A Few More Observations from Rad Live and a Letter Concerning Toleration

 Watching "Rad" on the big screen, especially in contrast to the letterboxed VHS tapes, you really see so many more details that you never have before. When I saw "Rad" last year I noted many such details. Seeing it again, I have just a few more...

First, the big one: in one of the "Rad" deleted scenes, in preparation for the big race, Cru is gifted "the Murray from your store." That Murray, the shop owner and the store are established in the opening "walk this sucker" montage. The store is 7-11. The bike:

The bike has a sign on it. I wish I had memorized it from the theater but it's like a prize for Hell Track or an advertisement or something.

The store owner is someone Cru delivers to on his route:

In the scene where Cru is tempted by The Devil and resists the temptation, the trash can in the background is Pac-Man themed. The opening on the left is Pac-Man, the opening on the right is Ms. Pac-Man. She has a bow in her hair.

The third thing is a repetition... I am once again reminded that every Rad shirt available for purchase on the web is inaccurate to the props in the movie. Oh well.

In the era before this blog, I did some in-depth research to try to figure out where Cochran was. I believe I found it was in Canada, perhaps because imdb lists one of the shooting locations for the movie as Cochrane, Canada. Of course that's a dead end of sorts because the fictional Cochran was in the U.S.. Regardless, the decoding of the BMX magazine has already revealed the Cochran of the movie is in Oregon. It should be noted that the spelling is not consistent even within the movie: sometimes "Cochrane," sometimes "Cochran."

That said, seeing the movie on the big screen, I noticed the license plates in a way I never have before:

You can see how front-and-center this one is but it just blends into the VHS brown fuzz. I was able to find Oregon license plates from the past that look like that but not from the 1980s and not for passenger vehicles. This one is left to the viewer. Someone with access to the higher res will hopefully be able to take a look.

Finally, in preparation for this post, I found an old email of mine that notes there is a sign in the film that labels the date of Hell Track as June 26th. I don't have the original source on this, I don't know where I got it from but I trust myself. Somehow I never followed through with commemorating that day... we should all add it to our calendars.