Original subtitles

-♪ I've been thinking 'bout our cradle ♪

♪ The way it used to sway

♪ When the magistrates were squealing by ♪

♪ And the roaches ran away

♪ The men would come to Memphis ♪

-You know, I don't call up my bank to listen to

the fuckin' "Nutcracker Suite."

♪♪

-♪ Hey, everybody, have you heard the news? ♪

♪ Joe Bob is back in town

♪ He's over at the drive-in, hanging around ♪

♪ Watching crazy movies, so come on down ♪

♪ To Joe Bob's "Last Drive-In" show ♪

♪ Blood, beasties, boobies, and more ♪

♪ Joe Bob's "Last Drive-In" show ♪

♪ It's a spooky good time with monsters and ghosts ♪

♪ Crazy, kooky fun with the world's greatest host ♪

♪ Joe Bob's "Last Drive-In" show ♪

♪ It's gonna be legendary

♪ Joe Bob's "Last Drive-In" show ♪

♪ It's gonna be very scary

♪ Joe Bob's "Last Drive-In" show ♪

♪ Let's go

♪♪

[Static crackles]

-Tonight!

We continue our holy crusade, our crusade to bring

Walpurgisnacht to America.

The night of the witches, the night of Satan worship,

the night that's exactly six months after Halloween,

the night when the line between the living and the dead

is so thin that Michael Jackson could do a sequel to "Thriller",

Cher could talk to Sonny,

the Beatles could have a reunion concert,

my grandpa could send me jokes again that he got out of

The Saturday Evening Post in 1937.

But mostly, it's about witches, evil witches, nasty witches,

witches that are flying on broomsticks and pitchforks,

headed for the Brocken.

The Brocken is the mountain in Germany where

the Witches' Sabbath takes place,

the all night orgy with Satan.

The witches are like Satan groupies.

They're trying to get a backstage pass

and an invitation to climb aboard the Beelzebub tour bus.

So, Darcy, you have a decision to make tonight.

-What's that, boss?

-Darcy the Mail Girl, ladies and gentlemen,

here to handle the social media that comes in from

all nations of the world.

And how many e-mails came in today from Tanzania, Darcy?

-Um, zero.

-All but one nation of the world.

Darcy is here to field your tweets, your instas,

your TikToks, your probing questions.

Darcy is of the opinion that when the movie is on,

you should be typing stuff on Twitter.

My opinion is that when the movie is on,

you should be watching the movie!

How old fashioned of me.

-Some people can do both at the same time.

Maybe you should post more during the movie.

-I'm watching the movie, okay?

Anyway, Darcy, you have a decision to make because

everybody dresses up like a witch on Walpurgisnacht,

but one person does it to confuse the witches.

It's a witch disguise. You're like an undercover agent.

And another person does it to be a witch

because in most villages of central Europe,

the main purpose on Walpurgisnacht is

to burn the witches.

Reduce them to ashes.

Make those unholy, green faced vixens

crash and burn on the flight path into

the Hexen --

Hexentanzplatz.

-The what now?

-Pay attention, Darcy. The Hexentanzplatz.

I explained it last year.

You know, I can't go over the whole history of

Walpurgisnacht every year.

But the Hexentanzplatz is the witches dance floor.

It's the place on the mountain where the witches,

they do lap dances for Satan.

-Ooh. Can I got?

-Yeah, well, yes. But let me finish this.

So half the people on Walpurgisnacht are trying

to kill the witches before they make it to the mountain,

and the other half are witches trying to fly to the mountain.

So which one do you want to be?

-Have you met me?

-Okay, you're a witch. -Yes.

-I get it. I'm gonna be witch finder general.

Burn, baby, burn!

-Sex with Satan, baby.

-Alright, so polar opposites, as usual.

So as we go through the Walpurgisnacht rituals

tonight, you know, the history, the traditions,

the customs that we hope we can transfer from Europe to America,

so we can start celebrating the second Halloween over here.

A few of our Mutant Fam are doing it this year.

-Yay!

-I'm gonna dish the info on the witch burning,

and you are gonna go with the broom stick lore, okay?

-Okay. -Actually, the more hard core

witches prefer to fly on pitchforks

instead of broomsticks.

-Team pitchfork, baby.

And by the way, all you Wiccans out there,

look, we know your cuddly and friendly and you do

white magic, not black magic.

You don't have to convince us of that.

Any time we talk about witches, we get Wiccans that want to

come on the show, talk about group hugs, alright?

We're going to the nasty side!

We're not doing the group hugs. We don't need that.

And by the way, Darcy, the colors on Walpurgisnacht,

everything on Walpurgisnacht is the opposite of Halloween.

So Halloween is orange and black,

Walpurgisnacht is blue and white

because we're not messing around this year.

We are doing everything absolutely by

the Walpurgisnacht book.

-There's a rule book for it?

-There's actually so much crap about Walpurgisnacht written

over so many centuries.

They don't even ask me for ID when I go to

the New York Public Library reading room.

-Oh, my God, you do that?

-Yeah, I've been there so many times,

they don't even ask me for ID anymore.

-Wait, okay, you went to the library for witches night?

-Not just to the library.

Have you even seen the New York Public Library reading room?

That sucker is like two city blocks long.

It has these 100 foot ceilings.

But the main is that's where you have to go to get access to

those 4 million books that they keep under the ground

because they're so, you know, rare and fragile and everything.

-I mean, isn't that all online now?

-No! Darcy.

You know, we don't need to be

discussing the reading room right now.

The point is, there are books and treatises and paintings

and religious texts in all kinds of languages about

Walpurgisnacht for every century since May 1, 870,

which is -- let me do the math on that --

1,200 years ago.

-Wow! You know the exact date?

-Yes, because the Catholic church

canonized Saint Walpurga, the enemy of witches,

on that day.

Before that, the holiday was called Beltane.

And it's Pagan. Remember from last year?

Austin, do you have that Celtic --

Oh, I have the Celtic calendar.

-But you know what? We're good.

We do not need the Celtic calendar.

-Too late. We're bringing out the Celtic calendar.

Alright, so anyway.

To look at a lot of those books and treatises, you have to

fill our a stack slip so that one of the library employees

can descend into the vast underground tunnels of the NYPL

and bring it out for you.

And then you can't get another

book till you give that one back.

-That is fascinating.

-Well, you're the one that expressed, you know,

amazement that Walpurgisnacht

would have a rich literary history.

-No, I expressed amazement that you would go sit in

the library all day to plan an intro for a horror movie.

-Darcy, I am appalled.

I'm appalled that you don't appreciate

the cultural landscape that we're exploring here.

Not just the landscape of Germany and Scandinavia,

which are the main places where Walpurgisnacht is celebrated

today, but the ancient cultures of Moravia and Bohemia.

-Do we even have a movie? -Yes, of course we do.

The movie is "Witchboard"! -Yay!

-Because it's witches night.

-Although "Witchboard" is not really about witches.

It's kind of a "bro movie."

-That's true. It is kind of bromance.

But Tawny Kitaen gets kind of witchy.

And it has the Ouija board, which is a famous tool of

necromancers and mediums.

-Do witches do that?

-I think so. -You don't know, though?

There wasn't a book about it in that fancy library

nerd reading room that you were hanging out at?

-Very funny. Okay, look, Darcy.

I'm gonna explain this one more time.

Alright, see, here's all the Pagan holidays.

And here, we'll put it at the top.

This one is -- here we go. Right here.

-Okay. -This is Samhain.

-It's what now?

-Well, it's "sa-when".

You know, Halloween. Halloween.

Samhain, "sa-when."

You know, being a Pagan is like being in Quebec.

You have to say everything three times.

And the over here at the exact opposite,

six months later, is Beltane, which became Walpurgisnacht,

which we're gonna call Witches Night

because nobody can pronounce Walpurgisnacht.

And it sounds like a German medical term for bulimia.

So everything revolves around the seasons,

which means everything revolves around the sun and the moon,

which means everything revolves around crops and livestock

and sex and childbirth.

So, for example, on Beltane, you're especially worried

about the cattle.

You don't want the witches making the cattle barren.

So like in 1589,

8,000 witches went the Brocken.

Went to the mountain that year.

And the towns around the Brocken did not have milk all year long.

-That's a good thing.

[Laughter]

-They weren't vegans, Darcy.

-Sorry. -They raised cattle,

and they fished, and they killed wild game.

But the witches actually took that one step further.

They used the flesh of babies to make themselves young.

-Oh, they still do that.

-They do not do that. -Oh, my God.

Babies skin cells,

they honestly do that at beauty treatment places.

-They do? -They do.

-Are they beauty treatment places run by witches?

I mean, what... -I mean, some are judging by

what they charge you.

[Laughter]

-You weren't even shocked by that!

You weren't even shocked by baby flesh eating.

You know, oh, baby flesh. Oh, yeah, I've heard of that.

-It's true. -Okay, so all of this is

Druid stuff, and it goes back thousands of years,

before recorded literature.

And we know they did it in Ireland and Scotland,

in many parts of Central Europe, and it was full of all kinds of

creepy stuff like ritual human sacrifice and nature gods

and goddesses.

And the goddess they worshipped at Beltane was Diana.

-Whoo-hoo!

-And the goddess of sex fertility and nature.

She was like Claudia Jennings in "Gator Bait."

Nubile, barefoot, frolicking in the woods.

-I could do that. -I know you can.

But over time, it got to be less and less about cattle

and more and more about sex.

And of course, these wild Brocken orgies,

they might be having sex with the cattle!

'Cause I looked up some of the drawings of

the Brocken orgies, and the first one I look at,

it shows a witch licking the anus of a demon

in the shape of a goat.

And I mean, you know, at first, when they the orgies

on the Brocken, that sounds good.

You know, hey, people, there will be an orgy

on the mountain tonight, you know?

But then they add, "Anus goat licking included,"

and it's not so cool anymore, you know?

-No kink shaming.

-No what?

-Kink shaming. -I'm kink shaming?

-Don't be judgmental. How about that?

-Alright, far be it from me to criticize someone's

livestock fetishes. -Exactly.

-So anyway, over time, the woodland revels

get so far out of hand that the Catholic church decides

they have to stamp it out.

-What got out of hand?

-Woodland revels.

-Okay, just checking. Just checking.

-So they choose a famous female

because Beltane is all about women.

And they tell everybody --

the famous female is Saint Walpurga.

And so they tell everybody it's no longer Beltane.

It's Walpurgisnacht, named after Saint Walpurga,

who drove the witches out of the Saxon abbeys

at Heidenheim and Eichstatt.

With their superior Jesus magic.

You know, the nuns have this Jesus magic kind of stuff.

Actually, if you go to Eichstatt today,

oil flows out of the tomb of Saint Walpurga from

October 12th to February 25th.

I don't why it's just those days.

You can drink the oil, or you can put it on our body

and be healed and protected from witches.

So anyway, they chose her because she was anti-witch.

So Beltane became Walpurgisnacht.

Walpurga's Night, not Witches Night.

It was a "take back the night" move by the Catholic church.

-Are we watching a movie tonight?

-Yes, but let me set it up.

-I feel like you've set it up.

-Alright, I haven't told you all the types of witches...

-Oh, my God. -...that fly to Brocken

on Beltane.

-Maybe after we start the movie.

-Because you have to decide which witch or which witch type

you're choosing for our later reenactment

of the burning of the witches.

-What happened to sex with Satan?

-That only happens if you don't get burned up first.

But on Walpurgisnacht, the witches always get --

the witches always get burned up first.

-This was more fun last year when you talked about alcohol

and then ran bare ass through the woods all night.

-Alright, yeah, well, we can do the alcohol,

but I'm not exactly proud of being a meme illustrating

incoherent drunkenness.

Did you do that? Did you create that?

-I didn't. People did it 'cause they loved it.

They love that meme.

-Well, this year, it's all about sex and fire, Darcy.

-I'm there. -Okay.

"Witchboard."

-[Laughs] Thank you.

-"Witchboard" is the sensitive story of some L.A. party animals

who start monkeying around with a Ouija board so they can talk

to a dead kid named David, and the result is that

several of them get their brains dashed to Jell-O because

an evil Portuguese mass murderer jumps through the Ouija,

grabs a movie camera that floats around a house

like Casper the Ghost on angel dust

then Linda Blairs the body of Tawny Kitaen.

Remember Tawny from "The Perils of Gwendoline"?

You know, where she dressed up like a Home Depot appliance

and tossed her cookies inside the volcano?

Remember that?

This time, Tawny is the prize meat in the love triangle

between a three-piece suit wearing holy yupster

named Brandon and a drunk named Jim who keeps saying,

"Hey, I don't talk to cardboard, man."

The story is about how you should jack with a Ouija

by yourself, especially if you've been smoking

Arkansas polio weed or throwing down those Vaseline cocktails

they sell on the street in Tijuana

because that gives the evil Ouija spirits a chance to be

real nice to you until you start vomiting

and saying the F-word a lot.

As soon as that happens, a trained psychic can

immediately diagnose you

as having bug-eyed demon head disease.

But by then, it's too late.

The guys in the flick eventually have to go out to a boat dock

at Big Bear Lake and sit there with the Ouija on their lap

so they can get the spirit to come out in the open

and levitate some axes and talk through a larynx box

like evil spirits are expected to.

So, let's take a look at those Drive-In Totals.

And let's cue air traffic control to be on the lookout

for crazed harridans all sexed up for Satan

with torch bearing villagers

trying to shoot them out of the sky.

We have 4 breasts, 5 dead bodies,

2 undead bodies, 1 pint blood,

1 demonic weejee board, 11 meaningless jump scares,

sundial impalement, aggressive POV ghost camera,

Tawny Kitaen teleportation wall bashing,

head chopping, ax attack, demon stabbing, exploding weejee,

demon possessed barrels, demon possessed ketchup bottle,

hatchet to the forehead, aardvarking, tire slashing,

1 major construction site safety violation.

slow-mo third story picture window plunge,

gratuitous Biblical cocktail party convo,

gratuitous juggling police lieutenant,

gratuitous fog shrouded cemetery,

gratuitous Rose Marie,

head rolls, kung fu, oil drum fu, weejee fu,

planchette fu, plumbing tool fu, sheet rock fu,

strangulation fu, dream vision fu,

microfiche fu.

Drive-In Academy Award nominations for JP Luebsen,

as Malfeitor, the evil Portuguese spirit,

for disconnecting all the phones.

Kathleen Wilhoite as the rainbow haired punk psychic

that gets impaled on a sun dial.

Tawny Kitaen for her big "trapped in the shower

by the Ouija spirit" scene.

And Todd Allen as Jim for saying, "He's about as clever

as a bag full of doorknobs."

Also, a special screenwriting nomination for the director,

Kevin Tenney, for the following conversation between

the two guys searching for the evil spirit --

"What's our first move when we get there?"

Big Bear Library.

Why? Why not?"

2 1/2 stars. Joe Bob says check it out.

I have a question about witches, though.

Why is the most famous wicked witch in all movies

from the west?

In "The Wizard of Oz", why is she from the west?

Aren't we the west?

Isn't going west the way of America,

the path toward freedom?

When we say "the west", don't we mean Europe and America?

And why is the good witch,

Glenda, why is she from the north?

Victor Fleming directed "The Wizard of Oz."

He was an L.A. native.

He wouldn't want to put down the west.

Flintridge. He's from Flintridge.

Isn't that part of L.A.?

-Oh, are you asking me?

-You don't party in Flintridge?

-No. -Anyway.

Anyway, they're kind of saying that Dorothy should have gone

due north from Kansas, where she would be safe.

And what's due north of Kansas? Nothing.

There's nothing due north of Kansas.

Winnipeg. -Whoo!

-She would be happy in Winnipeg, alright?

But instead, she goes west, where the witch is trying

to steal her shoes all the time.

Isn't that the plot of "The Wizard of Oz"?

-No. -Yes, it is.

-No, it's not. -Margaret Hamilton,

the greatest witch in film history,

represents the vicious west, the cesspool of Hollywood itself.

And all the good people live in Saskatchewan.

You know? Where they make --

What do they do? What's the main industry of Saskatchewan?

Wheat? -Sure.

-Lentils. I know they make lentils.

You know, they send legumes all over the world

to vegans like yourself, Darcy.

-Are you making a point? -Yes.

My point...

There are no flying monkeys in Saskatchewan.

-Wow, that's your point?

-That's one of my points, yes.

[Laughter]

[Static crackles]

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[Indistinct chatter]

-I'm telling you, that's the problem.

[Indistinct chatter]

-Well, if you don't believe in God, Brandon,

then how do you explain the creation of the universe?

-How do you explain the creation of God?

-He's always existed. -So has the universe.

-Bullshit.

-Why? Why is that harder to accept than your God?

-There is no way that intelligent life

could have formed so quickly

without some kind of divine intervention.

-Come on, Roger, now you can't honestly

count someone like Jim here as intelligent life, can you?

-That's good. I'm impressed, Brandon.

I mean, that's almost witty.

Almost.

I'm gonna get another drink.

-Like father, like son, huh?

-You just don't know when to quit, do you?

-Michael, I'm waiting. -Okay.

-How does he do this?

-Speak of the devil.

-Don't. I've had enough religious

discussion for one night.

-What?

-When did you guys get here?

-Just walked in, man.

-What, are you leaving me out there with Lyndon's,

uh, law school chum?

-Sorry. -Priorities, man.

Jack first, hello second. What you drinkin'?

-Whatever's handy.

-Hey, Jim, look, everybody is kind of fancy out there.

You sure we're not a little under dressed?

-No, man, I think they're a little overdressed.

-Alright.

Speaking of which, who's the guy in the $800 suit?

-He's Brandon Sinclair.

-Of the Sinclair Vineyards?

-Mm-hmm. Linda used to date him.

-[Whistles] -I'm impressed.

-So's he.

-Jealous?

-Jim?

Hi, Lloyd. Hi, Mike.

-Hi. -Hi.

-Well, I guess we'll go rinse out some things.

Sorry. Excuse me.

-Are you all right?

-I told you he was an asshole.

-I know you did.

You gonna come back out to the party?

-In a minute.

Look, can you just go play hostess, and I'll

try to come up with some clean jokes, okay?

-Okay.

Jim.

I love you.

-I know.

-How can you believe in spirits if you don't believe

in God or Satan?

-There's been evidence of their existence.

Eyewitness accounts, photographs,

recordings, you name it.

-And I've contacted some of them.

-With what, a "wee-jee" board?

-Ouija. -What?

-It's pronounced, "Ouija," not "wee-gee."

It comes from the French and German "Oui" and "Ja." Ouija.

And this is a planchette.

-I don't care what you call it, dude.

It's just like a game. Like checkers or chess.

-For your information, "dude," the Ouija board

has been around since recorded history.

It was in wide use as far back as 540 B.C.

-I guess if Barbie dolls had been around

that long, you'd be talking to them, too.

[Laughter]

-Beats talking to you.

-Well, that's because I use words with more

than one syllable.

-Oh, would you like to talk about that?

-Yeah. -Um, look, guys...

Can we play a bit of the game? That would be fun.

-Alright.

Now, for the best results, the Ouija should

be used by two people, preferably a man

and a woman, and it shouldn't be sitting on a table.

It should sit on our knees so there's as much

body contact as possible.

Also, the two people should have clean, pure systems,

so that the energy flowing from us to the planchette

is as strong as it can be.

-Are you saying that the spirits

actually come through our bodies?

-Oh, don't worry. It's perfectly safe.

-I don't think I quite understand what you

mean by a clean system, though.

-Someone who doesn't smoke or drink, like you.

Care to give it a try?

-Oh. No, I don't think so.

-Come on, come on.

-Oh, geez, come on! Please!

-Alright. -Alright, good.

-Good. I don't smoke either, and I haven't been drinking tonight.

So together, we should be able to make a clear, strong contact.

-I'll bet he wants a clear, strong contact.

-Alright, one more thing before we begin.

The spirits are lousy spellers, and a lot of them like to lie.

So just to play it safe, I'm gonna try to contact David,

the spirit of a little boy who died about 30 years ago.

-You mean you've actually talked to this spirit before?

-Yeah, I've contacted him several times.

For some reason, he is connected to this particular board.

-Why's that?

-Well, I don't know, really.

It's just that every Ouija board seems to have

its own dominant spirit.

Maybe it's because this board was made the day David died.

-How do you know when that board was made?

-David told me.

-How do you know he wasn't lying?

You said they liked to lie. Didn't you say that?

-Uh...[Chuckles]

I'd really like to try this.

-Alright.

David, are you here?

Can you hear me?

-Can I talk to him?

-Yeah, go ahead.

-How old are you, David?

-Uh, thank you very much. Goodbye.

-Why did you stop? -Oh, that wasn't David.

-Well, then who was it? -I don't know.

Like I said, they like to lie sometimes.

-How do you know it wasn't David?

-Well, David was 10 when he died, not 8.

Besides, we have a special signal

that no other spirit knows.

-Ooh. That's a little spooky.

-It's a little stupid. -It's a lot stupid.

-[Laughs]

-David, can you hear me?

Would you like to talk to us?

David, is that you?

-It's doing a figure eight.

-That's David's signal.

Would you like to speak to him?

-Yeah, I would.

David?

I don't know what to say to him.

-David.

Do you know me?

-[Laughs]

-David, will you return to the living one day?

-Reincarnation?

-That's what they all say.

David.

Will you be able to choose your parents when you return?

-Yes.

-Bullshit.

-What?

You can't believe you were stupid enough

to pick your parents?

-Hey, I don't talk to cardboard.

[Laughter]

-Careful, Jim, you're upsetting David.

-What's he gonna do, haunt me?

-David, are you all right?

-Yeah, he's all right. He's just a little dead, that's all.

-Shut up, Jim!

David, are you all right?

-Brandon, it's really racing.

-Yeah, maybe he's late for the last flight back to limbo.

-What was that noise? -Sounded like a gunshot.

'Scuse me, folks. Pardon me.

[Dogs barking]

Oh, man, multiple sadness.

Who owns the red Cobra?

-I do, why?

-Your tires are history, bud.

-Thanks a lot, Morar.

-What? This is my fault?

-Those are brand new tires! Now, how do you explain it?

-I don't know, man. Maybe your buddy Casper did it.

-That's right. Because you made him angry.

-Then why didn't he flatten my tires?

-Why? Because I was in control of the board.

He held me responsible.

-You're crazy. -You're drunk.

And you're a loser.

In the great family tradition.

-Jim!

Jim.

Well, thank you very much for ruining the party.

-You're welcome. But don't worry.

The night's still young.

-Are you serious?

Look at me. I am furious with you right now.

-I know. And you're so gorgeous when you're angry.

-Look, don't joke when you're this close to death.

-Okay, okay.

I'm sorry about the party, and I'm sorry about Brandon.

And I'm sorry about the crisis in the Middle East.

-Alright. That's it.

-Come on, come on.

You knew you were taking a chance when you invited him.

I know your heart was in the right place.

It just didn't work out.

Jim, you promised me that you weren't gonna

start anything with him.

-I kept my promise.

He started it.

What did you want me to do?

Just sit there and take it?

-No, I guess not.

-I really am sorry.

-I know.

[Squeals]

-Why do I love you so much?

-'Cause I make you laugh.

-Yeah? And Woody Allen makes me laugh.

-I know, but I'm sexier.

[Whistle blows]

-What you doing?

-I lost my hammer.

[Gasps]

-Use mine.

-Sucker, you could have killed me.

-Nah, then you'd come back and haunt me

and flatten my tires and stuff.

-[Laughs]

[Laughing]

-Sit down, sit down.

-Linda's putting Twinkies in my lunch again.

[Beeps]

-Ms. Brewster, this is Dr. Gelineau's office calling.

We have the results of your test back from the lab.

You can call us today until 12:30.

-Hello, Linda. This is Brandon.

I just realized I left my Ouija there the other night.

Could you bring it to class this Friday?

I'm having some friends over Sunday,

and they want to use it.

Besides, I want to contact David to see if he's

calmed down yet.

Well, see you Friday. Bye.

[Beeps]

-David, are you here?

David, is that you?

David, do you remember me?

David, is it true that you can really choose your next parents?

Do you know why I'm asking?

The tests, they're positive.

I knew it.

David, would you like to --

No? How come?

J...

I...

M.

Jim? What? You don't like Jim?

Well, Jim's a really nice g--

Boy, David, you sure know how to hold a grudge, don't you?

David?

David, are you here?

David, where are you?

-Man, don't tell me you bought that crap

with Brandon and that board.

-Oh, please.

What, do you see "Spaz" written on this man anywhere?

Please.

So how'd the board jump off their knees?

-I don't know, man. He probably kicked it.

He always was about as clever as a bag full of doorknobs.

-[Chuckles]

What is it with you guys, anyway?

-Linda, I guess. At least that's when the friendship ended.

-You guys were friends?

-Best friends.

When we were kids.

-Get out of here.

-Yeah, I practically grew up at Brandon's house.

Both my folks were alcoholics, and, uh...

...I didn't want to spend too much time at home.

He thinks I stole Linda from him.

-Did you?

-No.

No.

I didn't even know they knew each other.

I'd been off at med school,

and when I met her, they'd already broken up.

-You went to med school?

-Didn't know I was such a multifaceted dude, did you?

-I didn't know you had more than one brain cell, James.

What are you doing here?

-Loafing. Come on, lunch is over.

-No! Daddy, please!

-Come on, I want to finish the house this month.

-You are bringing me way down, bud.

-You're a lazy scumbag, you know that.

-Employment means nothing to me, pal.

[Gagging]

-Lloyd?

Hey! Hey!

[Static crackles]

[Horn playing]

[Horn plays]

-I'm practicing.

-I see that. But what are you practicing?

-Well, right now, I'm a herdsman winding my horn.

But I was fluting -- this is a shom,

made of peeled willow wood,

taken from the Boehmerwald Mountains

on the border between Bavaria and Bohemia.

These are harbingers of your demise.

-Lovely.

-Warnings to all witches on this night.

Okay, notice how Lloyd gets killed

by the falling sheet rock, Darcy?

-I did. It's a really great scene.

It makes you jump.

-Yeah, well, Kevin Tenney, the director,

had worked construction before he got into USC film school,

and he wrote this script for class in film school.

So he knew his sheet rock because that may be

the greatest sheet rock kill in film history.

-Are there a lot of those? -No.

Anyway, Kevin Tenney grew up in Fairfield, California,

which is a military town next door to Travis Air Force Base.

And -- I mean, it's not just a military town

because it's also the headquarters of Jelly Belly.

And I think we would all agree that there is no jelly bean

like a Jelly Belly bean.

Would you agree? -I agree.

-One of the things that Kevin likes to say is that

his worst day on a movie set is 100 times better than

the best day he ever had on a construction site.

So he knows construction, but he hates construction.

Kevin was a whiz kid film student at USC in L.A.

at a time when almost all the whiz kid directors

came from either USC or NYU.

And he actually quit school because he got

a three picture deal with Ivan Reitman!

So I think he was still going to school, actually,

when this movie was being funded.

So anyway, he comes out of USC, and bang, he's shooting this

$2 million flick about Ouija boards right away.

And I know, I know. It's "wee-jah."

It's "wee-jah", not "wee-jee."

You know, we know that from Brandon, the jerk-olla

in that first scene, who gives us the Ouija board history

in the party scene, which I'm pretty sure is stuff that

Kevin just made up for his script.

Like Brandon says, "In ancient times, the spirit boards

were called witch boards."

And that line got edited out of the movie.

So good move, Kevin.

We didn't need that explanation of what

the title of the movie actually means.

But the Ouija board does not go back to 560 BC or whatever.

It goes back to some game inventors

in Baltimore in the 1890s.

But we don't have to wonder about it because later this

evening, we're going to be talking to the world's

foremost expert on Ouija board history.

-Yay. -But right now, Darcy,

I'm gonna explain the weapons that I'll be using

later tonight to kill you.

-Wonderful. -Alright.

The name of this holiday is Burning Out the Witches

in the Tyrol.

-Ah, yes, the Tyrol.

-Yes, the Tyrolian Alps, between Bavaria and Bohemia.

So what we have here are weapons.

Begin with holy water.

Picked this up this morning for obvious reasons.

Incense.

We're fumigating the area of all witch smells.

-Okay.

-Pots and pans for making

loud, obnoxious noises like a 3-year-old.

[Clanging]

Go all over the countryside doing that, you know?

Because nothing annoys witches like obnoxious, loud noises.

-True. -Resinous splinters.

Black and red spotted hemlock over here.

-What was the one before that?

-Resinous splinters because, as you can see,

the wood is resinous, and it's splintered.

-Just making sure.

-And this hemlock, by the way, is lethal.

I had to get a priest to bless me this morning

just so I could touch the stuff.

-You did not.

-Plenary absolution, Darcy.

I've got divine permission to handle these wicked substances.

I'm absoluted at this very moment.

Because we also have caper spurge.

-Ooh, that one's pretty.

-It's also highly poisonous, you know?

And then we have rosemary

in case we want to kill Simon or Garfunkel.

And of course, twigs of the sloe.

-Of course. -Yeah.

You probably know it from sloe gin.

They use the black thorn berries in the gin.

-What are you talking about?

-A-ha!

What am I talking about? That's a good question.

Um, it's this concoction, which also includes juniper

and the other one I forgot the name of

that later tonight will be set ablaze while you

are cutting capers in the woods.

And from it, we will make a torch, and will will

unchain 20 hounds, and we will set off with whips

and with metal cookware to banish you.

I wonder I could use the whip to rattle the cookware.

You know, the whip itself is a good weapon.

But if you rattle the cookware with the whip.

-[Whips cracks] -Holy...

[Whip cracks]

That sounds... -If I went like this.

No, that doesn't work.

-That's too complicated. -Anyway, there's --

Yeah, alright. Well, you don't seem scared.

-I mean, maybe a little bit.

-You know, I just said I'm gonna burn you up

in Thuringian fashion, you know?

Thuringia being the region of Germany that

is most devoted to the burning out of witches.

-Give it your best shot.

Do I get any weapons to fight back with?

-Yes, you have your own weapons.

You have magic mushrooms.

-Yeah, I do.

-And strong liquor, made from powerful herbs.

-Nice. I like my weapons better.

-And wild dancing. That's one of your weapons.

-I can do that no problem.

-But it depends on what kind of witch you are.

There are numerous witchcraft families.

And each family has its own set of demonic tricks.

-I want to know all of them.

-Okay, next break, we're going to do that.

You should already know all about the alcohol

because we did that last year.

-Actually, you did that last year,

but I'm good with my shrooms.

-Okay, well, one of your weapons, actually,

is the Ouija board itself.

-Ooh, I love board games, but I don't think that's very scary.

-It's not a game, Darcy.

It's a portal to the other side.

-There are better ways to get there.

-Okay, you also need a churn dasher.

-That is too many things to remember.

What the heck is a churn dasher?

-When you're making butter from cream,

you have this heavy pole, and it has a cross on the top.

And you use the arms of the cross to pound

that cream until it's helpless!

-Alright, so who is going to pound that cream

till it's helpless?

-I don't know.

A churn dasher technician is gonna --

-I'm excited to meet them, but I wouldn't expect a witch

to use anything with a cross on it.

-See, that's how sneaky they are.

See, they rode on broomsticks, pitchforks, and churn dashers.

And I think churn dashers were considered hard core,

even more than pitchforks.

Anyway, we got to classify you first.

And so -- -Classify me?

-What kind of witch are you?

We're gonna do that at the next break.

-I'm a furious, don't mess with me kind of witch.

-Okay, I'll explain at the next break.

-Don't patronize a witch, sir.

[Laughter]

-Alright, let's go back to the Ouija board classic

"Witchboard."

Just roll the film.

[Horn toots]

And by the way, we're gonna have two alcohols this year --

Maibock, the beer that they make just for Walpurgisnacht.

We got a case ready of Maibock.

-Nice. -Plus that liquor from Finland

that rearranges your brain cells and makes you dance

like an orangutan with an electrode up your butt.

Every drink they make for Walpurgisnacht should be

labeled "Get drunk fast."

You know, because there's no sipping on Beltane.

There's no room for cocktails and aparitifs on Beltane.

It's just drink and burn, drink and have sex,

drink and fly,

drink and spear witches out of the air with harpoons.

[Horn toots]

You get to a state where -- well, you get to --

[Horn toots]

Assemble the witch squad, bitches!

[Laughter]

[Static crackles]

-David, are you here?

Well, it's nice to see you made it back.

R.

I.

N.

G.

Ring?

My diamond ring?

You know where it is?

Where?

D.

R.

A.

N.

Dran?

You mean drain? Like a sink drain?

Which sink? The kitchen?

The bathroom.

Thanks, David.

Oh!

Ow. Darn.

There goes my nail.

[Gasps]

Jesus Christ, don't ever sneak up on me again.

Fuck!

Shit.

Fuck.

What are you doing home?

-I live here.

What are you up to?

-I found my ring.

Remember the one that I lost when we moved in? See?

-And that's such a monumental event that you started swearing?

-What?

-Your language, babe.

I think "gosh" and "darn" are the strongest words

I've ever heard you use.

And when did you take up plumbing?

-You're never gonna believe this.

David, he told --

-Uh, David who?

-You remember David. The spirit of the little boy.

-Oh, I don't need to hear this shit now.

-Jim! What's -- What's the matter?

-[Sighs]

They closed the site early today.

There was an accident, and...

Lloyd, uh...

Lloyd got killed.

Oh, God. What happened?

-There was a load of sheet rock, and it wasn't secured properly.

It -- it fell.

-I've never liked you doing that job.

It is so dangerous.

-Everything is dangerous.

-[Gasps]

[Retches]

[Coughing]

[Bell chiming]

-Mr. Morar?

My name is Duherst.

Lieutenant Duherst.

-Police?

-Homicide.

-I didn't know Fairfield had a homicide division.

-I'm it!

I'm also the bomb squad and the truancy division.

Do you like magic?

-What?

-Magic, you know, card tricks, sawing ladies in half. Magic.

-Yeah, I guess.

-Me too. I always wanted to be a magician.

I don't have the hands for it, though.

Not, uh, dexterous enough.

-Then how do you defuse bombs?

-I don't know. No one's ever planted a bomb here.

[Laughs]

-What can I do for you, Lieutenant?

-I'm investigating Mr. Salvador's death.

You ever been to Vegas?

-No. Why?

-They got these two guys there, Sigmund and Roy.

I mean, they are the best magicians I have ever seen,

without a doubt.

I mean, they do some really amazing things.

You know, there's only one thing I like better

than seeing a good magic trick.

It's trying to figure out how it was done.

-Lieutenant, we're not really

talking about magic here, are we?

-No.

I believe Mr. Salvador was murdered.

The ropes holding the sheet rock on the scaffolding

were cut, apparently with some kind of hatchet.

-Are you sure?

-I'm afraid so.

Did he have any enemies?

-No. None that I know of.

-I understand that you were with him when the sheet rock fell.

Now, is there any chance that the killer

could have been aiming for you?

-I don't think so.

-Were there any other witnesses?

-No. No, I'm afraid not.

-And you lost your hatchet that same day?

-I lost my hammer.

-But it has a blade on one side, right?

Have you found it yet?

-No. No, I had to buy a new one.

-Just vanished into thin air, huh?

-Nothing up my sleeve.

-Touche.

I'm sorry for intruding here.

-Jim, you didn't tell me you were with him.

-I didn't think it was important.

-Wasn't important? It could have been you!

-Hey, it was just an accident.

That's all. It was just an accident.

Can we go?

-Well, the lieutenant's not too sure about that.

And neither am I.

David, did you cause that accident at the site?

David, don't lie to me.

Are you still angry at Jim?

David?

David?

[Telephone rings]

Hello?

-Where were you?

-What?

-You were supposed to bring my Ouija by class yesterday.

-Oh, God, I am so sorry. I completely forgot.

I went to the funeral with Jim.

-Oh. Yeah, of course, uh...

Well, how's he taking it?

-Well, he's sleeping right now.

-That figures.

-Brandon, that's not even fair.

-Isn't it?

Tell me, did he cry at the funeral?

-Face it, Linda.

The man has ice in his veins.

I've known him since he was 7,

and I've never seen him cry once.

Not for anybody or anything.

-Brandon?

How many times have you contacted David?

-David?

Quite a few times. Why?

-Have you ever seen him get that angry?

-No, never.

Look, did we just change subjects when I wasn't looking?

-Brandon, look, I'm getting a little worried.

I've been using the Ouija.

-Alone?

-Yeah. Why?

-Linda, listen to me.

[Line clicks]

-Hello?

Hello?

Brandon?

Hello?

-Hello. -[Receiver thuds]

-God damn it!

How many times have I told you not to sneak up on me?!

-Look, I'm sorry. Next time, I'll wear a bell.

-Why don't you just rattle your fucking head next time?

-What the hell's eating you?

-I don't know.

I don't know. I'm so scared. I feel like I'm going crazy.

-It's all right.

It's gonna be all right.

-No, it's not.

I'm pregnant.

-Are you sure?

I mean, did you see a doctor?

-I already know.

I have an appointment on Monday.

I've been having morning sickness all week.

-Well, no wonder.

No wonder you're a nervous wreck.

You're not going crazy.

You're just becoming a mother.

Granted, it's almost the same thing.

-You're not upset?

-No. No. Of course not.

-God, I love you.

-I know.

-And you love me.

Even though you don't know it,

I know it.

[Child singing in distance]

[Child singing in distance]

[Door creaks]

-[Screams]

[Gasps]

[Static crackles]

-The jump scares in this movie are really good.

And I kind of like the ghost camera that floats around

the house, the spirit of David, I guess, who's up to no good.

Tawny Kitaen said she really did not like that scene

we just watched, and in later years, she couldn't watch it.

Tawny Kitaen got this role through an open casting call.

Kevin Tenney said they interviewed dozens of

hot, young actresses because they wanted the character to be

really hot since two guys and an evil spirit

are all fighting over her.

And so all these women read for the role.

But Tenney noticed that when Tawny Kitaen came in,

the crew and the guys in the waiting room,

all the guys did double takes on her.

And she was the obvious man magnet.

But the girls in the office liked her, also.

So irresistible to men, not threatening to women.

So he hired her.

Now, this was before she started staring in

the Whitesnake videos.

She eventually married David Coverdale,

the lead singer in Whitesnake.

But while making this movie, she was actually dating

OJ Simpson, who would call her all the time on the set

using a fake name.

But of course, everybody knew the fake name was OJ Simpson.

Okay, Darcy, let's move on to which classification.

Are you ready? Give me that --

Where's our witch classification chart?

I want to use this.

We got to classify you as a witch.

-Alright. I already have my costume.

-Darcy, I'm not talking about the outer witch.

I'm talking your soul.

-Okay. -The inner witch.

-If you're gonna be a witch, your evil heart has to

come from within your wicked body, you know?

We can't fake that.

-Okay, well, what kind of witch am I?

-Well, there are three general categories.

Let's start with that.

There's the old crone that's trying to steal the babies

and use their flesh to be young again.

-Okay, I am not the old crone.

-Let me do all the categories first.

You might end up wanting to be the old crone.

-I'm not the old crone.

-Okay, the second category is the evil seductress.

-That one. -Okay.

She pretends to be seducing you with her sexual allure,

but she's really trying to make you into a minion of Satan.

-Okay, it's that one, but what is this one?

-The third one is the sorceress.

The one with the bubbling cauldrons

and the poison herbs and the potions.

She puts a hex on the village so that no babies are born

and the cattle are barren.

-That one's too complicated. I'm sticking with number two.

-Okay, number one, though, is the ultimate witch.

Margaret Hamilton taught us that.

There's never been a witch to compare to Margaret Hamilton

in "The Wizard of Oz."

And she was most decidedly an old crone witch.

-She was great, but I'll do that in like 30 years.

-Okay, just saying, you could stretch now.

-I don't want to stretch. I'm good.

-Alright, alright, now, let's get more specific

about the various witches that we're gonna burn up tonight.

Alright? -Only if you can catch us.

-Darcy, don't make it worse for yourself, okay?

Did you see how many ingredients

are in this torch that I'm gonna light up?

Look at them. Some of them are still here on the table.

The ones that I didn't knock off.

-Really scary. -Alright.

-The torch I'm creating to burn you up has been classified

as a weapon of mass destruction by the UN.

So, okay, you have to choose your witch family.

This is a chart of the various --

this is a list of the various types of witches who are flying

to the Brocken even as we speak.

Numero uno, the wolf crone.

This is a hag who lives deep in the forest

and can command the wolves to do her bidding.

-I like commanding the wolves, but I'm not doing the hag thing.

-Hag-sploitation. That's a big part of horror history.

-No, I'm good. -Alright.

Number two-o, the cunning sorceress.

She's an expert in divination and spells.

She comes across as a healing spirit,

but it's a ruse.

It's a Florence Nightingale appearance,

but she's really a witch.

-I'm not that one. -Alright.

Numero three-o, the wild woman.

-Okay, that one sounds good.

-The wild woman is a child of Lilith, the first wife of Adam.

She belongs to the night. -Nice.

-She has the head and body of a woman,

but the wings and feet of a bird.

-That's interesting.

-How crazy about high heels are you?

-Not that crazy.

-Okay, it works then because, you know, bird feet,

but the rest is glam with wings.

The wild woman is always out there at night shrieking

and sleeping with anything that moves -- polysexual.

-That is not a problem.

-And she kills babies to stay eternally youthful.

-Uh, I'll take that part under advisement.

-Okay. Numero four-o.

Weathermaker witches. They command the elements.

-That one's kind of boring. -Okay. Valkyries.

Descended from Brunhilda.

They fly across battlefields, influencing war,

making prophesies of doom.

-You know what, I was very into a military guy,

so I am not interested in that one.

-Okay, droods, also called harpies.

They fly around the countryside giving out bad dreams,

preying on sleeping people.

You know they're there because

they leave a bird-like footprint in your bedroom.

-That's too much work. -Okay.

-Bilwis.

That's a mother witch.

She has a gaggle of children with dirty hair

who trample the grain and ruin the harvest.

-No children. -Alright.

-Ash wife, or the German is Eschenfrau.

She never goes away. She's the ultimate nagger.

You have to appease her, or she kills you.

-That's too domestic. -Alright.

The hag, also called a crone.

Associated with the Hawthorn Hedge.

She hides in the Hawthorn hedge.

When you walk by, she issues demonic curses.

So stay away from the hedges on Walpurgisnacht.

-No hags, no crones.

-Alright. They're the most powerful witches.

-No! -Alright.

The Highland Hag of Bairn, in fact,

turns to stone every Walpurgisnacht.

And then is reborn on Halloween.

So you get both holidays.

-That doesn't sound like a party to me.

-Alright, elder mother. -No.

-I haven't described the elder mother.

-No! -Alright, she keeps

dragons from landing on your roof.

-No. -Alright.

Easter witch.

She's a bratty little girl who has to be appeased,

or she causes massive mischief.

-Probably not. -Alright.

-Alraune.

Has a weird spelling, alraune.

This one is interesting.

Alraune was the main character in a 1911 German novel,

but it was based on a myth that goes back hundreds of years.

So it was believed that when a criminal is hanged,

he ejaculates at the moment of death,

and when the sperm sinks into the ground,

it creates the mandrake root

because a mandrake root looks like a penis.

So it was it was believed that if a witch, quote,

"Made love" to the mandrake root,

meaning use the mandrake root for a dildo,

she could get pregnant and give birth to a girl

who was beautiful and sensual,

but has no real feelings and no soul.

That's the alraune.

This witch can tell fortunes,

but she's really, really expensive

if you buy her as a fortune teller.

And she dresses in silk and velvet, she bathes in wine.

She knows magic. She knows all about fertility.

And if you ever cause her to shriek,

it will result in the downfall of your entire family.

So meeting an alraune is like going home

with the hottest stripper at Spearmint Rhino

and then finding out the next morning

she has your credit card and she's never leaving.

-All right. I think we found our witch.

-Really?

-More than the Lilith wild woman?

-I don't want to kill the babies for that one.

-Okay. You just want to kill the men.

-Exactly. -All right. Okay, Darcy.

I think we are ready for battle. -Yay.

-You're the alraune, headed for the Brocken

to cut capers on the Hexentanzplatz.

-You said that before. What is it?

-The Hexentanzplatz. That's the witches dance floor.

-No, not that part. Cut capers.

-Cut capers. You know, frolic like a goat.

You know, be crazy on the dance floor.

-Like a goat. -Yeah.

-Okay. -On the dance floor,

on Walpurgisnacht.

Capers must be cut.

-I promise to caper.

-Okay. This is the longest set up in "Last Drive In" history.

So let's get back.

Let's get back to the greatest Ouija board movie ever made,

"Witchboard."

Roll the film.

Oh, God. Are you a Tawny Kitaen fan?

-I am, yeah.

-I think it was right when this movie came out

that she made the first Whitesnake video because

I met her twice, and she was in a big hurry both times.

-Once was at a promotion we did together.

I wish I could remember what the promotion was for,

but we were at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

And I think it must have been for the Movie Channel.

And she seemed really, really nervous.

And then one other time in Amarillo, Texas.

Whitesnake was performing for the rack jobbers.

And I won't go deep into what that is,

but the rack jobbers are the companies

that stock records and books in places like Walmart,

Walgreens, you know any place that's not a record store

or a bookstore, but that carry books and records.

That's not really Walmart doing it.

It's a rack jobber.

And the biggest rack jobber is in Amarillo.

And they have this annual four day wild party in Amarillo.

And on a certain day,

the entertainment was Whitesnake, me.

I was there for the books. I was the book guy, you know?

And Roy Orbison, bless his heart, we all performed,

and it had to be right after "Witchboard."

And she was again very much in a hurry,

not focused, like she had a lot to do in the world.

You know, she was rushing around, very distracted.

So but really, really sweet.

She had this voice that said,

"I like you, you're wonderful. Bye."

So, you know, anyway, sorry.

I was just remembering all this because she passed away

during the pandemic.

It was so sad.

She never beat the drug dependance thing.

But the shocking thing was David Coverdale.

He said, on the day she died,

he said he hadn't talked to her in 30 years,

which if you remember the video "Here I Go Again",

iconic, right?

I mean, how could you do that video with her

and not talk to her for 30 years?

Anyway, doing the splits on the Jaguar

in the white chiffon outfit, and then other videos for them.

You know, she was legs, heels, lingerie, writhing.

She did a lot of writhing in those videos.

But the movie we're watching now,

this was right before that whole thing broke, so...

-She's so good in this.

-She is good.

She's an actress. She's a good actress.

But she got saddled with that image as the girlfriend

in the video.

I wonder why she stopped making movies.

Anyway. Sorry. Way off topic.

-That's okay. She's amazing. She deserves it.

-And you'll be an amazing alraune.

-Thank you.

-And a dead alraune because I'm going to kill you.

-Don't count on that. -Yeah, well, I'm gonna kill you.

-We'll see.

[Static crackles]

-I'm giving the board back to Brandon today.

I've already made up my mind, David.

There's nothing you can do about it.

Oh, my God.

Damn it.

[Gasps]

[Screams]

[Tools whirring]

-Hey. Hey.

Do you know Jim Morar?

-Yeah. -Where is he?

-Right over here.

[Hammer pounding]

-What are you doing here?

-I tried to call, but your phone was dead.

And you drove all the way out here to tell me that?

-No. I want to ask you something about Linda.

-You want to know if she snores.

-I should've known better.

-Hey. Hey!

Jesus, man, you used to have a sense of humor.

-Okay, can you be serious for one minute, please?

-I'll give it a shot.

-Has Linda been acting strange lately?

She hasn't been to a single one of her classes all week.

-What do you mean strange?

-I mean like nervous tension, insomnia, nausea,

any kind of erratic behavior?

-How did you know?

-Has she been swearing a lot?

-Like a truck driver.

-I think Linda's been using my Ouija.

-No.

[Laughs]

-Alright.

Alright, I know you think this is a crock of shit.

But just bear with me for a minute, please.

-Okay.

-Alright, when someone uses a Ouija alone,

like Linda, she's very susceptible to the spirits

she contacts.

And the wrong spirit will take advantage of this.

At first, he'll be extremely helpful and friendly.

So that she's lured into using the board more and more.

Pretty soon, all she wants to do is use the board.

Everything else, like going to classes, becomes unimportant.

This is called progressive entrapment.

When she reaches this stage, the spirit changes.

He starts to frighten and terrorize her.

Gradually breaking down her resistance.

And once that's done, he's able to possess her.

-So, what you're telling me

is that I'm living with Linda Blair?

-Dammit, Jim, I'm serious!

-[Laughs] I know. That's what makes it so funny.

I thought you were an atheist, man.

-Look, I'm not saying that it's a demon.

Just the spirit of someone evil.

Evil when he was alive and evil now that he's dead.

I want to bring a medium by your apartment

as soon as possible to exorcise the spirit.

-[Scoffs]

You're serious.

-Jim, how do you think I knew all those things about Linda?

Those are all symptoms of progressive entrapment.

-They're also all symptoms of pregnancy.

-What?

-Linda's pregnant.

I'm going to be a father.

-Terrific.

-Come on, Brandon.

I mean, can't you be happy for us?

-You gonna marry her?

-Yeah.

Of course.

-You don't even love her.

-Let me tell you something.

You haven't talked to me in two years.

So don't stand there and tell me how I feel.

-I know you better than you think I do, Jim.

I knew why you dropped out of med school. Does Linda?

Because you knew you'd make a lousy doctor.

Because you're not capable of giving a shit about

anyone but yourself. -Shut up, Brandon.

And when you get tired of Linda, you're gonna

walk away from her, too.

-Shut up, Brandon. -Just like you did with school.

Just like you did with your parents,

just like you did with --

-Shut up!

-Jim? -What?

-There's a phone call for you in the foreman's trailer.

-Take a message. I'm busy.

-It's your landlady, man.

It's something about Linda.

-Is she all right?

[Hammer clatters]

[Door opens]

Hello?

-Jim, this is Mrs. Boses.

-Is Linda all right?

-Well, she's fine now, but she was scared awfully bad.

-Well, let me talk to her. Is she there?

-Yeah. Just a minute.

-Jim?

-I'm right here, babe.

-It was David.

-David?

-Yeah.

Jim, he used to be so nice, but...

I don't know, I'm just so scared.

-It's all right, babe. I'm on my way home.

And I'll take care of it, I promise.

Alright?

-Okay.

[Receiver clicks]

-Alright, bring your medium by tonight.

-Jim, this is Zarabeth.

Best medium in Northern California.

-Hi.

Thanks for coming.

-No prob. [Laughs]

Hey, nice place.

But, uh, you got yourself

one gnarly spirit here, I can feel it.

-See? Hairs standing up on my arm?

-Mm-hmm.

This is your expert? Where'd you find her, the circus?

-Okay, so she's a bit strange, but...

-A bit strange?

Her head looks like a friggin' rainbow.

-You must be Linda.

-Uh, Linda, this is Zarabeth.

-Hi.

-She's a medium.

-How bitchin'.

-Uh, yeah, I prepared everything like he said to.

-Top-notch job, Jim.

Let's get this show on the road.

-I can't believe you did all this while I was sleeping.

-Okay.

I'm gonna make contact now,

so whatever happens, stay in your seat.

Alright? If you stand or talk, the contact might be broken.

Oh.

Bummer.

I forgot my crystal ball. [Chuckles]

[Laughs] Just a little psychic humor.

I don't really have a crystal ball. [Laughs]

-Should we hold hands or something?

-Nah, that's just in the vampire movies.

Anyway, my nails are too grody.

Okay, let's talk to some ghosts.

[Clears throat]

-Who are you?

-Please don't hate me.

-Who are you?

-David.

-David, do you know me?

-Yes, Brandon, I know you.

-How old are you?

-10.

I passed away.

-Tell us. Why are you terrorizing Linda?

-I love Linda.

-Then why are you frightening her?

-She hurt me.

She won't talk to me anymore.

Because of him.

-Jim?

-He is cruel.

-You are cruel, David.

Linda fears you.

-I'm sorry.

I was angry.

I...

I love you.

-Linda no longer wishes to speak to you.

I am taking the Ouija home with me tonight.

-I know.

-The woman you are speaking through is a psychic.

She has the power to exorcise you from this apartment.

-No.

I'll go.

I never meant to harm anyone.

Goodbye.

-David, why...

-Goodbye. -David, wait!

-Linda! Don't!

[Clattering]

-[Gasps]

[Wind whistling]

-Ah!

[Wind whistling]

[Cans clattering]

-[Groans]

Brandy, catch the lights, huh?

-Huh?

Oh, yeah.

-Zarabeth, thank you.

-Too cool.

But I didn't do it. David left on his own.

-Yeah, well, he sure knows how to make a dramatic exit.

-Well, maybe I reacted a little too quick.

-What?

-I don't know, maybe I should have given him more

of a chance, you know?

I mean, he's not evil, he's just...

He's just like a little boy.

-No way. No way.

He is taking this thing home now.

And that's it.

-Believe me, Linda, we did the right thing.

-Oh, for sure.

I mean, that was one nasty ghost.

Good thing the exorcism didn't happen.

It would have been mondo tough.

[Gasps] I see a vision.

-What is it?

Me...in your car...

going home.

[Laughs]

Just some more psychic humor.

Come on, Brandy, let's hit the musty dusty.

T.T.F.N.

-"T.T.F.N.?"

-Uh, "ta ta for now."

-Uh, thanks for letting me bring her.

-Don't mention it.

To anybody.

-[Scoffs]

[Static crackles]

-So we know that the Ouija spirit

can cause Sheetrock avalanches, windstorms,

steak-knife levitation, ketchup-bottle tumping, uh,

can lock the doors of any room from the outside,

can cause nightmares, can play con games

with anyone silly enough to use it while alone

due to... progressive entrapment,

another thing that Kevin Tenney probably made up.

Um, we should've brought Kevin on the show

to explain the rules of the Ouija hex

because it seems very fluid. [Chuckles]

Um, the Ouija can basically do anything supernatural

it wants to do in this movie.

Also, why is Rose Marie in this movie?

However, the Ouija board is, apparently, no match

for the punk psychic medium

played by Kathleen Wilhoite as Zarabeth.

Kathleen Wilhoite was amazing in a Charles Bronson movie

that came out around this same time, "Murphy's Law,"

but she was still relatively new to the business.

She broke in when she was 19 years old

in, uh, private school,

but she would go on to be one of the hardest-working

character actresses in L.A.

She was in "Angel Heart," "Crossing Delancey,"

"Road House," many TV series.

She does a lot of cartoon voices, even today.

Um, Santa Barbara girl, also from, uh --

she was also from the USC drama school,

but, uh, Kevin Tenney found her at an audition.

Anyhow, you know who loved this movie when it first came out?

Bob Murch.

Bob was so impressed by this movie

and the theory of progressive entrapment

that he became an obsessive researcher

into the history of what he calls

spirit communication devices,

and today he's the world's foremost authority

on Ouija boards, and, more to the point,

he is with us right now.

Welcome, Bob. -[Chuckles]

-Or should -- [Cheers and applause]

Or should I call you Murch? -Murch is perfect.

-People call you Murch, right?

-They do, and thank you so much for having me.

-Well, thank you for being here.

Uh, everybody has fooled around with a "Wee-Ja" board.

"Wee-Gee." I'm gonna call it "Wee-Gee."

I know -- I hope that doesn't offend you.

-It doesn't. -Okay.

-What is the right pronunciation?

-Originally, in 1890, it was pronounced "Wee-Ja"...

-Okay. -...but by the 1920s,

people were playing so much they said they were "Wee-Gee-ing,"

and they started to say "Wee-Gee," and the --

-Oh. Oh. "I'm gonna be 'Wee-Gee-ing' this weekend."

-Exactly.

-That's where it becomes "Wee-Gee." Alright.

-So -- and the company was so smart

that they didn't want to tell people what they should call it,

so the box would literally say,

"Whether you pronounce it Wee-Ja or Wee-Gee, it spells fun."

-Oh, okay. So -- But -- But anyway,

everybody has fiddled around with one.

Why -- as the world's foremost expert,

why are they so scary?

-No pressure. [Both chuckle]

Um, you know, you sit at this game,

and you ask if something's out there,

and everyone's afraid of dying, so we don't know.

We're afraid of what we don't know.

We're afraid of things that are out there

and what they might be.

The Ouija board allows your imagination to take control

and make up anything. -So you think people

naturally ask death-related questions?

-I think that death is what causes them

to want to reach out, right?

You know, the one thing that we can't do when someone dies

is -- is just talk to them. -Oh, they want to be

in contact with someone who's dead? Okay.

-Yeah, or they might want to use it as an oracle

and ask questions like, "Oh, Ouija, tell me --"

-About their future? -Yeah, or,

"Does Bobby like me?" -[Chuckling] Okay.

Um, where did you first see "Witchboard,"

the movie that changed your life, right?

-It -- It absolutely changed my life.

My grandmother was really into horror,

and she was really into science-fiction,

and she snuck me into -- in 1987, I believe,

13, 14 years old --

she literally snuck me into the movie to see it

'cause I was too young. -Where was that? What theater?

-Portland, Maine. -The theater --

the downtown theater in Portland, Maine?

And what about it made you obsessed with it?

-I was watching it, and even at 13 or 14 years old,

I realized, "This is the first movie I've ever seen

where the main character wasn't a person."

The main character was the witchboard,

and everything that happened happened around that witchboard.

The murders only happened when you used the witchboard.

-Now -- Now, obviously, we just watched the medium scene

with, uh, Zarabeth, uh, talking to the spirit

identifying himself as David in the movie,

and this reminds us that the Ouija board

is directly related to the spiritualism movement

that started in the 19th century and has never really gone away.

-Well, the -- the modern spiritualist movement

basically started in 1848 in Hydesville, New York,

and what happened were there were these three sisters

called the Fox sisters.

They believed they were having intelligent communication

with a ghost, with something,

and how it started was, someone asked a question,

they would hear a knock,

and so maybe one knock for yes, two knocks for no.

And then they would quickly say,

"Geez, this is taking forever, these questions.

What if we do one for 'A,' 'B,' 'C,' 'D'?

It would just take forever."

So they would lay out their alphabet cards

and their numbers and use their finger

or, um, a pencil,

and they'd go over the alphabet or the numbers,

and then they'd hear a knock. So close.

-But you're telling me, for real,

these sisters in Hydesville, New York,

are sitting there, asking questions,

and there's knocks on the wall, answering them?

-That's what they're saying. -That's what they said.

-This is what they say, and -- -Okay.

Why were they believed? [Laughter]

Um, um, you know, there must've been all kinds of --

there have always been con artists

doing séances and things throughout history,

so -- so why is that one event so important?

-The early Associated Press picked up that story

and blew it out all over the world.

-Oh, the media liked the story.

See, this is the same thing that goes on with bigfoot.

[Chuckles]

Okay, now -- now, who is Charles Kennard?

Charles Kennard is the man who would claim to invent the board

that would become Ouija,

but he was the first man to manufacture Ouija boards.

He had the idea in 1886.

He would start manufacturing them

under the Kennard Novelty Company

in 1890 in Baltimore, Maryland.

-Okay, so he was a businessman.

-A businessman who was into the occult.

-He was into the occult, and he had seen some kind of board,

and he decided, "I could mass produce these"?

-Exactly. -And -- And how --

how did they came up with the name Ouija?

-I always thought, and so did a lot of people

that Ouija was "Yes, yes," in French and German.

That's what we had always been told.

But I was researching with The Baltimore Sun,

and we came across a series of letters in 1919

from all the originators

talking about what happened that night,

which we had never seen.

So, again, according to them, this is what happened.

They didn't have a name.

They were calling their new product

a witchboard -- general name --

and so they decided since the board had helped them

with other things, they'd ask it.

So they sat around the board and --

with this woman named Helen Peters,

who they considered a strong medium.

They asked the board what it wanted to be called,

and, letter by letter, it spelled out O-U-I-J-A.

-Really? And they -- And they --

How did they know that was the end of the word?

[Laughter]

-That's a good question.

They've never heard that word before.

It didn't make any sense to them.

It didn't exist before that.

So Charles Kennard would ask, "Well, you know,

what does that -- what does that mean?"

And the board answered, "Good luck."

And so it became Ouija, the Egyptian Luck Board.

They thought because Egypt was so mystical at that time,

there we so many discoveries out in Egypt,

Americans saw that as so far away,

it must be Egyptian.

They thought the word literally was in Egyptian.

There's no such language as Egyptian,

but they didn't know that.

And so they started this Ouija, the Egyptian Luck Board.

It was a good thing. -Okay.

And, then, who was William Fuld? F-U-L-D.

-William Fuld is equally important to the story

because he was an employee right away.

He was a stockholder.

And he would, in three years, go on to kind of --

the company was put in his hands,

and because of his marketing genius,

he knew that every generation rediscovers the Ouija board,

which means there has to be a new story for every generation.

He just marketed the hell out of it,

and, again, his idea was,

this has to be in everyone's living room.

-Well, the reason I ask is 'cause, for years,

his name was on the board.

It was called the William Fuld Ouija Mystifying Oracle Board

or something, right? -Mm-hmm. Absolutely.

-But, apparently, Fuld got in touch with a David

on his Ouija board

because, uh, he fell backward out of a window

while doing something to a flagpole, right?

-Yeah. -That's how he died,

just like Zarabeth in the movie, right?

-He was a micromanager, and instead of just letting

other people take care of stuff he didn't need to be there for,

he climbed to the roof of his three-story factory that,

when it was built in 1919, was considered a skyscraper

because it was one full block,

and he was up there, telling them what to do,

and, uh, he was leaning against an iron...

and it came loose and he went backwards.

-So -- but that was in the Ouija board factory?

That was actually at the -- -That was at the factory

the Ouija board told him to build.

-Wow, so the -- the board, um, um, birthed his business

and then killed him? -Well, I mean,

business went on for a long time.

They didn't sell to Parker Brothers until 1966.

-Wow. Meanwhile, there are all these other companies

that are trying to, uh, take over the spirit-board business

and repeat the success of the Ouija board,

and I wrote down some, uh -- some names of them.

Uh, these were actual products

that came out from other companies --

Vo Lo board, the Crystal Gazer board,

the Mecca Answer,

the glow-in-the-dark yogi board, the wizard tray,

Veda The Magic Answer Man board,

the Swami Mystery Talking Board.

Um, there was, obviously, some money to be made here.

Uh, why did these others fail and Ouija continued to succeed?

-It's the longest-running name for a talking board.

People just think every board is a Ouija board.

And these companies, they saw how much money

William Fuld was making, and so, when the patent ran out,

they started making other talking boards,

calling them other things.

None of them ever lasted because people really wanted

the "authentic, real" Ouija board.

-Talking about the authentic board,

this -- this first one here

is the authentic board today, right?

-Today, this is the board that's made today,

and I got to work with Winning Moves and Hasbro

on this board, and one of the cool things was --

-You worked with Hasbro to design this board?

-Yeah, well, what happened was, this is a throwback.

Winning Moves licensed it, and they're a game company

that does a lot of retro boards. -Yeah.

-So this is a remake of, um, what was made in the 1990s.

-Okay. -This is kind of throwback.

And if you see, it will say,

"William Fuld Talking Board Set."

That took a long time to get his name back on there,

but now he's back. -You -- You worked hard

to get William Fuld's name restored to the Ouija board?

-I did. -Okay.

-[Chuckles]

-Now, what is this one, though? This is the original one, right?

-Right. So this is what we believe

is the first board that they were manufacturing.

It would've originally been called a witchboard,

but because it says "patent applied for" on the back,

we know it has became Ouija

because, in the patent, they call it Ouija.

-Okay, so before they got their patent, they had this?

-Mm-hmm. -And this was the -- so --

so we have the latest one

and the earliest one here. -Mm-hmm.

-Here's the big question, Bob.

Um, what is the freakiest thing you have witnessed

during the use of a Ouija board?

-The thing that is the strangest is how people react.

There's just a few groups of people.

There's the person who believes it,

who's taking it very seriously.

There's a person who just thinks this is total bullshit

and, "I can't believe I'm doing this,

but she's pretty, so I'll play."

When you start to play, everyone's talking,

but it gets really quiet.

Ouija is quiet scary.

It's that noise of the planchette

moving across the board with the felt feet,

and when it starts to move,

the first person to pull their hands off it

is the person who thought it was bullshit.

They're the first ones to scream and be like,

"Okay, I'm done. That's enough." -Really?

-And what I watch is just how people

are really afraid of these things.

-Well, one thing -- one thing they say in the movie

that I didn't -- I've never heard of as a Ouija rule before

is that it has to be two people, male and female, uh,

and they have to be facing each other

and the Ouija board has to be on their knees.

Is there anything to that, or is that just something

from Kevin's script? -No, that's actually true.

Ouija was a date game.

Why it took off so quickly was,

it broke a number of Victorian rules.

-Oh. -In 1890,

you couldn't touch each other if you weren't married.

Here, you're sitting in the dark,

you're lighting candles and a fire,

you place the board, your knees are touching,

your fingers are touching.

It just -- it -- again, it broke these rules

that allowed people to be a little cheeky.

-Yeah, knees and fingers. [Chuckling] Okay.

-That's where it starts. -You're a believer?

-I believe the Ouija board works.

-Works in what way?

-I have seen it work with ideomotor response,

your subconscious pushing it.

We planted things, in talking,

and then we get them out that way.

-So it's just felt on cardboard, but --

-But I have seen other people have experiences,

and I have witnessed things

that have happened on the Ouija board

that I cannot explain. -Okay.

-But I don't believe it's the board that has the power.

To me, it's you.

-It's what people bring to the board.

-Well, when the Ouija board tells you something bad,

we give it power.

We say, "It's the Ouija board's fault.

Get the Ouija board out of the house."

-Okay, yeah.

-And because if you don't follow these "rules,"

you can get caught, and that's where things get scary.

-Progressive entrapment, okay. -Exactly.

And, by the way, all the Ouija boards in the movie are fake

because they were afraid of being sued by Parker Brothers,

um, and so they didn't use the actual board

that was on sale at that time,

but according to you, Bob, this -- this -- this movie

did more for Ouija board sales than any other event, right?

-Well, except one, and that's "The Exorcist."

-Oh, "The Exorcist," with, um --

uh, Regan summons Captain Howdy.

-Exactly. "The Exorcist" is, really, the only time

that Parker Brothers or Hasbro

would respond to numbers and sales,

and they did an interview after "The Exorcist,"

where Ouija board sales went through the roof

mostly because most kids wanted to see

their best friends' heads spin around

and spit up split pea soup. [Laughter]

-Okay, well, who wouldn't? -Right.

-Okay, Bob, well, thanks for being here on Walpurgisnacht,

so I guess -- I guess "Witchboard" was, um,

probably the second-most influential movie in the --

in the popularity of the Ouija board.

-You know, the '80s were perfect because, again,

another generation discovered it.

So '70s, "Exorcist," '80s was an updated version,

and it just goes from there. -Okay.

Well, are you a drinking man, Bob?

-I love spirits of another kind, for sure.

-Okay, well, this is the segment where we break out the alcohol,

uh, and this is some serious Sima from Finland,

uh, where they love Walpurgisnacht,

and we're gonna chug one of these,

and then we're gonna chase it with a Maibock.

I don't know where our Maibocks came from this year.

This is, like -- the Maibock is the first thing

from Walpurgisnacht that has really made it over the ocean.

Um, have you ever burned any witches, Bob?

-I-I try not to. [Chuckles] -Okay.

Well, stick around. Where's Darcy, by the way?

-Oh, she's getting into her...costume.

-Okay, you're gonna like this, Bob. You should stay for --

Thanks for being here to explain the --

the ways of the Ouija... -[Chuckles]

-...and, uh -- let's -- we'll toast the --

we'll toast to William Fuld, you know?

-Exactly. Rest in peace.

-Yeah.

Go ahead and roll the movie, 'cause --

and also, Bob, you probably already know this,

but in the story of, uh, Faust,

the devil takes Faust up -- up to the mountaintop, the Brocken,

uh, to show him the kinkiest, wildest sex he's ever seen.

He takes him to an outdoor orgy, and Faust is never the same.

So I don't want to scare you, Bob,

but you might want to go home before Darcy comes back out,

'cause that's where we're going tonight.

You ready for that? -Oh, I'm ready.

-Alright. My kind of guy. Wise man.

[Laughter]

♪♪

[Static crackles]

[Engine revs]

-You did a good job tonight. Thank you.

-You ever heard of the word "malfeitor" before?

-Malfeitor?

It's Portuguese, it means someone evil.

Why?

-Was David Portuguese?

-No, I don't think so.

-And he was only 10 years old?

-Yeah.

-Whoa.

He must've taken some mega vitamins,

'cause he was a real toughie.

-Something's bothering you. What is it?

-I see danger ahead.

-For Linda?

-For you, if you miss my house.

[Laughs]

It's coming up on the right.

[Laughs]

-A little more psychic humor, huh?

[Both laugh]

-All kidding aside, though, something is really icky.

-Like what?

-I'm not sure. Stay by the phone,

and I'll call you later on tonight

after I do the Nancy Drew bit.

[Chuckles]

T.T.F.N.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-♪ In the middle of the summer ♪

♪ In the middle of the night ♪

♪ She was deaf from her own heartbeat ♪

♪ Still she heard something move ♪

♪ It was just out of sight

♪ And the morning was way out of reach ♪

♪ Well, she's made the answer ♪

♪ By the light of the day

-♪ Oh, it's so far away

-♪ And things go bump in the night ♪

♪♪

-You!

♪♪

♪♪

[Doorknob rattling]

♪♪

[Breathing heavily]

♪♪

[Screams]

♪♪

[Breathing heavily]

[Gasps]

[Screams]

♪♪

[Groaning]

♪♪

[Grunts]

-Police are calling it the worst traffic accident

in the county's history.

An accident of a different sort claimed the life

of a Fairfield woman late last night

when she fell to her death from a second-floor window.

The victim, Sarah Crawford, claimed to be a psychic

and worked as a professional medium

under the pseudonym of Zarabeth.

Police officials will not divulge

whether the death was suicide or murder,

but a full-scale investigation is presently underway.

-Thank you, Stu.

Lee'll be back with weather right after this.

♪♪

[Buzzing]

-Yeah, who is it?

-Jim, it's Brandon.

We have to talk.

-Alright, I'll buzz you up.

-Okay, but meet me in the upstairs lobby.

-What's up? -Where's Linda?

-She's asleep, man.

Why? -Come here.

Come here.

[Panting]

Zarabeth is dead.

-What? -Someone or something

pushed her out a window.

-Jesus Christ.

-She suspected something about David.

She was going to check on it.

I think David killed her.

-Wait a minute, man, the spirit killed her?

-Yes, and I think he cut the phone line, too,

so I couldn't warn Linda about the Ouija,

and he probably killed Lloyd.

But that time I think he was after you.

-Man, are you listening to yourself?

You're telling me that there's a 10-year-old ghost flying

around Fairfield killing people.

-Look, I know it sounds crazy, but I am sure that I'm right.

-Well, assuming that you are,

I mean, why would he wait till now?

You contacted him long before Linda.

-I've never been alone.

I've always had people with me when I use the Ouija.

-Well, okay, so you took it home.

-No.

I checked the box this morning.

No Ouija.

-Man, that's impossible, I boxed it myself.

-Well, maybe Linda removed it when you weren't looking.

She's obsessed with it, Jim!

That means that she's already fallen

into progressive entrapment.

-Well, then I just have to find the damn thing

and get rid of it. -It's too late for that.

Linda is so open now, I don't think David needs it anymore.

-You told me that that's where he got his power.

-No, it's just a portal.

You see, uh...

Most spirits are trapped in their own world,

and they can't enter ours without some kind

of help, like a medium or a Ouija.

-Or someone that's been opened by progressive entrapment.

-Yes. -Yeah.

You're telling me that Linda is a portal for David.

-Eventually...

he'll possess her, unless we can stop him.

That's why I'm going to Big Bear.

-What's in Big Bear?

-That's where David claims he died.

Now I have to go there and check out his story.

We can't fight him unless we know exactly who he is

and how powerful he is.

And, for all I know, he's been lying to me

since the first time I contacted him.

-You really going up there?

-I have to.

I feel responsible.

-Wait, you gonna leave now?

-Yeah, until I get back, you keep an eye on Linda.

-Brandon.

Listen, man.

Look, I don't know -- I don't know if I buy all this.

♪♪

But good luck.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-David, are you here?

David, have you come back?

[Gasps, screams]

♪♪

Jim!

Jim, help!

-Linda? Linda?

Open the door.

-Jim!

-Linda, unlock the door!

-Jim!

[Screams]

Jim!

[Sighs]

♪♪

-Jesus.

♪♪

♪♪

-Jim?

Linda? Is everything alright?

Hello?

Jim? Linda?

-Mrs. Moses, call an ambulance.

-Why? What happened?

-Linda's hurt.

♪♪

She's unconscious.

♪♪

♪♪

[Siren wails]

[Tires screech]

-Doctor Rogers, 1742.

Doctor Rogers, 1742.

-Dewhurst, what do you want from me?

-You know, I don't think I've got the dexterity

to be a juggler, either.

-[Sighs]

-My, my, that was rude.

-I got a "D" in manners.

-How well did you know Sarah Crawford, AKA Zarabeth?

-Why, was she into card tricks?

-I don't know.

But she managed to get her throat slit

before she went through a window.

That's a pretty neat trick in anybody's book.

What do you think her throat was slit with?

-A hatchet?

Whatever it was, her throat matched the ropes

that were cut on the construction site.

Have you found your hammer yet?

-No.

I guess it just vanished.

-You know, I saw this magician once.

He managed to make an entire elephant disappear.

An entire elephant!

That's no mean feat, either.

Just a tiny elephant is pretty tough just

to stick up your sleeve.

Of course, I know that he didn't really make

that elephant vanish into thin air.

He just managed to hide it someplace.

-Mr. Morar?

-Yes?

-I'm Dr. Gelineau.

-Is Linda alright?

-Your diagnosis was right on the nose,

a mild concussion.

That must have been quite a fall.

-Yeah.

How's the baby?

-Linda missed her appointment yesterday,

so I didn't get a chance to tell her,

but she's not pregnant.

-But she's had --

she's had morning sickness all week --

-Nevertheless, I'm sorry.

-Can I see her?

-Sure, but she's still unconscious.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-[Gasps]

-I'm going with you.

[Engine revs]

What's our first move when we get there?

-The Big Bear Public Library.

-Why?

-Why not?

-Oh, well, as long as you've got a reason.

Hm, hello.

-What? -Wait a minute, wait a minute.

Let me enlarge it.

Bingo.

"A gasoline explosion

aboard a small motorboat claimed the life

of 10-year-old David Simpson early yesterday morning.

Funeral services for David, the only child of John

and Betty Simpson, will be held this Saturday

at the Green Meadows Cemetery."

-Well, now we know David's telling the truth.

We still don't know why he's terrorizing Linda.

-How do we find that out?

-We ask his parents.

[Static crackles]

♪♪

[Laughter]

♪♪

-Alright, so, just getting in practice.

Just getting in practice. [Laughter]

We get that real serious scene

with the two guys talking about Linda

and how she's in trouble, and, seemingly out of the blue,

Brandon says, "I'm going to Big Bear."

And when that scene happened in the theater

when the movie first came out,

the, "I'm going to Big Bear," line would get a big laugh

as a, "What the fuck?" moment. Why is he going to Big Bear?

'Cause, first of all,

if you don't live in Southern California,

you may not know what Big Bear is.

It's a lake resort and a skiing resort

that's about a two-hour drive from L.A.

up on top of the San Bernardino Mountains.

But if you do live in Southern California,

the line is doubly funny because Brandon is saying,

"You know, this Ouija-board stuff has gotten intense

and heavy, and I'm responsible, so I'm going to Big Bear,"

meaning he's running away to take a vacation.

So, anyway, we do learn that David,

the spirit in the Ouija board,

is a boy who died at Big Bear Lake

in a boating accident when he was 10 years old, so --

but that's in a scene that got cut out of the movie.

So what he -- what he's going to Big Bear to get in touch --

the reason he's going to Big Bear

is to get in touch with David.

The whole plot at this point revolves around

the Big Bear public library. [Laughter]

Um, one reason this movie looks so good --

all those ghost-camera moves and the night shoots

and the jump scares and the dream visions

and the kills -- is that it was shot by Roy Wagner.

Roy Wagner grew up in the little town of Cairo, Illinois,

right -- right there where the Ohio River

meets the Mississippi River.

Historic town but tiny town.

And he would go to the local movie house,

and he would write down the names

of the cinematographers on the big movies

and then call them up and interview them

for his little magazine in Cairo.

Um, not directors, cinematographers.

He eventually made his way to L.A.,

and he wanted to be a cinematographer,

and -- and -- and on this particular movie,

he was still in the very early days of his career.

He started out as just the camera operator,

but after one week, the director of photography was fired

'cause he couldn't move fast enough,

and he couldn't do all the shots that they needed,

and so Wagner moved up to cinematographer.

Uh, he'd already done one of my favorite

kung fu flicks of the '80s, "Pray for Death,"

starring Sho Kosugi, but, um, at that time,

you didn't really get much credit

for doing a martial arts movie, so he was still an unknown guy.

He would go on to an illustrious career, though.

He shot all of John Badham's films.

He was constantly nominated for Emmys

for shows like "Quantum Leap."

Um, "The Last Drive-In" audience would know him

for his work on "Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors."

-Hell, yeah.

[Lightning crashing]

♪♪

[Wolf howling]

♪♪

♪♪

-Damn, Darcy.

You look ready to party.

-I'm ready for the satanic orgy. [Laughter]

-I see you are. -[Chuckles]

-You love "Dream Warriors." -I do.

-Roy Wagner also shot "Return to Horror High."

-Hell, yeah.

-You're really frisky tonight.

-I'm ready for battle, baby.

-Roy Wagner also shot "Mortuary Academy."

-Eh. -No response to "Mortuary --"

you know, the horror version of "Police Academy"?

Wacky hijinks?

-I am not in a wacky-hijinks kind of mood.

-Okay, well, have some Sima.

-Oh, I will -- at the orgy.

-[Chuckles]

Sima. The Finnish liqueur.

I'll -- I'll open a new one.

[Laughter]

We're gonna need several of these

before the epic battle of good versus evil.

-Team evil, bay-bay.

[Laughter] -Okay.

One more story about Roy Wagner.

The reason I brought him up is, um,

Tawny Kitaen had a little fluffy lapdog

that had been given to her

by her current boyfriend, O.J. Simpson,

and she loved the dog, and she took it everywhere with her.

And she had dyed the dog's hair.

She dyed it red to match exactly the shade of her own hair,

and Roy Wagner, who was the number-one

practical joker on this set -- there were quite a few of them

'cause this was a very young cast and crew

who were into hijinks. [Laughter]

Um, Roy Wagner orchestrated a practical joke.

Uh, the special-effects department made up a doll

that looked similar to the little yappy dog,

and they dyed the hair on it the same color,

and then they mashed it up and put it underneath the --

the tire of that red Cobra convertible,

and then they started screaming that there had been an accident

while Tawny was in her trailer,

and, uh, she came running out of the trailer

and saw the mutilated fake dog, and she went into hysterics.

-Oh, my God. That is so mean.

-Darcy, you're a witch.

-I mean -- -Nothing can be too mean.

-I mean, that is mean, though. -She got over it.

And the production of "Witchboard" continued

and moved on up to Big Bear, and then, um...

By the way, that little red sports car is a Cobra,

and I-I don't know what Cobras sold for in 1986,

but, today, they go for like $1.5 million or something.

And the reason they had the Cobra

is that Walter Josten, the producer, had just bought one.

This was Walter Josten's, uh, first movie.

He was a commodities broker,

who wanted to get into the motion-picture business,

and -- and this is the first script that he read

and he liked the script and wham, bam, thank you, ma'am,

Kevin Tenney's career was launched

and Walter Josten's career was launched.

He has now produced 100 movies, and he's still going strong.

Uh, in fact, he produced Kevin Tenney's next movie,

which was "Night of the Demons,"

uh, which made even less sense than "Witchboard."

Walter Josten would eventually buy the "Leprechaun" franchise,

uh, the "Children of the Corn" franchise.

Um, he stayed with horror for a long time.

He made all the "Witchboard"

and the "Night of the Demons" sequels and remakes

in addition to music documentaries

and more mainstream stuff.

Anyway, he drove a Cobra.

Alright, that's enough "Witchboard" trivia.

Back to the movie.

And now we know, from this movie,

why you and I suck at the Ouija board,

because we're supposed to have it on our knees,

a man and a woman -- we got that part right.

Never use it alone, right?

A man and a woman facing each other,

total silence, with the board underneath.

When was the last time it was total silence around here?

[Laughter] -Do you want to try it?

-No. No. Absolute-- no, I hate that thing.

But one thing Kevin Tenney said

about the inspiration for the movie,

he said he went to a party and somebody brought a Ouija board,

and, uh, that gave him the idea for the script

because he thought,

"Nobody's ever done that in the movies before,"

uh, which can't possibly be true,

because, as Bob Murch just told us,

it was used to summon Captain Howdy in "The Exorcist."

But even before that, "Thirteen Ghosts" had a Ouija board,

um, "The Uninvited" had a Ouija board,

"Amityville 3-D" had a Ouija board,

"Satan's Blood" had a Ouija board, um...

Actually, remember the Ouija board in "Mother's Day"?

You know, the demon talking through the board

is just as illiterate as the guy using the board.

It's hysterical 'cause the demon can't spell.

-Ooh, there's a Ouija board in "The Bat Whisperers."

-In the what?

-"The Bat Whisperers."

-That's got to be one of those precode movies from the '30s

that you're so fond of.

-It totally is. But not just any movie.

It was the very first wide-screen movie.

-Wow, secret witch knowledge. -[Chuckles]

-So, anyway, it's -- it's more accurate to say

that "Witchboard" is the first major treatment

of the Ouija in film.

♪♪

-You will drink the alcohol now.

♪♪

[Laughter]

-How did you -- I was thinking about that.

How did you know that?

-I'm empowered.

-By predicting that I'm gonna drink alcohol?

I mean, the odds on that are better than a coin flip.

[Laughter]

-You will say some silly nonsense.

-[Sighs]

Flack to -- back to the flick.

Okay, you got me on silly nonsense.

-No, actually, that was way better odds

than a coin flip.

[Laughter]

♪♪

[Chuckles]

♪♪

[Static crackles]

-Damn it! [Exhales sharply]

There's not one listing for John or Betty Simpson.

-The article said David was buried

at the Green Meadows Cemetery?

-Yeah. So?

-So maybe the caretaker's got their address on an invoice.

[Crickets chirping]

-Jesus, don't do that to me, alright?

-Sorry, man.

Look, nobody's home.

Place is locked up.

-Oh, damn it.

I guess we're just gonna have to come back tomorrow.

-You know, as long as we're here,

I'm gonna check out David's grave.

-Why?

-Why not?

-No, Jim, don't!

Ugh.

I've got a very bad feeling about this.

[Crickets chirping]

Oh, God, I've got a bad feeling about this.

[Crickets chirping]

Jim?

Jim? Where are you?

[Owl hooting, dog barking in distance]

[Crickets chirping]

♪♪

♪♪

[Barking continues]

♪♪

♪♪

[Barking continues]

[Rustling]

♪♪

Aah!

-Shut up.

-Oh, God.

You scared the shit out of me.

-Shut up. Shut up.

You're gonna get us both arrested for grave robbers.

-Where were you?

-I found somebody I want you to meet.

-Who?

-David's parents.

Look at the date, man.

David's parents died on the same day,

less than two weeks ago.

-Must have been some kind of an accident.

-What if it wasn't?

♪♪

I'm going to try and get some sleep.

I got to get out to the dock first thing

in the morning.

-I don't suppose you have an extra toothbrush in that bag.

-I'm afraid not.

-Damn, I hate talking to ghosts with plaque on my teeth.

[Both laugh]

A little psychic humor.

-[Sighs] God, why are we laughing?

-It helps us forget how scared we are.

What happened to us, man?

♪♪

We used to be like brothers.

♪♪

-I don't know. Things change.

People change.

-I didn't steal her from you. You know that.

♪♪

-I know.

It's just that every time I see the two of you together,

I go crazy.

I start saying stupid things, and I can't stop.

I tell myself, "Brandon, stop being such an asshole."

Then my mouth pops open, and out comes another stupid quip.

-You're still in love with her.

♪♪

I envy you that.

Remember what you said about me quitting med school?

-Jim, I'm sorry, I didn't mean that.

-Oh, no, you were right.

♪♪

You know what I'm afraid of more than anything else?

That I'll never be able to love anyone,

and that I'm gonna end up spending

the rest of my life alone.

♪♪

If I had any real guts, I'd get out of her life

before she wastes any more of her time on me.

♪♪

-So tell me.

What does she see in you that she didn't see in me?

-I make her laugh.

-So did I.

-Yeah, but only in the bedroom.

♪♪

[Both laugh]

♪♪

-You really are an asshole. You know that?

-Yeah.

[Laughs]

-[Echoing] Linda.

Linda.

Linda.

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

♪♪

Linda.

Come here.

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

[Gasps]

[Sighs]

[Gasps]

[Screams]

-What'd you get?

-Take it. Let's go.

-Ah, man.

Haven't we seen enough of these?

-We're gonna need it to contact David.

-Man, I got a real bad feeling about this.

What are you doing, man? I thought we had to

put this thing on our knees.

-Not this time.

Since this is where David died,

contact with the spirit should be very strong.

-Not too strong, I hope.

-Don't worry.

If I'm right about Linda being his portal,

she's too far away for him to reach us.

-What if you're wrong, and the Ouija's the portal?

You know, we're gonna be opening the door

if we use this thing.

-I'm not wrong.

Linda is his portal.

David can't hurt us here. We're too far away.

Besides, he can't do anything while she's sleeping.

She's under sedation, right?

-Yeah.

-Linda?

I think you should stay and let us run some more tests.

-Oh, no, I-I feel fine. I -- I just want to go home now.

Thanks.

♪♪

-David, why are you terrorizing Linda?

♪♪

N-O?

N-O what?

♪♪

"T." N-O-T.

-Not?

-David, do you mean you're not terrorizing Linda?

♪♪

-Then who is?

♪♪

♪♪

Evil.

What the hell does that mean?

-I don't...

♪♪

Wait a minute.

David.

You were at Jim's party, weren't you?

♪♪

And you flattened my tire?

♪♪

David, now, this is very important.

Please tell us the truth.

Did you kill Lloyd at the construction site?

♪♪

And you didn't kill Zarabeth?

♪♪

But you did speak to us through her.

♪♪

-No.

Then who the hell did we talk to?

♪♪

♪♪

Again with the evil.

-Oh, wait a minute, wait a minute.

I think I have it.

David, is this evil another spirit?

♪♪

Is this spirit powerful?

Did it force you out of Jim's apartment?

♪♪

Is this spirit's name Malfeitor?

♪♪

Then Linda never actually contacted you

all the time she was using my Ouija.

♪♪

-Alright, then who's Malfeitor?

-That's what we're gonna find out.

♪♪

David?

Who is Malfeitor?

♪♪

♪♪

-Her? Who is her?

-David, do you mean Linda?

♪♪

Well, then who is her?

♪♪

-What's wrong? -I don't know. He's agitated.

Be careful.

David, are you alright?

What's the matter?

-Hey.

Didn't you say they were lousy spellers?

-That's right.

David, did you misspell the word?

♪♪

Alright. Okay.

♪♪

Now, just try again.

One more time, slowly.

♪♪

Who is Malfeitor?

♪♪

"H"...

♪♪

..."E"...

♪♪

..."R."

♪♪

-What happened?

-I lost him.

It happens sometimes.

David.

-Can't you get him back? -I don't know.

David.

-What is he trying

to spell here? -I don't know!

David?

-H-E-R...

"E."

Here!

Malfeitor is here.

-But he can't be. That would mean --

[Gasping]

[Coughing]

♪♪

Jim.

♪♪

[Coughs]

♪♪

[Grunts]

[Water splashes]

♪♪

-[Groans]

♪♪

♪♪

-Brandon?

♪♪

Brandon!

♪♪

[Sighs]

♪♪

[Groans]

♪♪

[Panting]

♪♪

[Gasps]

God! Jesus!

Oh, God.

♪♪

Oh.

Oh, God.

♪♪

Oh, God.

♪♪

[Crying]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

[Static crackles]

-Okay.

Jim and Brandon are sharing a cheap motel room

at Big Bear and talking about their feelings

and saying stuff like,

"I'm afraid I'll never be able to love anyone."

I thought they were just gonna start having sex

right there on the paper-thin mattress.

Instead, they go to the creepy cemetery

in the middle of the night

and they poke around with flashlights

and then decide to talk to David on the dock

with a pastel Ouija board,

even though Brandon said earlier in the movie

it's not safe to use the Ouija board

unless it's a male and a female using it together.

So does that mean...?

No wonder this movie sometimes turns up

on queer-fear lists, right?

And, come to think of it,

a whole lot of furry, bare-chest shots, too, right?

Um, anyhow, the actor playing Jim,

who does some excellent bawling -- his -- his --

he just bawls his eyes out really well

as the demon camera swirls in the air above him.

That actor is Todd Allen, a Texan who would go on

to make three films with Kevin Costner

and very memorable in "The Apostle,"

if you remember that movie with Robert Duvall.

And most people remember him

as slave trader Dollar Bill in "Django Unchained."

Um, he also had a recurring role on "Friday Night Lights,"

uh, did multiple films with Lawrence Kasdan,

but he's the real deal.

Graduated from the University of Texas.

Went to work as a roughneck on an offshore oil platform

to raise money so he could attend

the famous Neighborhood Playhouse in New York,

where they teach the Meisner technique of acting.

Uh, he was also a Golden Gloves middleweight champion.

Uh, he's had a really interesting career

while working exclusively out of Austin, Texas,

where he still lives today.

Uh, he played the ultimate macho role.

He was the legendary test pilot Chuck Yeager,

the man who broke the sound barrier

in the movie "Pancho Barnes."

Okay, his bro lover, the actor playing Brandon,

That's Stephen Nichols,

who was a major heartthrob on daytime TV.

He is a soap superstar,

mostly for one role, uh, "Patch" Johnson.

He wore an eye patch on "Days of Our Lives,"

but he was also on "General Hospital,"

"The Young and the Restless,"

did a whole lot of, uh, theater in L.A.

He played Jim Morrison in "The Lizard King."

Um, Cincinnati-born, grew up in Dayton.

So Witchboard had the beefcake and the cheesecake

in the form of Tawny Kitaen,

who is becoming a different person now.

She's changing. Is she becoming a witch?

I d-- I don't think the movie is really about witches.

It's more about demons.

But in keeping with our Walpurgisnacht theme,

you are about to dance with the demons, Darcy.

-Bring it on. -Alright, before I kill you...

[Both chuckle] ...later on tonight,

we're going to do a little air traffic control.

I want to show you where you're going.

Your destination is here,

this whole region, the Harz Mountains.

This is a -- this is a detailed map of the Harz Mountains

so you'll know exactly where you are.

It's part of the Saxony-Anhalt region of Germany

and, uh, specifically the area right outside the town of Thale,

right here near the Bode Gorge.

This -- you can see -- sort of see the Bode Gorge here

just below Thale called the Hexentanzplatz.

Um, now, are you riding on traditional broomstick

or hardcore pitchfork or alt which churn dasher?

-Actually I have a friend in Santa Barbara

that has his own plane,

so he's just gonna come pick me up.

-Damn, Darcy, have a little respect for witch tradition.

-I would prefer not to mess up my hair

on the way to the orgy, okay?

-Okay. Whatever. -Thanks.

-Alright, well, once you get to the Hexentanzplatz,

you must join the other witches in dancing

away the snow. That's the first thing you do.

You must dance until all the snow is gone off the mountain.

And, uh, we have an eyewitness

from, um, two or three centuries ago

who told us what this whole procedure looks like.

"Witches, demons and beasts invited by Satan himself,

they tangled tongues, pressed parts,

and split their flesh at the seams

in macabre dances of vice."

-Well, you know, I used to be an exotic dancer, so no problem.

-Okay. And then some of them are following Medusa

and some of them are following Lilith,

but, "Witches, young and old, are offering sexual services

to whoever ventures up the mountain."

-Still not a problem. -Okay.

Um, and we know from Goethe, the famous German writer,

that Faust himself is forever changed after,

"He partakes in an orgy of wine and lust and laughter

with the denizens of the dark side."

-Okay, so Faust was a high roller.

[Laughter] -[Chuckling] Yeah, he was.

And I'm just going to hurry through this account from, um --

this is from 1486, the eyewitness wrote this.

"The witches on Brocken are sex-craved femmes fatale,

penis-pilfering shapeshifters,

and man-corrupting putrid, disgusting hags.

They cavort with devils, incubi, succubi, and other witches

because women are carnally insatiable.

-True enough.

-"The witches ride upon beasts with the pagan goddess Diana,

obeying her commands as a mistress,

answering her summons to service."

-That is exactly the job I want.

-And then, um, you want to end up cavorting

and cutting capers here. Where is it?

At the -- it's right up right around here

at the Teufelsmauer or the Devil's Wall.

-What's there?

-Let's just call it the VIP room, okay?

-[Chuckles] Got it. -Okay, and then --

and then if you're pleasing to Satan

or to one of the greater demons, you'll be taken to the Brocken,

the tallest peak in the Harz Mountains

and the site of the Witches' Sabbath.

-Hmm. I'm gonna be the first one there,

commanding all those other witches

to do whatever big daddy Satan wants.

-Darcy, you are enjoying this entirely too much.

-You've unleashed the beast, baby.

Deal with it. -Okay, Darcy.

You know what? Have some Maibock.

Let me get you a glass, because we --

-Uh, I'm good. Thank you. -Alright, and -- alright,

you know, I've never seen you like this.

-Dude, just wait till we get to Germany.

-So, to sum it up, the -- the - the witches are all drinking,

having sex, and worshiping Satan in a three-stage process

that lasts till dawn, and my job is to burn all y'all up.

-[Laughs maniacally]

[Thunder rumbles]

-Damn.

Alright, back to the thrilling conclusion

to the 1986 indie hit, "Witchboard."

Do you agree with me, Darcy,

that, uh, Jim and Brandon were on the verge of having sex

in their crummy little room at the Wishing Well Motel?

-I wish. -When I think of Big Bear,

you know, I think of Reggie Bannister

'cause he lives up there on Big Bear,

star of the "Phantasm" movies.

Reggie and Gigi, we had them both on the show

when we did the "Phantasm" marathon.

Um, but you know who made Big Bear famous?

Cecil B. DeMille.

He was the first celebrity to vacation up there,

and then Hollywood started filming up there,

including one of your favorites,

uh, "Jack Frost." -Yay.

-Um, also, boxers like to train up there.

Like, Oscar de La Hoya trains up there.

Um... Tyson trained up there.

"Sugar" Shane Mosley, Fernando Vargas.

Let's go to Big Bear. Let's do a show up there.

-I don't know what mountain you're going to,

but I'm going to the Brocken.

-Darcy, you are really scary.

♪♪

-Good.

[Laughter]

♪♪

[Static crackles]

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

♪♪

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

♪♪

[Ghostly voice moaning]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

[Crickets chirping]

-David?

David, where are you?

David, what have you done with Jim?

David, answer me, God damn it.

[Crickets chirping]

David.

[Crickets chirping]

You bastard.

♪♪

♪♪

-Carlos Malfeitor was a fairly notorious

mass murderer in his day.

He killed nine people.

Chopped them all up with an axe.

-Whatever happened to him? Is he still alive?

-No, the police finally caught up to him around 1930.

Shot him down in his own home.

There it is.

♪♪

-Hello?

Yes, I'd like to speak to Linda Brewster.

She's a patient in room 310.

No, no, 375.

It's an emergency.

What?

When?

♪♪

-[Screaming]

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

Aah!

♪♪

♪♪

[Engine revs]

[Moaning]

[Gasps]

♪♪

[Screams]

-[Growls]

♪♪

[Birds chirping]

-Linda?

[Birds chirping]

Jesus Christ.

[Birds chirping]

-[Grunting]

-Geez!

Linda, I'm trying to help you.

-[Distorted voice] Fine. Then stop moving.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

Go ahead, James.

What are you waiting for?

-Linda, I love you.

♪♪

-[Normal voice] Jim?

-[Breathing heavily]

God, Linda, I...

-[Distorted voice] It's not that easy, James.

-[Groaning]

♪♪

-[Grunts]

♪♪

-Don't move, asshole!

The rest of you people go back down to your apartments.

Now!

I understand you left quite a mess up there

in Big Bear, Mr. Morar.

-Dewhurst, listen.

It's not what you think.

Listen to me.

-Don't. -Li--

-Ms. Brewster, can you stand?

-[Moaning]

[Grunts]

You won't kill her, James.

-I could shoot her in the leg.

-That won't change anything.

-It'll buy us some time.

Time to fight you, time for Linda to close the portal.

-Only you can do that, James.

-Put it down.

Put it down!

-You're so smart.

You haven't figured it out yet, have you, James?

You're the portal.

Not Linda.

You're the one I opened.

You're the one I terrorized by torturing Linda

and by killing your friends.

♪♪

Linda's mine as long as you live.

♪♪

-Bullshit.

Bullshit. You tried to kill me.

♪♪

-No.

Just scare you.

You're the portal, James.

♪♪

You wanna save Linda?

That's right.

You've got the means right there in your hands.

Go ahead, James.

Close the portal.

But you won't.

♪♪

You can't.

You don't love her that much.

♪♪

Not thatmuch.

♪♪

-Linda.

-Is she worth it, James?

♪♪

Is anybody really worth it?

Think about it.

[Cocks gun]

♪♪

-[Grunts] -[Normal voice] Jim, don't!

[Gunshots]

[Distorted voice] [Grunts]

[Growling]

No!

♪♪

[Growls]

-[Grunts]

♪♪

♪♪

[Bell tolling]

♪♪

-[Sniffles]

♪♪

-[Sniffles]

♪♪

-I now pronounce you man and wife.

You may kiss the bride.

♪♪

[Cheers and applause]

♪♪

♪♪

-Look what I found.

-A Ouija board.

[Chuckles]

Gee, I haven't seen one of these since I was a kid.

-I didn't know they've been around that long.

[Both chuckle]

-I wonder if it still works.

-With all those holes in it?

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

-♪ In the middle of the summer ♪

♪ In the middle of the night ♪

♪ She was deaf from her own heartbeat ♪

♪ Still she heard something move ♪

♪ It was just out of sight

♪ And the morning was way out of reach ♪

♪♪

♪ Questions may be answered

♪ By the light of the day

-♪ But it's so far away

-♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪ The stairway's a dragon

♪ When you turn out the light

♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪ She'd been dreaming of demons ♪

♪ Dreaming of fire

♪ Dreaming the deluge was near

♪ When something awoke her

♪ Like the voice of a child

♪ And suddenly nothing was clear ♪

♪♪

♪ Logical conclusions

♪ Get harder to make

-♪ As you lie there awake

-♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪ The coat rack's a madman

♪ When you turn out the light

♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪ Logical conclusions

♪ Get harder to make

-♪ As you lie there awake

-♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪ The stairway's a dragon

♪ When you turn out the light

♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪♪

♪ Bump in the night

♪ The stairway's a dragon

♪ When you turn out the light

♪ And things go

♪ Bump in the night

[Static crackles]

♪♪

-Okay.

Nice double ending.

Actually, triple ending if you count the Rose Marie scene.

And once again, what is Rose Mary doing in this movie?

Uh, I know she was a huge fan of Stephen King,

but what's amazing is that she was playing

the elderly landlady in this movie,

and she would still work for 30 more years.

She was doing voices on "Garfield" into the --

well into the teens, so 90-year career.

I don't know any other actor with a 90-year career

because she was "Baby Rose Marie the Child Wonder"

in 1927 at the premiere of "The Jazz Singer,"

and that was not her first appearance.

She had been on stage from, I think, the age of 3.

Um, she was not just in vaudeville.

She was a headliner in vaudeville as a child.

So if you make a list of the people she worked with,

it's people three generations removed from us,

like Edgar Bergen and Rudy Vallée and Phil Silvers,

and her mentor was Jimmy Durante.

So she -- she -- in fact, she was the Showroom act

at the Flamingo in Vegas

on the opening night of the Flamingo in 1946,

'cause somehow she was connected to "Bugsy" Siegel.

Um, And in 1986,

she still wants the little part in the horror flick?

You know, I think they call that being a trouper.

Anyway, I think there are a lot of cheats in the plot,

um, starting with the fact that Malfeitor,

the, uh, evil demon in the Ouija,

does not appear until the last act,

and he's unrelated to anything else in the story.

Malfeitor has no lines.

He was played by the on-set photographer

just because the guy was tall and broad-shouldered,

and he looked menacing,

but the rules of the supernatural

Ouija spirit are also confused.

They basically just make up anything.

The board can levitate objects and slam doors

and use knives and axes and hatchets

and push people through windows

and go to any location with no motive

other than it's an evil spirit.

[Laughter] But why this Ouija board?

Why this woman's body?

Why does he need to kill Zarabeth or Brandon?

Unexplained.

And if Jim is the portal --

they seem to make a big deal out of that.

"You're the portal. You're the portal.

Kill yourself." You know?

first of all, he's the only person in the movie

who never had anything to do with the Ouija board.

He refused to use it.

Second, he doesn't believe in the Ouija board.

And, third, he was just a visitor

at the party at that house.

He doesn't have anything to do with the house.

And if the house is the portal,

which seems to be implied when they reveal

that Linda's house was a serial killer's house,

uh, why would Jim also be the portal?

And then the way to get rid of the evil spirit

is shoot the board with a gun?

-[Chuckles] -That was the whole solution,

blam, blam, blam, and the board whirls through space

and kills the evil spirit?

I mean, if they'd just mutilated the board

instead of throwing it into a garbage can,

you know, the movie would've been over 40 minutes earlier.

So "Witchboard" was a minor hit when it came out,

making $7.3 million

on an investment of just $2 million, so --

but it sold 100,000 video units,

and that meant that Kevin Tenney's career

was off and running.

He never went back to USC to finish his master's degree.

He just kept on making movies --

um, "Night of the Demons," uh, "The Cellar,"

which went straight to video, "Witchtrap."

Kevin Tenney made more movies with "witch" in the title

than any other filmmaker 'cause he also made

"Witchboard 2: The Devil's Doorway,"

"Witchboard III: The Possession."

That was made in Canada.

That pretty much ended the franchise.

Uh, Tenney made an excellent action thriller

called "Peacemaker" with Robert Forster and Robert Davi,

um, and he also made one of your favorite films, Darcy,

uh, "Pinocchio's Revenge"...

-Yay! I mean, "Mm, yay."

-...before going into producer mode.

Um, he produced, uh, "Brain Dead"

and, uh, that "Night of the Demons" remake

and several other movies. -Mm, I like it, too.

-You like that remake? -Mm-hmm.

-Um, he made a bigfoot movie, but it was one of those

sweet children's bigfoot movies, you know?

Not a big fan of those. -[Chuckles]

-Probably the main legacy of "Witchboard" in the horror world

is that everybody started using Ouija boards in movies

'cause before "Witchboard,"

the Ouija had been used maybe 10 times.

Um, since "Witchboard," it's been used like 50 times,

starting in 1990 with the whole plot

of "Sorority House Massacre II," right,

which revolves around five girls in lingerie

talking to a killer on the Ouija board.

-Love that movie. [Both chuckle]

-"What Lies beneath", "Prison of the Dead",

"Long Time Dead",

"Malefic",

"Paranormal Activity."

All those movies use the Ouija.

And remember "I Am Zozo"?

Zozo being the spirit that has invaded hundreds of

Ouija sessions.

"The Pact", "The Conjuring 2."

And then Hasbro, which owns the Ouija board,

they bought it from Parker Brothers in 1991,

they tried to do a franchise of movies.

They made a movie called "Ouija", which came out in 2014.

It was a lame PG-13 flop

because they didn't want the Ouija board

to do anything sinister or satanic or harmful

to the person using the Ouija board.

So -- hello! No plots available for that.

And then Netflix made that movie "Veronica."

That is supposedly based on a true story of

a 15-year-old girl who played with a Ouija board

and died under mysterious circumstances,

and the police could never figure out what killed her.

None of these Ouija movies, though, can compete with

"The Devil's Gift."

Did you see that?

"The Devil's Gift." -Yes.

-In which a jolly chimp is possessed by a demon.

You know those monkeys that bang the cymbals together?

A demon possessed cymbal crashing toy monkey.

Imagine the possibilities. Okay. Darcy, what did you think?

Tawny Kitaen can kick ass, right?

Those were some pretty decent stunts in the fight scenes.

-Oh, my God. She's awesome.

And she did all of her own stunts.

-Also, I think she challenged Jill Schoelin

for the latest shower scene in a movie.

Her shower scene comes right before the ending of the movie.

Remember, Jill Schoelin has a shower scene

at the climax of "The Stepfather."

Same thing, shower scene

as climactic fight scene motivation.

-I like the kills a lot.

There are some really creative kills,

and Tawny Kitaen working that ax, mm, yes.

-Okay, the most interesting thing I read about

Tawny Kitaen's career is that when she was 14 years old,

growing up in San Diego,

she got a backstage pass at a Peter Frampton concert,

and she saw that Peter Frampton's girlfriend,

Penny, was getting the VIP treatment,

and she decided that's what she wanted to aspire to,

to be the girlfriend, and she did.

She was on the cover of two Ratt albums.

She became the Whitesnake girl, and she married David Coverdale.

That didn't work out.

So then she married Chuck Finley.

200 game winner.

Pitcher who ended up at the -- he ended up

at Anaheim playing for the Angels.

And they had two kids together while she was still acting.

Mostly she was in TV after the '80s.

Died before her time.

Her heart couldn't handle the drugs.

Okay, Darcy.

Should we do a little mailbag before I burn you up?

-Yes, we can read some mail before I terrorize your soul.

-Okay, great. Go for it.

-It's from River in Roanoke again.

-I remember River. -Yeah.

-How old is River now?

-I think he tells you in there.

-Oh, he's got, like, little things in there.

-Presents.

He's got a -- Gosh, River.

He's got -- What is that?

Is that a babadook?

-A babadook? No.

-Okay. What is this? What is it?

I don't know. -He'll tell you.

All right, I'll read his letter.

Okay.

"Dear Joe Bob, it's me, River. How have you been?

I'm now 10 years old now. I'm about to be 11.

If you don't remember me, I was the 8-year-old

that didn't know why I liked 'Wolfcop.'

And I still don't know why.

Another movie you should watch is...

"The Quiet Place."

While you were talking to Svengoolie,

Ernie was moving a lot.

But there's a better movie than 'The Quiet Place.'

'Willy's Wonderland,' including Nicolas Cage in it.

From River.

Hi, Darcy."

Hi.

And then he tried to write -- draw you a picture,

and then he X'd it out.

Never mind.

-It was a good try.

-So, yeah. So I actually agree with you, River.

"Willy's Wonderland" got buried during the pandemic.

Nic Cage fighting murderous animatronic characters

in a fun house.

Who wouldn't love that?

And really, if I had to choose between rewatching

"Willy's Wonderland" and "A Quiet Place",

I think I would go for the Nic Cage movie, right?

Anyhow, he forgot to put your message, Darcy,

but if you'll recall,

River invited you to dinner previously

and said that he would provide a veggie plate.

So -- But do you agree with him?

-Oh, anything is better than "A Quiet Place."

-Really? You dislike it that much?

-Oh, I really do. -Okay.

-You're a mom.

How old do you think a kid should be

before he's allowed to watch hard core horror?

-To me, you're never too young, with no restrictions.

-Okay, Darcy.

Somehow that doesn't surprise me, you saying that.

But now it's time for the second movie,

which is totally satanic, as you know.

It's actually a satanic movie financed by the Mafia.

So it's got all these levels of evil penetrating through it.

And as soon as it starts,

I'm using all my witch fighting knowledge to bring you down.

-Have fun with that.

-Walpurgisnacht act two, after the break.

But for now, I'm Joe Bob Briggs reminding you

that it may seem like

we're drinking a lot on Walpurgisnacht,

but I once killed a six pack just to watch it die.

[Laughter]

-Ugh. Okay.

-We probably need a few witch jokes.

Don't you think?

-Oh, we don't need any witch jokes.

-Yeah. What happens when a witch breaks the sound barrier?

-You're going to tell me.

-You hear a sonic broom.

-Ooh.

-What was the worst part of being convicted

at the Salem Witch Trials?

You had to register as a hex offender.

[Laughter]

Okay, guy walks into a bar.

Guy walks into a bar, says, "Bartender, give me two shots,

one for me and one for my best buddy."

The bartender says, "You want both shots now,

or you want to wait till your buddy gets here to pour his?"

And the guy says, "Oh, we want both now.

I got my best buddy in my pocket."

And he pulls a little 3-inch man out of his pocket.

And the bartender says, "Can he even drink that much?"

He goes, "Oh, sure, he can drink all that and more."

So the bartender pours the two shots,

and sure enough, the little guy drinks it all up.

And the bartender says, "That's amazing.

What else can he do? Can he walk?"

The man flicks a quarter down to the end of the bar,

and he says, "Hey, Rodney, go fetch that quarter."

The little dude runs down to the end of the bar,

picks up the quarter, runs back down,

and gives it to the man.

And the bartender is in total shock now.

He says, "That's more than amazing.

What else can he do? Does he talk?"

And the man looks surprised, and he says, "Sure, he can talk.

Hey, Rodney, tell him about that time

we were down in Africa on safari

and you called that witch doctor an asshole."

[Light laughter, groans]

-Oh, but that wasn't really a witch joke.

-That was a witch doctor joke.

-That doesn't count. -That totally counts.

-That doesn't count.

I will see you on Brocken, sir.

-You'll never make it to Brocken.

-I'm going to rule Brocken.

-You're toast. You're going to get burned up.

-You're delusional.

-Good joke, though, right?

-Delusional.

[Laughter]

[Static crackles]