New Movie Reviews with Flick Chick Vique Nandor Fodor and The Talking Mongoose
Our Red Vine Reviewer Vique Rojas is here to tell us about the new flick, “Nandor Fodor and The Talking Mongoose.” Learn more at https://phoenixfilmcriticssociety.org
Category
🛠️
LifestyleTranscript
00:00 - Welcome back.
00:03 Our favorite Red Vine reviewer, Flick Chick Vicky, is back to talk about a movie that
00:08 she has a very special personal connection to.
00:12 - First thing I wanna ask you, Teresa, do you have any podcasts that you listen to?
00:16 - Oh yes, I'm a big podcast person.
00:18 I love WTF, I love Fresh Air, and of course, This American Life.
00:22 - Oh, okay.
00:23 Now, a lot of people are into, especially women, are into true crime.
00:27 - True crime.
00:28 Oh my gosh.
00:29 - If anybody was murdered, I am here for it.
00:31 - Oh really?
00:32 You're a murderino.
00:33 - Oh yes.
00:34 - So, that is not me, but if it's weird, paranormal, freaky, can't be explained, I am there for
00:41 it.
00:42 - Okay.
00:43 - And I actually was a big fan of Art Bell, if you remember the great Art Bell, who did
00:46 Late Night Radio, and he is the reason why so many podcasts, even true crime, exist today.
00:51 - That's true.
00:52 - Because he did his radio and got a big following, and did a lot of kinds of topics.
00:57 He was political when he first started, but that was not when I was listening to him.
01:01 And then when he went off the air, he started doing podcasts.
01:05 And when I listen to a lot of paranormal podcasts, a lot of them credit listening to Art Bell
01:10 and how they wanted to start one.
01:12 Well, one of the very freakiest stories I ever heard about, maybe 10 years ago on a
01:17 podcast, was the story that's the basis of this movie that I'm gonna review today.
01:23 And it's called Nandor Fodor and the Talking Mongoose.
01:28 And this is actually, everything I'm gonna tell you is true.
01:30 - Ooh, I love this.
01:31 - From this point on.
01:32 - Okay, I'm intrigued.
01:33 - So, this is about a family in the 30s who claim they had an entity living in their barn
01:40 and in their house, in their property, that was a talking mongoose named Jeff.
01:47 He actually had his own name that he called--
01:49 - Well, what else are you gonna call your talking mongoose?
01:51 - He called himself.
01:52 Yeah, but not the typical Jeff, he spelled it with a G, one of those, you know, a European.
01:57 Well, so this gentleman brings this case to Nandor Fodor, who is a Hungarian-American
02:04 parapsychologist.
02:06 And he goes to investigate this case because there's already been a bunch of controversy
02:10 about it.
02:11 The crazy part is, Teresa, neighbors, acquaintances, experts, scientists, a lot of people came
02:18 around this property and were investigating, and a lot of people claimed to have had interactions
02:23 with Jeff.
02:25 They all swore it was real.
02:27 - But if he speaks, are there recordings of his voice?
02:31 - There were witnesses.
02:33 There were a lot of witnesses.
02:34 Anyway, so this movie is about this investigation.
02:38 And all that part is true.
02:41 Whether you think there was a real talking mongoose or not is up to your own imagination
02:46 to come up with.
02:47 But Simon Pegg stars as Nandor Fodor.
02:51 He did not write or produce this, he just stars.
02:53 Minnie Driver is his assistant.
02:54 - I love Minnie.
02:55 - Yes, and she looks great.
02:57 And Christopher Lloyd is the gentleman who brings the case to Nandor.
03:00 - We know him from Back to the Future.
03:02 - And so many wonderful things, yeah.
03:04 - Taxi.
03:05 - Yeah, taxi.
03:06 And he brings the case to Nandor in the first place.
03:09 It is fascinating.
03:10 And as you can see from this trailer, it is given first-class treatment.
03:14 It looks like a masterpiece theater production.
03:17 I, for one, was, I've always been haunted by this story ever since I heard it.
03:21 - You don't forget about a talking mongoose.
03:23 - Yeah, you don't forget about it.
03:24 And when I heard there was a movie, I went, "What?
03:25 I am there."
03:26 And I requested a screener.
03:27 I thought I was not let down.
03:31 Some of the stuff I've told you is not covered in that, and that's the fact of all these
03:34 people that had interactions.
03:36 There was a reason why a lot of people believed that this was true.
03:40 - Well, tonally speaking, is this like a purely paranormal story, or is it played for comedy?
03:46 - No, it's played for real, but there's, you can't help but wonder, but it's played for
03:51 serious.
03:52 But it's a paranormal.
03:54 It's not necessarily spooky.
03:55 It's a little creepy, but it's a paranormal mystery.
03:59 And I give it four red vines because I like the topic, and I thought they did a beautiful
04:04 job of bringing it to life for me, something that I've been wondering about for years and
04:08 years and years.
04:09 - So four out of five red vines because it answered a question that you've been asking
04:13 yourself back when Art Bell--
04:15 - I don't know if it answered it, but at least it gave a visual component to this thing that's
04:22 haunted me all this time.
04:23 - So it was satisfying, and people should see it.
04:25 - Yeah, it was for me.
04:26 - Okay, you guys heard that.
04:27 - And I think anybody who isn't familiar with the story would just really enjoy it.
04:31 - If you wanna know more about this haunted barn and the perhaps talking mongoose--
04:37 - If you like freaky and paranormal and mysterious and weird, like me, you're gonna love it.
04:44 - Check it out.
04:45 Thank you so much, Vicki.
04:45 - Thank you so much.