Blank Check with Griffin & David - Memento with Amy Nicholson

Episode Date: July 2, 2017

Amy Nicholson (MTV News) joins Griffin and David this week to discuss 2000’s fractured crime drama, Memento. But how was Christopher’s brother, Jonathan Nolan, involved in this project? What is it about this strange art film that enabled it to crossover into the mainstream? Are there any tangents about Tom Cruise during the conversation? Together, they examine Guy Pearce’s career, the movie's brilliant storytelling devices, their mutual joy for some great Pants and share gym class stories from growing up. Also, be sure to listen to Amy’s podcast The Canon on Earwolf!

Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe. You can follow us on Reddit, blankies.reddit.com. A big thanks to Andrew Pergudo for social media, Pat Reynolds and Joe Bowen for our artwork, Clay Montgomery for the theme song, and as always, podcast! He's doing it backwards, you get it, because of the movie. That's the thing we do at the end.

I'm explaining to our guests your stupid bit. Oh, you can follow us on Twitter at Blank Check Pod or check us out on Facebook. Please welcome everyone. Oh, hi, everybody. Let me just shake this Polaroid quickly. My name is Griffin Newman. I'm David Sims. This is a podcast called Blank Check with Griffin and David.

We follow filmographies directors who had massive success early on in their careers, and then were given a series of blank checks to make whatever wild cinematic follies they wanted. And sometimes the check's clear, and sometimes they bounce, baby. And we're connoisseurs of context. We like looking at the larger picture of how the film got made, what it means in the larger arc of the person's career, and how the film was received at the time and how it's held up today.

When did you add that connoisseurs of context thing? I feel like you're doing that now. I said a couple times, and then Ben, a.k.a. producer Ben, a.k.a. the Benducer, a.k.a. producer Ben, a.k.a. poet laureate, a.k.a. the Haas. This is a terrible way to welcome our guests. A.k.a. the keeper, a.k.a. the tiebreaker, a.k.a. our finest film critic, a.k.a. the meat detective, a.k.a. the meat detective? I'm sorry, a.k.a. the fart A.K.A. The Haas This is a terrible way To welcome our guests A.K.A. The Tiebreaker A.K.A. Our Finest Film Critic

A.K.A. The Meat Detective A.K.A. The Meat Detective I'm sorry A.K.A. The Fart Lover Okay great A.K.A. The Fuckmaster He's not Professor Crispy

No You can wish him A hello fennel I'm not a temperature queen either We're getting all the bits Out of the way He's graduated certain tells Over the course of different maesters

Such as producer Ben Kenobi Kylo Ben Ben say Ben I chum a lunce Say Benny thing Ellie Ben's with the dollar sign, and Warhose. The fans love all this crap. You can talk.

You gotta believe us. I can talk? Oh yeah. We like people to talk before we introduce them. That's the last bit. Here's the cornerstone of this podcast is that everything the fans love, David hates. Right. Including sometimes whole episodes they demand that we do.

Including entire co-hosts of this show. Sometimes. Hi everybody. Sometimes. Anyway. That's a joke because we are of course

hashtag the two friends. Right. We are two friends who host a podcast that's a competitive advantage that does not apply to any other podcast that's ever existed.

Right. So we trademarked that we've hashtagged it we're good. But what we like to do in this podcast are miniseries. Uh huh. Jesus. We're what we like to do in this podcast are miniseries. Uh-huh.

Jesus, we're still in the intro. And this is a miniseries on the films of Christopher Nolan. Right. And this miniseries is called The Pod Knight Cast. Apologies for the title. Yeah. Yeah. Got a tattoo on my thigh.

Fact six. Don't trust the pod knight. And I'm trying to figure out who the pod knight is. I don't know. Okay. And we have a guest. We have pod knight is. I don't know. Okay. And we have a guest. We have a guest today. Yes.

Great guest. It's a very exciting guest who we're annoying with all this crap. She is a film critic for MTV. She's the host of the podcast, The Canon. Ladies and gentlemen, Amy Nicholson is here with us today. Hey, guys. I've just had my mouth open in quiet astonishment for the last three minutes. Hello.

At least he did it all. He just did it all at once. Yeah, well, get ready for the ending. Oh, boy. Yeah. Hi, Amy. Hey, guys. Amy's in New York. Amy's in New York from LA. Yeah, cross-continental. We flew you out here as we do

with all of our guests. You're very rich. Thank you for putting me up at the Carlson. Of course, I'm Anton. I'm a superhero. I feel like Tom Hanks in Joe vs. the Volcano. This has been a really magical week. Thank you. I feel like I can die happy now. Please, my pleasure. You know, it's honestly worth it to see the glint in your eye. So, you know,

of course, the blank check policy is... We should do a John Patrick Shanley miniseries. All two of them? Isn't that Joe vs. the Volcano? He did that, right? And Doubt. Is that it? Is there a movie in between? Let's find out.

No. And I hate Doubt. I think that's a bad movie. Let's do that miniseries. What do you think of Doubt? I think that every time Viola Davis lets her nose run, she gets nominated for an Oscar.

That's a secret power. That's when she discovered it in Doubt, right? She was like,'s let's let's try the one run with nose running yeah yeah everyone knows that you have to wipe waste not from your when it's running down your face but what viola davis presupposes is maybe you don't maybe you don't uh i i fucked that up um amy you know of course we have a rule that everyone knows that when we fly a guest out from another city on our dime, as we always do from our infinite pockets. Could you upgrade me from business to first night time? Well, it's one or the other, because right now you had business, but you were allowed to bring one celebrity guest with you.

As we know, when Fran Hoffner was on the show, she brought Ansel Elgort not into the studio. I vaguely remember this bit. Who was your celebrity plus one on the airplane? Who would you like to ride an airplane with in general? That's a good question. Who would chill you out in an airplane? That's true because I'm going through a list of people I think would be interesting and then people who I think would be nightmares to sit next to.

Who is most likely to talk about themselves the whole time? You don't want someone who's too funny or too like, you know, into doing like a lot of this. I couldn't deal with Anthony Kiedis. You couldn't deal with Anthony Kiedis? Didn't he wear a shirt on? He wouldn't be wearing a shirt. He would just be going on and on about the Red Hot Chili Peppers

and their new music. I have a sub question. And then we have to get to the movie. But I have a sub question. Have you ever seen anyone on a shirt with, on a plane with their shirt on? No. Like in general, like a grown person. I think I've seen people with barely not a shirt on, like on the way to Vegas.

A shirt with like a wire vest, yes. Yeah, I've seen close to no shirt. Because it's like when you had some mesh vest, when is the line between is that a shirt or not? Like how much fabric do you technically need? Or like Hawaiian shirt unbuttoned. That's another like almost shirtless look where it's like you're hanging out, you know? Yeah, it's like if you have a Hawaiian shirt with seven buttons and you only have one button, are you wearing a shirt or not? Barely.

Yeah, but if you unbutton the button, they're going to say you're not wearing a shirt. Correct. Right? It's just this difference of an inch. Yeah, is that the move too when they're like, can you please put a shirt on? You just button one button

very passive aggressively. See, I like when we get this philosophical because it really is. There's an inch that separates you between two different states of being. Really, it truly is just one button.

This is a shirtless movie. There's a lot of shirtlessness, male shirtlessness in this film. My answer would be Vin Diesel, by the way. I would sit with Vin Diesel on the plane. He's a man of few words. He wouldn't talk the whole time, but when he had something to say,

whoo, boy. I don't usually like being negative, but the only thing I can think of is who I don't want to sit next to on a plane. Sort of like your cheerful producer. Don't say Vin Diesel. I just went to a thing where I saw Jewel talk every day. Okay. And I went to this Walmart film festival where Jewel was there.

And I saw a great piece about it, by the way, which is worth reading. Well, I left out cause it was a little mean, but I saw Jewel, like first I saw Jewel give a concert and then I saw Jewel the next day, like talk about mindfulness at a seminar.

And then I saw Jewel on a panel about feminism in Hollywood. And each day she gave the exact same speech. And then the fourth time I saw her was at the award show and she gave the same speech again about her entire life. And I know her life story so well right now that it just becomes aggravating and I'm mad at her. And she's literally the last person I'd want to sit to next to on a plane because she would tell it to me again.

I think she'd probably tell it to me twice. What's Jewel doing these days? Apart from apparently just starring as like the main centerpiece of a film festival. Does she have an album? She's starting a website about mindfulness. She's really getting into teaching kids how to meditate so that they can deal with the stresses of the modern world. Well, that's a great answer to your question.

She was married to a rodeo clown. She was? For like 10 years. She lived in her car. I did not know that. I did. I knew that very well. Did she talk about the rodeo clown? It was like a Hillary Swank very well she didn't talk about the rodeo it was like a hillary swank situation she did not talk about her she left out all the interesting stuff she really only talks about from like she talks about the time she turned down a million dollar signing bonus like non-stop if you ever hear her talk she'll talk about turning down a million dollar

signing bonus like because it was like what too corporate or like it wasn't wasn't she felt like with her yeah she was like i was a homeless teenager living in a car with my mom i didn't have health insurance i almost died because i had problems with my organs and i went to a hospital and they wouldn't help me because no she had no problems with her organs i forget which organ i should remember if she told she said it enough times she was shoplifting a lot she was stealing clothes she stopped shoplifting when she saw herself with in the mirror wearing a sundress and thought she'd gone too far. Then she started playing music. Oh, God, now I'm running through all the others. I'm so sorry. But she became famous and

locals saying, this is not the Jewel podcast. Anyway. I just, I'm sorry. I just found out so much about Jewel. I just want to run it down real fast. Okay, one, she dated Sean Penn. Did not know that. In 95. So, like, really kind of trashy Sean Penn, too. Like, really scary Sean Penn.

Wasn't he married? When did he marry Robin Wright? No, I feel like he marries Robin Wright like in the late 96. Okay. He only dates blondes. It's really interesting. Yeah, it's true.

Because then he was with Charlize and he dated Scarlett Johansson. Yeah, he's very particular. Isn't he dating Vincent D'Onofrio's daughter now? Is she blonde? No, she looks like Vincent D'Onofrio. No, I think she's got dark hair. No way.

I refuse to believe that he's dating her unless she's dyeing her hair. She is a blonde. Vincent D'Onofrio's daughter? Layla D'Onofrio. She's sort of a dirty blonde. Is she a natural blonde? I don't have this information. I can tell.

Do you have a picture? I'm going to guess. I don't know. I'm going to show you a picture and you can make a decision. Here she is with Sean Penn. Alright, here we go. Here's a side by side of them. No, she's a dyed blonde.

Looks like it, right? Let me look one more time at the eyebrows. It looks like it. She's barely a blonde. But, you know, she's fair haired, I suppose. I don't know. Also, she married a rodeo cowboy. I'm sorry for calling him a rodeo clown. That might be rude.

They were married for 10 years. And she is the cousin of Koryanka Kilcher, who played Pocahontas in the New World. Really? I've heard her in interviews say that's not true, and people just made that up. Well, it's on Wikipedia. Wait, you're saying that? Koryanka. Oh, Koryanka.

Well, she's the daughter of Ats Kilcher, it's on Wikipedia. Wait, Jewel saying that or the woman? Kurianka. Oh, Kurianka. Well, she's the daughter of Ats Kilcher, an Alaskan. And apparently, Kurianka is also, but maybe it's all made up. Yeah, I don't know. And she's estranged

from her mother. Oh, I didn't know that. Who she accused of stealing money from her later in there. We used to live in the car together. Yeah, I don't know, man.

So that's what I got on Jewel. Her family, she comes from a line of singers. That's nice. Anyway. What I was going to say is Jewel her family she comes from a line of singers that's nice anyway what I was gonna say is Jewel was kind of

at the height of her popularity with this when this movie came out this was like Jewel's oh my hands my hands my hands that's how that song

the title's pronounced right my hands you have to say it like that you can't say my hands Amy thank you very much for answering the question. You chose to sit with Bizarro Jewel. No.

Bizarro Jewel. The opposite of Jewel. I would say I'm crashing this plane, but then I'll probably get stopped on my flight home. Like the opposite of Jewel. So like Lou-age. Lou-age. Lou-age. Yeah.

She gives clothes back to stores. And she lived in a boat. Yeah. She gives clothes back to stores. And she lived in a boat. So, yeah. So, Jewel was at the height of her popularity. The year is 2000.

And the film Memento. Yeah, this is obviously an episode about the movie Memento. Right. Have we not mentioned that? You know that, right? This is clearly, that's all we're talking about today. This is about, yeah, we're talking about Memento. Christopher Nolan's breakout film.

His second movie. Amy requested it, I believe. It's one of the only Christopher Nolan films I like. That's a good reason to request it. Interesting. Wait, what are we talking about? Memento. Oh, I forgot. Guys, I forgot to tell you. I slammed Ben into a bathroom mirror right before this episode

started. So he doesn't remember anything? He might be like 75%. How many bits are we fucking doing? They don't tell me about this shit, Amy. They don't tell me about these bits they planned. Well, couldn't you tell from the blood gushing down his nose? And it's obvious it's all over the controls. In David's defense, that's Ben's neutral state.

For one reason or another, he always has blood poured out of an orifice. At least you didn't like wrap him in a shower curtain or what? What's like what's another piece of imagery from me? I would never do that. Ben is my friend. Do you want me to put duct tape on anybody's mouth? Because I could do that. Poor, poor Dodd.

We need to get into Dodd. What happens to Dodd? We got to talk. I just I just want to put that on the table so we don't forget. I just want to resolve Dodd. Do you think it's related to Lot Dodd? We got to talk. I just want to put that on the table so we don't forget. I just want to resolve Dodd. Do you think he's related to Lot Dodd? From the Star Wars? Yeah.

Maybe. I don't know. They look similar. When did you turn off on Nolan then? Are you just sort of not a Nolan fan in general? Sort of, you know, more recent epic widescreen Nolan? How do you feel about Christopher Nolan? Well, say a week ago,

you were at the Ehrlich wedding. I was. That Dave and I were at, and I said, like, excited to have you on the show, and you said, I think it's the only one I like. And then I immediately said, wait, no, I also like The Dark Knight. Okay. Okay. Sure. And then I'm gonna get kicked out, but I've never seen The Prestige.

Oh, wow. People love, you know. So, I just, I never have made it around to it. I don't know. It's fine. I just I never have made it around to it I don't know I just never haven't I think it's isn't it on Netflix right now it is on Netflix so you know you could easily watch the prestige which uh yeah I feel like you know movie nerds are always like that's the best one I think the prestige is great I like the prestige I've been lying and pretending I've seen the prestige for so many years how does it feel to finally unburden yourself gotta say that's a real prestige move I'm hoping that everybody forgets what I said in five minutes. Yeah.

But, but the later like inception, interstellar, the sort of recent Nolan, not your bag. Well, I think the thing with recent Nolan that drives me insane is he reminds me of Ridley Scott and that he doesn't seem to care that much about people.

He's just really full blown went over into the world of plot. Right. And when I watch his films, I feel like I hear dialogue come out of his mouth that no human would ever say. And I don't think he really cares about people at all as anything more than just mechanics in this Rube Goldberg contraption. Right.

That's designed to celebrate how brilliant he is. So I will watch everything he does now. Cause I want to know, I want to be on top of it, but I miss, maybe it's that you see a film like Memento at the start of a guy's career and you see one direction you want his career to go in and to see him go so far askew. It makes you mad. I think I don't know if you guys feel this way, but. Nolan is one of the first young auteurs that I've just bought in on right away.

Me too. And I felt some ownership over him. And maybe that I've just bought in on right away. Me too. And I felt some ownership over him. And maybe that's not fair of me to do. No, no, but I know what you mean exactly. So what's the direction you wanted him to go in? You see Memento and you think, what do you expect from this guy? I expect, there's something about directors when they work with limitation. I feel like maybe that's something we're going to be talking about a lot today.

That Memento is a film where pretty much his only technical effect is a reverse shot. The kind of thing that people have been doing since film was invented. And everything else he had to do with like his imagination and with his dialogue and with his construction. And none of it came from pixels. And I think you work best when you're constrained. And I wish someone at Warner Brothers would have been like, cool, you are still never getting more than $50 million from us. Maybe 20, maybe 20. Maybe every film should try to be made for like 20, maybe 30.

Now I'm just messing with the number. But, you know, I think that's when you get most creative. That's kind of one of the central conceits of our show. Oh, really? Is that like. Yeah, I mean, we go around a lot. But the blank check idea is that people like. It can be a curse as much as it can be a blessing.

You know, they want to earn that status or they can do whatever they want and write their own budgets and whatever. But oftentimes the best film they make is the one that gave in the blank check, which was the one that kind of happens by mistake to a degree. Like the analogy. Do you guys remember being in elementary school and being given like free writing exercises when they give you a piece of paper and they say, you have 20 minutes write something in your head yeah yeah and if it's a blank piece of paper it was always so hard yeah but if they give you one sentence or it has to use the word banana or whatever i feel like it's just easier to get even more creative like you are freer when you are constrained and now i feel like that's stalinist or something no i agree do you folks want to hear something really dumb i totally agree with you i also think it's a huge problem in TV, which I feel like

I've talked about. Even more so in TV, because I feel like right now, that's where the blank checks are being written more than anywhere else. And it doesn't have to end. It doesn't have to end. It doesn't really have to even, like, tell, like, a story every episode. It's kind of just like, just give us a season of a TV show. Like, you know, do what you want.

Right? My elementary school was so dumb that I think as a way of trying to teach that principle to us, they would only let us, like during art class, paint with one color at a time.

Really? They'd be like, this month is blue. Wait, would they hide the other colors? And then like at the end of the month they'd be like,

huge announcement, green. What? I guess maybe, no, I think they gave us each one incrementally. It wasn't one at a month, they'd be like, huge announcement. Green. What? I guess maybe, no. I think they gave us each one incrementally. It wasn't one at a time. But it was distinctly like... What kind of weird school did you go to?

Yeah, I know. We also didn't have gym class or theater class. We had rhythms class, which was interpretive exercise. What is interpretive exercise? Is it just like explore the space? It's like, I want you to do four laps around the room as a horse. And that was like a woman with a scarf. And then there was a guy at a grand piano who would play music to like,

it'd be like, here's a hula hoop, but you cannot use it as a hula hoop. Go! You went to like a fancy private school, right? Yeah, this is why you act. It's true. All the seeds are being planted. It was like a weird, like crunchy. Yeah, crunchy hippie private school. It wasn't like a fancy private school, right? Yeah, this is why you act. Yeah, 100%. It's true. All the seeds are being planted. It was like a weird, like crunchy private school.

Yeah, crunchy hippie private school. It wasn't like a fancy one. No, no, no. You weren't taught to like, you know, ride a horse or... No, no. You were taught to run like a horse.

Right, right, right. You were the horse. Did you guys ever have to play with parachutes in gym class? Oh, yeah. Okay, because do they still do that? That seems like the weirdest thing

that happened only when I was a child. You did not play with parachutes. I don't know if you know this, David grew up in London. I know, I grew up in New York. You have plenty of parachutes left over from the war. In elementary school, went to PS87. You didn't go to London until then. On Amsterdam and 78th until the third grade.

And that had this very weird playground that was designed by some architect who was like, I will design the perfect space for children like you know he was like given free reign he was given a blank check oh and it was this amazing playground that was full of like covered bridges and all these like structures that went up and down that we could just hide it and it was obviously a disaster for like grown-ups because they could not monitor us at all. It really was like a wonderful space, like for children.

So it was a great playground. They've destroyed it and replaced it, obviously, because it must have been like a health and safety like nightmare. But you never had the rainbow parachute thing. No. And you grew up in California, right, Amy? Yeah. And Texas.

And in Texas, we definitely had the parachute thing. Like one of my first memories is doing the parachute. You would this might sound strange. You grab, the parachute's a circle and everybody grabs around the ring and you just march carrying the parachute for no reason I could ever figure out to songs like the Ghostbusters theme song. And then you like wave the parachute up and down and it ripples. I've seen, right. I have seen that, right.

Where you're almost like you're holding a big trampoline and someone's going to like jump from a building onto it. Yeah, but it fascinates me because it doesn't seem like you get that much exercise, and I don't know why we all did this. I remember we'd only get to do it. Maybe it was just like, Jesus, they'll just, at least we can see where they all are and, like, you know, this won't be complicated. I remember it being like a once-a-year thing, like maybe two max. Like, it counted. It was, like, almost like a reward, you reward. Or like the last day before Christmas break

or something you get to do a parachute day. Do you think this is like a Cold War thing? When the Cold War ended in the 80s they had all these excess parachutes and they gave them to schools? Is that what happened? I want to know what kids do now. I don't know enough kids in elementary school right now. Probably playing their apps.

Can I talk about England for a second? Because in England when I went to elementary school in England when I moved there when I was nine they do the Maypole all the time

they love that you guys you know where there's a pole and a bunch of ribbons and you all like run around it and run around it

yeah like princesses yeah like little princesses and they also like Morris dancing which is like a sort of version of line dancing

where you're kind of like facing each other and you move around like that's good for kids you mean the one that you see in jane austen movies well that's like that's like romantic line dancing where you like have your hands you remember you need touch you know morris dancing you sometimes you have a stick and you just sort of like bang them together and like as you swap sides oh wow they gave kids sticks that's a really good idea your school sounds awesome hanover school It was a school for asthmatic built in the Victorian age.

It was on the canal, Regents Canal in London. Because the idea was like they would get the sea air of this like polluted canal. It's like very silly. And the playground was on the roof. On the roof? Yeah. Everything about this is so dangerous. I love it.

Yeah, we weren't allowed to play with real balls. We had these like foam balls. Because obviously if we kicked a ball over the roof, which was really easy to do, like, we could harm someone. This is where I went to school. I stunned you two into silence with this. My weird country elementary school also had the playground on the roof, and it was, like, a cage.

Yeah, no, we had very high walls. Yeah, it was, like, on the roof, but then they had these cage, like there was like fencing all around it and above us for that very reason. So no one like fell off the side or threw a ball or anything. This makes me so glad I grew up in Texas where we just had giant fields. Right. We were soft as we could run around.

Yeah. Here's my school. And that's obviously, that's the roof. You know, those high cages Hanover it's a nice school guys Islington it looks like a prison

yeah well you know my school is like by a swamp then grew up in New Jersey yeah and I'm surprised

because we only played dodgeball like that sounds very Jersey though and it was just like that though and it was just like that was life it was just like

gym class you know where the dodgeballs are basically it's just like hit your friends with balls I hated I hated dodgeball Ben no offense you're out

but I find nothing surprising about that that is the least surprising thing I've ever heard and I was a fat kid and I always got hit but you were a fat kid I don't see it

because you're so wiry yeah I was a fat kid but Benny was got hit. Wait, you were a fat kid? I don't see that because you're so wiry. Yeah, I was a fat kid. Dude, Mike Fanny was tipping over the bike. They were always... Yeah, how fat? Amy's question. How fat? Pretty big.

I feel like I'm setting a vigil. How fat were you? I'll show you a picture of my face. Really? I've never seen the picture. I've only heard the stories. I've never seen kid Ben. This is huge.

The fans are going to go crazy. They're going to love us talking about a picture they can't see. This is wonderful. We'll post it on the pictures. I've only heard the stories. This is huge. The fans are going to go crazy. They're going to love us talking about a picture they can't see. This is wonderful. We'll post it on Twitter. You didn't lose the weight until your 20s, right? When did you get skinny? In college. I was a skinny kid who got chubby once he was a teenager. You can see my fat

face in marching bands. Is that you in the back? Yeah. That's you in the back? You look like a little toy soldier. What was your instrument? At that time, they had me playing the tuba. Oh, boy. That is rude.

You have so much more face. You have a little fat kid, a tuba. You had a lot more face back then. You had, like, double the face. Jeez. You saw this? No, I need to see it. Oh, my God. All right, slide it over.

He does look... He looks like a bespoke collectible. Like, he looks like a precious moment statue. Oh my God. Oh yeah, he really, you're right. He looks like a toy soldier. That's like the best way to put it. He's so red faced though.

I know. You also look really like grumpy. Like cause your arms are folded. That was our serious photo. And then we had another photo where we're having fun. you gone to a reunion everyone's like damn not yet but i'm excited yeah i'm excited i mean everyone's gonna be surprised it's funny all the people that picked on me how old are you in that photo i am 25 12 you're 12. Okay. Yeah. All right.

I mean, that's an age where all kinds of things start happening, I guess. You stretch out. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway. Dodgeball. So this, of course, is a podcast about the movie. I get hit all the time. Yeah.

I was getting beamed, baby. You're a big target. Beamed? Beamed? All right. All right. All right. All right. Yeah. Thank you for trying to get us back on track, Griffin. alright alright alright thank you for trying to get us back on track Griffin we're talking about memories we're talking about memories

that's true what are we doing again I'm gonna hand you a tissue just wipe the whole general face area so Memento coming off of following sure he makes this tiny little have you ever seen following face area. Yeah. All right. So, Memento, coming off of Following. Sure. He makes this tiny little, have you ever seen Following?

Mm-mm. I haven't. It's this little sort of calling card movie that is a festival hit. I was taken aback by how similar these two films are stylistically, watching them close together. I mean, this movie really is like grown-up Following. Sure. Yeah.

But it's also very, it reminded me of Insomnia, which I also watched right at the same time because they're both daytime noir movies. I forgot that there's like almost no night in this movie, which is, I feel like at fun risk. Like, you know,

it's all like this like washed out. It's somewhere in California, right? I assume like it's like. Yeah. The license plates say Arizona. Oh no. They say Nevada. They say Nevada. It's, it's. But they license plates say Arizona oh no they say Nevada

they say Nevada it's the west but they shot it in California yeah right but it looks like the kind of people you'd meet in Nevada on your way to Vegas

if you've ever made that drive we make that drive a lot living in LA I would love to make that drive I've never been to Las Vegas really? it's one of my greatest regrets I really would need to get

to Las Vegas it is fun for a little bit well the problem is greatest regrets. I really need to get to Las Vegas. It is fun for a little bit. Well, the problem is I really, like, really, really like to gamble. So it's both, like, I really want to go, but also, like, I fear what would happen to me. You and my father are so similar. I know. It's true.

We've talked about it. All right. So he makes following. Yeah. He went on a cross-country trip. Let me give you some context, actually. Look, I'm a connoisseur of that. He went on a cross-country trip. Let me give you some context, actually.

Hey, look, I'm a connoisseur of that. He went on a cross-country trip with his brother, Jonathan, from Chicago to L.A. But let's make it clear, Chicago, the city, not big Chicago, Michael Shannon. They did not start the road trip at Michael Shannon's feet. No. Oh, that's who I want to sit next to on a plane. Oh, he'd be great. Great choice.

Another Hawaiian shirt fanatic. I was trying to think of someone in a Hawaiian shirt, and I can't believe I didn't even think of him. But he keeps it buttoned. He's classy. He sure is. All the way up to the top. I think he to think of someone in a Hawaiian shirt and I can't believe I didn't even think of him. But he keeps it buttoned. He's classy. He sure is. He's classy. All the way up to the top. I think he unbuttons the top too.

He should do a Nolan movie. He'd be fine for Nolan. He'd be great in a Nolan movie. Everybody would be lucky to do a Michael Shannon movie. Very true. Nolan should do a Michael Shannon. Nolan's good at casting actors

who look like buildings and Michael Shannon looks like a building. You know what I mean? Because Michael Shannon should have been Jack Reacher. This is the thing. Oh, I've gone on about this so much. Oh, man. We did a Jack Reacher episode. We been Jack Reacher. This is the thing. I've gone on about this so much.

We did a Jack Reacher episode. We love Jack Reacher on this podcast. It's Liam Neeson or Michael Shannon. That's who it needed to be. I like the idea of Tom Cruise making a franchise like that and a character like that, but that specific character in that book should have been Michael Shannon or Liam Neeson.

Amy wrote the book on Tom Cruise, who is this podcast's favorite movie star, for sure. We talk about him a lot. Thank you. I'm glad that you guys respect his talent. We totally respect it. But still, he should not have fucking been in Jack Reacher. No.

But like Raleigh Griffin's saying, I like to see him stretch, and it's a weird, weird role for him. We love that movie. Love the first Jack Reacher, just like the second one. The second one should have played it. Man, Michael Shannon would be a great Jack Re Reacher he's perfect like I was obsessed with those books before the movies came out and so that in my whole head in my whole head I made it sound like a big place but in my head I kept thinking of uh how perfect he would be because

you can just picture him walking down a dark alley in a white t-shirt right and jeans from a thrift store and his toothbrush and terrifying you and that's what Jack Reacher is supposed to be a guy who scares you the second you see him he's not supposed to surprise you he surprises you it's like oh i can deal with this guy and tom cruise then he does his exactly face and the movie actually really screws up the plot of the book i wish we had had you on our jack reacher episode because that would have been awesome uh so but as a cruise and reacher fan that must have been very scary when they were put together like very confusing well the lucky thing is i wasn't a cruise fan until i started to write

the cruise book right so i've you have not yet been converted to cruise it's true i thought he was a hack and then i realized i was wrong so the whole thing of the book is me telling myself that i'm an idiot and how did i get this wrong for so long? I had a late conversion to him too. I didn't, like I actively disliked him until maybe like 2008. Well, I've loved him since I saw Jerry Maguire. Anyway, What's your favorite Cruise? Quickly.

Well, my favorite Cruise performance, even if it's not necessarily the best, is Interview with a Vampire. Oh, he's great in Interview with a Vampire. That's a great pick. He's phenomenal in it. Interview with a Vampire is what convinced he's great in Interview with a Vampire. That's a great pick. Really cool choice. He's phenomenal in it. And Interview with a Vampire is what convinced me that he's an actor and Brad Pitt is not. Because Brad Pitt's terrible in that movie.

Brad Pitt's awful in that movie. I think Brad Pitt eventually figured out his stardom, how to use it in a sort of quasi-cruisey way. But he also definitely needs a good director. He's very director-dependent. Did you see War Machine? He's like, that's a great example of a terrible Brad Pitt performance. Yeah. Wait, have you ever seen one of Brad Pitt's first movies, The Dark Side of the Sun?

I have not seen The Dark Side of the Sun. I have heard of it. Oh, because I have seen The Dark Side of the Sun. Please. It's the movie where he is a young rich boy who's allergic to the sun, and he spends the whole movie in a head-to-toe gimp mask, like actual zippers over the mouth. And he can't go outside. And then he finally falls in love with a local girl.

So she convinces him to have this one day in the sunshine. And he goes into the sea and a dolphin comes up and like hits him in the face. And that was not scripted. It just happened. It was the first time Brad Pitt ever left the country. He never had a passport before. I think they shot it in Malta or something. Good God. Yeah.

My college professor co-wrote this disastrous movie. So I've seen it. I didn't see that. I think like the earliest Pitt I've seen is like Johnny Suede or whatever. Those like, you know, pretty boy movies he made. Yeah. Cool World. Yeah.

I've never seen Cool World. He would love this. I mean, spoiler alert. Like when he starts going into the sun, he gets lesions all over his body and he's like topless and skinny and covered in lesions. I just love that some people had young Brad Pitt and they were like, okay, what movie should we put around him? What if he's covered head to toe in leather? And then lesions.

And the most beautiful human being who's ever existed. Let's cover him and then destroy his skin. Okay. So anyway, while Chris and John were taking this cross-country trip, John pitched Chris on this idea, this movie idea. Guy with short-term memory loss. Had he already written it as a short story at that point? No, no.

He pitches him on the idea. Then Christopher says to him, write it, write the script. Then Christopher decides, no, it should be backwards. He comes up with the backwards idea. Jonathan decides to write a short story version of it. Christopher writes the script.

That's why it's sort of like quasi-based on a short story. But they're sort of like... They were kind of written simultaneously. They were written sort of an idea incubator almost. And Christopher, I believe in the same way that he wrote Following, he wrote it linear and then he messed it around. He didn't write it as you see it. He just remixed it.

Right. Yeah, exactly. Have you ever read the short story? I read the short story as a teenager. It's totally different. Yeah, thank you. Have anyone ever read the short story, Memento Mori?

No. It's basically just told from the perspective of Leonard in the mental institution. Oh, that's very different. Yeah. It's not really the same at all. I'm glad they cut the Maury, though.

Yeah. I know. Memento's a good title. Sometimes it's a little too pretentious. Sometimes Lessie is Maury. You know, in the case of that title. Wow. Is he usually like that? He's always. He's usually worse. He's Tony. On fire? Yeah, I'm usually like that. Emma Thomas, Nolan's girlfriend at the time,

now wife, who was like, she's a movie producer, but I think she was up and coming. She showed it to someone at New Market, the now defunct indie studio. Up and running studio, shingle. And he loved it and greenlit it, the producer there, for four and a half million bucks. Which is kind of a big bet at that time, off a following. I guess so, yeah.

They shot it seven weeks, uh, shot in LA. Brad Pitt was going to play Leonard as, I don't know if you knew, but it's great that he came out. I'm glad he didn't. Aaron Eckhart and Thomas Jane were both considered and everyone passed.

Uh, and then Pierce guy Pierce who had already been in like LA confidential. He was like, what the shot in 98? or shot in 99 no it shot in 99 because it comes out in 2000 right?

because the Matrix had already come out that's what I was gonna ask so this they shoot this right after the Matrix comes out they like

Carrie Ann Moss in the Matrix they cast her and she suggests Joe Pantaleono for Teddy wait so you're telling me that Carrie Ann Moss

took out her ironing board and her steamer, placed her clothing item on there, ironed out all the creases, and then passed Christopher Nolan a fine pair of Italian pants? That's right. Joe Pantaleono. Apparently, the producers worried he would be too villainous. You know, he's too obviously a scumbag, but they cast him anyway. He's great. That's the Joey Pants

pull. You can't hate him. How do you feel about Joey Pants in this movie, Amy? I really like him because he looks so insecure. He looks like an alley cat that you just donked in dirty water. His hair, his weird tufty hair. Yeah, it's not the cat's fault that he's repellent. That's just what the cat

is. And to make you deal with that he's repellent. That's just what the cat is. And to make you deal with your own natural repellence to a guy just because he seems awkward and he has that crooked grin, but he's not necessarily that guy. Like, we prejudge people. We do. Like Mr. Pants. Look, one thing that I noticed in this movie is that when he gets his photo taken, he's like, not here, not here. And there's no explanation for why he does that. Like, it's not like it plays a part in the plot. Better lighting. He's just like, why he does that. Like, it's not like it plays a part in the plot. There's better lighting.

Yeah, he's just like, nah, come on. Well, and in the photo, you keep on going like, why is his smile so weird? And then when they take the photo, it's because, oh, the sun is right in his eyes. So he's like squinting to sort of block out the sun. That's one of the many things I love about this movie is how the photos are all kind of bad. Yeah. Like, it would suck if they were all like these head perfectly composed head shots. Like the Natalie photo, you can barely see her like he's.

Yeah. Yeah. I was thinking about it like if you made this movie in the age of Instagram. Right. You would know at least when you took all the pictures and you could make your little caption underneath it. But you would probably take three or four different pictures and then maybe people would know what you were thinking about anyways unless you made your account private. No, you're going through all of this in my head today. This is a movie that right, smartphones immediately make

it irrelevant, right? You must be texting stuff to yourself. All noir movies cannot function in the age of the smartphone, I guess. Especially this, which is about evidence. It would be a movie about two apps. He'd have his Evernote app and he would have

a private Instagram account and he'd just scroll through them and he'd go, great, I got all my information. I'm never having to search for a pen around Carrie Ann Moss' house like a fucking idiot. One of the best things about this movie is that she defeats him by removing pens from her house. That's his ultimate

kryptonite. He's like, no pen! What do I do? That's one of the things I love about this movie. He should have a tape recorder. He really should. He should be like, you know, July 1st, it's me. This girl Natalie is like, she's up to no good. So you want him to be Kamala Goughlin? Exactly. Or Henry from the Book of Henry.

Or Fletch. Or Fletch. Fletch has a tape recorder. Or Fletch. I don't know about you guys, but Guy Pearce was a really big to me already when this movie came out. Because Priscilla, Queen of the Desert was one of the first R-rated movies I ever snuck in to see. That's like 94, I think? 94, yeah.

I was really young. I got picked up by an older guy to go on a date. And that was the movie I wanted to see. My parents weren't going to let me because it was R-rated. And it became my favorite movie. So I didn't know who he was at all when I saw that movie. Or Terrence Stamp. Or the guy whose name I'm just blanking on,

Hugo Weaving, who was in The Matrix with Carrie Ann Moss. I didn't know who any of these people were, and I just believed they were the people on the screen. I totally believed Terrence Stamp was transgender. I believed all of it, and I believed Guy Pearce was just a handsome gay Australian man,

and then I realized he was an actor, and I felt very dumb. Guy Pearce is, it's funny, he's so pretty, but in such a strange way, but he has those an actor and I felt very dumb. Guy Pearce is it's funny he's so pretty but in such a strange way but you know he has those cheekbones and the very angular face so he's perfect for obviously for Priscilla

for that movie but he's become I love him now where he's still kind of pretty but he's a little older and he looks like this sort of look please go ahead it's the same argument I make about Tom Cruise, which Tom Cruise got more interesting as an actor

once the bags started developing under his eyes. You know? These guys who kind of look a little too perfect when the insecurities come. I just did a whole 80s Cruise run.

I rewatched like Rain Man, Color of Money. Well, I love how his neck was really thick and then his neck somehow got thin and I don't know

how he did that. He made his head bigger. He got one of those head enlargements. He got one of those... Head pumps. But the thing with Guy Pearce is he's not just pretty, he's prim, you know? And he looks, like, almost unlikable.

His lips can be pursed together when he wants them to be in this way that makes him seem unpleasant. He can also look like... Which I think he uses to his advantage. Exactly. And he can also look like in that one picture where he first kills the guy,

and he's, like, ecstatic. Right. He can look like a soccer hooligan. Yeah, I know. It's true. Yeah. Giving him the blonde hair was actually a good touch, too, because it makes him seem a little alien. Yeah. Because it's so white, his hair. Like, it's so light. He also has weird horse teeth, which this movie uses well when they want him to be a little unnerving.

If he smiles a little too big, his whole face gets very distorted. It's just crazy now how, like, you know, like, I feel like he makes memento, and he should be a big star after this, right? Like, and he was apparently, he was almost in The Dark Knight as Two-Face, like, you know. Oh, really? You know, and, like. And I think he was in the running for Batman and Begins, right?

He was in the running. He auditioned for Batman. And, like, instead, he doesn't become a star. He does the time machine. Yeah, he kind of just vanishes. for Batman and Begins he was in the he auditioned for Batman and and like instead he doesn't become a star he does the time machine yeah he kinda just vanishes he's in Count of Monte Cristo

remember that and then he sort of comes back in the late 2000s as this weird preening villain guy like in the King's Speech in like that movie

what's it called Lawless or whatever with Shia LaBeouf yeah Iron Man 3 Iron Man 3 he's really good in Animal Kingdom and now like the Alien movies where he's Wayland you know where he's or whatever with Shia LaBeouf. Yeah, Iron Man 3. Iron Man 3. He's really good in Animal Kingdom.

And now like the Alien movies where he's Weyland. He's become this creepy character actor. It's so odd. Sorry, what do you think, Amy? I know anybody else didn't consider him a major star, but maybe it's just my Priscilla grounding in him. I consider him, I love him. And anytime I see him,

I'm like very happy to see him. But he's just had an odd career. I'm sort of looking at his... He doesn't really have an iconic leading role post-Memento. But Memento's he's so good. They're all sort of supporting performers. What's so interesting about him is he's kind of Rob Lowe-ian. You know where Rob Lowe is

handsome in a similar way? Where Rob Lowe can't play anybody except people who are just a little unnervingly handsome and it has to be part of the character like when he is in Parks and Rec. That's the kind of character that Rob Lowe was designed to do and Guy Pearce is like the slightly more villainous version of that.

Slightly more twisted. But it's like you almost play a character who vanity has to be built into the role like it is when he plays Wyland in the Aliens movies. Right and I mean this is before Memento i love love love his performance in like confidential which is like a movie i've seen a zillion times and he would have won your davy award that year right for best lead for sure and that's like a movie where he's like

very vain uh like the character is very vain and you're watching like slowly is it he both like gains and loses his vanity you know what i mean like he figures out how to look and like how to be a cool cop but he also realizes it's all like bullshit anyway i love i mean i love it wait you know how like when you were in elementary school a place we've been talking about a lot today there was like the cutest boy in the class and the cutest boy in the class tended to look like guy pierce did that kind of shrunken Ken doll look. Right, yeah.

And the slightly thinner face. Like bones. Yeah, he's pretty. And usually that guy grows up to be kind of hideous looking. But Guy Pearce just kept it going. And he made it work as an adult. Maybe that's why he gets cast as these villain roles. As all of these producers are reminded of a guy who was mean to them when he was in fifth grade.

Someone to throw balls at him. He's less charismatic. I think by design. He doesn't like to be boringly charismatic. You know he's married to Carice Van Houten? Really? From Game of Thrones. Melisandre from Black Book.

Paul Verhoeven movie. How long have they been married? Not that long. You know what I also don't know about him? How tall is he? He is, I will tell you how tall he is. He started out as a bodybuilder, right? Before he was an actor?

He started out, oh my God. I think he was a professional bodybuilder. See, in England, he's legendary as Mike from Neighbors, which is this Australian soap opera. So that's what I think of him from. I don't think he ever was a bodybuilder. I think he was a bodybuilder. All right, well, we're just going to leave that.

He is 5'11". That's way taller than I would have thought. Perfectly normal height. Doesn't he look like he'd be 5'8"? Yeah, he looks like, well, because he's small. Compact, like a bodybuilder. Compact is usually the word you think of with bodybuilders. Tom Cruise, all the great bodybuilders.

He plays Leonard. Leonard Shelby. Oh, right, we're talking about the movie Memento. An insurance, a supposed insurance investigator who has short-term memory loss. Spoiler. Anterior-grade amnesia. And after the murder of his wife,

and he's on some weird revenge mission where he's trying to, like, find her killer. We all know the plot of Memento, right? I mean, Jesus. It's a tough movie to actually, because we usually go through the plot, kind of, and then have our observations as we hit those points, but it's a very tough movie to discuss chronologically.

It is. Well, maybe we can go through it chronologically in the way that the movie screws with our emotions. Right. I'm sorry. Hold on one second here. I won the Junior State Championship when I was about 10. I just found the whole world of bodybuilding really fascinating. The idea of actually changing yourself was fascinating. And as I got older,

I concentrated on developing my mind and spirit rather than my biceps. I was always looking at my biceps, wishing they were bigger. No, no, no, no. Wait, wait, wait. I was the proud bodybuilder that I think some guys are. Guy Pierce. He was a 10-year-old bodybuilder? 10-year-old bodybuilder is not a bodybuilder. Through his teen years. So he was like young Hercules. Yep. And then when

he hit his 20s, he started developing the mind. So he waited until he was 20 to read a book. Yeah, I guess. They have 10-year-old bodybuilders? Apparently. What can a 10-year-old do? Australia is weird. Australia is a weird place. They have 10-year-old alligator wrestlers? I don't know. I've never gotten to go to

Australia yet. I've also never been to Australia. But he moved there when he was 3 years old. He's actually born in Britain. Oh, really? He was raised in Australia and you're right competitive amateur bodybuilder until the age of 16 I just saw it

and he also fenced anyway Guy Pearce he plays Leonard Shelby and the movie starts with a Polaroid of a murder

he's shaking it he's shaking it backwards just like Andre 3000 told him to do it's very you know like you say it's like his big show off shot it to do. It's very you know, like you say, it's like his big show-off shot. It's like Nolan's only big, right?

He's got this reverse shot. He's got the David Julian, like that sort of weird synthesizer score. And the Polaroid D develops. Right. And he goes backwards. It undevelops. I'm always fascinated by special effects that look like things that

could happen in the real world and just really disorient you. Because there's just such a difference between a special effect like a reversing Polaroid and a CGI dinosaur. And like this Polaroid is so normal that the fact that it's bizarre blows your mind. Whereas a CGI dinosaur, I feel like you just shut off and you're like, who cares?

I agree with you. Right. You're immediately like, oh, I guess we're in fake land now. Yeah. I was talking about the movie Seconds recently. Have you guys seen Seconds with John Frankenheimer? John Frankenheimer. Yeah. Yeah.

There's just this little moment where he goes, where this character tries to run around and escape in an elevator and there's just no elevator button to get down. And it's just that little like, whoa. That's such a good little nightmare. It's the tiniest special effect. This is why I want directors to have like $5. I mean, give them all $5. I mean, give them all $5 and see what they do. I don't disagree with you. And like Griffin says, this is part of

the concept of our movie. And you know, in the... This isn't a movie. I'm sorry. This is a weekend. Yes. You know, in our Insomnia episode next week, which we've already recorded, we talk about how like, even getting insomnia, what doesn't happen anymore. You know, you make a movie

like memento now you get the superhero movie right after that at least you know like 15 years ago it was like oh you know here's like a star-driven small like mystery movie right now yeah now he makes this and he gets spider-man 8 or whatever not to be derisive of spider-man 8 maybe it would be great i have no idea yeah Spider-Man Homecoming 6. But you're right, sometimes the director isn't ready for that yet. No.

And then they get exposed as untel- You can't get promoted too fast if you haven't learned how. What's his pants fantastic for, guy? Trank.

Your tranks. Well, I also think a big thing that happens now is that they will promote someone too fast because they go like, look, if it turns out they're up for the job, that's a benefit to us. And it turns out if they're not, then we overpower them and the studio

takes over the movie. Right. Like it's easier to push over a guy like that if it's really IP based brand building franchise movies versus if you hire Ridley Scott and Ridley Scott's going to stand his ground. Sure. I think that's like one of the large symptoms of studio filmmaking.

Right, but then you get like an Alien Covenant the other way around. Yeah. Where Ridley Scott's like, I have this specific idea for this movie. And I bet Fox wishes

that they could have hired someone like Josh Trank to make an Alien reboot. I bet they do. Anyway, did you like Alien Covenant? Have you seen Alien Covenant? Yeah, I saw Alien Covenant.

I liked it better than Prometheus because I thought it was less pretentious and fewer speeches, but it's still, it saw Alien Covenant. I liked it better than Prometheus because I thought it was less pretentious and fewer speeches. But it's still, it's still, it's still, it's still. That girl, though, was great. And I'm just blanking on her. Katherine Waterson.

Yeah, Katherine Waterson. She just has this baby face and she sort of looks like a stork and she's really stretched out. She's also 5'11", like Sigourney and Guy Pearce. She is compelling. I really, I like her face. I like her face a lot. And a bird face in a good way. Like,

I don't mean that. I think bird body. I'm trying to think what, her face is more like a, she does, she does have an interesting quality. I mean, she looks unlike anyone else in movies.

Yeah, but it's also got that thing where, you know, like Christopher Nolan, Ridley Scott can't write dialogue for a human being to save his life. He doesn't know how humans talk. Nor does he care anymore, right?

He's more like, right, I have this big idea for my movie. And the dialogue's only in service of the plot, which he's leading with. See, a difference between Nolan and Scott. This movie has decent dialogue. This movie has good dialogue, I would argue. A difference between the two of them for me is I think Christopher Nolan works best when his characters are similar to him like he can't write naturalistic human characters but he can write guys who are as sort of clinical and obsessive as he is and when that's the primary focus of the

movie I think the movie kind of works I think Ridley Scott thinks he's more of a humanist than he is you know he's constantly sort of fighting with that. And a character like David in Prometheus is probably much closer to how Ridley Scott views the world. You mean Ridley Scott doesn't know he's a replicant? Exactly. That's what I'm arguing. Spoiler alert. Nolan's two biggest influences are for sure Michael Mann and Ridley Scott,

who are both these robotic, at times, filmmakers, right? And he would admit that, Nolan, that those are his two biggest forebears. But then the weird thing is, in terms of what he's come to represent in culture it's like somewhere in between Steven Spielberg and Stanley Kubrick like he's at this weird axiom of like cold precision but also super analog superstar director status like right populist yeah yeah weird he's got little boys in the palm of his hand. Literally, he holds little boys when he's directing. Memento.

Wait, yeah, what are we doing? Jesus Christ. Ben, how many times have I told you? Your name is Ben Hosley, okay? No, he knows his name. That's the thing. Your wife was murdered, and you have to come in here and podcast with us

every week in order to find her. I'm going to talk about seeing Memento. I saw it in the theaters in England. This movie came out in 2000 in England. It came out Seeing Memento. Right. I saw it in the theaters in England. This movie came out in 2000 in England. It came out before it came out in America. It came out

20th of October, 2000. And this was definitely, I was 14 years old and this was a movie that like blew my mind. Didn't it come out in 2000 in the US?

No, 2001. Came out March 16th, 2001. okay, fine. And then I bought it on VHS and I made people watch it with me because I was a little teenager. And I remember showing this to my mother and one of her complaints being like, why does he know his name though? Like, you know, she just like did not like the short-term memory loss gimmick at all.

Anyway, when did you guys see this movie? That was me. I probably saw this movie after Batman Begins because that was the first Nolan movie I had seen. I'm a big batman fan that movie for me was like oh this is the comic movie i've been wanting to see my whole life and then after that i like went back and watched uh insomnia memento hadn't seen since then i probably i have not seen since 2005 saw it once oh really yeah okay right i watched it a bunch and i remember at the time i i mean i definitely liked it more watching it this time because at the time, I definitely liked it more watching it this time

because at the time I had seen it, it had been so overhyped. And it was one of those movies which a lot of shitty people liked. Especially five years after its release, it was a movie that a lot of dumb people wouldn't stop talking about. You mean it was a fight club? It was kind of a fight club. It was a fight club, for sure. And Nolan sort of does fall...

Also starring a shirtless... Correct. But Nolan falls into that territory where it's like a lot of dumb people like his movies for the wrong reasons. You know, there are a lot of elements that I don't think are what he's consciously playing up to. It's different than Fight Club, which is like a satire and guys took it at face value. Well, right. But the thing with Memento and with a lot of it was like, I get this movie. Right.

That became. Yeah. It's like the way they say that Trump is a poor person's idea of a rich man. Nolan is a okay smart person's idea of a genius. Right, right, right. But what's fascinating about him to me, I mean, and this is the whole thing that I sort of can't crack of how Nolan, like what he reflects in society that has made him, especially in American culture. It's very odd because here you have this like sort of elitist,

cold British man who should seem like the antithesis of what like mainstream audiences want to see in filmmaking. But he's like tapped into this very like universal thing. And it is that he is kind of like a dumb person's idea of a genius, which isn't to say he isn't smart, but he's this very particular type of smart where I think he's not watering himself down at all in his intelligence. But his level of intelligence and how he tells stories is just understandable enough for people to get with some effort so that they feel like they're smart. Right. It's like breadcrumbs where you follow his breadcrumbs and at the end you feel full. Because he's very clear in what he's doing.

Anyone, if they're paying attention, can track on to it. And he's very aesthetically engaging and he hires beautiful movie stars and he's got cool sequences and cool plots. Right, and he always prestiges really well. Like the third act, you're always like, ah, yes, yes, it all works. And people feel proud when they finish watching a Nolan movie. Yeah, and none of this, I feel like, as we're talking about it, it sounds like we're being condescending, but it's still cooler in a lot of ways than what other filmmakers are doing.

He's not just like, here, take my garbage. He's like, let me strew this garbage around in this really artful way, and it's going to be modern art. And at a certain point, especially once I'm seeing movies like Interstellar, where I'm like, okay, this is just what he does. And I feel like you see enough movies by a director and you stop being frustrated by their bit, whatever you want to call it, their tropes, and you're just like, oh, yeah, look, of course.

I wish he didn't keep killing my wife's. He's so into dead wives. And this is a dead wife movie. It's a dead wife movie and he loves dead girlfriends. And I feel like there's something in him that's like, I don't quite know what makes humans sad on a normal level, so he has to just take it to 11. I feel like this is the common complaint about him

right where he's like look I've distilled a basic emotional arc into this very complicated epic puzzle that you walk through right like I've made this cool maze and then at the end you understand what being sad is. He just knows grief. He knows grief so well. He likes grief. But there's so much more interesting

things in life than grief. Right but as I rewatch these movies for this podcast I really do. He likes grief. But there's so much more interesting things in life than grief. Right. But as I rewatch these movies for this podcast, I really do. He likes making movies about like ghosts, right? Like walking ghosts who have like a thing left to do. This movie is about a person who is basically dead. He directed Casper, right? He directed Casper. Then he moved on to this.

And Ghost Dad. He did. Ghost Dad. And Ghost Ship. Ghost Ship, sure. And Ghost Dog. He directed Ghost Dog oh yeah

that's a good movie but this is right this is about a guy we gotta add a lot more episodes onto this mini series maybe we should do a ghost ghost pod any movie with ghosts

but remember Ghost Dad he's not a ghost right remember wasn't this what we got in trouble with the trivia he's not a ghost he's like in a coma

or something he's in a coma and he like he's like they think he's gonna die and he enters a ghost state Ghost State? He's in a coma or something. He's in a coma and he's like they think he's gonna die and he enters a ghost state and at the end of the movie he comes back to life. Same trick that just like happens. And then he gets a mistrial. Fuck off. Alright.

At least they're retrying it. Are they definitely gonna retry? They announced it immediately. I mean I've served on a jury. I was certainly not surprised. Especially when I heard they come back and said, what is beyond a reasonable doubt? I remember when I was on a jury, that was a lot of discussion about like,

what does that mean? Were you the 12th angry man? I was a little bit, actually. He was on the Cosby jury. That's what David's not mentioning. No, I was not on the Cosby jury. It was a piece of shit case. Anyway.

What I was just going to say is- Sorry, I totally derailed. Oh, when did you see Memento that was my question oh yeah I think about Memento a lot because I feel like

one conversation I feel like I'm always having with people is that I love VOD and streaming and as soon as you can stuff for

indie movies now because I feel like right everyone can see it because everyone can see it like there's not this way of like you're only reviewing for a handful of people who hopefully will remember that this film exists when it's at the video store in a year.

Right. Although I miss video stores a lot. Me too. So Memento, when Memento played, it played at a theater maybe 45 minutes away from where I was a freshman in school. And we all just piled into a car and drove out there together. It was just this big, big, big deal where I think we were full. We met up with a bunch of our friends at the theater. It was our night out.

We were so excited to go and drive to see it. Yeah. And I missed that a little bit because I'm from a kind of small town and like you would look, oh, this is my college was a small town and to look around a little theater and to know everybody in there

because you were all so excited to see this one movie that you had heard was good. And also just sort of like, like we're talking about restrictions, like the lack of choice was almost exciting where it's like, what does the art house theater have? It has one screen. It has one movie every week. Like, what is it going to be? I will

see it because I trust them enough, right? Well, and also a movie like this that did break out a little bit outside of the art house, it's like that might be the one art house movie that makes it to a multiplex. It might only be in one multiplex within an hour range of where you are, but it might be the one alternative. That's exactly what this was.

There was like a big theater in a mall far away from us that sometimes would give one of their screens to something interesting. If something kind of broke out of the pack. So did you enjoy the film when you saw it? Absolutely. And I felt like I was patting myself on the back. There's a cool new movie and I've actually gotten to see it, which did not happen that much in Oklahoma.

Right. Shit. It made it to Oklahoma. I mean, obviously this movie was a huge hit for it see it, which did not happen that much in Oklahoma. Right. Shit. It made it to Oklahoma. I mean, obviously this movie was a huge hit for, it made like, we'll get to the box office, but you know, it did well.

It made about $25 million. Got a DGA nomination, which was the craziest thing. I got two Oscar nominations. Writing and editing. Right. The editing nod was so funny because it's like, I mean,

it's a perfectly well edited movie, but obviously. Anytime there's a movie with multiple narratives, any kind of storyline, they give credit to the editor. And it's like I mean it's a perfectly well edited movie but obviously anytime there's a movie with multiple narratives or it's told out of order they give credit to the editor and it's like the editor is just putting the pieces together in the way the writer told them to but yeah but hey it's a well edited movie

yeah it's a very taut movie especially considering it's pretty long in my head it was shorter but it's almost two hours long I always thought it was like a 90 minute picture it's like right at two hours. So the plot of Memento, I just described it, and it's going backwards, and so that's the plot. What do you guys think of Memento?

Yeah, I mean... Let's dig into Memento. Hadn't seen it since 2005 or 2006, whatever it was, and I was surprised by, no joke, how little of it I remembered. I remembered the ending scene very vividly and sort of the basic idea of it but watching it I was still like kind of it felt

like watching it for the first time because I couldn't remember how it all fit together I couldn't remember the pieces I just remembered the end point the end of it all I remember scenes like I remembered Carrie Ann Moss coming back like messing with him yeah who's so good in this and such a an undeveloped

character. Yeah, she's, I mean... She's a femme fatale. I guess that's the excuse. What I like so much about this movie is how much it plays with just our need to prejudge everyone else and assume that the hero is the hero.

You just assume that Guy Pierce is on a quest and so, well, god damn it, who is messing with Guy. Yeah. Like you just assume that Guy, that Guy Pearce is on a quest. And so, well, God damn it. Who is messing with Guy Pearce's life? Never really considering that Guy Pearce could be messing with his own life. Of course. Right.

Or the, and like he has those things early on where he's like, memories are unreliable. I trust evidence. And you're like, right, this guy, he knows what he's doing.

He's got his folder. He's got his, you know, he has a system. I have to trust this guy. Cause he's, he's like, he's perfectly crystallized his mission. But of but of course like his missions like all his stuff is

bullshit right carry on sorry i love about this movie there's the whole like metatextual element of like i feel like this movie is kind of a commentary on how people watch movies and that like you engage with any scene and try to pick up on the contextual clues of how someone's behaving how they're dressed how the scene's lit. The things that give you all these signals of, like, okay, who's my hero? Who's my villain? When is the scene going to be, you know, kind of, like, teasing a threat of danger or whatever? And he's sort of observing every scene the same way we are.

Like, the character in the movie has as little context as we do in the audience so you're like it's an amazing audience association movie yeah because you're just like seeing it through his eyes trying to figure out like have have you have have these conversations happened before has he spoken to this person before is that his car or not exactly even in that way where he tells us right on about sammy and then like writing and he's like did I tell you about Sammy and we have that frustration of being someone in his life who already knows this story that he's already forgotten and we immediately feel what it must be like to be around him right and to that point like I also what I think is so fun about this film is when a director is able to

get inside the audience's head and just mess with it so much that you really i think when we think about like filmmaking and film construction we think about like the look of it and the performances and and you know how the script is written but this film remind watching it again today it reminded me of watching did you guys get to see uh billy lynn's long halftime walk oh yeah did you get to see it in high frame i saw it in both weirdly yeah yes like i know it gets a lot of garbage for the high frame rate but that garbage for the high frame right but that the use of high frame rate in billy lynn's halftime walk makes you so hyper alert and so uncomfortable and so miserable seeing all of the text of what's going on seeing all of these

people moving seeing all the glitter in the pom-poms that you really get to where he wants you to go with it which is this is what ptsd feels like right and he makes you feel it by using this technology it's it's manip, but in a good way. It's discombobulating. Exactly. And I think that's so hard to really do. And that does it well. And Memento does it well.

I think you're right. Yeah, Memento, you genuinely feel both like him and you feel like the people, like people like Teddy around him. I've never come up with a better term for this than like theme park movie. And it always sounds like derisive or backhanded, but it's that movie that makes you feel the exact way the character's feeling through like cinematic technique like this you know and like diving down the butterfly does that too where it's like sure we're gonna use this to make you feel like it's almost a vr movie yeah because there's a difference between like audience empathy for what the audience is feeling and audience like awe and submission and i think

he later on goes towards awe and submission like here is a giant astounding image bowed down instead of thinking like only about your nervous system and what is your nervous system feeling and what is your brain doing when yeah when you see a movie like this you wish you'd make movies like this for sure like this movie also it's like more fun than a lot of his other movies and i like most of his films but there's like you feel a playfulness here like the joy he has yeah and just the he's right you know i'm chasing this guy he's chasing me it's like a dirty grimy movie and he's sort of like digging into all these weird little like scummy pockets of this culture but also the fact like the joy he's having at the trick he's pulling off.

Because, right. It's pretty infectious. When you watch the movies, you know, like the movie is really about this weird guy comes to town and it's, it might as well be like, uh,

what's it called? Out of the past or whatever, right? Like some fucking weirdo shows up. Everyone knows him. Oh, it's the memory guy. Yeah.

You can imagine this being like 1882 Nevada. Exactly. Right. It's almost like a Western. Like he rides up on his horse. This shit town is that it's the memory guy. Yeah, you can imagine this being like 1882 Nevada. Exactly. Because it's like a Western, like he rides up on his horse. This shit town is that. It's like there's the bad bar that the guy deals coke out of, and there's the discount inn that no one's actually at, so he's renting multiple rooms to the memory guy just to cover the bills. You can't tell pants is the good kind of sheriff or the bad kind of sheriff.

Who the fuck is he? And then there's this goddamn Blair Witch House at the bad end of town. What is that place? And Joey Pants says it's this fucked up place. He doesn't even really... He's like, you don't want to go there.

It's a fucked up place. And so it's about this guy wanders into town and eventually everyone is like, oh, this guy, I could like do something with this guy. This guy's kind of useful. Cause he's, he just wants one thing,

which is to find, you know, John G. I, I could get like, so Joey pants is like, I can get some money out, you know,

out of sort of using him as a blunt. So Joey pants is the cop who was assigned to his case to find the man who, who murdered his wife, except spoiler alert, didn't actually murder his wife, but the man who attacked him, the man who was assigned to his case to find the man who murdered his wife. Except, spoiler alert, didn't actually murder his wife. The man who attacked him. The man who injured his brain. Right. But yes, yeah.

He finds the man. They find him. They kill him off books. They take the cutest Polaroid of all time. What a sincere smile. He looks like he's a Burning Man. He really does look like he's a Burning Man. It's so true.

And it's perfect, right? Because he's illuminated by the flash of the Polaroid and it's just black around him like you have no idea what happened winning smile he's pointing to his nipple he's pointing to know he's pointing to here where he's gonna put i did it that's the idea it looks like he's pointing at me making a funny yeah yeah um and uh and so i kept him from just writing i did it well there's a shot in the movie where you see her lying on his bare chest and it's the tattoos there. And you don't know if it's like, you know, right at the end when he's kind of like processing like, oh yeah, maybe I, maybe I'm like lying to myself and you don't know.

Right. Did he just not do it or did he do it and then get it removed or like, you know, like, cause I like the idea that even the tattoos aren't really very trustworthy, right? Like you can fuck with tattoos. I was wondering watching this because now I feel like the big trend in tattoos for the last maybe eight years has been like inspirational phrases all over the body. Sure, sure.

A quote that you appreciate. Quotes, you know, like remember to breathe, you know, tattoos like that, which I don't think people had that many of in 2000. No. 2000 is like the end of the nose pierce, ear like that, which I don't think people had that many of in 2000. No. 2000 is like the end of the nose pierce, ear pierce, eye pierce trend. Tattoos were more symbol-based. Yeah, right.

The Celtic art or the Sanskrit symbol or whatever. The tribals weren't over yet. Mall tattoos. Mall tattoos, right. Maybe that's a Darth Mall, of course. Where they would be like, yeah, look at all these symbols we have. Does any of them speak to you?

And someone would be like, oh, I like that one. What does it mean? They'd be like, it means like cup of coffee and like, you know, Bengali. But sure, let's put it on, you know, your cheek. Body forever. But you're wondering if this movie kind of was at the forefront of

text-based tattoos. Well, yeah, because he has, he doesn't just have word tattoos. He has so many beautiful fonts. They're a really good font collection. The lady who's giving him the driver's license tattoo, I mean, the license plate tattoo, which is like aesthetically one of the least pleasing tattoos. It's literally just license plate number, blah, blah, blah.

That's a great, she's doing a great job. That looks like great. It's a freehand serif font. It's amazing. She's awesome. I mean, he's such a, it's such a, I don't know who had the idea. I assume, you know, one of the two Nolan brothers had this. It's such a good idea, the image of him.

Like, just to look at him. And it's such a low-scale prop, like, just to paint him with all this weird makeup. And they do a good job teasing it out. Because at the beginning of the film, you're just seeing the one on his hand. He's wearing this weird suit that's really high quality, but also doesn't fit him properly. Which I love. That's another thing that's sort of out of the past

about him. Why does he have this car and like right at the beginning Joey Pants is like your window is broken you know like. You're right about the alien thing though

because the character he kind of looks like the most is David Bowie in Man Who Fell to Earth. Oh that's true. Where it's like this guy's very handsome and very stylish

but weirdly off. And yet what's weird is I think so many movies lazily write this hero character with the nice suit and the nice car never questioning why he has it and i like that this movie says this is bizarre this should not be happening you should not have an endless supply of money why does he have all this money where's he getting money from right how does his i mean like yeah how does his mission work at all you know and i love that one of the tattoos is an

actual like plot twist in the movie when he finally lifts off the bandage and it says, don't answer the phone. That's great. And it's in such scary font, too. He has it in weird impact lettering. I love how the end credits of this movie are just a shot of him turning around and they're all tattooed on his back.

That'd be great. The camera just slowly pans down. What do you think of that line when he realizes that he has a gun and he says well i don't think they would let someone like me have a gun right and teddy's like fucking hope not yeah but i'm like oh no we live in a world where we're having this fight all the time and yes lots of people who should not have guns because of mental reasons are having guns it's for sure and but not only that like the movie is kind of like he kind of does get to have a gun like That's sort of the problem.

You're letting this guy run amok. He probably should be institutionalized. Maybe the anti-gun lobby should just buy that 10-second clip and just be running it in ads all the time. I fucking hope not. But of course, you know, this movie is the reason why I own a gun. Because we got lunatics like Teddy running around. Teddy? What did Teddy ever do?

All right, so Teddy's this, right, so Teddy's this kind of like busted guy. I guess you don't even really know if he's a cop, but when you rewatch the movie, as I have rewatched it many, like the more you see it, like Teddy, you're like, what's this guy doing hanging out?

Like, because he shows up in his car at one point, like he has this weird familiarity with him yeah that makes no sense when you consider the guy's never going to know who he is right right but i guess that's his move is just if i just am totally familiar with him he will get that i'm not a threat yeah and like right from the beginning when you see him there's all these signs that you can't trust him you know the movie keeps setting it up like that's not my car that's not my truck and he just feels like he's always mansplaining to him i guess like his life and always being wrong and you don't know if you can trust anything that's

coming out of his mouth right and then of course he always looks at the polar is like don't believe his lies all right well i won't believe his lies but uh which things are the lies but it's true teddy always just shows up and has what is basically seems like decent advice which is you need to leave this town like and if Leonard probably knew that he's been hanging around this town for a long time he would get that but he doesn't know that he just knows that he just woke up like

in his brain every 15 minutes and he's like so where am I again do I know you like you know I love how well he plays the fake like oh yeah you know like this sort of like the Sammy Jenkins thing, essentially. Yeah. Over and over again. I relate so much that because I feel like I have mild face blindness.

I mean, I like I don't like people self-diagnosed noticing themselves with crazy diseases. So I like I probably do not have face blindness. I'm probably just terrible at looking at things. But I never recognize people. it's like very hard for me to recognize people usually and so I live so much in that Sammy world of like preemptively smiling to make sure that if I forgot who

that person is they're not mad at me and I feel like that's my continual state so I empathize so much with that and he's I mean to me the scene in the bar where he's like I'm here to see Natalie and she's like, I'm Natalie. He's like, yeah. Hey, how you doing?

You know, he's trying to just move with the way, even though he literally just walked into this bar knowing nothing except I am Leonard and my wife is dead. Like every time. That's what he remembers. I have a coaster in a suit. But it goes into like my larger Nolan Reed, which is all of his movies end up being about confidence. And very often they're about literal con men. Sure.

And that's who this character ultimately turns out is revealed to be. Kind of. Yeah, but the way he's able to function. He's conning himself. Right, but they also say

he was a con artist before. Oh yeah, right, right. No, no, no, no, no, no. They say Sammy Jenkins was a con artist. Don't they reveal that he was a con artist? No, Joey Pants.

I'm so nerdy because I've just seen this movie so many fucking times. The real plot is Sammy Jenkins is him. He killed his wife by giving her a diabetic overdose. Oh, I hope that's not it. That's terrible. But Sammy Jenkins, who he was a con man, who he rightly exposed as an insurance fraud investigator. Oh, OK.

Yeah, because that's what Joey Pants said. I mean, this is all just what Teddy says. We don't know if it's true, but he's like Sammy Jenkins was a con man. You're the one who the story is about. Like, that's you. But they talk about how he uses like con man techniques in order to make it through life because he has to fake until he makes it. He has to go into rooms and seem like he knows what he's talking about and that's like the ultimate currency in a nolan movie is speaking with authority speaking calmly you know having the facts even if they're like written down on polaroids

he's able to go into rooms and until people call him out on it seem like he understands what's happening i don't want him to secretly be sammy jenkins that's just such an unnecessary complicated plot twist that reminds me of later Nolan. I know what you mean. This movie doesn't need that at all. It doesn't need it. I mean, the idea, obviously, that Nolan is trying to drive through is like this guy is he's deluding himself like intentionally. Well, I like it on that straightforward level that we're all lying to ourself about something.

Because really to me, what this movie is about is the quest for meaning in your life. Like, for sure. Does your life have purpose? Do your actions have purpose? What do you life have purpose? Do your actions have purpose? What do you have to do to pretend your actions have purpose? The way like I could be, you know, that,

that I convinced myself sometimes that writing a review of an Adam Sandler movie is the greatest gift I can give the world right now, which is not true, but I'm deluding myself that that is what gives the world meaning. Absolutely. Um, when that's the whole like, you know, quixotic thing about his quest is that, like, all he wants to do is kill this guy.

And if he does it or if he did it, he won't remember it. Right. So he won't be satisfied unless he's able to do it again. But I do think what's, you know, important about the end of the movie is he says, like, no, I'll know if I do it. Like, it'll be different somehow. Something will change. And Teddy's like, yeah, I thought so, too.

But you didn't. And like, it's a good reversal of this sort will change. And Teddy's like, yeah, I thought so, too. But you didn't. And like, it's a good reversal of this sort of ghost movie because it's like, right. His unfinished business is finished. Yeah. But it doesn't matter because he's just trapped in this state anyway. I mean, how amazing if Teddy just knocked him out and then got a giant happy eagle on his chest covering up. Like, I wish he didn't have to go into so much detail about what happened to his wife.

Raped and murdered. I know. It's a little much. He could just say like, you're avenging your wife. He just said, you're happy now. Yeah. And every morning he looked in the mirror and went, oh, OK, I wish he didn't have to go into so much detail about what happened to his wife. Raped and murdered. I know. It's a little much. He could just say, like, you're avenging your wife. He just said, you're happy now. Yeah. And every morning he looked in the mirror and went, oh, okay, I'm happy now. Right.

But that's, isn't that, it's like, that's not possible. Right? I mean, like, that's. If you had enough money and you got a good tattoo artist, sure. He's got a trunk with 200 grand. I love that he's driving around with 200 grand in his trunk and he doesn't even know it. This is such a funny character. Like, when you remove him

from the context of this movie. The movie is so bound to his perspective necessarily. Because I mean one thing also that's fun about the movie is when you're watching every scene you're like this has to wrap in a few minutes.

Because they can't go too long. Which I think works well. And then when you finally see the handoff like Teddy going Lenny! You're like oh I've seen this. And that's always a little end going like Lenny you're like oh I've seen this and then like that's always like a little like endorphin rush where you're like

oh they did another they did it again which the Lenny thing also falls into like that like how people view movies like he's doing a bad performance like Lenny is putting too much like spin on the like hey buddy how you doing? You mean Teddy. Teddy sorry Teddy is doing that too much

but that's how like in movies and shitty movies, especially as shorthand, we get like, oh, I guess these people are friends. Because the character's introduced in the first scene, they go like,

hey, buddy, how'd that fucking thing go? And you go like, oh, they've known each other before. I also like that when he explains his memory condition for the first time in the movie, he's explaining it to Mark Boone Jr. who plays the hotel clerk.

So well cast. And you know, especially once you're re-watching it, like, oh, this guy's heard this like ten times. He just gets a kick out of the fact that he genuinely does, he genuinely is like explaining it for the first time. And everyone in the movie keeps on testing him. In the way that like his wife tested him, if you believe

that story, Carrie Ann Moss tested him with the spit in the ear. But that's the thing, right? No one can really buy it. They're like, come on. This can't be real. Like, you don't know who it is. But there are actual people like that now. Yes, it's a real condition. It is a real condition. You know what's interesting to me, too, is the way that you see these signs of use. You know, that you know the car has Jaguar is, like, filthy.

Right. And how did it get filthy? Where did the dust come from? And I like that idea of trying to, like, backdate it and try to figure out where it all happened from. And the scratches on his face. And the scratches on his face and then when you realize he's walking into a bar dressed like the drug dealer and everyone's like what is happening because you can't walk into a bar wearing that suit you think it's a general comment about the suit being too nice for that place and that's

the thing with dodd too or dodd's like you what are you doing driving this car you know but anyway sorry carry on oh but just like the way the way things these like habitual things become so familiar to us that don't become familiar to him like the car alarm for some reason the car alarm always pops out to me because you just keep hearing that security thing that beep beep beep beep beep and he builds in patterns into the movie that make this world feel very familiar to us it's like the only thing that feels grounding in a way you're right and like right part of the idea is he's like, um, you know,

he, he survives by creating these like, like Pavlovian things that he can, like him instantly be like, Oh yeah, I know. I like, this is my room.

I get that. Just my room. Cause my, my, all my weird Polaroids are in here. I mean, and you never know by the end of the movie, how many rooms he actually has at this end. You never know.

You never know if it's three or four or seven. So yeah, and we should say cross-cutting between the backwards chronology of the film are these forwards running black and white scenes that are much shorter of him on the phone to Teddy. Such a smart move for him to do it in black and white. It's such a simple thing and talk about not

having the money to do anything crazy, but just like okay, you just want to be able to track this story in pieces, so anytime the movie's black and white, your brain but just like, okay, you just want to be able to track this story in pieces, so anytime the movie's black and white, your brain can go like, okay, right, back to that narrative. And he's wearing like a flannel shirt. He's like kind of like country Leonard, like before he became city Leonard. And he's

talking to Teddy on the phone, and the score is like this weird like ticking noise, which I also think is crucial. I've seen this movie too many times. I had it on VHS. I watched it all the time. I once lost a babysitting contract because I showed it to a kid who was too young to see it. He wasn't that young. He was like 12.

That shouldn't be too young. He freaked out. He didn't like it. He didn't freak out in front of me, but later he complained to his parents. That time was going backwards? Yes, exactly. He had become unstuck in time. Because it's not a thing where you'd be worried that there's somebody

living under your bed. I mean, maybe somebody hiding in your car. I mean, it opens with a scene of violence that I guess is sort of nightmarish, like the blood rushing back into it. But apart from that, it's not really a very, it's kind of a weirdly chased movie. I guess they're sort of swearing and stuff. No one doesn't like skits.

Haven't 12-year- olds just seen so much blood already hey man look maybe he was an innocent 12 year old well let's call it out maybe they were just looking for an excuse David no

maybe he hated me the real reason they got angry at you is because they walked in their kid in the shower and he had a bunch of tattoos that said history paper do on Thursday

right he learned all the wrong lessons take out the garbage so so Lenny don't yell at, so Lenny, Lenny is looking for John G. Yeah. That's all he knows.

The killer of his wife. The guy's name's John G. He was maybe a drug dealer. License plate. He's a white male. Right. And then he's got this license plate. Right.

And we know that he has killed Teddy. Yeah. Like, to start the movie. But as the movie goes on, I feel like we are sort of more and more thinking like i don't think teddy is the guy like right this doesn't make sense because why would his killer yeah or his wife's killer like hang out with him all the time so much do you think do you think teddy had to like put a lot of work into making sure he never accidentally

went after john goodman because they're they're in Nevada. They're close enough to Goodman. Where do you think John Goodman lives? Oh, he lives in New Orleans, right? Is he a Louisianan like he was in Treme? He takes it easy. That's why he was on Treme. I can roll out of bed.

Is that what he was like? Dab-a-dab-a-doo! So I guess he kills Teddy. And then before that, there's the sort of like, if I'm going backwards, you know, there's like the Natalie stuff. Sure. No, no, before that, there's Dodd, right? Natalie kind of has her section in the middle of the movie. No, before that is Dodd, where he like wakes up in a hotel room and there's a guy he's like tied up in his closet.

Yeah. Played by Callum Keith Rennie. And then, and then you go back to Natalie and you realize like, oh, she sicked him on this guy. Sort of. Kind of, sort of. Kind of, sort of. Not really. It's more like Dodd just goes after him because he's obviously stolen the drug dealer's car and clothes.

Right. And, right? But she convinces him. I mean, she. She convinces him that Dodd beat her up when in fact she fucked with him Leonard until he punched her right he punched her yeah

what do you make of that I feel like that was a that was a crux scene in the movie in general the Natalie reversal you know yeah I mean because we want to empathize with her so much when we see her kiss him and say like you'll remember this you know she becomes that where you wish that it was sincere

and she like she's the one who sort of unveils him in the mirror so we see all his tattoos in full i've never totally understood so is her main play just she's trying to get revenge on him for killing her boyfriend i think so but i don't know. It's not, like, and it's sort of the problem of many a Nolan character. They're plot function first and a character second. Well, he just likes brunette women with beautiful eyes who are fucking with people. She is a proto-Marian Cotillard

for him, right? And then before that, I guess, I'm trying to remember, like, what else happens? Not much else happens. I guess it's just I guess we should talk about the Sammy Jenkins story a little bit Sammy Jenkins I'm sorry played by Stephen Tobolowsky and Thomas Lennon plays his uh his doctor right and uh Harriet Simpson Harris who's a great actress great like character actor she's the uh the wife Mrs. Jenkins isn't it

true that Stephen Tobolowsky used to have amnesia? That an accident happened to him? That sounds like something. I heard something like that. I mean, not just because he seems very interested in these roles. He does. This and Groundhog's Day. That's true, right?

Roles where he is like a specter. And Garfield the movie, too. He plays a similar function. I don't know. I also feel like Stephen Tobolowsky because he has the podcast where he tells all these crazy stories from his life. That does sort of sound like something. I don't know. I also feel like Stephen Tobolowsky because he has like the podcast where he tells all these like crazy stories from his life. That does sort of sound like something. I don't know. Unless you think he's making it up. I mean, can we trust him?

Like, do you have a tattoo on your body? Do not trust Stephen Tobolowsky. Well, that's the key to the Tobolowsky files is that he's an unreliable narrator. But so I guess the fun of the movie is just like you see on Natalie's picture that something's been crossed out and written under it. Right.

You like you just want to see how all these things fall into place. Like he takes great care in making sure every little clue gets sort of its own little answer. And I guess that's why people respond to the movie so well. I don't know. Like, I know what was written on that. I am a genius. And this is where, right. what was written on that?

I am a genius. And this is where, right, the criticism comes from where he's like, you know, the somewhat patronizing criticism of like, you,

you're, he's just holding your hand through the whole thing. He's a trickster. But I don't think that's fair either. I think he's. But when people write

themselves that big of a check and they're able to cash it. Right. You know, just narratively, like making a really complicated plot.

I mean, that's, it's the same thing that gave M. Night Shyamalan his blank check. You know, it's like. Right. You're impressed at the parlor stretch I mean, it's the same thing that gave M. Night Shyamalan his blank check. You know? It's like... Right.

You're impressed at the farthest stretch. Yes, it's true. Same period. Exact same period. And it's like you can't pull that off by accident. Whether or not you can repeat that, whether or not you can grow that and evolve that into something else, you can't make that kind of movie by accident. Right.

Because people like Ebert thought that Memento was a movie you should only watch once, maybe twice, and then it didn't get any better than that, but you're, David, clearly proving that wrong. Well, I really liked the movie. I was a teenager, and I was just someone who watched as many movies as I could, but it was, you know, this is a pre-Netflix era, my

teenagehood, and so I did watch it over and over again. I did enjoy it, but it was also one of those movies that, you know when you're a teenager, you like showing other people movies? So I would like yeah like like to my friends i'd be like oh you should watch this yeah there was a thing when you had stuff on tape where it was almost like trading underground records exactly like you had a special thing right and you'd be like come over and see this thing you wouldn't just be like oh you should stream that someday you made it like a social of it yeah and the other movie was clueless that i would try and

make everyone watch because all the brit boys were like, I don't want to watch that. That's not for boys. And I would just be, no, no, it's good. You boys get so limited. Thank you for making them watch it. That's one of my favorite movies. That's the movie I've seen the most is Clueless. Did it seem alien to them? Yes. Was

British culture different enough? I had to explain so many jokes. I had to explain what Cliff's notes were because that's a great joke in Clueless when she writes a little love letter for the teachers. And Dionne's like, that's a beautiful quote. Where'd you get that? And she's like, Cliff's notes. And no British person understands that.

So I always had to pause and be like, let me explain what Cliff's notes is. And meanwhile, they're like, we just hit each other with sticks in recess. A Morris dance. You hit the sticks together. So you were like the annotated Clueless. Oh, God, I love Clueless.

You were like the Cliff Notes of American comedies. A little bit. Yeah. But I was like an American. Right. I tried to explain what America really was to these people. And they. You're like Clueless.

This is basically a documentary of American life. This is American life. Because they, you know, like the most common thing that kids would do to me all the time would to be to pinch my nose and say, now you can't talk. Because in Britain, the joke was like Americans talk through their nose. Oh, really? Because we have nasal voices. What are they talking about?

You'd be like, uh-oh, you can't talk anymore, can you? Like that was a joke that multiple people did to me. Isn't that strange? I've never heard of that. Can you still talk? I'm, like, testing it out. Of course you can still talk. This is me talking with my nose pinched.

I feel like we all pretty much sound the same. But to British people, Americans, they have, like, such a nasal voice, like, that they thought we just talked out. Where do they talk from? I don't know. Buttholes. Stinky butthole talker. I don't know why this is David's memory lane, but I remember when I was 10 years old,

kids in Britain call each other bastards all the time. Like, bastards. Yeah, sure. For some reason. And I remember trying it out and saying it wrong, saying bastard, and everyone laughing at me. Because I didn't know I was going to say it wrong. Look, this is a movie about mammary.

We're relating our own experiences to those of Leonard Shelby. Wasn't it you who pointed out that one Nolan has a British accent and the other one doesn't? We talked about this. I think we might talk about it next week. Or no, did we talk about it on the following episode? We figured out why. I think it was the following episode.

They grew up separately. Their parents were divorced. They grew up separately. And one grew up in Chicago, one grew up in London. So it's like the parent trap. Mm-hmm. Right. And then they did a parent trap and they got back together.

But no, yeah, he grew up in Chicago. And of course, as we mentioned on the following episode, Christopher had an older brother who was a con artist who was sent to prison. And I feel like nobody knows that, but it is interesting to hear about in the context of his work. Because that's what he's obsessed with. He makes so many movies about con artists. But his mom lived. His mom didn't get murdered, right?

No, I don't think he has any women haunting him or anything like that. He should. But it's just funny when you... Would you haunt Christopher Nolan? No, he seems tedious. Let me haunt Michael Shannon. Ben, what's your take take you said you had a take

on this movie oh you said it was really smart and good I just wanted to get to that before we wrap things up I've been here check out this Polaroid

see if that jogs anything oh thanks okay yeah right so this movie's like a term paper go on it's so So this movie is like a term paper. Go on.

It's so hard to follow. I felt like I had to work at it. Had you seen it before? Or was this it? Yeah, I'd seen it. But I don't know. I didn't retain any of it. So it's fine. It's just like, why make it so confusing?

You just wish it was just straight shot. Start to finish. This is my thing. Make movies easier to follow. Great. Thank you, Ben. Copy, paste,

add a fucking montage, make it sexy. You got a movie. Make it sexy. Ben's favorite movie is Fletch. Yeah. If you know what's going to happen, he's going to save the day

and get the girl. Well, because he's working overtime. Gotta work overtime. Fletch is working. If you know what's going to happen he's going to save the day and get the girl. Well because he's working overtime. Gotta work overtime. Fletch is working overtime. Thanks Ben. You just looked you should have

looked around the room. Well he doesn't remember where he is. Your producer Ben record the podcast. I can't remember what I was going to say. He kills Jimmy Grant

at the end of the movie. Yeah. And then he sets himself on this path. That's the right thing. That's the prestige. That he's going to kill. He kills Jimmy Grants at the end of the movie. Yeah. And then he sets himself on this path. That's the prestige. That he's going to kill Teddy this time. Yeah.

He decides, he writes, don't believe his lies. And he's creating a little wrench in his machine that's going to eventually resolve with the murder of Teddy.

Which I find the ending oddly optimistic because, I mean, A, yes, he's giving himself another false flag to murder. But B, it's also like if he murders Teddy, he's freed of this guy who's forcing him to murder other people.

You're right. You're right. You don't think Carrie Ann Moss is going to go find him in like 20 minutes later? He's going to be like, oh, here's this coaster. I should go meet Carrie Ann Moss. That's why we need to see Tumento. That's why he needs to go back to the well. Memento?

Yeah, you're right. That's better. Memento, yeah, that's much better. That's why we need to see Tumento. That's why he needs to go back to the well. Memento? Yeah, you're right. That's better. Memento, yeah, that's much better. Jesus, your fucking face is red right now, Griffin. I'm really angry at myself. No, but I find the end of the movie when he commits this murder, right, and immediately realizes, like,

oh, fuck, this isn't the guy. And then he confronts Teddy, and Teddy says all this stuff. Then in response response he throws kenny's teddy's keys into like some rushes like you and teddy joe pantoliano who's wonderful he's so good at pathetically looking for those keys he's looking for those keys for like 10 minutes while you know leonard's just sitting there having this whole internal monologue about like is this true do i do this to myself teddy is rifling around for those keys teddy go look

for those keys i gotta do some voiceover if iling around for those keys. Teddy, go look for those keys. I got to do some voiceover. If I'm looking for those keys, you'd be like, you wouldn't buy it. You'd be like, the keys are right there. He would have seen the keys. Joey Pants can make himself so pathetic that you really feel so bad in this moment of his death sentence. I would argue that Joey Pants is one of the best, like, transformative status actors. Like, he's really good at within a movie going from high status to low status and selling both, even though he's kind of a guy who's, like, right in the middle.

You know, he doesn't seem particularly pathetic or particularly impressive. But, like, there's so many movies, like, Midnight Run's another one where it starts out and it's like, oh, he's got, like, fucking De Niro by the balls. And at the end of the movie, De Niro's just like, fuck just like fuck you and you're like this guy sucks that's my hot take on midnight do you want to know some fun facts about joey pince yeah uh he runs a um non-profit uh called no kidding me too about uh depression uh in for actors who have depression uh because he says anytime he says that to another actor like oh I've suffered

from clinical depression they go no kidding me too. So that's what it's called. Isn't that so cute? That's beautiful. It's really sweet. He's a wonderful man.

That sounds like a great sequel to Memento. Should Memento just be called no kidding me too? No kidding me too. No kidding Memento. Do you think it's his most I mean I guess The Matrix

is his most famous and then Sopranos and right and then this and the Midnight Run and then LA Confidential I mean the Fugitive he's got the dude

How do you feel about Joey Pants? Have we praised Joey Pants? We love him We've praised him he's so praised like he's like Joey Tuxedo now Can we talk about

Carrie Ann Moss a little bit because it's weird We talked about her It's weird that she has Matrix then this and there was like matrix she she got legit oscar buzz because this movie was sort of an underground like sleeper hit and i think she is really good in this i mean those scenes are complicated she really pulls them

off she was in chocola this year before as well which she also plays an abused wife in that i think she doesn't have much to do. And then she had like a couple failed like Red Planet. Yeah, she's in Red Planet. It was sort of weird that she never got her own vehicle. I wonder if like

Angelina Jolie just ascended and took over the dark haired green eyed femme fatale. She just kind of supplanted her

and got all the roles. Kind of unsurprising. Surprisingly made the detour into action movies when she seemed a little more highbrow Carrie Ann Moss

probably would have been a Lara Croft type she could have been in Wanted or Lara Croft she'd be perfect for that the other thing I mean she was 32 when The Matrix hit

so like you know Hollywood is not a very nice industry to women who hit in their mid 30s like you know and there's also like Linda Fiorentino

at this time too like there's a lot of competition for this niche. And that's the kind of movie we... Because weren't we talking about John Dahl last week? We were saying that Christopher Nolan, with following Memento and Insomnia, he was going to be the best version of John Dahl.

John Dahl, who made The Last Reduction. And he was going to do good, mid-budget, studio, fine cast, neo-noirs. And when he, and it's the same thing with Bryan Singer, honestly. Like, public access, usual suspect, app pupil, it's like, oh, right, yeah, here, this guy's gonna make these, like, hard-boiled 90s R-rated movies. And then somehow Christopher McQuarrie

just ended up making them forever, and I wish he would stop. What do you want Mr. McQuarrie to do? I don't need him to do really anything. I'm fine if he doesn't do anything. He just chills out? Yeah, he can just relax. He can just take his usual suspect's money and just go limp off and be fine. He's Tom's guy now. I know, it's a shame.

He's on the mummy credits. He's killing Tom's career, I feel like. I really do. See, I like the McQuarrie... I like the movies where McQuarrie's got a strong hand in. I like Rogue Nation. I like Edge of Tomorrow. I like the first Jack Reacher. My theory is Cruise felt so

betrayed and isolated after 2005 that he just wanted to trust someone and he just latched onto Macquarie and he won't let it go. Because before then Cruise barely ever worked with the same director twice. I know. And I think Lyman is that guy for Cruise too. He trusts him too. And I think he's trusting the wrong people. Well, I mean, I think

it's more, like you say, it's a trust issue in general. He needs to go back to how he's trusting the wrong people. Well, I mean, I think it's more like you say, it's a trust issue in general. He needs to go back to how he was in the nineties where it's like, you are a great director. I am Tom Cruise. I respect great. Use me. Uh,

which he was almost like too forceful about, but still like he really was like, I worship at the altar of you. Oh, Stanley Kubrick. Oh, you know, whoever.

Yeah. Paul Thomas Anderson. I saw your first film. You're going to make something great. Put me in it. And so like, what do you want me to do? Okay, I'll do it. Sounds weird, but okay, I saw your first film. You're going to make something great. Put me in it. And so, what do you want me to do? Okay, I'll do it. Sounds weird,

but okay, I'll do it. And now he doesn't do that anymore. I know. What we should do is take Polaroids of Christopher McQuarrie and Doug Liman and write, do not trust these men. And just put them in his pocket. And the Scientology guy. It'd be interesting to see Tom Cruise do a Christopher Nolan movie. My opinion with Nolan in general is I'd like to see X-Star do a Christopher Nolan movie? My opinion with Nolan in general is I'd like to see

X-Star do a Christopher Nolan movie because he's pretty good with stars. I'd like to see a Clooney-Nolan movie. But that's almost more a complaint about how movie stars don't get to make fun movies anymore. I don't know. I feel like that's sort of what we really mean by that. So I had this thought watching it this time. We had talked

about these first three Nolan movies as this little neo-noir trilogy that he diverted from so much. And we recorded our Insomnia episode before this episode just because of scheduling stuff. So I re-watched this after re-watching Insomnia. And I was just like,

God, the leap from this to Batman is so weird that, like, he transitioned so well that they would give him the job, that they could see how he would apply the style. But, like, there's, I think, a cleaner, shorter line between this and Batman

because this movie does feel very 90s comic book-y to me in a certain way. It feels like a Vertigo miniseries. Sure, like an Ed Brubaker. Here's a weird, high-concept noir thing with these grimy archetypal characters.

Yes. Maybe that high concept. Yes. Yeah. That's why, maybe that's why. And there's something very pulpy about it. Yeah. You know?

In how he does have almost this weird superpower and everyone sort of talks about it. Like it's a burden. Memory guy. Right, but he's memory guy.

Like, it does feel like it could be a vertigo title or he could be like a marginal villain that Batman fought for like four issues in 1987.

Oh yeah, the guy that Batman keeps fighting, and then he just keeps coming after him because he didn't know that he already fought him and lost? The problem is the guy doesn't know he's been defeated. Your crimes will not be... You can't beat someone who has no shame because they don't remember being embarrassed. That's what he is, right?

Yeah. Yeah. I feel like we're wrapping up, but if you took some notes, is there anything else, Amy, that you want to point out? I mean, just this idea that I think we are very gullible as audience members, which I think we've kind of been touching on a little bit, but to me that's just this main thing I love is like,

I think we have a tendency to sit down in a theater and believe everything we're told about everybody. We're not cynical in the theater. You know, I think it's like going to a magic show. You kind of need to be not cynical. Exactly, exactly. And so I like the feeling of being taken advantage of in this way.

In the way where it reminds me not to be so naive about everything I see at the theater. You should watch Prestige. I think that's the other Nolan movie that functions in this way. I should see it,

but we spend our lives watching new garbage. I never have a chance to watch old classics. Our old classics. Hey! No, but wait. I mean, so are you,

because I'm like this, like when I'm seeing a murder mystery or whatever, some movie, I never like try too hard to figure it out. I'm always just like, it'll wash over me soon enough, right? Like, I feel like some people go into the movie thinking like,

I'm going to solve this movie while it's happening. Which is why I think a lot of people like Nolan movies because people want to feel like they won. You're right, but no, I'm like you. I don't actually try to guess. I mean, I'm going to solve this movie while it's happening. Which is why I think a lot of people like Nolan movies, because people want to feel like they, like, won. You're right, but no, I'm like you. I don't actually try to guess. I mean, I get annoyed.

You sort of think right away, oh, I hope it's not that guy. And then if it is that guy, I'm mad. But I'm not busy doing it. I'm more concentrating on everything else. Movies should be experiential. Yeah. Do you guys want to play the box office game? So we do a game where I try to guess the box office the week the movie came out.

This is a weird one. This is a weird one. This is a weird one. My father and I read the box office every Monday when it came out because he was obsessed with sports stats. That's how I bonded with my brother and I hated sports. I have all this stuff burned into my memory forever because it was the only way I could build a bridge emotionally to my father. That sounds very Dolan-esque.

Yeah, Chris and Rulon should make a movie about you. Father's great man. So this film came out, we should say it was a hit at Sundance, you know, so that was where it sort of got buzzed

and it had been a hit overseas. Comes out March 16th, 2001, right after the Oscars or right before, right in the Oscar season of last year. Yeah. It makes 25 million domestic,

39 worldwide, which is very nice for a... It would have been 40 something adjusted uh sure and um it opens number 27 on 11 screens makes 230 000 so it's not in the top five so number one march 16 2001 which is like that's great for the box office game because there's no good movies. Yeah, right. Because summer 2001 is very, very big to me. But this is right before we have the shreckening, right before the mummy returns,

right before Dr. Dolittle 2 knocks on our door. The Fast and the Furious. So number one is an action movie, an R-rated action movie starring like a washed up action star of an earlier era. Exit Wounds? Yes. Got it before I even said and a rapper. Because I remember it being so weird.

It was a big, nice opening weekend, 18 mil. Well, and like Steven Seagal's slump happened like his last successful movie before Exit Wounds was before I started tracking the box office. So when out of nowhere he had like a $20 million opener, I was like, since when does like Steven Seagal make money? My dad was like 10 years ago. Steven Seagal and DMX. Yeah, I saw the movie in theaters. I have never seen it. Have you seen Exit Wounds?

God, no. It is on Box Office Mojo's. It's the fourth highest dirty cop movie behind L.A day and the departed it's got two comic relief characters in it one of them is tom arnold the other one is anthony anderson the only thing i remember that movie is the last scene is clearly them being like oh these two guys are funny let's add a scene for the end credits of them talking and it's just tom arnold anthony anderson talking about jerking off number one at the domestic box office. Eva Mendes is also in it apparently.

I don't know. I don't remember that, but sure. Number two was at the time one of the most expensive European films ever made. It's a war movie. I saw this in theaters. It's not John of Arc, right? No, it stars two very pretty British actors.

And one very pretty British actor. Enemy at the Gates? Starring? What, it's jude law yep and fuck the other one is it's a race it's it's joseph fines joseph fine and rachel vice and jean-jacques and no director that uh yes and ed harris is in it as well it's about the battle of stalingrad have you seen that movie no yeah it's a bad movie i didn't get to see a lot of movies this semester i'm so sorry i remember I don't mean to rub it in. No, I'm just like, I feel very momentum in my daily life, as I said, and I have a very

hard time remembering movies I've even seen. He's the opposite. And so I'm impressed by this. This is really knocking me out. I think there's a sex scene in the trenches where all these other soldiers are sleeping around him, and it's like, that's just kind of rude. Yeah, where they're having sex in a muddy trench three weeks weeks into the battle of she's like disguised as a man yes and you're like like i get it like you know you guys like each other but this this seems

they're snipers yeah all right number three is was number one the week before okay it's a comedy drama sort of sort of a crime comedy starring two huge movie stars who don't spend much time together on screen. Oh, The Mexican. The Mexican. Julia Roberts. This is absurd.

This is what he does. Julia Roberts and Brad Pitt. I think some people now wonder if I'm looking at the answers. No, I'm looking at the answers. I can vouch that you are looking at nothing. Right? Yeah. My brain is stupid. I saw The Mexican for my 15th the answers. No, I'm looking at the answers. I can vouch that you are looking at nothing. Right? Yeah.

My brain is stupid. I saw The Mexican for my 15th birthday party. Oh, congratulations. I remember that. Yeah, Gore Verbinski. I haven't seen it since theaters. I remember it being kind of good. I saw it on an airplane.

I think it's kind of solid. Gandolfini. Gandolfini's really good. Really good in it. People were angry that Brad Pitt and Julia Roberts weren't in it together at all. Nope.

They have like one scene together and it was sold as like the two pretty people together. Yeah, they only have a scene together at the end. So number four is a dog movie that I've never heard of.

Like never heard of. It's not C-Spot Run. It is C-Spot Run. That's crazy. What is that? I don't even know what that is. It's made $24 million in three weeks. It's doing just fine. It's made $24 million in three weeks.

It's doing just fine. It's a David Arquette family comedy. David Arquette. Oh. It's a David Arquette vehicle with him and a dog. You know, we're nostalgic for old, like, you know, like the Hollywood of our childhood. But Jesus. David Arquette dog vehicles.

It's a David Arquette. I remember the posters. David Arquette on top of like a dog. No, no. The dog. David Arquette's in the dog carrier. The dog's on top. See spot run.

I think he's got to protect the dog for some reason. I think it's like someone important's dog and the dog. It's kind of like a Marmaduke type. I did not. But this is what I remember distinctly about the movie. It's a Warner Brothers picture. And they put the first trailer for Harry Potter in front of it. Oh, sure.

So the box office was boosted because this was still in the era, like you were talking about with Insomnia and the Attack of the Clones trailer. Or not Insomnia. What was it? Ice Age. Ice Age with the Attack of the Clones trailer. Yeah. Where if you were like, you know, you want to see the Harry Potter trailer,

you got to go see this dumb David Arquette dog movie. And opening weekend, it made like $12 million because all these parents had to take their kids to it. Are there things in your brain that you don't have room for because you've made room for this almost anything else how to be a functioning person my past and future guest and my friend sam rogan uh has said uh it was like the i think the most real moment has ever happened on our show you and sam were talking about me while i was in the studio right and you both said yes, sometimes I just wonder how you make it through the day. How do you like fry an egg? I just,

sometimes I'm standing around and I wonder how you do this. All right. I don't know anything other than this. Uh, yeah. Sam or Gals Bam from the show, as we know. Uh,

number five, 50. Oh, well now what is it? I almost said it. It's a crime thriller. Number five at the box office. I almost said that. It's a crime thriller. Number five at the box office. I almost said that.

It's the first time I've ever done that. Starts with fifth. It's a crime. Crime thriller starring a major, you know, big actor and someone we make fun of a lot in this podcast, who was, I guess, a pretty boy of the moment. Jesus, it's such an irrelevant movie. And with fifth yeah it starts with fifth 15 minutes with ed burns and robert gave that one away i feel bad yeah uh never seen no neither of us don't know anything about that so we rag on ed burns a lot we've ed burns yeah. His character in the City of Private Ryan is from Brooklyn.

I don't know if you know that. That's subtle. It's kind of subtext. That's like a trivia piece. Did you know that Ed Burns' brother wrote Daddy's Home? I didn't. I watched Daddy's Home because of the occult. You're a big Daddy's Home fan.

I feel like Amy's the biggest Daddy's Home fan I know. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Is that true? I mean, I think it's a really solid film, but I'm also a John Cena girl, so when he shows up in the end, I'm in love with this movie. I think John Cena is the untapped comic resource of the modern era, and I'm ready to retire The Rock and switch totally over to Cena. I think Cena's better.

I think Cena's great. No, I just feel like you're the only one who I read, like, really saying, like, we need to appreciate that. And then Sofia Coppola said it was one of the 10 best movies of the 21st century. Did you not see that in the New York Times? She did? She said it was one of her 10 picks for the day. With the caveat that she watches it all the time with her kids. But nonetheless, she does love it.

I feel very vindicated by that. I was very pleasantly surprised by it. I remember the trailers being garbage, and I watched it, and I think it's a good character comedy. Like, it's actually good, like, character-based. There you go. They just put the couple of dumb, like, slapstick-y scenes in the trailer, so it looked really broad. And, like, I didn't know Hannibal Buress that well before I saw that film. He's amazing.

He comes in, and I'm just like, I am in love with that. Thomas Hayden Church is really good in it. There's that one scene where he yells after Hannibal Buress, and he's like, no, I'm still here. And then they spend this scene going like oh man I was gonna run after you and I was gonna say this and Tom St. George is like why don't you just do it anyway he's like well I don't know it feels forced now I've already explained they spend three minutes

deconstructing the scene they don't do and I'm like this is a weird gag for like a family comedy alright I'm cutting you off good movie Daddy's Home just some other movies Crouching Tiger that's in the top 10 still down to earth what's it up to at that point

it's up to 100 million dollars crazy exactly which is crazy when you think about it insane down to earth the Chris Rock

Just Like Heaven remake or whatever it's not Just Like Heaven best movie Heaven Can Wait I guess so probably by default I need to rewatch them

I did see that one Hannibal Ridley Scott. Hannibal. Ridley Scott's Hannibal. Yeah. Chocolat. Yeah. Lassie Hellstrom's Chocolat.

Steven Soderbergh's Traffic. So a lot of the, like, Oscar holdovers, I guess, are hanging out. This is when Oscar movies didn't come out on DVD. Like, cast away. The week after the Oscars. When they would, like, start to really boom at the box office post-ceremony. But yeah. And then Memento had a very nice long run. It was in theaters all the way through September, starting in March. You know, so it was like a real word-of-ceremony. But yeah, and then Memento had a very nice long run. It was in theaters all the way through September,

starting in March, you know, so it was like a real word of mouth hit. And it was always hovering and like, it only goes into the top 10 like for two weeks,

but it's always sort of hovering around there. Kind of movie that doesn't really happen anymore. It was an it movie and he became the it director. Yeah. He was the kid

everyone was talking about. Thanks for coming by, Amy. Thank you so much. I'm glad that we could sit around and talk about this movie. Maybe someday he'll make another one like this. Maybe he will. I don't know. I don't know. I'm excited to see Dunkirk, but when I heard

he was making a war movie, I was like, right. Another of the big genres. Can't you be like, can't he do Ridley Scott and do a movie about Russell Crowe just drinking wine i'm just gonna say you know like i love how ridley scott in between like kingdom of heaven and robin hood and all he's like i we should just do this movie or russell crowe just drinks wine like a french villa yeah like nothing happens this thing where they assign directors to two picture deals for like 180 million and they're like you can split

this up however you want. Yeah. You want to do two 90s or do you want to do like a 150 and a 30 or yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly. I would love that idea.

I agree. But then you get the Book of Henry sometimes, you know. We're about to record a Book of Henry. You'll have heard it at this point.

It's an emergency episode. But let's call it quits. I mean, Christopher Nolan seems more likely to be able to go back and do a smaller movie creatively than a lot of other directors would. Sure. I mean, he could do whatever he wanted. I don't know.

Obviously, he could do whatever he wanted, but it seems like he might actually choose to do that at some point. I hope. I would hope so. I mean, imagine spending money gets boring after a while. He's bought himself all the toys he ever wanted, So what else does he need to do? That's a good point. Are there any Nolan movies in the canon? I think we voted Inception down and then I have not put another one forth.

You never did a Dark Knight episode? I haven't done a Batman. Yeah, we've not done a Dark Knight Batman episode. You don't want the fans to at you? I mean, I like the Dark Knight actually. Like I remember watching the Dark Knight at a press screening and then going home and watching the original Batman, the very, very first one with Jack Nicholson. And suddenly feeling embarrassed of Jack Nicholson's Batman, a Batman that I had loved so much. And then feeling bad that I felt embarrassed for it.

And having that sense of what is it like for an actor to think you did something definitive and then somebody just comes along and embarrasses you. It was almost like watching Jack Nicholson do it again with his pants off. It felt really terrible but it's funny to watch old superhero and supervillain performances where you're like oh right they were just kind of like does this work and then it's getting refined and it's getting coming from different angles

and the truth is I'd almost rather watch that now I think than another dark and twisted superhero movie it's like Wonder Woman is the first Superman all over again. And that's great to just see it cheerful and big and happy, like happy, like innocent. No,

I agree. It feels like a breath of fresh air. Yeah. She doesn't have to have a dead wife. Right. Look, Amy, you got lucky actually,

because usually you have to buy Jack Nicholson dinner. If you want to see him play the Joker with his pants on. Boy, I think he buys the dinner. As Carrie Ann Moss might know. I want to get Amy the power in that scenario. Boy, I think he buys the dinner. As Gary and Moss might know. I want to get Amy the Power in that scenario. No, fair enough. I'm going to dinner with Jack Nicholson.

Pick up the check, Jack Nicholson. MTV's picking it up. You guys are talking about my dad, you know. Just kidding. It's a Father's Day dinner, I meant. It's a Father's Day dinner. Oh, man. Imagine him being your dad.

He has like a bunch of kids. He has a fashion designer named Jennifer Nicholson. There's not that many famous Nicholson. So you take note of them. You're right. I didn't even put it together though. Of course, Amy Nicholson right here in our studio. Right here.

Daughter of Jack. Illegitimate blonde daughter of Jack who grew up far away and looks nothing like him. What a twist. Boy. That would be a Nolan twist. Yeah. All right. Thanks for coming in.

Thanks for being here. Everybody listen to the canon. Is there anything else you want to plug? No. Fair enough. Everyone should for being here everybody listen to the canon is there anything else you want to plug no fair enough I want you to read all your pieces

yeah you're an excellent writer for sure one of our finest film critics for real pay attention follow the feed what do you mean for real

nothing oh no this just got suddenly tense in a way that I can't understand no no no we love each other and as always really letting that silence just anything else This just got suddenly tense in a way that I can't understand. No, no, no. We love each other.

And as always. Really letting that silence just. Anything else you want to say? Because he's about to do his stupid bit. I think just bring on the stupid bit. Bring on the stupid bit. Wait, can I say that I like your shirt? Oh, yeah. Thank you.

I'm wearing a shirt that's Alfred E. Newman dressed up as Axl Rose. I think this shirt was listed as Axl E. Newman. I like it because it's a cross-section of the two people I admired the most when I was 13. My two 7th grade heroes were Alfred E. Newman and Axel Rose. Axel Rose. That explains how I ended up

the land. In like 2000 Axel Rose was your hero. Oh yeah. My two favorite bands in middle school were Guns N' Roses and Journey at the least cool moment to like either of those. Really? I got picked on equally for both of them. That's like worse than like Weird Al being your favorite musician age.

Well, I transitioned from Weird Al. He was probably my favorite musician at 11. Yeah. Do you understand how frustrating it is to like be like obsessed with Journey and have kids throw apples at my head and call me a fucking loser and then like four years later it like becomes right and everyone's like oh you like that song it's so funny right and I was like I was there when it mattered when they needed me when they really

no one was left on the island I bet those people who threw apples are quietly thinking Griffin was right all along what a trendsetter what a cool guy I should let him know that he's the coolest and he was secretly better than all of us. I wish I still had that apple. My friend Oliver Ignatius and I at summer camp did a ribbon dance

to Don't Stop Believing and I sprained my ankle and I limped for the rest of the summer. And then you had to explain why. We just ripped up fabric and we tied it to sticks we found in the woods. And we did. And it was like, ha ha, we're we did as children. And it was like,

ha ha, we're in on the joke. But it was like, I just wanted to dance to this song my entire life. I wanted people to have to watch me dance to this song because I remember hearing

Don't Stop Believing for the first time and said, why don't all songs sound like this? Oh my God. Anyway. I'm really glad I told you

I like your shirt. Yeah. You triggered some good things. Right. Bring us home, Griffin. Ahem. You triggered some good things. Bring us home, Griffin. Memory can change the shape of a room. It can that the name of the show is Blank Check. Memory can change the shape of a room. It can change the color of a car.

Memories can be distorted. They're just interpretation. They're not a record, and they're irrelevant. If you have the podcast, hi, everybody. This is Griffin in Blank Check with Griffin and David. I'm not part of this bit. That's it, right? We're done.

No, you got to intro the show. Jesus Christ. David Sims is blank check. Yeah, there you go. Griffin and David. We're hashtag the two friends. Right. All right. I'm here too, producer Ben.

We're done. Today we're talking about the movie Memento. Yeah. I was confused by it. Well, Ben, that's because you're bleeding. Oh, shit. Yeah, David, push your head into a bathroom mirror oh yeah

it was David remember look at your tattoo it was David it was it says David on my arm Ben you actually have tattoos don't you do you have any tattoos no Ben actually looked at his arm just in case he picked the wrong arm

oh yeah that's really oh I do have tattoos alright it's over okay bye