The Directors' Wall

74. The Journeyman: Curtis Hanson #6: White Dog (1982)

Spoiler alert: Bryan and A.J. are very excited to talk about White Dog (1982), directed by the great Samuel Fuller and co-written by Fuller and Curtis Hanson (we also give away plot details and twists). Paramount executives were expecting this story, about an actress who realizes the dog she has taken in has been trained to attack Black people on sight and the animal trainer who tries to retrain the dog, to be a sensational horror movie, but Fuller (director of Shock Corridor and The Naked Kiss) created a thoughtful art film that deals directly with racism. In going through the history and release of White Dog a familiar pattern emerges: Hanson writes a screenplay hoping to direct, does not direct, the film is made and then shelved or not released, at least not in America. We marvel at the talent involved on and off screen, including great performances from Kristy McNichol and Paul Winfield and a score by the legendary Ennio Morricone. We also talk about the film’s non-release, speculate on what White Dog would have been like if Hanson directed, and are impressed by Hanson’s resilience after another career setback that should have been a breakthrough. This episode’s themed drink was: Jim Beam.

73. The Journeyman: Curtis Hanson #5: The Little Dragons (AKA Karate Kids USA) (1979/80)

Curtis Hanson is finally back in the director’s chair, from start to finish, and it is for the now quite obscure kids movie The Little Dragons, AKA Karate Kids USA (1979) Unsurprisingly, this is not a movie that comes up in interviews with Hanson so we had a hard time digging up any background or behind the scenes information. Bryan and A.J. try to make sense of this movie about a pair of young brothers who use their karate skills to foil a kidnapping that is trying to be a mix of The Bad News Bears, The Hardy Boys, and Deliverance. We speculate on how and why this movie changed titles, marvel at the long life and career of character actor Charles Lane, and share the moments that broke our brains. This episode’s themed drink was: cans of beer.

72. Coppola Cast #36: Megadoc (2025)

It’s time for another great debate about…Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis thanks to Mike Figgis’s documentary Megadoc (2025) which recently debuted on The Criterion Channel. Both Bryan and A.J. loved Megalopolis so we’re predisposed to like a documentary about its making-of, but Mike Figgis crafted an interesting and non-glamourous movie about making a movie. We talk about Figgis’s career and how his respect for actors figured into his approach to the doc; also discussed are Coppola’s frustration with his department heads and Marvel, the increasing tension between Shia LaBeouf and Coppola, and other documentaries about troubled film productions. This episode’s themed drink was: Francis Coppola Paso Robles Cabernet Sauvignon 2023.

71. The Journeyman: Curtis Hanson #4: The Silent Partner (1978)

It’s our 2nd annual Christmas Episode! Our journey through the work of Curtis Hanson brings us to the Christmas crime thriller The Silent Partner. Hanson wrote the screenplay, based on a Danish novel, with the hope that he would direct. Things didn’t work out that way but he did have a hand in completing the film. We talk about Christopher Plummer’s incredible and frightening performance as a psychopathic bank robber; it might be his most intense performance as a villain. We also talk about Elliott Gould’s great performance as a mild mannered bank teller who only seems average and unassuming. There’s a lot to discuss from how the film balances sometimes wildly different tones, to the Canadian tax shelter film era, an appearance of a young John Candy, and how, despite very positive reviews, The Silent Partner went mostly unseen in America. Tangents include: First Blood and the Rambo movies and declaring that Showgirls is forever. This episode’s themed drink was: Glühwein

70. The Journeyman: Curtis Hanson #3: Fly Me (1973) & Evil Town (1987)

It’s a drive-in double feature of movies directed by Curtis Hanson, sort of. Before he completely parted ways with Roger Corman, Hanson directed a prologue for Fly Me (1973), Corman’s entry in the sexy stewardess genre. Later that same year Hanson directed a horror film called And God Bless Grandma and Grandpa, but was fired after the producer decided he wanted a movie with a totally different plot that would eventually be titled Evil Town when it finally saw the light of day in 1987. We review the rest of Fly Me, but spend most of our time trying to make sense of Evil Town, a would-be slasher whose incomprehensible plot is the result of production history so troubled it includes multiple reshoots and title changes, a fraud scheme, the SEC, and more reshoots. Bryan and A.J. try to pick out what remains of Hanson’s original movie, complain about the rarity of the Evil Town blu-ray, and also talk about the remake, Evils of Night (1985), which was released before the original movie. On the bright side, Hanson’s segment of Fly Me featured character actor Dick Miller.  This episode’s themed drink was: Kagatan cocktails.