can't believe my grandpa took me to this movie multiple times. Like, I was, we were kids. And this movie fine. But this movie is like, kind of a terrifying film. Yeah, there's a lot of elements in it that I was like, why was I not more worried about this situation when I was younger? Yeah, like I was more You know what I mean? I was more fascinated in Everything that was happening, and then scared, like, playing records backwards. That was the first movie for me where I'm like, Holy crap, if you play a record backwards, it's gonna give you some kind of crazy satanic message. And I ruined a lot of my parents records, playing them backwards. How were they supposed to know if you didn't try? You know what I mean? Exactly. Exactly. You were saving them. I had to take Michael Jackson's Thriller and, and, and just reverse it. I remember doing that. Trying to, and obviously nothing made sense, but still. I remember specifically. The Vincent price part I would go backwards on okay, but not you know Nothing obviously came of it. But no I did just because of this just because of this movie. I wanted Rockets after this movie. I wanted to go shoot off rockets all of a sudden like this is cool I want a giant rocket to launch into the face of a demonic beast? That sounds like fun! Yeah, um, that's something we're going to get into because I was highly disappointed about that when I was later on in life when I actually shot off rockets. I was like, that would not kill a demonic beast coming out of my floor. There was the legend of the construction worker. Hmm. Stuck in the wall. That was like, buried alive in the wall. Like, like, when I was a kid, throughout my life, I was always like, I, like, this thought still even crosses my mind to this day. Like, what if there's someone buried in that wall? And we just don't know. Oh man. That's a great conversation starter in a boring atmosphere. If you're just visiting someone, Like, hanging out at someone's house. Especially for a first time, right? You're at someone's house for a first time, you just kind of like stare at the wall. I wonder if anyone's buried in there. You think anyone's trapped in your walls? Can we check? Oh man, it's either gonna start up a really good conversation or they're gonna kick you out, one of the two. Yes. Fantastic. I mean, the 80s though was like this great, fantastic metamorphosis of the horror genre. Like, so many crazy horror movies came out in the 80s. This is one that just, that I was able to watch as a kid that stuck with me for a very long time. Right. I mean, you've had, you had the slasher films, but the slasher films I never really got around to until I was in high school. You know? Right. Haunted House stuff, sure. Older horror movies. Like Universal Monsters, you know, like Vincent Price's Waxworks I remember seeing as a kid, House on Haunted Hill, a lot of those older black and white movies for sure. Absolutely. But I mean, um, we can't forget The Omen. Oh, can't forget The Omen. But even The Omen, you know, like, I don't remember the first time I watched The Omen. I remember the first time I watched The Exorcist. And I was around 13 when I saw The Exorcist for the first time. It really jacked me up. I assume the Omen was around the same time. But the one thing that has always haunted me about the Omen was that freaking song. That santaed, what is it, do you remember this song? I can't remember. But it's just like, Da da, da da da. I don't remember. Something like that. Scared me, scared the hell out of me though. Ave Sante? Ave Sante. I was close. I said Sante. Yeah, you were. You had it really close. Yeah. Dude, remember when we showed that to a bunch of friends and they were like, Why would you do this to us? They're like, Yeah. Because it was great. Because we are Satan. No. Sorry. Sorry. I meant to say, because we are legion. Yes. Anyway. I liked we are Satan more. That was funny. Oh man. Alright, so, okay, so the gate falls into that early 80s. Yeah. Weird. Yeah. It's just one of those cult classic movies. It doesn't have like a huge following, but it's got a decent following. If you've never seen this movie, you should watch it because it's great. It is. I mean, it's, it's basically, it's, it's, it is. That horror film from the 80s that makes the, you know, those horror films so enduring, like it's got all of that stuff in it. Yes, but there are points in it that nowadays you hear certain lines come out in that movie and you're like looking to see who's watching with you. Like, I don't say that. Yeah, I remember this last time I re watched it, it was just kind of like, oh yeah, those, those words. Those words that would get you cancelled today. Right, exactly. You can't use words, you can't use certain words anymore. They were Yeah, we You know They were just commonplace back then. They were just common to say in the 80s and 90s. Yeah, because they weren't The stigma hadn't been brought to our faces that, Hey, maybe you shouldn't be saying that. Yeah, I mean, one of the reasons why that The Gate is so For me, looking back on it, re watching it, The use, the, the, the practical effects used on this film to bring these like creatures to life was awesome. I mean, this is a time, I mean, there's like so many. CGI was like, wasn't really a thing. you had stop motion, they were using stop motion animation. They were using forced perspective shots. Like, crazy forced perspective shots. Like you wouldn't even know, you wouldn't even know. There's, there's that shot you were talking about where the guy falls to the floor and all the little like demons go running around. Those are all people like dressed up in costumes. But it looks like they could be stop motion. But they were all actual people. It was all fake. There are crazy photos of this online that just kind of like blows your mind to how like this thing was shot. So cool how they brought these demonic entities to life. Well, and okay, speaking of the special effects, when I was a kid, I thought the scariest part it was is I thought they really killed the dog. In the first 30 minutes of the movie. I thought that was a real dead dog that they were carrying around. Because that thing looked so real. You thought that was a real dog? Oh, man. That's rough. It missed. Yeah. That's rough. Oh, that killed me. But yeah. That's, that's uh, And I watched it again this time and I was like, oh yeah. I remember thinking that was the real dead dog that they were carrying around. You know toting around. Yeah, the boyfriend had in his car for I know a day. It's like I'll take it I'll take care of this Throws a dead dog in his Porsche and takes off Wanted to get laid so bad that he was willing to just take the dead dog off Off this family's hand. Oh my goodness. But yeah, special effects were great in this for the time. And I can respect what they did back then. Well sure, and it's also you know, it had it's charm with like the imperfections and stuff. It wasn't a perfect like, film. The special effects were, you know, still a little shoddy for the time because it was a low, kind of a lower budget horror movie. But that adds to the whole charm of it. Charm of it, and Oh yeah, definitely. The minions, those, those little minions though. Like, they gave me nightmares. I can I get it.'cause they're kind of like this, like a mixture of the cyclops from, uh, Jason and the Argonauts and just like the devil. Yeah. So, yeah, I get it. That, and there's just something I can see that that's something that you, these are things you just don't see these days in the movies. It's all CGI, digital, clean, clear. Like, everything's polished looking, this movie had like a handmade texture to it that I just, just really appreciate, you know? Yeah, I get it. Absolutely. But I mean the whole movie taps into Like this, The Fears of Childhood, right? Right, right, right. Uh, the plot revolves around these two young boys who accidentally unleash a horde of demons from their backyard. Ha ha ha. Of course. You know, what else are you gonna do when you're a kid? You know that, I mean, if I was a kid and I had the opportunity to unleash demons in the backyard, you know, we would do it. You know, I would do it. Absolutely. I would just be too curious. Stop us not to unleash a demonic force onto the world. Sorry, everybody. If it ever happens, it was probably me. Yeah. And, um, I would've probably helped him in some way, shape, or form. But yeah, I mean, anything for the shot, man, that's what it's all about. Trying to record a great shot. Sometimes you gotta bring up demons. Sometimes you gotta bring up the demons. 100%. Absolutely. It was kind of like that age old idea of like, what if monsters under the bed were real kind of thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We did one, um, movie, like Little Monsters. That's what those monsters were for them. This is what these monsters are for these guys, man. Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And the movie's, you know, both a mix of the childhood innocence and the lurking unknown that adds this genuine terror to it. Right. And I just like that it was also set in this suburban setting. Right, that no one noticed that that shit was going down. How did no one notice? That's what I'm saying. I mean There was a lot going on at this house. Right. A lot. Kids coming in and out. Screaming when he's levitating and breaking all this shit. Oh, let's talk about the levitation scene since you brought that up. Yeah. This is one of those things where you're just like, teenagers are so stupid, especially in the eighties. Yeah. Teenagers are stupid in every era, but that one was a little, that was like during satanic panic and all that stuff. So they're trying a bunch of weird, weird stuff. Yeah. But at the same time, you remember when you grew up and you was like light is a feather stiff of us. Stiff as a board. The same, same thing, right? We all did that crap. We all did it. But it's like, this movie took it to like, the next level, right? And this kid comes and he's like, I'll do it, I'm brave. I'll show you teenagers that I can Be floating demonic person right to give you guys a little perspective. This is Stevendorf as a kid. This is his first film. Yes. Yes, Stevendorf. You're right Yeah has the exact same face just with that dumb haircut that we all had when we were kids Bold type of haircut. So just imagine that. Okay, go. But yeah, so the kid gets in there he does his thing and he literally he they're doing their Their, their thing, their levitation, spell. And the kid levitates, breaks a light as he's levitating, falls to the floor. Like this kid went just, this kid like experienced real levitation. And all of these teenagers are like, Ain't no thing like no one makes a big deal of it through the whole thing the kids like what about the levitate like he's talking To his sister. What about the levitation and she just like brushes him off like ah Levitation there's nothing like I want to call it nothing his whole thing was like I want to call mom and dad, right? I want to call mom and dad. She's like I levitated. I'm scared. She's like so what right? like it didn't Like, she's trying to impress that boy so bad, that levitate, and everybody's like, pfft, levitation, pfft, we do that all the time. Yeah, but. It just, it was funny to me how it was just so like, Nonchalant? Yeah, just, it wasn't like a big deal, but the thing is, is like, if you were a real teenager and you did something like that, it would be a big deal. Big deal that someone had just levitated for real. Absolutely. And like, like the same with the reactions to the dogs, like the little kids crying and everybody's like, ah, dog's dead. Moving on. Yeah. I want to call mom and dad. The dog was just brutally killed. No, we're not calling mom and dad. Don't do it. Yeah. And that's, I think that's kind of an eighties thing though. Like that's how they were. It's exactly how they were. Well, that's how they portrayed teenagers at that time. Like, very nonchalant, very blasé, as far as everything went. I don't know, I was a little bit more emotional at that age. Yeah, I mean, even if you weren't scared of it, I would have at least been like, Dude, that was freaking cool. We just levitated somebody. For real. Right, and you didn't want to tell everybody. And so you didn't even get that. You didn't get the fear from it. You didn't get the excitement from it. It was just like, Eh. So? Right, exactly. Throw the dead dog in my Porsche. I'll drive it to the dump. Nevermind, I'm taking it back and throwing it in this hole. Did you ever try to screw around with the occult Billy? I mean, just when you and I and the other guys were being dumb and try to Ouija board once, and I think that was the extent of it, uh, didn't really do anything. But yeah, OU Ouija board is always, I remember doing that as a kid. I didn't do much as a kid in regards to like trying to like talk to dead people or talk to ghosts that, or conjure spirits or anything like that. Right. Yeah, I, I wasn't a big fan of that, but. Now I just, now I just search them out. Go all, go to all the haunted places to see if they'll talk to you now. That's true. It's easy now. It's a lot easier. You don't need a Ouija board. When they say it's gonna bring you bad luck, let's trust them on that next time. Never. I'd never trust. I will look at that stupid headless man in the eyes and tell him, Shut up. Shut your face. Your face is dumb. Yes. Well, we really got off course there. Yeah, we did. Huh. Yeah. Alright, let's bring it back. But yeah, Dorf. Stephen Dorf. Dorf. The Dorfmeister. He plays Glenn in the movie. Glenn? There's no kids named Glenn. No one's named Glenn. Dumb. It's like, where did they come up with that name? Did you ever know a Glenn? I never knew a Glenn. Uh, just Glenn Guglia from, you know, The Wedding Singer. That's about it. Oh, The Wedding Singer. Glenn. Ooh, maybe that's what he grew up to be. He went from that kid to this really obnoxious adult. Nice. Nice. That's how it is in my world now. This is, this is where our minds go, people. Yep. Sorry. Okay. We're getting back to, here we go. Yes. But the gate, it is kind of one of those time capsules of the eighties, it just, Yeah. Has this really heavy nostalgia for me. And the music! The music! Right. The rockin soundtrack! It was The heavy metal music, man! That was the first time that I was like, introduced to heavy metal music. Because at that time, it's like, my dad and my mom, they were listening to like, Billy Joel and Bruce Springsteen, and like, Opera. The Beatles, and opera, and Michael Jackson. Yeah. You know, Linda Ronstadt, who else? They're all fantastic singers, but yeah, it brought you into the heavy metal genre. And I was like, yeah! I love this music! I want more of this in my life! Right. But then, at the time, you couldn't listen to it because that kind of music was Satan music. And if you listened to that music, you were messing around in the world of the devil. And we just couldn't have that in our house. We could not have the devil running around our house with heavy metal music. Oh, there we go. But yeah, so the music was good. Terry was probably my favorite part of that whole movie. Terry was great. He was, he just knew everything. He knew everything. I, you know, I like how he's so like, there's that moment where just so matter of fact, he's like, You've got demons. Exactly. I love that. Oh, man. But yeah, he's, I mean, if Terry wasn't there, Glenn would be would have succumbed to the powers of the dark side. See, I would have never, I wouldn't have hung out with Glenn. Glenn wasn't the kid I would have hung out with. I would have hung out with Terry, because Terry was an interesting fella. He was. He was gonna take you down some adventurous road that you would never expect. Yes! Totally. I agree. But, Glenn lucked out to have a friend like Terry. He did. Actually, real quick, while we're on the subject of Terry, Mm hmm. The kid who played Terry, his name was Louis Tripp. And he also reprised his role in The Gate 2, Trespassers. Have you seen The Gate 2? I have not. Oh, wow. I have not. Yeah, I've never seen it. I've seenI could tell you what the box looks like in my head. I just It's obviously not as popular. It's not as good. But it might be worth talking about one day. Okay. Might be worth staying a talking about. I'll have to watch it and then we can talk about it a little bit. But he was the only cast member from the original film to return to the sequel. Okay. And, uh, that was also directed by the original director. Hold on a sec. Where is that? The actor, uh, he starred, uh, Tripp, the actor, he starred in a bunch of TV shows, uh, in Canada during the late 80s and early 90s. He was also credited as the nerdy kid in the movie Detroit Rock City. Oh, okay. But he hasn't done much. But I did find That, uh, someone, like, kind of offered an update on what he was doing as of the early 2000s. I don't know what he's doing now, but as of the early 2000s, he worked at a call center in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada. His legal name is now 1220. L being the 12th letter in the alphabet, and T is the 20th. 1220. 20. Yeah. Uh, the guy that offered the update on this said, I loved the gate movies, but honestly would not have recognized him at all. He's certainly now an imposing and decidingly non nerdy looking guy. Very quiet and very friendly and polite is how he's described as. Oh, okay. So, I didn't expect that. That was just one of those weird things I found while researching this movie, and I was like, because I wondered, like, what happened to that kid? He, I never really saw him in anything else, and I guess he was just dumb with acting, I don't know. Yeah, yeah. I mean, sometimes they do that, look at Chunk. I get it, but he was like, he had this unusual look to him, it looked like, you know, he had that like, character actor kind of look, where he could have like, really made a career out of acting. You know? Oh, absolutely. Had he like, had he pursued it, I think he would have been very like, A very well known, character actor. At least. At least. Yeah, cause he's recognizable. Yeah. But, I guess that just wasn't his thing. The movie was directed by Billy? I'm not even gonna try it. Tibor Tak Tak Takics? Cacks? Tibor? Or Tybor? Tibor? We're just flying by the seat of our pants right now, bud. Um, Tibor So, we're either gonna refer to him as Tibor, or Tybor, or just Director. Yeah, um, just to save ourselves some face, we'll probably just call him the Director. Yes. Sure. The first draft of the script was written by Michael Nankin, when he was unemployed and recently divorced. It was based on And I quote, the nastiest thoughts from his childhood. Interesting. Yes. What was he going through? He was going through some hell, obviously. Ha, ha, ha, ha. Okay. In the final version of the film, Glenn and Al were depicted as being more mischievous than what had originally been written. And the demons spread to the rest of the town in the original script. Where they would drag neighbors out into the streets and kill them. Yeah! Yeah! Where were they? Yeah! Where were they? Exactly. They probably didn't have the budget to pull that off. Yeah, I was gonna say, yeah, they don't have the budget so they had to keep it there. But having those demons dragging people out of their homes and like killing them in the streets? Sure. Yes! Fantastic. Let's do it. Bring it on. Let's go. Yep. Dead. Big giant demon at the end, that monstrosity was originally envisioned as being made of bloody entrails. Really? Entrails of a person? Just, it just said bloody entrails. I don't know if it was of a person, or an animal, I don't know. Or just I just really want I want to find out why they put those little arms next to their ne It's kind of like little arms of a T Rex, what the heck are those for? Because the arms could, like, grab it and feed itself. Oh, I don't even think those arms could reach their mouths, weirdos. Anyway, continue on. Maybe it had a mouth and a neck, that it would feed. Gross! Yes, that's what I want. Is that what you want, Bill? Yes If that's what you want, I'll give it to you. I will give that to you for Christmas. Do it. Alright. You asked for it, Nick Mouths. The special effects supervisor on the film, Randall William Cook. He went on to work with Peter Jackson on The Lord of the Rings. Oh. Yeah, that's that guy. Look at that guy. Stark got his career started on the gate, then went and made one of the greatest trilogies ever made. Ever. The director talked about the original script. Mm hmm. Uh, in an interview with, I believe, comingsoon. net. Yes. And he said, the original script was pretty much as dark as the movie ended up being. The bones of a great film were, were all there in Michael's draft. I came to the project as a result of just having finished Snow, a short film which won some awards and was theatrically distributed all over the U. S. Because yeah, short films used to be put in theaters. Back in the day to get financing for the gate The producers had to partner with the Canadian company that I had already this is the director speaking By the way I had already I had a relationship with Michael understood this and welcomed me as the director with enthusiasm some of the changes I remember bringing to the table were the opening dream scene That gently introduces the important childhood abandonment theme present throughout the film. Instead of a brother, I wanted Glenn to have an older sister. Michael was great at detailing their age differences and incompatibilities as siblings. Another thing I remember adding was the whole satanic rock thing. With the music and the backwards lyrics. I think the original script, they went to a library to get some demon info. In the film, they get it from the album's liner notes. And by playing the record backwards, what I remember the most is how nicely Michael welcomed me onto the project and worked so hard at making the script fit my vision right down to the smallest details. We've remained good friends ever since. So they had a great working relationship together. There were no, like, contentious things happening when they were, like, Developing the final draft of the script. It's great. Yeah, and I actually kind of dig the idea of Al being in there as the sister. I don't think there's enough, like, stronger older sister roles in here. I mean, we're getting it right now in Stranger Things with, uh, Nancy and all that. Yeah. But I don't think it happens enough. So that's pretty cool. And in the end she ended up being, you know, a vital role to the whole thing. Yeah. It was a good choice. Sure. Uh, just a couple little things. about Terry. The logo on the back of his jacket is that of the Killer Dwarfs, the metal band from Toronto, Ontario. Okay, that's cool. That's a real band. That's fun. Yeah, they're well known for their offbeat sense of humor. Hmm. There you go. In case you didn't know. I didn't know. Terry's back patch, when he's first seen, is for the band Venom, who released the song, The Seven Gates of Hell, in 1984, on the B side of their Warhead single. Just in case you wanted to know. Well, yeah, I mean, that's pretty cool. Um. No, they're real. They were real bands. Sometimes they throw real bands in movies. It's great. Sure, why not? Why not? Just do it. Eric. The guy. The boyfriend. The boyfriend. The guy with the dog. Yes. He threw the dog at his Porsche. So, he was supposed to carry the body of Angus the dog around the garden to be buried. The actor struggled to carry it because of the weight. So, the set designer, uh, John Backer, Brought it to a local taxidermist to have the organs removed to make it much lighter. Are you shitting me? Was that a real dead dog? What the I need to go to bed. Serious. Real. That's what I That's what I found, Billy. I I don't You know, I let you go with it when we were talking about it earlier. And I couldn't wait to get to this part because I needed to see what your reaction would be I'm, so so you guys don't know this but I called joey while I was watching the movie and I was like dude when he's Carrying that dog. It really does look like a real dog. He's carrying so joey's been sitting on this information For a while and now i'm super messed up, but i'm like i'm trying to like I mean, these are, I, these are details I found about the movie, I, it, but yeah, it says the set designer brought it to a local taxidermist to have the organs removed and make it much lighter. We're just gonna pretend like it had fake organs in it. So they really must have had a dead dog, if that is true. The 80s were crazy. Billy is just like, his face is buried in his hands right now. That's dude, they would get in so much trouble now for that. And now I'm, yeah, okay. But maybe, well, but maybe that's fake. Maybe what I found is fake. I don't know. Uh, nope. We're sticking with It's real. What? That's what I heard. That's what I read. So I'm just gonna get it. Stick with it. I'm sticking with it. Yeah, we're sticking with it. I couldn't find anything other than that. So, uh, so what's gonna happen now is, is that nothing is gonna shock me in the rest of this the rest of this episode,'cause Yep. One of my greatest fears has come alive. They killed a dog for a movie. They killed a dog for a movie for real. Unless it was just already a dead dog that they had just like Did they, did they, they put a casting announcement out. If anyone has a dead dog, please bring it to the set. We could really use one right now. Disturbing. Okay. Uh, I'm glad you didn't give me any warning on that. You're just like, here you go, bud. Get some organs removed. Nice. Uh, there's kind of a little, a little glitchy mistake in the movie. I don't know if you caught this or not. It's fine. Okay, but with when Al, Glen, and Terry in the backyard setting up the rocket Okay, Al crouches down with a pair of pliers to tighten the bolt She's not tightening anything. She's just moving the flyers back and forth back and forth in midair And it's so funny to watch Cuz she's just like Man, I love stuff like that like Like when they have people standing in for actors in a TV show, but you can clearly see that they're not the person they're supposed to be. Yes. I love that stuff. Yep. But I mean, the air needed to be tighter around the rocket for it to perform. You know, I just, that made me laugh. That was just one of those things that I enjoyed. But before we go on a word from our sponsor In the silent expanse of our universe billions of stars hold the secrets of countless civilizations. Among these are those who by fate or misfortune have been cast adrift finding their way to our small blue planet. 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Let us be the light that guides these lost stars home. For in the embrace of our shared humanity, we discover that the universe is not just a place of vast emptiness, but a home filled with love, waiting to be shared. 1 800 ADOPT ET Dude, it sounded like Alan Rickman in, like, a nature show. It was great. Someone's gonna crack up over this one. All right. All All right. Here we go. The director also Blah, blah, blah. Let me get my brain back in the thing. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah. When talking about, uh, jumping onto a film project like this, the director said at the time, You know the filmmaker's wisdom that's passed around all the time? Never work with children or animals. Well, I'd have to say it didn't hold true on the gate. All the kids were extremely professional and adaptable. I think we caught everyone in the cast at a magical moment in their lives. None of them had a lot of experience, and a few none at all. They hadn't picked up any bad habits yet. The only difficulty was sticking to the work rules for kids. With all the school and rest periods, we could only get a few hours of filming a day. Stephen Dorff really connected with the part, and was easy to work with. I think his natural performance contributes greatly to what makes the movie work so well. Nice. Look at him saying nice things. Yeah. He had a good time working with the kids. I mean, and they all did a great job. Yeah, yeah. They all, they all had this very natural, uh, feel to their, they brought a natural feel to their characters. Yeah. It's, they, they were characters that you could like, kinda like relate with in the situations they were, they were in except when they just, you know. Fought demons. They fought demons and didn't fight demons. Find anything interesting about levitation when it really happened. What dorks? let's talk about the visual effects real quick. Okay. Yeah. We like those. So the demons were real actors in rubber suits. Like they were really running around the little demons. The Little Demons. That was all shot using forced perspective stuff. There was some, stop motion animation involved. Like with an arm getting slammed in the door and it like, turns it like in the, when it hits the floor it turns into a little sperm and then gets, goes back under the door. Right, right, right. That was fun. The rubber suits were made to look minuscule by their position relative to the camera and to the human characters. And it's just so crazy how they pulled it off. It really is. Yeah. I mean, I also like the effect of the phone. When they hung up the phone and it melts on the wall right there. I was like, oh, that's cool. Like, that was all, you know, that was all practical effects. It wasn't CGI because they didn't have stuff like that. So, man, I just thought that was a cool effect. Yeah, it really was. And until you see the photo, like, we'll share this, but until you see the photo or look it up right now, like, you'll, you really won't know what we're talking about, but. It's something cool to check out. Yeah. The director talked about the, visual effects and bringing the little minions to life in the movie and shooting them and all that stuff, all the miniatures and the people in suits. And he said, A fortuitous delay before the start of production allowed me to spend my many extra weeks with Randy Cook designing the creatures and storyboarding. We ended up with several similar creature looks. For the minions, to choose from. Technological and budgetary constraints kept us in the ballpark of what we ended up with. We knew their heights relative to a human, and that they would be played by people in suits on forced perspective sets. They needed to be of a design that could easily be manufactured in multiples, as a rubber suit with a lot of agility. Due to budget constraints, we could only create one head mold, so we had to choose only one expression. And they ended up with dumb, we, they ended up with a dumbfounded look on their faces. Only one had some very basic facial animatronics. Throughout the film, Randy used an encyclopedia of techniques to make the minions work. Blue screen, trick perspective, stop motion, puppets, They were all used in rotation. Once you think you have it figured out, we introduce another technique. Another process used to great effect was the undercrank, and it's explained that you shoot them at a lower frame rate, so they would appear to move a little more So they would appear to move a little more furtively. So they had to be coached to move in special ways in order to compensate for the frame rate. So that's why the minions kind of do look like they are stop motion is because they shot weird. Yeah. They had this weird movement and that's what made me think that they were stop motion all of these years. Cause it looked like it, but it turns out forced percent forced perspective guys in demon suits. And shot a different frame rate to make it all look weird. And it worked! It all worked so wonderfully. It made them creepy. Loved it. Yeah. They were pretty cool. And like I said, like, one of the best shots was the exploding man into lots of little minions. It was fantastic. It was, it was, it was The start of a, a genre of shots, like, cause you see that all the time now. Yeah, exactly. Uh, the eye in the hand. Mm hmm. Do you remember that? Yes, I do. What would you do if you opened up your What would you do if you opened up your hand and there was an eyeball staring back at you, Billy? I would do exactly what Glenn did and stab the shit out of that thing. Would you really? Cause it'll look like it hurt. It's gonna hurt, but I don't want that on my hand. I don't No. No, no, no. What if you just No. One There's an easier way. There's not an easier way. There's gotta be an easier way than stabbing the eyeball in your hand. Um, I don't really care. Do it. Why not close your fist and just smash it? Because on low it's there. And if it starts blinking under my fingers and I feel it, Nope. Stabbing that thing, we're not taking it. But it was cool. I mean that, that's always a cool shot of that. You know, everybody uses that one now too. You like you got it in Pants Labyrinth and you've got it in anime. It's just, but that was the first time I've ever seen that though. Eye in the hand. Yeah, it was. That was, uh, that was Randall William Cook's hand. Oh, okay. The special effects supervisor used his own hand to create the eye. Did he stab his own hand? I don't know. We should ask him next time we talk to him. We should ask him. Yeah, we'll call him. Uh, when the director was asked if there was a particular effect or gag from the movie that stands out as one of his favorites, he said, it's hard to pick a favorite, but there is a moment in the film that I'm always thrilled to see. The medium dolly shot after Al is taken into the wall by the workman. When Glenn walks toward the camera, staring at the closet. He hears Al's distinct screams for help. The look on his face, the camera move, the lighting effects, and the story point all combine to powerful emotional effect. And of course, the scare where the workman falls over and breaks into scattering minions. Heck yeah. Now I went back to re watch that shot, and it is a great shot. When I, when I read this, I was like, I specifically looked for that shot and I was like, that was, that was pretty good. How that all came together right there. But yes, and the work man when he falls, like Billy's favorite scene. That is my favorite scene. I love it. It's so good. So good. when asked about the band Sacrifice, at least I think that it was, that's what the band was called. Yeah, that's what, yeah, I think that's what it is. Uh, that's the record that Terry plays backwards to learn. About all this stuff in the movie. when asked about that band, the director said, I approached an artist designer friend. Mark Kra zin ski, who was a specialist with graphics and was in a band with his brother Mike. The band posed for the pictures and Mark designed the album cover. The liner notes included some of Randy Cook's drawings. Vince Carlucchi's band, Station Twang, provided, I love that, that's a great band name, Station Twang, provided several pieces, including the heavy metal stuff. They were made up of several former members of the Toronto band Cardboard Brains, another great, another great band name. Paul Young, the leader of the Cardboard Brains, also provided several of the voices in the film, including the Ghoul Dads. Great. YOU'VE BEEN BAAAAAAD! Scream in the driveway also used in the trailer. That no other neighbor heard. No other neighbor heard, yes. Yes. And Carl, Carl Kranis did the spoken word vocals on the song that inspires Terry to play the lyrics backwards. That's cool. I mean, that album cover was fantastic. The detail in it was so cool. That's cool. Like, I was like, man, if I had that album, that'd be rad, just to see, not to listen to, the music wasn't that good. But I also love that line, too. When the dad's like, YOU'VE BEEN BAD! Yep. Uh, cause that's what demons do. It is. If you ever hear that, run away! RUN AWAY! I'd pee my pants. Actor Carl Krennis, who portrayed the zombie workman in the movie, was also the dialogue coach for the child actors who appeared in the movie. This Carl Krantis guy, he was actually kind of a full time production assistant to the director on the movie. Had his hand in a lot of things. The director said, I needed an assistant who could be on the production full time and rehearse with the child actors. Most of the time, on set, actors are just waiting, fighting the natural tendency to get bored, losing focus and energy. With child actors, these factors multiply tenfold. I needed a coach who could keep the kids occupied and their energy in sync with the work on set. When it came time to cast the workman, Carl's acting experience and gung ho enthusiasm made him the perfect candidate for the heavy metal prosthetic makeup required. He also was willing to wear full contact lenses as the workman character. Wow, he really enjoyed that character of the director. Yo, he did. He really did. That the whole premise of the movie, I think. It's true. Yeah. Okay, well, good for him. He did it. But all in all, like the gate, it stands kind of as this like shining horrific example of eighties horror cinema that we all just love. It encapulates the era's ingenuity, the vibrancy of the youth led narrative. It's got that youthful energy to it that I just, I've always loved. Okay. And the fun of horror mixed with adventures. Horrific adventures, Billy. We love horrific adventures. We've been on a few horrific adventures. We have. It's basically a film that, despite how old it is, continues to thrill new generations and offer a nostalgic journey for those who witnessed its original release, like myself and Billy. And if you are looking for a wild and fun time and you have not seen The Gate, You need to watch it because it's so good if you're listening to this now Go watch the gate when you're done listening to it Yes If you're in for a nostalgic fun time like a definite 80s movie from front to back the thing is start to finish 80s You'll enjoy this one. It's a lot of fun. Yeah. And there was a sequel to The Gate. The Gate 2 is not as popular. Not many people talk about it at all. Billy hasn't even seen the movie. Okay? Yeah. so Billy needs to watch that. I do. I do. I'm excited though. I didn't know there was a second. Now I feel all bad that I didn't. But the, as we said earlier, the movie sees Lewis Tripp's character, Terry, uh, return. And uses the dark forces to his advantage, like all the things that he learned from the first movie, he brings into this next chapter of the story. When asked about how this sequel came about, because the original director directed the sequel, the director said, I remember our plan was to try and create a real sequel, not just a remake of the first. Our biggest idea to make it different was to make it about Glenn's friend Terry. If they were going back to the same hole, it at least needed a new cast of older characters. that's I love it. That's what he wanted to do. Actually, real quick. Mm hmm. Real quick, everybody. Hold on. Real quick. I'm gonna read you a couple synopsises. I'm gonna read you the synopsis for the first movie, and then the synopsis for the sequel. Perfect. It is perfect, isn't it? You're perfect. Thanks. Okay, so here's the synopsis for the first movie. When best friends Miles and Terry discover a mysterious crystalline rock in Miles backyard, they quickly dig up the lawn in search of more. Instead, they unleashed the gate, the opening to an underground chamber containing terrifying evil. The teenagers soon realize the horror they unleashed as one dire event follows another. With supernatural fiends invading suburbia. It's up to the kids to find the secret that will lock the gate forever. If it's not too late, cause the gate was gonna like, take over the world, right? And I totally forgot to bring this up earlier, Billy, but Terry falls into the hole! He does, and that was a weird scene. That was wild! I totally forgot about that. Cause it's the first time you get like an up close look at the mini demons. As they're biting his face and neck. Right. And Terry ends up being possessed. Yes. Over all this, all this, like it causes him to become possessed in the movie. Right. Totally forgot to talk about that stuff earlier, but yeah. I'm glad I read the synopsis, because it just reminded me of stuff. Yeah, it was exciting to see the inside of that cave, but then when you really look around, they didn't show much. But It was like a hallway. It was a great, it was fun to watch Terry in that situation being terrorized by little demons. I mean, the look on his face was priceless. The terror and the fear, I loved it. Um, can you explain to me something? I'll try. So, Pretty much what they're trying to say is you can read any verse of the Bible at those guys, and they're just gonna Any verse, Billy. Any verse of the Bible. Any verse. Yes. Okay. I got it. So. The synopsis for the sequel is much shorter, and it reads, Four teens summon forth a diminutive demon minion from the other side to do their bidding and grant their wishes. But of course, they must all ultimately pay the price and die. I, I, I, I added that last part. And die. Um. And die. Heh heh heh. the sequel is worth watching. It's not as good as the OG, but it is still a fun movie. It's still to like nice to catch up with Terry. Yeah, and continue his adventure. Best character in the movie. Yep. well, awesome. I'm going to have to check that out because I really liked him. Alex Winter. Oh, From Bill, from Bill and Ted's. Yes. He was actually, uh, also developing a remake of the movie. I believe he was involved with the, uh, the Gate 3D movie Mm hmm. And he, when developing his version of the film, he was interested in bringing H. R. Giger in. Oh, that would have been cool. To do the creature designs for it. And H. R. Giger was the guy who worked on, The Alien movies, the Alien franchise. Yeah, he came up with the Alien design. Yeah, so he was supposed to be providing the whole new creature design and stuff for it. Uh, which were going to be based off the original designs by, uh, Randall William Cook. But, they actually did, I believe they released some, uh, some photos, like test photos of what they were looking at doing for this. And From what I recall, they do, they did look the same as the original creatures. Just Okay. Just a little more advanced? Yeah, just a little more advanced. Okay. But that's That's pretty cool that they were like looking to bring Giger in and to work on this movie. Like, that is Yeah, that That is interesting to me. Like, if you're gonna do a horror movie, bringing him in isn't gonna hurt the production. No, not at all. He's actually going to bring it up because he had such cool designs, his artwork is amazing, so just imagine what he could do with that demon. So while it was cool that they were at one point looking to get Giger involved, Giger obviously passed away and, I'm sure they could find an artist out there that could do, that can really get what they're looking for. There's a lot of great artists out there. Absolutely. If they ever do remake Giger. This reboot, whatever. You got me hanging on your every word now, bud. So yeah, so we don't know if I. The gate 3d is ever gonna happen. I doubt it now. I doubt that. I think it's just dead at this point I don't know if anyone will even try to go back to that, but who knows you never know You never know. Right? Well, I mean, we should actually start the whole franchise over again. It would be a really fun one. I'd be curious to know if Stevendorf would come back for, like, a legacy sequel or something like that. Great. Like, his character all grown up with a family of his own. Yep. Him and Al they have to find Terry to help him take this guy. That'd be wild. Wouldn't that be wild? I kind of want to say I wouldn't I wouldn't mind seeing that movie guys I wouldn't mind seeing that movie and his kids have to deal with the demons, right? But I mean and then we can blow past that Common theme where the parents don't believe the kids Stephen Dorff is like yes. I was there before let's do this Yeah, so I don't know. I'm excited We'll just have to see if, uh, if anything ever comes of that. It's been so long. It's been so long. I don't know. Yeah, I mean, but it does seem like a story that would be really awesome for, right now. Because we'd have the visual effects capabilities to make something amazing. What? I totally, like, just found this new note. Hmm. Okay, so we were talking about Lewis Tripp earlier, the guy who plays Terry. Yeah. Right? Okay. Yes. In 2020, he worked with Australian musician, Kid Crusher on a music video collaboration called Sacrifice, and he reprises his role as Terry for a tribute to the gate in this. Okay. Well, let's look this up. So, so that's just, so, so yeah, that's wild. So we just watched, we just watched the music video. So that was fun. It was pretty cool. Yeah, I mean, they recreated a lot of the sets that were used from the original movie. Louis Tripp has the same face. He's older now, but you would recognize him. Yes. Yes. That's pretty much it, guys. It's so much fun. I had a good time talking about it. Me too. Hope you all had a good time listening to it. Yeah, do you have any favorite quotes, Billy? Your quote and my quote are the, the dad. You've been bad. That's the one. I love that one. That's just because it's so out of touch, but it feels like that's what a demon would do. Something crazy and weird like that. Yeah. Terry had all the good lines though. Another line that I liked is, we accidentally summoned demons who used to rule the universe to come and take over the world. Yes, um. And then there's the one that's like, Demons aren't going to ring the doorbell. I like it when he's going through, he's talking about the, how to get the rid of the demons. He's saying the lines that he would need to say. And Glenn goes, isn't that kind of insulting? He's like, I guess it's supposed to be. I mean, we're trying to get rid of them. Yeah, they're, they're funny. It's Terry Steele's show all the way. Yeah, I'm going to, I'm going to have to watch it again just to enjoy Terry's role one more time. So, if you've never seen The Gate, go watch The Gate. This is a fun movie, great horror film, good family flick. Don't watch it with your kids. Or watch it with your kids, I don't know. I was gonna say, yeah, even we were kids when we watched it. I know, I can't tell you what you can and can't do, but if you've never seen it, see it. If you have seen it, go re watch it again, because it's worth revisiting. I watched it on Prime Video, I believe. Is that where you watched it? Yeah, that's where I watched it. Yeah, so, it's on Prime Video. You can watch it there. Enjoy. In the meantime, until next time, good journey, everybody! Good journey. May the old devils depart! May they burn in the fires of their own damnation. May they freeze in the infinite golden darkness of their own hideous creation. And