Sardonicast - Sardonicast 181: Beast Games, No Country for Old Men feat. @ManCarryingThing

Episode Date: January 20, 2025

Guest channels:  @womancarryingman   @ManCarryingThing  Support the Show for $2 a month and receive all future episodes early at https://sardonicast.com and https://www.patreon.com/Sardonicast. Website: https://sardonicast.com Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Sardonicast Reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/sardonicast Twitter: https://twitter.com/sardonicast Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/sardonicast Sardonicast Highlights: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC8AhJ0bzQgs5fb9m_ZCRqkw/featured Alex's channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/IHEOfficial Adam's channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/YourMovieSucksDOTorg Alex's Twitter: https://twitter.com/IHE_OFFICIAL Adam's Twitter: https://twitter.com/2gay2lift Adam's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/YMS Intro music by: https://www.youtube.com/user/anUnkindnessvideo Timestamps: 0:00 Intro rambles 15:45 Beast Games 48:26 No Country for Old Men 1:50:00 Questions 2:26:47 Recommendation + outro

Three, two, one. Okay, everybody, I'm sick. And usually I do an intro, but I got a great idea this time. I'm going to give away my job to AI, and we're going to ask it for an intro. Oh, Lord. Hey, what the? Okay, this is already not working. I don't really use this stuff.

Allow? I'm using co-pilot? Okay. Don't allow. Oh, good morning, Adam. Shut up. What can I do for you? I'm rolling up my virtual sleeves.

What am I hearing? It's co-pilot. Hello, can you please create an intro that is a parody of Mr. Beast, except he's, one of the games revolves around poo-poo and pee-pee. Let's keep it fun, but light. Here we go. What's up, Beasts. Welcome back to the channel where we take crazy to a whole new level. Today, we're diving into a wild challenge.

Loser has to spend an entire hour in the mysterious porta potty. Will they brave the stinky challenge or will they bail? Stay tuned. It's going to be a sensational ride. Make sure to like, subscribe, and stay fresh. All right. Thank you. Will they brave the stinky challenge?

I like that version of Mr. Beas. I like that guy. I'd watch his channel way more. He's got a better voice. Smooth, yeah. I'm Adam from your movie sex. This is Sardincast. Sorry for subjecting all of you to that, but that was kind of fun.

Yeah. I don't forgive you. I forgive you another time, perhaps. It was kind of different. We change things up. I'm Alex from I. He, but that's not all. You've probably heard the other voice there.

Who are joined by today? We are joined today by I'm mancaring thing. YouTube.com forward slash mancaring thing. It's forward. YouTube.com forward slash.com. MCT. Yeah. Slash.

Slashed. We're slashing the URLs. Forward slash. No, no, no. But I have to be real because I feel like I'm representing more the second channel, which is the movie channel. That's woman carrying man. Yes. Which I do with my wife who is on maternity leave right now.

So I've just been going insane, you know, watching Craven and Mufasa all alone. Yeah. Is Craven out on digital? No, you've, you. watched in theaters. No, no, no, I abandoned my newborn to go for two hours to go subject myself to Craven the Hunter. That sounds so funny. Because Alex and I had a serious discussion about whether or not we were going to just jump right into that. Yeah, serious. But we were like, we haven't even watched Venom 3 yet and we don't really feel like going into a theater to see it. Not only because we wouldn't

be able to say anything and yell or, you know, make crack jokes at it. But also because we're, you know, funding it. Also because we're saying to Sony, yes, more please, even though we kind of wanted it to get on digital sooner. And the best way to do that would be to not support it in theaters. So we decided to see Venom 3 last episode instead and wait for digital for Craven. I just feel like the amount of support I show Craven would be just like a tiny little speck of sand in an ocean of emptiness, you know, like, I don't know. Has anyone seen, seen Craven genuinely? It's... You might be the only one, like genuinely the only one in the world that's seen that film. Yeah, I don't know. There was another couple in the theater when I saw it,

and they were having a good old time. They enjoyed the whole thing? Yeah, you know, they walked out halfway through, but I assume that's because they had some urgent business to attend to. They are very busy. Probably had nothing to do with the film. So, I guess, so there's a, is it like, kind of like a Russian doll scenario? So there's women carrying man carrying thing carrying baby now. Yeah, yeah, no, it's very much like that and like that in reality, you know. Okay. It's, yeah, no, it's, I mean, the name of the channel originally was from a Wallace Stevens poem called Man Carrying Thing, which is just a very, I just thought it was just such a,

weird title. So I picked that very randomly for, I mean, I feel like most people just pick the most random things for their YouTube channel names. And that just happened to be it. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Alex, what, what about your YouTube channel name? Is it because you hate yourself? Um, that's the main reason. Yeah, kind of stem from you hate to myself when I went from there kind of thing. I'm Alex from I hate myself. You can't say your I'm Alex. We can't say that anymore. Oh, true. You can't say that anymore. Yeah. It's been appropriated and then canceled. Shit.

Is there another way to say it? No. No, no, no. Just sweet. No, but Jake, you mentioned your name as a reference to a poem. But one of the things it stands out about you and your channel to me is the emphasis on books and the literary. You got quite a unique channel going on with the, you kind of got the short form stuff going on, but you've got a few, like, long, hour long, like, deep dives on. things but also you go I filter by oldest and you got these older book reviews so tell me about how

you've like figured out how to get down to this mixture of content and focus and this love of books and how that applies to film and yeah yeah thank you very much uh well it started out because I had a heart and a soul and I was doing it with a passion and then over time that I erased that in order to grow and build on YouTube. So now, while I have found some success, I occasionally do the book stuff to try to preserve what little is left of my heart. As just for show. Yeah, well, it's all for show.

I mean, this is for show. I mean, of course. It is a show. But I do want to just shout out first off that I've been watching this podcast for years. I've been a lurker in the I haven't commented or anything probably no that's fine I can tell I've been I've been I've been watching I've been watching since the old days you know I I remember Community College I would listen to you guys talk about Spider-Man trilogy I mean this was 2018 2019 so yeah no I'm I'm just like really happy and genuinely very grateful to be on the podcast because I'm I'm I'm just like really happy and genuinely very grateful to be on the podcast because I'm I'm I'm I just, I love both of your channels. I've listened for a while. And I've got to say, you know, to all of the people out there on the subreddit,

you were all freaks. Yeah. Fuck you. I've been watching and observing for years now. You are all psychos. You know, funny, funny and, you know, sometimes well-meaning psychos. But I just, I hope I'm not being too out of place here. in pointing out that there are, you know, I've noticed there are two types of posts on the

subreddit, you know. The first one is, you know, oh, I wonder if they've seen, you know, my darling Clementine, you know, what do they think of this film, you know, that I just saw? And then there's Adam gave Captain America six, a two stars, but Alex gave it a seven. I should fight about that. And then I guess there's a third one, which is like... I heard Adam murdered Ralph's entire family. And those are the three circulating comments.

It's just, it's getting out of hand. It's, yeah, I'm used to it. Fuck everything. Yeah, that subreddits for you. So I felt like I had to just come on to the podcast and just, you know, how many opportunities do you get to just have a PSA about this? Yeah. Thank you.

Well, yeah. Yeah, I've been watching your channel for, I don't know. a couple years I don't know how I don't know what time is anymore but I've been watching your channel for a while I've checked out some of the women carrying man stuff as well

and I figured I figured you'd be good to have on the podcast because even on your main channel there's definitely a lot of awareness of movie tropes that you poke fun at and a lot of things that I also get kind of annoyed by that you you're able to give this sort of catharsis for

in a relatable quick satisfying way oh well thank you that's that's the hope um yeah i mean it's just like coming up with whatever annoys me at all and yeah and i feel like you you know you both are good at talking about what annoys you so um you know it's a skill it's a skill it's a skill to just be cranky about everything. I wouldn't be very good at making it in a short amount of time. I think that maybe I over-explain things too much. Yeah, that's quite a skill. No, but that's what I love about what you do because it's like a level of detail you go into,

like your Lion King review, the level of detail is frightening, like genuinely concerning. I think it's a problem. It makes me go, how does he subject himself to this level of detail and like analyzing it so closely? So it's a it's a level and a skill that I, that is really amazing to see. Some might call it hyperfixation. Some. I might be, I might be some kind of neurodivergent in some way. But I can't, I can't officially ever know.

because then apparently that would decrease my chances at potential immigration to other countries where they would consider me a, uh, with the health care negative, I don't know. Really? Yeah, I've heard about that. That's crazy. They would consider you to be like a burden on the health care system, and so they're like, no, thank you. Huh.

So I don't know. But I guess that's only if you tell them. Interesting. Well, I don't know. TikTok told me that I have autism and ADHD, so. Oh. Yeah. Oh, yeah. I've diagnosed myself with 100,000 mental conditions over TikTok. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Finally, someone's explained it to me. And it keeps recommending it to me. So I think TikTok knows. Have you noticed this fucking thing? So how many, okay, you're both on letterbox. Do either of you use the IMDB app like ever? I do, yeah. You do. Yeah. I've been

watching movies spoiler and a lot of the time especially now that I've been like kind of sick and bedridden for a lot I'll like pause a movie

do something else nap whatever come back to it later like maybe a day later right and a lot of the time I would say like the over majority of the time, if I go back into the app on the exact same title of whatever I'm watching,

because I'll usually look it up before I start watching it, right? No country for old man. And I don't have a rating or whatever. Hypothetically, I did have a rating for no country, but on whatever title, I go back into the app and if it's halfway through a movie or later in the day, however much longer, it doesn't really matter. nothing has changed. But if it's after I actually finish the movie and I'm like in the end credits or whatever, there'll be a pop-up on the app that says, what do you rate this title? Right? Like it knows that I finish

the movie. And now I'm thinking, is, is IMDB listening for like, does it have content ID for like the sounds of the end credits music or like the end of the movie? What's happening? Can someone explain this shit to me? Because it's happened so many fucking times. And I'm trying to like test this further. And it hasn't happened with some like really obscure titles. So I feel like it must be some kind of content ID system. But I don't remember telling it that it could listen if that's what it's doing.

So it's somebody doing an investigation for me. I might just be spouting nonsense. And what would it be listening for? Like the end credits and then it refresh. brushes like and then and then yeah if it's so so it doesn't it's not based on length because I've stopped the movie and like come back to it right and this happens like in a theater too where I'll be done the movie and then go back to the same title in the app and it'll be like oh the pop-up what would what do you rate this how many stars I'm like oh okay interesting I

for a while I thought it was just a default of like you know after however many hours or whatever you'd I don't know like I don't know what it's doing form refresh thing because I've I've had this happen to me as well but never to to that level of like accuracy where it's like right after finishing a movie and then it yeah so I don't use it as regularly as you though so I'm just I don't know somebody else figure this shit out I'm not gonna talk about this any longer because I don't I don't even know I think this could easily be explained by the fact that IMDB is an evil evil website and app and I I'm I'm a I don't know how you still use it.

I feel like most people have abandoned it, right? Well, they don't, Letterbox doesn't let you rate TV shows. I approve of that. Oh, really? Yeah. You don't like it. It's supposed to be coming, I thought. Yeah.

Are they going to do that? I don't know. I feel like it makes it a bit simpler. And I don't know. I like to look down from my ivory tower down upon the TV landscape, so. Mm-hmm. Oh, you're like Tarantino looking down on TV.

I see this. Yeah. I'm basically Tarantino, yeah. IMDB is definitely going to shit. I wish there was, yeah, it's, I wish that I could just show up to whoever's managing IMDB and just shake them and be like, can you fix this about it? here's a real simple easy solution to this problem.

Like just about the UI or like list making. Like let me click and drag. Like you used to let me do that. Why'd you change it? I have to number each thing individually. Yeah, it's so stupid. It is kind of crazy.

It's kind of crazy because they had such an advantage. It's kind of like what, Zoom and Skype, you know, just like you guys had such an advantage. And then Letterbox comes in and takes over the culture, the movie culture. So yeah,

they fumbled it. Well, speaking of fumbling it, we saw Beast Games, the new show from the titular Mr. Brest. And how many episodes did you all see? I saw all four that are currently available as of recording this episode. Same. I saw all. I saw five. I saw the secret episode. Oh, shit. We've gone ahead in time. Because I scanned all the QR. barcodes and I played all of the mini games. And you bought all the feastables. You got a magic ticket. I did, yeah.

This was shocking. And I kind of, I started watching it just out of morbid curiosity. And then I couldn't stop watching it because of just how uniquely bad it was. Because I remember, this came out. I hadn't seen it at the time. But someone from IGN gave this a two out of ten. Yeah, I saw that. And Mr. Beast responded with like a quote tweet.

I'm paraphrasing something along the lines of, you know, a lot of people worked really hard on this show and had fun. Why are you trashing it? It's like, okay, well, you know, it's kind of funny to defend it that way. Like, what if he genuinely feels that way? And even then, it kind of like not having seen it. I was like, that seems kind of harsh. but now that I've seen it I'm like

yeah that's pretty fair that's a pretty fair assessment of how fucking terrible this show is yeah it's grotesque it's honestly grotesque the whole time I was watching these four episodes all I could think was

in a few decades Mr. Beast is going to be hosting the Hunger Games like just straight up that's just where we're going to be but yeah I thought this was like gross and it's so it's so similar to squid game and concept and even execution as far as like the presentation of it and these people with the masks on and logos on their faces and stuff it's like they serve no

purpose how have you even legally got away with this yeah yeah well he already did the squid games in real life youtube video and so if he didn't get if he didn't get yeated over that legally i think that's his biggest video too so i wonder if that is fed into this whole show idea yeah yeah there's no purpose to the mask guys other than just reminding you of Squid Games. How familiar are you guys with the Mr. Beast content? Like, it's just videos day by day. I can honestly say I've never been able to sit through an entire one. Maybe like a minute. I sit through, I sat through a couple. Yeah. But I can't do it because of that just frantic editing, like screaming everything and the text flying around and the vibrations.

And it's just, it's way too much for me. But what about you, Jake? Are you familiar with the Mr. Beast? I've seen a lot of Mr. Beast videos. There's a real fascinating. with how they're produced. And I think just also from like an algorithmic level, like just trying to understand what they think is going to be so successful. I mean, it is successful. But also I think what makes it work so well on YouTube and keeping, you know, 14-year-olds glued to the screen, it's so, so different from what they try to do on Amazon.

And it's so weird because I expected the show to at least be like, competent and in like have some interesting stuff like okay they have all this money mr beast like he's he's done like cool stuff like in arguably like some like cool set pieces like they may not be to your taste but it's kind of like okay there's some interesting stuff going on he's objectively cool well that's what i'm trying to get to yeah he's my best friend but um i think that what shocked me on this, even the first episode, was that the games were like, boring. It was, there was nothing interesting. It was just a lot of people. And literally, like, half of the games in this game, in this show called Beast Games were just people trying to decide who to eliminate

amongst themselves. Yeah. It's a very lazy fucking approach. There were three types of games that we've seen so far. It's sacrifice yourself or someone else for money. And just say that you want money or whatever. Something involving a red ball or something involving a gold coin. And that's like all three. It's just like, oh yeah. And then we had the quiz game for babies where we're a multiple choice question asked what's the largest animal. And one of the answers was blue whale. was rhinoceros and one was like what ostrich is like literally elementary school questions to the point where even within that episode they're like all the contestants are getting them right so we had to make this harder and then it was still baby questions I'm like

dude like is this are you even marketing this like as a kid's show like what's what's going on this is kind of boring it's really weird it's not even stimulating enough for kids so why are all the, why are all the games baby, like, was that a note from Amazon or like, is, is that, you just completely creatively bankrupt at this point? Like, oh, catch the ball, throw the ball, throw the ball at the right time. How many coins you give away to one person. Like, fucking Christ, I can't believe how lazy these game concepts are. It's genuinely astonishing. I was kind of intrigued at first with the whole, like, oh, there's a thousand people. How are they even I was kind of thinking about that. How do they even put this together? And they're mentioning

like a thousand cameras and all these different angles. And that whole psycho first game where they were all on those squares and every single person is individually like vlogging into a little camera attached to their little booth or whatever. Yeah. This is this is all about the excess, I guess, and the scale and oh, we've built a city somewhere. And yeah, you can win a private island. It's just like the gross excess. All of his most popular videos I know for. Yeah, it's just handing away big numbers and the whole thing is just, oh, we're getting bigger, a bit, getting crazier. But of course, like, within these first four episodes, we're down to, what, 60 contestants from a thousand? So, even that's, like, not interesting, the scale of it at a certain point.

Yeah. And you're just, you're just barely now starting to understand who the people are as individuals and relate to them as people. Yeah. Yeah. It's like been, like, each episode's like, each episode feels really long. Yeah. It's like over 30 minutes, I think. It's, it's, it's like an hour. Yeah, we're on the fourth episode. We've gone through so much time and I'm like, that's what's crazy to me because I feel like there's always this economy of time in Mr. Beast videos. Like they're always boom, boom, boom, we've got to get to the next important thing. But this is like so repetitive.

We're doing the same type of game over and over and we still don't really know who people are. There's that guy who's like the cult leader who's like super religious. But beyond that, everyone is just kind of a mush. Yeah, it's like they're all new characters every single episode. and they don't even have character. All you do is just see random people screaming with no emotional attachment to them. They don't have stories.

They don't have goals. They're all just fucking NPCs because they're not characterized within the show. I don't know if either of you ever saw Squid Game the Challenge, which was the Netflix reality TV show version of Squid Game. Did either of you see that? No. No.

Perfect. So you're not going to get canceled. for talking about it. So people are, there's a lot of really toxic conversation about certain pieces of media on the internet, like Twitter, and also particularly letterboxed,

which is part of the reason I don't go on there, where things like Last of Us 2, or like, now it's Amelia Perez, where it's just like, Jesus Christ, you can't even say that you like something without inciting a mob or whatever

or alerting the horde. Squid Game, the challenge, I do encourage you just check out the first episode because knowing that Mr. Beast is essentially trying to emulate that and just seeing how monumentally different and just how terribly he failed at doing that, it's night and day. It's genuinely night and day. Sure, there are controversies with Squid Game the Challenge. did they do everything perfectly in terms of like the level of exploitation

that comes with making a fucking game show reality show or like the safety of coordinating 500 people in a warehouse and not being able to like completely climate control everything and there's some things where it's like okay you know maybe some of the contestants if they've experienced something that they can measure,

then they can sue them, and maybe they'll sue them. I don't know. Right now, it's just their word against fucking Netflix or whatever, right? Mm-hmm. But in terms of filmmaking, it's actually really impressive.

And people fucking hate me for saying this. I don't even think it's a great show. Like, it's filled with reality TV show bullshit. I give it like a six. But they, they, on the first episode, They characterized.

There are people to follow. There are interesting dynamics. And it's just the shots are very intricately coordinated for a reality TV show where there's like 500 people. Everybody's got like a lav mic, the amount of editing and decision making that would go into curating all of that footage and especially all of the audio and isolating the audio from all. these other people that are like within close proximity. It's just it's actually impressive and I hate that I can't say I liked the show without a bunch of people going like that's immoral like fucking crazy every fucking every game show on the fucking planet every reality show ever has exploited people.

One of the episodes of Fear Factor didn't even get aired because it was Joe Rogan getting two girls to drink donkey piss and semen. Like, every fucking, like, people get exploited in non-reality TV shows, too. Werner Herzog's abused animals in, like, every single one of his films. He just, like, threw a fucking horse in the river. He killed a bunch of mice for his, his Dracula movie or whatever. Like, you know, and the reaction to me not liking one of those films as much was like, I can't believe Adam's so uncultures.

Like, what fucking, I don't know. I wish it could just be about the filmmaking. I don't know. None of these takes are as bad as you. disliking trap though. I think that's unfortunately. Yeah, that's a fun one. You're still talking about M. Knight-Sharmelon in 2024? How could you?

Okay. He also released a movie this year. Anyway, that was my little ramble, but I do I'm really curious to hear both of your takes. Just watch the first episode. Like, it's, there's something really intriguing about it. Like, I enjoy that show. So fucking cancel me. I enjoy Squid Games the challenge, okay?

From a filmmaking standpoint, and I appreciate the amount of work that went into it, even if, by nature of it being a fucking reality television show where you're getting a bunch of people who need money to compete for money, it is unethical, yes. So is this fucking Mr. Beast dumb shit, too. And every reality show. It's all gross. How does the production compare to the Beast games, which it's supposed to be the most expensive reality show ever made? He keeps saying it.

A hundred million dollar budget, which is obscene. And outside of the scale of it, I don't really see why. Because the actual way it's edited and put together is very much like a YouTube video. Like, it's not Netflix quality, like what you're saying. Oh, yeah. It's disgusting. It's genuinely disgusting. It just doesn't look good.

Yeah, no, and I think that's what's crazy. And like, you're talking about, like, the Squid Games show. But even you could look at, like, I was thinking of too hot to handle. Like, that's a, that's a guilty pleasure show, you know, that that's like not great, but it is following, like, the structure of reality TV and game shows. Like, there's a narrative. Like, it's manufactured. Like, they have writers.

They manufacture it to be entertaining, to hook you in with characters and stories and plotlines. And it just felt like Mr. Beeson, I know this because I, I've watched interviews with Mr. Bees talking about making the show where he's like, yeah, we were going to, we talked with Netflix, we talked to, you know, these other companies to produce this, but they wanted to have their say. They wanted to have some control over how the show got made. And he's like, no, no, no. Yeah, he's like, we want to do it completely ourselves.

Big mistake. Our team exactly how we want to do it. And as a result, you get a YouTube video that's eight fucking hours long. Yeah. And has no pacing. And I don't think they even had, it felt like they didn't have right. writers on there or people who understand that these shows are largely manufactured. They have writers and structures and all these things to keep you entertained.

And it felt like they literally just threw a ton of people in there and just filmed everything and hoped something came out of it. Yeah, that's a big part of the problem is that it felt as though they were kind of figuring out the show as they went along without having any kind of concrete plan, right? So, you know, to some extent, other reality TV shows do this too. Like, Squid Game is the challenge. You know, it focuses on characters. But a lot of these decisions are kind of made in post.

A lot of that is also just filming everybody or as much as possible. Or having the camera operators at least be informed enough on what makes good television to be able to focus on certain characters. They didn't literally film everybody like they did in Beast games. Beast games, them having a fucking GoPro attached to everyone's like, Lectern or whatever in that first episode. And the quality looks so shit. And you can tell in like so many shots like,

oh, you just did a really bad crop zoom. And everybody's pixelated. The lighting sucks. None of it looks real. The audio is fucking horrendous. It's like, you know, he's going to explain to the audience like a fucking child, which is, I guess, his target demo. every single time saying,

we broke the record. We have a thousand cameras. It's like, okay, well, you spent a lot of money and it looks like shit. So that's more embarrassing, dude. It's way more embarrassing that you spent that much money. Yeah, also the sets aren't even like cool at this stage. And I know they keep teasing. Oh, it's going to be so cool later on.

But so far, like, they're in this city and it just looks like a gray compound. Like, there's nothing unique there. They stand up on this tower that's like a half of a car garage or something, you know, and they're throwing giant ping pong balls. Like, it's, there's nothing visually interesting there. Yeah. We're stacking blocks. But we're kind of, we're describing this as like a failure, but that's part of what I'm intrigued by is like, like, this is like the number one show in the UK. How do you, how do you even measure it as a failure?

How are they making that $100 million back, like Amazon, I mean? It probably is getting ridiculous engagement. If I had to guess, like most people that have Prime. He's got that audience, that fan base. They wouldn't have invested into it, I guess, if they couldn't see some way of it being worth it. And he's uploaded YouTube videos linked to it and was advertising it on all of his social. So it must be, I guess that's what $100 million looks like. Like, when you hand it to Mr.

I don't really get that, the economic side of it, like how that works, how they make that back. Well, I, so I watched through, I think it was in the first or the second episode, where I started getting frustrated with the fact that I was still getting ads even though I had prime because they changed that however many, however long ago. Yeah, it sucks. And I looked at the price difference and I was like, oh, it's only a few bucks. And then I thought, no, you ain't. fucking fooling me. You're not tricking me. You assholes. Because that's what they want. They want

people to watch this dumb shit and then get frustrated that they're still watching ads. And then click the button and that's how they make their money. You're now in a subscription for a thing where it's like, okay, there's 10 episodes of this show. How much shit do I really watch on Amazon Prime? Not much. Not much at all. Yeah. So, I don't know. It's all this subscription nonsense. There's just people, you know, forgetting that they're subscribed and then not using it. And that's when they make their money. Yeah. I think, I mean, overall, like the show, it's so weird because I feel like most game shows,

reality shows, they have a theme to like, what are they trying to say ultimately? Yeah. Like, too hot to handle. Like, ultimately they're trying to say, like, there's a way to have more valuable relationships that's just beyond sex. and then other game shows you know there's something kind of like it's not like super meaningful

but at least there's a theme there's an idea this is simply like they don't have a theme they don't have a structure so it just feels like how cruel can we be to people and how low can people get because the challenges aren't difficult

or exciting it's just like all right how many people can we make cry today yeah and um And Mr. Beast is such a strange host because he's just smiling through it all. He has a sense of power over these people that is kind of gross. And most game show hosts are there to empathize with the contestants. And they're kind of like, I don't know, communicating from the contestant to the audience and trying to like bring that link.

But Mr. Beast is just laughing at them and smiling like, oh, isn't this? so difficult and challenging and these people are breaking down. It's like after a few hours, it is really hard to stomach. Yeah, it's all about him and he's weirdly the villain. He feels like the king who's got, he's like sprinkling breadcrumbs for the starving mass and he's like they're just laughing. He's just like an anime villain, him and his crew. Willing like just pure black and they just like sit in there smiling. It's genuinely creepy and just like mean-spirited Yeah, and grotesque, just seeing the, and just losing the whole, like, satire element of, like, why Squid Game was a success on Netflix and that whole framing was so kind of gripping and alluring to people in the first place was like, oh, isn't this like a disgusting idea, like a game show where people have their lives on the line? And it's like taking the reality TV concept to its extreme in a fictional setting.

This is like, oh, let's just take out all of the meaning, I guess, and just make it real as far as we can without breaking the. the law, even though they, like, the last episode we saw ended with them, them sending in, like, navy seals to skin them or whatever they were going to do. So I don't know how far it goes, but. And that's a YouTube video. They did that already. Yeah, a lot of this shit. Yeah.

He's so lazy. Like, this is, this is your biggest project you've ever made. This is the most money that's ever been spent on anything. And, and you're trying to, you know, you're trying, you're trying to get into actual. quote unquote television versus like a YouTube video and you're literally just recycling your old content you couldn't think of any better games like that that makes so much sense with you saying that like he he only shopped around for a network that would let him have full creative control because like zero people that

have worked in any legitimate entertainment industry would think it's a good idea to have his like three weiner looking friends as these these quasi hosts that add absolutely nothing. Like Mr. Beast is already so much of a fucking charisma vacuum. And then he's his three, I don't know, are there three? Are there four? I couldn't tell you right now. His friends that all look the same.

Just chiming in being like, well, dude, they're doing this thing that you can already see they're doing. Like all of the narration, even for Mr. Beast, is just like so fucking redundant. I'm like, oh, this is, I guess it's a kids program. Like, I guess, yeah. Yeah, I guess you're supposed to know who they are already. Like it's a Marvel movie or something? Like the Beast Universe.

Like, oh, it's him. Yeah, I don't know. What I don't get is that he says in interviews, like, he said that I don't have ton of charisma. I'm not a personality that people want to watch on screen. So I have to come up with other ways for people to get entertained. And he even says that makes him better than other YouTubers who only rely on having a fun personality. He's like, I can do more and reach wider audience because I don't have that personality. And so I'm wondering, okay, with your game show then, why not have a different host?

Why not bring someone else in? And I think it's the hubris of thinking, you know, we're number one on YouTube. So that means we can make a really good show. And it's just there's a lot of ego there, I think. His personality is money. And that works for a lot of people. there's a lot of there's a lot of people that will gravitate towards that just just the insistence that something's expensive and also i don't know perhaps with this newer medium of it being like an internet

thing and it's like oh sometimes he'll see someone's tweet and having less of a barrier between yourself and someone who has an ungodly amount of money i think a lot of people look at that and think if I suck up to him, maybe I'll get a couple dollars. Like, legit. That's honestly what's happening with a lot of people, right? That was part of the intentional branding. I thought, like, especially early on with his content, I thought that was kind of like part of it was like he'd walk around random cities.

And if you recognized him or knew who he was, then you'd give you a sum of cash or whatever it was. That's where it all kind of came from and started with this like weaponizing philanthropy thing where it's all about like, yeah, the money and giving it away. in ways that I guess conveniently look really good and also are like self-serving. Oh, of course. And it was, it's been like a shield, I guess, for years. And only in like the last year or so as it started kind of crumbling as the excess is kind of impossible to justify at a certain point.

Like, I know it a few like Mr. Beast quotes down. So sometimes pull one out in the intro. I think these are real. Like this is what comes up when you search Mr. Beast's quotes. It's stuff like and it feeds into exactly what's wrong with this show. I'm trying to conquer the future as one of them. Or I don't know why and I'm not just saying this to look good. I've just always been a really nice guy.

Well, the best guys say that. The last one. Once you know how to make a video, once you know how to make a video go viral, it's just about how to get as many out as possible. You can practically make unlimited money. That kind of says it all, huh? that is just like his existence as a I don't even want to use the word creative really it's like a

machine a business I was gonna use that word let's just like numbers go up machine yeah yeah he talks about how he's got like a CFO to like manage his money and he's he's he's gone beyond being an in an individual like he's a brand he's a he's a brand he's a corporation he's worth like half a billion dollars if not more at this point so yeah he's uh he's uh he's a very interesting type of character in the sense that like and there's a few of these that

exist on the internet of just people who now that now that YouTube and this algorithmic culture has existed for some period of time like over a decade for sure now we see people who have kind of like grown up within it and just the human nature of like you know learning how to thrive within a system or exploit a system. Some people are going to be the best at it. Some people are just going to be so fucking good at it. And now seeing what that is and what that means and the type of person that is and the type of content that they produce, right? YouTube used to be like people expressing themselves. Right? Now it is literally just content. Yeah. It's, uh-huh. Yeah. Mr. Beasts was like

where that turn for me as far as like, you know, it used to be like PewDiePie. Like a dude, You hired a few people to help make his videos and whatnot, but it was still like PewDiePie, like an individual. But now it's like, yeah, this big brand thing. It's linked to chocolate bars. It's linked to all of this stuff. And I'm actually kind of surprised it took as long as it did for this like algorithm maxer to like just figure out how to get it to that level. Like how many, he's got like more subscribers than there are people in America now. Yeah.

So like, yeah. Yeah. I'm more surprised that it didn't happen quickly. quicker, to be honest, which is like, okay, yeah, every decision is about growth, growth for growth's sake. And it kind of begins and ends there and just like, where does this end? How far can you take this? Exactly. I mean, he's still doing it.

But I can't help but feel like the kind of spin on his optics and it coming back around on him in certain ways is like the only way it can end. Like it's the insurgification idea. When you just follow growing and growing for the sake of growing, like, where is there to go? Like, if all you're, like, playing around in is excess and just like, it's the biggest thing. It's the most of a thing. It's the most money I can give away. Like, it kind of starts being interesting after a certain point. Yeah, it definitely doesn't feed into the show.

There's no, like, creative idea or anything like that. All I'm doing is just thinking about, like, there's a documentary, the contestant about that Japanese man. He was kind of abused. I had to live off magazines. I was just thinking about, like, the producer. Yeah, yeah. That or the film, what's it called, cheap thrills, which is kind of like the sickening concept of this show,

again, kind of taken to its logical extreme. It's like just rich people throwing their money around to see how far they can get the poorer people to do things that they want them to do and just like how gross and explosive and sick that is. And even the other day, like on the BBC here in the UK, there was a documentary going around of the, about the late 90s early 2000s like boy band managers and the abuse and the just the yeah what the hell well the interviews with the managers and like the way they talk about their success and like how warped and deranged just like the guy and the contestant it's just that's all I'm thinking about when I'm looking at Jimmy in those cold eyes like fake smile is like are you even a human anymore like what is going on in there not a human He's a beast. That's why I study him every day, you know, got to, got to learn, got to be on that

grindset with with the YouTube channel, you know. Go to become him. Yeah. I think one of the telltale signs of like a YouTuber just like creating content without a soul is watching them kind of morph into like a very child friendly brand like attemptedly where it's like, oh, you're making, you're making content for children now because you know that that is one of the most lucrative markets, right? You don't, you didn't start out making content for children. You're just doing that because that's where the most money is. Like, and, and because that's the easiest way to, you know, convince stupid people to buy your dumb fucking energy drink or whatever, right? Like, it's, it's just, it's all money. Yeah, it's the most lucrative angle. Yeah.

It is interesting to see the backlash, though, because I think this is like, it hasn't let up just quite yet. And I feel like it's just a wave building. And it's really interesting to see how he's handling it and how they are all trying to just ignore it. I know he probably has the most powerful PR people telling him what to do right now. But I do think he is a very, like, sensitive about it because I don't think he's dealt with this much backlash before. And I think it is kind of, I don't think he really knows how to, how to handle that. Because he, his whole thing is being not divisive. And now that he's becoming divisive, he might have to lean into one thing more than the other

or, you know, make a statement, make a stand and try to curate his audience in a new direction. But he fundamentally, that's antithetical to how he makes content. So it's just going to be interesting to see what happens. I don't know. I think he is uncancellable and people don't give a shit. Like, we're, we're internet, we're internet people. Like, we, we hear about the controversies and all that shit. But, like, his audience is children. Who cares? He's going to be fine.

He's not going to have to address it. He's never had to address anything, really. He's fine. He's literally uncancelable. He's, like, he's made it. He's never going to not make it. Yeah, I suppose he can afford the best lawyers in the world. So, yeah. Even if there is drama, link to the show or investigations.

I have information that could lead to the arrest of Mr. Beast. Oh, hell, yeah. Drop it right now. Right here, right now. No, I would, they'd kill me. Yeah, literally. Put you on the Mr. Beast Island or whatever. Yeah.

Okay. Anything else to say about this show? It's really, uh, it's, like, what gets me the most is just how terribly fucking filmed it is. and how little of a plan they had for just making anything that's even compelling at all. Like, it's just, you didn't know what you were doing, you didn't know what you wanted to do,

or you just kind of like farted something out, which is embarrassing when you're spending that much money on it. Like, theoretically you would have the resources or at least want to have the amount of planning go into something to make it better than your YouTube videos, but as it is right now, it's somehow worse filmed than his YouTube content. And more boring and less compelling, less of a hook, it's worse than his YouTube videos. How the fuck did that happen?

So two out of ten for me right now, but we've only seen the first four episodes and maybe you'll get really good. Yeah. And meaner. It's a lot meaner as well than what I've seen from his other videos. I'm here for it. Once you're a couple episodes in and there's, you're on the 10th crying, screaming breakdown from someone that had to put their dog down so they could go and compete in the show or whatever. It's like, what are we doing here? Yeah, it's mean-spirited, horrible, just missing the point entirely.

I don't like the average reality TV show, but this one, this was like insulting to me. This is a half-star. Go away. Yeah, I'd give it probably a two out of ten closer to a ten than a one, but... Nice. Yeah. Perfect. We have a recommendation from man.

Yeah, man. No country for old men carrying things. Go for it. What is it about? Yeah. So there's this movie. called Don't Country for Old Men. I don't know if anyone's heard of it.

Never. It recently was put on 4K through Criterion. Good timing. Yeah, so I didn't really plan to talk about this, and I haven't really thought about it for a while, but they put the Criterion edition on the Criterion Channel, so I was able to watch the special features, which I love, yeah, the special features are on Criterion Channel right now,

And I was really excited for that. That was the only reason I was excited for the 4K upgrade because they have a conversation with Megan Abbott, who I think is a writer, fiction writer. Anyway, she has done several interviews with the Cohen brothers on their other criterion editions. I think she did one on Miller's Crossing and on Blood Simple. And those are some of the best interviews and discussions with the Cohen brothers talking about their actual films. Okay. She can really get some interesting tidbits out of them. So I rewatched the movie and then I watched that conversation and I felt like I came

away with a new respect for the movie. So I thought it would be fun to, yeah, talk about it and revisit it. And I can maybe share some of the fun little details that she teased out of them. Please, yeah. I love this movie. Okay, cool. Yeah. I think this is in the last 365 days.

This is my third time seeing this movie. Oh, really? I just happened to, because I hadn't seen it in years. I think it was on the flight back from Vegas, I watched it. And it was watching it on this little plane monitors is not enough. No. And then the 4K came out, so now I've got to see it again. So this is fresh in my mind.

This is, I mean, it was fresh in my mind anyway. I can watch this film whenever. Yeah, I pretty much memorized it at this point. one of their best and also unique in their catalog as far as the minimalism of that style that they're going for here. And especially following up lady killers as well, which I think is probably my least favorite film of those that I've seen. There's only a couple I haven't from their whole catalog. But it's definitely the weakest. So following that up with this, wow.

Yeah, it doesn't really get much better than this as far as like Westerns exploring tension. this just every element being this like minimalist interpretation of like westerns or flipping what you'd expect from these genres on its head and saying uh uh saying i'm well let's just put it that way it's not about happy endings it's not about the the man the the the guy coming in and saving the town it's quite the inverse actually it's quite we can get into it the the philosophy that they kind of explore through this villain and this world that they set up and the way these different characters are exploring it,

or trying to make sense of it. It's quite deep and fairly nihilistic, I feel, um, by the conclusion, but we can get into that more. Yeah. So we, uh, pick apart the film, I guess. This is one of few films where I,

like, I vividly remember my experience coming out of the theater. I remember just like kind of sitting somewhere after seeing it in, uh, Cineplex? in South Edmonton Common theater. Nice.

And just kind of like being taken aback by, I guess, mostly like the structure and, uh, spoiler alert. Everybody watched the movie. It's like a classic.

Uh, just how, how they decided to end the film, especially, like the last quarter of the movie and just how, uh, you know, tone down and,

and more almost kind of calm. Like it's a very winding down kind of ending. And I was like, oh, wow, I really wasn't expecting that for a movie that throughout the majority of it is just like really high tension. You're almost expecting some sort of like really satisfying conclusion from it. And through through its choice of not having something, I guess, being immediately satisfying or narratively satisfying in the conventional sense, they get to make something that's a bit more meaningful.

And so I legitimately, like, wasn't sure how I felt about it. When I first watched it, I was like, hmm, that's a really interesting choice. I'll think about it more. And then, you know, the more times I watch it, I've just enjoyed it more and more. Yeah. And yeah, I've seen it definitely over 10 times,

but I don't know how many times. I've seen it a bunch. So, yeah, I love this movie. What were you going to mention, Jake, about the extra stuff? Oh, well, first I just wanted to talk maybe a little bit about how there will be blood was, I think, the same year this came out. And that was a big deal with those two at the Oscars, I remember. And this movie, I think, has such a formative place in my brain with movies because I saw it at the perfect time, you know, and I saw it with my dad on DVD, like, after a. came out and I remember that was when I was really starting to understand like okay

movies can be different movies can be kind of kind of weird and unsettling and that's a good thing and that I saw that with there will be blood where it ends just kind of like what that's it that's it he's just you know it's just so bleak and then this one even more so is just it is so quiet it is so off putting and mysterious yeah and I'm sure we'll get into the ending because there's so many ways you can interpret that ending. It's really brilliant. And just kind of marveling at that and like turning to my dad and being like, that's it. And he's like, yeah, that's it. It just ends. And being so like, whoa, that's crazy. That's so cool. So I'm just really interested. And I was always really interested in what the

Coens actually thought about the movie because there's not a lot of like, they're really bad at talking about their own stuff and what they think of it. So I was so interested to see what they would have to say. And the conversation is funny because they talk about it like they had just seen it for themselves for the first time. They don't talk about it. When was the interview recorded? This was recorded probably this year or earlier this year.

Yeah. And they talk about it like, yeah, we don't know anything about what the movie is saying or what it has to say, but we're really interested in it. Wow. We have our theories because they are so, it felt like they were doing it from like a real exercise and adaptation. Like they, something else I learned in that interview is that they were given like the galley proofs or whatever for the book before it was even out because their agent was like, hey, this might be something you want to do. And they thought that this could be maybe the only Cormac McCarthy book.

that could be turned successfully into a movie because they were fans of Cormac McCarthy before, but I guess they were like, hey, this could actually be a movie. And I've read not the entire book, but a lot of the book. And a lot of what they peel away from the movie are these long monologues, like character-focused monologues. And they really strip it down into like its stark essentials. And it works so well because of that. And it has like this, I mean, we all know. It's just, it's so, so paired back for what is like a pulpy crime thriller.

And, yeah, I just, I was interested because of how they talked about, like, yeah, we're just kind of like interested in how this movie would turn up on screen. How could we depict this and kind of translate what we felt with that book? And when asked about the ending and what they felt about it, they're just like, I don't know. I have no idea. You figure it out. It's pretty funny. It's just what made sense to them. Yeah, yeah.

I'm curious then if you've read a big chunk of the book, how it compares with, because obviously there is dialogue, but it's mostly communicated through visuals and sort of subtle sound design and through characters actually not talking a lot. So how is that kind of communicated in the book? So like a lot of description of like, and then he's shot. I'm just curious how that minimalism is different or the same. Well, have either of you read any Cormac McCarthy just out of curiosity? I've read The Road.

The Road, yeah. And I own Blood Meridian, but I'm a bit scared to start it, to be honest. Why, yeah. Yeah, Blood Meridian. What a task that is. I have some audiobooks that I haven't listened to yet. I, yeah, I think no country for old men. Oh, that's another thing.

It started out as a screenplay. So before Cormac McCarthy wrote it as a novel, it was a screenplay. So that's, I think, why it worked so well as a movie, too, because it has that structure, that skeleton that is so movie-centric and draws from so much like, you know, noir, cat and mouse, but also like that Western vibe and influence. But, no, Cormac McCarthy, his descriptions are super, super specific. It's very rooted in like the era. So something that's funny watching it, when I was a kid, I didn't realize it was like a

period piece. You don't really realize until later, like, oh, is this like in the 80s? Yeah, this is like the 1980s because you just, assume, oh, it's Texas, you know, everyone dresses old-timey, you know, in this part of Texas. But then you kind of realize, oh, it's in the 80s because he, the border crossing guy asks Llewellyn, you know, if he was in Nam, and you're like, oh, okay. All right. They actually say Nam in the movie?

Nam, yeah. Nam. You were nam, yeah. Important detail, but. I mean, it is. So, yeah, to answer your question, it is. To answer your question about the book, how it's written, it is super detail, very specific, like the exact type of guns, the exact type of car.

And that's another thing in the interview that Joel Cohen said, he asked Cormack McCarthy, like, hey, how accurate is all of this period detail? And I guess Cormac McCarthy said something like, down to the wings of a net, you know? Like, he's so deep, he was, I guess, very focused on the details of the period. Yeah. Great. Yeah, I'm very impressed by the Cohen brothers in terms of, like, how detail-oriented they are.

A lot of the detail that you can see throughout their entire catalog, mostly, is found within character writing. So even these tiny small characters that will show up only for, like, a tiny scene, they're unique and memorable characters, you know, from casting and like, you know, body type and the haircuts and the costumes, but especially the way that characters talk. There's just such a genuine nature to how these characters are performed and written, where it's like, oh, you just, it's like you just plucked a real person out of real life. And, you know, especially, I've spent like a good amount of time in the American South now. know, there are some characters, there are some characters, and it's fun if you're going to have something as a setting, whether it be like a period piece, time-based setting or a location-based

setting, you kind of, you benefit a lot from showcasing the setting as a character, which they're really, really talented at doing through the characters in the film. And I love especially, the writing and editing choices in terms of how much of these characters to show and when especially the cuts are going into the next scene a lot of these brief conversations with just random people in the town

it'll cut to the next scene right after they just say like a fun little quirky like oh okay like this is kind of a character line and it's somewhat comedic despite the extremely dark tone of the majority of the film. But, you know, we get lines like, well, it's got two double bans and then just on to the next scene. And it's like, it's kind of like a punchline. There's a bit of levity to it. But it never takes away from the tension and seriousness of the entire story, which I just find really incredible.

Yeah, those cult characters, I feel in particular, the levity. Because, I mean, this is extremely dark and heavy. But their interactions are consistently kind of a bit more lighthearted and funny despite the seriousness of everything's going on around it. Yeah, it does feel real. And yeah, on that note, there are points where it almost feels like you're watching like a nature documentary or something. And these continuous like mentions of like the apex predator and the mention of lobes,

which I think means wolf or like the apex creature and the main characters like there are no loboosh. and obviously it kind of is Anton is the apex predator that's kind of what makes him a fun character he controls pretty much every scene he's in he's the just the impetus of evil he's almost like a

a demon like his presence in every scene he's in and just the like the costume design there and the hair choices and the way he's presented he's I mean he's one of the best villains in cinema and especially for how

much like going into the iconic yeah just utterly iconic what you're saying about the the skill that the coens have for fleshing out these realistic characters and just it never feels like exposition with them but in fact they'll often be talking about something completely mundane or what appears to be mundane but the the expression how much like you're learning about the characters through these engagements or interactions is it's masterful stuff like obviously the the call it scene and the gas station and just like the the mees on scene and detail of those, there's like chains above the gas station worker that kind of

look like nooses hanging above him and just the simplicity of the way it's presented with that, the close up on the, the, like, peanut packet and the, yes, it's just an, all of it's just an exercise intention. Oh, yeah, the rapper. Yeah, the rapper going, coming undone. And yeah, it's just like a simple kind of A, B camera set up there, but the, the intention to when it will cut or, and the editing here is like incredible. Everything like that is just, yeah, utterly impeccable and in the service of just building tension, this unrelenting tension.

Yeah, and I think part of the reason why it never really feels like exposition dumps of any kind is because this is one of the best examples of a film for, you know, show, don't tell, you know, you just mentioned the wrapper of the peanut packet or whatever. you know, like we can tell without Anton Chigur literally having a line saying like that he has disdain for humanity and the way that people live their lives. And like you can tell by the way he's reacting in a scene that he has some sort of, you know, hatred for just people and their choices that they make and like the value of their lives and, you know, you married into it, et cetera, et cetera. And also, you know, even scenes near the beginning of the film, we see Llewellyn coming across this

you know the aftermath of this drug deal gone bad we're discovering it with the character it's not explained by anybody we didn't see what happened we get to experience the same emotions that the main character does

by coming across this and being like kind of like what the fuck and just observing it I love I love that we're able to get those emotions just from proper choices made in the film. Yeah. It really makes you work with the movie.

You really got to like piece things together yourself. And it's, there's so little dialogue. And I will say this recent rewatch, I feel like there is one, if there's one flaw, one thing that always bugs me in that early scene where Lou Ellen's just piecing together, okay, one guy must have fled from this drug deal and taking the money and stuff. There's one line when he's tracking him down where he talks to himself. And I felt like the Coens just needed that to keep the audience there just a little bit more because it could be confusing. But that always pulls me out when he talks to himself.

I'm like, nah, no, he wouldn't be doing that here. If he stopped somewhere, he stopped in the shade. Yeah, yeah, exactly. See, I didn't actually mind that as much because he continuously will do little things like that, like when he's lying in bed and realizes there's just no way that it can be tracked. and he just says to himself, there's just no way. He's constantly doing that kind of thing. Yeah. I didn't actually ever bugged me.

It was like teetering the edge for me in terms of like notable enough for me to remember it, but not enough for me to be like, oh, that ruins the scene or the movie or like, you know, it's hard to really care too much about it when everything else is just so masterfully presented and thought out. Yeah. No, it's true. Like when you, I guess when you put it that way, Alex, like how he does have those little one-liners that are just so small, but really funny. Like when he's lying in bed deciding whether to bring the water back to that one guy. Yeah, yeah.

Who, like, clearly would be dead at this point. Yeah. But he's just lying there and he just goes, okay. Like, all right. I love that that is his downfall as well as a character as empathy. And, like, his humanity, like, fine, I'll go back and save this one guy. would attempt to even though that's exactly how they get all the information on him in his truck and managed to yeah everything goes wrong from that point yeah oh yeah yeah yeah so what what exactly was his plan for like staying back and not going with his wife like i understand he didn't want to put her in as much danger did he like

could because it's almost as if the implication is as as if he wants to make sure that like no one's following him but it's like i don't know i don't know He kind of just got a hotel. I don't know how many days he was planning on staying in town. Like, the movie works really well, like, in terms of what it's showing and the emotions we get from what it's showing. But I guess I'm just a little confused at his overall plan. I kind of get the idea that he doesn't have a long-term plan, right? He kind of seems like he's a capable guy. We know he was in the army later on in the movie.

And he's almost like improvising as he goes along. Like, we're right there with him. As part of what makes it compelling as far as like, oh, yeah, what would what would you do if you came across this scene? Would you just put your hands up and be like, no, I'm not touching this? Or would you try and get away with it? And it's kind of like the, yeah, that's what makes it compelling to watch is like what he's, what he loses and sacrifices in just this greed of wanting this two million bucks that he didn't earn. Yeah, I think he thought like, because he's always figuring out like, okay, how much shit am I actually in? And I think he slowly starts to realize.

And then finally, I think what switches is when he has that conversation with Woody Harrelson in the hospital. He's like, what is this guy supposed to be, the ultimate badass or something? And he makes the decision like, okay, I have to hunt this guy down because he's not going to let up. This is the only way I'm going to win. And it becomes personal, I guess. And that's why it's so funny that he just dies from some random people killing him. Yeah. from the other Mexican cartel people or whatever.

Yeah. And that's something, another thing I love, like the elegance of that cut, because everything is, like you said, it's just cuts, just very simple cuts, very, like, precise. And then there's that moment where he's talking to that girl by the pool who's like, come have a beer with me. And then it fades. Yeah.

And there's like a fade to black. And it's so off-putting. And you don't really know why it's off-putting until you realize that's the only time they've, do that in the movie. Yeah, true. And then it just cuts to, um, uh, bell, uh, in the car, in the gunshots. It's, it's so, it's so weird. Yeah. But works so well. And yeah, the, the camera movement following Tommy Lee coming across that chaotic scene. It's one of the only times there's a kind of crazy handheld shaky cam going on as well, um, throughout the movie.

Most of it is very kind of still and calm, even when it's being chased by a dog or whatever horrific crime is happening in front of you. That whole sequence is the anti-climax, some might call it, is one of the brilliant things about the movie and one of the, I guess, one of the more controversial things. And you mentioned like the first time you saw what you were left like, huh, I don't know how I feel about that, how that sits. And I think that's entirely the point of it and kind of what makes it as brilliant as it is. It's you're kind of like the Tommy Lee character, you're one step behind the movie. And it's kind of like what is cool about it. Going back to him almost as the perspective character towards the end.

And this old man just like trying to make sense of this chaos of this world that he doesn't even recognize anymore. And so yeah, maybe there is no way for me to pass this. So how do I make sense of this? This chaos that I've just seen happen in front of me and I've got nothing from it. They don't get the money. Anton gets away. Like it's a really bleak way it wraps up. And I think it's kind of almost like a couple of.

criticism of like main character syndrome, you know, of just being like, no, this is fucking reality. You're, you got fucked up. Okay? You're not a superhero. No plot armor here. Yeah. Like Woody Harrelson said, you're not cut out for this.

You're a guy who was in way over your fucking head and you're facing the consequences of this. You know, it's, it's literally just a way of presenting like, oh, no, this is, you know, other movies might have a, uh, uh, You know, fairy tale fucking ending. Might have some fucking superhero shit going on. But no, this is real. These are real legitimate consequences to the situation that you've placed yourself in. And it's, you know, it's like a wake-up call almost.

It's a confrontation of people's fantasies. I think the, what is also so unsettling, too, you know, like we were talking about sugar being like this devil like being Satan and this symbol of pure evil but then at the end of the film he just gets hit by a car and and goes stumbling off yeah i love the irony of that he is he falls to the same chaos and a random chance that he tries to force upon others you know like it's out of my hands and and we start to feel like okay well maybe he is god if he can do these if he lives this way and can feel above them. But also there's like this entropy inherent to everything and that none of us are free from just the passage of time by the fact that we could get hit by a car.

We can, you know, cancer, you know, illness. I mean, it's, it's one of those things that is, it just really makes you think when the movie ends. Especially with how the, the coin element kind of feeds into that exact point you just made where Antoine in so many scenes is making. out that there's a randomness to what he's doing even though he is like a cat who's already caught the mouse in all those scenes with the coin and it is just like a form of torture basically which is what is so strong about the I can't remember the actor's name right now the character Carla Jean the wife character Kelly Kelly MacDonald where she she's presented with this this chance coin flip option and but she's like no I'm not playing your game

That's what someone needs to say in beast games. Sorry. Call it. I'm not going to call it. I'm not going to call it. I'm not going to get the same fate. I'm not doing this. Jimmy.

But yeah, yeah, I guess that like juxtaposition of the, him trying to bring forward this idea of the, the, the randomness of the coin when he's actually has full control. And then actually by the end, the randomness of the world he's living in, um, breaking his arm. it's it's almost like that's that's almost for the audience where it's like oh this is so miserable everyone's been destroyed in some way but this character like we're concluding his arc by reminding you maybe he's not the literal devil like he's he's not safe from a fate or determinism or whatever he wants to yeah he's not jigsaw no not quite yeah he's not the serial killer from trap or whatever he's just like mr beast you know he's he's just like mr Beast.

This is kind of a perfect pairing. I like it when the recommendations connect. Yeah. Anton Sugar is exactly like Mr. Beast. Yeah. Traps people and is like, now drop the red ball. Call it. The performance is so good.

It really is. Bardem won the Oscar, I think, right? I think so. Yeah. I mean, but honestly, I'm just even more amazed by Josh Prolin's performance. It's his best role for sure. Very satsuia.

It's so, he's like doing nothing. It's so subdued and simple that it's, but he conveys so much and can keep us entertained with like, he's just like doing stuff. There's barely any dialogue through most of his scenes. He's just like building guns, hiding shit, you know, but it, I mean, that goes hand-in-hand with the filmmaking too, of course, but yeah. Yeah, it's amazing. It's, it is, you know, just one of the.

the things we get from just having such talented directors working with actors especially. Like, it's, it's a lot of what we see in the performances is, is a lot of what is from the script, right? We see so much subtlety within the character characters and how they're feeling and how they're processing things just by having an actual plan to, to showcase these emotions in ways that aren't overtly explicit, but you can tell that something's cracking beneath the surface. You can tell that he kind of knows he is in way over his head and that he's, you know, over the phone when he's like, no, I'm just going to try and get you or whatever.

Like, you can tell that he thinks that he kind of fucked up and that he's, that he's putting on like a tough guy performance as he's doing this, right? He's out of his depth, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And in that silence, though, these physical. performances get to kind of shine and the two sort of equivalent scenes of the antagonist and

protagonist having a moment where they're getting health supplies and dealing to their wounds or whatever, a particular like in the Anton one, like how much is communicated, just the characterization of him during that putting down the big plastic sheet, the way he steals the medication from the pharmacy by exploding the car, even just the way he takes the boots off and the way the blood like drips out from her under his trousers and whatnot and his expression in the bath when he's like dealing to his wound it's like you've been here before like you're yeah just silently dealing with this and this is intimidating this is scary like he's a fascinating sort of character to follow even though he's so he's a psychopath so yeah both of them are i mean there's something

about watching like really competent people uh try to like survive something uh yeah And like Josh Brolin, another thing that's so interesting with that, again, that interview on the Criterion Edition is that apparently Josh Brolin's audition tape for the movie was filmed by Quentin Tarantino. Nice. Yeah. So I guess he was working on like Planet Terror at the time. And on the edition, you can see a little clip of what that audition tape looked like. And I guess the Coens, they saw the tape and they're like, yeah, we don't really want you to be in this movie. but who filmed this? It's really filmed really well. And I guess Tarantino filmed it, but it's funny too

because you can see the difference in just style, just the fact that Tarantino was shooting this. It's really a unique thing because you usually don't see two directors covering the same material. And it's just this short little clip of him talking to Carla Jean. But in that clip that Tarantino shoots, Josh Brolin is, he has like this personality. He has this swag. He's basically in a Tarantino movie just like, the way he delivers the line like, well, I'll tell her. She's like, oh, your mama's dead. And he's like, then I guess I'll have to tell her, you know? The way he does it has such personality and like attitude and like, all right, this is a guy who's just like self-confident and cocky and everything.

And then to see that compared to how it actually is in the movie just shows you what different directors and filmmakers they are. Yeah. That performs is so different. It's crazy. The subtlety of having a character perform as self-confident, but you can tell that it is a performance of the character rather than the actor. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. Yeah. I want to mention the, first of all, I guess the cinematography. Mm-hmm. Lil Deaky on the cinematography. Lil Deaky? Yeah, Lil Deaky. He's great.

Yeah, I think it's like... He's pretty good, yeah. He's all right. Not bad. He's right. He's like the only cinematographer that people know by name. He's the only like household name for cinematographer. You know, debatably on how deep into film communities you go, I guess.

But like, he's easily the most recognizable. And for good reason. Like there's so much like consistency with the lighting and so much outdoor lighting that that it just seems like an absolute, like, logistical nightmare to try and film. And it's obviously very clearly ambitious with just how well they manage to seem things together. Like, I haven't seen another film attempt to do something like the chase scene near the beginning where the sun is rising over the course of the chase. Yeah.

And even though, you know, it's a little imperfect, sure. You know, you can tell, you know, maybe the clouds moved a bit too fast between this cut and the other cut or whatever. But like, the level of ambition and how well it still works regardless is like, oh, wow, like this is very unique. This is, this is very monumental for what it's doing. And using the environment and the look of it to communicate the story as well. Like the simple thing, like what's popping to my head is the silhouette of his truck. We looks back on the distance and we checks back again.

There's another truck there and it's just like audio design of the tires being popped. Yeah. Well, speaking of the audio design and that's another kind of technical aspect, the music or lack thereof. Apparently are about 15 minutes of composed music like diabetically woven into the movie in a way that you're just not really going to pick up or notice on. really. It's so naturally sewed in there. There's only a couple of times I even noticed stuff like that when he first, I think it's when he first opens the thing of money and there's a, like a wind sound effect kind of picks up and emphasizes the moment in a way that's like, well, that's a really clever, thoughtful way of doing this in this environment. You're not, it's not the big sting. It's not the orchestra coming in and it's da-da-da or whatever. It's like so subtle. Yeah. I was thinking. about that as I was watching at this most recent time for sure. I'm like, this could have been ruined in ways that maybe a good amount of people wouldn't even know. But for me, like, this could have been, this could have been just so frustrating if they had like really obvious use of score.

Because, you know, a lot of filmmakers, when deciding which places in the film to have a score or what tone for the score or vibe for the score or how present it is, a lot of the time that decision comes from this idea of like, well, here's this exact emotion that we need people to be feeling. But I think the problem with that in a lot of cases, maybe the majority of cases, is not only can you,

if you're an effective enough filmmaker, not only can you get those same emotions from just the filmmaking itself without this extra layer, this extra bandaid to try and lean people into a specific emotion. but sometimes it's better if people are able to just have their own experience with it regardless. I feel like this film is one where it does such an effective job at tension building anyway that it's not like, it's not even like, oh, by not having music, it's just more interpretable

how you're supposed to be feeling. No, it's the emotions are very clear and it doesn't need music to try and insist that. Yeah. Plus, you get more out of the sound design too. Because if the soundtrack was blaring over so many of these scenes, we wouldn't get so much of the incredible, like, quietness, right? When he's in a second hotel and, you know, he paid money to the guy at the desk being like, let me know if anybody comes in and he's swinging dick.

Later, he's like noticing the beeper, you know, seeing it flash, but it's silent. And then just that, this tiny moment where it's, It's so quiet, but you can hear something. And it does kind of remind you of the, you know, suppressed shotgun kind of sound. And it's like, it's so terrifying because he's not sure what he heard. It's not explicit enough to be like, oh, yeah, definitely this is what happened. But it's like, we know as audience members, okay, something's really wrong here. Like that it's terrifying.

I love it. Yeah. It's kind of, it's so hypnotic when you get into the rhythm of the sound. design. It's and I don't know, it kind of reminds me of like a Brasson movie where it's just the sounds are so specific like the sound of that crinkling rapper. The reason why it's so memorable is because that sound is so different from all the other sounds we've heard so far in the movie. And then, yeah, like there is music, but it's so subtle. And I guess when they were trying to, they asked their composer like, hey, can you write something for? for the credits. And I forget the composer's name, but he's like, okay, based on what? Carter Burwell? Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he's like, okay, write it based on what? There's no music in any of the movie. How do I write this piece? And they're like, oh, just figure it out. And it's the piece. I guess he based the final credit music on the ticking clock in Tommy

Lee Jones's scene. And it goes from that ticking clock to the, the, and that like, rhythmic. I love that music. They use it in the trailer, but there's something perfect about that piece that like takes you out of the movie on that like ominous dread. Yeah. So I just wanted to call out how the credit music works so well too. Yeah. It's it's funny how that's positively notable. Yeah. Like in so many other films, we wouldn't be talking about the credit music, but you're absolutely right. Like that it's an iconic score over the credits somehow. Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, also probably more notable just because of the lack of score throughout the film too. But, you know, it's like it really somehow manages to like continue the same feeling of the film.

Despite not having it previously. Finding the subtleties in the silence. It's like, yeah, the more you think about it the more, it's like, well, yeah, there's actually a hell of a lot of, like, an intention that you need to apply to this in a way that wouldn't be quite as important if it is a big, like, raging. There's a pop, pop-y score, like, playing over every bit of action or tension or whatever, but, you know, the classic horror strings is, like, Anton's sneaking around barefoot, like, it would ruin the whole thing. Yeah. But instead, yeah, they have to put all this attention on, like, yeah, when he's sneaking around barefoot and he gently places the air canister down and, like, what that would sound like. Yeah. Just like, yeah, these really

subtle noises and how much that enhances the scene, especially the buildup of tension. Yeah, that stuff really stands out the more times you watch it. Like, every time there will be some technical thing like that, it's like, oh, that was, that was an intentional choice. I didn't even notice the first few times, but this is like a really, just an expert way of handling some of these, these moments. Yeah. Super detail-oriented.

I have, there are anybody who's ever heard me talk about. anything knows that there are certain peaves, pet peeves of mine in films. One of them is very common and it pisses me off to no fucking end when there's a character in a film strangling another character or that's the implication and that's what they're trying to say. And you can see their thumbs over their throat and you know that they're not putting any pressure on their throat because they're showing it. And so my thought is like, okay, just don't even show their fucking hands so that I can make it up in my mind and believe that maybe they're like actually putting pressure on the character's throat. But the Cohen brothers found a very unique solution to this.

Just build a prosthetic in the guy's neck. It doesn't need to be as as bloody as this film, like although this film is incredible and how effective it is. But like, why aren't other movies with budgets doing that? Like, you can protect the safety of the actor and still have a shot where it's showing, like, oh, you're actually putting real pressure into someone's throat or just, you know, like, have the entire throat be prosthetic or something. Like, the way that they filmed the strangulation scene with the handcuffs in this is just, like, mind-blowing. I love that decision and just the blood coming out and, like, you can really feel that he's pulling. and actually strangling him. Yeah, the look on his face is great too,

but like, fuck, such a pet peeve of mine. And I'm just like, to see it done not only in a way that fixes that issue that I've had, but like goes above and beyond. Like, oh, wow, you went like 10 extra steps above, you know, like very happy to see it. Yeah, and you mentioned the kind of violence of that scene with the blood and whatnot.

And yeah, shout out to like all the different prosthetic. and moments of violence you do see in great detail, the broken arms, the shrapnel that's being pulled out of these very realistic looking wounds. But that kind of grounds the stuff that's implied and makes the implied violence almost worse in a way, be it the chicken guy and like his implied fate and that smash cut and how horrifying. What is implied by that is? Or what happens to Kelly McDonald, the implication of that cut with him checking

his feet once leaving. And that's all you need. It's like a thousand words in one visual. Yeah. Even something like the second hotel guy, you know, the guy he gave money to. When he comes back in, as I was watching it this most recent time, I was almost anticipating like a shot of like his dead body. Because in my memory, I was like, oh yeah, I remember him coming in and there's like, there's

some sort of carnage. But then I realized this time I watched it. Oh, you just see the chair. is out of place. And that's so interesting because I've seen this movie, yeah, the milk and the cat spilled over. You know that something's taken place here. And so it's so interesting that in my memory, I remember seeing some sort of like blood and carnage, like something disgusting and terrifying and gross, but they didn't actually show it. And that just proves how effective it was at not showing it, is that it made me imagine something that I later retconned as being real.

Like my experience with the film is my imagination is a part of my memory with the film like that's a concrete thing that's attached to it. Isn't that, isn't that cool? That is interesting. Yeah, you get such a good like sense of space that the characters are exploring and it feels like, yeah, it feels like it's being mapped out. And yeah, not even a way that you're thinking. It's completely subconscious, basically. But when you put it like that, yeah, it's not even a detail. Even with that strangulation scene, like, what?

I come away with that after seeing it isn't the image of the guy getting strangled violently. It's the scuff marks on the floor. Yeah, thank you for pointing that out. I was going to say that too. It's such an evocative image. Yes. Yeah. Very effective.

It's, uh, it, it highlights the struggle and force. And also implies like a longer amount of time. Yeah. Like they were, they were there for a while. that many scuff marks like this is brutal it's hard work killing a person I know from experience

you know yeah I'm Mr. Beast Brutal do you guys want to talk about that the ending I love asking people like how they perceive the ending

and if it is kind of if it is as cynical or dark as it might actually be. I don't know. How do you guys feel after experiencing that monologue? I feel like I have a different kind of feeling each time I watch the movie after he describes these dreams and what it means and he's talking to his cousin and these ideas of retribution

or how to make sense. I was kind of getting at it earlier like the cop saying, how do you even defend against it? What does it mean? What is it leading to some of the questions before that scene that get you? you thinking and I don't know through that those dreams he's explaining it does ring as like a nihilistic type interpretation from me anyway because he describes these two dreams one where he was given money by his father but then in the dream he remembers he lost the money he didn't know

doesn't know where it's gone um and the other one is a about that his dad going off ahead of him to make a fire these two kind of hopeful ideas it might be the idea of having money and in paying something, paying your way in some way, or the warmth of a fire, if I was like a symbol of life or whatever. And that being in a dream and disconnected from him and his line being, he says, then I woke up, right? To say like, yeah, this idea of hope that maybe I had that my forefathers instilled into me,

maybe these principles or ideas I'm trying to live by, more challenging or difficult to navigate with what I've been presented. with the, yeah, I don't really know how else to interpret it outside of a, yeah, dark, cold, uh, eye opening, like splashing cold water on the face of this Tommy Lee character who kind of shifts into being the prospective character by the end. He has these scenes here and there and feels almost like a B-plot type thing, but winds up being yeah, the point of the movie.

Yeah, you realize that that's what he was like the whole time. Yeah, yeah. What do you guys think? Yeah, I, like, I, I'm similar. to your perspective, I guess, in the sense that, like, you know, him saying and then I woke up is definitely kind of hinting it like, oh, yeah, that's not reality. And reality is very cold and chaotic and disturbing, right? You know, even the title of the film and a few other scenes. It's really definitely leaning into this idea of, you know, there are old men that are trying to make sense of, the world around them you know there's even the line of the guy being like I never thought we'd see green hair

and kids with bones in their noses and you know even though that might not be relevant to like the the carnage and depravity that Tommy Lee Jones's character is experiencing and discovering on a day to day basis it does kind of fit into I guess larger ideas

of fate and control in the sense that you know he is an authority figure he's like a sheriff, he thinks he has some sort of control, or at least he's trying to present some sort of agency around whatever area he is in his jurisdiction and trying to prevent these things from happening. But so much just seems, has just slipped from his grip. And society is going in a direction where he can't do anything about it. And he's just kind of showing up to every scene And being like, well, all these people are killing each other and I couldn't stop it.

I tried, you know, so it's a little vague of an interpretation, I guess, but I did, you know, it's just fitting into the themes of confusion and in control and fate and, you know, wanting to understand, I guess, if that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. And this idea that you can't fight change, you know, no country for old men. And old men thinking about, like, trying, you mentioned the green hair line and the bones through the noses. Like, that's their interpretation of why things have gone bad or whatever. And, you know, that's just a uniform kind of truth. We're like, the older you get, then we try and figure out what's wrong with it.

But I don't know, the Anton character is like a, it's like a physical manifestation of the idea of change. And it's particularly a change you cannot fight in any way. Yeah. That's what he kind of does throughout the story. You cannot reason with him. You can't reason it. It's random. It's chaotic.

And that is hopefully not going to be presented to you in your life through someone like an Anton. But people like that do exist. And there are horrors and evils of the world that are random and chaotic and how to interpret. Yeah, there is like a sad kind of idealism that feels like it's dying with that character. Yeah. Or at least his hopes and dying with his dreams. True. Yeah. I mean, I see it very, it's weird because I see it oftentimes as very optimistic, but very realistic about the world and especially that conversation that Ed Tom Bell has with his cousin where he's talking about this violence and crime that happened, you know, decades and decades ago.

Like, this isn't new. This kind of evil and chaos. This has been around. And that's the thing. That's a theme that you see a lot in McCarthy's work, especially in Blood Meridian, that and Blood Meridian takes place in the same general area as what's going on in no country for old men, except, you know, decades and decades prior, this relentless, horrifying violence that is eternal. That never goes away. It's part of, I feel like McCarthy is always trying to emphasize that. it is part of human beings and part of our existence.

But that also like with the road, like the road I see is also a very like almost sentimental, very optimistic book, even though it's about the end of the world because it is all about the love of a father and that kind of light, you know, carrying the light. That's something in that book a lot. Yeah, like holding onto your principles. Yeah. Yeah, very. And that's repeated.

here, like that symbol of carrying the fire, very similar to the road. And it's like, yeah, there is a connection. I feel like McCarthy and the Coens are trying to draw this lineage between history, between, you know, the legacy of violence, but there's also the legacy of hope. And as long as someone's carrying the fire, he sees his father, even in a dream carrying that fire. I feel like that's an optimistic image. And another telling thing in that final, and I think the Coens add this and bring this like subtext to the scene, after Ed Tom Bell says, and then I woke up,

I usually remember the movie as just ending, hard cut right there, and then I woke up. But what happens is he says, and then I woke up, and then it cuts to his wife who gives him, she's giving him such a sweet, understanding, like, look. It's just such a warm, Look. And in a movie that's all about masculinity, it's all about, I mean, it's men, no country for old men, you know. I feel like the Coens intentionally like let that frame in there, that shot, just to like open it up and feel like there's the sense of warmth between them. Like she has a knowledge that he doesn't have an access to feeling and emotions that he is kind of grasping at, but he can't because of who he is.

So, I don't know. It just, it, it, it, the more I see it, the more times I watch and the more I become familiar with like Cormac McCarthy's view of life and in his other work, I just can't help seeing it as kind of, that kind of dark hope that it permeates everything he writes that, yeah, like, I feel bad, but I'm kind of happy about it, you know. To kind of add to your point, I wonder if there's any connection with, you know, there's twice in the film where a character is injured and asks for someone's shirt, right? And the first interaction is near the border and the fucking dude bros with the beer. And they're like, let me feel the money, right?

And they're like just trying to exploit them, basically. Yeah, yeah. But then you see, you know, the younger characters that don't even realize that Anton Sugar is. a monster and they just see someone that needs help and they're like yeah somebody's already called the ambulance and hell i'll just give you my shirt and it's like you know that that is the younger generation but he's met with kindness and they they refused his money too he offered money and they said no we we don't want to take it at first right so i wonder if that kind of feeds into and supports the ideas that you're implying here that's such a good point i didn't even think of that yeah

that's so true because that's like the young generation have a sense of kindness and hope, you know, and goodness. That is, you know, it's not like aligned as just like the world's getting worse and worse and worse and which the movie kind of the title implies and which Ed Tom Bell kind of comes to believe by the end of it. But there are those signs that it's more complicated than that for sure. Yeah, that's really interesting. And I'll think about those things next time I watch it.

So yeah, I guess I don't have like a very hard Uh Interpretation of what I'm supposed to get out of the The entire film or the ending, but all I know is that it's super fucking well made Very entertaining and I appreciate so much of the craftsmanship That goes into it and I guess before we wrap up this discussion Who's your favorite character? I think mine's probably Carla Jean

I think she's like just such a fantastic Like rock to the story like she you know, she's, she's not one of the main, main characters or anything, but what she adds to the story, and especially how she's performed, like, she represents this, like, kind of innocence. And also, especially near the end, like, she's the first person that challenges the notions of, uh, this, this weird fetishized idea of, of fate that Anton's been fucking gooning over the entire movie. the original Guna Yeah and shout out to her um she her moment when she finds out

about what happened Oh hell yeah her husband um just such a small little moment but it expresses so much and again without a single word being spoken um it's just that performance there

um god it's tough to pick her favorite character though um I actually like the the first woman he clashes with who uh also puts up the guardrails and He only doesn't kill because of the, you hear someone else moving in the, in the rooms behind.

But I love that little bit character. She's in that one scene. But I, someone about that is like, man, I've seen you. I've seen you in real life. I've spoken to you. How do they do this? Or even just the guy who's the hitchhiker guy. He's like, man, you shouldn't be hitchhiking.

It's dangerous. Just right one that's seen. Yeah. Man, I'm going to shout out the bit characters that are in like one scene. Yeah. Oh my God. So good. I was going to talk about her.

I literally was going to talk about like how she was because I was thinking about that too. Like, yeah, I think only like the women characters in the movie challenge him at all. Like that and that scene is so funny where he just like walks into that trailer park and he's like, I need to know this. And she's like, I can't give out no information. And he just looks so pissed but he leaves. God, it's so funny. But I do, I think an underrated character, though, is definitely Woody Harrelson's. I really love what he brings to the movie.

You know, just that scene in the hospital, and he's like, you don't know what you're dealing with. And then when he has the confrontation with Shiger and he's trying to negotiate, that is, like, just the look, the dawning in his face, like, I'm dying. Like, I'm going to die right now. And how he faces that. He already told him, and you can't negotiate with him. And now he's like trying. Exactly. And then he's trying to negotiate.

And the phone ringing too. And what a way of like dismantling a bounty hunter character as well. Yes. Like going against type again with that Western idea of like, oh, the bounty hunters come in. He's going to be the coolest guy. He's going to save the day. But again, just does not go how you'd expect. And perfect casting too, because you think Woody Harrelson like, oh, yeah, this is a guy who's

going to go up against him and it's going to go well. And then. And yeah, of course, the, where he dies is just so memorable with the phone ringing. Yeah. And he just shoots him randomly. A sound design. The feathers going flying.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Not even showing him his body. Just the blood. No. Yeah. And then, yeah, a lot of fantastic recurring imagery, you know, the blood on the shoes and the blood on the socks.

And, you know, not only does that, like, give us, like, a very concrete interpretation of what happened to Carla Jean at the end, because we don't see what happened there. But you see him check his shoes. as he's exiting. But it also, like, I don't know, we could think about it in terms of, like, what is that trying to say about, like, you know, you're stepping in blood and you're kind of, like, leaving bloody footprints all over everywhere you go. Like, your actions are having consequences and leaving a trail, right? Like, that kind of fits into ideas of the film as well.

Yeah. The shot of the television, like the reflection. Oh, I love. Oh, all of the doubling. There's lots of doubles. images of, you know, Ed Tom Bell being right where Anton Sugar was. Yeah, very mysterious and a lot of, like, I don't know, there's a lot of those weird images that just stick in your mind, but you don't really know why.

Yeah. Well, because his character is, like, chasing something that he never interacts with once the entire movie. And close to the end when he's coming back to the crime scene, like, that's a moment where I guess it's not literal, you know, him behind the door and he's not, right? And it's like in his imagination and it's like what he's chasing is just not attainable. Like could that also be an idea of like the society he's trying to create not being attainable? Like his overall goals for trying to eradicate all of this senseless violence and death.

That's with outside of his reach and he's never going to chase it or catch up to it. Like, a lot to think about. True. And I'm giving this a one out of ten. It sucked. Easy ten. Yeah. Same.

Same here. Yeah, I'd give this a ten. We didn't mention the $25 million budget as well. What the fuck? A nice, solid number. Isn't that crazy? That's so low. I know.

That's insanely low for what this is. But modest and they made the most of it. Yeah. What the fuck? Yeah, for how technically perfect it is, that is incredible. I'm with the cast and everything. But yeah, wow. Pretty much perfection.

I love where it sits in their filmography, how much it stands out compared to a lot of their other stuff. Yeah. The style that's embodied in a lot of their other movies is just so real back. I love embracing that minimalism. One of the best westerns, I think. It's definitely one of my favorites. I've ever seen. So did you,

you said, you said you're giving it a 10, right? Man. Oh, yeah. 10, although I'd give it an 11 if I could. Well, you can't. Oh, okay. Yeah, that's actually illegal on this show.

Although I saw, um, Jake on your top four on letterboxed, you had, um, blood simple as far as a Cohen, which I haven't actually seen. Oh, yeah. So I'm curious how, why you have blood simple over.

Oh. No country or Bigelabas or whatever. Um, I just put, for the top four, I just put like whatever is on, like, on my mind whatever I've seen recently that I'm just like, oh, I love these movies, you know. Yeah, yeah. I don't think I'd put Blood Simple as one of my favorite movies ever made, but it is, uh, I just, I love it so much. I love how the Coens aren't like professional filmmakers yet.

So they do a lot of things. Like, they're such, um, precise filmmakers. They don't make mistakes. They do things very deliberately. But in Blood Simple, they're willing to try out things. And they do like really interesting camera angles. They try out all sorts of strange lighting. And it is, I'm a sucker for classic noir.

And that's what it is. And it's also set in Texas. It's similar location. It's funny. I feel like it has a lot of parallels with No Country for Old Men, you know, dealing with the chaos of the. the universe. Yeah, I definitely recommend, like, to check it out.

It's really, it's check that out. Yeah, I think that's the only one I haven't seen. I love it. Of theirs. Yeah. Except whatever their newest one was that people said wasn't good. I don't remember. Oh, I only directed by one of them.

Yeah. Yeah. Drive away dolls. Yeah, I didn't see driveway dolls, yeah, either. Yeah, I'll check it out at some point. All right, it's question time. And before Alex gets questions. from the stupid degenerate subreddit.

I've got a question for Jake. So people want to see fights. They want to see people argue. And you've watched my content. Yeah. What are some of my takes that you take the most issue with? Oh, man. Where to start?

And I can jump in with some because I did, I have to admit, I perused your letterbox and picked out a couple of like, Hmm. Rating's on there, which I could bring up. Oh, Alex, you're going to fight first? Yeah, he was going to fight first. Oh, really? I would love you to bring that up.

I have no idea what is controversial. I don't know. I feel like the main one that I can think of that's recent is that I liked Trap. Oh, no. Yeah, that was the ones I had that. We should have had you on for that episode. There we go. Yeah.

I know. I I I I the thing is I like trap but I also I can't really disagree with a lot of your criticism it's it's just like I I like it I think that what worked for me was like the whole experience of it being like a really ridiculous comedy and being kind of self-aware in dealing with the themes of fatherhood and navigating being a being being a father in the modern world. And I just, I thought that how it dealt with those themes while also being like a playful kind of like Hitchcockian Di Palma-esque, like thriller,

was really fun. And the fact that he cast his own daughter in a role that she really can't act in, just made it all the more amusing to me. And it may have been, look, probably was a huge mistake that he cast her. but for me it made the movie work even better. So I, yeah, I really liked it. Yeah. That's cool to hear.

I enjoy, I enjoy hearing other perspectives when they're not done in very toxic. Very, uh, I forgot to add, fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. Fuck you. You're a pedophile. Yeah. Yeah.

I don't, I'm always kind of thrown for a loop which films get this kind of further in certain communities and seeing that stuff that happened with the trap. You didn't believe me when I said M. Nighthead stands too. I didn't, yeah, during that very discussion, right? I didn't realize it was on that level, like the Snyder fans or whatever. But it does also seem to only exist like on Twitter though, specifically that that trap fandom. The comments seemed fine, like on the actual. Oh, yeah.

Nobody watched the video and took an issue with it. People saw the thumbnail on Twitter and got really mad. No link to the video in any of the responses. Like, okay, everybody's really mad. All right. It was really bizarre to see on Twitter. It really was like, oh, my God. Like, where is this even coming from?

Just every time there's something that I think they're looking for a hit tweet and the way to do that on film Twitter is just a shit on me for whatever reason at this point. And so it's like, okay, well, no one's engaging with anything I've actually said about the movie. Whatever. Whatever. I'm getting used to it. Yeah. Yeah.

It's weird that you've become, it's weird that they want to treat you like a film Twitter. They want to treat you like the bad guy all of a sudden with a lot of these takes when, I mean, you've been around doing this, you know, film criticism for so long now that I just think it's going to, they're eventually going to loop around and be like, oh, he was always right all along. Yeah, maybe. I think that's just what's going to happen eventually. Maybe the next generation. We're waiting for Generation Beta to get on Twitter. and then I'll be redeemed. Those poor sons of bitches.

My son will be on the front lines defending you, Adam. Don't worry. He'll be tweeting. Get on there. As if Twitter's still going to exist by that point. But yeah, any other disagreements? Alex, you had some? Yeah.

What other ones jumped out to me? Your rating for Megalopoulos stood out. Four star, I see. So you enjoyed. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Shamefully.

I mean, not really. I think that, I don't know, the way I rate movies it is like I guess I'm way less of like a technically minded reviewer. I feel like what came across to me was something really unique. And I just admired what was being. put out there and I did enjoy myself so I had to be honest about that I do think that there are super problematic issues all around with that movie but yeah I don't know I just I I had a good time perfect yeah fair enough what about two star for poor things which in your review you put

poo things that's so good that's the level I'm on yeah that's do I need to elaborate even that's that's what letterboxed is that's literally what letterboxed is it is I know it is super dumb yeah poor things I

I'm trying to remember like there I found the depiction of like like female liberation and what it was trying to say to be very shallow. I thought that technically, visually, it was very appealing. But I thought that overall it rang hollow to me as and kind of like, I just, you know what it is? A lot of it was I couldn't get over the fact that she had like a baby brain like through a lot of it. Like an infant's brain having tons of sex.

It's fucked up, yeah. It's a lot to get into, you know. And we have a review on our second channel. We go into it so much, and it's been a while now since I've seen it. So, I mean, I should probably see it again. But I'm overall not sold on Jorgos's whole whole thing. So I guess that's part of it. That's fair enough.

Yeah. I've had that from a few people. I'm curious by this one, though. Eternal Sunshine, one and a half stars. You're not a Kaufman thing. I love Charlie Kaufman. I love Senecki, New York. I love being John Glockwicz.

But Eternal Sunshine, you know what? I should probably get rid of that rating because it's not a sincere rating. Okay. We're not trying to bully you into changing your opinions. We just wanted to hear. No, this is just for fun.

I'm not like trying to... No, I'm not. I'm actually super, I'm super open to watching it again, but when I saw, I saw it so long ago, and I was not primed for that. I was, um, the aesthetic, I just was like, felt twee and like, like, uh, so earnest. And I, I just, uh, I really bumped against it at the time. And, um, I, you know what? Maybe I should give that a rewatch soon.

I, I should really try to give it a second chance because I love Charlie Kaufman. Oh, no. What? I feel like I'm just like about to really rub you the wrong. I love Charlie Kaufman, but I really dislike Anomalisa. Nice. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. There's no, there's no shame in having a different opinion. Wow. Oh, wow. We're not Twitter. Whoa. I thought you were going to do a Beast games situation. Okay.

Okay, good. This is a safe space. All right. Yeah. But also I'm the most toxic person talking about films apparently. I don't know. Fist of cuffs. Let's go.

Yeah. Nah. The last one that stood out to me was two and a half stars for everything everywhere all at once. Oh, yeah. I stand by that. Yeah. No fan? Yeah.

I, uh, I didn't, I didn't vibe with the humor. Um, that's fair. Yeah. Yeah. I just, I thought that emotionally it was trying a little hard. And I mean, this is, the movies you're picking out are interesting because when I look back on them, I'm not going, oh, those were poorly made. Like, objectively, well-made movies. But emotionally, I just find them kind of inauthentic or pushing in the wrong direction emotionally for me.

So, yeah, and everything, I just, every time I think about, They're just, I just don't like the humor. I just, I can't, I can't get with it. That's totally fair. Yeah. That's completely fair enough. Yeah. Yeah.

It wouldn't work for me if I didn't like the humor. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah. If you're, if you're not jelling with like the emotions of a film, you can still recognize like, oh, there's craftsmanship going into how it's made. Oh, yeah.

But if it's not connecting with you, it's like, what are you going to do? Give it like a fucking 10. It's not speak him to me. Yeah. Yeah. No, no. And I see why people love it. I mean, I totally understand the appeal.

and what works and yeah, how it's made very well. This is like, this is brutal. This is like judgment day, you know, I'm facing the court of God. Like, ooh. I didn't have a list of your takes. I thought you would have a list of my takes. Alex just kind of put you on the spot here. Yeah, I'm liking this as like a sec.

Every time we bring a guest on, let's just like torture them. No, I love it. This is why I love letterbooks. I can just judge everyone's taste and like, put them on the spot this is great shame I love it I love it this is fun yeah any any last contentions with one of my takes before we go to the degenerate questions um I don't know I think the Lion King live action remake was an astropiece okay all right I think that you know having realistic looking lions just made it so much

more immersive. Yeah. It's like a documentary. Yeah. Oh, exactly like a documentary. Yeah. Where there's no skies in real life. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Did you get, you guys saw Mufaso, right? Not yet. No, not yet. I'm waiting for digital. Oh, wow. We've been doing that a lot. I mean, good for you.

Yeah. That's the right thing to do, probably. I mean, there's things that I'm excited to see in a theater, like Nosphiratu, but I've been sick and like the brutalist. like, you know, interesting movies that I would like to support during its theatrical run. But over the past, like, I don't know, six months or so, I've been looking at some of these things that normally I would just be like, oh, I'm just going to catch this right away and like get on the algorithm or whatever. Fucking Craven, Mufasa. Like, I think it would be better if I just waited.

And then I could do like a live stream watch along to these things that I know I'm just going to be wanting to heckle anyway. So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a better way to do it. And then I'm not, then I'm not a part of the problem also. That's true. But then I ask myself, what would Mr. Beast do?

And he'd say, you know, jump on it. So I got to, you know. That's how I live my life too. What would Mr. Beast do? What would Beast do? What would Beast do? What would Jimmy do? Yeah.

Yeah. Well, I'm glad you guys have been spared from it for now. but I'm afraid you'll have to see it eventually. I'll see it eventually. I've seen a clip on X. Of always wanted a brother. Brother. Yeah, I saw that too.

Weird delivery. Oh, but it's not as bad as the villain song, where instead of like being like, I'm going to kill you, he goes, I'm going to make you go bye-bye. Oh, that sounds hilarious. Okay, I'm high. It's like TikTok censorship. Oh, yeah.

Okay. It's very fun. I'm gonna, I'm gonna unalive these characters in Minecraft. Okay, Alex, get those heckin questions out there. Let's go over to the freaks on the subreddit then and go to the suggestion thread. Yeah, fucking weirdos. Yeah. If you want to leave questions for future episodes, head it over to the suggestion thread over on the subreddit.

Just like dab sloth, seven. 10 did who says, Hey Sards, my question is for man carrying thing. Speaking on your other channel with your lovely wife, and since you just became a dad, congratulations by the way, do you look at movies and stories differently and maybe appreciate some of them or the opposite through the lens of being a new dad? I'm kind of curious about this too. I've heard this from multiple people that certain perspectives on art in particular will shift when that happens in somebody's life.

And of course, it's still fresh for you. how young your kid is but I'm sure gears are in motion things are moving do you have any experience with this so far wow what a lovely and respectful comment from someone I just called a freak like a year ago it's fine you all suck no congrats to you and your family thank you for that nice comment I I will say that funny enough I I will say that funny enough No country for old men. I watched it right before. So my son's like a month old.

So I haven't had a lot of time to reevaluate my taste in art. But I think if there's anything I've felt recently, it's a sense of urgency of I have very, very little time to do anything. So whatever I focus on needs to be highly intentional. And with no country for old men, I watched it probably like a week before. he was born. And I guess those themes of like fatherhood I picked up on that story of his dad. And yeah, I guess you just have a sense, I don't know, I feel maybe more like sentimental about that stuff and just just evaluating in general like, okay, what am I, what am I doing with my time? You know, I need to be very careful. And maybe maybe.

spend less time asking myself, what would Jimmy Beasts do? And instead, ask myself, what would, what would Obama do? I don't know. I don't know. Someone else. So there you go. That's my answer. I dig it. Perfect. Let me read. D-H-M-O protection agency. That's one for all of us. Y'all often seem more excited for indie and mid-budget films. But are there any blockbusters you're interested in seeing that are releasing in 2025. I've got a handful. Superman. I'm really curious.

I like James Gunn. I want to see what that looks like. If he can change the optics on a character that's been shoved into the sand for decades now, a little bit of hope would be nice. If they could get that right. Yeah, I'm intrigued by it for sure. I'm curious to see what it turns out to be. I'm looking forward to it, for sure.

I like the trailer. I like the doggy, you know. Yeah, I feel like he has a good handle on it so far, but I think I'm more looking forward to what Marvel's going to be up to just because I like seeing the desperation. I like seeing them pushed into a corner. I want to see Fantastic Four, you know? Is that the big Marvel one this year's Fantastic Four?

Oh, and Captain America with the Indiana Jones Hole. God, that looks really bad. Yeah, it does. The closest thing. Yeah, this isn't even a high budget film. I'm looking through my watch list. But there's also a chance that some of these, you know,

are just going to be big. Like, I didn't put Superman in my watch list. I'm just going to, you know, going to see how I feel when it's out. And I'm not going to have. have to be reminded that it's out by my watch list because people will be talking about it. When's, uh, when's new 28 years later coming out? Is that 2025? Yeah, it is. All right, there we go. That is, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's a good pick. But is that even like a, like, a mid-ish

budget film? Like, what's the budget on 28 years? Yeah, I don't know. What is like the minimum classification of a blockbuster? How much do you have to spend for it to be class as well? I guess I'd never thought about that. Apparently, 75 million. 75 million for 28 years. Um, um, Yeah, that's what Google says. Yeah. I need to see those movies. Oh, you haven't. Just see the first one.

Yeah, you can skip the second one. Yeah. Or watch it. Also looking for curiosity. Are you guys excited for Avatar 3? No. I had that written down. I have my issues with way of water, but I don't know.

I just have to see what James Cameron is doing. I have to. I'm sorry. Yeah, I'm, um, obligated to watch it as well, but I'm just... I'll definitely see it. I have just accepted and I have a very, in a childlike way, I treat James Cameron as kind of a godlike figure or a demigod, you know?

So I have 100% faith. He will make the best movie ever. I really liked Wave Water. I love the abyss. I like when he does his whale stuff where like... The whales? Okay, I'm excited. Like, I'm with you.

I'm all, I'm Avatar-pilled. I can't help it. I'm there for the whales, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You're one of his whales. Lava whales next? You buy his movie thousands of times.

Yeah. I'm one of his whales. Yeah. Oh, well, I guess except for the AI transfers of his fucking 4K scans. Yeah, that's fun. I can't support that. That's hilarious. for a guy that's all about the visuals

and being like, what do you do? Live in a basement complaining about the picture quality? What kind of response is it? Do not question God. Yeah. Do not question God. You just, you must accept.

Yeah, you know there's going to be some cool-looking lava. But I am sincerely excited for it. Yeah, I'm a hope for that. And I guess there's any one other blockbuster I can think of right now. I guess the final mission impossible. Oh.

The previous one was good. I think they're fun. Yeah, I love those. Yeah, there's, like, Avatar and Mission Impossible, there's some of the last kind of big blockbuster IPs I care about. Like, they deliver what I want from that kind of movie for the most part. Like, you get all the stunts and the crazy live action stuff with the Tom Cruise side. And then the ridiculous special effects in a way that,

and then it feels like something's actually being accomplished instead of, I don't know, a giant gorilla punching a giant lizard. It feels like there's a voice, like somebody, a crazy person behind both of those movies, but at least it's a person, you know? Yeah. And if for nothing else, I just watching the, I think I got more enjoyment watching the way of water like behind the scenes and people breaking down the visual effects and whatnot and just the layers of that.

It's like a genuinely intriguing to me. Yeah. Yeah. Mission Impossible. I'm ready for that. I love how they retitled it though It's so... I know, yeah

Dead Reckoning Part 1 No, actually it's final reckoning now You guys want to see this one We're just, yeah Everyone's like turned off by these Split and Half movies Yeah But we're getting more of them than ever

And they just like figured out It's better to hide it Like it's wicked part one secretly It's Yeah, fuck that shit Fuck it Part 1 secretly Fuck

I'm pissed Wait, I have the most random question, I'm sorry, but I feel compelled to ask. How do you guys feel about Babylon? I still haven't seen Babylon, so. Yeah, no, that's the new Damien Chazel. Damien Chiselle. Yeah. Oh, this one.

Yeah, you know, I liked it overall. It was too long, for sure. It felt a little unfocused, but like I was into a lot. of what it was going for just I don't know if I'm ever going to see it again sort of thing and I was a little yeah not strong on the ending also yeah it out by the ending I I get that I get that all right good to know what did you think I love it I love it um and in a similar way where I go yeah I totally get that too long definitely uneven but it kind of like a passion project and I think it's very cool that it kind of killed his career for a few years.

He'll be back. You know, like he had all this good. Oh, for sure. Yeah. But I think that, although for a while, though, it was like, all right, you had carte blanche for a little bit, but not anymore. Cartier Blanche. Because you're Cartier Blanche.

French. We're making fun of the idol. I think it's carte blanche is the correct pronunciation. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Sorry. You guys watched the.

idol? Oh, it was hilarious. Yeah, we love the old love here. Oh, my God. Yeah, it rocks. So you guys will watch the idol, but not Craven the Hunter. Yeah, well, I didn't have to leave my house. Not yet. That does make a difference, yeah.

Yeah. Fair enough. Okay. All right, I was just curious about Babylon because I'm, I really vibe with that movie. I love it. I like the ambition. I guess in a similar way, I like, you know, Megalopolis for similar reasons Babylon is very Megalopolis-esque Oh, you just convinced me to watch it

and then you said Megalopolis But no, like Babylon feels like more of what it tried to be than Megalopolis You know? Yeah, yeah, for sure, yeah Yeah

Is it bloated? Because I just see that runtime And I'm like, Yeah Does it earn this? It's three out of nine minute It should be shorter, But like, it was good

I gave it a six. I don't know what you'll think about it, Alex, honestly. There's things that I really like to about it. I just keep forgetting that it's like an option to even turn on. Exactly. It was a huge fly. Yeah. It feels like the most sincere a person a film nerd has ever felt

and tried to express their love for film in the most sincere and stupid way possible. Yeah. And that's why it like the ending. is weird and clumsy and chaotic, but it almost feels like, I don't know, look, guys, I don't know how other way to express how I love movies, but here it is.

And it's kind of like a weird, nerdy love letter, but also full of a lot of anger about Hollywood in general that I kind of, I liked how confrontational it was with the audience. Like, it really didn't give. a fuck. It was like, all right, like, I'm, I'm, this isn't about pleasing you guys. This is about how Hollywood is fucked up, but I love it anyways. So, yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, you kind of just sold me on it. That's a, nice. How old. Yeah. Um, should do a couple more

here. Um, let's do this one from Inspector Old 6-1-22. Hey, guys, I just first wanted to thank you for recommending Danish films so more people can know more about the such as Winterberg and Trier. My question is, when you saw another round, did you guys find the Danish drinking culture strange because we start way earlier than most? As for me, I started drinking when I was 14, which is pretty normal in Denmark. I just want to hear if it's strange for other cultures' perspectives. I thought this was interesting to bring up with the trio we have today. In the UK, it's not that strange to, we've quite a big drinking culture here, so that it didn't stand.

When I saw that film, it didn't seem. like it was, well, this is way more extreme than the UK type thing. Yeah. I don't know if that's just my culture. Legally, you know, to drink here. Legally, the drinking age is like 18 or 19, depending on province in Canada. But I mean, culturally, and I'm pretty sure legally, like, if you're a parent and you give

your 15-year-old a beer, like, you're not going to jail. Like, as long as it's just a kid can't buy it or go to a bar sort of thing. And so culturally, as far as my experience goes and just what I've observed, observed, like, that seems to be like a more common thing is like, oh, yeah, you'll get introduced to alcohol at like, I don't know, 15 or something. But you're just not going to the bar. Like, I don't know. It's not socially acceptable for, like, kids to get drunk, I guess, but, like, they're doing it anyway, sort of thing. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

I think the U.S. drinking age is like fucking draconian. It's like it doesn't make any sense. It's weirdly high for how much like liberty is a thing that is talked about over there. Yeah. Like you should be getting that out of your system before you're going to college, not in the middle of it. You know? But do people actually wait to be 21 there? I'd always just figured that like no one actually.

obeys it, but I guess people do? Yeah, yeah, nobody obeys it, but it's just like, it's, it's, the, the age in of itself becomes like an excuse, right? As if, as in once people turn 21, then it's like, oh, now I can legally drink. And so then the cultural expectation is that you're going to go all out at that point. When it's just like, I don't know, I feel like it should already be out of your system by that point. like you should be making plans for your life at 21 not like fucking it up for a year

I just feel like it because the age during the age is so higher that it extends this focus on like being a kid and there's this just like super I mean America I feel like the culture here's borderline Puritan and so much and very hypocritical and I grew up in a very red I grew up in Arizona Phoenix very conservative culture where I was

and I mean we had in high school we had assemblies like every year where we'd have speakers come and be like my best friend drank alcohol and he died and he drank so much alcohol one night he fucking died

and like trying to scare the shit out of us about drinking any alcohol yeah when we're like 17 18 you know and it's I also wonder if maybe because there's way more car culture, I don't know, there's way more probably drunk driving accidents just because everyone drives everywhere. True, yeah, you've got to drive everywhere.

Yeah, people have to and everything's so fucking far apart. It's funny that. You need the vehicle. Like, so many times in Georgia it's like, oh, we're going to a party an hour away. And it's like, oh, do people get an Uber? No. Okay.

Yeah. All right, that's just. the norm, I guess. Yeah. It's fucking weird. It is weird. Yeah. So I do understand that, you know, another round is a commentary on Danish drinking

culture specifically, but I don't feel like, you know, the relatability was like lost on me in any sense. Yeah, definitely it didn't stand up for being over the top or unrealistic. Yeah. If that's what they were getting at. Yeah. My family's a bunch of. of drinkers.

Everybody drinks so much. Yeah, same. And I can't on this stupid diet. Mm. Bummer. I know. Whatever. All right.

Let's do one more question. All right. Let's do one more then. Send on this one from Bornyck. What are your thoughts on intimacy coordinators? It wasn't a thing in the film industry until a few years ago. Do you think it's always necessary now? Anora is getting shit for not.

getting one or using one, but I think all the casting crew agreed to it and were fine with it. This is a more kind of recent thing that seems to be talked about in the industry. What the fact? Yeah, yeah. I guess, yeah, it's on the in the zeitgeist because of the ANORA discussion where they chose not to use intimacy coordinators. They've been around for a while. On Wikipedia, it says, demand for their role, significant traction within Hollywood and television and streaming platforms after the 2017 scandal with Weinstein, which makes sense.

So, like, yeah, they would become more common. But, yeah, like, they've existed for a while. And depending on, like, which film, you know, or which director would, I guess, facilitate whether or not they're being used. But now it's more of a consideration for sure. And it should be. It's funny that now, like, the usual cessation. of like, you know, everything is a Kathleen Kennedy video or complaining about intimacy coordinators and saying, like, it's just a made up job with no purpose. It's like, could you imagine you're a director and you're like wanting to film like a sex scene between actors, right? Like, these are real people. They might not know each other very well. Like, you might have legitimate questions or concerns.

like, okay, what happens if I accidentally get a boner, right? Like, there's real things to consider here, like, that you would want a professional that deals in these things to address, because whether we like it or not, people are fucking really weird about sex and sexuality, and there's a lot of repressed shit going on in 99% of people's heads that can fuck them up, right? I wish that wasn't the world. I wish people were a bit more chill about intimacy in general, but that's a lot of not the world, right? So you don't want someone to leave a film shoot feeling like they've been

taken advantage of or raped or uncomfortable or like assaulted in some way, even if it wasn't intentional for that to happen. So yeah, like it's a very sensible, easy thing to include and consider for people that you're by nature of having sex scenes and scenes with intimacy, you're already requesting for them to do something kind of uncomfortable. Maybe don't fucking wing it. Right? Maybe just be a little considerate.

That's all it is, is consideration. So yeah, I think it's fine to have intimacy coordinators. And I think that that's probably a good thing that they're considered more the norm at this point. Yeah. Yeah, I think in the case of a Nora, like, you know, if they all agree and they don't,

they feel like they're fine, they have it covered. Like, you know what? They're working at the top of their craft. Like, they are, they're kind of the exception in the whole industry where it's like people aren't really. It's not just movies like a Nora being made or, you know, all these movies that are winning Oscars. Like there's so many low budget, you know, kind of like slimy, messed up producers, all sorts. Like people who are taking advantage of actors and performers all over Hollywood. There's just so, so much creepy, creepy stuff that the expectation or at least the option to have intimacy coordinators in these situations is huge.

Like, that's a huge deal just to make people feel safe because it's not really the people like Mikey Madison and Onora who are the most vulnerable in these environments. It's the people who are making like little, you know, $5 movies in Hollywood being manipulated by people. I'm thinking about the Brian Jordan-Alvarez stuff. I don't know if you guys heard about this. No. This was a big thing that came out about this comedian. His show, I think it's called English Teacher. Anyways, there was allegations of him behaving very inappropriately on like a very low-budget,

like web project years ago with someone and assaulting them during the scene, during the filming of the scene. and that's something that would be avoided with an intimacy coordinator. So, yeah, I'm all for increasing that awareness and for having that access for people. Yeah. Yeah. Why be upset? Like, any angle.

Because it's woke or something. Yeah. But like, imagine, like, just think about some of the awful, awful shit that was happening in the previous decades before. You know, like, imagine Hollywood in the 50s or whatever. I don't even want to think it doesn't bear a thing about some of this stuff. So yeah, of course, anything that can counteract this grotesque behavior I'm all for. Yeah. You know, like, one day I took two American friends, Ralph and Peach, to a ski hill, and I thought, for sure, I can teach them how to snowboard.

I learned that I could not, and I was in over my head, much like Lou Ellen. I had no idea. I thought, you know, I could explain it to myself. There were a lot of things I didn't account for. They were falling all over the place. It was a disaster. I still had fun. I couldn't imagine.

Like, I think I would want that extra sense of security of, like, a professional who's had these conversations with people and not just fucking wing it. Like, even if I could think, like, about what I would say to actors to make them more comfortable in a situation that is, inherently probably uncomfortable for them. Like, even if I have an idea of what I would say, I think I would like that extra sense of security to make sure that I'm not accidentally having someone feel like they were taken advantage of or put in a really uncomfortable situation and then, like, you know, didn't want to say anything because I'm like the director or something,

right? Like, it's best to just have that extra sense of security. It's not a big deal. Right? it's just it's considerate it's if you're a considerate person then you should have no issue with this yeah absolutely all right that does it for questions that was a lot of fun yeah that was great

we have a recommendation for the next episode Alex yeah so it's uh I feel like I'm just really hovering around the 2000s, early 2000s right now. That's the next one's not going to chip break this curse. But I think this would be a fun, interesting discussion.

I've never seen this movie. There's no way you haven't added it with how much you talk about this guy. I want to do 8 Mile by Curtis Hanson. Sweet. Cool. You haven't seen it. Yeah, I'm curious. I haven't seen it.

I don't know. I just missed Eminem. Sure. completely so yeah it's been long enough for me I've kind of wanting been wanting to revisit it anyway perfect and yeah it's been so long that I don't even have a rating for it I think maybe at one point I didn't was like I don't know I actually feel about it yeah yeah okay awesome very excited if you don't want to be spoiled for eight mile uh watch it before 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, or patreon.com slash sardonicast, or click the join button on YouTube. Also, we got a Sardonicast highlights channel. Go subscribe to that. Hit the bell. Join, buy some feastables.

And, yeah, thank you so much for being a great guest. Thanks for the recommendation. Yeah, that was really fun. Oh, thank you, guys. I mean, I really, I just want to say, like, I really appreciate it. You guys invited me here. This was a ton of fun. So, yeah, I love what you guys do.

So thanks for, thanks for including me. It was really nice. Thank you so much. Where do people find you? Shout some shit out. What are your socials? Social. You know what?

Just go, go watch Mr. Beast videos. He needs it more than I do. Yeah, he needs it, man. Go check them out. No, I don't know. Just man carrying thing. Yeah. Or woman carrying man.

Yeah. Woman carrying man for more movie-related discussions. Yeah, yeah. If you want to see me lose my mind currently over the wonderful movies and theaters right now. Yeah, and then the upcoming family vlogs channel where you can exploit your child called man-carrying baby. And you can make them a celebrity and monetize the shit out of it. Oh, my God. What's going to happen when Mr. Beast has a kid?

Oh, no. Oh, my God. Baby Beast, yeah. We're falling into this hole, aren't we? This is inevitable. We're, oh man, we are reaching new levels of success. Yeah, that's the truth. His baby is going to be born a brand.

Oh, no. Ew. All right, yeah, thank you so much. That was great. Am I forgetting anything? I don't fucking know. All right. Thanks for listening, everybody.

I think you've done it, man. Uh, have a happy, a beast. Happy beast. Happy Mr. Brass. Thanks for listening. Bye-bye. Bye.