The American Friend

Tom Ripley, who deals in forged art, suggests a picture framer he knows would make a good hit man.

Austin Lugo: before we get into the American Friend. Next week we are going to be watching the Holy Mountain. We are always on the lookout for. Genres of films, types of films that we haven't watched before, and we realize that we have watched. No Spanish speaking films in our entire podcast filmography. So we tried to fill up that hole with this film.

This is a film you have seen before. Is there any particular reason you picked this film, Andrew? Well,

Andrew Harp: we were having a hard time picking a movie, uh, , and I was like, well, you know, holy Mountain is a good movie that, uh, everyone should watch. And that I wouldn't mind watching it again. I wouldn't mind watching it several more times.

Austin Lugo: It's very, I am very excited for that experience. I'm sure it'll be a grand time, but this week we are watching, or rather we just watched Vim vendors. The American friend. And are you seen two Vin Benders films? Is that correct? Yeah,

Andrew Harp: I mean, I've seen one of his features, Paris, Texas, which I watch that in college, so it's been a few years.

But, um, I mean that's like one of the greatest movies ever made and I've seen his documentary, uh, Buena Vista Social Club, which is the documentary of course that he made about the album, which is also pretty good. So yeah, I mean, like, I've seen some of his works, but he has like a bunch of features and I've only seen that one.

This is probably like the second, maybe third feature I've seen

Austin Lugo: by him. I too have seen very few of his work. For some reason, I always get him confused with Werner Herzog. Maybe it's just because they're both German filmmakers.

Andrew Harp: I get him confused with, uh, Jonathan Demi for some reason. Yeah, I

Austin Lugo: think thematically, or maybe there's just something about German filmmakers of this time because all of the German filmmakers I've watched of like the sixties, seventies, and eighties, they all have a very specific type of filmmaking techniques and.

The themes that they cover are very similar, and maybe it's just because Germany at this point in time was in a very complicated spot with the Berlin Wall and all that kind of stuff. But before this film, I two had only seen two VIN vendors films. I had seen Paris, Texas, like you have seen, and I saw the Wings of Desire, which as I've mentioned before, I've seen that film like six or seven times, an incredibly beautiful film.

Extremely well-written film, so I was super excited to get into this experience. You're probably getting

Andrew Harp: them confused too, because Vendors and Herzog, I mean, they both, they still work and they work for several decades and they both made a lot of features and documentaries, like they're both known for their features and documentaries.

Austin Lugo: So Vem vendors, the American friend starts off with the great Dennis Hopper. Our American friend, easily

Andrew Harp: one of the greatest, if not the greatest, like American actor that

Austin Lugo: ever worked so incredible. In preparation for this film. I watched some of the extra stuff that the Criterion Collection always gives, some of the interviews that they do with actors and that sort of thing.

And one of the interviews was with them vendors himself, and he talks about the experience of working with Dennis Hopper. Dennis Hopper actually wasn't his first choice. His first choice was John Houston, but John Houston immediately shut it down. He's like, I don't want to do this. I, I have no interest in it.

And so VIN Vendors is looking around and someone suggests that he go and meet Dennis Hopper and at the time, Dennis Hopper had just finished shooting Apocalypse

Andrew Harp: Now. Yeah, , which that shoot was over almost 300 days,

Austin Lugo: I believe. And famously an awful shoot. Just a terrible experience I've watched

Andrew Harp: out of Darkness.

Wait, no. Yeah, with the documentary about the, the production of Apocalypse Now, I don't think it's called out A Darkness. Heart and a Darkness. Yeah. And uh, the documentary about Apocalypse Now, like just mostly just like the production and shooting that they did in the Philippines and stuff, and, and that movie, Dennis Hopper plays a, uh, like a photographer and has a, the funniest cut ever because, They're showing behind the siege footage of Dennis Hopper, and it's just behind the scene footage, but he acts like his character in the movie.

Like he's really like hopped up on something, like he really is on drugs, you can tell. And then it cuts to Dennis Hopper like in the nineties or whatever when they made the movie. And he's totally chill, just sitting in his chair like, yep, that was crazy. I was not doing well. . Because like I think during this time I think he was heavily on drugs and just kind of temperamental and then I think later, I think he was able to get clean and then he had his like kind of big come up, you know, where he was in like boo velvet and stuff like that.

So yeah. Yeah.

Austin Lugo: VIN vendors. Describes meeting Dennis Hopper for the first time. They had already started shooting for two weeks, and what's interesting about this film is our two main characters, the American Friend, played by Dennis Hopper, and our protagonist, who's, I can't remember the name of the actor at the moment.

Bruno Gaines? Yes, Bruno Gaines. This is one of Bruno's very first films, so he's a very new actor at this time. He hasn't done a whole lot of work. He's extremely prepared and ready. And Dennis Hopper. Upon first me VIN vendors is high as fuck as VIN vendors describes it? Definitely.

Andrew Harp: Yeah. ,

Austin Lugo: he's still in whatever character he is playing from Apocalypse Now.

He is not in a good place at all. He's two weeks late for the shoot and he is just acting like the shittiest human being on earth, just in a really bad place. Then vendors is absolutely just pissed off because the two actors at first do not get along at all cause. Sweating heads, they're very different people, and they get into this huge fight onset.

You know, they're throwing punches at each other. I mean, really just going at it. So then Benders kicks them off. You know, he shuts down the film for a couple of days. And I guess that night, the two of them, Dennis Hopper and Bruno go and just get absolutely wasted and become the best of friends. And I guess for whatever reason,

Andrew Harp: that's basically like the movie.

It like completely makes sense. That's probably the best part of the movie is their dynamic in their friendship, their quote unquote friendship. It's the best part of the movie for sure. They're so good, uh, together and individually.

Austin Lugo: Absolutely. So you got Dennis Hopper who is selling forged paintings.

Andrew Harp: Yeah. He's rich as

Austin Lugo: fuck. Well, they're not forged, they're kind. It's weird because, but the painter is the actual, like original painter, but he's pretending to be dead and so he paints his own paintings and then sells them to rich people, which the whole plot line's very weird and strange. Quite understand why I guess the painter pretends to be bit dead because he makes more money that way.

If he's dead, then like Viv, he's still living, making paintings.

Andrew Harp: I didn't realize that he was, that he was pretending to be dead. I thought it was just like a very good like forger.

Austin Lugo: That's what I thought at first too. I actually only learned that from the documentary that I watched cuz we have vendors.

Mentions that maybe it's more

Andrew Harp: described in the book than in the movie. Probably. Maybe the movie is more, uh, it doesn't really matter either way, to be honest.

Austin Lugo: No, the point is the guy's forging paintings. And the other

Andrew Harp: thing about this movie is that the, that that forger is played by Nicholas Ray, who he, he's like in the movie for like two minutes, but it's like, oh yeah, it's Nicholas Ray cuz he is got his like eye patch and everything going on.

The movie is actually like, the movie's kind of weird because. All the actors are

Austin Lugo: directors, very famous directors. Yeah.

Andrew Harp: Including Dennis Hopper, Gerard Blaine, who I think is like the French guy who hires Jonathan and Samuel Fuller's in it as well. Nicholas Ray. And then like a bunch of other, all the other like European guys too that we see like more or less are also all directors.

If you go on their letter box page and you click on them, it's like, oh, they've made like a dozen movies or something like that. It's very strange, but uh, it's a funny

Austin Lugo: detail. Supposedly the reason them Benders hire, A bunch of directors for the film is they didn't hire a casting director. And he didn't know any actors, so we just hired, cuz like Samuel Fuller and Nicholas Ray were just close friends of his.

He's like, fuck. I just like, I know these people and I mean, they're technically actors too, even though they're

Andrew Harp: Samuel Fuller is in a bunch of movies. I mean, I would say Samuel Fuller is an

Austin Lugo: actor. Yeah. Nicholas Ray is interesting because Nicholas Ray wasn't originally supposed to be in the film. That whole part wasn't originally in the book.

At least his character wasn't. I think that plot was, but Nicholas Ray's character wasn't, and he wrote, wrote a bunch of stuff for him because I guess Nicholas Ray was in an extraordinary amount of debt and like he couldn't afford to pay his own rent, and so Vin Benders just felt bad for him and he is like, that was probably his a.

Andrew Harp: Probably, yeah, , very dingy apartment . They clearly filmed everything there to all of his stuff within like a day or something like that too. Probably within a half a day because like Dennis Hopper, he sees him and then he goes to Europe and then he comes back. But it's, yeah, it's like they're, it's clearly the same day.

It's, it

Austin Lugo: rocks. So you got Dennis Hopper who's trying to sell these forge paintings, and at this auction, which they just run the whole auction. Like they just start from the beginning and just run the whole fucking thing, which I. Very slow, very intimidating. The music, the score behind this, there'll be like very intense score when seemingly very little is going on.

Like it kind of feels like people are just standing around. But that score just puts this tension behind everything that just feels ugh. And they're going through the whole auction. And that's when Dennis Hopper meets Bruno, uh, Jonathan, who build. Frames for a living.

Andrew Harp: And they have like a shaky introduction where like, first of all Yeah, like Dennis Hopper, he's Tom Ripley, he's like from the books.

Yeah. And uh, they're in Hamburg. I think the movie mostly takes place in Hamburg, but they go to a bunch of different places. Yeah. And they like meet each other. And this like interaction that they have is kind of like, It's sort of the center of the movie, right? Where like Jonathan, he refuses to shake Tom's hand cuz he's basically says like, oh, I've heard of you before.

He also says out loud to during the auction, like, that's a forgery. Like there's something off about it. And he is like, yeah, I've heard of you before. And refuses to shake his hand. And then like, Tom also talks to a gun. He's like, yeah. And you know, Jonathan, he's got a, he is got a blood disease, he's gonna die soon.

Like he's not doing well. And he's like, Hmm. And then they don't, they don't meet each other again for a while. It really focuses heavily on Jonathan for sure. And then he gets like a, A letter, right? Jonathan does. That's one of the things that at least happens a little bit after their meeting is that he receives a letter from like someone in New York, right?

I think so. That's like, I'm so sorry about your blood disease, like. I'm sorry that you're gonna die soon. And he's like, what the fuck? Like, he's been told that, he's like, fine. For the most part, he has a blood disease. But it's clear that like Tom is like spreading rumors that he's doing very badly.

Austin Lugo: And Jonathan, of course is completely obsessed with figuring out Yeah, this like, it, it consumes

Andrew Harp: his life.

It's a big part of the movie. Yeah.

Austin Lugo: And I clearly, Tom just knows how. Manipulate people and kind of give what he wants out of things. Like he knows how much this will just consume Jonathan. It becomes his every wakey moment and every conversation he has with his wife, which he doesn't have a lot. She's the only woman in the film which Vin Bender talks about because of course the book is written by a woman and VIN vendors is fascinated.

The way she explores men and how masculine the world of this film is, and the book is, and what a few conversations he has with his wife. His wife's like, you really need to stop obsessing about Yeah. this disease day. Like you're, you're freaking everyone out. You got, you got a son. Yeah, she gets, uh,

Andrew Harp: pretty upset in the movie,

Austin Lugo: which is fair cuz he is being pretty obsessive about it.

Yeah.

Andrew Harp: He's like kind of freaking out a little bit too much about the letter and everything. And of course he's obsessing about like the rumor, but then at the same time he is also obsessing with the fact like, what if it's true? What if I've been lied to into thinking that like. Things are okay, but actually like I have no time left and actually my family will be left like with no money or support cuz I'm gonna die soon.

So he is also obsessing over that. Like what if the rumor is true? What if it's not a rumor? And it's actually like the truth. So like there's the scenes where like he goes to his doctor and he is like, Hey, is everything good? And the doctor's like, yeah, no, you're fine. It's okay bro. He's like, uh, okay. Like he still doesn't like a hundred percent trust him.

Yeah. Like you said, he's just completely obsessive and Yeah, it's such a big part of the movie . It helps that Jonathan is played by Bruno Gaines cuz he's so good. He has a really great eyes, he has like very dark, powerful eyes and he's a very vulnerable actor and so the character is very vulnerable and like, I don't know, he's really fucked.

Austin Lugo: Performance is incredibly raw and utilizing this idea that he's going to be dead soon, we. Meet the mysterious French man who is like

Andrew Harp: Raul. He's a criminal who

Austin Lugo: wants people killed. I don't think they ever explain why these people are killed or for

Andrew Harp: what purpose. They're like mafia people. I fe I think they use the word mafia.

It doesn't really matter. It's just kind of like, he's like a French guy and they want to kill these other criminal guys. And Tom owes him, I think

Austin Lugo: too. And I guess his idea is that instead of hiring a professional killer, an assassin of sort. He wants to hire this guy because no one would ever suspect that this man would murder these random people.

It's kind of like a strangers on a train situation. Like these people don't know each other. There's no reason they would do it. And he's utilizing the fact or which

Andrew Harp: also strangers on a train written by Patricia Highsmith.

Austin Lugo: Oh shit. I did not know that. She really does at all, huh? Yeah, she's, she's awesome.

She's a really good writer. So Raul utilizes the idea that this man is going to die of this rare blood disease, and he is like, I'll give you some money you can have for your family, Achilles people, and even if you get caught, which you won. Like it doesn't matter. You're gonna be dead like in a couple of years anyways, so who gives a shit?

Yeah,

Andrew Harp: that's the other thing on top of it is like all the murder stuff and of course like, you know, Ripley kind of pawning off the work also like alleviates his death with Raul as well. This movie is very like globe trotting. There's a lot of different language is being spoken. French, German, English, they're New York City, they're in France.

They're in Germany, of course. And yeah, so Jonathan, he goes to, uh, France to do the job, this whole section of the movie where Jonathan goes to France to commit the first murder. That whole section is like very good, where he goes to the doctor and everything, and he is like, and then he goes to the train station is very, very, very

Austin Lugo: good.

Oh my God. The train station scene is the rocks absolutely incredible. I mean, every beat of that, it just has the, the most, there's no perfect music of pacing. Yeah. It's just this guy. Following this other guy around and it's very clear that he has like no idea what he is doing. Like he's not a trained assassin and he has no idea.

Andrew Harp: I, if I had to kill someone in a public space like this, that's how I would honestly do it. , I found it very relatable because he's like, he's trying to like work up the nerve to do it right. Yeah, because you're following him the whole time while he is following the guy to kill just a guy, whatever. And there are plenty of opportunities that he could do it and he misses quite a few, but it's because he is like trying to work up the nerve to do it.

There's no perfect opportunity. But he's trying to like also find like the perfect opportunity as well to like Merk this guy. And I don't know, I found that very like relatable. Like the way that he kinda like moves around and follows him and just kind of is kind of like, I don't know,

Austin Lugo: it's just so nerve-wracking to watch this whole experience.

And there's this great little tiny scene right when he gets into France. He's on one of those people movers and at the end of the people mover, a guy just like trips off of the people mover and it kind of feels like this one off weird thing. And I couldn't understand why that's in there. Like I don't, why would they keep that?

There's, there's no reason. But of course when he finally does murder the. It's on an escalator and the guy falls off the esca or rather is killed on top of the escalator. It's a weird little parallel that I don't quite understand fully, but I love it. Like, I love that little, just tiny little detail of which they're like kind of suggesting that this is gonna happen even though it's, it's just like this tiny little thing and the whole chase is.

Tense and nerve wracking. Yeah, because you're like, you're terrified that this man's gonna get caught cuz he is not doing a good job at all. You think he's

Andrew Harp: gonna get caught too after the fact? Because they show like all the security cameras in which like, he looks directly into the cameras. So you think like, oh my gosh, he's done for, they're gonna get him.

But he doesn't, the police don't get him in trouble for some reason. Like he just doesn't,

Austin Lugo: it's absolutely no problem with police or, yeah, there's

Andrew Harp: like really no problems with police. I guess Europe is just different , I guess. Like, I don't know, like he's not a French guy. Like he's not a French citizen.

Maybe because

Austin Lugo: he lives somewhere else. I don't

Andrew Harp: know. Maybe it's a little bit more difficult to search out if you're like a, an immigrant. He just doesn't get in trouble with any like law enforcement, which I like. I like that there's no, like, you could really like fuck up a movie like this if you added like a separate like law enforcement thing where you add like a cop character or something who's like, we gotta find these guys.

That would be so super corny if they added it into this movie. But in this movie, it's all. Like the criminals and it just completely focuses on them. Yeah. Having

Austin Lugo: any sort of law enforcement involvement would've slowed down. The pacing of this movie, because I think one of the best parts of this film is just the absolute incredible pacing.

I mean, every moment of this film just feels exactly right for what should be happening. It never feels too slow. It never feels too fast. Everything feels just so perfectly paced. I mean, down to the single frame, just the way the camera moves and the way we move with. And the way we follow these people, it all just feels almost like a puzzle in which each piece just perfectly fits with the next.

And so without the involvement of the police or anyone, he basically gets away, Scott free. He is like, I did it. But unfortunately, according to Raul, the job is not done. He thought it was a one-off thing, but there's going to be a, a second murder in which he has to commit.

Andrew Harp: I think too, around this time you have like Ripley, he's in New York City.

He lives in Hamburg, but he's in New York. You have that random part where like, I think he starts to feel bad. About like, I don't know, fucking over Jonathan's life, over, you know, him being mean to him. And you have that crazy shot too, where like he's like walking like on the, uh, interstate wall. Yeah. Like in New York City and it like zooms and you're in like apartments that has like all of the criminals.

That the French guy wants dead, which that reminded me of something. I was trying to think what it reminded me of. Oh, he does that in Buena Vista Social Club where like a a, he'll be following a musician walking around and then it'll stop, and then it'll zoom into the background and then you have the set other subject that he's talking with, which is like another musician or whatever.

I think he likes to do shit like that, where you kind of like, people are closer than they. You know, kind of a small world type thing. But Ripley Tom, he, uh, he goes back to Germany,

Austin Lugo: I believe it's between these two murders that Jonathan takes his wife and kid to the fairgrounds or circus or carnival, something like that.

There's a rollercoaster and it's the wonderful scene because he's having like this serious conversation with his wife. But , they show him riding on a rollercoaster. They basically put a camera, On the front of a rollercoaster. It's a beautiful shot and they're just like zooming around, like back and forth.

And of course, Bruno's face. Jonathan's face is super serious. Just dead pit. Yeah. It's so funny. That whole scene is. Just a beautiful and touching scene between a husband and a wife and her concern with what he seems to be doing. She doesn't know exactly, but she kind of is catching on because Yeah, she's

Andrew Harp: getting more and more pissed off cuz he is like o obviously hiding like some criminal behavior.

It's like very obvious, like we like weird phone calls and stuff like that. Like yeah, she's no dummy and yeah, like Tom goes back to Germany. And he starts to like form a friendship with Jonathan. Like they start to actually get kind of chummy and stuff. Like he asks him to make some frames and things like that, and he makes it and they just kind of start to form kind of like a friendship.

It's a very like shallow surface level friendship, but they start to kind of like be chummy with each other and kind of like have some camaraderie going on. Yeah, and I think like soon after that he has to go in a second assignment, right? Yep.

Austin Lugo: He's a second assignment on the train, A long train. Love a good train scene.

Yeah, there's a lot of train

Andrew Harp: shit. Yeah. It's just high Smith. And I like the trains

Austin Lugo: and this one people are very concerned with because I think Tom's concerned about it because he is like, you need a professional for this because killing someone on a train. Very different situation cuz you can't leave, like you can't leave the fucking train.

Andrew Harp: Yeah. It's difficult. He has to kill like two people. Or may, maybe he just has to kill one people. But he, it's in a big group. It's the same group that we saw in another city. Right? Yeah. He has to like, like somehow like kill this one guy and try not to kill anyone else. And, but Jonathan's like, whatever. It doesn't matter.

There's also probably kind of like a, an excitement to it. Right? I would say the movie kind of progresses in a way where the more kind of crazy shit that Jonathan. The more, I guess exciting he finds it. So I think like he's like, yeah, I wanna fucking, you know, I wanna, I wanna do it because he's like kind of going through like a weird, you know, health crisis.

So he wants to do some exciting shit and yeah, he's like on the train and that train, the whole, that scene is really good too, where he's trying to like find a way to kill this guy and then Tom. Comes outta fucking nowhere cuz he fucks up. He immediately fucks up. He like, I think he has his gun in the bathroom, right?

And the guy opens the door, the guy he's supposed to kill, and he sees his gun. He's like, shit.

Austin Lugo: He's not a trained professional in any way. Like he's super nervous. He goes to the bathroom to play around with his gun. And of course the man who opens the door is the man. He's got a murder. He's like, fuck.

Like if all the people opened the door at that moment, he just couldn't lock the bathroom door. But luckily Tom shows up at that exact. And there's this incredible, yeah, so good. 10, 15 minute, maybe even 20 minute scene.

Andrew Harp: I could imagine this like same kind of like scene or like dynamic or whatever. I could see this translated in like other movies, like maybe like I could see this translated in like a really sh.

Kind of not good screwball comedy from like the two thousands or 2010s. Like I could see this movie being made today with like a really bad version with like Kevin Hart and like, I don't know, mark Wahlberg, right? , like you can kind of see it, you know what I mean? But you know them vendors, you know, he doesn't use a lot of music.

It's a very kind of crusty gray, brown, dark kind of seventies neo war vibe. So there's like a lot of darkness going on. But yeah, that train scene, you can see kind of like the, the, the architecture of like that scene translated into, you know, like a really shitty like comedy movie for Netflix about Kevin Hart and Mall Park Walberg or whatever.

Austin Lugo: It's probably already in production. I'm sure they're making probably,

Andrew Harp: yeah, it's probably already been made. It probably already exist.

Austin Lugo: Yeah, I think it's so interesting that there's some very funny and silly moments in this, especially this scene where they're trying to murder this man and have him locked in the bathroom and people keep walking by.

But because of the greatness of the film and because of maybe the honesty of the film, VIN vendors never makes fun of Jonathan, even though Jonathan has no idea what he is doing. And there's some absurd moments and he is doing some absurd things. VIN vendors is very sympathetic to Jonathan. You're always on Jonathan's side and you always wanna be on his side.

Andrew Harp: Yeah, you feel very bad for him.

Austin Lugo: And even though this is a very funny scene, you don't ever feel like laughing at him. You're the nerve. At least for me are still very high. And you're very nervous. There's like no music

Andrew Harp: or anything like that. Like, it's still like a very tense scene. Especially like Dennis Hopper's performance.

Dennis Hopper is just like, he's like rolling around on the floor and he's wild. He's like off the wall. He's off the wall. He's so good. But like, even though that performance is funny, it can be seen as funny. It also makes, I guess the whole situation more, um, unpredictable, right? Cuz like Tom, he's unpredictable, so it makes it more, a little bit more tense.

Austin Lugo: Tom is just someone who doesn't give a fuck about anything. I mean, he just does whatever when he goes and murders that man. It's, I mean, I guess at this point Tom's murdered a lot of people,

Andrew Harp: so yeah, he's like a murderer, like he's a professional murderer ,

Austin Lugo: so who cares how many people he has or continues to murder.

He doesn't give a shit and he does a great job. I mean, he murders this man. He throws him out the train. And then of course as they're trying to throw this man at a train, another man catches them. So that guy becomes part of the murder process and they gotta throw him out of the train too. They just throw him out.

It's so incredible because they get away with it. They don't, they just get away with it. Again. Yeah. That scene where like

Andrew Harp: Samuel Fuller is like walking through the train to find out where the guys went and they don't,

Austin Lugo: they, they don't do anything. It's so funny to me.

Andrew Harp: They just kind of get away with it.

You do have that really good moment where he goes to the front of the train, Jonathan, and he like cries out of the window. He's simultaneously like excited about the whole experience rep, but he's also upset about it. Right. And so he kind of like can't help but like be upset cuz he is not like, Because he's not Tom Ripley.

Yeah, he's not Tom

Austin Lugo: Ripley. Yeah. He has feelings and emotions and can't just murder people in cold blood. So there's a lot of mixed emotions at that moment because as you've pointed out, there seems to be sort of this fetish almost at this point for Jonathan, for killing these people. I mean, there's no reason he has to go back and kill a second person.

He's even paid to kill a first person. And even though he still believes that he is gonna die, He could very well just live the rest of his life without doing the second killing, but he finds some sort of dark joy in it, and now that he's had this bonding moment with Tom, Their friendship becomes even more strangely intertwined.

There's almost something sexual behind their friendship and not necessarily romantic, but there's just this underlying tension between these two characters after this woman, because I guess when you murder someone together, there is a certain relationship that forms between two

Andrew Harp: people. Yeah. This relationship, it's so good.

just after the train, they like hang out and chill, right? They like have some beers and stuff and they kind of. Once again, their interactions like, it's not like throughout the whole movie, it's more kind of, their interactions are for the most part, kind of few and far between. Once again, if we were to make the Kevin Hart Mark Wallberg version of this, I think the, whoever's producing would be like, okay, they have to meet, but we need to have them meet as soon as possible.

And they have to be together often. And the American friend is just kind of like, you know, their interactions and their meetings are more jagged. They don't happen super often, but when they do it, it's very pleasurable. It's very fun to watch. Very kind of weird chemistry because the characters are so different.

Austin Lugo: It's a wonderful relationship and good on VIN vendors for refusing to have just that be the crux of the film because it is such a pleasurable part of the film and whenever Tom Ripley is in it, I mean, he just, Truly steals the show. Dennis Hopper can't help but be one of the greatest actors of all time.

So whenever he's in it, he's just absolutely crushing it. And yet he's really only in a couple of scenes. Like even though when I think of the film, I think of Dennis Hopper and I think of those scenes of those two together. I mean of the two hours, they're probably only together maybe 20 or 30 minutes of the film.

A lot of the. Is just Jonathan just trying to figure his shit out, trying to not die from his blood disease and his wife slowly catching on and eventually just realizing that Tom Ripley is the absolute worst because he is, and she's. Fed up with it as she

Andrew Harp: should be. Yeah, she's super pissed off. I think Jonathan is being threatened by like, uh, whatever mafia guys are left the leftover people on the train, like I think, yeah, and it explodes in like a big physical alterca altercation, right.

Where he hits her. It's like very, very like rough. And I think after that too, I think a little bit after this, they go to Tom's house, right?

Austin Lugo: Yeah. Raul confront. Jonathan because Raul's been threatened, his house has been blown up or something like that. Basically the, the mafia figured out that Raul was tied to the killings somehow, probably because of Tom Ripley's how they figured it out.

I'm guessing cuz the whole reason of not hiring Tom Ripley and hiring Jonathan was because Jonathan had absolutely no ties, arrivals. There's no reason that they would connect it. But when Tom Ripley got involved, the mafia realized that Raul was involved. So now Raul. Absolutely pissed. And he's like, you gotta fix the situation.

And Jonathan doesn't know what he is doing. So they go to Tom's house, is that I know they go to a house. I didn't know whose house it was.

Andrew Harp: It's his mansion, right? It's his big ugly mansion in Hamburg. Yeah, he lives in Hamburg and uh, yeah, it's his big ugly mansion.

Austin Lugo: And they're basically waiting to be attacked, I guess, is the plan.

Because,

Andrew Harp: yeah, like you said, like Raul got bombed so they're like afraid that they are next because if they know who Raul is, then maybe they know who they are. So yeah, you're right. They're kind of like hanging out there because they expect someone to show up. And it's funny cuz they're right. Like I said, this is very comedic, but once again, the vendor's tone makes it.

Feel dark and sad, but yeah, like you could imagine, once again, the scene of them waiting in their big mansion, waiting for someone to show up. There's something comedic about it and this whole scene is really good too. You know, the action, the action of the movie is good. It's not too

Austin Lugo: stylized. It's a very patient film in the way it shoots its action scenes.

And I love the way Jonathan accidentally murders this. because the man's trying to step over like a, a ledge or like a, a sinkhole or something. And, and Jonathan just grabs his leg, pulls him down and just murders him. I mean, he hits his head and, and immediately dies. And Jonathan feels a bit guilty about it because I don't think his original intention was to murder this man again.

It, the tone is so strange because when, like you and I talk about the plot or things that. It sounds like we're describing a comedy and it seems very comedic. When we talk about it and yet in the film, like it's weird and like you chuckle, but it doesn't feel funny at all. It's a strange tone.

Andrew Harp: Yeah. Once again, it's just how the movie looks.

It's how the movie feels. It's use of music, it's use of no music. It's a very darkly lit movie, like this scene where they're like outside the mansion and stuff. The movie feels real too. It feels like they're in real locations. It feels like they're in real houses and buildings and trains, so I think that also adds to it as well.

Austin Lugo: So Jonathan murders this man, and they realize that there's probably others. So the bad guys are hiding in like an ambulance, I guess. And in the ambulance is Samuel Fuller, a woman and some bandaged man. Who's the Bandi? Is the bandage man? Supposed to be one of the people they. Tried to kill on the train.

That's Raul. Oh, that makes sense. Okay. I, I couldn't figure out who that was, but Okay. , so they sneak up to the ambulance. Of course, Samuel Fuller immediately sees them because neither of them are professional criminals. I mean, I guess Tom Ripley is, but Tom Ripley isn't. Oh, yeah, he

Andrew Harp: is. He has at least no qualms about killing

Austin Lugo: someone.

Yeah. I mean, he, he commits a lot of crimes. So I guess Tomer plea is quite the criminal, but Jonathan isn't at all. So they immediately get caught and they just throw Samuel Fuller down a flight of stairs. I mean, Samuel Fuller just falls down a giant ass flight of stone steps and a really cool shot, which I guess Samuel Fuller.

Requested that he shoot all of the saints that he's in. So he directs all of those saints . Cause of, of course he does. Cause he's the gray sample. I didn't know that. .

Andrew Harp: What I I didn't know that. That's weird. .

Austin Lugo: Okay. . So I guess Vin vendors and Sam Fuller are like really old friends because when VIN vendors made one of his very first films, Sam Fuller was like one of the only people that saw it and he kind of.

Fin vendors under his wings. So we saw Sam Fuller as kind of like a fatherly sort of figure, a sort of mentor. So whenever Sam Fuller is on screen of VIN vendors was just like, you know, you can direct this. Like you just, you just tell me what to do and I'll do it. Sam Fuller's like, awesome. That's sick. So that's why you have that really cool shot, which is only like, A second, maybe a couple of frames where it's an extreme closeup of Samuel Fuller falling down the steps.

Van Bender said he actually attached a camera to his body and like threw himself down a flight of stairs. It looks incredible. It's a great scene, and, and Samuel Fuller is the immediately. Murdered. They

Andrew Harp: fucking killed that guy. , I guess theoretically, all the bad, all their enemies are dead.

Austin Lugo: They're dead.

They don't have any problems. They did it. They, they fucking did it. I

Andrew Harp: think after that they're like, okay, what do we do now? Right? And they're like, well, they, they wanna get rid of

Austin Lugo: everything, right? They have to get rid of the car, they have to get rid of all the evidence.

Andrew Harp: And so their idea is they're gonna go drive all the way to the.

and then Jonathan's wife shows up, right? Yeah, she sure does.

Austin Lugo: Cuz she's figured it out. She's n she's no idiot. She realizes what's

Andrew Harp: going on. And there was a scene earlier too where like she's at his frame store and she sees him being friendly with Tom. And Tom clearly has like reputation, so she's like, This is not good.

And yeah, she goes to Tom's house and she's like, look, you need to go home. And he's like, I can't, like I have to take care of this. And then they go on a bit of a road trip. It, it feels like they drive her a while. . They make the road trip, which I think the vendors is a big fan of road trips, it seems like.

Paris, Texas has a road trip. It's basically one big road trip. I think he has other earlier movies that I've read about that I think are also big road trips.

Austin Lugo: There's only a couple minutes left in the film. They put in a little road trip.

Andrew Harp: They had to, yeah, he had to put it in there. ,

Austin Lugo: they go to the beach and Tom Ripley is acting like the crazy person that he is, and he lights the car on.

Yeah, and Jonathan just fucking abandoned him. He just, he just guns it. He doesn't give a shit. And Tomer please left to his own demise. And Jonathan and his wife are driving away and Jonathan's clearly having some sort of episode. Yeah, he's not handling everything well. So they drive off of a dam like thing?

Yeah,

Andrew Harp: it's like a wall. Kind of like

Austin Lugo: a, it's a slanted wall that drives up, which like stops the water from coming down onto the road or something. I think so. Yeah. Yeah. And he drives up at the car. Spins out. Really cool. Last second. You know, hand break, that kind of thing. Fun little moment. Then Jonathan is dead.

Andrew Harp: It's like the saddest ending of all time. It's a very sad ending. It's a really

Austin Lugo: tough ending. Jonathan has just gone through this extremely traumatic experience. You know, he's finally done the deed, right? He's finally figured everything out. You know, he is no longer has to murder any more people. He did it.

He's gotten away from Tom Ripley and. He just dies from presumably the blood disease, I guess. Yeah. It's

Andrew Harp: kind of like, it's kind of like his suspicions were almost correct. Right? Or his worries were almost correct. Right. Because he keeps being told again and again that he's okay. And I guess I think the doctors do determine, like throughout the movie, like, you're okay.

You know, it's fine. There's one part where he goes to get a second opinion and they like forge documents to make it seem like he. But I guess that's the thing with like, I don't know, cancer or whatever, you know, I guess like in some cases, doctors can't really 100% determine when a person's gonna go right.

Yeah, it's just a, a bad luck situation in which kind of all the pent up excitement and, you know, adrenaline probably led to his, uh, early demise rather than if he just kind of lived comfortably just doing all of his regular stuff, hanging out with his family. He probably does have a lot more money now, but maybe the murders and crimes and stuff that he was committing maybe led to him dying earlier than he would have

Austin Lugo: quite the tragic ending.

He spends the whole film obsessing about this one single thing about this blood disease that he keeps getting different. Recommendations about, and constantly harassing every doctor he meets and everyone keeps telling him that you're fine. You're gonna be okay. And yet, in the end, perhaps, and probably because he attempts to solve his own problems by murdering all of these people, the excitement and adrenaline as you spoke of.

Probably killed him. And that's it. That's how the film ends, just with Jonathan Dead . It's a

Andrew Harp: fitting ending for the movie. Just cuz like we talked about, the movie isn't very flashy or crazy. It's pretty low key in terms of its editing choices. The way that it looks. There's nothing particularly like, I don't know, everything feels pretty natural.

Paris, Texas is kinda like that too, if I remember correctly. So yeah, it just ends in a way that feels very ordinary. There's a car crash, but it's, it's nothing.

Austin Lugo: I mean, he doesn't hit any other cars, and the car's still fine,

Andrew Harp: and he just kind of slumps over and dies, you know, he doesn't, uh, get shot. It's not like Tom comes with a vengeance.

Jonathan just dies and Tom continues to live and that's it. You know, like there's nothing really else more to say about that. It's a very fitting ending to how the, the rest of the movie is. It's a very consistent movie in terms of its style and. Presentation, a truly

Austin Lugo: powerful ending. Final thoughts, Andrew?

Andrew Harp: Good movie. Yeah, it's a, it's a good, uh, Neo Awar movie. Once again, you know, those, the Dennis Hopper and Bruno Gaines performances are amazing and the way that the movie looks, I think is great. It has a weird tone. It's very particular. There's really only like a couple elements to talk about in the movie.

It, it's not a terribly complicated movie. The emotions are complicated and it's kind of hard to discuss just cause it, it's so complicated. Not in a surface level way, but in a, you know, interior way. Yeah. It's just a really solid movie. You know, just a really good eight outta 10 solid film for sure. I

Austin Lugo: adored every second of this film.

I found it incredibly well written as all of film vendors, films are, at least the ones I've seen visually, extremely appealing. Some absolutely credible performances. The score when they utilize it is so tense. I love that they just got all of these extremely famous directors to be in the film. , it's great to see Samuel Fuller and Nicholas Ray and some of my favorite directors of all time perform in a film.

The plot is insane and absurd. And I don't think anyone could have tackled it other than Vin Benders. I think under almost anyone else's hands this film would've been dumb and failed. I think Vin Benders walked a very tight rope when making this film, creating the tone necessary to explore the experiences that we as viewers, I love this film so much, and I'm so excited to watch so many more VIN Vendors films, so I'm gonna give this film a nine outta 10.

Okay? All right, y'all. Thank you for listening. You can find everything I do at Austin Luca one 12. I'm on letterbox

Andrew Harp: at Retro Andrew, r e t zero, Andrew.

Austin Lugo: And you can find this podcast wherever you hear podcasts. You can also find us on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube at theater 42 or with nothing to say. And thank you all for listening.

Thank you.