Sardonicast - Sardonicast 145: Oppenheimer, Cade: The Tortured Crossing, Tampopo

Episode Date: August 21, 2023

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Three, two, one. I am become Neil Breen, destroyer of corruption. Isn't that corrupt? This is SardanaCast. I'm Adam from your movie sucks. Hello. Hello. You got to just, you got to pretend like you're still like the, as if someone else said it

and you just say it after. Yeah, there's like no one to like bump it into. Yeah, yeah. I'm Alex from I. He and there's no Ralph to bump into this time. No one here to bump it. I guess bump into. Yeah, you're right. Hundreds of some episodes.

Five years couldn't really figure out which one of you to go first. Just fighting for that top spot. Yeah. Top dog. We saw Oppenheimer. It was a film. And we're actually, I know everybody's probably asking. why aren't you doing Oppenheimer and Barbie in the same episode?

It's because we're having a guest on next week and they didn't want to talk about Oppenheimer and they will be seeing Barbie and want to talk about it. And so I figure we'll save that for that one. Yeah, the movie event of the year, Barbenheimer. I didn't actually see them both on the same day, though. I didn't do it. What the fuck?

Mostly because of that. Yeah, sorry everybody. Why? It was mostly that three-hour runtime, you know? I do, man. Three hour, this was what, six hours pretty much? And then it's, ah, I don't know. I don't know, it didn't ruin my experience of both.

I still had, like, crazy, busy screenings and, like, an energized audience each time. So I don't feel like I missed out necessarily. Did you dress up? I dressed up like Spider-Man. Yeah? That was you? That was actually me, yeah. Okay.

Yeah, I don't know. This was interesting. There's a little article I found I'm going to bring up later that's kind of these old directors seeing like trying to predict, oh, is something changing right now, like on the verge of like something changing in Hollywood. Like the two biggest films of the year so far are both. They're still based on kind of IPs or real people or whatever, but they are more original than not superhero movies. That's one thing you can point out. I don't know, I was not expecting a three hour long biopic courtroom drama basically to kind of connect as broadly as it did. But I guess that's the, that's the Nolan Power, baby.

It is the Nolan Power. You can bring people in. Yeah. You could make whatever the fuck he was. He's just being crowds. Yeah. And I don't know, I feel like his last few movies that they've been kind of losing me because I feel like I really got into know them when I was a teenager. I was like the perfect age for the dark night and inception and this kind of stuff.

But then where he was taking his ideas, they weren't fully landing for me. Like, you know, Dunkirk, it's well made, it's good, but I just don't have an emotional connection. Similarly to, what's his previous one? Tenet. Tenet. Yeah. Yeah, it was pretty easy on that movie when it came out. Inaudible and incomprehensible.

Yeah. Yeah. And there are things I like about it in moments I remember, but there is, it is, it is Nolan to the max you know it's like all the stereotypes wrapped up with like a big big Nolan bow yeah it's a parody of a Christopher Nolan film basically yeah and I've definitely kind of soured on that one and haven't really revisited it so yeah I wasn't really sure how this one was gonna land because he's not really working with his brother anymore and it seemed like maybe that was the missing link like that team was

like what Kevin together yeah I don't know it's hard to know there's a lot of moving parts with films of this kind of scale and magnitude, but I don't know, this was bringing me back. I feel like this is one of his, his best films, to be honest. Okay. I was shocked. I was shocked that I was fully entertained for the entirety of that three-hour runtime, because that was my biggest I put off, like, I thought, we've been complaining about

it for, like, so many episodes. Everything seems to just be getting longer and longer, and it never really seems justified, or you can just see, like, parts that could be taken out. And I know you don't necessarily agree on this, but. But yeah, I was shocked. I was able to be kind of fully entertained. And it did ebb and flow. Like, within that three hours, I feel like the first 20 minutes or so is a bit of like a, man, I really don't want to like, I wanted to avoid the bomb puns.

But I was going to say bombardment of like, of like kind of those no-unisms. You know, he likes, he likes that, that quick kind of quippy dialogue, these short little scenes that feel like, they don't feel like, you. Yeah, I think how do people describe it? Kind of like trailer. It doesn't feel like real people talking is what you're trying to say, right? Yeah, yeah, basically. Yeah. And there's like a quickness to it.

It doesn't feel like scenes are like really breathing and it's like confusing as to what's kind of being set up and like what characters are supposed to be doing what. But I felt like it did start paying off pretty quick for me once you reach in that 30, 40 minute mark where it's like, oh, this is like such a big story and so ambitious in what it's trying to set up and tell. I was like forgiving that kind of funky beginning because it did start kind of reintroducing characters. And it's like, oh, remember this random scientist that was in a scene for five minutes earlier? Well, he was actually instrumental in this thing that actually happened like progressing here.

And it's like, yeah, it's really complicated. And I wish there were subtitles because I'm definitely not a history buff when it comes to this kind of stuff. I know very little about Oppenheimer as a person. But I think that's another thing that makes this movie so cool. I feel like it has inspired a bunch of people to get into the, this period of history and yeah as I was trying to say earlier about like some of Nolan's recent movies like Tenet feels like it wants to be important on this certain level you know and Estella feels like it wants to have this like backbone of like this is this is

something real man this is something as important as I want it to come across with that like booming sound there's like music playing every single second everything everything's epic you know for like of the better word and the subject matter here actually matches that vision to me because it's like yeah the more I was just kind of getting emotional like halfway through just kind of thinking about the scale of this and the fact that like this is like a real story and a real breakthrough that someone came through and all the moral and political and all these social implications that come it's like a really interesting character because that's another like trend that was kind of putting me off like this idea of biopics or a trend in Hollywood right now

everyone wants to be making their biopic about stars, important people scientists, Cheetos, Tetris, whatever. There are a couple good ones, but like, I feel like this would exist without that trend anyway. It felt like he really wanted to tell this and he was really impassioned about this character. And of course, it wouldn't be Nolan without some kind of time or nonlinear approach to that time. Because, of course, like the structure of the movie is jumping through different time periods. And again, that was another thing that kind of added to that clunkiness to begin with. But also, again, as the strings start reconnecting towards the end, I felt like it really brings it together nicely, especially for that very end scene, where it's, you know, coming back to, I guess, spoilers.

Can you say spoilers for, like, the real thing? Is that really like... I mean... It's like a real person. Everything he did is, like... I guess. I would argue even real events you could spoil a movie by talking about them. Some people assume that everybody knows everything about every event, right?

So like, I didn't know what was necessarily going to happen at the end of 127 hours. I didn't know it was going to happen at the end of Christine. I didn't, you know, like, I don't look up the stories of things before I watch the movies for them. I intentionally avoid that sort of, you know, like, Dear Zachary and blah, blah, blah, blah. I'm not going to like be like, oh, what's this about and like look up some article or you know maybe I'm just like I don't think I'm hiding under a rock but I just I don't search things up that don't interest me I guess or that I wouldn't otherwise but I would argue you can spoil that uh as in the same etiquette should

probably apply but anyway this is a spoiler conversation so get the fuck out of here who hasn't seen Oppenheimer you idiot you can watch a cam rip right now you lazy True. And some of the like negative trends that have like kind of been boosted by this whole Barbineheimer experience of it. It's like a new trend now. Like people for social media clout like taking pictures of like their favorite. That's funny.

They want a sad frame of Killian Murphy like in a certain scene or they want to get like for a meme basically. But they leave the flash on and annoy everyone and experience. Yeah. Yeah. I did hear about like some annoying people doing that during some screen. of Oppenheimer. My screening, you could fucking hear a pin drop, you know, if the movie wasn't playing. Same with mine. Did you watch it in like IMAX or like what kind of?

No, it's a bummer actually. Like the last thing I'd seen in IMAX was 10 it. And just like a month or two ago, my local IMAX closed its doors and like people were showing up to it. Perfect timing. To screenings. Perfect timing. And they just printed out like a piece of A4 like, yeah, sorry, like, we're closed now, we don't have any money. Did they, like, sell tickets and then close? Or did, because tickets were available for this movie for a while? Um, I think it was like, just before, um, yeah, so I don't know, it was more around when, uh, Astrois City was out, yeah.

I know, yeah, they probably could have made some money, but I mean, I must have been hemorrhaging stuff like, I don't know, we're not doing that great over here. Yeah. So I saw it in one of the, like, 35, total theaters on the planet that can play 70 millimeter iMacs that's definitely the way to see it yeah i'm jealous yeah i mean i don't know maybe when you're maybe when you're in toronto there'll be if you want to kill three hours and go by yourself there might be like a iMex they're still playing it honestly but uh yeah i mean it is the way yeah it is the way to see it it was definitely really

visually striking. The huge contrast between like different aspect ratios is always really interesting. It's like a really tall kind of like almost square frame but not really. And yeah, for the context of how

it was used in certain scenes, it really added a lot to it and it made it more of like a cinematic experience for sure. That being said, I have no interest in seeing this movie again. as much as I liked it. I liked parts of it.

I find it interesting, I guess, psychologically, how different people connect to different things in terms of whether or not they're a true story. Because that's a, that's, if we're looking at human being statistically, like, if you say it's a true story, people are more into it, right? That's why they lie to you and say that it's a true,

based on a true story in like horror movies or like other... And Fargo. Yeah, I mean... Yeah, that's the gag in Fargo. But it's like a real thing that they try to do for marketing when the strangers. Like, this is based on a true story. It's like, okay, well, the people in the movie didn't survive at the end.

So what was the story? They found some dead bodies that two people died at some point. And then you made up everything between the beginning and end of it. Because no one was there to tell the story. So what's the story you're saying happen? The new fucking stupid, stupid ass like... Adam Ellis Twitter thread horror movie trailer and it's like this is a true story. It's like the true story is that someone posted on Twitter and is a dumbass like what they thought their house was haunted? What? It's true that there were ghosts like what are you saying? So we know that we know that this is like a verifiable thing that can be done to make people more engaged in or interested in the film. We we know that this is true. That's why they do it. I think to some degree everyone is susceptible to this in some way because I was, you know, I have those thoughts watching Oppenheimer

of like, wow, interesting, you know, trying to connect it and tie it to the real world events. But I'm not, I'm not sure I, maybe there's like a scale or a spectrum of how different people are affected by it, because I just find personally that I'm not really the type to enjoy a movie more because it's based on something real. Like, I still find a way to separate those two things in my head or at least I, you know, maybe I'm just more conscious of it or maybe I try to do that. I'm not sure, maybe subconsciously. I try to treat the film as if it wasn't a real story. Does that make sense? Okay. I, yeah, I get what you're saying, but it's also, I feel like it enhances it too when it is something of this importance. I mean, like, it's what,

the biggest man-made calamity ever. Yeah. You know, like as far as people, it's like, I feel like contextualizing that and really exploring the mind of like the person who enabled that to happen is like an interesting story.

And I feel like what you're saying is especially true. Um, because I feel like there are examples where, yeah, like the, the real life true story is something important. Um, but how,

came together as a movie didn't really leave the impression something like this did be it like i was thinking about the imitation game a fair amount again you could argue someone equally as impactful as a person as far as like what they invented or managed to achieve in that time but like what do you remember about that movie like it's not like the most it's a pretty matter-of-fact kind of story like you know similarly to like darkest hour you know there's it doesn't have the the grander kind of narrative framing that he's going for here with this like timeline thing and not it's not just about the hurrah we got we got the the bomb done in time to glass Japan kind of that's that's just like the end of the second app pretty much and

then it's like hold up this there's actually like a grander implication to this and it's yeah how it leaks into the Cold War and this yeah obsession with communism and yeah what the American government were trying to hide and all this like espionage that's like oh so at first I was kind of thinking because that's really where a lot of the tension comes from is that race of them setting up this place in the desert in secret trying to get this this job done and there is something there's a little bit of tension lost once that kind of wraps up and you know where it ends and they've done the like test and stuff that's that's probably the best scene in the movie is that a sequence where they're testing it yeah yeah and not just because it is like the only kind of action type spectacle you'd expect to see from the nuke movie again like pretty restrained as far as that stuff's concerned like I really liked

how it was rooted to the character of Oppenheimer and his perspective of it like it's not cutting away to like show Japan he like just hears it over the radio let's watch the Michael Bay version let's try to imagine that for a second Michael Bay is Oppenheimer yeah that would be fucking nuts

Somebody make it Somebody make it in 10 years when AI can actually just do it Somebody do it Okay remind me in 10 years make it in AI when it's when you can do it Yeah So I guess I guess what I was trying to I guess I just want to clarify I think it's possible and I do To to value the importance of a real world event

By watching the movie But still keep the movie as a separate thing in your mind. Not saying like that it they're literally separate, not saying that there literally is no connection between the film and the real life events, but in terms of like judging the film, right? Because because I think that no matter what real life event that you're telling a story of, you're fictionalizing it in a certain way. You're the dialogue is movie dialogue, right? Like you're dramatizing it. You're creating a film. All film is fiction, even document. to a certain degree if we want to get

philosophical. Like there's no objective truth in any story. So yeah, when I'm watching Oppenheimer, there was, oh my God, one of the somebody linked me a Twitter thread

of someone who was calling me out for saying that I was bored for half of Oppenheimer. And their justification wasn't a clip from my review and it wasn't any like substantive justification. It was just a clip from the trailer with Matt Damon saying like this is the most important thing that's ever happened in a human kind ever

And so yeah, I guess the I guess the argument to some people is that the subject matter of a film alone Is is Justification to be entertained by how the film presents the subject matter no matter how it presents it Right Like some people they just literally can't separate separate this and it had like fucking 300 Reposts or whatever we're gonna call it now fucking Quentin reviews like like liked it for some reason. Weird.

Oh, really? Yeah, he's been doing some weird shit lately. Talked about this podcast without mentioning it in a very, very bizarre way. Anyway, not going to dwell on that. But yeah, to some people, it's like they literally cannot separate the real life event, or at least the significance of the real life event from the film and the filmmaking and how the film is presenting itself, which I just find to be bonkers. Like, it's the exact same reason why people are pimping out to fucking the sound of freedom. But, you know, you can use that

justification. You can use that justification to pimpe out the fucking Lorax, you know? Like, the Lorax is a movie about environmentalism. So, you know, that's an important issue. Does that therefore mean the movie is not boring? Fuck no. Right? Like, what are we saying here? Like, I think it is important to separate those things. It's about the craftsmanship to me it's about the filmmaking and I just yeah seeing as you brought up the lore act you gotta tell me why you be watching the law acts it was uh oh god yeah because it I I collabed with another channel we recorded like a

long distance movie watching thing and uh yeah fucking horrendous cancer hated it absolutely hated it it just wasn't as bet in that I didn't even realize that I was watching my second illumination film I didn't even realize that's what I was doing and And then over time, I was like, oh, minions are in the intro. Oh, was Mario your first illumination film? I think so, huh? Yeah.

Damn. Okay. Now you've seen their real best. Yeah, yeah, it was. Mario was a two and Lorex was a one. So, yeah. Have you seen the product tie-ins, the ironic product tie-ins they did for that movie when it came out?

Oh, no. It's a really funny car advert. using like the Lorax imagery. Just missing the entire point of the movie. Yeah. Sorry, getting distracted by Lorax right now, but... I got your attention. Yeah. Yeah, I think that it is, you know, if you're judging a film, you know, maybe it's not

possible to separate it in the minds of some people, but for me it is, or at least to a degree that I feel is different than what I perceive the average person is as, as, doing, especially with X threads or whatever we're going to call it like that. Like, okay, it's clear that some, it's literally impossible for some people and that's the justification alone. So yeah, I have a different experience. Yeah, that is a bad argument for why something is good. Yeah.

Just because it happened. Because it's about the most important thing that ever happened. It's like, okay, well fucking, if Derek Savage directed it, you know? Like, it's still about the same thing. It's still about the same thing. Yeah. Fuck. Like,

people are so dumb. Yeah. I don't know how you can distinguish the execution. It's not even, it's not even a complicated argument. It's not even, like, for me to even be explaining this

feels condescending for like the reality of the world. Like, it's disappointing to be reminded that I'm in a reality where like, apparently this is a complex thought. Apparently, Apparently this is not like a very simple thing to understand that isn't already just a given. But like, okay.

So weird. Yeah, I think a lot of people find it hard to actually explain why they do like something, you know? Yeah. Like if it's a feeling, like verbalizing it could be tough, I guess. But that is a bad reason. But I really think he executed on it. Like the fact, the main fact that it is a three hour long biopic and it has, it seems like it has everyone engaged. I don't know what your like makeup of your theater viewing was like, but it was like people old and young.

Like everyone seemed engaged with the film. Like, yeah, you could hear a pin drop. It was, I felt like the story was executed very well. Because, like, yeah, the no lymisms are scary at a certain point. I was like, oh, early on some of those dialogue scenes. And some of the framing of it was a bit like, you know, kind of dull as far as like blocking is concerned, just a lot of like shot reverse shot type stuff. Yeah, some of the editing was fucking weird too Like there were some shots in conversations

Where it was like three frames of just some guys Yeah, faces he's spawning That's the thing Some of the editing scene by scene Was kind of a bit And I rushed a bit like it felt like it just had to be there To just for the mechanics of everything To be in place to get like working

Because I think broadly the editing is actually quite good The way it is juggling these different timelines and just the way it was able to not get too muddled in that. And I felt like I was always pretty much in line with what was going on. I was understanding the greater context of what was going on, like, who was being referenced, even, like, convenient little flashes of, like, characters they're talking about that they put on screen because, I don't know,

I'm so bad with names and there's no subtitles, and they just presented it in a way where I could keep up with what was going on, because there are so many characters. You bring up in your review, it almost becomes a gag at a certain point. Yeah. And he's just like random character actors are appearing. It's like fucking the Avengers. Like it's so weird.

Yeah, you get Valerian like showing up for five minutes. Dane to Han. Thank God for, thank God for Dane to Han. It's the boys. They are all superhero actors, which is inevitable at this point also. It's kind of funny. Yeah, we got Iron Man. Yeah, you got Young Han Solo.

Oh, true. How did you, speaking of Iron Man, how did you feel about like the whole Strauss angle? Because I felt like that was a little longer than I need to be particularly, you know, in the grand scheme of the story, I felt that being like much less interesting than what Oppenheimer was doing. I don't know why we got so much of Strauss. Yeah, I feel like he was kind of the avenue for them to explore the more corrupt side of like the American government because that needed to be explored in there and this weird, you know, tension, the commie tension. And so I really liked that side of it and what I did bring out the characters, especially Oppenheimer. Like, he's a great, like, character study, I feel like. I liked that side of it, too.

I felt like they'd thoroughly explored all of it and then kept going, is my issue with every, every sort of, like, interesting thought and, like, the whole, you know, Red Scare communism thing. Like, everything, I found it really interesting and engaging, and then they kept doing it. And I didn't feel like it was building to at least enough of a degree to justify how much of the film was spent on it. You know, like, the film has a lot of really purposeful intellectual things to chew on. But it's, it's, it felt stagnant and stale after a while. I was like, oh, this is a great thing to touch on. And then they touch on it again. And I'm like, oh, I guess this is going to happen for a while.

and then they touch out and again, and it doesn't really seem to justify why it's still doing that, for me anyway. You didn't think that when it was revisiting characters, it was kind of re-contextualizing certain dynamics or like, you know, the Safdi bro keeps showing up, and each time his kind of stories embellish a little bit more and the way they clash in the courtroom, like all these years later.

And I felt like every time it was returning to a thread, it was kind of like adding something to a character or pushing something forward or explaining this little question mark to do with this bit of espionage and betrayal here or you know like i i didn't feel like it was wasting my time in that regard yeah i'm i'm glad you felt that way and that seems to be most people's experience but yeah they're just there wasn't there sure there was a benny saffey's character wasn't what came to mind in terms of like that complaint i would say just more or less like there were there were certain dynamics in certain scenarios that had already been established particularly the whole you know the courtroom stuff was really long and drawn out i don't if you didn't feel that way i'm happy for you but for for me i i didn't really feel like i was getting much more out of it uh as it was progressing and you know again for for me if i'm watching this is less of a uh true story and more of just a movie

I don't know. I'm like, I'm not a history buff anyway. And I think it's important to, you know, as I'm always trying to do, to share your biases. And so,

you know, in my review, I said, I'm not a history buff. I'm not a history guy. You know, it's not like a subject that's like the most interesting thing of the world to me.

I know that a lot of people are. You know, I think you're, I think you're more likely to really be absorbed in this movie and enjoy it if you have already have some sort of like fascination or interest in in that subject but I'm just kind of like yeah I'm I don't know it was a three hour movie yeah I do agree with you in the sense that the momentum does kind of change gears after a couple hours and if you weren't interested in what's going on outside of it as much

as that, because you can't deny, that's kind of like the, that's the heart of it, that's the ticking time element, you know, it's what, the mad rush to get this thing done. It's the kind of the most interesting part. But the way it does start kind of fleshing out what is going on with this Lewis Strauss character, that kind of like started building up, like, right as I was looking to something else to attach myself to, to try to conclude. Because, yeah, it does feel like, well, How do you even wrap this up, to be honest? It's such a broad, like, epic, for lack of a better word, like, going over decades and decades, you know? It's very ambitious.

It is very ambitious. It's a very bizarre project to tackle and try to turn into a film, especially with what they decided to include. This, to me, feels like Christopher Nolan's version of, like, a Terence Malick film, where he probably filmed, like, a fucking five-hour movie and then just cut it down. it really feels like that especially in some see like a lot of it feels like it's edited like like a trailer a lot of it feel like from the beginning of the movie it's like oh shit like you know the music's like super intense already everything's a fucking montage and then you know i was like wow this is an interesting kind of experimental approach from nolan wasn't expecting this and then half of the movie is like that and half of the movie is like a normal scene and

it's it was just kind of a jarring experience to me And again, I'm not, I don't know. It sounds like I hate the movie. I didn't hate the movie. It's just like not for me in terms of something I would want to revisit it again. I'm glad I saw it in IMAX. I got a lot out of it experience-wise, but like the whole picture, you know, I'm sure you, I'm sure you understand to watch a three-hour movie.

You got to love it. You got to love it. Definitely. I guess that's where I differ is that I guess I'm more forgiving to that kind of stylistic choice of that almost like montage approach to dropping exposition but there is god there is so much exposition really when you think about it it's just they're talking about it's just scientists talking about like the next step the next breakthrough that happened the next uh whatever the because this is based on a a biography i think yeah how i learned to stop worrying and love the bomb

Yeah, I just see it, but I've lost it. Yeah, so I don't know, I feel like as a whole, it did, I felt it was almost like the only way to get this into a package that wasn't longer, you know? Because I've actually seen that as a bunch of feedback people saying, man, this almost could have been longer. I don't know how you feel about that as someone he doesn't like the runtime as much as it is. But I probably, I could watch an extended version of this, like, if it would like sort out some of the, that kind of pacing stuff, some of those awkward scenes earlier on. But like, I changed the editing.

I'm kind of at this point I wasn't able to see this again because I've just been so busy, but I'm kind of like really excited to see this again, which I haven't felt about a Nola movie in a while. Mm-hmm. Well, I'm glad you enjoyed it. Would you think of, uh, I loved, I loved, uh, Lyndon Johnson character. That was really funny. Yeah.

It's got like a, it's got loads of great kind of bit roles. Yeah, like most of the roles are bit roles. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of thing though. It's like, very bizarre. Emily Blunt is good when she's in there. Matt Damon's really good when he's in there. I don't know, maybe I'm a sucker for like this,

this courtroom stuff a bit more because I found, yeah, that stuff with Macon Blair and these character actors like defending each other and bring it up all this old beef and it's, I don't know, it's like, it's just fascinating to me. And, yeah, I feel like the Nolanism actually enhanced the story instead of hindering it.

It didn't, yeah, it didn't feel tenanted to me in anyway. I felt like, it feels like he's back on track. It is kind of interesting having Christopher Nolan do, like, art-housy stuff or at least try, like, how did you feel about, like,

the weird naked in front of them scenes? And it's like, okay, this is obviously supposed to be, you know, talking about how he's feeling naked and vulnerable in front of them and how, you know, his personal sex life is being exposed to the people in front of him. And, you know, it's like a visual metaphor for that. It's like felt kind of silly at the same time, right? Like, it felt, I thought that that was a very weirdly comical presentation of it. I don't know if maybe it's just because I didn't take the rest of the movie as, as quite as seriously as you, or how did you feel about

stuff like that. Yeah, I didn't read it as comical. I actually kind of really enjoyed that stuff, especially when he's going into that hall of the cheering people and how that was like edited and executed where he's not really thinking about the immediate. And it becomes, yeah, kind of more like a horror scene, more of the him realizing in the moment, kind of the implications, the greater ones as to what he's just achieved. But I think the fact it is kind of rooted to that one character. It really helps keep it cohesive to me. So that kind of stuff, like, yeah, I quite like that shot where, so Emily Blunt, seeing the naked, you know, it's like the drama that is being forced upon them in this,

this just mess of a court case. And yeah, so with so many messy threads, I feel like, yeah, the fact that it is actually so coherent is quite a plus, to be honest. well I'm glad you enjoyed it as much as you did because people I was I was honestly kind of expecting people to be like god damn I wish Ralph was here to defend the movie because I wasn't sure what you you would think of it but yeah glad we had a bit of a different experience on this and I'm giving this one a six out of ten it was well presented for the most part and good IMAX movie three hours did you pee during the movie that's my real question I didn't I somehow managed to... Damn. Yeah, there was no urge, yeah. I did not either because I deliberately did not drink coffee before the movie. Yeah, that would do it.

That would do it. Yeah, I was quite surprised about how much I was into this. Yeah, it really felt like all these little Nolanisms that have been building over the years and all these ideas that just haven't connected just right there. It's just packaged and just... The story that's right for him, person that's right for him that kind of dialogue he loves I feel like just goes hand in hand with these like scientists quippy type characters yeah I was able to

keep along and I wasn't bored for those three hours this is like a really strong four-star for me eight out ten can't wait to see it again to be honest which again I'm shocked by the especially when you describe it as what it is a three-hour courtroom drama but killing Murphy man I think it would feel like he's a great actor. Same. Really does the character justice. Yeah, he was great.

He gets his three hour. Like, he's in like basically every scene. Yeah. And he really holds it together. Yeah, he was, he was great to watch. I like, I like seeing him in lead roles.

It doesn't happen as often as it could. Yeah. He's always kind of been a longtime collaborator of Christopher Nolan. And he's always just kind of showing up his side characters. But I remember the days of like, fucking 28 days later and I haven't seen

the wind shakes the barley Yeah I think he's quite a star In the UK with like peeky blinders and stuff I know that yeah you're right Yeah you're right Nothing quite on this level I feel like Oppenheimer's just like a household name in a way

It probably should have already been But I feel like it's energized it for Just younger people especially because I just think about, I don't know if you've seen these kind of trends where it's the, oh, I'm old kind of moments where, yeah, you see like shorts or TikToks being shared of like, this is the history of 9-11 stuff, you know. It's like, oh, I guess there are people that don't know about like this stuff and it's not even history from that long ago really wobble to, not even 100 years. There's 22-year-olds that were not born in like before 9-11. Yeah. It's disturbing to think about.

no. Yeah, here we are. I'm not disturbed by it, but that's live. I thought it was synectady. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, you know, it's all a matter of perspective and how you interpret it. Anyway, speaking of interpretations, we saw Cade the Tortured Crossing, a very dense, very interpretable film. Alex was lucky enough to catch it fucking how many months ago?

Did you see it? It was months now, wasn't it? Yeah. So in the Prince Charles cinema in London. Yeah. Heaps of people, everyone cheering. Really fun experience. But yeah.

Also, like, how do you... What do you even start with this bad boy? Yeah. So before we, before we, like, really delve into it here, part of the reason we're covering this on this episode is it's still playing. It's still playing. And you should all fucking... see it. If you can find

a city or a theater that is playing it, you know, even in his audio only list that he released, there's more theaters playing it now. There's some theaters that are doing encore showings. I think the Montreal one is playing soon. You might be able to

buy tickets still if you're a patron and listening to this now. I don't know. But yeah, I mean, they're playing into September, for sure. So, get your fucking tickets. And also, I really if there's one thing I really want to communicate here is perhaps

a conversation on like the etiquette for like a Neil Brain film because there's everybody goes into this knowing that it's something that you can like riff on that there's going to be like clapping and cheering and like someone will shout a comment

look out Neil or something and like you know that's all fun and good I think that there's some few people in each screening that maybe need to be told that although it's fun to riff on the movie they shouldn't be narrating the entire thing because I talked to some people after the show in the show that I went to

and they were like sitting next to some people that you know it was kind of like distracting him the whole time. This is the third time I've seen a Neil Breen film in theaters. I saw a twisted pair in theaters twice and when I was there at the Chicago show there was someone behind me that like

you know for the first five minutes was like just talking narrating everything. He was still talking about the movie. It's not like he was having a separate conversation with his friends, but he was talking so much and so frequently that I just turned around and I was like, hey, I know it's really fun to like riff on the movie. I know that this is the type of thing, but try to keep your commentary, like to try not to be talking the entire movie. That's fair, yeah. You don't want to practice in their stand-up, like. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it sounds like they're trying to do mystery science theater sometimes, you know. Yeah.

I had that when I went to see one of these room screenings. Oh, those are just garbage now. Those are just garbage. People throw in shit everywhere. Like, everyone was drunk out their minds and, like, just hooting and hollering. Yeah. It could be fun for a bit, but, like... The room is a fucking, like, Oscar movie's story.

And, like, everybody's grandma knows, oh, hi, Mark, you know, like, it's... Neil Breen is where it's at now. And I'm not trying to be elitist of, like, ooh, this is better because less people know about it. I'm just saying there's a certain point where it kind of gets ruined. You know, when a meme is nice and healthy and then a brand starts using it, it's like, okay, this is less pure, not because it's popular, but because it's like more cynical and how it's being used. And, you know, the motivations for the people attending or like the type of environment,

like the room is one movie. It's one movie and it's like fucking 20 years old or however much. There's no new observations to be made about it. I'm not going to make a review of it because there's there's nothing to say about it that hasn't been said Everybody in those screenings is is doing the exact same shit They're doing all the like It's it's it's so inorganic Because everybody everybody knows exactly what to say at exactly what time

It's like you memorized it like you studied it Neil Breen films like there are new things that come out You can react to it naturally you can have like an actual genuine experience with it and he's still fucking Pumping out bangers, right? He's like he's unfazed by the self-awareness. And maybe to some degree, there's parts of this movie that we can argue or maybe playing into some things a little. But he's still, he's still pure and he's still genuine. And even if there is a hint of self-awareness here or there, he's still delivering and he's giving people a fucking awesome experience and something that they want.

Right. So, yeah, that's my little rant about the room. But the core of that rant is centered around. Try to be respect. Please go to the movie. Buy a ticket. I want his shows to be sold out. but be mindful and respectful of other people

and how you're riffing on the movie. And also, if you're one person that's being bothered by that, don't be afraid to just politely speak up and ask. A person going to a Neil brain screening, like, it's not, this isn't, this isn't the sound of freedom. You don't have to be, like, scared if the person next to you is, like, crazy and holding a gun, probably.

Like, it's a bunch of YMS fans. It's literally just a, bunch of my fans and red letter media fans, etc. like that are showing up to the movie. If you, if you ask politely, like, it'll be fine. There won't be any conflict. You, it'll, you don't have to worry.

Just, just be like, hey, you know, say what I said. Hey, it's nice to, you know, don't be afraid to speak out for other people to. You know? I want these, I don't want these film screenings to be the best film screenings that anybody's been to in their entire life. I want everybody to have fun.

So we can, we can enforce that by having good community standards and self-policing and yeah promote good etiquette I think it's kind of good you brought up Tommy actually in the kind of played out nature of that because that does seem like the big difference where the intent is like so obvious to the room you know and like the reaction after he's still tweeting to this day like the room memes and it's like yeah yeah that was so was a while again oh hi Marr Same line, Bart. Yeah, yeah.

Whereas Kea, like, I don't know if you got theories, but I'm just like trying to, I'm trying to figure out with this guy. Like, how much does he know? You can engage with it. It's perfect. Like, he, he knows that, like, white tiger thing. He knows how that looks. He must do.

Yeah, spoilers for Kay the Tortured Crossing from now on. Doing a spoiler discussion. Like, come on. Like the bizarre stock footage and like everything's like a needless green screen. Everything is a green screen. Okay, okay. Here's my

theory for that is that this might be like a COVID production movie because this has been completed for like a year because he was doing the festival route. So this movie is not like no freshly made. He was doing it's been completed for a long time and it was doing the festival route.

It probably took a long fucking time to edit. I think it was just one guy editing the whole right and if everything's green screen that might have taken a year too he might have filmed it in like 2020 2020 21 that might be why there's no real locations because this is the first of his films where I don't think there is one actual location in the entire film and everybody's just a green screen or stock footage like this this is unprecedented for neil brein right so okay yeah I'm no brein expert I think it might be a COVID film yeah because they're having a full fight scenes and stuff and they're clearly just like on separate layers just like

amazing through each other I remember that music in the fight scene like it was yesterday yeah yeah I mean it's that's the thing though is that Neil Breen has never looked at a limitation and thought no he's looked at a limitation and thought I'm gonna make the movie anyway like he fucking you know even if even it when he had real sets that I was I watched Fateful Fying I did a rewatch like a few days ago. That one's got to be my favorite. And there's certain aspects to it where it's like, okay, you can't, it's not possible that a man in his 50s doesn't know what a hospital looks like.

Or doesn't know like that it looks fake when it's just like air tubes and no actual piercing of the skin and he just like pulls it. Like it's just putting air into his wrist. Like, I don't know. It's very confusing what the disconnect is between what he puts in his film and what's in his head or what he thinks looks real or what is real in his mind. It's something to interpret. But I feel like he maybe just he cares so much about the story he's trying to tell that he's willing to tell it no matter what and in whatever way he can, which is actually like, I'm not meming, but like a really kind of admirable and important. thing to get in the mindset of if you're trying to write. So many writers get bogged down about the practicality of what they're going to be shooting and it limits what sorts of things they can write.

Now, Neil Breen, I'm not saying he wrote the best story because of that. The best example of this would be like Charlie Kaufman. Like he wrote Seneck Deke, New York without even considering how the fuck that was going to be felt. Like he just, he just wrote, he wrote something that was true to himself and he wanted to tell this story of like the fucking fractal image reality of viewer and and artist and and participating in art and life and death and everything and nothing and one thing exclusively and everyone and one person at the same time and he didn't think about how he was going to film it realistically like maybe he did he's the director but like it just happened right so I think there is something to learn from people who aren't kneecapping themselves in that way.

And maybe to a certain degree Neil Breen does. To a certain degree. Yeah. I guess on that note, I'm just curious, like, if I sit down and read a Kaufman script, I feel like there's an A to B to C, like kind of beautiful narrow. being woven there what what am I reading on the the tortured crossing script like how's he justifying like the the the white tiger guy coming out or is it just like I need I need something to fill this shot here I had this kind of vague

idea for like I guess I filmed them like walking over a bridge what I thought was going to be a bridge and I found this like PNG of a bridge on Google what's the what's the balance there of like the absolute nonsense absurdity to like actual earnest genuine like story tax. I actually can't tell. Like I feel like I'm being trolled somehow, you know, I like. But we don't know. What's the truth here?

We don't know. Wait, wait, it's not possible to tell at the moment. And he's so, yeah, I'm not going to say who I know or what type of. I know some people in some industries that have like interacted and had email. conversations with him in particular things. And he, the, the, the conversations that I've heard from those people that I will not specify anything about, the, the, the, the takeaway is like, he is really that person and that he's, like, very, and he'll get, like, really hung up about certain details of what's happening

in his script and feel like, you know, like, there, if someone, like, if someone, like, misinterprets a thing, he'll be like, no, you know, in a, you know, in a, very particular way. You got to respect. That is the earnestness. You got to respect. Yeah. You know, that is, yeah, I get what you're saying that.

I happen to rewatch a few episodes of Xavier Renegade Angel. Yeah. I feel like he's, he's kind of, he's kind of got the vibe of that character, like an old version of that character. It's just like. Nice. I don't know. I don't know what's going on. There's, he's got like an android eye.

And it's like a screen, it just freezes. Yeah. for like a few seconds. Did you, did you rewatch Twisted Pear before watching this? I didn't, I didn't have a chance to rewatch, so it has been a while.

Okay. I couldn't remember the complexities of, but I didn't think it was going to matter that much. No, it wound up not really mattering at all. All you need to know is that there's Cade and Cale. Cade is the one without the beard. Cale has a beard.

Cade is like good and kale is like kind of bad and like a drug addict or something. Otherwise, like the idea of, this as sequel is like fucking bizarre honestly. They didn't need to be those characters. I don't know. I'm not sure how this was justified.

So like let's try to, to try and summarize this newest film is difficult, particularly because people haven't cracked the code and put it on Wikipedia. So in Twisted Pear, you can actually just read the plot there on Wikipedia. Oh, I see. And if anybody listening, don't do it. before you watch the film, always watch the Neil Breen film first, then read the Wikipedia plot summary after.

Because you'll learn fascinating things. You'll be like, that's what the fuck was happening? So, like, in faithful findings, I recently read the Wikipedia plot summary after, and I was like, oh, the sniper that was trying to assassinate him, spoilers, assassinate him at the end,

died because the main character Dylan, played by Neil Breen, killed him by reflecting the bullet using his psychic powers. Like, I didn't, I've seen the film like fucking ten times. I didn't know that's what happened, but it seems, but I read it on Wikipedia. I'm like, that, that makes sense as to what he was trying to do. And then I think, are there, are there just people that are on his wavelength that know what the fuck he's doing? Are there nerds that are just obsessively trying to figure it out? And then they come up with a good explanation? Or is he editing his Wikipedia pages?

Yeah, what if it's the wrong interpretation? I don't know. No, but it makes sense. When you read those things, it makes sense. That's the issue. It's not like absolute nonsense. That's why it's kind of entertaining. I shit you not.

I don't know if I should just, because you haven't seen Twisted Pear in a while. Otherwise, I would read the plot right now. It's a few paragraphs. But I'm encouraging anybody to watch Twisted Pear, then read the Twisted Pear plot synopsis on Wikipedia. Because it's like, it's an insane

experience. If you had to try to do it for Cade, what would you say? So, for memory. I didn't know anything down, right? There's like an asylum. They're like these people. There's like magic.

So Cade had, there's a bunch of people. He raised money from some people to build a hospital. And then the hospital gets built and he says out loud that he hasn't seen it. And he's like, I haven't seen this hospital yet.

And then later he finds out that the hospital is bad and like run down and that the people there are like kidnapping, I guess, drug addicts off the street and then stealing stuff from their bodies and then putting them back out onto the street and then kidnapping them again instead of just keeping them there. And there's some of the some of the people are like they, I think. there was one guy that said out loud, like, this is the worst detox, what's it called? Rehab, there's another word for it. Oh, yeah, a rehab clinic. Yeah, he was like, this is the worst rehab clinic ever. But I think that he was mistaken. I think he thought it was, and that it actually

wasn't. But I still don't understand the motivations of like what they were stealing from the people or injecting them with maybe. They were doing some sort of experiments on them, and I don't know for what purpose. Yeah, there was like that one scene in the doctor's surgery that he kept cutting to like every 15 minutes. Oh, that was great. And this other guy shows up. Get out of here! I'm busy! And that had a payoff. There were payoffs in this film. He learns, Neil Breen has a great feel for setup and payoff. Because there's, you know, there's things that get called back later in the film and are satisfying. Very much so. an audience full of people watching it ironically, especially.

You know, it's, uh... What are the rules with the... When like people, I don't know, they die or get like sent to another dimension or something, they like just phase out, you know? I'm not sure. But maybe it's possible that even if we see the same actor

that maybe the implication is that it's a different character, maybe, and maybe they did die and maybe they captured a new person or something. That might be the case. Okay, yeah, that's really confusing, but okay. At the end, when the keyboard man was playing and the other characters had a dance off, which was incredible.

I forgot about the dance off. That was one of the best seats. Man, that was so satisfying. And then there were a bunch of ghost versions of themselves behind them. I think that I don't I'm trying to understand if they're supposed to be different characters

the ghost versions of themselves because it wouldn't be the first time that Neil Breen has copied and pasted the same person trying to be and implied that it's different character at the end of pass-through there was like a bunch of bodies laying in the

yeah now you're saying that that is making things okay that does make things kind of make more sense but also less in a way you know now I feel like I don't know I didn't even know anything that really happened Yeah, it's interpretable is the strongest word to describe this film.

But here's the thing. I'm happy to see it again. And you know what? I'm lucky enough that I already know where I'm seeing it again. And I'm not going to say where. I'm not going to say which city. But I get to see it twice in theaters. So, yeah. I get to, I'll come up with better interpretation on second watch. I'll be. I'll try my best to be a translator, although, like, it seems like there's other people that exist that are just far better at that than me. But, yeah, so,

kale, kale the beardy boy was, I think, stealing either drugs or maybe the things from their bodies or something. Like, I don't know. Were they, like, were they just, like, stealing drug addicts

and then, like, stealing the drugs from their bodies or something? Like, I don't know what was going on. They never really explain it in any way. Yeah. Like, was the, was the evil cade, like, linked to it in any way? Like, what? You mean kale?

Why was he there? Cale, yeah. Yeah. My favorite leaf. Oh, yeah. I don't know. But he, uh, he died at the end and I don't remember. I don't, and I don't know how that happened necessarily, but it was very sad.

Yeah. That was my favorite part of the whole, like, battle sequence slash, dance off thing. That was quite the crescendo payoff action spectacle. Yeah. Otherwise it's what, like a bunch of, I remember him like repairing a range rover or something.

Yeah. It's like broken down with his magic. Yes, he did that. Is he like from the future or something? Where do these powers come from? He's an advanced AI. And in the beginning of Twisted

Pear I think he's a cyberhuman so I think in the beginning of Twisted pair there was stock footage of like two twin children and he's like one of us got powers and the other one got powers but one of them used it for good and one

for evil and there was like a weird like 3D rendering of some face and it's like I don't know if that's the face that gave them powers and it's weird because we never see that in this film. So you'd expect as a sequel they would like tie it back in that way. In terms of

how they could have shown and edited things in this newest film that like as a sequel they could have done a lot more to tie things in. Maybe there will be a third film of these same characters. The true caper to explain.

Yeah. There's purposefully not things being answered. Yeah. Set up. I see. Yeah. Every shot was a green screen and it's largely incomprehensible. Or like random B-roll. Yeah. Yeah, that doesn't seem to link to anything.

I liked a lot of the, um, the, like, boardroom scenes of, like, executives, like, standing in, like, such awkward positions, like, in, like, just the most bizarre. Just completely random, like, framing. He's, he's got a great mez-on scene. every frame of his films is a painting every frame of painting in his film like legit like okay you you can't fake this

you can't replicate it doesn't matter how self-aware he is because whatever he's doing he knows what the fuck he's doing like in terms of creating like an entertaining film if anybody if anybody's out there listening who has not seen a Neil Breen film fateful findings and twisted pair

are his best ones like they're fucking classics Like, faithful findings is just like scene after scene after scene of like just bangers, you know? Like, it's like last time I watched American Psycho, I'm like, wow, every scene's a classic scene. Like, it's the same with fateful findings. Like we got spinach, we got gym drunk, we got the barbecue, you know, we got no more pills, no more books. Yeah, it's that level of dedication. Like it's too much dedication to be a shit. post like a an ironic thing. There is too much of an earnestness. But that's the thing. Even if, even if,

let's say there is some level of self-awareness now, even if we were to say it was entirely self-aware. And he's like faking the whole thing. A lot of people that are trying to replicate this sort of thing or think that they're replicating this sort of thing or are trying to make a so bad that it's good movie. Their biggest mistake is they use that as an excuse to be lazy. They use the irony as an excuse not to try. So that's what separates something like, like Bordemic 2 from black dynamite. You know, that's a film that didn't use that as an excuse to be lazy. That's a film where it's like, it's, there's an insane amount of effort put into the

goofs and gags and so bad that it's good nature. And there's details, there's subtleties. There's, there's, it's, it's very densely packed with, with, with, with what it's trying to do. It's not like, oh, I'm just going to not try. everything's going to be in front of a green screen and therefore it's funny. There's something there. There's something there.

And I'm glad that he's, you know, continuing to be the lead actor in his films. I think that's a huge part of it as well. Yeah. If he is fully self-aware, he's an incredible actor. Yeah. An absolutely incredible mind-blowing actor. If that is the case, then, like, man, I'll be bow on it. Brain's feet, because that would be something else.

Like, if he just reveals in like 10 years time, yeah, I knew all along exactly what this was. I'm not sure I would believe him. Yeah, but that's what makes it the ultimate gag. Did you watch his, so he released a five and a half hour long five film retrospective documentary where he pretends to talk about his like secrets of making movies, but really just doesn't say anything and just repeats himself for five and a half hours on two different DVDs. And he just like, yeah, it's insane. It's like that's a weird window into his world

We're like He'll just actively Like not say how certain things are done But essentially he thinks that the substance there is just him Saying that he's a legitimate filmmaker over and over again And him saying like I went to I had sold out screenings For my latest film I went to France Here is the set for that it's like he's showing it's like an he's an old person

Slowing a showing a slideshow He'll just show like some behind the scenes photo like here is uh during twisted pair we filmed that this thing and then here like but you're not going into any details about what you're doing you're not going like it's not this isn't a helpful documentary to anybody that's trying to learn filmmaking or even understand you. Well I guess it in some ways it invariably is a way to get into his mind but like not in the way that you would want out of a it's like the most repetitive thing ever like he literally just like. keeps repeating the same shit and just says essentially nothing. Essentially nothing. It's, but that's, that's a part of the magic here is that he, he must not be entirely self-aware, right? But the fact that it's up for debate is so special. You have to imagine, right?

It's so special. Yeah. This is art. You can make, you can make an argument that, that his art is as meaningful as any other piece of art that's ever existed. you know like people clown on him people shit on him or whatever I don't know how many people are shitting on a lot of it is like ironic love and enjoyment but it is coming from a genuine place of love and enjoyment like I love his films I'm excited to see I'm fuck how many fucking movies do I watch twice in theaters in a year right like how many times does that happen

where I'm like I'm so excited about the experience and I had such a great time watching it and I love the energy of the crowd and like I love just seeing him successful. I love, you know, that I was able to help share his films with more people and that he's able to fund his projects even if, even if the, the budget isn't really there. He probably is making a good amount of money. Like, you could probably do, you know. It helps, right? It's like, I don't know about the screenings you've gone to, man, but it's like hundreds of people. I mean, sure he's getting a little kickback or something. For sure.

He's selling out, as in not in a bad way. Yeah. The screenings are selling out. In the intended way, yeah. Yeah. What is the point then where it would be ruined? When does someone go from the Tommy Wazoo to the, okay, this just stop being funny? Like the Derek Savage thing is funny up until a certain point where it just kind of becomes like sad, you know? Like.

Here's the fucking thing. Neil Breen is the exception to the rule in the sense that Tommy Wazzo made one good movie, one earnest movie, and then tried to replicate it because he was like, first he retroactively said, it's a comedy, I was trying to make a comedy. And then he comes out with the neighbors where he is earnestly trying to make a comedy. But when you earnestly try to make a comedy and fail, it's not funny. When you earnestly try to make a serious movie and fail or whatever our definition of fail is, then it is funny, right? You create something special when you really try. When you're doing this insincere like, oh, I know how to be funny and I was doing it the whole time. Trying to be part of the joke.

That's the rule. Neil Breen is the exception to the rule. Fucking James Winn Bredemic did the exact same thing. Bredemic 2? Absolutely unwatchable because it thinks that it's a part of the joke. But it can't be because he doesn't know how to be a part of the joke. And that's what made Bredemic 1 special. Samurai cop, you know, fucking lightning in a bottle.

You got every other example, you know, sure, you can not. list some directors that consistently put out some so bad that they're good movies. Like, M. Knight's done it more than once. You know, there's some Ova Bowl, but like, those ones aren't as enjoyable. Like, they're more just boring. Like, in terms of the, the really ripe and juicy so bad that it's good films, Neil Breed's the only one that's making good ones and hasn't been ruined by self-consciousness or criticism to a degree that has ruined his films. To some degree, he has been aware after I made my video and it blew things up a bit. The promotion for his next film, I think, yeah, the one he made after the video got popular, he said, don't worry, there won't be any

laptops. And it's like, okay, so there's some things that he takes to heart and some things that he's considered his criticisms. So there's less laptop, there's no laptops anymore in his films because he thought that that was a legitimate criticism, I guess. And there's no there's not as... I don't know if past fateful findings as many people in his films drop things and fall and have like weird

slapstick moments. I know it happens once in Twisted Pear actually maybe twice. Maybe that one's not ruined. I don't know. But yeah, there's certain things that have been self-consciously altered but the heart, the soul of what makes this film special remains intact. So yeah, I'm happy about it. He's a fucking artist.

That makes it even more confusing though. It's like, okay, so that's something you'll interpret is a legitimate criticism. But why not other... God, that's like just open the flip. What 40 chess is this guy playing? Remember when Derek Savage, like, you know, I made my Quilcat video. He changed, you know, you can't find the original cut of the film anywhere anymore because he's George Lucased it because of certain criticisms.

So he removed, he added a shot of Cool Cat looking both ways before he runs across the street, right? He removed his Playgirl magazine photos from his children's website. Like, there's certain things that he decided were like, okay, yeah, that's fair. But I think Derek Savage might also kind of be a person where, you know, I don't know if you've seen his YouTube channel. The content he makes is still very funny. It's just, he's not Neil Breen in the sense that Neil Breen is. still creating films every couple years whereas Derek Savage is just trying to rebrand the same film over a decade and not really creating new film yeah what was that last new thing he actually released like it seems like it's just like cat fights coronavirus it was like 20 minutes long and then he does the 420 awards sometimes the one coming out soon is the the quote unquote fifth annual 420 awards because we're not sure where the fourth one went but um it's just skipping it we don't know it could have happened and was never released or

I don't know the poster says fifth annual but there was no fourth they skipped the year was really good the first 420 awards show he said we want to become the fourth largest award show in Hollywood by four years and then he

skipped the fourth year so it's like he never has to admit defeat if there was no fourth show oh wow I don't know quite literally yeah

I don't know. We can only interpret. What a character. Yeah. Both Derek Savage and Neil Breen are incredible characters worthy of voyeurism. And, yeah. No, that's the thing because there's like, man, I don't know how you feel about like Chris Chan and that type level. Not as interesting.

It's not a different thing entirely. Yeah, because I just don't know where that line is where it's almost like this should get mean, you know? It's like, is this person like so, like, so, they have, they lack self-awareness to a degree where they're almost like humiliating themselves, you know? That's what the Christian stuff feels like to me. Yeah, this, it crosses into the threshold of like, in court, there's people that are considered not mentally there enough to be held criminally responsible for certain things. I don't know where Christine is on that. I don't I know if I it's the subject matter is just way too long and about things that I don't really care about for the most part where maybe if somebody made like a really you know what is

it like fucking 50 like half hour to one hour long parts of the comprehensive documentary on chris chan like I I make a make a fan edit of that shit maybe I'll watch it but like I got I got bored into like episode three. I was like, I don't really care about this. Yeah, I was in the same boat. The content that Chris Chan is making

is not as funny as like Neil Breen or Derek Savage. And I don't think it's the same category even of person. No. No, the kind of local type phenomena. Yeah,

that's a weird one. Cade the Tortured Crossing. I'm giving this one a 10 out of 10. Yeah, I'm right there with you. Five star, 10 out of 10. Ooh. Experience. You're not really going to

find anywhere else. It's a unique film. It's full of twists and turns and surprises. I, you know, part of me while watching the film was like a little disappointed that it, you know, as halfway through, I'm like, is, just green screen the whole fucking thing? Like, is this just going to be like only in these locations and so stagnant and just this happening over and over again? But then immediately after I realized, it's probably good that I'm a bit.

disappointed in that sense because that means he's still pure and he's not just playing towards the audience in a fake and calculated way that there is a way to be like wait this is you know what we're watching is like kind of bad like the for that to still be a thing that can happen watching his films i think adds legitimacy to the to the argument that he's still very much pure and that it's not like all a phony fake thing right yeah it doesn't feel like the like the incredible bulk or something Yeah. It does read different. He didn't just do twisted pair again, despite it being a sequel.

He didn't just go, oh, here's what you want. I'm going to give you the exact same thing. Yeah. He did. He just made another movie. And if he went the opposite direction. And in many ways, he did the same thing because he makes the same movie over and over again. You know, he has the brainisms.

But it's still a fresh, surprising film. Yeah, people say that about where's that. soon you know yeah exactly exactly exactly exactly always green

at the end of the day love it love it all right we have a film recommendation from

hell yeah what's your name this is a special um i he I he I he I he

I he I he she um um I don't well I sorry I got a little anecdote to introduce this, uh, perfect, this movie right here.

Um, just a really round about way as to how this movie was introduced into my life, right? Um, great. This is like a, a weird determinist thing that you kind of set into motion when I, when I visited yours a couple years ago. Mm-hmm. Um, when I was leaving, you were like, just giving me some like, nice, like foods and stuff and, like, local stuff to you that I won't be able to find. find and of course in Vancouver there's like a large Asian population so he gave me a bunch of these like random noodles like these noodle brands including this like this crazy like spicy one it's like ridiculously spicy like just yeah this somewhere like that yeah you're like eat this

if you want to challenge yourself or something um so like fast forward to once I'd been home and like settled after a few months and I just found them in my my cupboard or whatever and just made them up. And it set me on this crazy path, this journey, because I liked it so much. It was so delicious to me. Um, but I've just been, I've got this like, basically, yeah, like, I've been trying to, I've basically crowdfunded this, this, like, noodle recipe, um, on this, like, secret Twitter account I have. I think you found it recently. Um, but I didn't know that you did this on, like, I found it recently. What the fuck happened? This was a while ago now. Yeah, yeah. This was like, Crowdfunding the noodle recipe.

This unhinged noodle journey. Yeah. Where I was like posting all these pictures of the noodle goose from the Kung Fu Panda movies. It also shares the noodle connection, trying to make the best noodles. And like each time I was posting a picture of my latest noodles, there'd be replies saying like, oh, you've got to add, try adding like a bit of a coconut brick in there. Or put a bit of saratja in there. I'll make sure you get the Shatashi mushrooms. And it's just building and building.

And now I've got this ultimate like noodle. recipe. Hell yeah. How that leads back to this movie is that under, it was like one of my final ones before I'd kind of gone out of this obsession. Those are apply to the picture saying, you've got to watch the movie, Tampopo. So that's kind of how it was introduced into my life in this weird, crazy roundabout way, thanks to the noodle gift.

Perfect. You can trace it back. So yeah, this is a, The 1985 film Tampopo by Juzzo Itami. Just a full-on comedy, Japanese comedy. Because I'd only heard about it, and I did actually know, I was recognizing scenes while watching it.

I think there are some pretty famous, or infamous, or however you want to describe the scenes from this movie, I'd definitely seen in places before, but it's kind of known as ramen western, I kind of spin on the spaghetti western, label and tongue and cheek that kind of says a lot about the film in and of itself to be honestly kind of the tone it's going for what it's trying to achieve or say um but yeah it's like

a very simple setup just like a the framework of a western um a couple of uh they're milk truck drivers i think is the link um but they're these noodle experts rock up to this town um and there's a struggling ramen shop run by this woman, Tempopo. And they kind of fall into this master apprentice type role. And it's a journey of Tempupo trying to make the best ramen in the town in order to save her business and make a name for herself. Yeah, all framed in this kind of wacky absurdist comedy It's it's not quite what I was anticipating And I thought when I'd heard this like description of it being more of like a parody of the average Western or whatever

I was expecting it to yeah lean more into those trappings and they're there but much more vaguely and it's much more in service of like Pretty wacky comedy some of which is like vignettes completely unrelated to the plot entirely like they're just these whole cutaway gags and at first I was like kind of getting confused what some of them meant or like waiting for them to like come back or like pay off in some way when the only thing really grouping them is this broad theme I guess of just food and especially with how it intersects with like relationships and sex and like the humor that can be found through kind of the social norms that especially were established in Japan during this time.

Japanese culture with food is very particular. Yeah. And there are definitely a bunch of things about that. I was sure I was probably missing, obviously being from the West. And I was finding, I found, and I used to find this 2017 articles, like a cultural guide to Tempopo, it reckons, where it was like pointing out some of the things we might mean. not being Japanese obviously, like little things where things that we maybe wouldn't consider as taboo or kind of cutting edge as far as like commentary or things to joke about that would have been in this movie at the time. Like I can whip up a couple of examples. The whole framing supposedly was taking the noodle like the ramen restaurant because traditional.

like a typical ramen shop is staffed and patronized by men. Yeah. You see Japan, despite its modding trappings, is a deeply gender segregated place. While women are, of course, welcome in ramen restaurants. Raman is considered a quick meal for working men. What's the equivalent environment for women? Spaghetti shops, don't ask me why. This was even more the case 30 years ago taken in this context.

Tampo's struggle in the film isn't just about making ramen, but about showing the world that a woman can be a master. rum and maker because yeah I was like with the comedy angle and like some of the lines towards the end like um I didn't the old the old man master guy he's like frankly I never thought a woman could become a good noodle cook yeah type stuff um I was like yeah I'm a little bit confused as to how to interpret that but it feels like this is a heavy satire um to me like what it's trying to do and what it's trying to break down. Like another one is the scene where all the women are like delicately trying to drink

their noodles without making a single noise. And then they look over and there's like the white man slurping. And they just give in to their wills and just start all slurping in this like crazy. There are a lot of elongated eating scenes in this movie. Very. And it. And it is funny. Like, not all the jokes land and some of the vignettes, like, we're like, I'm not really

sure what it was trying to say with that, but a lot of them are, like, really kind of cringe comedy, like, quite unusual, kind of taking the grossness and the, I don't know, just using food for comedy in this way is, like, quite a clever concept. I haven't really seen. This ain't no food fight, you know? This ain't no sausage party, where it's. cycle like really obvious dumb it's like if that one of the scenes uh I had definitely like seen clip before or talked about in like a video somewhere is that

it's like that's sexy and with the with the egg yolk man that was like that was like surreal that was that was that was that was so disgusting to me it was almost making me feel like pink flamingos or whatever you know that's very I don't know what it was about that. That's very funny. I actually talked about pink flamingos with my friend that I watched Tampopo with. We had a conversation about like what's the most disturbing or unethical like or you know, gross things you've seen in film because he's not as much of a film guy.

It was my friend that I haven't seen in like two years and I decided to kill two birds with one stone and watch the podcast movie while he was visiting as I do. And yeah, pink flamingos came up. And also, yeah, we had a, maybe we'll get into this later. We, you know, because we noticed that they did kill a turtle on screen. Yeah, yeah. About like the chicken and pink flamingos and, you know. Yeah, and that's really not what I was anticipating comparing this movie to.

But it's like a unique way to do humor. Mm-hmm. Especially when it really was playing with the, like sexual stuff um is that really funny sexy and where they're like it's like gradually escalating like how they're involving food you know it seems like more kind of standard and then they're introducing like live prawns and like making them crawl along the skin and just

craziness like that yeah i think it's like effective it's humorous it's uh very visually striking like i can i can remember the angle uh that yeah those films were seeing like Like, I remember, like, the fucking, the salt and the lemon on the breast and the, yeah, the fucking, yeah, that was a very memorable and very funny scene and shocking. And, you know, shock humor works. Like, I like seeing things that surprise me. I like seeing things that are kind of balzy. Because, you know.

Yeah, well, egg yokey in this case. I think maybe people are too self-conscious. about what audience members want to see and what might be too much for audience members. And I kind of, I do respect films that kind of just like want to show something weird and different and bizarre and might make people feel uncomfortable, but you never know, you know, unless you show it to an audience. I like, I like films that do that. Yeah.

Yeah, it's definitely trying something, something crazy, something different. Everyone's going to see that egg yoke-see, man. The dedication, those actors that have to swap. that egg yolk and they don't crack for a second it's just it's so excruciating there's a lot of like

just excruciating kind of like cringe humor which is my like as a British person that's kind of my territory right there you know the office peep show there's loads of awesome

like I can't I shouldn't even be looking at this or just cringy situations almost like sitcom level like stuff which of course is appropriate with it being

and trying to be a comedy first and foremost. Because, yeah, it's like, it's pretty ridiculous. It's pretty silly the whole framing of it. Like, it's not trying anything outside of that. Like, it, a lot of the humor for me was actually from just the bizarre dialogue with how, like, it's obviously part of the joke, like, how they're talking about this ramen as if it's like this, this life-changing thing. And describing it, like, they've got sincerity, but they lack guts.

They're smooth but strong and like all this funny, ridiculous kind of over descriptions. And he's like apologizing to the pork before he eats it. It's just so it's so ridiculous and over the top. It's, yeah, very heightened and exaggerated. And I would also like to point out the music does a great job at carrying that over-exaggerated tone. And I think the music particularly might be part of the big reason why people are calling it like Western inspired. Like not just the obvious things like the fucking cowboy hat.

But I think I think the tone of the music is also, you know, a part of that and how the energy of each scene is displayed in a very over-exaggerated, very kind of, I guess, ironic, you know, just a very humorous way, the seriousness that you can't possibly interpret as as extreme seriousness or genuine seriousness but the the heightened ironic satirical seriousness i i love it very much yeah because yeah that is kind of what makes that western uh parody framing so funny it's like it's such a it's such a bizarre kind of juxtaposition like when you think of the westerns that is the the men's men with their gun and they go their hat and they're they're dirty in the desert and it's like this is like just people awkwardly sat in a line like slurping soup for like

minutes and minutes and like ordering food like clinically and slith is like a funny way to do it but it does still have the little like yeah the rival noodle shops it's the the wanderer who comes into the town and like fixes a problem and then leaves like all these kind of tropes from that exactly yeah they kind of open it up and make it a bit more accessible I guess yeah this is this is the director's second movie, he's got a couple of the comedies in there, which I'd be curious, kind of how they land, but the, just hearing it as like a, described as a, a parody of westerns was kind of what got me intrigued into this to begin. Yeah, and it's kind of interesting because that, like, that's not, that's not, like,

the most immediate observation from me in terms of watching the film. Like, it's very possible to just watch this and be like, this is weird, you know? Yeah, yeah. It's very odd. But then, you know, you kind of clue in the inspirations over time and, you know, the fucking end scene where the guy's just getting shot over and over is very funny. Yeah. So you start to notice the inspirations over time.

And even devoid of, you know, if this movie existed in a vacuum without being conscious of those inspirations, it's still very funny. It's still very entertaining in its own. right. It's very interesting how it's almost like they just decided like, okay, what's, what's every sort of little mini scene, little vignette that we can do related to ramen, you know, like, and it, in some ways that seems silly. And they presented it as silly, but it is also kind of like an earnest, like, reflection of culture. It is like a very, you know, it's like, if a Canadian did the same thing and it was like about hockey.

which those films do exist and they're bad. But those films do exist and they're bad. But this is something that works and it's like, okay, it's sharing and embracing the culture. It's not taking it too seriously. But it is putting something on display that, you know, is important and that people love from the culture. You know, the etiquette towards eating and like the ordering at the restaurant and the woman, you know, like memorizing the order and everybody like, oh, like. clapping for how impressed they were that she memorized the whole thing and then like yeah the fucking the oh my god that that scene with the uh old businessmen where they all ordered the exact same

thing yeah and then yeah i was about to mention that one at the at the end he's getting kicked under the table because he wanted he had his own thing that he wanted to order and he's like expected to conform with them and then they're fucking yeah beat red faces at the end loved it yeah that's a great scene because it stays it stays rooted on the waiter so it like really makes it feel way more excruciating for each of the characters like waiting for that order but no that was that was one of the things on this cultural guide thing it specifies that scene as far as the as this yeah Japan is well known as a hierarchical society that values consensus over conflict for better or worse the scene plays on those expectations hierarchy in fact

is explicitly built into almost every interaction in Japan. For example, the Japanese language itself has different sets of endings for words depending on whether you're speaking to someone positioned higher or lower than you. In a hierarchy, it is impossible to speak with someone in Japanese without explicitly expressing your relative hierarchical position to that person. Any viewer can see that the young man in this scene is at the bottom of the hierarchy, but a Japanese viewer would have a much clearer understanding. Anytime you take guest to a meal in Japan, there's an unspoken cultural rule governing

where each person sits and how everyone behaves, the more senior a person is the further from the door, he, and yes, most of the time it is a he will sit. Yeah, just stuff like that. Fascinating. Yeah, because obviously, like, that's not going to be at the top of my mind. Like, this scenes are still funny, and, like, the acting is good enough, and you're picking up kind of the general gist of the joke,

but it definitely, I feel like it was strike harder, like if you were, if you're actually there in Japan in the 80s and you have the full cultural context. Another or interesting one, it's the only other one I'll dump on you guys. Dump it. To do with the homeless men. There's like a whole section, a whole gag with these homeless guys that like sneak in to like make eggs or something. They have this whole like side gag.

Yeah, where the protagonist and the sun enjoy food with a band of homeless men. From a modern Western perspective, the scene may be considered endearing in 1980s Japan. It would have been considered provocative. Homelessness in Japan manifests differently than we're accustomed to. Almost all homeless people in Japan are middle-aged or older men, many of whom have fallen victim to the country's extremely rigid, social and economic institutions. They do not beg, do not interact with non-homeless, and are very often very well-dressed. Many refuse to accept help from the government for fear that their families will find out. They tend to congregate in tight communities of well-organized cardboard shacks.

Many of these trappings of Japanese homelessness are evident in this sequence. While statistics on Japanese homelessness are sparse, it is anecdotally said that many of these people previously had well-paying jobs and families but do, well, they fell out the system due to the rigid corporate structure. It's extremely difficult for a man who leaves the labor force once to return. So when Guru takes Tampopo to find Raman master among the homeless, the film is doing something radical. It's shedding light on homelessness in a society which wants to ignore the shadow population. Tempopo provides an endearing human face for a forgotten population and forces the cinema going public to look at it. Another really interesting cultural angle, I feel like. I feel like we're talking about homelessness with the movie Casten was on just a few episodes ago.

True. Wendy and Lucy. Yeah, Wendy and Lucy. Yeah, this is obviously a way more comedic stunt on it, but again, you have to take into a fact when the movie came out and what it was saying, when it was saying. audience it was saying it too. Yeah, that's one of the, that's one of the interesting thing about comedies, though, right? Like, there's a bit of a movement in the UK at the moment,

like arguing about whether to filter these old, like, comedies, the Monty Python and stuff where, I don't know, I guess. As in, boo censoring them, not boo-monte Python. Yeah, yeah, I'm right there with you. I think you had to see them as like a, yeah, a little snapshot of when they are. made and what they were saying at the time based on that environment it doesn't really make sense to try and it's worse to pretend it didn't happen it's media you can put a warning at the

fucking beginning of it like if we're allowed to we're allowed to watch you're not it's not like you're not allowed to create media that has controversial elements in it today you just fucking like you know if it's if it's subject matter is mature just put that at the fucking beginning what are you talking about yeah yeah sorry What's interesting, going back to that the businessman scene, the waiter ordering scene. So there's a criteria in Blu-ray for this, and one of the featureettes is literally a 90-minute-long documentary about the production of the film from the director himself. And I didn't watch the entire thing, but I skimmed through it and watched. I didn't have time to watch the whole thing, but I watched like a few different scenes.

and it's funny that I mentioned the Neil Breen five-hour retrospective documentary where he takes five and a half hours to say absolutely nothing. But I think you would find this really interesting. It might be available on YouTube. I think it's just called the making of Tampopo. I'm sure you can find it somewhere.

But hearing the director talk about what it was like to work with certain people on the set, the joys he experiences filming a particular scene and why the efforts and considerations made into doing certain things. He's like, oh, yeah, I couldn't see the details in the child's eyes expression on the monitor. So here's me over here looking away from the monitor to see the kid and make sure that it's all right there.

The scene with the businessman and that beat red face, there's like an entire sequence of this documentary where they're going over like the makeup tests and the different variations in different shades and doing camera tests with them and the actors talking about. how much more red it looks before they film it, but then on camera it doesn't look as red. And so they're kind of joking and being like, you know, I was on a movie once where I had makeup redder than this and everybody on set thought it looked so stupid like I was drunk or something. But then on film, it looked perfect. And so it's a really interesting lens into the production of a film.

And it's really interesting hearing it from the director himself. Like his video diary made into a 90 minute little documentary feature. I think that's fascinating. And yeah, I think you should check it out. Yeah, let's just check that out. Yeah, that sounds awesome. Yeah, it does make you want to revisit the movie because I feel like now knowing some of these more like cultural trappings and some of the implications.

Like a lot of directors talk about like how they dread kind of like staging scenes where like a lot of characters sat around food eating, but that's kind of like the whole premise and point of this movie. There's so many of those. And I think a lot of the time they are staged well. They are like quite long shots of like five or six people all coordinating with each other and bouncing off each other. And yeah, sometimes some of those like gags just they feel it feels like scatterbrained and a bit sidetracked sometimes. Like I felt especially towards the end that whole sequence where there's that like old woman in the supermarket just like squeezing peaches and squeezing cheese and just like running around.

It's almost two hour long film and it felt like, I prefer the stuff with like the gangster with the white hat that had like that had more of like an escalation and pay off to me, like especially with that whole death scene where he's last words are just describing how to like serve wild boar really well or something ridiculous and then she agrees with him. like they'd be nice with soy sauce and a horse radish is like a final worst at him it's just like so so goofy yeah but so like so genuine and how serious they're taking it it like really makes the humor work well you reminded me of the scene of the wife dying and the husband's like wait maybe i can maybe i can cure her by getting her to cook and she like gets up yeah yeah that's right

like a zombie gets up dies immediately after and then he forces his kids to finish the meal like this is the last meal your mother ever cook you eat right now they're like crying like that's a great scenario like that's a great concept for a scene i it is awkward it is cringe and it is just bizarre but it just the the creative writing that it takes to imagine and envision these different scenarios and they're all very similarly thematically linked and and you know the the tie-ins of food and everything it's it's like a fun creative writing experiment. It's like, it's like a, you know, you have all these different ideas, and you can fit all of them in your film if you want. It's one of those things where it's like,

he didn't necessarily try to tie every single incident into one story. He just decided like, yeah, fuck it, I'm going to show this. I'll show this if I want, which is cool. You know, you don't have to conform to the set rules of filmmaking and storytelling that everyone else is doing. you can just kind of do your own thing and this is an example of it working out which is very respectful. It's almost like a Monty Python meaning of life type thing. Yeah.

Yeah, that's a good. Comparaisen actually. Yeah. Yeah, definitely not what I was expecting, but I wound up like especially, especially the first like 30, 40 minutes. So it's like, oh well, we're actually like doing this. This is like a really funny, crazy idea that you're presenting here.

And like, yeah, I just think, But yeah, I love comedy obviously, but I love the slant of getting like different cultures, kind of like the way they'll spin certain jokes and set up certain things. And I don't know, I don't know what other cultures going to be coming up with that egg thing, man. Like I'm really hung up on it, but that, that felt like this is definitely like a Japanese idea right here. A very sincere snapshot little window into Japan. Yeah, I loved it. Even in the end credits where it's like, it's just zooming in like a baby drinking breast milk.

That was, I thought that was like, again, like a thematic thing. Yeah, like it is like kind of the first thing you eat, like the guys were driving a milk truck. True. Like the mate Maybe it was something to do with that Like just bringing it full circle Linking it all back around And it is yeah

A bit of that shock you know Like just as so making that association in your brain Like Because also there's scenes of like The slurping out the noodles And the juice and shit It's like a lot of edgy kind of imagery

Um Yeah really funny Yeah Especially the more I think about it Yeah There's some Great looking food in the film too that Omuri rice looked fucking dope.

There's literal and figurative food porn in this film. And I guess I should mention before we wrap this up, I didn't know anything about this film, but a friend had told me that I should eat ramen while watching it. So I did order some good Vancouver ramen from one of the better spots. And it was a great... Experience to be slurping down ramen with a friend. It does make you one of the slurps some ramen.

Yeah, yeah, I did that. I got, I got the, the intended preferred, uh, 70 millimeter IMAX version of this film by slurping down some fucking good ramen noodles and, uh, you got that 4D experience. Exactly, exactly. Yeah, I really enjoyed this film. I will agree that there were, um, some parts that I, was more invested in than others, but even during the parts that I was kind of like, you know, there were some scenes or some sequences where, let's say I was a bit zoned out, but it wasn't

like zoned out like, uh, get me out of here or I'm bored or like, oh, I'm thinking of, you know, entirely different things. It was just kind of like a calming disassociation or detachment from it that I was still enjoying. And it was just a nice kind of like passive experience watching the film at those scenes. Does that make sense? Yeah. Yeah, that does make sense. I was also never bored despite me bringing up that two-hour runtime.

Also, partially because of that kind of scatter shot structure, like you don't know what's coming. It's just going to whip out a random gag that, sure, one might not really connect with you, but one probably will, because there are quite a few of them in there. And yeah, some of them do link together, and there's this loose thread. Yeah, I was never bored with it. It was always constantly creative and silly. It probably just didn't need as much on the main Tampopo, like, story of the, like, I don't really care about the noodle bar redemption thing that much.

Like, it's such a, like, loose framing just to, like, drape everything. I'm glad it's there. Yeah, I'm glad it's there as well, but, like, mostly because of, like, the funny, like, sitcom-type moments where they are, like, sneaking to rival. ramen places and going in their bins and like trying to figure out what their recipe is compared to theirs and like tricking other chefs to like get their recipes and it's just so goofy and silly and I love that kind of thing and it does really work sweet I'm giving this one a seven out of ten for now we'll see if it moves to an eight on my next watch it would definitely make my list of that year either way loved it great movie yeah yeah this is this would be a low eight for me low

full star. Definitely not what I was expecting. I'm glad, I don't know, just to have like another weird, obscure comedy to like whip out. Like if you want to make someone feel things, you know, whether it would be a bit grossed out or have a good laugh or something bit different, bit crazy. Cool. I guess question time. Let's do some questions then from the Sodorant Guys community head over to the subreddit over there leave whatever questions you feel like for future episodes just like cloud shooter 32 did sent us a little bit of an article here um we can link to you in the chat down there if you want to look um coppola recently was quoted saying we're on the verge of a golden age i was kind of teasing this earlier when i'm talking about arp and i'm

wonderful and illuminating cinema scene in large theaters with the recent failures of temple ipes like Indiana Jones in the flash as well as the success of original critically acclaimed films like Barbie and Oppenheimer. Do you think there's any credibility to his claim? And if so, how do you think it will manifest itself? Yeah. I mean, I hope he's right. I think it's a little too early to tell. If you actually go on the article, it's funny because he says, I've yet to see them. Yeah. But the fact that people are filling big theaters to see them and that they are neither sequels nor pre-cels,

no number attached to them, meaning they true one-offs is a victory for cinema. Yeah. The movies are back, baby! Yeah, I think, you know, this is a particular thing to note post-COVID. Because it's not like movies and the cinema-going experience

just kind of waned out over time. There was like a massive event that kind of ruined things, for a bit and people were taking a while to get back into things in the same way. Like, yeah, that's a big part of the story. So, yeah, I mean, I, it is great seeing people excited for two things. We have to remember, like, people were excited because it's Christopher Nolan and Barbie. So it's still, it's still that they're attached to things they're familiar with, but it's nice that it's not, I mean, yeah, like, it's super, people are getting super,

superhero movie fatigue in a sense where it's not like no one wants to see a superhero movie anymore. It's just that it has to be a good one for it to make money or something that people want to see. You can't just make money assuming that people will see it because it's a superhero movie alone. You kind of have to make it a movie that people are excited for, not just a character's IP or whatever, unless you're sticking to just the most popular characters ever. like, you know, any Batman reboot is going to get people watching it. Any Spider-Man reboot is going to get people watching it. But, yeah, to exhaust all of these other characters,

then sure, people are fatigued. You've got to do something special with it. Yeah. For now, things feel a little bit invigorated, I guess. I don't know if anyone was really expecting this level of success from this. There's just something so natural about it, like the way it converged. Like, it didn't feel like this corporate celebration, despite it being a little Barbie movie.

about the man who created a bomb. Yeah, there was something really positive about that. And since seeing a bunch of other stuff, I feel like just there are more crowds about, like, whenever I'm going, whenever I've been to the theater ever since this event, like, it just seems busier. Like, people are, they're, like, really making an effort to go and engage in these spaces.

And, like, I don't think I've actually seen this outside of, I don't know, like, really, niche type things, you know, like a, like a brine event, you know, the type of thing you have to know, um, you know, this is like just the average theater experience, but like people are there and it's not like, it wasn't about like a Marvel movie. It's like the only one I could really think of was like the end game, like how people flocked out to see that and it was busy. But this does feel different. Um, but yeah, it is so linked to Nolan and Greta slash Barbie as an IP

I don't know if that necessarily means there's going to be like a trend because they always take away the wrong ideas from these trends don't they? They don't know what the fuck is the reason for the success so to them it will

be like oh we need more toy movies that's what people the people want toy movies and biopics and it's like ignoring the artists involved and the the artistry involved ignore that part. Like, oh, that's why people... That's why this movie's successful because it's Barbie.

Like, okay. Yeah, they don't know what the fuck they're doing. It's gigantic corporate idiots that are only in their positions because of nepotism and they don't know what the fuck art is and they're making the decisions funding the art. And of course, tale of as old as time. I think we should just be supporting artists and not, you know, I've made this rant a billion times. But yeah, find the artists you love, support them.

hopefully the studios can make talented artist visions come to life like they did with this. Hopefully we see more of that in the future, but we'll see, we'll see what the takeaway is. Maybe, maybe we were, maybe we were just in a really big lull in terms of like corporate mainstream cinema for the past decade plus. Maybe we're, maybe we are coming back. Maybe we're, maybe we're on the up and up. I don't know. We'll have to see.

It's hard to tell, man. Some of the conclusions people take away from these successes and failures that feel like are just a bit like, well, I don't really know. We're not say C's. We don't know what's going to happen. Speaking of a couple of it, though, that you heard about this, like, thing? This passion project he's been working on for, like, 10 years or something? No.

I keep seeing these stories about it. He's, like, really struggling to get this thing. It's like a big sci-fi epic. like um megalopolis what yeah got adam driver oboe plaza forest wittaker john voit schuyler buffs in it apparently jason schwarzman yeah i'm just i'm just really curious when that'll actually come together or something or if it would just be trapped forever like um a terry gillian movie looks like there's set photos oh it might be it must be in place production yeah maybe well yeah yeah

Yeah, it says post-production on IMDB, so hopefully that's the thing. Yeah, what's the... What is Mr. Coppola been up to? Let's see. What was the last thing? I said, yeah. Because, what, Godfather 3 was, like, early 2000s? A film called Distant Vision in 2016

that apparently nobody watched and nobody liked. Okay. Yeah, it doesn't seem to have been doing a lot of important things for a long time. So, I don't know. Yeah. Yeah, it'd be nice if you could get like one more epic out, I guess. Yeah. It comes together, not like Godfather 3 or whatever.

Jack. Well, Yeah. Hopefully. Well, let's do this one from Estosun misogios to Alex and Adam, who as of writing this are the only members of the podcast anyways long. Your specific brands in YouTube have somewhat negative connotations to them, i.e., I hear everything and your movie sucks.

Now, most of your fan base knows that this is. not really reflect the content that you create. Alex doesn't really hear everything, and Adam doesn't make videos exclusively telling filmmakers while their movies are bad. However, do you think this choice has impacted the general perception of your channels in any way? Do you think it's any way related to how YouTube

and social media algorithms tend to favor negative language as it drives engagement? Edit, to add to this, I recently remembered an incident in 2017 just after the Last Jedi came out. Rich Evans and Jack Packard of Red Letter Media were streaming on Twitch on the now defunct pre-REC channel Jack had just expressed an opinion that for me aligned with what Alex said on his video of the movie and I recommended it in the chat Jack refused to look it up because he saw the channel name and thought it was another cinema sins lull Yeah, I kind of made bed with the main my piece with this

Yeah, like it is like the branding But I feel like that was also kind of like part of the fun is like having this this way of getting people's attention, but then when you actually go into the content, it's like pretty measured and fairly relaxed. Like I'm not like bouncing off the walls. Like, uh, I feel I'm pretty, I know, I'm pretty sure. I lay out my just how I'm feeling. Um, yeah, as good of faith as possible. Um, and like, yeah, I've heard, I've heard that feedback before. Like, I won't watch their channel with that name. It's like, okay. Other people will. Sure. Um, yeah, 100% it can influence people.

I've always, I don't know, like, that's kind of a funny thing to hear that that was Jack's response. Because I've always kind of thought that like one of the oldest, most common idioms or whatever we want to call it is, is like, don't judge a book by its cover. Yeah. Like that, you know, you can just, you can, you can just click through the video and listen to like a couple seconds and, you know, if it's not worth your time. then you don't have to watch the whole thing or maybe, you know, but to swear something off because of the title is kind of interesting.

Yeah, the title, the title of a channel can influence people in that way in the sense that I don't think anybody should be, like, surprised if they name their channel something and people interpret from how they name the channel. For myself in particular, you know,

your movie sex is not, like, it's, it's, you know, I think I avoid a little bit of that by having it singular. You know, like, clearly I'm talking about more than one movie. Clearly, I don't think every movie sucks.

It's the name of, like, a series on my channel. It's the name of the channel. But I think, I don't know, I've existed on this platform long enough that anybody that does say something like, do you just hate every movie? Like, they're not taken seriously. So it doesn't really. Yeah. Doesn't really matter to me.

I do want to change the channel name to just YMS because your movie sucks.org is kind of a mouthful. But I'm trying to find out if I'll lose my verification checkmark if I change the name. Because I've already got the at. I've already got YouTube.com slash at YMS, so that's fine. Yeah. My guess hate is a bit more a charged word than sucks as well. But again, it's phrased with an eye. Like it's eye statements.

I feel like that separates it in a way. I'm not expecting anything from anyone. It's just things I'm saying. Yeah, and I mean like the bulk of the content or at least like the main series or whatever is like I hate. Right. And then in any other video where you're recommending things, like it's clear in the title of the video.

I think the titles of the video have more to do with the content of the video than the name of the channel. The name of the channel, you know, it'd be weird to assume that all every video on the channel is the exact same from the title of a channel Mm-hmm

But then at the same time I wouldn't even necessarily blame someone for assuming certain things because like the Especially if we're looking at the landscape now Yeah for sure there is a bunch of like That kind of stuff out there Um

Yeah you don't need to book cover it as you just said Um Because that was another thing It was kind of like stumbling when I was like trying to think of the channel name originally, I wanted something with like cynical or something dry like all the like stereotypical like British content was especially at the time like inspired by like total biscuit, cynical, and stuff like that. But that's all like taken.

It was like what angle was left. I just happened to stumble across one that also that algorithm tends to favor. Yeah. Yeah, just stumbled into it. I think I consciously knew that critical content was something that did better, you know, ignoring the algorithm, it's just human nature to engage with things that are breaking a circle jerk or with things that are criticisms or dunkings or making fun of. And I, you know, there's comedy within that. That's where comedy, like, it's a little. in terms of creating art or content out of your opinions on other content, like when I'm praising

a movie, there's not as much room for jokes. And even if I want to write jokes in those, sometimes it feels inappropriate or unfitting. Sometimes, especially when there's pacing and music involved and showing film footage and all that stuff that goes into my videos, sometimes I want the tone of what I'm saying to match the tone of the film that I'm recommending so that people understand what they're getting and it can act as a recommendation for people to be like, oh, I like what this is. Let me go for it. So in that sense, it's a bit more difficult to be like sarcastic, dry humor, blah, blah, blah, blah, even though there's some times where I have done that in recommendations. But yeah, in criticisms, it's a lot, there's a lot more

you can do in terms of creating comedy in terms of creating engagement. So yeah, I've always kind of known and recognized that like the criticisms and even the meme type videos and movies that I cover on my channel are going to be the ones that get the most attention and do the best. But that doesn't stop me from finding the value in recommending smaller films, in talking about smaller films, in doing festival reviews, in trying to get people that are familiar with my content or subscribe to my content, you know, maybe lured in with the cool cat. but then by the end of it they learn about Jim Cummings or Matt Johnson or

you know there was a point in time where I was the only notable person online talking about fucking Denisville Knove or the Safdi brothers or you know a lot of people a lot of people that have since blown up over time I find value in helping people find those things and I think that it you know it's a way to contribute to seeing their projects get funded

seeing there be more interest in funding them from producers. If there's more eyes on them, they're more likely to get their project made, right? So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because I remember kind of twigging onto this around when, I quite like Mark Commode,

and I just found myself on these playlists of like, his reviews where he'd get the most impassioned something you know like he doesn't like the parts of the Caribbean movies yeah like the difference in his review when he's expressing it is like entertaining in a different very entertaining his review on the visit yeah yeah he's got some really great funny ones he's got such a great vocabulary um that yeah that kind of highlighted to me like yeah there is just like a different level of interest when people listen when you're like kind of mad about something in a way they don't um the other way around which is unfortunate is

you got to kind of sneak it in or build a platform like you have with the film festival stuff. It's not impossible. I'm happy and proud to have an audience that is genuinely excited to hear me talk about festival movies. And also to have an audience that like, you know, at a certain point in time, go back however many years, like, it was more of an effort from my part to discover smaller films. but because I've built an audience of people that are interested in foreign and independent films, the conversations on my subreddit are often like, hey, Adam, you should check out this movie

or this is playing at this festival. You know, I'll stream myself making my festival schedule and going through each single film on the program being like, okay, here's why I'm watching it. I like this director for that reason. Maybe someone will be like, oh, you got to check out this one and when this thing at this other thing or this director, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And because I fostered that community, it helps me out. As much as I'm helping anybody else out, it helps me out because I have a genuine interest in new artists and new art and trying to help people discover things that they love. So it's a symbiotic relationship and I'm happy with the audience that I've built up in the community. Yeah, yeah, that's cool. Let's do this one from Goosey McGooseface 2. I watched Corridor Cruise's latest CGI review and they mentioned how the trailer for Garry Edward's new film, The Creator, may have used footage from the 2022 Beirut explosion as a shot with some CGI over it. They took the point it was improper and made them keen not to see it.

But I thought, why, since movies regularly use footage from, say, World War II or the Vietnam War or the Iraq War, and people see it as stock footage, same with news, B-roll of natural disasters and crime footage. What's your angle? It's called a reference shot, and, you know, sometimes we live in a fucking internet age. where we have a variety of real world events taking place, and if you are test with creating a realistic explosion, then you're probably going to use a real explosion as a reference shot. Now, we can have a conversation about if it's too similar or dissimilar or what that means to the artistry.

Like, is it like tracing? I don't think so, especially for computer animation. References are used all the time. Like people will just often like film Even computer or traditional animation animation in particular Reference shots are very useful I wouldn't consider it unethical for like I don't know to use If a director really wanted to know like okay

What's the most realistic way it looks when someone gets shot in the head And there's various archival footage you know you don't even have to go to like a snuff website You can just find it on Reddit a lot of the time you know like in the even in the popular subreddit's like what the fuck there's footage of people dying or someone you know like it's not the subject of the entire subreddit it's not like the the goal of the subreddit but you can find these things without like going into like the dark corners of the internet and if you want to look at that and go like okay well you know this destroys my idea of the the cliched like oh I'm shot and I'm gonna fall over slowly no you just you've

dropped like a fucking rag doll because your body can't hold itself up because you're dead right so if you you know and it's clear which directors made those considerations i if you if you're trying to present something in your film that's supposed to be real life and not some exaggerated thing that doesn't exist then you might use real life to to reference that i don't you know is it is it i don't understand what it's doing to the victims of the tragedy to use it as a reference shot for an explosion and I think even the noticeable comparison

between the trailer and the actual event is something that just seems like kind of like only something that can be hyper-focused on if it's just a Twitter thing. Like, right? Like, Twitter is the fucking problem here, not. Yeah, I haven't seen this exact

example with my own eyes. But who's to say the context even? Does that matter too? Like, what if it's the intent of a scene to use imagery or invoke feelings or imagery from recent conflicts in order to make some kind of point or? Yeah, like, they're fucking, how much have people used the references from like Hiroshima and shit? When they were, you know, when you, if you make like a nuclear explosion and a film, like, we have documented accounts of, what sort of devastation exists in real life and people use that in their films and it might

match up one to one because they're trying to be realistic, right? It's not saying that the event that took place was not a bad event. I don't know what the perceived fear or perceived implication is like I don't understand what they think is bad about. Like are they saying it's bad because it's like cutting corners and that they should be? I don't think no. I think it's. It's coming from a moral. I think it's a moral panic, not a artist. I think it's more based on like, oh, this is a real thing that happened to real people. That's insensitive, not like you're a lazy artist.

Like, I don't think that's what the conversation is. I could be wrong. Maybe this is just something that I haven't looked into enough, but that was my vague understanding. I'd probably have to research it more to have a stronger take on it. But, I mean, I don't know, there's a lot, like a lot of war imagery baked into the stuff. Yeah, I don't know what it's necessarily inherently bad if you want to use some of it, especially if you're trying to make some kind of point. Like, we haven't seen the movie. I don't know if that's what it's going for. Exactly. It's a trailer. We don't even know what it is in the

fucking movie. Yeah. And it could be, it could be like an early, if it's like a computer generated explosion, it could look different in the movie. Oftentimes in trailers, they'll, they'll have like rough shots of computer animation that aren't completely finished. Like, we don't, it's really weird to be making those judgments, but, you know, I don't know. I could be wrong. Yeah, I feel like this conversation is a bit more interesting when you're talking about more like the, you know, where they're just reenacting or recreating. What's it?

Was it poor greengrass? Is that his name? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, when it's actually about the real event, like that fucking Norway shooting or whatever, like that was, that seemed incensed. Yeah, the one in Norway. Yeah, I was trying to remember what it was called.

22nd of July. Yeah. That's the one. 2018 movie, yeah. I remember having these kind of thoughts around that. Because that's so sensationalized. Yeah. Right?

Yeah. I don't know. It makes you question it a bit more. And then that's also judging the movie and not the trailer too. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, whereas if it's just one shot from a trailer, I feel like, at least see the movie before making moral kind of course about it

I don't know that's what seems right to me not that you can't judge trailers or anything but like what are we if we don't even know what the context is especially yeah yeah you want at least the framing to be known before you completely

write something off like it's happened before like trailers lie sometimes or the context is different when it's yeah frame a different way or the ever so common shot that's in a trailer but not in the movie. Yeah. Yeah. I think some are going as far as like some of the Marvel ones I think they just make like shots

like they like render full complete shots that like just aren't the same like they're made to trick you. I'm so yeah. Who knows? All right last question. Yeah let's end on be a good one. Let's do this one from Hey Stupid 74. What's up boys? Hope you both stay hydrated.

Recently, it was announced that Disney will be completely stopping the manufacturing and release of physical media in Australia, with the last film receiving a physical release slated to be Guardians of the Galaxy Volume 3. After that, no other films under Disney will receive an official DVD-slash-Blue-ray release, and will instead, presumably, only be available on Disney Plus. If Australian fans want to buy DVDs or Blu-rays, they will have to shop internationally. As a physical media collector, this feels like a slap in the face, but it may be a sign of what's to come in other countries. Penny for your thoughts.

I find it funny that Australia apparently doesn't buy enough physical media that Disney feels that it's even worthwhile to print it because their internet sucks. Yeah, it is bad. So like if you're streaming or torrenting, like, I guess that's what you're doing, but like you'd think that physical media would be popular. It's very popular in Germany.

And you can tell by just how many German Blu-Rays exist that don't exist anywhere else, for like American films smiley face operation avalanche that fucking 4K collectors thing for the new Suspira was a German only release and like countless things I have to fucking import from Germany that's annoying

but I have a region free Blu-ray player I am I'm upset with where Disney is going because it sucks yeah I would like physical media and I wish that Disney didn't own Fox because that makes things not look great for the future of certain Fox's own properties that I love and would I would like to see get physical media releases. But what can we do about it other than by physical media, which a lot of people just aren't doing.

So, you know, what can we do? It's, yeah, Disney Man, they're putting their foot in their mouth right now. Like the streaming world stuff is like, I don't know, there's some, some stuff we, weren't some consequences we didn't see coming that are just like oh I don't I don't like this new precedent that's being set by this new landscape like how many shows are they just like just vanish like that that Warwick Davies uh god damn it that that Lucas film thing where willow there was like a Willow show that came out and then they just like ripped it away it's like gone it's like it doesn't exist anymore

they're like taking it off the it's just a weird precedent to set as far as like So how do you watch it now? Yeah, yeah, you just, you have to pirate it. Yeah, yeah. You have to pirate it if you want to watch it. But that sucks. Like teams of people would have worked on that show and it's like, what do they have to show for it now? At least it got released on like Batgirl.

Yeah, true. That's a worst example. That is a more extreme example. But the fact it even happened at all is becoming like a standard almost expected thing. It's like, what a unfortunate quirk that allows them to do that. It does seem like it's happening more often. Yeah, fuck. I mean, if you live in Australia, you love physical media.

You got to get a region-free Blu-ray player. That's the only fucking thing to do, I guess. 4K Blu-rays are region-free, except for like a few, like, maybe like 10 of them that were accidentally region-locked, because they're not supposed to be. The standard for 4K Blurays is... Yeah, you can look up, you can read about that. I don't understand it either, but that's my understanding of... 4K Blu-Rays are generally region-free. There's a very small amount, handful of them that are not.

Yeah, but then there's a lot of media that doesn't exist on 4K. Blu-ray is like the highest quality available. At which point, yeah, you've got to get a region-free Blu-ray player and hope that your favorite films aren't owned by Disney. Yeah. Yeah, not have much power in the situation, I'm afraid. Yeah. It's kind of, yeah.

Yeah. it's bad is my answer it's bad I don't like it yeah but there's a lot of a lot of things in the universe that are bad that I don't like that I feel powerless to do anything about so

here we are yeah I suppose in Aussie they're already a bit more used to some of the the crazy weird like filtering with like video games and stuff yeah video games has been like some video games specifically like left a day and I think GTA or something. It's like weirdly censored in Australia specifically. I don't know what you guys are doing over there.

Yeah, I've heard about that with a bunch of stuff. The weird, weird government restrictions. Yeah. All right. Those are some good questions. Thank you. Yeah, that was. All right, we got a film recommendation.

It would be my turn. But we're having a guest on and I let them pick. our guest is Jay McCarroll from Nirvana the band the show also composer the kid detective and Blackberry and yeah he's a awesome composer slash actor collaborator uh Canadian guy and he'll he'll be talking about uh we'll be talking about Barbie but that's not the recommendation uh but he's recommending uh The Edge, which is a 19... 97. Yeah, 1997. Alec Baldwin, Anthony Hopkins.

The Post is funny. And I actually have not seen this, so... Yeah, me neither. You know, okay. It was about a bear, okay. Cool. Hell yeah. I know nothing about this.

Don't know what I'm supposed to expect, but that's his recommendation. And so if you don't want to be spoiled for The Edge, Watch it before the next episode. These episodes come out every two weeks. You can listen to them early by going to sardonicast.com slash premium. Also, patreon.com slash sardonicast. You can listen to them as they're edited.

Also, we got merch link in the description. Also, there's a Sardonicast highlights channel. And also, we're probably, at some point, we're probably going to be doing like sponsored ad stuff, which will not be in the premium slash Patreon version. Yeah. So we're not including those yet. We're talking about it.

We're going to figure out how to do it. They won't, you know. Everybody else does it. I'm like one of the last people on the fucking planet that hasn't done it yet. So yeah, I'm going to. I need some money. Things are getting more expensive. And I'm like, yeah, you know what?

I should probably do that. Also, in an unprecedented first, I think, I am also going to reveal the recommendation for the episode after, because it is my turn. And the reason I'm revealing it now is because Neon is doing a 4K re-release in the United States right now. So when this episode is out, you can probably watch it that day.

For Old Boy, 2003, my boyfriend's going to be visiting this week and I want to watch it with him because he has never seen it. Cool. So, yeah, that's the... So the 2013 old boy, nice. No, cool.

No, 2003. Oh, yeah. For people who haven't seen an old boy, do not. I repeat, do not watch the 2013 Josh Brolin Old Boy. Do not do it. Watch the 2003 Old Boy.

Just as a reminder, that is the film recommendation, not for next episode, but for the one after it. The reason I'm telling you about it now is because by the time the next episode is released, it won't be fresh in theaters and I just wanted to make sure people were able to catch it in theaters as the re-release is happening. Yeah, fair enough.

Yeah. I think it's only in theaters in the U.S. for the neon re-release, but there are 4K Blu-rays currently available anyway. Yeah, I watched this in 4K. Yeah, it's been a while. Perfect, perfect. Yeah, I was looking for a good excuse to

show the BF. All right, the edge. The next episode is The Edge with Jay. This is crazy. I don't know what to expect. And, uh, very excited. Boss baby's back. Barbie and the Edge.

Maybe that'll be a better double feature than Barbenheimer. Yeah, let's see. Yeah. All right, have a happy tortured crossing. Thanks for listening, everybody. Have a happy edge.

Have a happy goon. All right, bye-bye.