Sardonicast - Sardonicast 186: Adolescence, Unforgiven

Episode Date: March 31, 2025

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 Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/sardonicast.bsky.social 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 Jake's channel: https://www.youtube.com/@ManCarryingThing Jake's movie channel: https://www.youtube.com/@womancarryingman Alex's Twitter: https://twitter.com/IHE_OFFICIAL Adam's Twitter: https://twitter.com/2gay2lift Adam's bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/yms.bsky.social Jake's twitter: https://x.com/ManCarrying Jake's bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/mancarryingthing.bsky.social Adam's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/YMS Jake's Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/mancarryingthing Intro music by: https://www.youtube.com/user/anUnkindnessvideo Fan art: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sardonicast/comments/1j5mwkx/what_if_ralph_never_really_left_ralphspiracy/?share_id=f4SiBSLCMVVTlbA9X5S2S&utm_content=2&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1 https://www.reddit.com/r/Sardonicast/comments/1j48ig6/i_hate_everything_carrying_your_movie_sucks/?share_id=01hFrJVTxJEglOoH4iH1x&utm_content=1&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1 https://www.reddit.com/r/Sardonicast/comments/1j4wy1o/starship_gooners/?share_id=wjg0DVBB9Hjxmy9jo940_&utm_content=2&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_source=share&utm_term=1 Timestamps: 0:00 Adolescence 42:09 Unforgiven 1:28:18 Questions 1:57:32 Recommendation + outro

Three, two, one. It's a hell of a thing, killing a man. That's a quote from Unforgiven, and I'm sure I did a great job imitating Clint. I'm Adam from your movie sex. It was good. You got some gravel in there. Yeah. Well, I'm kind of, I feel like absolute shit today.

Under the weather, but we're powering through with the magic of friendship. And cinema. energy and cinema also cinema yes cowboys I'm Adam from your movie sucks this sardona cast hello I'm Alex Hermitchi I'm gonna I'm gonna pick you gonna hunt them one thousand times that's that's my little that's my little plug that's a great American accent that's a good one and I'm Jake from man carrying thing and woman carrying man and I don't have a quote from the film yeah no There's no more quotes. We took all the good ones.

There's only two of them. The rest of it is just guys staring out into the sunset like cowboys. Yeah. It was really, uh, really avant-garde. Just sadness. Very bold decision to only have two lines in the film. It was, yeah. But you know, the rest of it being Clint Eastwood just growling was, I thought it was cool. Hmm. Yeah. He does kind of a, like a Christian Bail Batman voice, you know.

Really? It's not quite that extreme. It's not quite that, but it's kind of, it was reminiscent of that. My brain's been ruined. I'm curious, you guys both, how many Clint Eastwood movies have you both seen? Just out of guessing. Um, well, directed or acted or both. Yeah, starring or acting or acting. Yeah, we've seen the Dollars trilogy.

I've seen like Grand Tremna and... Yeah. Grand Torino, it was already. Cool, cool. Million dollar baby? Million dollar baby, that's one, yeah. American sniper? I've seen a few.

I would say less than 10? No, it has to be probably around 10. Cool. I don't know. I mean, he's made like 500 movies, so it's inevitable. Yeah, it's hard to just pull like random ones, but yeah, a fair few. I feel like I'm familiar with his directorial style and his acting style. Classic such as Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, starring

Kevin Spacey oh I haven't seen that wow is it a classic no one has it is not all right speaking of the the active filmmaking hmm good transition we watched adolescence the new film from the guy that did the other thing Stephen Graham and And yeah, Jack Thorne. Who the hell, no, who's the director of the fucking, my brain is so much. Philip Barantini. Thank you.

Philip Barantini who did a Boiling Point, which is a fantastic film from 2021, where kind of the quote unquote gimmick was that it was all achieved in one shot. But it seemed like it was justified and goes beyond a gimmick in my mind in that movie. And there's actually a TV show I haven't seen based on the same concept. And of course, adolescence is the latest from this director, directed all four episodes in that similar style that was getting at with Boiling Point. Although one one, one long shot, one one for every one of these four episodes. And that's kind of what, that's what drew me to outside of the fact that this show is everywhere, man. This is like, it feels like we've already got another, like, I don't know that if there's just, from now on every year, Netflix is going to base the biggest series of the year on like some British tragedy, like,

last year was baby rain, and I would go adolescence this year. Oh. Yeah, I vaguely heard that it was based off of a real thing, but I didn't look into it. Yeah, it's not, it's not, I mean, some of the discussion around this in the UK is like just totally out of control of a while. But, um, some people are treating it as if it is an inaccurate, um, like based on real events thing, but it is, it is fictional. Like, some of the ideas that it's playing with are based on like horrific things that have been happening in the UK for the past 10, 15 years or whatever, but it's not a literal adaptation. So some of the commentary I'm seeing and reading about it is quite sort of out of touch

or I don't know, just focusing on things that are definitely coming from perspectives of people that haven't watched it and have more just like, oh, it's been all whipped up into a media frenzy and we're talking about like, it's somehow become about like immigration and race and stuff and it's like missing the forest with the trees. Oh gosh. Yeah, with what I think the show is actually getting at. That's hilarious. And like yeah, like this morning I saw unfortunately like it's got on Piers Morgan just

like baby reindeer did and like it goes into these kind of political conversations. The best media commentator. I know yeah, exactly. But it does kind of give you an idea of the kinds of discussions that are coming about it and I think that the dude from the whatever podcast was like arguing about like what makes a man and all this kind of thing. And it's like what the fuck? Like a lot of the like commentary seems like this strange sort of self-report

whole in a way of like, that's what you've taken from this shit? I was curious because I was trying to find like lower rating reviews because everything's glowing positive and so I was like I wonder if there's any like negative reviews and all I could find were like, oh okay, here's a negative review. This movie is trash because it does not depict what I thought it was going to depict in the film and is not addressing the issues I think that are wrong with the country such as immigration. It's like you're...

Why are you watching or complaining about this? It's clearly not what you want to watch. Yeah. I mean, we're very much at the point. We've kind of mentioned this before. But we're very much at the point where films and TV shows, they're just such cultural conversations already that people that are trying to inject their own worldview that, you know, that they've been trying to perpetuate this entire time.

They'll latch on to whatever popular thing is being talked about. then just use that as an excuse to keep their propaganda going. It's really annoying. Mm-hmm. Which is kind of ironically what this show is trying to get at because while I don't think these conclusions that I was bringing up are necessarily correct. I don't know, did it feel to you guys like it was coming down with a heavy hand of like, this is what's causing this and this is a simple issue that we're boiling down into this left

the right thing because to me it really didn't feel that way at all and the the four episode kind of miniseries structure of it seemed to indicate that it was quite broadly aware and broadly also quite understanding of the human element side of it and was more interested in let's depict these different environments these different interactions and try and get down to maybe the wise of this not necessarily indulging in the the rest of it the bigger kind of cultural war side of it you know outside of the obvious kind of more flamy stuff like maybe mentioning Andrew Tape by name and the Mano Spear and this red pill kind of stuff. And it's, I don't know, it's kind of trippy just seeing this like injected into these

really well made dramas were led by like Stephen Graham of like all people who I love. He's on my favorite character actors in his performance in here is amazing as it usually is. Yeah. You know, shout to Venom 2 as well. You know, stood out in that one. Oh yeah. But yeah, yeah, he was deeply involved with the making of the this and the writing process and I don't know I found it entertaining all the way

through the four episodes with the kind of conclusion that the it was kind of backloaded as far as my favorite episodes with three and four as far as what it was saying and I feel like if everyone should watch at least episode three even if you're not like that interested in it I thought that was quite a quite a standout episode as far as like flexing performances and this like intensity of the way it's being presented with this one shot kind of style that is going for I mean, I never really felt like a gimmick to me, especially in that episode. Whereas in the first and second ones, I felt like there were moments where I was like,

this isn't quite as intense, especially the one in the second episode around the school. What are we doing about spoilers right now? Well, yeah, I mean. Spoiler conversation. I didn't really know how to talk about otherwise. I guess we all recommend it. It's a show, four episodes, Netflix, drama, all in one take, each episode. They're about an hour long winners.

Watch it. Now we can spoil it. All right. Yeah, you've probably seen it. It's like number one everywhere. It's being talked about everywhere. You're British though. It's number one for you.

I don't know. Your opinion doesn't matter. Yeah. Am I wrong? Is it like, is it big on like Netflix and it's all over social media and everything? Not my social media. I left the Britain land. I knew it was big because I,

I saw a, you mentioned it in the group chat and then I asked Nadia about it and she was like, oh yeah, I watched that like days ago. That was like crazy, super good. I'm like, what? I didn't even know you watched this. Isn't this like some depressing stuff? She's like, yeah, it was awesome. I loved it.

I'm like, okay. I guess I got to see it now. Yeah, I guess enough people are talking about it. I only discovered it because somebody on my subreddit or actually a couple different people on my subreddit were being like, hey, is Adam going to watch this? It seems up his alley and then I looked it up and I was like, oh, I liked boiling point. Let me check it out. Yeah.

Yeah, because after you sent that message in the group chat saying about the show, it was like literally the next day. Like I saw on the news that Kirstama or the prime minister, it was like talking about this as far as how it relates to children and his children and how he wants to make this like a conversation. And kind of like baby reindeer where all these like other conversations outside of the show started kind of popping up. I'm I don't know. I feel like quite passionately about this topic as far as, and it's delicate to talk about too, trying to find an angle that doesn't make you just like cringe and just boil down to like phone bad or social media bad or whatever, this kind of thing. But like, I think it's kind of most valuable aspect is how it's able to communicate some of these ideas that we might know as younger people that have kind of grown up with social media. But like the parents and the older people that like.

Yeah, true. just didn't understand the, the, what was happening, basically with talking about like the implications of emojis and the manosphere and these expectations and like algorithms that are sending these ideas and forming communities around them and like, the behavior that is affecting as far as like real kids. And then, yeah, when it does apply to kids, when you open this Pandora's box of like social media and Instagram and Snapchat and then hand it to children and then developing minds, like some obviously some horrible shit's gonna come from that and while I didn't like love the second episode as much as the others as far as like just the energy of that episode and what it was exploring

or like the hook of it the depiction of that school and the way it was kind of exploring the social media side of it I thought was quite interesting especially with the angle they took with the the main investigator's son who happens to go to that same school that he's kind of going around questioning about um there's a great engagement with him and his son and that kind of explores the themes in ways, kind of, I don't know, in quite a realistic way where he's like, he's not really involved in the story, but he's kind of a, he just watches from the sidelines and explains, like, you're missing this whole element to this dad, like, this whole social media element that like, you just don't understand because of your age.

And it's this weird situation where it's like, where does the blame go? And it's kind of throwing out with these questions, like, is it the parents' fault? Is it the school's fault? Is it the phones or social media's fault? And it's like quite a broad question it's asking. And it's doing a good job at least sparking like the conversation in quite an entertaining way. It's interesting because I feel like I may be a little more negative than you both on this show. I mean, I did like it quite a bit.

But you hated it. Yeah, saying I liked it. It means I hated it. No. I thought it was okay. IGN. 7 out of 10. No, I actually did like it, but it was a hard watch.

I mean, it's very in your face and just like you got to watch the whole process of this kid getting booked and feel the guilt and the shame of the parents, every side of it. You know, it's just so much pain on every side. And that's really well portrayed. But I found the conversation around the show when people are saying like, yeah, it's a really important topic. And it's cool to explain this. even to people who are older who may not know about, like we're all online.

We know about all this stuff. Terminal-eat culture and all that crap. Yeah. So it's just old news. So I think that was part of maybe my perception watching this going in of like, okay, this is about this topic. This is going to be an important discussion. And it felt kind of like a cursory glance at this.

And I kind of feel like maybe older people watching it, maybe boomers watching this who aren't aware of the in-cell world and all of that would just kind of. to come away and be like computers are scary man like yeah like that's a scary place we don't know the kids are not all right and i feel like that's a theme that we've seen throughout every decade of every generation you know of the parents going at some point whoa this shit is scary we don't know what our kids are up to what they're kind of people they're hanging out with what are they doing at the mall you know there's all sorts of scary shit at the mall um and i think that the in-cell stuff and all of that is really worrisome.

But it felt like this show isn't really about that as much as it is about like the parenting and grief and shame and like how something like this can happen. And I think ultimately it's like what I got from it is like there are no clear answers, you know, it was like a perfect cocktail of why this kid did this. Yeah, there's like right wing radicalization online, but it's also, you know, there's the It's the way he grew up, the way we see how his dad behaves, you know, his anger problems. We see, you know, just it could be some biological thing in his brain as well, just the perfect cocktail.

And it's just, I felt like it didn't go deep into those areas that I necessarily wanted to explore. And I felt kind of like a theater piece of, okay, let's see these four little vignettes and stories and kind of look at this like crime drama of something you'd see. Netflix do a shitty version of and see it from a perspective of like, okay, how are these people actually feeling and from every single angle and getting those different perspectives and how it impacts their lives? And I thought that it was very well done, but I don't necessarily feel like I learned anything, which is good because I don't, at times I was a little worried like, oh, okay,

is this going to try to be like a very important episode of a TV show of like, this is what you need to know about the online right and what's going on? So I like what it did, but I think in a different way than maybe other reviewers have stated. Yeah, I mean, it didn't feel like it was preachy or anything to me. Like, it felt mostly like about the characters and less. Like the messaging was there as kind of a way to get a bit more out of it if you want to think about those things, but it didn't seem like it relied on it or anything. Yeah, I think the most shocking thing is that it mentioned.

the word in cell at all and like Andrew Tate because it's such a topical thing and we're not here red pill we're not used to seeing that in any media so the fact that this is like one of the first major shows that really seriously mentioned it as a topic I think that's why it's caused so much like a conversation yeah yeah what is the what is your prime minister saying about it he's bringing up the kind of importance of because he has young kids around the same size, age sorry, is the main character in this. I'm just saying about how it's important and he's going to just wants to have that conversation really.

Yeah. I'm just kind of shouting out that yeah, it's it is something we should be concerned about and worried about because I don't know it. While we do like understand it like what you're saying Jake, well, it does kind of seem obvious to us. Yeah. I just feel like the there needs to be. I just want these conversations, these things that attach to be around something

kind of important and yeah it's a shame that's what I was saying about like just dancing around and trying to make it not sound like cringy or uh just overly simplified but it's already kind of exploded past the I don't know it's not like we've boiled this down into any solution to this problem yeah yeah at the same time it I don't know you have to highlight it in some way because it feels like crazy town another in from some angles so also like I feel like a big issue here is that there's like a divide now between people who are are old enough and who are parents who didn't grow up with the internet and now there's new generations who grew up with the internet and have a better understanding of how things

work and you know I was watching this show most of it carrying my kid you know on my chest while I'm watching it on my phone and just going like yeah this is horrifying this is terrible this is not a fun thing to ponder but also like how what would I do you know when he's of that age when he's online and it's like I think the best thing you can do is just like educate yourself and have an understanding of what is actually out there and what they're watching and engage with it and maybe that's something that's that will be better when you know new generations of parents grew up with the internet and know what's out there it might just be a little less I don't know I feel like I'll be able to talk to him and be

like you know this stuff is stupid right you know it's it's tricky but you never know I mean it's everything's changing every day generation, so. Just make sure you stay up to date on all the latest memes. I'm sure he will love that. Yeah. I'm sure he'll think I'm really funny and cool. I find the like the parenting argument or that's kind of what the conclusion of that

Pierce Morgan video I mentioned was. It's like, yeah, it's kind of down to the parents and simple as that. It all comes from there in the home or whatever, which is true to a certain degree, but it's also like what are parents are actually supposed to do? How are they supposed to adapt to technology that people from a certain age range in below can understand? Is it on them? We just kind of introduced that into society. Like, we didn't vote on it like democratically, really.

It's just like, oh, that's the Silicon Valley, I guess, like, just controls the way we communicate. Yeah, everything is experimental. And it's, yeah, it's experimental and it's been built with like engagement at the top of the pyramid. It's not like, yeah, exactly. Protecting children is at the top of the pyramid. It was one specific thing and like these kind of behaviors kind of manifest from the way it has been built. It's like it doesn't necessarily have to have been built this way.

But it is specifically right now where it's this like zenith of these crazy subcultures and especially post-2020. Just like that was the speed run of like this anti-intellectualism, this rise in this manosphere bullshit and tape coming like coming in dying and then being boosted by the American government recently. It's just like what the fuck? This is so beyond Barity. This is obscene when like, I don't know, at the heart of this show, I feel like it's kind of simply, it's definitely about the like masculine perspective. It's about like fatherhood and masculinity in the way that translates through the generations because the Stephen Graham character who is the dad of the kid obviously.

He has lines talking about how when he was a kid his dad would batter him. He says or, yeah, and talking about how he was like ashamed of his son who he tried to get to sports, but like was made fun of by the other parents and just these kind of complex relationships he has with his own kind of like emotions and how his granddad like has an effect, even though it's like generations removed on his son and like how he's maybe approached his, I don't know, internal monologue or how he wants to. He specifically mentions he would never want to do what his dad did to him. So then what's it saying from that? Is it saying that this is kind of like manifesting from this mix of him, him not giving something that his kid needed and the kid finding it through other means through this like stuff at school and stuff he's finding online? And I don't know.

It's just like it asks a bunch of questions. And I don't really know where it settles, but it definitely gets you thinking about it. And I just especially like in that last episode where it shows the family. dynamic almost in a way to try and make them look as uh kind of normal yes as someone could be in that situation as possible where it's like the it's the dad's birthday they're trying to have like a normal day and obviously the stuff with the graffiti on his van happens and and breaking down again and again but the you see little flashes of what they might be like as a family unit um and just trying to work through it and like i don't know maybe it hit extra hard for me because like the

A crime like this happened in my county, like, when I was in secondary school, like, someone a few years below did something like this to their girlfriend at the time. And it was like to see like the way the school was depicted and the way it kind of, uh, shown delight on this like middle England school problem where like the, the teachers like just don't have any control of what's happening in that school. And it was like, this is, this is triggering me. This is almost exactly what my school was like and that was without the added element of this social media bullshit that I could just manage to skirt by like before it really is at the level it is now with this. Yeah. Sending these like 4K like nudes to each other and it's like I don't know how like anyone navigates that stuff.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm kind of glad I didn't grow up with social media as present like. Doesn't I feel like dodging a bullet? Yeah. Like we were we were just in the my space era era for me or whatever. Like that was fine. Yeah. Yeah. And it was like early Facebook for me where it was like there's bullying on there for sure, but it's not, it's just not like it is now. It's completely different now.

These algorithms are like fine tuned now. They know how our brains work. They know how these dopamine release cycles work. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of aggressive. I mean, I think part part of the problems too is that we're all vulnerable. And I mean, how you could have done this similar show, but from the perspective of

some old someone's older parent becoming radicalized on Facebook and falling into Q and on and stuff and um you know it's just like our human brains are not ready for this world of uh algorithms and all of this crap um so that's why we need the neurolink that that's exactly just merge merge mind and internet and yeah i just don't know why we're not more upset that it's being delivered to children in this way you know so giving how odd drugs or something. Yeah. Like it's...

Yeah, I don't know. It changes your brain. Also at that age when you're like... At that age of 13 or whatever, like you're already... Like, so many kids before the internet would go through a phase of like, I don't understand girls. I don't understand the opposite sex. I'm scared of like all this stuff and angry and all the hormones and everything.

But yeah, with these right wing, you know, Andrew Tate people, it's just a whole new level. So, yeah, I mean, I don't understand it. I didn't have that, you know, growing up. So it is a different world. Yeah. Now every child has adult role models that act like children. You know. Yes.

They see themselves in the character, right? Have you seen fucking... There's like an ex QC showing off his like freezer. It's just filled with fucking popsicles. He's like, he's living... He's living the child's dream. different character but you know I don't know there's a love will cry yeah yeah I found the show to be very watchable I found it to be a very complex in its

filmmaking in terms of like the coordination and I was just especially watching episode two just thinking like about how much of a nightmare it would be to coordinate all of those children and like even even ignoring the fact that it's a single take show like that would just be a fucking nightmare yeah and I'm actually really impressed with how many how many extras they had for that yeah yeah it feels like dense and like it's a real location yeah and that's the one that has maybe the most ambitious shot I think out of the four if you don't count the just concept and premises being ambitious enough but the it like I guess the camera

gets attached to a drone towards the end of episode two yeah this overhead shot and then goes back down into transitioning to Stephen Graham's character, which is an incredible shot. And I was like, man, how do you do that? And on like the Netflix, like, uh, social media stuff they've been putting behind the scenes clips of how they did it and whatnot. And they should watch that. And like, when they say it's one shot, I'm looking for those, those hidden little moments where it's like, oh, you went through a hallway and you definitely cut there or something. But there's, there's nothing. And all four of these is. And as you say, the, the staging and timing of it is excellent. It never feels like, um, like, like the Northman.

kind of pops into my head where they had these long shots and the whole thing wasn't at one hour, but there's some sense of thing when you have these minutes or minute long shots where you can kind of feel like, oh, the timing is a little bit different because of the way this is flying and like the coordination that is like required to get this done. I'm like noticing like a bit of clunkiness here and there, but it's pretty seamless throughout the whole show for me and it was more of a matter of like how much it aided what the episode in particular was depicting, which is kind of why the third episode where the focus is on the psychologist, psychiatrist, that's talking to the 13-year-old boy.

And when it just leans into just being this performance-focused, intense conversation with these two characters and the camera's just kind of moving around the room quite organically. And it's, yeah, it really kind of enhances the intensity of that scene. And when things escalate, you don't really even get a chance to breathe kind of right there with the characters. And I thought that performance from that 13-year-old boy was crazy. I thought it was very good.

Apparently, he's never acted before. Yeah, which is even crazier. They just plugged him off the street. He's just like that. Yeah, what has he been through to be able to do that? Because that was crazy. Like, that's an angry little boy. Put him in the show.

They just followed him around. He didn't even know he was in a show. Is this a safe space, guys? Because I need to say something. I don't know. Yeah, go for it. I don't know. Find out.

Go for it. Okay. I kind of hated the one shot thing. Oh, you found it to be a gimmick? Okay. I thought it was... I didn't... I thought that it served really well during certain moments but also part of me was...

I just kept being pulled out of it. I know that's... I don't know. It just felt like, yeah, this is really cool and technically that's... Oh, wow, this must have been really hard to do and I kept thinking that watching it and not really thinking about the characters or the show or the story as much in certain moments. Yeah, I thought some episodes, like, I think episode three, the one of the therapist was, I think that worked really well. But other times, I was going like, wow, this is really cool.

But yeah, I don't know. It didn't do much for me. And I also was thinking like, if it didn't have this one shot thing, would people be as an hammered with the show, honestly? I don't know. I think a good amount of people, yeah. I think I think the average, when, When it gets to this level of popular, I think the average person watching is not even aware that it's all in one shot. Like, I remember I took my parents to see Birdman, and then I asked them after, I'm like, oh, how'd you like the whole one shot? They had no idea that that's what was even happening in the film. Like, they were just, it was just not something that they were thinking of or consciously aware of. They were just into it.

Maybe so, yeah. And I think a lot of people experienced media in films in that way. Like, they're not thinking as much about the technical elements. Yeah. Which is, you know, not wrong, I guess, but... I think, yeah, the subject matter is just spicy enough, isn't it? Yeah. And it's like the kind of true crime stuff as well, it's like so popular, especially on Netflix.

It's like, all they fucking make at this point. Yeah. But I like this angle of it. I feel like it does complement the story with it being something that gives off, like, anxiety vibes. I feel like the single-woner take compliments that very well. Like a lot of the best movies that do that seem to have anxiety pretty prominently in it. Yeah.

Yeah. Just the buildup of energy. Yeah. It doesn't give you a break. Yeah. I mean, I understand that it definitely works in moments. But yeah, for whatever reason, I just couldn't gel with it as much as I wanted to. Maybe it's because there's such a, I feel like I just keep seeing movies and shows that keep

adding like one shot things. And it's like, hey, look at this. We're doing a one take, you know, 10 minute thing and it's like, I don't know. I'm just kind of getting tired of. It feels a bit show-offy. And also, you know, it's easier than ever, you know, like I feel like it used to be much, well, in terms of like the equipment. Just the fact that you don't have to have film. You don't have to have film.

You don't, yeah, I mean, it's not like Hitchcock doing rope, you know, 10 minutes got to zoom into someone's back in order to change the, the, the. the camera but no and that's just like personal preference I guess for that and also it started to verge onto just feeling like live theater because like the camera work yeah was good and it was very like like the camera gets to the points where it needs to to film everything and have and cover what needs to be covered but it also didn't feel like if it weren't for the one take thing it'd be kind of like normal shot coverage of the drama occurring on screen and having it all happen in real time helps you more immersed with the actors. It's sort of like theater. So it felt more like theater than TV,

I guess. Yeah. Which isn't bad necessarily. It's just different. Yeah, I don't say that as a bad thing. Yeah. It's an element that does come out of the style, which I feel makes it more unique. Like, I don't know, I don't know how you're saying that there's like a lot of shows now that will do like oneers within it. I still I don't know like there could be show offy moments that do feel egregious and things that I watch but I don't know if it's a stylistic choice that you're doing consistently throughout an entire project I feel like that's just a I don't know just a cool choice yeah I suppose yeah the the fake one thing only really bugs me more when it's like I don't know in ready player one or whatever it's a full kind of CG environment it's like there's no

20 thing and it feels like a cheat code to something. Yeah, whereas I feel like they actually dedicated themselves to the concept here and really took it to its extreme. But I will agree in the first two episodes, that was kind of more of what I was getting out. There were moments where I was, if I even have the thought where it's like, I could, you know, I don't even need to see some of this like a cut is like exactly what the pacing of this would need right now.

Like in that first episode where like every single finger is being scanned before that being processed. And I know you could say that's building tension or whatever, but I was in that moment thinking like, okay, I don't know, don't know where this is going, but like, how are you going to justify this to a certain point? And three and four, I felt like justified it very well, but I was, I was thinking about it a couple of times in those first two episodes, like the more yeah. Yeah, I do feel like three and four were the most justified in different ways, which was cool. I was really impressed with episode four with just how much ground they cover. both you know physically and also emotionally it was so varied and they did so much

yeah it was very happy with episode four great place to end it honestly amazing place to end it yeah leaves it just open enough um I loved that yeah reincorporation of that shot of him on his kid's bed um I saw like all these people are picking apart like the trivia and stuff there's like a little um kind of gash in the wall of the his son's room that kind of looks the shape of a knife So in the first episode when he's like got his hands up, his hand is perfectly in the space where that gashes in the wall to kind of look like a knife. And then in that final shot, Stephen Graham tucking in the teddy bear, that same kind of knife gashes in his back, which is like a cool visual way of reinforcing what has been going on. I'm sure there's heaps of stuff hidden like that into it.

I just, yeah. Yeah, I'm quite in awe of the like production side of it. And that did kind of elevate, as we're saying, like this messaging is not. exactly something new for us, but the way it was presented, I felt like, was just, I know, you get these right actors in here. I love a lot of the character actors and the dialogue was good enough. There were a couple moments, yeah, where I don't know if I directly needed the Tate name drop or if you could have kind of gone around that. I don't know. Yeah, I didn't, I wasn't bothered by it. Yeah, I'm still kind of trying to figure out how I feel about that. So it's

like, I mean, he's a real dude. He's like a big deal. He's, uh, yeah, you can't not talk about it. Like, yeah, so it's quite a conundrum to like... He's a genre. Yeah, exactly. And yeah, I don't know how to get past that kind of just an innate surrealism of like watching a show of this scale and popularity that is including terms like manosphere and the red pill and they're making Matrix jokes about it. And it's like, wow, this is... I remember when this was like ironic like minion memes and it was like, what the fuck? This is like the world now.

Okay. This is quite disturbing. How much do you think the show was trying to leave things open-ended throughout the series in terms of like... Because I almost feel like an idiot because I was watching the show thinking like, oh, maybe there's a chance that he didn't do it. Because there was enough within the show where it was like, okay, he wasn't on camera between the stabbing and the last time that he was. they identified it was him, right? And then there's the kid that, like, ran away. And I was like, oh, is he, did he do something?

Did he know something else? And so, like, there were little sprinkles, like, just enough doubt that I was kind of, like, holding on to that idea. And then by the time the, you know, the final episode happened, I was like, oh, okay, I guess I'm an idiot. I don't know. I don't know if it was even trying to imply that. All right.

Did you miss the, when Stephen Graham watches the CCTV footage of him, uh, stabbing him. I mean, he's convinced of it. Right? But I was looking at that being like, I don't know, that's pretty far away. I was thinking like a lawyer, you know. I want beyond a reasonable doubt, right? And I was still holding out for this kid being like, yeah, he looks like a sweet little boy. He couldn't hurt a fly.

Well, that's what I liked about the show is that it could have definitely included that kind of like, let's investigate this. let's have the trial and let's see all these big moments and I was kind of expecting that. But then at the end of episode one, when they showed the footage, to me, that was like conclusive of like, oh, shit, all right, this is not the point of finding out if he did it or not. He did it. And we're talking about the aftermath now. So I like that.

He was denying it. He was denying it. Yeah. You know, I was just thinking of it. But like on an emotional level, I think that's exactly where the show wants you to be. Because like, what you're presented with is like a 13 year old boy who's like. introduced by him like pesting himself in fear and like you don't know as the audience like if he's done it you don't you want to think that he hasn't done it because it's something like

so obscene and like all the different people in the police department are like saying like I hate these juvenile cases and stuff like this that really just gives it this air of like man I really just hope this isn't the way this is going but I think we have to treat it with this like certain protocol and it's part of where the I think they're just hook of it comes from is like yeah this what makes someone of this age do this like where does this come from why um yeah in the different angles where does it come from where does it go where does it come from cotton I Joe don't do it I don't sorry I would also like to point out that I would never think of ready player one again if you didn't bring it up so much

It really like Mark to... It has really stuck with me because it's like... It's what Fortnite is now. It's like the biggest game in the world, you know? Like, it is just Ready Pearl One. It's like all these franchises like mashed together in this IP goop celebration. True. Do you like it, Jake?

Have you seen Ready Player One? I haven't seen it, actually. I need to... You'd love it. You don't need to. You should watch it. I think people like it. I have seen the BFG though.

Oh, God. The big fucking Gaybo. is what I call. Yeah. Not very good. Yeah, I need to check out that one. Don't. Yeah.

Just do yourself for five minutes. Steven Spielberg really hit his stride with Ready Player 1. I forgot it was Spielberg. You know what I will defend though? I will defend Warhorse. I don't care. I'm defending Warhorse. Yeah.

It was good. He did two movies. He did Lincoln and War Horse that year. And that was, I mean, people hate on Warhorse because they think everyone wants to fuck the horse, but it's just some people. Just some of them. Comberbatch does for sure. Yeah. I don't think I actually saw Woolhouse.

Anything else to say about adolescence? I thought it was great. I thought it was very, very engaging. And the only parts that felt like phony to me were just some of the physical moments, like some, you know, characters pretend. to punch someone else or the chase scene. It was like, you're not really running, you're kind of running slow for the cameraman to catch that. Yeah, sort of a lot jog, yeah.

Yeah, but otherwise, very, very super impressively coordinated, fantastic performances. The child actors were not bad at all, which is great, you know? The expectation is that they would be bad, but, and yeah, Stephen Graham, really, really great job. Yeah, yeah, I'm pretty much there with you. I love how it is asking these kind of broad questions and leaving it up to you to sort of figure out where you think this misery is coming from in one way or another. It's getting at this idea of like this where this lack of self-confidence or sense of self can lead, whether you think it's the parenting or the social media or the school or whatever.

The filmmaking and performances and everything used to convey what it's getting at really worked. me um this would be like a strong four-star eight out of ten for me um i i am very curious see what this director does going forward like is that just are they going to make everything this one take i don't know if they're really good at it and they they want it to fuck it that's their style now i guess they're good at it yeah i guess it's just like yeah how i'll be curious to see how they can take that um and how many different kind of genres and types of stories they can do without it just being like oh it's the one-take gimmick guy again doing his thing like sure i mean like if that's if that's just what he likes to do if he feels as though

uh there's like an emotional and artistic benefit to doing it and he wants to do that every movie fucking power to him i mean yeah he's two for two his next thing should be like associative montage like michael bay hyper yeah like just balls to the wall let it out you know yeah but i like i like the show i i i think it was good you even though I have complaints. One out of 10, good show. Nice. I also give it a one...

Closer to a 7 than a 0. I gave it a need. Cool. Nice. Cool. I had a recommendation for a movie, and it was Unforgiven, 1992, directed by Clean Eastwood. And I recommended it because it was... Gene Hackman died recently and there's a bunch of Gene Hackman films that I haven't seen.

And so I figured, I'd knock one off of the watch list, one that somehow I haven't seen and everybody else has. There's a lot of those actually. Yeah. Yeah, it was a great Western. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, hold on, hold on. I'm sorry. I need to guess.

I have to guess. Wow, yeah. You both are going to give it an eight out of ten. We'll find out. Okay, go ahead. I just, I have to. No. You're going to get the predictions in.

You've got to lock these predictions down. Locking it in 8 out of 10 and it's not because you both just gave something an 8 out of 10. I'm using my brain here. Okay. Go ahead. I'm sorry. Yeah. If you'd, we could promote like a gambling side gig where I'm down with that on the subreddit.

Yeah. Let's gamble on this. Well, you can't do anything anymore without gambling. No. Well, what's the point? Exactly. The same thing with alcohol, at least for me. Yeah.

I found it to be a great Western, but also a great anti-Western. I like that it was critical of a lot of familiar concepts and tropes and kind of character traits, I guess, even, that we see in Westerns. You both loved it because you said that in the last episode before I even saw it. But I guess what do you think anyway? Yeah. This is funny because it's known. like Eastwood's kind of goodbye to the Western genre and like a, there's all like meta commentary angle of this like past his prime old man who was known for

being a gunslinger, but now he's like kind of washed up and can barely get on his horse anymore. But this was like the first one of the Clint Eastwood like Westerns that I watched for some reason. But like it's still connected with me and it didn't even though I didn't obviously pick up on that meta commentary that first time I saw it. It's obviously enriched revisiting it for. this watch after seeing all of those classics now. And yeah, I love it. I love what you're saying about that anti-Western, the kind of unromanticized,

all these characters are gray, and there isn't really this binary, good and evil like some of these oldest Spaghetti Westons might have, whether it's the mustache dwelling villain. And it's fun, as good as they are, there is something a bit more truthful about the version of the West that Unforgiven depicts and the kind of,

I don't know, it's a very dark kind of nihilistic movie. in totality, but let's go Jake. I don't want to know your top level thoughts. One out of ten. Now, it's so good. I love this movie. I love this movie and I grew up with this. My dad is crazy into westerns, so I grew up watching all sorts of Westerns and this was

one that I always loved since I was a kid. I've probably seen it like 10 times, something like that. Yeah, every time I see it, I get something new. I'm always fascinated by the structure of it, the English Bob segment, how Gene Hackman is in there and we can get into this later but I remember as a kid I'd watch it and go like, yeah, it's a great movie but dad, what's the whole point with English Bob and, you know, Little Bill like that's such a long segment in the middle of the movie. And he's just like, it's good, that's why.

I'm like, all right, yeah, yeah, it is good. But now I have my ideas about it. I have better, I have a better opinions on why that works and it works amazingly. So it's just, it's incredible. I think that Clint Eastwood, and I'll disagree a little bit with like the anti-Western thing because I think for what it's doing, I feel like there is a strong tradition of Westerns being critical of the idea of the West. I mean, it's been going back as far as like John Ford and, you know, Ford Apache and all, you know, all throughout history. I mean, even like

a 1939 stagecoach, I feel like is a kind of pulp fiction of Westerns in that when stagecoach came out, Westerns had kind of been like a dying thing of like, oh, that's so 1920s. Like, no one gives a fuck about Westerns anymore. And then John Ford comes in with stage. coach, which is like an amalgamation of all these classic tropes and that kind of revived Western for my understanding for a while for a very long time. But I think that there is a sense of like what makes Westerns work is that we're looking into the past and questioning like what does it actually mean to have this sense of idealism and because it's not real, because we know that it's not real, you know, and this sense of expansiveness that was an illusion. And

And, you know, Unforgiven is also similar to like the Manure Shot Liberty Valence in a way, but just played to a more level of extreme violence. Clint Eastwood, of course, is playing on his star persona of being in tons of Westerns. So it works very well. And I think he was the perfect one to direct this because he has such a like very simple but very well, like classical Hollywood style of filming and framing everything. I could go on and on. You guys go ahead. Say more. Yeah, I think that like one of the ways in which I would find that it's like critical of I guess the genre and the tropes is there's a lot of characters that

Just we discover are just basically full of shit, you know Like everybody kind of tries to pretend like there's some sort of badass killer And then you know I spoilers for the movie you should watch the movie Yeah, jean hackman's character you know he builds himself up in this like oh yeah I would have killed you so hard you know I would have shot you in half a second and then when he's given the opportunity to at the end he has like five seconds at least where he he probably could have killed Clint Eastwood's character and then he you know he's pretending to play dead and makes the noise with his gun he kind of sucks and then you know the blind

kid that claims to have killed five people then we find out he didn't like the only one who's actually you know a hard killer like an actually competent killer is the main character or yeah Glenn Eastwood and even then he's just saying like he he's basically lucky you know well lucky when it comes to killing yeah yeah but I love how that feeds into like the character study nature of and the title of unforgiven and start idea of like redemption and if you the character kind concludes at least in my interpretation towards the end that like it there is isn't really space for redemption and he's for the whole movie he's talking about how he's kind of being loyal to his wife even in her death how he stopped drinking because

of her how all these things all these stories attached to him but they're the old him there's like a different version of him it's not him so when you get that turn towards the end and he grabs the bottle and starts drinking and then kind of becomes the man he used to be and excels at it and I love that little touch with the kind of character building. And an example of being told something over being shown, actually working better for the character where you do here. Like, it starts small at first.

So it's like, yeah, you shot Charlie Pepper. And then it was like, oh, you hear his old gang was terrified of him. And then it was like, I remember when you, when the kid mentioned you shot those two deputies, I thought it was three, not two. It's kind of scary. Yeah. And then by the end, they're talking about this like train heist and like a huge explosion. And he's like, yeah, I killed.

Bragging about killing women and children. Yeah, he's like just straight up. Like, that's what I am. I've killed women and children. For fun. I'm like this demon that's just, you can't really stop me for this. And there is something really kind of bleak about that, you know? Yeah.

Like what it's saying with that, like, can you not like escape your past when it's been, when you've done the things that you've done? Yeah. And also I like the idea of having like a main character that, you know, I'm sure there are plenty of people who I idolize the character as like a badass and just go like, oh, wow, he's so cool, you know, Clint Eastwood. But I like that we have a character that literally is just a guy who is murdered women and children.

Like you don't really have that a lot in movies in terms of a character that audience members could latch onto as the main character, whether or not it's explicitly suggesting you should, you know? I feel like movies are afraid to have that as a character. character yeah it's like dealing with the consequence of it it's not like a Nathan Drake type thing right so I just don't even think about that side of it don't think about all like there's murder and death or whatever that this character is caused no we're gonna like wallow in this and like look and take a magnifying

glass to this character that has been through all of that he's been through like the heights of the old west that you know and you can kind of just like imagine that it is a continuation or this same character from the three dollars trilogy or whatever head cannon you want to give it but then just like looking these people like you know the main character or the the the sheriff who's also kind of like a psycho in his own way like you said in that prison scene like putting them to the test and yeah like what it would take to live in this world and how they most of these people are quite similar but the only thing that really uh disconnects them are things like a a badge that can endorse the violence

or yeah true this sort of thing yeah i mean i on this rewatch i I was thinking a lot about like the question of who's allowed to dispense justice or violence. You know, we have are the prostitutes who want to get revenge. But in another movie, it'd be a really clear cut of, oh, these guys suck. They're, I mean, they do suck. But also you have that one guy who's the friend who wants to bring a horse, you know, over and try to settle things. And like, there is a way this could have been resolved that and it wasn't. And it's kind of like exploring in my mind the transition of like old school Wild West violence and justice of assassins like samurai going out, getting paid, committing violence to each other, whoever they see deserves it.

and then transitioning into law and how things should be and having a sheriff and power. But what the movie explores is that that's just as unjust, you know, that can be wielded to just as horrible and cruel purposes in the fact that little Bill is just like a horrible psychopath who dispenses just. It's really unfairly, you know, he lets these guys go. He just makes them come back with horses. And then he, you know, beats some people. He doesn't kill English Bob, but he ends up killing Morgan Freeman's character. So it's, yeah, it's just kind of like exploring those themes of the changing trajectory of society and how power in and of itself is. And, you know, it goes into that, like the famous climax of the scene of the movie.

the emotional resonance of the movie of, you know, the kid, the Schofield kid after killing someone, he's like, well, he had it coming to him, didn't he? And Clint Eastwood, of course, says, we all got it coming to us, kid, you know. Amazing line. Similarly, the deserves got nothing to do with it line as well, getting out this idea of like, yeah, the morality of this world or the lack thereof while Gene Hackman is opining that he doesn't deserve. the doesn't deserve the death he is receiving it's like well I mean look at the world you're in and look at how you're all acting like this is where it's gonna go

the I'd like to point out the writer for this film is also credited as writing a blade runner and 12 monkeys yeah I'm glad you said that was interesting yeah what a crazy last name peoples What a crazy middle name. Yeah. Apparently, the script was floating around in Hollywood for years and years, and Clint Eastwood passed it up earlier. And I think that it's good.

A lot of people have said that. It's good that he did it when he did because he was like the right age for it. But it's funny now watching this movie after seeing, you know, Clint Eastwood's career for the past couple decades. And it's like, you know, he looks like a. strong young man in this film. Yeah, it is crazy actually to think about how old he is right now. Holy shit.

Wow. Yeah. And there was that whole element where he was like morissying it saying it was like this is the last thing I'm gonna make. Like this is my last film. So I guess when it, even if you had that mindset, I guess when making it like it. The film has that feeling like a conclusivity to it. Yeah. Mm-hmm.

And that's why they give him the Oscar. They're like, all right. Oh, yeah. That's a fun trick. fun trick to get an I'm done guys this is my last one actually yeah it didn't work for phantom thread though it didn't well maybe one battle after another Daniel yeah oh no yeah Daniel day Lewis you're right did not work yeah he tried what happened there why did they why did they not give it who was who won the

Oscar that year with phantom thread who do we need to bully yeah yeah yeah Who is my enemy? Let's find out. Hold on. We're going on a side quest. Wasn't it, um, some older actor. I can remember. That was like due for it or something.

I've almost got it. It was gay old man. Gary. No. Oh, okay. So it was an older actor who was due for it. Okay. Yeah.

I like him. Gay old man. it's it's just uh it fits you know it rolls off the rolls off the tongue and he shouldn't have won for that movie but i don't know i agree daniel de louis can't win everything true uh one thing i love about this movie is that it it really just from the first i don't know minute it's clear that it just doesn't really waste time setting things up and getting into what it's trying to do do. The conflict was so immediate. And I was very happy. I was like, oh, wow, we're just getting into it. Didn't really feel like we needed much developed before that point. It was just developing

as it was exploring the conflict. And yeah, I absolutely love the weird structure of it that you mentioned earlier, Jake. I just, yeah, I like that I like something that is somehow so popular that it's a classic, but it also feels atypical. Because you'd almost expect by the nature of something being a classic that everything else would just eventually rip it off, you know, like everything, every action movie became diehard over time, you know? Yeah, I think that middle segment English Bob, Richard Harris is amazing in the movie and his, him going toe to toe with Gary Oldman, not Gary Oldman, with Gene Hackman, Hackman, old man. Gay hackman. I think gay hackman. I think that it's just incredible, but it serves multiple purposes because I think the reason

why this movie has such a great pace is because they treat that segment as like a B-plot for the middle part of the movie, which is typically the slowest part of any movie where things start to slow down. So it's a good B-plot. We get to cut back and forth between them on their journey and them in the town. We get to see how sadistic a gay hack fan, old-hap. Halfman's performances. We get to see what a bad, tough duty is and how he treats assassins, how he feels about

assassins. We get the meta commentary with the writer who is such a great addition to the movie that is just exploring the themes in so many brilliant ways. And then, yeah, I guess it, I guess that's it, yeah, but it's good. Yeah, I also like to, there were really clever ways. that I feel the the atmosphere and setting was presented and like the information about the characters so like an example is when they were talking about the rain coming like oh we could sure use some rain and then Morgan Freeman and Clint Eastwood are like just in the pissing

rain and he's like oh come on we could drink I like that not only was that atmospheric but it gave us information about like how far away the characters are basically where it's like, oh, you have two different locations and one's talking about, oh, the rain's coming. It's starting to rain over here. It's raining over there. It's like, oh, okay, we're getting information about where they are. I like that. And it just adds to the atmosphere too.

And the dialogue throughout is amazing, the way it complements what's going on and finds a great balance of characterizing what's happening, but also adding sprinklings of like humor with these like weird idiosyncrasies with these little side characters that will come in and talk about the condition. of like pain in the cold compared to the warm and like just funny little lines like that or little character building moments between the two leads where they're talking about like the jerking off basically i don't miss it all that much or the or the the the duck of death and the way that kind of builds into that whole scene and the way there's that that payoff every's like no i meant duck like this kind of thing and yeah i love you mentioned that writer character um and what that brings out of the scenes he's in with him kind of, uh, binging up the, uh, English Bob character through his writing and because he's so like detached from the environment.

Um, and he's like believes all the lies and he's just kind of like a leech just hops from character to character. He's a simp. Yeah, then he's like helping Gene Hackman build his house. He's like, yeah. Um, and you feel him want to latch on to Clint Eastwood at the end of the movie, but he's just like, before he gets threatened. I will kill you.

Yeah. Okay, goodbye. Yeah, he was a lot of fun. There is a line that I don't know why it made me laugh this time because it was kind of like a serious moment but it's when William Money Clint Eastwood, he's like feverish and he like, I saw Claudia, I saw my wife and Morgan Freeman's like, well, that's a good thing, right? And then Clint Eastwood goes, she had worms all over her face.

Yeah. It's just like he's so, he's almost like childlike in the way that he's so like, I'm different now. I'm better man now. I'm just a good man now. I've been cured of all that. My devilness and all that stuff. And like when he's almost like suppressing his Clint Eastwood persona.

Well, he is. And it's a very skillful performance, I thought. And by the time at the end of the movie, it's almost, it is cathartic because he's like taking revenge and we hate these characters. But also like that's the kind of sick satisfaction. of violence on screen of watching Westerns of like, yeah, this is exciting, but it's also disturbing. And like, the way it manages that is really interesting. I love, uh, on that exact note, that kind of anti-climax where he manages to hit the,

the boy who's been trapped under his horse. And like, that agonizing, like, drawn out scene of him, like, bleeding to death and screaming while his friends are like, you shot him, he shot me. And he's like, even Clint Eastwood's coming in, like, damn, a drink of water for Christ's sake. Like, like, this is just agonizing, it's like picking at the rock like awkwardly. And it's a yeah, crazy uncomfortable just ugliness. Like it just, the film throughout will do that. It just holds up like, yep, this is like the real kind of ugliness of what this environment would like look and feel like.

And yeah, it is very unromanticized from that kind of angle. Yeah. How did you guys feel about the Schofield kid and his performance? Because I, I really like what he brings. I think that he's so like, so unpleasant of a character and just right from the start, you're like, this dude's such a bullshitter and he's like, I don't believe a second that he's killed anyone, you know? But Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman, like, throughout the movie, they're just kind of like

putting up with him and his stupid antics until that moment when he breaks down, you know, by the tree. But I really like his performance. Yeah, especially in that scene by the tree. where what you're saying doesn't match the emotions he's performing. Yeah, I mean, every single performance in the movie was great. His addition as a character I found, I remember having a moment where I was like, it's really kind of interesting that we get a movie that where there's a blind assassin basically

just has one of the characters. He wants to kill people and he can't see shit. Like, it's a fun kind of extra conflict to add in there. It is, yeah. And he won't admit that he can't see either. He just like refuses. Yeah. He's just very stubborn.

And like he has that standoff with Morgan Freeman and finally Clint East was like, okay, you can see 50 yards. All right. Sounds good. Yeah. Just do with it. Let's move on. Trying to mediate the arguments basically and trying to calm people down.

I was pleased to see in this movie that not only, you know, was Gene Hackman great in it, But he had like some of the best scenes, honestly. Like every single scene he was in, I was like, oh, wow. Like this is either super intense or like just super engaging. Like, yeah, those scenes in particular I found to be highlights of the movie. So having picked this because of Gene Hackman, it was nice to have something that really let him shine is what I'm trying to say. Yeah. Yeah, one is Oscar.

Yeah, he does end the scenes he's in. Yeah. True. Yeah, I think the best film in the movie might be that prison scene where he's handing the guns around. Like the tension is so high in that scene and kind of what it's exploring is. Yeah, it's so intense. Shout to the sets as well. I love that little town they built.

True. Variety of locations, the way they did stage and a lot of good use of like shadows and lighting for just like simple conversations and whatnot. For on a pretty like modest budget of like $14 million. It was like a, it seemed like a fast official. production. Yeah, I've wanted to stone full some of this. Yeah.

Well, Clint Eastwood famously is like a two-take kind of director, you know. Oh. Yeah. Home by lunch, you know, very strict with his budgets and it doesn't, you know, go crazy with it. So there was an angle of Gene Hackman in this film when he was like, like on a ladder, doing something with his roof.

And from that angle, I thought. he looked like Tim, the important man. Really? I thought he looked very silly. I was like, oh, wow. He's kind of like a Tim. I was to go and get a screenshot. Yeah.

Wow. Jake, I know you're probably confused, but it's a, it's a, Alex, you can explain it if you want. It's just one of my personalities. Yeah, one of his, uh, alter. One of the Jungian, uh, personality. Yeah I am I am intrigued You'll learn someday

Okay There's lore There's lore I need to learn Kind of too much lore to one back Speaking of lore Do you know there's a Japanese remake of this movie What 2013

I heard about that Yeah I've never seen that We've been what's in it I think Oh shit Yeah Was it literally just called Unforgiven Yeah, same name, I believe.

Oh. Okay. Yeah, really random. Yeah, I wonder what the point of that is. I guess that's how I feel with most remakes. Like, when you've got something, I don't know, when it's already such a classic, how could you imagine doing a better job at it? Like, you're not improving it.

Yeah, you're playing with fire. Like, what are you doing? Yeah, maybe it's the location that gives it, like, be kind of interesting in like a Japan. I guess it's like the opposite of Leonie stealing Yo Jimbo for festival. Yeah, yeah, exactly. Revenge. This is for Kimba. This is for you Jimbo.

Yo Kimbo. Yo Kimba. The kids in this movie were also, like, not terrible. I like the way that they were cast because they looked like they were basically forced to be adult. at a young age. Like they looked like they'd seen this shit. Like they've gone through a war. Yeah. Yeah.

Gotta separate them hogs. Yeah. Throughout the whole movie, even later on, he's like, can you go check on my kids? They're separating the hogs. I'm like, how long does it take to separate the fuck dogs? These poor children. I do love that they introduced like his character like literally rolling around and pig shit. Oh yeah.

It's quite a good visual. He does a lot of good physical stuff in this movie. A lot of like trying to climb onto the horse and falling off and it's a physical role there's a fun scene yeah yeah how old was he Winnie yeah I was just wondering though if that's 92 that's how many years I guess 30 60 is in a 60s I think okay born 1930 damn it's he's so old yes he truly is yeah 62 that's wild he's 94 right now yeah he's 94 right now Yeah, well, Jesus.

And he's still directing. Yeah, he is still directing. That's crazy. Sure, number two. Good movie. I mean, I guess he just likes doing it. I imagine so. Hopefully.

I don't know how I would feel at that point. I'm like, I'm still pumping out YouTube videos at 92. I'm going to start thinking about life differently. I mean, if you like doing it. Yeah. I mean, maybe that's the secret to his longevity. Who knows? Yeah, you just never stop working.

That's why we're trying to raise the retirement ages so we can all live longer. We'll work forever. That's right. That's why we got to start pumping out Sardinacast episodes three times a week. Daily. Never stop working. Never stop posting. I loved the pheasant shooting scene.

I feel like visually and just also character. Yeah. Character wise. Everybody's accent in that entire scene was just so fun to listen to. It was all so distinct and so weird, very, very animated characters. Speaking of that scene, this might sound like weird, but for some reason in that moment, I'm watching them sitting on the train. First off, I love the way it's staged when English Bob is introduced with all the newspapers

of the president getting shot. I think it was Garfield, right? And the paper's coming down to reveal him. And then I realized, shit, they're on a real train. Like, that's a real background. They're just like hanging out. They got a real train on like a railroad and they're just shooting on it and then they go out on it and they're shooting the birds.

So like, you know if it was today, it'd just be like on some set, you know, with the green screen. But I don't know, just there's real authenticity in every moment. And maybe this is just like, oh, movies used to be so much better because it was all real. But like with Westerns, like that's part of the magic. Like it's the environment. It's the, it definitely.

Nature. Yeah. Yeah. It sells the whole like framing of it. I was thinking about that in a similar way with, uh, when dialogue was just shot on horseback and how they don't shy away from showing off the background and yeah, just having it shot on location. Even though I don't think it wasn't most of it shot in Canada, actually.

Oh, fuck this movie. Fuck this movie. It's changed everything. But you mentioned English Bob. I got to shout out his accent change towards the end is awesome with him. Because like that front wood way he's presenting like he's royalty pretty much and all that. I love his dialogue about the monarchy. I'm like having a go to the president's.

I love all that stuff. It's really funny where that goes. And yeah, I completely agree with the way on its face. Because I couldn't really remember the structure that clearly. It's been a while since I've seen it. But the way it does like kind of reincorporate and pay off that whole section with English Bob being like, oh, yeah, this is actually as multiple layers of like what is it achieving. Like it's entertaining and setting up these characters with the stakes of the town and like it increases the tension for when Eastwood and co show up there. It's like very like artful and well done.

And yeah, going back to that writer, it's like, I don't know. I want to know what was in the juice he was drinking because some, that's like three crazy. movies to be attached to as far as like a script can yeah it's concern to two of them being big sci-fi kind of epics and then this and there is like quite random but I'm more more for it I love all of those scripts yeah yeah the writing it's very tight it doesn't feel like there's any time wasted no you know everything everything feels like it adds to the film yeah great pacing for two hours 10 like it never sags for me like it just completely it just constantly builds on itself

And just every character introduced is interesting or something to add to it. Yeah, all of the character, well, most of the side characters, too, just get those little moments of humanity. I love the, forget her name, but the woman who gets cut up in the beginning of the movie, that's a little scene she has with Eastwood after she, like, helps him, helps nurse him back to health. And he's like, you look like me. And she's like, oh, yeah. Oh, great. you know and then she's like well you know they're getting in advance on the payment you know if you want a free one and he's like I don't want that it's just like oh shit I'm hurting her feelings you know

it's just a tender moment there that's really nice and then of course you see that reflected later on at the end of the film when she's watching him like a monster out of a horror film marching through town killing everyone it's a yeah I don't know it's a cool moment I love how the town spoke have a chance to take him out of too but like none of them have the balls yeah yeah like came to be true yeah yeah I mean he's a demon at that point yeah he's lit he's fucking master chief it's just he's running around it makes him scary the fact that he kind of is at peace with it too where he's like well I guess I am just this ultimate killer and the writers like asking him those questions like did

Did you prioritize, like based on who was the best shot in the room and take them out one by one? He's like, no, really? I just kind of start shooting. Yeah, very methodical. When I start drinking, it's just, it's like his super superhero. Yeah, it just comes to him that naturally. Yeah. So was he, um, did we get much information as to like what he was sick with?

It was just kind of one of those, like he was, he got sick for a bit and then wasn't. That was kind of interesting. Yeah. Yeah, just kind of seemed like he got a fever or something or just something struck him. But it was like, it was good for the story too because it's just another conflict at that point. And like he's sick when he's getting beaten up by a little bill, you know, like he's just, it really helps build up. up the conflict between the two of them and you really want him to come back like a badass at the end of the film.

Yeah. It like emphasizes the character change too because it makes him appear more frail and like when he is, when there is that conflict in the bar and he does it like this kind of frail old man who's like hiding his intentions but after the character change, he's like completely different and he's presenting himself in the complete opposite way where it's all like confidence and yeah, just the inverse of the old frail man he was presented at in the little shit. So it's quite a good character change.

Yeah. When I was watching the movie, I was almost expecting, like, this is the type of movie where he might just die of a fever or something. You know, they're by the campfire. He's like, is he going to die? I'm like, wow, you know, they could probably do it. The movie's been subversive enough already, you know. And like, I wouldn't, it wasn't out of the question for something like that to happen.

You know, I was watching this too going like, you know, it would make a lot of sense for his character to die at the end of the film, you know, I think another movie would have done it that way of like, you know, he's repented and he's doing this one last act of goodness, you know, of protecting someone or something like that and going out on, you know, a blaze of glory. But you kind of see throughout the movie like the one prostitute who's like really angry about the cutting up situation and really trying to get these men killed. And she seems like the strongest voice in the room and the others are kind of like just going along with it. You know, you kind of see from her perspective of like, okay, this isn't the right thing to do either, you know? This doesn't seem like what is helping the woman who is actually the victim in this situation. Yeah. And it's just making matters much worse and it's just so nice to see that kind of perspective of like, yeah, like all these characters are flawed and are trying to find ways to deal with

justice in like a really lawless land and time. And by the end of the film, like when he kills Gene Hackman's character, you don't feel that excitement or thrill. It's really remorseful. You know, Gene Hackman is just like, I don't deserve this. I feel like I don't deserve this. You know, in his mind, he was justified the whole time of trying to stop this lawlessness and assassins and all that stuff. So, yeah. Do you guys agree? It's as kind of cynical as it feels on its face. I'm just trying to figure out how like it's still like a satisfying film despite that kind of downness at its core. It works in both ways. It has that romantic beginning and ending, the beautiful theme, guitar theme that starts and ends the movie.

It's like it doesn't end on this bleak, dark moment. It ends on this kind of like sad, romantic thing of like, well, he went off with his family. And I like the framing of like the Claudia's mother not ever knowing why she went off with this guy who was violent. And it's kind of mysterious. and really beautiful. Yeah, I mean, it's kind of what we're getting at almost with Starship troopers and that, you know, so someone can watch it without any exploration of what it's trying to get at and it still works. Yeah.

You know, like it works. It works in multiple levels, multiple layers. I like that. Yeah. I especially love, I'm thinking about when Eastwood says, I'll come back and kill every one of you sounds a big. And it's like in the pouring rain and he's like stood in front of the American flag. And it's it's kind of framed as a hero moment, but the score is like saying the opposite. So it creates this really interesting emotion from it where it's like, oh, in like a, I guess a A to B kind of Western, this would be the hero like cheering moment, but it feels like kind of gross and wrong.

Like we're at this point and it's yeah, there is something like really dark and cool about that. And I love that personally for what it's like broadly saying. about the genre and the meta commentary of it I'm just I'm just trying to unpick like because it's also like so successful and considered one of the best westerns of all time you'd definitely probably be in my top five yeah I love what it's saying I wonder I'm trying to think if I enjoy a Western more than this one because I like this one a lot nice do you count no country I if no country is a Western I guess no country is better yeah I I don't know, this feels more like a Western Western.

Does that make sense? I feel like there needs to be like more of a period piece. Really cool, a neo-Western, no country. I hear what you're saying, yeah. Need to be in the 1800s or something. Yeah, this is top 10 for me, for sure. One of the best Westerns in my mind. But I'd still put a couple others above this.

Like what? I don't know. I got to go with some John Ford classics. My Darling Clementine, probably one of my all-time favorites. The Searchers. I really like Ford Apache. I don't know. Have you guys seen a lot of those older Ford Westerns?

No. No, it's a blind spot for me. Oh, okay. And watchlisting. Interesting. The Searchers was already on my watch list. Searchers is complicated, but it's a great movie. And Fort Apache is one I think more people should see because it is really like not what people expect from like a Western from the 40s.

Because it is like investigating imperialism and, you know, Western expansion. And it is very critical. But it's also kind of has like the unforgiving. thing. Like, you could definitely read into it as like, oh, it's a heroic story about one bad apple who was Henry Fonda. But it's like, it's very critical. And I think John Ford and Clinney's Wood are great to compare against each other because both politically complicated individuals and not their movies don't necessarily reflect their politics at all times. And I think that's why Clint Eastwood is a great artist just like John Ford because they're not making didactic

films that are, well, not always, I guess, American sniper is such a complicated movie, but... Is it? It is an interesting film. But, I don't know, it's, I'm very interested in what they do, regardless of if I disagree with Clint's politics, but I just think that he's able to kind of make art, nevertheless. Yeah. Do you think it manages to avoid like glorifying gun violence?

Because I was reading in the trivia or whatever that Gene Hackman was trepidacious about being involved until Eastwood reassured him that it wouldn't kind of romanticize guns in particular. But I guess you have to have that kind of media literacy of like understanding what the film is going for. And by that kind of hero moment kind of understanding the complicated emotions it's going for and not just on its face like, yeah, he's he's gone back. to be in the Luke Skywalker that we wanted from this character and he's like, kicking ass and not taking names or whatever. Um. I think it's almost impossible not to glorify gun violence in movies. Like I don't know of a movie that, yeah, like guns are cool.

Like I don't know. There's something so- It's just like innately just depicting it is like, just having an image of it. It's like, oh, I want to like hold that and yeah. Poo Poo Poo Poo! Yeah. I mean, I don't know. I guess like maybe Hanukkah is like the closest who's like really.

But I don't know. I haven't seen all of his films. Adam, maybe you can have a different perspective on that. Yeah, in terms of his like commentary on violence and movies. Glorifying violence. But yeah, I mean, like in the same way that we were kind of talking about with this film and others, you know, funny games. It still works on a surface level entertainment.

Yeah, still look at home invasion movie. Yeah, it's a very intense movie for that genre. Even if it, yeah, I can't spoil it. I can't even say more about it. Have you seen funny games? I have not. Oh my God. Nope, it's very good.

All right. Yeah, I won't say anything about it. I'm never going to say anything about it ever again. I've only seen code unknown and I've seen cache. I think funny games might be my favorite right now. Oh, wow. Really? The American one?

Yes, actually. Oh, really? Yeah. Well, he directed better. Yeah, I've only seen the American one. Yeah, that's such an interesting thing. I really want to see those for sure. Okay.

Cool. I guess, yeah, we'll talk about that more later. Do we have anything else to say about Unforgiven? No. I think. Love the score. It's about most of what's going on. Yeah.

Good score. Yeah, score is great. I love all these characters. There's pretty much nothing. Nothing major that I dislike about it at all. I don't really have anything on my notes as far as like negative critiques, to be honest. It's kind of perfect. Yeah.

Yeah. I can see why it's a classic and why so many people like it. It was just one of those like immediate connections. I was like, oh, okay, I'm watching a good movie. It was just pretty easily. Yeah. Yeah. It was comfortable.

You're in good hands. Don't have to worry. No worries at all. Yeah, I give this for now. I'm giving it a high eight. It's close to a nine, but I would love to see it again. I was right. I was right.

Damn. Well, I'm going to have to make you wrong, Jake. I'm going to bump my rating up, actually. I had it as an eight. At a spite. I'm going to bump it up to a strong nine, actually. Oh, four and a half. I'm losing so much money right.

In real time. You can see the stocks go down. Yeah, and I'm giving this a 10 out of 10. Perfect. 8, 9, 10. Let's go. Awesome. All right.

Glad the blind recommendation worked out. Yeah, that was great. It was great to revisit that. Awesome. Yeah, I just didn't want to interrupt the unforgiven discussion. But what's interesting about, um, The Funny Games US is like, I feel as though the US version, without spoiling it, obviously, I feel like the US version is like what he wanted to make the entire time, which is why he did it,

like 10 years later. It was just, you know, he had to build up his director cred first and then be able to do something that was a bit more, that would have been more impractical at the time, you know, shooting a movie in the States with American actors when he doesn't really speak English, you know. And yet people, I don't know, like every single collection and box set and like criterion, they only really seem to acknowledge the Austrian one. And I don't know if it's because a lot of people consider that to be like, oh, that's the real one because people are, I don't know, predisposed against the idea of American remakes or something, even though he did it. Maybe people, I know a lot of people do genuinely like that one more, but I'm wondering if it

might also be like a rights issue thing where it's just like more difficult to get the rights to reprint funny games US or something. Are there other examples of directors just remaking their movies? I'm trying to think. Yeah, there's a really unusual one. I feel like there's another example somewhere, but I forget. Yeah. But it is very funny to do a shot-for-shot remake of your own movie.

That far apart, too. Yeah, I mean, there's Gus Van Sant doing that with Psycho, but that wasn't his movie, of course. What? He did not direct Psycho. What the fuck? All right, question time. And let's do some questions then from the Sir DonnerCost community. Head over to the suggestion thread over on the subreddit for future episodes, just like A.BENZU did right here.

Thoughts on this quote from Abbas Kirostami. I prefer the films that put their audience to sleep in the theatre. Some films have made me doze off in the theatre, but the same films have made me stay up at night, wake up thinking about them in the morning and keep on thinking about them for weeks. How do you interpret this? Are there movies that you found sleepy in a good way? I don't know. There's some things that immediately pop into my head. Some recommend the movies from this very podcast, actually.

Jean Diehlman is an obvious one where... Yeah, I think there was a post on the subreddit that was like asking me to revisit it in some form. It's been a long time. I've never seen it. Really? Interesting. I actually recently picked up the Chantel Ackerman box set from Criterion. Because I haven't seen any of her movies.

Oh, cool. So that's a blind spot for me. I'd be curious on your thoughts on it how it washes over the first time. But I think about that film regularly and it's been many, many years. Good. It's doing its job. Yeah. That's the thing.

Even if the experience was frustrating all, as they put it in this quote, sleepy. I don't know, like Tokyo's story was quite kind of sleepy and quiet. But I think about that film regularly as well, also. So I think there's something to this kind of idea. Like you might know something that a film doesn't have to be about enjoyment in the moment, you know. It can linger with you in ways you don't expect and it can be through something such as kind of boredom or an intentional. slowness or sleepiness. Yeah.

What pops into your guys' heads around this kind of query? It's good to like have an expectation when you go in of like how much is this movie going to demand of me, my focus. Do I need to like set out a block of time to really engage like I would with Stalker or, you know, press on or something like that? I love those movies. I love Stalker. But like Stalker doesn't put me to sleep because I find it so like.

engrossing. Yeah, I'm with you. But there are certain, I guess some Bergman movies occasionally I feel like... But I don't know, like there's parts of Twin Peaks to return that do this to me where I'm kind of like, okay, this is really slow but I think about it and it's the point and it's like I admire what it's doing. So yeah, there's stuff where I definitely am like, I don't get mad at the movie for putting me to sleep.

I get mad at the movie if I know it's trying to excite. me and it's putting me to sleep, you know, because it's like, okay, there's mixed messages here. But if it's like, I know that it's trying to deliberately, like, engage you and ask of your focus, then that's like, yeah, that's a great thing. And I'm not going to, I'm not meeting it at the level I should, I guess. Yeah. I'm thinking about like Nuri Bilgaid J-Lun films. So the guy that did about dry grasses, which you saw Alex.

Oh, yeah, yeah, I love that. He's got a lot of movies that are very, very, like, slow, but so well made that you always have something to chew on. Winter Sleep is a really great film. Like, they're undeniably slow. Like, no matter who you ask, everyone will tell you it's a slow film, and it's even categorized as, like, slow cinema. He's part of the slow cinema movement, which is interesting. Yeah, things like that and Jean Diehlme are... movies that some people might consider to be sleepy movies, but to me, even though I watch them and I agree, like, yes, they're slow.

I don't know. They're not movies that I feel tired watching because I'm what I want out of a movie I'm getting out of it. You know, the incredible acting, the cinematography, like there's just, there's so much for me to chew on the entire time. And even Jean Diehlma, where it's, you know, on a surface level, you could say there's not much happening. that my second watch of that movie I was like I was like really into it I was like I was absorbed the entire time just kind of like knowing what it was going into it like that does help

that makes a huge difference yeah something that definitely clicked just the nature of watching it for a second time there are two movies that I've fallen asleep in the theater for as an adult one of them was awake 2007 um

yeah one job One fucking job. Yeah, hating Christensen and Jessica Alba. Oh man, I forgot about that film. Yeah, yeah, I remember that. Yeah, I fell asleep. And then the other one was the town directed by Ben Affleck. Wow, that's, okay, that's random.

Oh, damn. Yeah, I was so bored of that movie. But yeah, those are my kind of sleepy movies. Just things that I... Fuck you, Ben Affleck. Yeah. Fuck you, Ben Affleck. Yeah.

And looking at awake, it's only an hour in 20, minutes long as well. I know, yeah. I guess I wasn't a, I guess I was a teenager when I was out. Yeah. As a not baby, I mean, not as an adult.

As a not baby. I'm gonna, I don't know, I'm gonna upset you about bringing up Belitah. Oh shit. But that's another one. I kind of, uh, I don't know,

so, how do you say, I wanna say Satan tango. It's Saint-Tango. I'm just gonna call it Satan Tango. Yeah. That was another one I like regularly think about even though it didn't fully work for me and it's like seven hours long There plenty of shots like I remember to the stay and like the atmosphere and imagery from it That one doesn't stick with me. I really want to see that

Really Bella Bellatar films have not stuck with me I'm giving him exactly one more chance I'm gonna watch workmaister harmonies. Okay, but after that if you didn't like like his other ones I don't yeah Exactly we'll see I guess um That's supposedly his best one. I don't know. Yeah, that's the thing. Yeah, I don't know. It's only two and a half hours, this one.

Yeah. Breeze. Whereas, like, the seven hour experience of, like, combining the last, like, three or four years of, like, Amazon Brime and Netflix originals, like, uh, red one or whatever, like. Yeah. That's like the kind of sleepy I'm not looking for, you know, where it's like, true.

There's no voice at all. There's nothing. There's genuinely nothing. it's like staring at like a Coke can or something. Not stimulating despite trying to be. Yeah. I'll be honest. Like most movies I see in theaters now, and this is also because I'm like sleep deprived

with a new baby, but like I really, every movie is a sleepy movie to me now, but it's just like how much can I resist it? But lately, like, I saw Snow White. Congratulations. Oh, God. Please don't shame me anymore. No, no, no. I don't.

I feel guilty as it is. but how how was it did you like it was it good uh it was fine you know i'd give it a low one closer to a 10 than a zero but um i think yeah it exceeded your expectations yeah wildly my expectations were rock bottom and it it overperformed uh slightly but uh no i did like fall asleep during like for like two minutes or at least i closed my eyes because it's like Fuck, when you get into that middle, when you get into that middle segment where it's just like where our characters go in, we're in our third or fifth musical sequence and the dwarves are looking like they're like demonic, like, you get scared.

Was it funny about it or just boring? Sounds boring. No, it was just, oh, no, no, no. The best parts of the movie were Gal Gadot because she was so fucking bad. that it was just so engaging. I would watch a cut of that movie that's just her scenes, which would probably be like 10 minutes long, but she makes, she made, she made Rachel Zegler look like Marlon Brando. So, yeah.

That's why. That's the, is it particularly worse than like the recent Disney live action remakes? No, no, no. Why is this one getting review bomb to the degree? It's nearly 100,000 ratings already with it. That's it. Because that has so many. I don't know why.

I just, I don't know why it is this. It's because, it's because Culture War channels have been making six videos a day each for the past two years about Snow White. Like it's literally, like everybody's been waiting for this.

Like it's, they've been talking about this non-stop. Every single day. Creating content out of nothing. I did a skit kind of about that the other day. That was like people, you know, being over the top vitriolic about it and one of the lines was that Rachel Zegler caused the 2008 financial crash the way people talk about her. But no, honestly, it was just fine.

It was fine. I think the reason why I'm grading it more on a curve is because they added a lot more to this movie than they did to like these other remakes. It wasn't like The Little Mermaid where they tacked on two new stuff. songs. It was like, okay, they really re-amped this with lots of new music. So I was like, they did something at least. Was it all good? No, but it was, I don't know. What can I even say? It's so fucking boring to talk about now. Yeah. It looks like something I would not watch in a theater for sure. It's like maybe on digital I will acquire a copy legally, of course.

Yeah, I was waiting to see what people were saying about how funny the like CG dwarf characters are because they look they look creepy as fuck from the trailers. They are and Dopey is like really like looks like a little kid and you know like sweet face, whatever. He's the least creepy one. But then at the end of the film, spoilers, he talks and he has like a grown man's voice. He's like, what's up? It's like, fuck. Wow. That's funny.

Yeah. Crazy work. I just I'm not getting trapped in a theater for that. And I'm not giving them money for it. Those are my rules. No. Yeah. All right, next question.

Um, I'll slash jammedia says this. Has Jake seen Cool Cat? Oh, a little important question. Man. Seen Cool Cat? Nope. Tell me at least you've seen women gun safety. I've seen Adams videos on Cool Cat.

I've seen Adams videos on Neil Breen. Neil Breen but no I don't know I just haven't like I think because you got to have like sit down with friends to watch that and I don't really have any friends who are gonna be like Hey, you want to watch this shit No, that's why you just invite them over and you just put it on without saying anything You don't even tell them what you're gonna put on you just put on cool cats Yeah, no I don't think my friends are online enough for that They would just be like what that's what that's what that's that's that's that's that's that's that's what that's that's that's that's why it's even better you gotta expose them to it yeah uh yeah well one one of these days

okay yeah i don't it derrick's like you've seen what he's up to at the moment adam with these like multiple personalities he's like playing on twitter yeah like what the what do you say blackface yeah he's got like a new cat what's his new character yeah well he's created a character called hood rat hood rat and he's doing like wraps and it's like It's it's I I don't know if it's technically It might as well be black face He's wearing like a just like a black

Covering over his face But he's he's doing like the rap hood character sort of thing He had a song called hood rat for Trump This is the guy who went after you right? Yeah Old Daddy Derek Totally forgot about that Yeah he went like yeah there's so much lore there

It's funny you too He's like still active It's crazy Yeah He's the gift that keeps on giving. Jesus. Okay. If the gifts are like shit.

With a boat. Yeah. He's my Rachel Ziegler. I'll keep making content. Okay. Cool. But at least he's giving me something to work with. Like, geez, I don't know how these people...

I don't know how you'd say the same thing about Rachel Ziegler six times a day. for two years. It's crazy. The content farm is insane. People click on it, I guess. Yeah. I saw someone say that Rachel Ziegler was the best thing for these channels since, what's her face, Captain Marvel. Oh yeah, I was gonna make the same comment. Exactly. Breeler, so there'll be a new one. Yeah. There'll be another one soon. It's just so disingenuous. You just, you know, they don't get that much that is just stuck. It's just purely.

It's been clicked. So stupid. Uh-huh. Yeah. Gets people mad, I guess. Positive feedback loop. Uh-huh. Let's do this one from Extinction Annie.

How do you make a movie that's not subtle work? I've been trying to figure out why movies like the substance or auction don't fall flat despite being not subtle in the slightest while so many films with these same themes fail spectacularly. To me, it's like a tone thing, like a kind of self-awareness. Exactly. And good. Like these two films, they mentioned, the substance, um, an octa in particular. Uh, they have, like, cartoonish aspects to them, but it's, it's the intention with how they're

presented. Like, it doesn't feel like it's trying to be earnest without, like, any level of commentary or awareness of what they're doing. Um, kind of what makes it distinct to me. Yeah. I think it's, uh, an aspect to the approach of, like, if you're trying to, to teach them something or if you're just trying to display something that they already should know, you know, like that's kind of what the substance does.

Like the substance isn't trying to teach the audience anything, but you know, if it was like, I have something important you guys need to know, then it'd be a different type of tone. Yeah. Which some movies do. Yeah, it depends how far that like dial is ramped up because I'm thinking about like Those Adam McKay movies, like that feels like that dial is almost like, oh, it almost like being condescending at this point. Um, and this isn't really working for me, even though it's not exactly subtle in the way

it's being, uh, presented. I wish don't look up wasn't so annoying. I kind of like don't look up more than others. I, I defended a little bit because to me, I was like, this is so over the top that it's like, is it aware? Like, how aware is it of, um, maybe. it's not maybe I'm just reading too much into it but um I don't know I I think that vice was pretty annoying though the other true Dick Chaney one yeah yeah it really just depends on how you approach it

you know the substance doesn't take itself too seriously and as long as you're not going into the territory of just doing this fake self-awareness with the fourth wall break and being like oh isn't this a bad line that I wrote or whatever like I don't as long as you're not doing that isn't this script bad yeah are you just acknowledging it yeah yeah yeah are you are you are you presenting something earnestly you know are you expressing a part of yourself that feels genuine hmm do you feel like so how does that apply something like Moulon Rouge which neither of us like liked um oh really yeah are you a fan you do you didn't like Lulan Rouge? No. No. It was my first time seeing it too. So I wasn't that familiar

with that style outside of that Romeo and Juliet movie, which I don't remember being quite as bad as far as I liked like the production quality, but the way it was edited was like so frenetic. I just couldn't connect with what it was going for. I guess I couldn't figure out like the tone it was trying to, well, I understood what it was going for. I just didn't speak to me. Right. And it's more kind of irritating on its face. I guess it's kind of like with adolescence. I kind of like that it went for a choice, you know?

And I just kind of vived with, I've only seen Mulan Rouge once, but I like Baz Luhrm and I really like the Great Gatsby, which is not the maybe sort of controversial take, but and I really like Elvis. I just like the extreme aspect to it of just going for it. I don't know. It's, it doesn't, I don't know. I like it. Yeah, again, it's just like depends on who you are. Like, yeah, he is heavy-handed with everything he does, but I think that he's aware of it. So, yeah. Yeah. And also, it's important to remember that, you know, much like Buzz Lerman films, the examples provided in the question, you know, they work for a lot of people, but they don't work for everybody, right? You're never going to create something that connects with everybody in that way. A lot of people did find them to the substance to be like too far, too on the nose, you know, heavy handed in its messaging or...

Yeah. I mean, I wanted a little more from the substance personally, you know, because I thought it was old. I wanted just a tiny little more of something because... But it is like a fable. It's like a fairy tale sort of, so... It's like a black man. But I did get a... I got a little bored.

I thought it went a little too long personally. Yeah, I'm kind of that with you, man. You're the most wrong you've ever been about anything. Yeah. All right, one more question. Okay, let's end on this one from Efficient Claim 9591. I notice Adam is always looking to get his movies on 4K Blu-ray as opposed to Alex, who usually goes to streaming services.

Does the media format that you watch movies on matter to you guys? And if so, how do you guys feel about older movies when they're upscale and put on newer formats like 4K UHD or Blu-ray, since they were made before that technology existed. To me, it seems less authentic to watch a movie made in the 60s or 70s and 4K on a modern TV because they didn't know that these things would exist. We're making a film at the time. Of course, it's impractical, for example, to keep a VHS player and an early 90s TV around just for the occasional old movie viewing. But to me, it seems to do older movies a disservice by taking them and putting them on modern tech when they were made with their current tech in mind at the time. I don't know if this commenter is, you know,

is one of these people, but there's a lot of people that don't understand that, like, the resolution of film is greater than 4K. Like, we have 4K Blu-Rays now, but, like, the resolution of, like, actual film has been, what is it, like, more than 8K or something? Like, it's, it's up there. It's, I don't know how to translate into pixels, but a lot of people don't know that. And I don't know if the commenter doesn't, doesn't know that. But that's how a lot of people talk about modern, you know, resolution, I guess, in terms of watching a film.

Yeah. Isn't that like a common thing for like the CRT VHS players? So like it would cut off or change aspect ratios or fuck with stuff constantly. Yeah, that's annoying. So I don't, I don't really see it that way. I feel like it is some nostalgia there of like missing older formats and like, you can enjoy that. But also I feel like the filmmakers. of you know like the 1950s or whatever like John Ford making the searchers never thought

people would be able to watch it at home on incredible you know prints you know like yeah also like back then prints would get really shitty and scratchy and like people don't think like you weren't always seeing like very good qualities of these movies when they were originally run so yeah I don't know I feel like we're just really lucky now to be able to watch these movies how we do. I guess that's how I see it. Yeah, the most accurate version is going to be the theatrical experience, I guess, you know, especially things that are shot on film. But in terms of home video options, like the 4K Blu-ray, if that's the best quality you can get it in, I would say that that's going to be the most authentic. I would, I would

never argue that like DVD or VHS is going to give it a more authentic feeling unless it's like a very particular film that you know there's some kind of niche element to it that attaches to the idea of watching it on VHS or something but well what about like the Blair Witch project you can make that argument but at the same time I do I like I I would want a 4k Blu-ray of that if they ever released it in 4K because I like I like I like seeing the detail in something even if it's like video right like even it I want to see the most detail possible of even things that are considered to be like imperfections in the format yeah yeah the least compressed most the closest you can get to the original as what is what

you want although like lossless I don't think it necessarily means it's you know a more less authentic viewing experience if someone is watching something in a less than ideal way of it. I feel like someone putting on like an old version of No Country that was on DVD, even though it's not the highest quality possible, there's still like engaging in the story and there's still plenty can get out of it. I know, I don't know, like anything like this, whether it's like a huge technical element, whether be music or film or whatever, a whole like sects of people can form around. like just the like purity or the almost like getting to like a gatekeeperly level of like it's

has to be film and i just don't care about like digital film and it this kind of thing um and i don't know i feel like people can get lost down that sometimes um went to be the important part is sort of the story or the what the art itself is saying um so i don't i don't really get caught up on that personally yeah even for something like the blare witch project like if whatever look they want to give the film, if I'm getting a lossless version of that, I'm still getting the most accurate one. Like, if they want it to be more VHS-y, then they can reflect that in the master, right? Yeah. I don't have to do it by myself on my end. If you want to catch up and watch a bunch of, especially a mixture of films that don't have like wide releases, a lot of the time

you don't even have the choice of, um, exactly. of like a DVD quality for some of these. It's crazy. There's still so many things that are like only on DVD. I can't believe it. That's fucking nuts. It seems like you're just like throwing money away. It seems so dumb to me.

Yeah. There's a movie from like 2021 that I really enjoyed that doesn't have a blue. It just has a DVD called Intregalde, I-N-T-R-E-G-A-L-D-E. Let alone all these like cool, were like are you going to be able to like buy severance on like 4k like how's that working yeah i don't know when you get streaming in there like i'm so pissed off about um the apple movies like um oh yeah um um scrozy like i want killers of the flower moon on blu-ray i can't get any physical copy of that yeah yeah also like didn't it just come out that they they're losing like

a billion dollars a year yeah on it so it's like We don't even know if they're going to keep the streaming service alive forever. They might just decide to shut it down. Yeah, what if you just shut down the division? Where does it go? Exactly. Then you'd piracy. Piracy is keeping films alive.

It's about film preservation at this point. Very much. I mean, like a lot of it is. Damn. Well, Intrigaldé is on Prime Video is what I'm learning. Oh, yeah. Hell yeah. I think we did it.

What was the question? It was just about like how much you value the format of a movie. Yeah. And if it's authentic to you or not, if it... It's all good. I mean, I don't have like a 4K TV. I just, you know, if I can get 4K, I'll get 4K. If it's not much more, then Blu-ray is good enough for me personally.

Yeah. Yeah. I'll watch in whatever highest quality I am able to. Yeah. And that's just how I do it. But I won't like, if I have like a Blu-ray of, you know, blue velvet, I'm not going to upgrade it to 4K. Oh.

I just, I mean, I'm, it's just not worth the expense for me because I feel like I've, you know. Well, I have a problem, so it's worth the expense. We know, we know, it's okay. We support you. A socially acceptable addiction. All right, thanks for the questions. That was good. Yeah, that was some.

Yeah. Oh, there was one thing I wanted to mention. We, on the last episode, we recorded, the facts of something we mentioned changed within an hour of us recording the episode. So the initial news broke that the viewership was down for the Conan Oscars. but it was actually up and they just didn't report the right numbers immediately initially.

Oh my God. Yeah, a little correction. So we were reading from from trusted sources that had bad information and then they changed the information after we released the episode. So, Conan's coming back,

which is good. To ABC and the Walt Disney company, I want to say I'm so fucking sorry for this. This was a mistake that we should not have allowed to happen and as a result I will gladly attend the Oscars next year to make up for that yeah I'll watch Snow White in the theater to apologize yeah we're well we'll about 4k blue right yeah great one more fact check from I think two oh god sorry I might as well from like two episodes ago

I was mentioning something about the brutalist AI usage. And I think, so I was reading articles at the time, and maybe I misread one article and thought that it was used more than it was. Or maybe I was reading another production designer talking about their movie. Because some of these articles, they were interviewing like several different people in one thing. Anyway, when I made my Oscar video on the channel, I couldn't find the articles that.

I thought I had read saying that they used AI for like some of the actual like buildings. And it makes sense that they yeah wouldn't have because I was like, you know, those are probably miniatures, right? Those don't look hand painted. So I don't know if that actually happened. So I could be wrong about that. I think basically they only used AI visually for the, um, the, uh, blueprints, basically, is my understanding.

So yeah not the buildings in the film but the blueprints of the buildings So oops no okay so then less than okay yeah even less than we then what we thought it's so fucking complicated I'm sorry it's it's such a mess it's such a mess like that whole thing I recently saw Cronenberg say yeah like oh the AI voice thing was not that was clearly a smear campaign and I would look at the comments and everyone was so mad at him and I was like I thought that was pretty clear clear it was a smear campaign. Yeah. It's just the topic. I think it just gets people so heated. It's tricky.

It's tricky. All right. Alex, you have a recommendation, I think? Right, yeah. So I have a recommendation. It's a bit of a wild card, I think. Oh, wait, wait. Hold on.

Hold on. I have a complaint. Is it? Follow your complaint. Be HR for a minute. Is it not? I was under the impression it was my week to pick. Oh, was it?

Did I just hijack it? It's possible. Whoa. What is going on here? My brain is much. I didn't fact check this at all. I thought you said earlier, Alex, I thought you were saying it earlier, Alex. Fact checkers, fact checkers, please come in and okay.

Are we all, we're fact checking the episode. We, oh, yeah, yeah, because the one before that was a. Yeah, it is Salship Troopers. Yeah, I was hijacking your... Oh, sorry. Chimed in and... Thank you. Wow.

Thanks for the complaint. Wow. I am under siege. Why did you say anything before we started recording? Didn't Alex, did Alex not ask if it was his turn before we started recording? Am I crazy? I was putting... I was making bets on the subreddit to see if you guys would notice.

Oh, okay. And I just made 50 bucks. So... Um... Damn. Sorry, Alex. But, um... You wanted to take.

it away from him. That's okay. I'm hijacking it here and saying that you guys have to watch a Robert Altman movie. Now I don't know how familiar you guys are with Robert Alton. What do you guys, have you guys seen a lot of Altman? No. No. Neither of you.

Well I'm looking up at IMDB right now. Let's see. Oh my God. This is, I'm thrilled. I'm excited. Yeah. recognize any of these. Holy, oh my God. I am, this is a dream. I recognize them, but I don't think I've seen it either. Oh, yeah, I recognize Nashville. Wait, have you seen Nashville?

No. I think so, yeah. There's a lot on my watch. You see Nashville. A long time ago, a long time ago. A long time ago. Okay. So I was going to recommend Nashville and, um, McCabe and Mrs. Miller and three women are probably my favorite of his moves. I've seen probably like 16 of his movies. I'm obsessed. I love Robert Allman. I'm going to recommend, I guess, Nashville because that's probably his most well-known. And McCabe and Mrs. Miller is a Western. We just did a Western, so I figure let's... Okay, cool. Okay. Yeah. Good, awesome. All right. If you don't want to be spoiled for Nashville, Robert Altman, 1975. Watch it before the next episodes out. These episodes come out every two weeks. You can listen

early support the show go to sardonicast.com sign up for premium it's only a few bucks a month also patreon dot com slash sardonicast also the members thing on the youtube thing also there's a sardonicast highlights channel and our betting app yeah our the sardonicast bets gambling yeah that sounds so much worse my brain is fucking toast i'm going back to bed gambling thank you Thank you for carrying the episode for me, both of you. That's good. I am under the weather today and my just not functioning at my normal. It happens.

It was good. It was fun. Thanks for listening anyway. Have a happy Trek 5. Trek 5, everybody. Yeah. Thank you. Bye, bye.

Bye-bye. Bye.