Best Seller (1987)
The boyz discuss Best Seller.
Comments (26)
This movie was so damn boring I could barely finish it. Still haven't while I'm writing this. 5 out of 5 burnt cigarette butt holes on hand ✋🏾
“It’s a A-picture. It’s Best Seller.” -JCVD
My dad died recently and Gabrus' bit about everyone coming to ME for comfort about it hit so hard lol. 'Yeah, this must be really hard for YOU, guy that was in the service with him 15 years ago... Glad I could help??'
Big smile on my face at the Kuffs mention
Yo the big blue rips
I don’t know what it says about me personally that I heard Rodgers talking about the 400 view VHS channel he watches and thought “oh yeah Binghamton Broadcasters, I follow them” but you definitely can’t say that this podcast hasn’t found the right audience.
I wish the boys would give Renegade a chance since they love Branscombe Richmond. He is a fuckin delight in Renegade and there's certainly several episodes worthy of the zombie squad treatment
Come on, Stanger! “On a scale of 1 to 5 weeks on the bestseller list” is the obvious criteria!
This is perfect Memorial Day programming as Dennehy used to tell people he got killed in Vietnam.
could this be the original version of the robbery 'President Mask' trope in American cinema? I can't recall an earlier example.
I probably will regret writing this later on, but in this moment I feel I have to. My mother is dying as I'm typing this, and in the final years we bonded over watching crime/noir thrillers. She was a huge book lover and knew all about the publishing industry. So lo and behold, here's a movie which checks off both those boxes. I wanted to show her this film, but it got lost in the shuffle, so I'm watching it now while she's sleeping. I guess the boyz talking about reacting to death was too much of a coincidence not to comment on. All the struggling to find the "Right" thing to say is a topic that's front and center right now, for all parties involved. Anway, this show is exactly the kind of thing that's necessary and exactly what I need as I stumble saying the "Right" words.
I’m going through a similar situation here, Evan. Just be there, with her and for her, that says more than any words.
I just know it was bad associations from this movie that sunk my company's chance of being successful. You'd think Kapa Intercontinental would be far enough away but I guess not.
The funniest Hollywood Arclight costume thing I remember was when Skyscraper was coming out and they had like, 10 dress shirts and they just got progressively more torn up/bloodied/burned.
Since you brought it up on the pod… Dream Lover is a textbook hidden gem. Could be in the top five of erotic thrillers. It’s got a bit of a standard plot twist for these, but the execution makes it come off as special.
Had never even heard of this, had no idea what this was about, so I was blown away, doesn't fully work. but I was down for the ride.
I really enjoyed this back in the day. Woods charismatic psycho act is a lot of fun and Dennehy is always well cast as a solid cop type. Plus it's cool to see a burly character actor like him play the lead cop for a change.
I saw the Big Blue in theatres with my mom when I was 6 in ‘88. The opening scene of the guy free diving under ice still terrifies me to this day.
Was a bit surprised that the Boyz were unfamiliar with it but maybe it didn't break in the US. It was Besson's big sort-of blank check after Subway (1985). I'm a couple years older than the Boyz, and from Europe -- and it was MASSIVE over here, a true phenomenon, huge cultural impact at the time. Inspired at least a couple of my friends to get into diving! Then when I was about 20 and went to university I got a reality check when I realized that it wasn't beloved by all, but rather mocked for its bromance between the master divers, its shallow portrayal of women, etc. All fair points.
There's always good stuff in a Larry Cohen script, he had a knack for good premises. Often tried to one-liner premises or stories that answered the question, "what's the worst that could happen in this situation?". Like the Boyz say, the bones are decent. Something about casting James Woods turns Cleve into more of a sleaze/psycho than he perhaps was written as. And I agree that the inconsistency of the character is a problem -- magic ninja one moment, callous psycho the next, then wannabe-chummy buddy with Dennehy next. I also feel like Dennehy is underserved by the movie. But the opening heist and the shootout at the birthday party go a long way. Found this Cohen quote: "Eventually [Best Seller] got produced by Orion with Brian Dennehy and James Woods, who were good in the picture, but once again I felt that I was getting the B team. If Gene Hackman had played the lead, we might have done much more at the box-office. Brian’s a wonderful actor, but he was never a movie star. A picture like that needed movie stars. I wrote it originally for Kirk Douglas and Burt Lancaster – that kind of combination."
I think there needed to be a section in the story where Dennehy used his actual detective skills to figure out if Cleave and his story was legit, then he teams up with him to take down Kappa. Also hard agree on Cohen, he had a lot of crazy ideas — God Told Me To is ridiculously entertaining and over the top, but I would almost never recommend it to anyone.
Goddamn. Im only a year younger than B D was when he filmed this 😪
I was living in LA in the late 90’s. A new Old Navy opened near the Bev Connection, and I saw Ron Howard shopping with his kids while I was browsing for slacks. Ron was being as nice and sweetly patient as humanly possible as the security guard cornered him to complain that Potsie sang too much on Happy Days. I think the show was still rerunning on local TV. Seriously, a nice guy.
I missed a transition in the Boyz' conversation and thought for a minute they were talking about how sweet and kind Russell Crowe is.
Watched this on Tubi and as soon as it ended Remo Williams started playing… best streaming app ever!
I miss Clubber & Jason. Are they still rooming together?