Sardonicast - Sardonicast 152: The Killer, In Cold Blood, Capote

Episode Date: November 27, 2023

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Three, two, one. I serve no God or country. I fly no flag. If I'm effective, it's because of one simple fact. I don't give a fuck. Ooh, getting chills. Yeah. This is Sardana cast.

I'm Adam from your movie sucks. That was a quote from American Psycho. I mean, Drive. I mean, um, the killer by David. So, um, I'm Alex from I. Um, my, my input to the intro is, uh, panic on the streets of Sardonicust. Any Smith's fans out there will know that one. Oh, yeah, okay, okay.

Yeah, there we go. Yeah. Yeah. If you're, if you're not familiar with the Smith's discography, you can watch the killer and then you will be pretty much caught up. Yeah, you'll be after being killed. Yeah. Um.

What'd you think? What was the movie? The movie David Fincher's latest. His first movie since, what, three years. Yeah, spoiler discussion, everybody. Yeah, spoiler discussion for the killer. It's out on Netflix right now for everybody. And the title kind of gives it away. Michael Fastbender is a assassin, a hired killer who, uh, yeah, he messes up his kill in the first 15 minutes. And the ensuing chaos follows. And I thought this was pretty enjoyable, not Finch's best by any means, but I thought it was a fairly standard and simple kind of assassin revenge type plot elevated by Finch's direction, the overall presentation.

And some kind of interesting subtext or themes to think about that kept me thinking about it after. I've watched some of the scenes again since that I enjoyed. Yeah, I quite like this. I know people on the subreddit think we're going to like war over this one. Because we had another flower moon kind of situation. People just going crazy over ratings and whatnot. But yeah, I thought this was pretty solid. I'd probably like this more than Mank his last film.

That's kind of souring on me, the more time that passes. Mank is very forgettable. I remember basically nothing about it. Yeah, I remember like a CG giraffe or something. Wow. That's more than I remember. Yeah, it did not stick on me. Yeah, it didn't stick on me either.

I just remember it was in black and white. Yeah, that's... Yeah, that was definitely one of his one for me type projects. Yeah. What's, uh, this is a spoiler discussion. Do you want to talk to me about the subtext? The scenes you rewatched, but tell me about it. So, yeah, I found,

A lot of people are kind of talking about this as, and this isn't what I would say, always picking up on that first watch, but a lot of people have been interpreting it as a sort of a self-reflective Fincher deconstruction, where he's taking a little look at his own formography and the way he uses violence, and a lot of his films do use violence and saying one thing, but perhaps being misinterpreted in one way. That isn't quite what I took away from that first watch, but I can definitely see how people are reading that. And I read quite a good article that's floating around of quite a good review of this. I agree with some of its points. But I was more interpreting it as I like this ongoing theme of the action speaking louder than words, where there's this ongoing narration through the movie where the killer is. Yeah, you kind of alluded to it in this intro to the podcast where he is saying one thing. and he has this kind of almost like Andrew Tate-esque manosphere, like apex man type stuff. Sigma male.

Sigma male. That's the phrase I was looking for. Whereas he's constantly telling himself that like, yeah, whatever it takes, make sure you're one of the few, not of the many. Yeah, I'm effective because I don't give a fuck. Weakness is vulnerability. Forbid empathy. Empathy is weakness. And then the dissonance of.

his actions completely going against everything he is telling himself in his head. It's like an unreliable narrator situation where, yeah, it doesn't match. And there's a lot of interesting kind of scenes that happen as a result of that. I thought I found that to be a compelling angle that made this stand out in a sea of these kind of assassin-standed revenge-type framings. Yeah. I saw there were like, inklings of that and perhaps on a second watch it would be more apparent to me because the way that

I was watching it on a first watch I felt as though the you know him saying like I'm a perfect fucking thing I don't give a fuck blah blah blah blah blah that didn't necessarily feel incompatible with him like fucking up or him like going against uh what he's telling himself in his head like that that exists in plenty of other you know kind of sigma male movies that are not claimed to be as ironic and so not saying that this movie isn't done with any sort of self-awareness or irony at all but that because of its presentation and especially because of the fucking Trent Reznor Atticus Ross score. It was just such a jumbled,

uh, mess of attempted emotions for me. And oftentimes it felt like it, like it really was trying to be cool. Like how, how much of the movie do you personally feel is more satire commentary than straightforward?

Because I think the movie is very much still trying to sell itself as something straightforward in the sense that like people who are into Sigma male movies or whatever, you know, the literally me character, I think they're still trying to market it. And the film itself is presenting it in a way that it can be enjoyed from those types of people in this way. Or is that just, I guess, a deeper part of the commentary of like, oh, he's creating something that maybe certain art house crowds will see through that and get something else?

of it. My problem is that already exists in things like, I don't know, his own movies like Fight Club or like you can look at Martin Scorsese films like Wolf of Wall Street and there will be people that will just take away the entire wrong message and look at Leo DiCaprio's character is cool or people, a lot of the fans of American Psycho will see his character and be like, oh yeah, this is like an alpha male type thing and not not understanding the commentary. Yeah, Homelander. Yeah. Like, this exists outside of this particular film.

And so I don't really feel as though it's adding anything new to the genre. I don't really feel as if it's doing anything special. And it is difficult for me to really make definitive statements and gauge exactly how self-aware any given aspect of this film is. because there's a lot going into it and I just the overall experience for me did not work but I would like to hear you talk more about it

yeah whereas I thought the self-aware angle was I don't know I didn't even think it was particularly subtle I thought it was fairly blatant almost I was questioning it at first with that first 15 minutes where it is mostly Fastbender in that room waiting kind of talking about his philosophy and you're just kind of question like what is this going to be the whole movie

and then yeah the second he misses and the kind of frantic stuff that follows that there were just too many examples that were kind of pointing towards that whole blatant self-awareness like the fact that yeah we mentioned the smiths thing he's like rocking out to the smiths and nearly every scene um talking about how yeah he's talking about how emotionless he is and then one second he's listening to like the most stereotypically emotional band like of all time like the smiths it's it's it's it's It's like, there's like an inherent juxtaposition there. And I do agree with you on the, the emotion. I'm not really feeling many emotions as far as the characters are concerned. And Fincher does kind of have a knack for this, this cold presentation. But I feel like it does work packaged within the cold, seemingly emotionless assassin character. Yeah. I guess, I guess maybe I did need it to be a bit more blatant because I think,

you know, just the juxtaposition of like the Smith's fucking, you know, Patrick Bateman had entire scenes. Like he has his entire music philosophy. And in that sense, I find that more interesting because he actually talks about what it means to him. And there is more subtext in terms of like, oh, you're interpreting in that way. Like, that's kind of fucked up. I'm able to get that out of it at least. So, you know, him listening to the Smiths the entire time didn't feel out of place in terms of like a, ooh, this is a blatant commentary on how it's, uh, juxtaposing or contradicting his claim of lack of emotion. I just, it didn't, not saying it wasn't, not saying like, oh, it definitively wasn't or anything. I'm just saying like, the communication of this is just

not, I didn't, I didn't get much out of it. It wasn't really what I was looking for in terms of commentary or in terms of just even if I were to watch it unironically in a straightforward narrative kind of way I don't really care about the characters I don't care about him I don't care about his girlfriend I don't care about any of the people that he's killing or why he's killing and structure wise like it really just feels like the movie could have ended at several points and then he's like oh I got one more it doesn't really feel like the revenge mattered as much and so much of it felt so derivative of other movies of this, let's call it genre, I guess, like Drive, where even from the first, you know, 15 minutes of the movie, I was like, this is kind of feeling like we have

drive at home. And then as the movie continued and further progressed, it really, really just kept reinforcing and even more so that feeling of like, okay, this is just, this is just making me wishing that I was watching drive, right? Like, the satirical, I guess, meta-narrative elements, they don't save the movie from being, like, really boring for me. Perhaps it would be more interesting on a second watch, but damn, I was really disappointed by that. Yeah, I wasn't bored by that, even though I wasn't, I wasn't, like,

in love with this character and think it's, like, a deep character, necessarily, but I think a lot of the situations they put him in, were very tense. I thought there's a lot of good tension in the movie, lots of good scenes of buildup. Like I do really like that first 15 minutes and the way that builds up and it's leading you to think one thing and goes a different direction. And then yeah, the frantic reaction to that and how he's dotting all around the planet, the pace is quick, all different characters. Big fan of that, um, the fist fight scene an hour in how brutal that was. Which one?

Uh, with the in me, in Miami. Was it the one with the table? Yeah, with the table. Yeah. I liked that the score ruined it. I fucking hate the score. Really? The Trent Resner Atticus Ross score in this,

it absolutely ruins like pretty much any scene it's in. It feels so conflicting with the tone and what we're seeing and in what context we're seeing it in. It really feels like one of their like phoned in sort of, sort of like, oh, we're trying to recreate the idea of what we're supposed to sound like, I guess, particularly in a David Fincher film. It never felt appropriate. And it always felt like, you know, this scene would be much more interesting without music.

Or this scene would be much more impactful or, you know, I would be able to get so much more out of it without the music there. And it was so constant and ever present. And I'm just like, fuck. Like, if it was just the Smith soundtrack, like the licensed music, I thought, really added to the tone and the nature of the film and gave it a less serious vibe and gave it kind of a, it allowed for me to feel more like it wasn't taking itself as seriously, whereas any scene with Trent Reziner and Atticus Ross's score just kind of robbed that from me. And I was too busy thinking about like, why the fuck? Why the fuck are you doing this? There was one part where it sounded, where like, literally the score just sounded like oh he got glitched as he got punched just like weird shit like that and I'm just I can't see I I really like that I like that that like that like in that scene in particular my rewatched it earlier as part of that that score is

part of what makes it hit to me and does enhance the tension especially when when when the guy falls on the chair leg and yeah it all ramps up I don't know I feel like I feel I feel like it did actually compliment the action you were seeing and it did help to heighten what was going on with that score. So when you experience that action scene or anything like that in the film with the Trent Resner, Atticus Rusk or those are scenes that you're more or less experiencing unironically, but the other scenes, there's more of an ironic nature to it, is that I'm just trying to understand. They come across in earnest because I feel like he's a good action director.

I feel like he is good with the tension, reminded me of. of things like a great scene towards the end of Zodiac or some of his stuff in Mind Hunter where he just is very good at construction construction. Yeah. Yeah. Of tension. Or even just like the opening, I love those opening credits. It's just like 50 seconds kind of like montage of images implying the killer's backstory

and stuff is done because you don't really get to see him achieve any of his assassination actually in the film. Because this is based off a French graphic novel. which supposedly was or did include a lot of different environments and would cut away to show his other assassinations and whatnot, but this is firmly rooted in Fastbender's perspective. But I think a lot of this stuff to interpret from it is not necessarily just like a deconstruction of Finch's career or whatnot,

but it's kind of saying other things, like you could say, I don't know, it's talking about how destructive perfectionism is or these internal ideas that can only take you one way. Um, yeah, I just thought a lot of that juxtaposition was solid. I liked, yeah, the globe trotting. I love that sound design. I just thought, yeah, the plot is very basic and simple. I would never deny that, but I just feel like the presentation completely elevates

it. And I don't know, you're not alone in feeling the way you do. I watched Mark Commode's review a couple days ago. Oh, I haven't checked his out yet, actually. I think he's, I think he's more on your side. Um, he, he was more question. questioning what it was about this project that made Fincher so passionate about it, because he's he's been, he's wanted to adapt this since like 2007 or something, this graphic novel.

And sure, I don't think it, yeah, it's definitely at the top of his filmography. It's not, it's not the most deep film out of everything he's made for sure. But I don't know. I found this, I found this very entertaining from beginning to end. I just, I think his cold calculating style really matches. cold calculating assassin. Yeah. Yeah.

I think the idea of an assassin thinking about the, his meticulous way he's structured his life. And I especially like the whole, the brutality that that character unleashes onto other people in the world who he sees as the many, because that's a recurring theme in the movie, the many. The normies.

The normies. even they say normies he's like yeah he has a line about one of the many product placements where he's eating McDonald's and he takes the the buns off the breakfast muffin and he's talk about the like protein gains he could get from it but I think the way it is presented is like that's kind of funny to me knowing about this whole like manisphere space and that kind of stuff I feel like someone could read that in complete earnest which yeah reads kind of differently to me but yeah I would rather have a movie that I could experience earnestly all throughout,

or one that I could experience ironically all throughout, or, you know, it's not necessarily like a deal breaker to have the two as long as they're complimenting each other, but I don't disagree at all with anything you're saying about, like the directing. Like, I think that that particular fight scene you were talking about was incredible without the music. Oh, so good.

The music just fucking ruined it. I hated it. And I just don't agree. the museum. I can hear the great sound design choices underneath the music. I can hear the foley that is so much more interesting. And it's not like you need the music to fill the space. It's not like you don't have great sound design underneath it. I don't understand why they felt it was necessary in so many scenes. And I just, I don't felt like it complimented the rest of the tone of what the movie seemed to be going for with the whole, you know, the Smith's playlist, right?

I liked, I liked what it was going for with the Smith's playlist. I felt like I was, it felt like different films kind of competing with each other and trying to exist as one, but just did not really flow together for me at all. And I really, yeah, I just, the, the, the Trent Rezner and Atticus Russ thing is just, I, it really just felt like them going through the motions at this point. I've enjoyed their soundtracks in Fincher films before. I think it really absolutely works with Gone Girl social network, obviously. But this particular one, it was just so uninteresting and bland, and it conflicted with the tones that I would otherwise be experiencing in the film.

Even just parts where he's like walking up to a location. or, you know, like, driving around, I'm like, this would be so much more interesting if I was able to absorb anything emotionally. And especially in a movie that's attempting to have this, like, meta-narrative or commentary on his other works, I would prefer for me to be able to have some sort of ability to have my own experience with it and think about things in a way where it's not insisting a certain tone or emotion. It really doesn't lend itself well to being any kind of kind of an ironic score, and it really doesn't lend itself well to being a straightforward, unironic score. It really just prevents me from experiencing either ends of those spectrum,

and where it is in the middle is just not, it's just irritating and distracting. And I mean, I've said this before about a lot of other movies. Like, if I think the score is bad, it really affects my experience. And that is one particular thing that is really just standing out. in this this film i cannot deal with it that's interesting to me because their score and the scenes that utilize it kind of are more the scenes that do read as yeah this is more of like an effective drama with yeah and they're using it in a way to sell what is going on and when the smith's stuff is being utilized as a bit more that's where a bit more of the satire angle is being went on to me um yeah but then then then

there are multiple scenes where they do mesh well, like I think the scene where he is looking down the scope of his sniper rifle and he's trying to find the exact moment where it is with each cut. If it's from his perspective, you're hearing it blasting as the audience, but as it cuts away, you hear it more in the distance and it's like, yeah, increasing the tension. It's, and the editing there. Yeah, like the sound design editing choices are all incredible. I loved those.

I loved those. And the transition between, you know, it's kind of diagetic. I mean, it is diagetic. But it's like every POV shot you experience the music in like the two-channel headphone way that he would otherwise. And then as soon as the shots, not his POV, then, you know, like the great choices. There's stuff I really liked about this. And the hallmarks, the trademark style of David Fincher, obviously, it looks very clean.

There's a lot of shots where, you know, if it were a. different director, I wouldn't be assuming that there's, you know, like, superimposed elements in it. But I'm like, oh, yeah. Yeah, great special effects. This scene looks great, and I bet there's a bunch of special effects in it. And then come to find out later on Twitter. It's like, oh, yeah, he actually filmed each one of those apartment windows individually and then, you know, place them in the scene with different blah, blah, blah, blah.

I'm like, yep, sounds about right for David Fincher. And that's probably why it looks so cool and so clean. I will say the CG like the planes felt under budget like that same director

fucking 10 years ago had better looking planes in his movie also he's kind of like got plain autism he really likes planes I don't know what it is I bet

I bet he's the type of guy that knows exactly what model each one of those planes are I bet every time he takes a flight he's like I'm on this particular model with this engine. Yeah, exactly.

That meticulous, like, line of thought, I feel like is explored really well, and I can see why people are interpreting it as kind of him shining the looking glass back at himself, because I think that is a good way to do that, especially with the way it wraps up, though. It's not the first time he's kind of done this weird, like, meta self-commentary on his movie. Remember the, like, the jelly bean scene with the... in Gone Girl with, sorry, it was gummy bears.

And he was like, yeah, repetition. And he was like, pretty much calling attention to the fact that, like, him as a director, he's notorious for being difficult to work with because of how much repetition his actors ask for him to do to get each take exactly, right? Some of that is found in this movie. And I've read what people are saying.

And there is, you know, obviously there is a lot of, like, him making commentary on his own films. I'm just like, I need it to work. regardless. I can't have the subtext be the only reason why I enjoy a film, right? There's plenty of examples of this. I need it to work as its own thing or find the commentary so interesting or so substantive or the visuals so interesting and substantive. Like some, I need to be able to grab onto something because even though I love the way it's shot and I love his directing and how cold it is and et cetera, et cetera, clean. It's just, I kind of get numb to it after a while and I'm kind of

frustrated with the characters. I'm kind of just annoyed at the pacing, just wanting it to end. And yeah, this is the worst fincher for me. I don't know how much more I have to say. I could see, yeah, I could see those issues with the pacing, and that's one of the places I'll agree. I think the way it wraps up is a little bit quick and feels a bit uneven compared to, yeah, that slow buildup towards the beginning and all that tension. And after that scene where he confronts the billionaire, which was kind of what I was getting at to earlier, where he is brutalizing all these people who he does see as the many. And then as soon as he gets to someone who he perceives as the few, it's the one person he doesn't brutalize or destroy. He lets him survive.

And I think that's kind of an interesting idea, like the billionaire is the anyone who survives. Yeah. I think you can interpret it a lot of different ways. I feel like this lens of like this perfectionist assassin who makes a mistake is an interesting, yeah, kind of meta-narrative on Fincher himself or just the ideas of like hustle culture and. Yeah, I do think there has a lot of consistent themes, but I guess what the biggest place I disagree is that I think it does, it's not the greatest, but it does work, I think without reading anything deeper than that. I think it is, yeah, a basic revenge plot, but I think the execution and the presentation is so rich and well done. And I think the pacing's pretty good up until, you know, the latter section where it's trying to wrap up. It wraps up a little bit.

I don't know. It doesn't feel that satisfying when the credits roll. No, not at all. I hate the fucking last shot. The last shot just irritated me so much. the like flinch on the little eye twitch like it's just it's disgusting i hate it yeah but that's when irritated me to know he does have a good line there though where

it's kind of him coming to the realization that yeah i am one of the many you know and then perhaps it's like buying into this idea going feeding into the hustle culture thing where it's like yeah if i just earn enough money then perhaps i can I can buy a new life for myself. That's an ongoing thing where he's got all these different identities. And each one of the identities is a different, the name is a different like 70s sitcom,

which you might interpret as another more obvious nod towards the comedic or self-aware angle. I don't know, it's kind of, it's prodding it itself now and again, and the stuff in the Tilda Swinton scene, where she's talking about, she has this anecdote, poem type thing about this bear, which I feel like is kind of describing the main character.

He has one idea, but it's being interpreted by someone else as a different motivation. And I feel like it does have through lines with the action speaking louder than words, with this, the different things it's kind of talking about. But yeah, this worked on a few different levels to me. Yeah, I'd happily watch this again. I don't think this is weakest movie. I see it more kind of in line with like the game, panic. Haven't seen that one yet.

Kind of around that sort of level for me. That's the only one I haven't seen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I quite like this. Like, to me, this is a high seven out of ten, three an half star. Yeah, well, maybe I'll give it another chance in a couple years.

I kind of, I'm around that point in time where I feel like maybe I can give the house that Jack built another chance, see how I feel about it. Yeah, people have been bringing that one up in comparison to this. But I like that as well from memory and you didn't. Exactly. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I don't know. He's like quoting Popeye in this.

He's like, Eat McDonald's that didn't love some of the, you know, like the Amazon product placement, even if it's trying to say like, look how he thwarts the billionaire with like cheap gadgets he bought off Amazon. I don't mind that much. But I don't know. That's kind of a thing you get used to with Fincher. he does utilize a lot of product placement. But I don't mind the McDonald's one at the beginning because it does say something about the character

like that isn't, you know, he's taking the bread off the bun. Like, just don't eat McDonald's if you're... Yeah, David Fincher movies, you just have to get used to product placements. You have to accept that they're there. Yeah, yeah. He does it every movie. A lot. A lot more handheld camera work as well than a lot of his other movies.

Like Gonga, I think has like one hand. handheld shot and the whole thing. I thought that was quite an effective. I think that was used quite well for the more tense scenes like the one at the beginning in the first 15 minutes where he's preparing his sniper rifle and he hears someone coming in to the apartment or whatever he's in and it switches to handheld and he's, yeah, the music kicks up. And I feel like that's kind of what was carrying me through it was I did feel like it was a compelling tense. film and that stuff worked for me. Sweet.

I'm giving this one a four out of ten. It was hovering at like a five and then that last shot happened and I just got pissed off. Yeah, I feel like time will be kind to this movie. Hopefully. I'm willing to give it a chance again in the future. But yeah, I was just, I was irritated and impatient and not not feeling what it was selling and

fuck that that score that score was terrible I can't hmm yeah I like that school I'm big on that school mm-hmm what did you give it oh I did say a minute ago but I uh seven out 10 three and a half star yeah yeah yeah solid all right you recommended a film yeah so I was I was trying to wrap my brain like trying to say how did I even find this film how did I know about it because I'm the one he recommended it but it's one of those ones that I think there's been sitting clearly you had some thoughts yeah like I don't know I'd heard somewhere about how good it was or maybe I was reading about Truman Capote or something like this but either which way my recommendation was in cold blood

the 1967 film directed by Richard Brooks as I just mentioned based on the famous Truman Capote novel documenting the tale the true story of a two men who travel across the country in America to rob what they think is a rich farmer's house. They hear there's $10,000 which I think the crime happened in 1959

so that amount of money would be like 150 grand or something today just for reference. They hear that there's a safe with this amount of money in. They rob the family at like two in the morning, tie them all up.

Spoiler discussion. Oh yeah, full spoilers here. Yeah, they tie them all up, can't find anything in the house, and wind up murdering the entire family, as the title suggests, in cold blood. And yeah, the following is the kind of procedural, the rise and fall with, they don't, they get like 40, it's like $42 or something change that they managed to get from the, the robbery itself. but there's a whole, uh, check, man,

I had to like wrap my brain like a, I remember like writing checks when I was like a kid, but, uh, they do like the whole check, uh, what they still, yeah,

like doing what they can with that. And yeah, part of what makes it so great is, uh, kind of the double meaning of the title and what it's saying about, how someone might get to this position where they commit this crime and trying to, sort of add some complexity or explanation to how this happened, how they were caught, and how it was dealt with, and kind of a deep critique of the justice system in the end.

I don't know about you, but this was, this is one of the better films I've seen in a while. I thought this was, this was excellent. This was fantastic. I thought it was pretty great. Yeah. Yeah, I knew pretty quick when that seamless transition like really early on. And there are a lot of really great transitions in the film with there's like a, a bus driving along and it cuts to a train. And it was just really smooth and seamless. I was like, oh, there's like some real thought put into this presentation right now.

And it just didn't let up. It just kept delivering on that front for the whole two hours and 14 minutes. I thought just everything was in line, not just the presentation, but the performances. I was, every time Scott Wilson was on screen, I was like glued to it. I thought he was, he was like so compelling as a character in that performance, like the idiosyncrasies he was putting in there. His weird kind of gross charm that he was delivering. Just really interesting characters and the Robert Blake, Perry performance as well, I felt

that's where the kind of the real complexity of the film lies where you do get to see kind of what led to that you go into his past a little bit he's an he's an aspirin addict he's got a lot of trauma he's carrying around

with him and I love the choice of how they choose to unfold the information I thought this was interesting that this came right after the flower moon discussion where oh yeah I was about to yeah I was totally reminded of Scorsese killers of the flare moon yeah because I I thought that was such a good decision where there is this whole

build up to this event and then there's just kind of a blank space where yeah it's building up these two guys and they're talking about this this robbery they're going to commit and then when they actually get to the house that they're going to rob which side note is the same house that In the big Lebowski, the, when bunny runs away and there's a scene where the, the PI shows a picture of where bunny runs off to and is hiding the whole movie. It's the same house from the actual killing happened, which is like a funny, weird connection. And Philip Seymour Hoffman's in that movie, which is another, but we'll get to that in a bit. True. But, yeah, I thought it was just kind of expertly told all round.

And yeah, the way it does skip over the event until it's necessary and how much more powerful it is for it just kind of cuts to the next day where the 16-year-old girl, I think she is. Her friend comes the next day to pick him up for church and then she's the one who finds the grotesque scene that's all been set up. and then showing the more like procedural cop angle of the investigation and the whole kind of neo-noir angle. It's all in black and white as well. Some fantastic lighting. I love the use of lighting in here. Some really memorable shots. Some great music too.

Quincy Jones. Pretty much everything about this was fantastic. Yeah, I love that Quincy Jones score some really unique ideas. I love that bottle. scene. That's dietic right there integrating the bottle sounds into the school. Just a really complex, well done film, which I feel like you can probably owe a lot of Capote's original work to some of that complexity. But the Richard Brooks directing as well, though, I feel like it's not to be scoffed at either.

Oh, of course. Yeah, there's definitely a very clear vision when it comes to like the visuals of this film and how things are put together. What makes the writing really apparent, or I guess the talent in the writing really apparent, is the very distinct way that characters talk. They have, in the way that their dialogue is written, they have consistencies as to what types of things they would say and how they would say it in any given conversation. so the, yeah, his name's Dick.

He's constantly saying things like honey or baby or sugar like at the end of his sentence. And like later on in the movie, I think they kind of even draw more attention to that. The other character kind of like makes fun of him for it. I forget the exact one. Yeah, he mocks him for it. Yeah, yeah.

So having consistencies like that where it's not just, oh, a bunch of different characters that sound like they could be the same character or that sound like the writer, I really appreciate and enjoy when the characters are written in very distinct ways. And, you know, that goes into... I think it's probably the best thing

that an actor can work with. I think that it's something that can help their performance and help them really get into the character is having a very clear sense of how a character speaks. And that was pretty apparent. in this film yeah yeah i feel like that just applies to most of the technical angles of the film like

uh it's very noticeable early on how great the editing and the timing is to the way it's cut it's it's so quick and snappy and the way it is just like just really nice intentional choices like a character says my name is and then it cuts to like a different character referencing that the name that was going to be said but in a different context so it works in two ways and it just keeps going like that throughout the whole film. It's so intentional. I should say, it's got to let up at some point with this because this is so good the way this is put together.

But it just doesn't let up. It just keeps going like that. Yeah. It's probably the best way it could be structured in terms of order. I remember as soon as it gets to eventually revealing the killings. And it's like a nice, you know, full. scene that doesn't just feel like a quick flashback or reminder. It's like, okay, now, now we get to see this scene finally with the context of everything else that's happened in

the film. And I'm watching that. I'm like, I'm trying to imagine what the scene would be like if I didn't have all that context beforehand. And I really felt like that was the ideal way to experience it, knowing not only that they're, inevitably these characters are going to die, but it is particularly brutal and that it's over nothing. And it really enforces a sense of dread that otherwise would not be there if we were watching that scene. If it had taken place chronologically with the events of the film. Exactly. It gives you such a good hook as well.

Yes. Because there is a whole big question mark looming. Like you see these guys and sure they're not the cleanest guys you'll find, but it doesn't match the way things unfolds. So it's like, how did this happen? Why did this happen? You're right there with the police investigating in terms of like trying to suss out how it was put together and how it happened. And I thought, yeah, that was a, that's a good observation.

Great camera work in here. Yes. I thought the blocking was really great and energetic with these like crash zooms and interesting camera movement all the time. It's just, it just never lets up on that stuff. Also something I really appreciate about great movies is just a clear sense of location. Whenever we saw them returning to a location, it's like, oh, it's very clear where this is a very distinct landmark or whatever the side of that building said. It's like, okay, this is clear. And it never lingered on a single location for too long, even though there is a section of the movie that I found to be like a little slower than the rest of it.

I, you know, maybe 10 minutes could have been cut out somewhere around halfway through, but it still didn't linger on any given setting or scene for too long. It had a very digestible pacing, and it always felt as though things were moving along. And again, as it goes on, the more I'm reminded about Killers of the Flower Moon, not just because it's like, oh, this is a full story with good pacing, but because there's a lot of similarities in terms of like the crime and then investigation

and then the whole interrogation and court scene and the court procedure like there's a lot that reminded me of that so it was kind of fascinating with this being you know not a particularly long movie but it feels like more happened

in this movie than Killers at the Flower Moon it felt it felt like more was fleshed out exactly yeah i felt i got like a full perspective yeah i felt like these characters were really fleshed out in such a convincing way it's like after the event happens a lot of that second act is the procedural angle of like the cops investigating and you you go see like the characters parents and they're being interviewed and it's just it's just such a good shorthand to flesh out these characters and have a good reasonable excuse to dump their exposition. Like if a cop is asking

you questions and yeah, it makes sense for the dad to be reminiscing about that and then you get even more storytelling through that with when the lead characters give their perspective of what's happening and it doesn't really line up and it's all, it's just a lot of depth to what the characters are talking about and yeah, just so many great scenes. Even though there's a lot of discourse like it's apparently like a Zuma thing that they like hate sex scenes and movies so I'm always thinking about that when there's like sex scenes

I thought the sex scene here was really great the way it brought out the kind of trauma of that main character yeah that was interesting when they're in Mexico yeah yeah it gives you some context it was a great another kind of dietic use

just the space and integrating characters and yeah Yeah. Again, just editing and presentation choices also. It's just, it's a really substantive and thoughtful way to do it. And it felt like it really was interested in fleshing out that Perry character. I thought that was like important. He's the one who kind of, he's, he has a lot of complexity to him because, yeah, he's the one who does, he's the one that starts the violence, really. He's the one who, who cuts the first throat. and aims the shotgun at him and finishes him. He does all of the violence. Yeah, yeah, but he's also the one who he stops the Scott Wilson character from assaulting the girl.

And there's like a really interesting, confusing, thought-provoking dynamic there. Because it's like, wow, this is an interesting character. You could easily have a film try, make an attempt at a character like this. that could, and the worst case scenario or the scenario from like a less talented writer or filmmaker would be a character that seems conflicting to the point of it being either unintentional or just illogical and just not understanding. And even though we don't fully understand every detail about this character and his decision making, because a lot of his decisions are, you know, not necessarily even thought out. a lot of them seem reflexive and emotionally based.

It's written in such a way and presented in such a way where rather than feeling just like, oh, this is a conflicting character that's not written properly, it feels like a fleshed out character that is more complex and there's more to him. And there's, how do I describe this? The complexity of the character is apparent without it feeling like improperly fleshed out.

It feels like the film is, aware of his complexities and it feels like the film is very much aware that he's not a straightforward copy paste character. It's not just the stereotype of like, this is a bad guy. Yeah, exactly. This is a very complex character who did it did terrible things. Mm-hmm. The worst things. And is a, and is a bad guy. We can, we can say it's a bad guy, but it's not the bad guy character. It's not, you know, It's I like that it offers a lot more of that and it gives you more to think about and it makes it more interesting for rewatches, right? Like I want to know more about this character. I want to I want to put more thought into it and there's so much to absorb about this film and the characters in this film that I really feel like a second watch can bring out more of that.

Yeah. And it's summed up quite well where there's a line. I can't remember who says it, but it's kind of like the thesis of the. movie, how can a sane man commit an insane act? And it really does explore that well. And you can definitely see, especially after watching Compote, it got me thinking about this, as a writer and the way he was empathizing and spending so much time talking to him and trying to understand him, in retrospect, it's clear that he added, I don't know, a romantic sort of interpretation of things. And I know it's known that he's sort of changed some of the truths to make it kind of work better in the the fictional sort of format.

It blends it, doesn't it, that original kind of story that he wrote? Like, not everything is exactly one to one with what happened, obviously. Like, the dialogue that is being written is kind of written in a more romantic sort of way. Like, I'm sure he didn't really say, like, before he's hanged. He has, like, a sort of apology. He says something like, I'd like to apologize, but to who? Which apparently in real life he didn't say. And that's very much like a writer trying to think of something thought-provoking for that character,

knowing him personally and being a great writer. And that's like a through line throughout the whole film. Like, after he stops the assault. in the bedroom. He says, like, I despise people who can't control themselves, even though that's what he does a few minutes later. And, you know, the romantic kind of lines, like, all to steal a kid's silver dollar. There's just a lot of great dialogue, which is clearly plucked from that book, but it's a, oh, there was another great line. Whereas, yeah, where they're talking about when they, when they're trying to break down, like, why or how this happened. Someone says something like,

they wouldn't neither of them would do it alone but together they made a third personality that's the one who did it that's a fantastic thought-provoking line i was just i was just i was just like jotting down many of these lines because uh it's it's just so expressive and thought-provoking like uh when you get a few scenes with the scott wilson character where he's giving his perspective on the whole idea of the death penalty and he's kind of weirdly agreeing with it because in his personal philosophy it's like hanging is just revenge and what's wrong with revenge he's like weirdly fine with it it's just like it's just not if you're the one being hanged like it's yeah yeah getting all these different perspectives was really interesting and then the other guy saying how yeah he describes it as saying he had a a bomb ticking inside me and yeah just exploring all that whole backstory and how it led to where it was I just yeah I found that so compelling. Yeah. I really liked that Perry was a character that you could tell had so much

internal conflict and he was very much self-critical despite doing like the worst things. Yeah. And, you know, he just in the middle of like the robbery, like the problem is us. Like what are we doing? And like then eventually, I mean, you know, over time you can see this kind of transformation of him start starting to talk positively about crime paying and being like yeah we can do this and then coming up with all these like weird like fantastical but unreasonable implausible ideas of like oh we're gonna we're gonna rob this and do this and it's like okay this is gonna find treasure we're gonna win in the casino and trooper our money and all the find the chintamani stone yeah really just started it was like is this going to be an uncharted movie but no it's it's more about

Just this weird, naive kind of childish mindset that this character has. And one that seems to be changing in ways, like, I don't know if I wouldn't diagnose as bipolar. I'm not like if it's like psychiatrist or anything. But there is a complexity to it. And I like how it was explored. I love the music. Yeah. Great score.

We talked a bit about it. What I really enjoyed about this film is in scenes like when they do wind up killing the family when it shows it later, a lot of the choice for sound design is this kind of thing that's, you know, debatably between music and just atmosphere, that kind of like low hum where you can pay attention to it. you might not know it's there, but it is making you feel something. And it is suggesting this kind of like sinister foreboding, uncomfortable nature to the scene without being so explicit that it's a full score and like doing the whole traditional stereotypical, you know, scare cues or like dramatic cues or anything like that. I like that. I like that it was held back and reserved and very effective at communicating that emotion in a way where you're still able to watch the scene and it's not like explicitly forcing you in a certain direction. It felt

very natural and very complimentary is what it was. And I also like the choice to not have Capote be a character in the movie. There's kind of two characters that represent his place in the real life story because he's so entwined in this. from the very beginning, but I love the creative decision from him to do that, where there is the, there is kind of a, someone writing for a paper, um, he has some good lines towards the end. Yeah, newspapers will be sold. Laws will pass. Everyone will pass the buck, these kind of ideas.

But there's also the, the cop angle, I think is also kind of another stand-in for Capote and kind of what he was learning and what he was figuring out. But yeah, I thought that was an interesting choice. not to have him in there directly to try and, you know, there's something more, it makes it less about him. It's more about these central characters and trying to explore the core drama of what happened there. He was clearly obsessed with this and a, I mean, they were waiting on death row for, what, five

years or something? Yeah. So it's like, can you see in the Capote movie, like, what it was doing to him? But, man, there are so many great scenes. Like, I love, I love that ending. I think that's a fantastic ending. That perspective shot of the hood being put over his face. He's like chewing gum or something.

And again, with the audio, it's kind of like mimicking the visuals of a, of a heart pounding, which is slowly getting louder in the background. It's like rising in the background. And it's all, and then cutting to the title. I wonder what the earliest use of that is. Yeah. Because that's a bit of a, you know, you could call it a trope at this point. But still, very useful.

Literally the exact same thing happened in like the, exact same context in another movie we talked about on the podcast. I, spoilers for, uh, how do, how do I mention the title of the movie without spoiling it? Whatever. Yeah, I know you're going to say. How do I even mention the title without spoiling? Yeah, I can't. Whatever. Yeah, I think, I think people listening will know. There's, there will be people who know, yeah, they can figure out. Ask on the subreddit if you can't figure out. Although that did add to it, that, that had a much, that had more going on also. But yeah, then, then showing the of the film again giving it that double meaning where in cold blood applies to the inciting

incident itself, but then it's also describing what the government did as well as dealing with them. Like they were killed technically in cold blood by a governing body and that's definitely a through line. It's very very anti that kind of crime and punishment death penalty angle and that is a controversial subject and I think it handles it quite well with quite finesse yeah yeah I love that angle just so many great details like when you look at the when you look at the poster the the eyes that a picture there are not the actors who play the characters is actually the real cool the real eyes of the real culprits thought that was a really cool creative decision that's great didn't even

know I wrote down a couple editing choices that I really, really liked. There was the, uh, like, who could have done this? Who would be so sick? Take your pick on any crowded street. And then it cuts to the two main characters walking like on a crowded street to try and pun that shit. It's like, oh, you know? There's lots of great cuts like that. Yeah. Great transition, but it also leads us into the next scene naturally. And there's a reason for following them. And there's a reason for them being there at that point in time doing that thing. Very, very sensible. there's the kind of like foreboding subtle background music that gets cut out at the exact same time that a woman turns out her like bedside light.

So it's not like at the end of the scene, but like just five seconds before the end of the scene. And so the choice to count out the music there instead of just abruptly when the scene ended, I thought it was really cool and added to the just kind of sinister. tone and atmosphere of certain scenes in this film. I thought it was really great at capturing setting. I thought it was really great at capturing tone and atmosphere in general. It had a really great sense of what you were... The types of feelings that I got out of it, it just felt so intentional and purposeful.

Yeah. Like it didn't just happen. It's not like a accident, you know? Yeah, yeah. Although in saying that one of the more memorable shots is Towards the end where they are on death row waiting and the The rain the peri character in the rain. Yeah, that was supposedly Yeah, that was like fake rain. They didn't even it wasn't intentional they were it wasn't like established or like storyboarded to be that way

But it just kind of worked out that way. Yeah, that's great the the light is the way the way the tears on his face. Yeah, it's it's it's so memorable It's just tears in the rain impactful. Yeah. I guess the only things I didn't really like, though, that stood out to me as, I guess, more nitpicks. Sure. A couple of instances of, you know, it's because of the age of the movie, I suppose, but some of the, like, rear projection in the cars looked, you know, a little bit dated, a little bit aged, which was only stood out to me because nothing else was really felt aged in that way to me. Yeah. And there were instances.

I don't know why that's a thing that like never really bothers me unless it's like very particular. It only really bothered me because there were instances of them doing it where it was seamless. There's one where they're in they're in the car and there is heavy rain and that's kind of obscuring the fact that it is on a sound stage or whatever with the wipers going. That's like that that's like a clever way to obscure it in my mind whereas the blatant rear projection can just, it's just something. been kind of aged and unless, uh, was it, Pulp Fiction, whether it's like an intentional kind of reference, it can be, you know. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Stylistic choice. A little bit age, a little bit goofy. Yeah. Well, yeah, the other, the only other major one I have was the, the performance of the, the 16-year-old girl. I thought she had some kind of, uh, weird goofy delivery that she had a line where she was like, good grief, what is this? Some kind of joke?

Well, like, when the crime is going down, I was like, oh, like, I'm buying this aside from that one line that really, like, stood out to me as like, maybe you could have used a different take of it. Yeah, I didn't, I wasn't bothered by that either. I don't know if it was necessarily a line delivery thing. There might be this, maybe I'm like a bit more, I guess, either forgiving or just not as familiar with, I guess, you know, the average way that a, person of that age and gender would talk in the late 50s or how someone would react. I guess I kind of just like give a bit of, I don't even necessarily say credit because it's not like I was thinking it was bad, but I guess there's just like a different set of suspension of disbelief in terms of like how characters talk and act that because I'm not as familiar with the time period or people from that time period and, you know, like, am I going

reference like archival footage or like a real documentary like I don't know I don't know I don't know how people fucking act the further you go back so it was yeah it wasn't even the verb eage to me it was more that did stand out to me compared to how yeah the emotion of it it wasn't convincing me whereas basically everything Perry and Dick are saying like so well acted so convincing there's never there's never even a moment where I'm doubting the the intent I don't know with The way I interpreted her in that first part was that she just, like, didn't understand the seriousness of the situation yet. Because even the other characters also... That's how I figured it was written, but I wasn't buying that that's what she was communicating.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. The only thing I really didn't like about the movie was that I just felt like the pacing was absolutely perfect outside of between the missing chunk of time when the murders happened and, you know, the investigation started. from that point up until the collecting bottles on the highway, which is a scene that I loved. But everything in between that, I feel, could have been trimmed down. It was like starting to lose me entertainment pacing-wise.

This could change on a second watch. Maybe I'll be way more into it knowing everything that's coming and, you know, getting more out of certain scenes, especially with more context about the characters and their interactions, et cetera, et cetera. But that was, you know, on a first. watch just a chunk of the movie where I was like... So you're talking about the section before they're court?

Yeah, pretty much. Pretty much the whole police investigation. Like, yeah, I felt like that could have been trimmed down, but I might not feel that way on a second watch. And I do want to watch this again. So, yeah, I loved all that stuff. Because that's when a lot of the best Scott Wilson stuff was coming out where he is, you see kind of how manipulator, uh, see his skills coming out.

And yeah, they, you get the slow kind of. drama building between them where they're clearly they kind of stop getting on at a certain point they're feeling the the tension build with like they're listening to the radio that they stole from the house and they're hearing about how the cops are getting closer and building up and there is there was an underlying tension to me

because you know they're caught at some point and that's like as an audience member you know that's going to happen so that was compelling to me and trying to figure out like So how were they cool? Was it because of this guy in jail that dobs them in for $1,000? And that turned out to be the kind of lead that winds up, taking them down. But yeah, and then just the presentation on top of that was just, it never really loved for me, to be honest. There wasn't a point I could even identify as being a weakness in the pacing.

I thought the pace was actually pretty much perfect for how much information is delivered and for how many characters there are and for how many perspectives you see. and it's like hopping around to different people in the town, giving their perspectives early on. And it's like a really broad, yeah, a broad amount of perspectives that you're seeing that just keeps it compelling. Yeah, I might feel more entertained in that section a second watch, but otherwise I thought it was like absolutely fantastic,

really expertly told story, very smart choices in terms of how things were structured, great acting, great cinematography, great music, like just everything that makes a great film, everything that I love about the details, character writing, a sense of location. It's really, really fantastic. So we'll see how I feel on a second watch

in terms of like just, you know, the chunk of the movie flowing for me. But right now, I'm giving it a very high eight out of ten. It's closer to a nine than a seven. Hmm Whereas yeah I'm slightly above you there This would be a very solid

Very high Nine out of ten Or four and a half star for me I was Yeah I was compelled from beginning to end I thought there was so much complexity So much to think about So many shots lingering in my mind

And I gotta say man Like if you're listening to this Just watch this film I look at how many ratings it has On IMDB and it's only like 28,000 ratings And I just feel like Come on,

spread this, people need to watch this because, I mean, people always talking about, yeah, films are so, this is, this is what you're looking for. I don't even like movies. Yeah, yeah, I think this is like such a great one. This feels like it would be perfectly not out of place on like the top 250. I was kind of surprised that it wasn't. Yeah, yeah, I don't know if it's just not that well known or Capote kind of stole its thunder or what, I don't know.

This feels like it would feel right at home there, but, you know, right underneath like Joker between Joker and Avengers just a million superhero movies yeah a bunch of Bollywood yeah so I really do urge people to check this one out because I know a lot of people have put off they they they imagine because it's like from the 60s oh this is probably going to be boring have different sensibilities like no no no no no check this out no no no no no no it'll be well worth your time no no no no no cool sure you're you go on to Kapotee? Yes.

Yeah, I'm ready. All right. Do you want to interview? I can't really. Are you going to say that I'm the smartest person ever for recommending it? Well, yeah, I was I was going to bring up. Was it because of the subreddit or what? Because when I recommended the film, I didn't actually know that this was linked to it.

This is another one of those films that it's been in my watch list for like years and years and years and years. Always been a fan of Seymour Hoffman, knew he won an awesome. for this. And while I was just praising that poster for In Cold Blood, I really don't like the poster for Goodboater. I think it's kind of a really plain, boring poster. So whenever I saw it there, I was kind of like, I'll get to that at some point. It does look like the most boringest movie ever made.

I was expecting to be bored to tears, to tears. Yeah. So the reason why I recommended it is because you recommended it in Cold Blood, and then I saw on the poster, it said Truman Capote's in Cold Blood. And then I was like, well, Truman Capote, that's the Capote movie. And so I bought the Blu-ray 4th thing, like, yeah, I'll probably do like a double feature or something. And then as I, you know, you know, looked at the IMD description for Capote. I was like, oh, this is specifically about him researching his novel in Cold Blood.

So that just happened to work out. So I was actually considering doing like, I was considering doing a Capote double feature, no matter what Truman Capote film that you had recommended, but it just happened to work out this way, and I'm glad because I think watching Capote without having seen in Cold Blood would have been the wrong way to watch it. This is very much... Absolutely.

This is one of the most companion piece, companion pieces that you'll ever see. It should be in the dictionary for companion piece for a film, you know? Yeah, yeah. They need each other. And in saying that there is something, I do feel like In Cold Blood does take some of the thunder away from this movie. Because a lot of things I was loving about that 67 film, I just wasn't getting from Capote.

Because this is Bennett Miller, who people might know as the director of Moneyball or Fox Catcher. I think he did as well. Yeah. And while I did enjoy this movie overall, it's very much a different style. It's way more kind of like Oscar Beatty. Yeah. I think that's the Bennett Miller thing. It seems like he quite likes things that the Oscars will like.

To me, it was really about the Philip Seymour Hoffman performance. It's an incredible performance. I don't know if you watched any Capote interviews from back in the day. There's someone YouTube. I did after the facts. Yeah, I did after two because I was curious. I was like, wow, wow. They really, getting Philip Seymour Hoffman for this is like, it couldn't really be more perfect.

No. Yeah, it's pretty much. It's a perfect delivery. His acting is pretty spot on for this. And it carries the whole thing because there were issues for me outside of that performance. But that was the one central thing that's like, yeah, this is a 10 out of 10 performance in a film that I'd probably rate lower than that for other reasons. But what are your overarching thoughts on this? Well, he definitely earned that Oscar.

And looking right now, apparently it was nominated for four other Oscars. That's actually shocking because I would have assumed there every once in a, you know, I think every year at the Oscars there's like one movie that only has like a performance nomination. I would have assumed that this would be one. It got a best picture nomination in 2006, which was just crazy because there would only be like five nominations that year, if I'm not mistaken. Like total. So to fit this one in, like, there's. tons of movies in 2006 that are good, but I mean, weird for best. Like, I just wouldn't

expect it, but yeah. So Philip won the Oscar for Best Actor. Catherine Keener was nominated for supporting, which is also crazy. Not like she's, like, none of these things are bad. But I'm just shocked that it's considered Oscar level. And then writing, adapted screenplay, and directing even. So that's kind of fascinating. But, you know, the one that was, was very much deserved actually one. So I do, I do think that his performance carries the movie, but I don't think the movie is bad, all things considered. Like, there's maybe a couple aspects about this movie where I'm like,

that's kind of cheese. And oh my God, some of the sound recording, like the, whoever was responsible for setting up Catherine Keener's mic in that outdoor scene like under the umbrella and like continuing on to the car like she's peeking throughout that entire scene I'm like what the f and it's just her

like you didn't do your job I don't know what the hell happened there so there's weird technical issues I thought that this was his first movie and I'm learning right now that it's his second feature so still pretty fucking great for a second feature even but yeah I liked this movie

a lot more than I thought I would because I thought it would be like a snooze fest. But I found myself, you know, past the first 22 minutes or whatever, I found myself so engrossed in the character and the performance and just being able to soak up so much about it that I'm kind of shocked that for a two-hour movie where on paper not really that much happened and probably could have been trimmed down. I'm shocked that I was pretty solidly entertained and in.

intrigued for the entire runtime. This kind of seems like a bizarre film to even make in that sense. Because it almost seems like kind of like a niche subject matter that, you know, you would have to watch in cold blood to get like the full experience out of this. Like how many people watched this without having watched or read in cold blood? Like was that a huge thing? Is that why there's a discrepancy in the user rating in MetaScore? you know yeah I guess it's a very famous novel but yet mentioning those ratings like this

has like a hundred and thirty nine thousand ratings on IMDB alone yeah you're right five times way more in cold blood um so I guess that yeah the it's got a bunch of character actors but I guess there was a draw there um yeah I don't know I feel like watching it straight after it was a little bit of whiplash in terms of like I wasn't engaged on the same level as interesting as that score was but any anything that directly mimicked or I guess mimics not really the right word was telling the same beats of the story that was covered in cold blood I feel like it was just for the most part better done of course original um of course whereas here it felt way more like a

2005 it didn't feel offensive though it didn't know it wasn't offensive but it felt way more like yeah this is a two thousand and kind of Oscar Beatty movie whereas that 67 film I feel like was not you don't feel dated or aged by anything like that like I don't know how you felt about the music but I just was not jelling with the music in this movie I found it kind of corny and was not it's just the before there's so many great character actors bouncing off each other and I felt like that was that's enough that was enough for me it wasn't really complimenting or enhancing the emotion of what they were bringing it was more

kind of distracting to me it wasn't okay It wasn't jelling with me. Yeah. I, um, near the beginning of the film, I was like, it was teetering on the edge of corny for me. I'm like, no, really? Is this what we're doing? But over time, like, I was just so into the character in the movie that I thought that the soundtrack overall was something that was complimentary in the sense that it wasn't

too distracting in terms of what it was doing. Like, it wasn't, it wasn't being some sort of like complex, like, listen to me. like it wasn't trying to go for like being a super memorable super like oh one of the best scores of all time it was just trying to exist to complement the emotions of the film and in that sense I think that it that it did its job could it have been better sure but I I I'm not bothered by the choice of how it was used and what the score ultimately was in this film I don't think it was It didn't ruin the movie, didn't really take me out of most of it. It wasn't egregious, but it also, I don't know, it wasn't elevating anything to me either.

I thought it was just serviceable for what it was doing. It's not why the takeaways. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It did exactly what it needed to do. Could have been worse. Yeah.

I thought the core, the dynamic between Seymour Hoffman and Catherine Keener, that was kind of my favorite, angle of the movie just the real life story of them being friends and her going on to publish her own to kill a mockingbird like two incredibly famous pieces of fiction in there and the fact and just getting to know that they knew each other and they had this dynamic and him being like an asshole at the the screening of her the film adaptation of her book and all was like that's that's more that was weirdly more interesting to me than the relationship between capote and Perry Smith maybe because of that direct contrast where I was just I don't know a lot

more attached to that Perry in the 60s film and I just felt like there was something I don't know I was thinking of like the Oppenheimer kind of editing for like the first act of this movie where it's almost the pacing is so quick and scenes are so short and it's It feels like it's so desperate to get to the Perry Smith crime dynamic that I was like, man, I almost want to sit with this longer. I want to be taking in these performances and these dynamics a little bit more, but it's almost not letting me. It's just going, it's just moving so quickly.

Yeah, but that might also kind of just be like in terms of what your expectations of what the film is trying to be about, right? Like, because it is, it's a Capote movie. It's more of a, I like that those other characters from the other movie are there, but it is a Capote, like the character. study is Capote. It's no it's sure there's yeah yeah, there's added context to the other characters of the other film, but it is more just about him. So I understand why they would want to not, you know, really be as slow or, uh, it's not even a slowness I'm looking for. It's more

like, okay, I get that you want to get to the Perry Smith dynamic, but even when it got to that, I, I wasn't feeling. I felt like I was, being told a lot of things and not shown them. Like a lot of characters were talking about, like, how much they've been talking and how much they've been communicating and they were talking a lot about the relationship they had. The whole movie is talking. Yeah, exactly. Everything is talking.

It could have been shown in a way that I would have bought into or believed a little bit more. I thought that it was kind of, I thought that it was appropriate and made sense. given what this movie is in terms of like, okay, this is about a writer trying to like essentially interview these characters to find the true character in these events. And the right, you know, Capote wasn't there. A lot of what he's experiencing is just an account from somebody that he has to trust. And so, you know, a lot of things from his perspective, they can't ever be shown. So I felt like that kind of worked in terms of what the movie was.

Most movies, I would agree with you. I would rather have like a show don't tell for much of it. But I felt like that in this scenario, it fit what was happening. Yeah, I don't know, because there are also a lot of, as far as the structure is concerned, it does kind of jump around a fair amount. And that's, you know, the nature of the real life story and the, the, the, the, the writing process, but that was like sapping some of that energy for me when, yeah, we'll just like cut to like a year later and all these like dynamics are like changing. And yeah, it is

with the structure of it being more of like a biopic type thing. But I don't know, maybe that's just me and I don't, I typically don't love biopics. And I feel like without the Philip Seymour Hoffman angle, I don't know if I'd really care about this movie that much, despite the great character actors that are sprinkled throughout here. I just feel like, weirdly, I could have done with like another half an hour to this movie or something. I just need a little bit more, I don't know, complexity, a little bit more going on. There was something lacking for me with that kind of angle. I don't know if it is just the direct contrast, but I just didn't feel like I got the best impression of some of these relationships. Yeah, and there was nothing

about like the way it was being presented and for as far as direction or blocking or whatnot or elevating it or keeping me going it wasn't it wasn't a show-offy movie other than the performance i mean but yeah it's all around that yeah and who knows how much of that is like intentional i mean there there is a pretty direct sense of tone in terms of like how coldly it's presented and the color grading matches this. And so the directing style, like, it's not really trying to do much. And I feel like in that sense, it works. But also, I mean, like, there's less ways to fuck up, I guess. You know, it's not as ambitious as a way. Yeah, it feels way less ambitious. Yeah. But I don't need it to be. I don't need, I don't want, I, I never wanted a movie like this to be

trying to compete within Cold Blood. I think that it works great as just like a companion piece, a little extra bit of information in context that after having watched Capote, I'm even more excited to watch In Cold Blood again, knowing everything that happens in this film and the context of his character and how he was interacting with him supposedly during the whole events of this film. Yeah, I guess I'm more trying to explain why I, I only really liked this, love that performance, liked the movie overall, loved in Cold Blood.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I strongly liked this, despite some flaws. I was pretty surprised with it and I was really not upset with it. You know, it's funny. There was another scene that reminded me of Killers of the Fire or Moon. There was a criticism that I didn't bring up in our original discussion.

when they do the, or maybe I did say this and I don't remember, when they do the teleplay or the reenactment, sort of like Martin Scorsese cameo appearance in Killers of the Flareman. Right at the end there. That scene in comparison to Truman Capote and like microphone in the audience, the sound quality in Killers of the Flower Moon was too perfect where I'm like, you didn't have microphones or speakers that worked that way in that decade.

You didn't. Right. Right. Like, you're not making something that looks accurate and it's distracting. Whereas in Capotea, I was like,

oh, okay, there's a little bit of, you know, peeky kind of reverby thing going on here. Like, you, you understood the sound space a bit better,

even if it wasn't like 100% accurate, there was like an attempt. Whereas like Martin Scorsese talking to a crowd in Killers of the Fire Moon. I'm like, what is this shot in like 20, right?

Yeah, like, when's the setting here? Like, what's, what, that's not how things sound. It's, there's no, you know, it was a lack of detail. And again, I mean, Killers of the Flower Moon, that's not even the only issue with the sound design, but, you know. Yeah, that is one of the things I did enjoy about this, I suppose, is the, the, the period piece, nature of it. Yeah.

It's a lot more, it's, it's fairly subtle in how it's done. You know, they're lying on the grotesque. 60s furniture and there was walking around the phone and the cars and everything. I like that stuff and I usually enjoy that. It did have good production design and I like that there's oftentimes this trap that period pieces will fall into where they'll get a bunch of like, let's say, old cars to show off, but all of them look like they're fucking brand new, right? And there's like no dust on them or anything.

This, you know, they actually, yeah, there was. some texture on the cars and, you know, other sets, uh, props and stuff in this film, which I appreciate it. It's like, okay, they look a little worn. They don't look like they're just like new, you know, if you go back to 50s or 60s, not everybody had a shiny car. Not everybody's car was like the shiniest thing in the world, obviously. It's, you look around cars currently, you know, people. Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Like mud. I guess that's just I just kept thinking about in cold blood and how much I was just, I'd prefer to watch that film again. Perfectly valid.

There's much less of a disconnect there, of course, it being 67 and the event, the event happening in 59. Like, it's, there's no disbelief with any of that. Like, all of that is so believable and it feels like you are just there in the 60s. Whereas, yeah, this does, it does feel like an early 2000s movie a bit more to me. two more things I wrote down one that I really liked and then I'll get into a criticism I loved the the sassiness of Capote especially when he was like just like fucking

insulting the guy like I know it I know what exacerbate means there's not a single word you can illuminate for me and then and then he says like it's absurd do you know what do you know what absurd means and then just immediately leaving I love that there's some great there's some great dialogue in this there's some really great dialogue

there has to be great dialogue otherwise the performance couldn't be as well realized which is the same thing with the last film and you're absolutely right about the body language that is like absolute key for you know true character transformation is the limp wrist even when he's doing the fake punch his wrist is limp

you know the crossed legs and just like how it moves with his sentences. Yeah, yeah. Even the way he'd hold like a glass. Exactly, exactly. That's why he got the Oscar. And then one final little criticism,

I thought that it was a bit fucking over the top and cheesy at points. One point that stood out to me was the, the Jesus painting with the shotgun muzzle flash. Yeah, it was like, eh, eh. I didn't love that whole montage. I don't know if it even necessarily needed that, to be honest. It could have been more subtle.

It was like weirdly gratuitous in a way that didn't help the movie Yeah, it felt like that was there Almost as like a payoff to people who didn't know about the event in detail I don't know I guess so yeah That would have been more powerful if it was just left to Capote's perspective of learning about it All through the language or the words I feel like you could still show it without it feeling as

Like sensationalized It did feel sensationalized It stood out as being like, oh, I get, this is an American movie, you know, like, that's, that's where it stood out in that sense. Like, oh, yeah, this is for American audiences. Yeah, or like when Perry Smith is, like, getting out of the, the car to be hanged. And there's, like, the kind of corny slow mo that clearly wasn't, like, an in-post thing. And I was just thinking about, like, the comparing the hanging scenes and just how much more effective it is in that 16. version. Yeah, I almost wish, I don't know how they could have really achieved it, but I think that contrast of what was real and what was exaggerated by Capote, that could have been explored somehow or communicated in a way. There's something really interesting there and reading about it after it was like, oh, that's really cool that like in the scene

where he's asked about his last words and he like forgets what he was saying but halfway through because I guess it's just so panicked and there is something much less like romantic and uh literary and like fiction um like that 60s one i just yeah i wish there was kind of more of that sprinkled in here and i don't know how you'd necessarily do that but no and i think it you think it could have easily like more fallen flat on its face if it did try is kind of my thought process here is like I think in some sense it was aware of its own limitations in terms of what it could present and I like that it did not try to exist in the same space but more or less is like DLC you know it's fucking extra level yeah it does feel like a kind of DLC we're using some of the

same assets but it's good DLC I liked it I liked it yeah it's a solid DLC yeah I would give this one, a seven out of ten. Liked it a lot. Yeah. Yeah, I liked it too. I'd actually give it the same, the same rating. It would be a low, low seven, low three in a half star for me. I did, it was just completely carried by those, by that central performance, especially.

He definitely deserved that Oscar. This is worth checking out for that alone. Um, but I just, I can't see myself revisiting this because I'll just be thinking about in cold blood and we'll probably just put that on instead. Yeah, that's what I was going to ask you. Yeah. Is it like you're going to rewatch in cold blood but not this? I'll rewatch both of them.

Yeah, I'm not sure if I, maybe just to see the performance, the Hoffman performance, but I don't know if I really connect with this director that much. I don't know. He's got his style. He likes these kind of real life stories and adapting them. But I don't know. Not my favorite. It's not really what I'm looking for from a lot of cinema.

Did you see the sorry last thing? This film like stole the thunder of another Capote. I was just about to ask you about that. Oh, yeah. I had the IMDB open. Somebody sent me the trailer after I watched Capote. And I was like, holy shit. Did you watch the trailer?

I didn't watch the trailer. I just looked at 9DB. I saw it. Yeah, Toby Jones. Sandra Bullock. Yeah. Anybody that's confused, there was a another Capote movie being made at the same time about the same thing.

Like literally like him researching his novel In Cold Blood and that's the movie. And it stars Toby Jones and the like it's just this wound up changing its release and releasing a year later because the fucking Philip Searle more Hoffman movie was coming out and they're like, uh oh I guess we got to move this around. I watched the trailer for it. How's it look? It seems so fucking, it's a big, uh-oh, stinky. Like, it's a big oops.

What's shocking about it is just how fucking star studded the cast is. Yeah. It's like Sandra Bullock, Daniel Craig, Jeff Daniels, Hope Davis, Gwyneth Paul Trow. Sigourney Weaver. Sigourney Weaver. Yeah, it's insane. And just what I didn't know it, I was watching the trailer. I was like, what, how many fucking stars are you going to throw in here?

What? What's going on? and the fact that this just nobody watched it apparently and it's not as well received and I'm curious to check it out I added it to my watch list because like now it's like what the morbidly curious is yeah it's kind of interesting on that like it's weird when this happens where like two films about something similar wind up in production at some time like there's those two Steve Jobs movies it happens now and again but like just comparing the compote the compote the Pote budget, 7 million made 50 million worldwide, infamous, $13 million budget, probably because of that cast, grossed, 2.6 million. So, yeah, a huge block. What the fuck is the, what the fuck is the point? I, um, one thing that I noted from the trailer of this infamous one is that, because it did show the two killers in just a couple shots. I'm like, they don't really look like the same characters, but something that.

I really appreciated that I didn't mention about Capote is the Perry guy, like, what great casting? It feels like the same fucking guy. Yeah. The other guy, not so much, but like Perry, like. The big Oluskey guy. You're the nihilist. Yeah, he really captured it and he looked like him. And I really liked that about it.

Yeah. Very cool. All right. Question time? Yeah. Let's do some questions then from the Sardonicast community. Head over to the suggestion thread on the subreddit. If you'd like to leave questions for future episodes, just like Vince is depressed.

Have you played Spider-Man too? And have you enjoyed it? I know Adam did not. I brought it and was kind of let down how it was not as good as the first one. I found that Arkham games better as the series goes along and these sort of stagnating or getting worse in terms of writing. Have you put up like a A clip or something

About your experience Have you finished it? I'm not sure what he's referencing No, so I there's Two Sunday streams The first one I played 30 minutes And then couldn't handle it and just shut it off And played another game that I wanted So you can see my part quickly

You can see my part one of me just like giving up Because I'm like well The beginning of that game is just so fucking unimportant and numbing and insistent and fake, phony bullshit emotions of like, we're fight, you're fighting the big Sandman boss and oh, you get wings and like the music doing like the most cliche just fucking like soy boy Marvel shit like ever. And the entire time I'm playing a fucking tutorial. It's a tutorial. Have something different for the fucking tutorial. Don't lie to me and pretend like, oh, this is so epic and you're fighting a big boss and there's like, what the, what emotions am I supposed to get from fighting a big boss if there's no consequence to it and the game's playing itself for me? This is a tutorial.

And so I just wasn't buying anything that it was selling. And I was just kind of pissed off at it. And I was like, you know what? There's another game, the Talos Principle 2, that also just came out. I want to play that instead. And I did. And I had a great fucking night. And then.

Hop on Liza P. No. I don't know. I don't know when that would ever happen. But I, yeah, then next week after that, so this Sunday, I played another few hours of Spider-Man 2. It got a bit better. I just needed some time away from it. I needed a little bit of a break.

And then, yeah, there's a bunch of better that I just kind of hate. And, you know, the combat as it gets. more intricate and there's more gadgets and more things to unlock. I start to enjoy it more. But the story sucks. The dialogue sucks. None of the characters feel real. Everything feels like forced and insisted. And there's fucking like what bothers me a lot about this fucking game. And I can tell it's only going to get worse as I keep playing. Is they think they're fucking naughty dog. And they're like, they think they're fucking naughty dog and trying to do like some weird life is strange shit like oh collect the trash around your house i'm like

get back to the other shit get back to the important like why am i doing a walking simulator right now oh you're on a bike with your friend isn't this meaningful don't you like the music and this is just so sentimental like yeah maybe if i gave a shit about these characters or if what was happening in between these parts was just so fucking special that like you could justify a break but i barely felt like i was getting anything out of the game so far so for them to like take a break. You're like, oh, you're doing a bicycle scene. Oh, you're doing a trash collecting scene inside your own fucking house. Like, no, get, we haven't even started shit yet. Get me to the shit that I want. Yeah, I always just see those scenes as like, oh man, on playtesting,

people are just rocketing through this game too quick. We got a, we got to slow people down right now. Yeah, I guess. I don't know. I think that they thought that they were doing something artful. It feels really pretentious. I don't think it was about slowing people down. I think they think that they were doing art. I think they think they're fucking naughty dog. It's like a PlayStation cliche almost at this point. You know, the person over the shoulder. Sony. Saddad simulated type thing. Yeah. Jason. It did feel like heavy rain.

I do kind of, I kind of liked the opening set piece. I thought that was okay as like a way of just getting you straight into the action. And I think the movement system is fantastic. But man, I'm so with you on the writing. I was like, I really, I really. kind of dug the story of that that first game. I thought Doc Hawk was like a really fun character, like what they did with that and I'm like losing his mind to try and save his body and the whole like Sinister Six angle and this like really good, a really good boss fight towards the end with the vulture and Electro. The characters is like dangling and playing with that being Venom and Craven the Hunter. These are two characters that like personally I've never really

have never really connected with or seen the appeal in. I thought, oh, maybe they're going to like find an angle to win me over like they did with some of the characters in that first game but man they are they are weak-house characters like Venom's motivation like sucks Craven is just such a boring

character Venom is an obligatory addition in any Spider-Man property because it's the most popular character it's the Joker you know like it's you know if you know Spider-Man you know what Venom is if you know the Joker's actually a good character I know I know but he brings It's like something cool out of the main character, whereas like Venom, I guess it's kind of cool how it changes the main character and what you can do with that.

He made him emo. And him like controlling him at night and stuff. Yeah. I haven't gotten very far in this game yet, so I don't know what I'm in for it. There's something so like 90s about Venom to me. Yes. It's not necessarily like a bad thing in it itself, but it's like, you just like, it's like the Boba Fett thing. It's like you just like how he looks, man.

I just think he looks cool. You want him on a t-shirt and you want him to divorce people. I've just never connected or understood that character. Well, you say the word vore. But like, honestly, I think half of Venom's fan base is like just people with a fetish or people who don't know that they have a fetish. He's like, he's like, he's a big, musly, gooey man who can eat people whole. He's like with a deep voice in a really long tongue, right?

There's a lot of porn of Venom. There's a lot of porn of venom, okay? I've seen all of it, all right? You guys can stop. You can stop pretending. I've seen all of it for research purposes just to, you know, see what the hell is going on. Try to investigate, but you people. That's hilarious.

No, but if you're bugged by the right and that early on, I don't know if you're going to be able to finish it, man. I know it's going to get worse. I already know it's going to get worse. That's why I just couldn't play it that first day. I'm in a bad mood. I need, my Sunday stream's supposed to be my day off. What do I want to do here?

Do I want to have fun? I want to have fun. I want to have fun playing a good game, the Talos Principle 2, starring Adam Green, the director of Frozen 2010. Oh, funny, weird. Yeah, he has a voice in that.

It's kind of funny. Like, I'm kind of so over that Ubisoft open world design, you know, the checklist type thing. So I just, I just rocketed through the main story

in, In the weekend it came out just to see those main beats. I don't care about anything else. But yeah, I was a little bit disappointed on that front. I do like that gameplay a lot. But did you play the Arkham games? Because the biggest contrast to me is like that character and the different types of gameplay are, they're fucking, they're perfect.

He's a perfect character for that. Like the stealth stuff is justified. The punching stuff is justified. The detective investigation stuff is completely justified. Whereas that model being transferred over to Spider-Man, like, I think the stealth sections are really, like, boring and badly designed. Like, there's no tension. They have been terrible so far, you're right. They're just easy mode.

Like, and they keep giving you gadgets to make it easier. And, like, they never, they're, like, such strict rules in those Arkham games. And, like, yeah, you can do this easy takedown, but, like, once. And then they, like, start twiggin and they start, like, counteracting you. And you've got to, you've got to adapt to the enemies. as you're like Spider-Man. There's like, no, every time you're like slowed down in the games, I kind of hate it in Spider-Man.

You know, I want to be swinging around. I want to be moving a million miles an hour, and that feels great. I want to be jumping off rooftops and flying all over the place. That's why I want to be Spider-Man. I don't want to be... Yeah. Crawling around in vents and stuff as Spider-Man. That's lame.

No. No, this is a factory game made by people who think they're artists. And sure, there's probably individual talented artists working and doing the, the fucking the least paid most effortful things in this game but when it comes to

the people that you know making the actual decisions in terms of what appears in the game and the story and all that shit like oh boy it really seems like one of those like

nepotism higher fucking you're in a group and you're just your team of writers and too many cooks in the kitchen and they're like oh we think that this is what a game should be or what a Spider-Man game should be

like it's really it just feels phony it's fake it's bullshit if you want to play a game made by real people with real things to say in a real artistic vision go instead download the talus principle to or the first one they're both like really good well all my two's that right now but um it's a puzzle game by the way and not everybody's into it just FY you oh right and that first game you remember those those Mary Jane sequences where you're like stealthing around or whatever oh yeah there's no combat I hear there's The way they reintroduce those, it kind of trivializes the bad guys in a way that is so goofy and insane to me where it's like everyone, even the people that like the stealth in the first game and like to the things that I had problems with in that first game, everyone was going on about those sections and how boring and bad and how it hurts the replayability. and they made the decision to double down on it and let's flash out the gameplay here.

Like people want to be playing as Mary Jane, right? It's just like, come on, man. I was like groaning. Well, because everybody who hated those sections in the first game were just sexist and there was no good reason for it. So they have to double down to prove that women are smart. There's one okay one. There's one okay one which is used for kind of like story purposes in a more kind of horror context. That was pretty cool.

But outside of that, I don't want to be playing Mary Jane with like a spider gun going around taking out goons. That is, that is lame and it makes it like... Taking out gooners. Yeah,

maybe that would be more enjoyable and believable. I mean, that would make it fun. Anytime something's bad, just make it a shitpost. Make it just like a disgusting, profane shitposts and then it's fixed in some way. She kind of does have like a goon gun, yeah.

Yeah, that was like really goofy. Okay. It's like yeah, because as Spider-Man, you're like, you're fighting like hordes of goons and you've got to do these combos and take them down. And the Mary Jane, she's going around by herself. No superpowers, mind you. Just like tasing, like a hundred guards sneaking around. It's like so stupid. Oh.

It's not what I'm looking for. Yeah, I'm really just not, I feel like it's going to get worse as it goes. So I'm going to do the game in chunks. I will be playing bits of it every week. I will not dedicate an entire day towards playing that game. I will dedicate part of a day. Yeah.

It has its moments, but like I was, yeah, I was quite disappointed by that story in the writing specifically. I thought, I thought, yeah,

there was no, no reason for it to be that level. No, no. But I, I was thinking back to when people got mad

at Ralph for skipping the cut scenes in the first game. Right. And I tried skipping the cut scenes in this game because, I mean,

I guess Ralph was ahead of his fucking time. It wouldn't let me skip the cutscenes. They fucking, they must have listened to our podcast. They must have listened to people getting mad at Ralph. Being like, we will remove the ability to skip the cutscenes because this story is more important or something. I don't know.

That's funny. I was honestly just like, please get me out of here. I didn't do anything. Oh, fuck. You know, I was just, I was totally not. I wanted to escape. Oh, man. I can't wait to see the clip of you doing the music.

park section that's gonna be awesome to watch. Oh god, yeah, there's some fun shit. Why is everyone's face different? Why is everyone look different from the first? Man, I would go the game opens and it shows a character and I'm like, oh, you know what? I heard all this stuff about the face being changed. I don't mind this face for Peter and then it turns out that character's Harry. I'm like, oh, okay. And then you see Peter he's like, I don't know how well. he's supposed to be like in his mid-20s or something but he looks like a baby it's bizarre I everyone looks stupid everyone looks fucking stupid Mary Jane looks strange like everyone yeah

all the faces are a little bit a little bit funky I don't think MJ stands for Mary Jane I think it stands for massive jaw got her all right uh yeah what I don't know we'll see how the rest of the game goes yeah yeah we'll see well I'm sure we'll get some fun uh moments out of it. If anybody wants to watch me suffer, I play games every Sunday, and I will be starting it with the Spider-Man too, whatever. I'll be continuing to do that. Twitch.tv slash YMS plays. Don't even have to spell it. It's exactly how it sounds. And on YouTube, YouTube.com slash at YMS streams, and you'll see you'll see gameplay. And I will be, I stream in both places now.

Actually, if you want to catch the live one, you want to go to YMS plays on YouTube. YMS streams is for the archives. I know it's confusing. Sorry. Subscribe to all of them. Hit the bell. All right.

Next question. How fatuitous buddy says, I'm curious what you have to say about this. Now that Best Buy won't be selling Blu-Rays on either physical or online stores next year, do you believe we're nearing the end of physical media or we're going to treat Blu-Rays slash DVDs as a niche collectible like vinals for audio.

I hadn't heard about this, but I read this variety article. But yeah, Best Buy is going to end DVDs. Is this a Grim Reaper knocking door to door? I'm shocked they hadn't already. I mean, like, fucking... The selection was always shit with Best Buy. They stopped selling CDs a long time ago, obviously. I mean, nobody buys CDs anymore.

Yeah, that doesn't surprise me. But, you know, vinyl has made a resurgence. there's still people that want physical media and perhaps maybe the more that streaming services and studios that license their content to streaming services keep weirdly fucking things up

or removing things or changing things or like even if you buy it on iTunes they can just remove the content you don't actually own the media you own a license to view it I like having physical media I like the collector's aspect to it and I also think it's the best quality

I mean it is it is yeah it's not Netflix for it's a 4K blue ray, right? You don't have to worry about the bit rate. You don't have to worry about it. It's on the disc. I mean, yeah, we exist in communities that do care about physical media.

Who knows whether or not that space is forever going to shrink and never be profitable again? I'm willing to believe that it's something that is sustainable because there's plenty of media companies that exist right now that pretty much just sell like collectors, 4K Blu-Rays or you know just physical media

like Arrow we got fuck who did the vinegar syndrome they've got the first movie from Dream scenario guy they got that on Blu-ray oh yeah yeah

there's tons of there's tons of like Blu-ray companies like Criterion is like a Blu-ray company that's the big one yeah they seem to be profitable It's more like I watched earlier as of the time of us recording this Chris Stuckman made a video about the film industry and how he's scared about certain things And he mentions in it the the Netflix film The Netflix film Hush

It's like just taken off the service now and it never had a physical release and it's not alone in this happening and this seems to just be happening more and more and more and I I, there's something really, really disturbing about that to me. I don't like that. There's something gutterily like, ugh, like huge teams of people are making this, and millions of dollars being sunk into it. And now, how am I supposed to watch Willow now? You know? Yeah.

Yeah. It's, it's very weird as far as like the art form and the overlap with the way it's monetized and the way, the unintended consequences of, of the streaming wall. And now I feel like we're reaching we're reaching we're we're reaching the tail end of the The positives of what was great about streaming to begin with it feels like it's all like yeah, they're all introducing like Ad schemes and it's like oh my god they're raising them the monthly costs over and over it's like well you're just gonna push people back to Illegal stuff. Yeah, you know So yeah, it's just a snake eating its own toe I feel comfortable in

my ability to get the media that I want in any given way, whether that be, you know, fucking getting past region lockings and like, uh, all that shit. Like, I'm so, I do this basically, you know, I do it for a living. So if I need to torrent things, I will. And, uh, well, uh, well, well, now that it's, it's like you're not even given a choice. Like, if you want to watch hush right now. Oh, yeah. You have to do that. You actually have to do that. It's like some more Nintendo games or whatever, where there's like, you have no choice. Yeah. So what?

You're just leaving money on the table. This is very strange. Don't like it. Yeah. And then the worst weird shit happening with the Coyote versus Acme, another write-off for Warner Brothers. That's the latest victim. Yeah. But the news on that is that they're allowed now because of the public backlash and because

of all the, you know, artists that worked on it leaking how much. they enjoy the project and how much it was like well received and like all the love and art that went into it and like all this shit like getting big on Twitter now warner brother's like okay I guess we'll sell the distribution rights to somebody like if Netflix wants to buy it or apple wants to buy it we'll do that why wasn't that on the table for anything else that they did why wasn't that on the table for bat girl is this story like we need to complain harder about bat girl like I want to see that out of morbid curiosity I don't give a shit if it's going to be a bad movie. People made it. People like, even if I don't like it, there's people that worked on it

that care about it. You know, like fucking, oh God. That would be fans who love it. Yeah. It's so annoying. If you're going to tax write off it anyway, just fucking leak it. Leak it. Leak it. Yeah. Satire. I'm not telling people to do anything illegal. I'm lying, actually. That Acme movie is kind of a fun premise to me. I feel like you could do something pretty entertaining with that. Yeah. Who knows if that'll be good or not, but. No. But yeah, that was like one of the more, because like WB they've been releasing some some real shit lately, but that was one way. It was kind of a fun way to spin your IP, you know? That's kind of cool. And that's the one they'd like shell.

Yeah. I mean, the score seemed really cool. I liked the clips of the orchestra. I don't know if you saw that. Yeah. It was like one of the league. No, I saw that I saw that reel that was taken down, I think, shortly after. Yeah. Yeah, very unfortunate, very weird place. This industry is in specifically, I feel like. Yeah, very interesting, very sad. And I don't know, maybe get your Blu-Rays in now while you can. I mean, you'll be able to get more Blu-Rays in later if more people buy Blu-Rays

because companies are doing exactly what's profitable. If it's profitable for them to release a thing on Blu-ray, they will, right? Why do you think like Netflix owns certain properties that are Netflix originals that wound up getting Criterion Blu-rays because they know that if they were to release that they, you know, it has enough popularity that someone would actually want to buy it and it's licensed through Criterion, right? There are streaming service originals that do exist on physical media because there's a market for it. If more people bought physical media, then more physical media would be sold. It's really that simple.

So it's just a matter of convincing people. Yeah. It definitely seems like that market is shrinking. though, because I always pictured like, yeah, DVDs will be around for fucking ever, you know, because I just figured it was like old people, certain of a certain generation would just be like churning through DVDs forever, you know, but I guess maybe not. I guess streaming really is just taking over. It's like crazy how quickly that happened, but here we are. Thank you for the questions. We did it. Yeah. Got some good ones in there. Hell yeah. Um,

I think it's my turn to recommend a movie. It is. What have you got? Is it? Yeah, yeah. It's not as easy to get confused as it was when they were three of us. Yeah, true. How do I pronounce this? Aguirre? The Wrath of God, directed by Werner Herzog. Never seen it, 1972.

It's supposedly interesting. Oh, yeah. Have you seen it? I haven't known by a movie fan of Hutzog. So it would be nice to fill out. That'll be fun. That'll be fun. Yeah, yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

Yeah, low commitment, hour and a half. Apparently, there's a bunch of shit about the movie. that'll be interesting to discuss, regardless of what the movie's like. But, yeah, I have pretty, pretty good high hopes for it. I like... Yeah, this is cool. I liked his Nusferatu thing. So anyway, if you don't want to be spoiled for Aguirre or whatever, I don't know,

the wrath of God directed by Werner Herzog, 1972. Then watch it before this next... the next episode comes out. These episodes come out every two weeks. You can listen to them early by going to sardonicast.com. Sign up for premium. It's only $2 a month.

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