The Big Picture - ‘Napoleon’ and the Top Five "Great Men" Movies

Episode Date: November 22, 2023

Sean, Amanda, and Chris explore the high highs of Ridley Scott’s ‘Napoleon’—in particular the battle scenes—while trying to sort through their feelings on why the movie doesn’t come together as a whole quite how they hoped it would (1:00). Then, they try to place ‘Napoleon’ in the historical context of “great men” movies and share their top five in the genre (40:00). Hosts: Sean Fennessey and Amanda Dobbins Guest: Chris Ryan Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do if everyone said they heard your trailer a hundred times? You'd probably make a new one. I'm Justin Sales, the host of The Wedding Scammer, The Ringer's first ever true crime pod. We've been hunting a con man for a few weeks now, and our hunt is coming to an end. Schemes, heartbreak, how to put on a wire. We've covered all this and more, but there are still a few surprises left. Binge The Wedding Scammer wherever you get your podcasts. Get groceries delivered across the GTA

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Offer ends January 31st, 2025. Visit td.com slash dioffer to learn more. I'm Sean Fennessey. I'm Amanda Dobbins. And this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about short men with big ambitions. We are joined... Don't look at me when you say that. We are joined today by not a short man.

Yeah, I'm 5'7". It's normal. By a tall man with an even taller brilliance. Yeah, thank you. Chris Ryan. Hi, Chris. Do you think it would be weird if I was like 6'2"? Do you think that would change the way you think about me? It would change the like 6'2"? Do you think that would change the way you think about me?

It would change the energy. Yeah. No, I think it would change the way you think about yourself. I don't know. Okay. I've always been fine with my height. After I got over, like, basically my professional sports dreams crashing. When did those come crashing down for you?

13. Oh, okay. That's what I knew. 13, huh? Yeah. But when you were 12, you were like, I'm making it to the bigs?

Well, I thought I was going to be an Olympic swimmer. Okay. Then I couldn't. When they changed it from 25 yards to 50 yards, I was like, I can't do that.

Then I thought I was going to be at least a double-A baseball player. Yeah. But then they started throwing change-ups and I couldn't hit the, I couldn't hit a curve-ups and I couldn't I couldn't hit the I couldn't hit a curveball honestly.

And then I couldn't hit a fastball either. So that was a big hurdle. Yeah. If Brigadier General Napoleon Bonaparte had said I can't hit the curveball

we might live in a completely different world. Robespierre may be still cooking. That's right. He would be atop the mountain. We are talking today of course about about Napoleon,

which is the new film, the latest film, from the 86-year-old commander, Ridley Scott. And we mentioned last week on the Ridley Scott Hall of Fame that we saw this movie together. And this is one of the more curious films

of 2023. It is written by David Scarpa. It stars Joaquin Phoenix as Napoleon, Vanessa Kirby as Josephine, his empress, along with a rogues gallery of character actors supporting these two stars. I say this is a weird movie

because it's basically two movies. It's a psychosexual romantic comedy about two freaks living in France in the late 18th and early 19th century. And it's also like a world-class Ridley Scott battle movie. And they're operating simultaneously and it takes place over roughly 30 years. Roughly the extent of Napoleon's adult life. Amanda, did you like Napoleon?

Yes. Okay. Yeah, people got to chill out. How's did you like Napoleon? Yes. Okay. Yeah. People got to chill out. How's your ear doing? It hurts. In terms. Okay.

So I shouldn't be talking loudly. You already yelled once. Okay. I'm sorry. Well, I just wanted to communicate my enthusiasm. You got a little infection. What's going on? I think so.

Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Before we recorded our last podcast, let's just take people behind the curtain. Great. Why stop now? He's so angry with me. So you guys did Hunger Games.

Then Sean ran in and did The Watch. And now you're doing Napoleon. Yeah, and you declined to let me on The Watch. I didn't decline. I just haven't seen the show you wanted to talk about. So anyway, I've just been sitting in a windowless room by myself cooking. And now I'm ready to go. And this is what happens.

But before the first podcast. We have a job to do. Sean asked me, he was was like can you just not be too loud at any point today like that was the direction that he gave me before this big podcast so um because of his ear yeah okay i'll i'll keep that in mind okay yeah man this ruled is it like a masterpiece i don't know probably not did i have a great time yes did i enjoy it i'm glad that i forced the last podcast into this podcast and this is running later in the week right so on our last episode

it doesn't on the big picture it doesn't help Amanda right now. It's about to get on a plane. That was him, okay? I was doing the time signaling responsibly, an exposition, and he started making fun of me. So, stop putting it on me. But wait,

I reacted negatively to The Hunger Games ballad of Songbirds of Snakes on our last episode. And we talked a lot about some of it is just like, that's really like not what I want to be seeing at the movie theaters that's not my kind of like remember this type of movie that you liked here's someone doing a credible job of it

napoleon is remember this type of movie you like here's someone doing honestly a more than credible job uh there i guess it is two movies I guess you can feel the seams a little bit like I don't really care I had fun Chris what'd you think I thought for a movie this big that my feelings about it were small uh which is not to say I didn't like it I liked it quite a bit but I just yeah but I just felt like with the exception of some of the battle sequences, which are astonishing, and just another example of Ridley Scott's mastery of not only moving great numbers of people, but then duplicating them with CGI so that it seems like even greater numbers of people, and there's some things in the battle sequences that I've never seen before.

And despite the fact that it's a horny, funny, ribald, kind of naughty, dangerous liaisons movie outside of that. That there was something maybe a little bit missing at the center of the movie. I think it was Phoenix, and I think it was the Napoleon characterization. So I'm excited to talk about that part of it.

Because I liked this movie a lot. It did rule, but it did feel almost like a coming attraction for the longer version of itself that may or may not ever come out on Apple. I wonder if Ridley made a minor error by suggesting that the four-hour cut of the film that he has made will eventually come out because It's very difficult to wrap your arms around the story of Napoleon and his reign throughout Europe in, you know, 300 years ago,

but because like, um, he did a lot. He, he, he, he was engaged in some of the most memorable, bloody,

fascinating military actions of his time or anytime. Um, he was an incredibly complicated guy. There is an entire complex that has been named after him given his height and his relationship to power and how he sought power. And so there are large stretches of the movie where something critical happens. And then in the next scene, Napoleon has a conversation with Josephine and then like six years go by and then another critical moment in history happens. And so I do not want a 10-part Napoleon docudrama

on a streaming service, but that certainly could happen and maybe in some respects should happen to kind of tell the full picture of the story. There are a lot of movies that are like this, that are about great men and as you suggested Amanda we'll talk about

great men movies and what are like good examples of great men movies. You could certainly do a movie about just Napoleon and Josephine. That's your favorite

genre of film right? How did you know? You could also just do a movie and a movie has been done just about Waterloo. You could do just a movie about soldiers in the Napoleonic Wars.

That's a movie that Ridley Scott made in The Duelist. They do the French Revolution in about nine screen minutes. Yeah. It's pretty quick. Yeah. Now, you could make the case that that's just the prologue. It's a pretty nuanced moment in the French Revolution where it's like factions counter factions,

royalists versus the Robespierre revolutionaries. It's complicated to go as fast as it goes. It worked for me. I mean, it was fine. But I can imagine being like, so wait, who's on what side here? And why is Napoleon flipping to this? And now they're back to having an emperor. So Napoleon was front row for Marie Antoinette's beheading?

Yeah. I think we were talking about the idea of subjective filmmaking with The Killer, how that's a movie that is seen almost entirely from his perspective. This movie is pretty similar. We don't see a ton from other characters in that world's perspective. We see battle sequences from varying perspectives and from opposing sides, but we don't see in the world of Napoleon much beyond his view. And I think that that is ultimately kind of limiting for the movie. I agree. I basically agree with Amanda.

Like I had a blast watching this movie and I laughed a lot. And I think that was pretty much its intention. Sure. But it's hard not to expect a probing character study of one of the most significant people in the history of humanity. And it's not quite that. It's not quite, you never quite get to the bottom of Napoleon. We don't really under, we understand early on that he might have a complicated relationship with his mother, you know, that particularly when his horse is killed by, with a, with

a kind of a, with a cannon fire and he dislodges the cannon from the horse's corpse and gives it to his brother on the battlefield and says, send this to mom. That's a great character moment that tells you a lot about this guy and how he thinks about the world and his parentage and everything. But there's not a lot of that.

And instead, what you get is this, like, rollicking fuckfest between two freaks and sick battle sequences. And there's not really anything wrong with that, and I don't even know what I was expecting, but I feel similarly about the emptiness that Chris has put his finger on. Well, there is one version of the movie

that you just described, which is a pretty intentional response and critique of the quote-unquote great man theory of history. movie that you're finally going to get some sort of like psychological understanding of this significant historical figure and this person who like lives on in our cultural you know minds um like you know we have an idea about this person's psyche that we use as shorthand to describe many other people sorry for the pun um but and and so making a movie that is intentionally like actually it's not this this guy wasn't like a great man or he's not it's not this like deep exploration of you know what it means to inspire history books he was just kind of like a weirdo who then you know he like got kind of freaky with his wife and then won some, like, amazing battles till he didn't. That is an interesting movie. That's, you know, that's, like, in the Marie Antoinette vein of let's look at history in a different way and let's look at our expectations of what movies are.

Reminds me a lot of Amadeus. Yeah. A lot of Amadeus. But I don't actually think that's the intention of this movie i think that it's a that's a fun read of it but it kind of feels and and you're right we know ridley has shared and and we know ridley scott at this point that there's a lot on the cutting room floor and so you begin to wonder okay so you just cut a lot of things and this is what you piece together rather than this is like intentionally the portrayal. So it feels a little, I don't want to say tossed off because that's like unfair to what is a really impressive achievement of like, you know, actually staging these battle scenes.

And as Chris said, like using the CGI far better than most people do, and a real sense of scope. And a really funny performance by Joaquin Phoenix. But yeah, I don't think it has that much intention. I think one of the interesting things about it is, one, we think of Joaquin as one of our most psychological actors. Yeah. Who is a character who like often doesn't have a lot of lines of dialogue in his films,

who conveys a lot with his kind of simmering kind of menace or sadness or whatever it is he's bringing to the part. When I think about the other movies that this movie is correspondent with, like it is Amadeus, it is Barry Lyndon. It is Dangerous Liaisons. You know, Ridley Scott is maybe the world's biggest Stanley Kubrick fan in the world. You can really feel a Barry Lyndon influence. This is obviously a movie that Kubrick labored for years to bring to the screen and didn't. Yes. Desperately wanted to make his Napoleon film.

Never could really get it off the ground. And in most of those movies you have characters you have actors like tom holst and ryan o'neill playing those parts and those guys are kind of ciphers they're not actors who bring like an extraordinary amount of depth to their characters they are almost like court jesters in beautiful bodies meant to like render them the majesty of the figure joaquin's kind of the inverse like joaquin brings a lot of weight to every part that he has. And so I think there's just like an expectation as a viewer

that you're going to get that probing thing. Right. And I don't know if that's what you were indicating when you were saying that there's like something there that isn't...

And I feel like the opposite is true of Vanessa Kirby, who I feel like imbues Josephine with like a kind of wild, modern, powerful... Yeah. Yeah. More the Marie Ant, powerful. Yeah. Yeah. The more the Marie Antoinette,

Sophia Coppola, Marie Antoinette, like this is a kind of modern sexuality inside of a figure that the century is old that you could, of course you could see could inspire and bedevil one of the most complicated men of his time. So I don't know. It's,

it's really weird because when Austerlitz is happening in this movie, I'm like, this is the best movie I've seen this year. I'm like, this is, I have chills. This is why I come

to the movies. When the first cannonball hits the ice, I was like, dudes rock forever. Like we have, we did it. And I cannot believe

like the ingenuity and the brilliance with the staging and the fact that that CGI looks so good how many shots are there like in the frozen lake from beneath the surface

where I'm like how the fuck do they do this spewing out of like the frozen holes and the holes in the frozen so like I don't want to sound like somebody who's taking it for granted

I'm not I've seen the movie twice it's fucking amazing at times and then there it's a movie that feels both too long and too short and that is tricky for me yeah um i sat there so i don't know if we can get into like not spoilers but a little bit more detailed descriptions there's two things i wanted to sort of say one

is that uh about joaquin for the first 20 or 30 minutes of the movie i was like why is joaquin phoenix in this movie not in a bad way but I was just like, sort of strange that they would choose this guy to play this part and not do the Joaquin Phoenix thing, which he really does do in an absolutely hysterical sex scene is when the full Joaquin experience starts coming out and this almost like feral guy reveals himself. And as the film goes on, like, he has moments of deep psychological pain

that you could, you know, point to his performance in The Master or Joker or whatever. Like, the big, iconic Joaquin Phoenix performances that are, like, this guy who has so much stuff going on inside, but maybe not the grape upstairs to, like, really articulate what's going, what's happening. And there's,'s like this great sex scene there's also a wonderful wonderful scene in egypt where he gets up on a box to look into

the eyes of an embalmed pharaoh that they discover in one of the pyramids and it's actually it turns out uh i read that that was this is an accidental moment that happened on set where Phoenix gets up on this box and he's looking at the sarcophagus or whatever. And he puts his hat on top of the sarcophagus. And then the skeleton kind of accidentally falls and it startles Napoleon. And I was like, this is a moment of pure magic that I wish this movie had five or six more of throughout. And instead seems to be like more concerned with like racing through history

than it is in actually like enjoying any of the spoils of war, I guess it would be the way to put it. Yeah, I felt the same way. I felt there were long stretches of the movie where I was like, what did Napoleon do besides go to battle? Where did his brother go?

Like, you know what I mean? Like there's like their characters who just vanish. Yeah, there's one, I guess it's like a voiceover in letter where he's just like, we conquered Italy. Like, do-do-do.

And I'm like, oh, okay. So we're just, thanks for filling that in. Yeah. Mark Bonar, who I realized after the fact

played the Scottish best friend in Catastrophe, is a significant character in the first half of the film he plays Jean-Anne Doshino

and then just disappears like I have no idea what I mean they do say he's just been like exercised from the

council or whatever is essentially like sets the movie up for the first 20 minutes where he is like running

from room to room to be like this is what's happening this is what's happening we is what's happening we need you to do this we need you to do that he puts Napoleon in a

position of power ultimately yeah and then he also just disappears from the movie and so obviously the movie is completely centered around Joaquin he was probably saving a

lot of his acting from Adam Webb I imagine oh god we haven't discussed that yeah I watched the trailer because Chris sent it to me what did you think of

the trailer Chris I thought it was really beautifully written will you see that film the trailer because Chris sent it to me. What did you think of the trailer, Chris? I thought it was really beautifully written. Will you see that film? You tell me. Oh, yeah.

Absolutely. Oh, well, yeah, but I mean, he was asking whether I'll see it. You know when it comes out? Valentine's Day. That's right. Yeah. Goddamn right. Make it make sense how Madam Web is coming out on Valentine's Day, but Anyone But You is coming out on Christmas.

Make that make sense to me. Just invert them. It's the same studio, same star. I believe the director of Anyone But You said that it's like hot people in Australia during the dead of winter for us so that we'll have like escapism in our rom-com.

Okay. Illogical, honestly. Nevertheless, Napoleon. It's clearly a truncated version of the story i'm not sure that a four-hour version is going to be able to get across the entirety of the napoleonic experience but i agree with you there are small a lot of but you have an opportunity now so tell us an opportunity to tell us about the napoleonic experience and like the history yeah go ahead yeah and what you thought was missing?

I would like to know like what his reign meant. Yeah. Like what, I don't, we don't really experience him like at court, which is such a critical part of so many movies like this about leadership. We only see him when he's under threat. And obviously he did have to basically fight through his reign because he was constantly being challenged. And it was at this critical moment in European history where all of these empires, and this is your opportunity to ask your Austria questions, but all of these large nation states were

trying to wrest control from one another, to control trade, to control just the idea of power across the continent. But you really only see that at the end when it feels like he's under fire and the run up to Waterloo. Well, it's like also an era of mergers and acquisitions for a lot of these ruling families. So there's a lot of like so-and-so married so-and-so's cousin thus bringing together

the Prussians and whoever. I'm not a history major, but it did seem like the movie did do a cursory job of being like who you marry and whether you get an heir is very important still. major but it did seem like the movie did do a cursory job of being like who you marry and who whether you get an error is very important still right so you're on this sort of cusp of modern political thought with the french revolution but you're still dealing with a lot of like royalist ideas about like if you if nicholas marries this woman then we're all set but

meanwhile if this person is nice to me and i make the treaty with this person, then we don't have to go over here in the winter or whatever. One of the funniest moments in the movie is when Napoleon and Josephine are at dinner with many friends and they are having a fight about their inability to procreate, to create an heir. That is a funny scene. And at a certain point, the funniest line in the movie, I think, is when Napoleon in a fit of rage yells to her, destiny has brought me to this lamb chop. Yes,

I've seen that this has already become a thing. It's already become a meme. It's really, really good. And it is really funny. And what it reveals

is that in many ways the movie is more interested in communicating those ideas in that way. In that kind of goofy, like, kind of like Phantom Thread-ish kind of way. Yeah.

That scene reminded me a lot of Phantom Thread. Mm-hmm. And where it's Arch, it's really kind of laugh out loud funny, but also meant to be menacing, but also meant to be representative of this conflict between these two people. But it's because we're trapped in this moment in history where we're shifting from God has chosen these people to lead versus we are a democratic republic is the necessary transition as a cultural as a world yeah and napoleon of course claims that he has been chosen by god but he's just a he's just a regular french guy um and who's willing

to shoot cannons at people yeah excuse again excuse me and so it being trapped in this moment of history there's a lot to explore there is really my point yeah of course you know what I mean there's like a lot to unpack about how the

about how civilians in any country were willing to accept or reject kingdoms and emperors yeah and the movie's not interesting

no do you see a civilian at any point I mean I'm sure that you do, but like, in a wonderful shot where they're locked up and they're being let out

of the cages after the reign of terror. Well, gosh, I mean, there's also the harrowing scene where Napoleon gets the, the sort of, I can't remember,

I think it's the council are like, you know, we're about to be attacked by, I think, royalist supporters in the streets of Paris.

And he's like, I'll repel this revolution, but I'm, if you do this, like, I. And he's like, I'll repel this revolution. But if you do this, like, I want to have, like, my name at the top of the marquee here. Like, it's not about, like, I'm your second in command. And they're like, okay, go for it. And he basically turns the cannons on the French public and blows them to pieces. Which, again, felt like, you know, it honestly felt like a visual representation of, like, a lot of imagery that we saw, we saw two or three years ago when there was a lot of protests in this country. That felt like Ridley Scott showing us the real down and dirty version of that, like what fascism shows in the face of that kind of protest, which is ironic because it was effectively a royalist protest.

Yeah, Right. Um, and that too is like kind of an interesting modern take on the Napoleon story, but it's one minute of the movie and then it moves on and no one remarks upon it. No one psychologizes it or even internalizes it. We're just onto the next adventure. I think that it's worth mentioning that like really Scott's two most, I think successful both artistically and maybe not commercially, but like critically, historical epics. Gladiator, which is basically a straightforward revenge story. It's like a road movie that turns into a revenge story.

It's this guy coming back from war, finds out that his family has been killed, takes revenge as a gladiator then kingdom of heaven which is essentially like a bastard finds out his father is a very important person in jerusalem and he goes to like basically step into his father's life and defend jerusalem in this war of the civil war that's happening there like there is a very like clear through line a clear story there's not really like a clear story that napoleon wants to tell is it napoleon and josephine is it napoleon on the battlefield is napoleon and his unquenchable thirst for power in france is it napoleon's relationship to his soldiers who kind of facilitate his return from elba and and get him to the precipice of taking the country back all these things that are kind of like brewing in the movie.

And no one, I don't think, ever chooses. I don't think they had to choose one, but it would have helped to have had like, this is the story of how Napoleon did this, this, and this. And instead it's, this is the story of how Napoleon did a bunch of stuff and then died. Yeah. Pretty much. It's not quite cradle to grave, but it is. It's all the greatest hits.

Yeah. We don't do Childhood, but otherwise, we need him as a promising young general in the army who has a... You know, I think the Siege of Toulon,

the Toulon battle sequence is incredible. Yeah. Incredible filmmaking. I mean... Yeah, I don't mean to sound almost like I don't want to sound like I'm like,

eh, this is fine. I'm like, this is pretty fucking mind-blowing in a lot of places, but the best of these movies from Ridley Scott especially have like a bone marrow of character and story that still

connect the huge battle sequence. It's interesting that filmmakers have had a hard time getting their arms around this. In the 20s, Abel Gantz made a very famous four-hour Napoleon film. It's probably the most celebrated Napoleon movie ever made. There have been a lot of stories set during the Napoleonic Wars.

War and Peace famously captures some of this time. That movie Waterloo that I mentioned to you guys from the 70s captures this time. There are a handful

of others, but there's something almost too big about Napoleon that has, for a figure who looms so large, I mean,

he's on that short list of these figures who are almost like unimaginable to us, the terror that they wrought. Like, he's responsible for the death of millions of people based on the conflicts that he pursued across Europe and Russia. And for probably the reasons why this movie ultimately is like an awesome three-starstar movie that's kind of where i net out on it it's because it's too much there's not a way to do it there's not actually like to me there's not like oh well if only you had done this you would have had a better version this is too big of a life it's too when you're when you go by the time you get to waterloo in this movie which i thought was staged really well i think some people have said that they felt like this was the least

effective one i liked this one a lot i I thought the photography in particular, like there's some like vistas that are wild. The phalanx building by Wellesley's army. Infantry Square. Infantry Square. That's fucking incredible stuff. But by the time you get to that point, one, you're like, it's Waterloo. We've been watching this movie for two hours and 25 minutes. We know it's about to be over.

We know it's going to happen. I enjoyed Rupert Everett chewing the scenery. But the wind is out of its sails, you know, and it's hard to feel like it's going to capture the highs of the Toulon siege or the, you know, the battle at Austerlitz or any of those other things. And so can a movie like be effective if it's just bludgeoning you with this two types of things? I don't know. How does that compare to Kingdom of Heaven in terms of the battle structures? I mean, Kingdom of Heaven has these massive spectacles that happen out in the desert. There's one specifically pretty jaw-dropping battle sequence in the desert

with a lot of incredible cavalry and horse stuff going on. But there are villains in Kingdom of Heaven. There is somebody that Orlando Bloom is foiled against. I think Wellesley pops up three-quarters of the way through this movie as an adversary. Who's the Russian? Is it Alexander or Nicholas? It's Alexander.

Alexander is sort of like this person that seems to be intoxicated by Napoleon, but then also betrays him or becomes his adversary. You could make the argument that the thing that Napoleon is sort of dominated by is his own will and his own ambition. And that's why when he goes to Moscow and they burn Moscow to the ground

while he's hoping to take it, and instead the Russians burn Moscow so that he can't have it. It's like the most impressed he is in the movies. Like, I can't believe like they have the courage to do this. I'm so, I'm so in awe of this almost, but that's not like a character.

That's just an idea. Um, and I don't know how, how deeply interested this movie is in ideas. I thought it was really interesting that at the end, one of the title card sequence is that all the people who died

fighting for Napoleon like how many guys he lost in battles and I was like this movie did not seem like super interested in like the casualties of war

up until this point. Yeah. So in Waterloo Rod Steiger plays Napoleon. The movie Waterloo. The movie Waterloo. The movie Waterloo. And there is a very similar sequence to a sequence in this film where he returns from Elba and he greets his regiment.

And it's like, do you accept me, basically? It's like a father being reunited with his children. And we see this warm embrace. And that happens at the beginning of the movie. And that alone. And I thought it had an emotional punch in this movie, too. at the beginning of the movie. And that alone, and I thought it had an emotional punch in this movie too,

in Ridley Scott's movie. But to Chris's point, we didn't really see him have too much of a relationship with the soldiers. Yeah, he gives bread to those guys.

Yeah, yeah. On their march to Russia. But otherwise, that's not really conveyed to us. He's mostly a man in rooms talking to his brother

and a handful of, and Talleyrand and a handful of you know and tali rand and a handful of other people and so that part too is a bit of a struggle i think also like he i mean he killed thousands and thousands of people across europe so many people um so it's it's hard to know like why i just really want to see the four-hour version. I think that's really what it boils down to. Can I ask a slightly more general question? Where do you guys land on the idea of dual-track releases for these kinds of things? I was asking because obviously he's teased Napoleon.

There's like a sort of three-part version of BlackBerry that airs on AMC now. Like you can watch it. You hear about this? Yeah. The movie? Yeah, so they cut it up into three parts and added some new sequences.

So each part is now like 47 minutes. And now, I didn't know if you'd seen this, but did you see like Basil Ehrman has done, taken Australia and turned it into a miniseries called Far Away Downs and added a bunch of footage. So, but now there is kind of like this weird uncanny valley of like, there is a new thing featuring Hugh Jackman and Nicole Kidman from almost 20 years ago on Hulu.

And it's just a mini series of version of Australia. Then this will be, if they put out a four-hour version of Napoleon, I will watch. And I will probably watch it over the course of a couple of nights. So, Quentin Tarantino obviously did this as well with The Hateful Eight on Netflix. There are two different gambits to me. The four-hour Napoleon,

I think would be a tough sell for the streaming TV audience. But the four-part, one-hour installment miniseries, like, just think if this was just like John Adams on HBO, but the four-part, one-hour installment miniseries, just think if this was just like John Adams on HBO, but it was Napoleon. I actually think that would be quite successful. Now, would they have been able to get Joaquin Phoenix to do it? Probably not.

Would they have even gotten Ridley Scott to do it? Probably not. But that is actually the rare case where I think, just in terms of trying to compel the audience to participate, you would have gotten people down. I'm kind of fascinated to see what this movie does at the box office. Because there is like a dad core master and commander. Yeah.

A group of people who really want to go see a movie like this. This is a good one to choose, I think. And I don't think that most normal moviegoers will come out of it doing what I'm doing, where I'm like, wow, what is really, what's the there there with Napoleon? You guys really brought the dad history vibe. think that most normal moviegoers will come out of it doing what i'm doing where i'm like wow what is really what's the there there with napoleon really brought the dad history vibe to this podcast which i like i guess i sort of knew you have it chris in particular what do you mean well you're just you're dropping a lot of battle knowledge you know and history knowledge and i'm

just is that part of your extracurricular pursuits? I think I've just seen a lot of fucking war movies. Yeah. And I've had history class. I read a lot of historical fiction, I guess. So maybe I am becoming. I know, but I always think that your historical fiction is set like 100 years later. What do you mean?

Other than this? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't really know a lot about the French Revolution. I think I hoped to learn more after seeing Napoleon. And I didn't. That's the other thing, is that it's been reported

that there are a great number of inaccuracies. I don't really care. I mean, to quote Ridley Scott in The New Yorker, get a life. Yeah, that never really bothers me. The accents didn't really bother me.

I didn't really care about that. Like, all sorts of things about this movie that people might be like, well, I was like, I could give a shit. I actually just wanted, I think, honestly, I wonder wonder whether he and i responded to the same thing is that like these are our this is one of our favorite subgenres and i have very high standards yeah

i mean i just i think that's it i think that's it sure and listen i don't i don't think this goes in his hall of fame and i mean i don't think we put it in but i don't remember it's really hovering right on the outside well i just i was like we haven't we've barely talked about vanessa kirby and this is a movie about how josephine aka vanessa kirby just has a weird hold on this man and he's and i liked that part of the movie. I did too. Like, I just, I thought, it is relatively focused. And they have a very strange chemistry. And it's very funny. And it's probably, like, a pretty simplistic reading of history. And the motivations of a man who killed thousands, if not millions, of people.

But, like, I don't know. I had a fine time at the movies watching it. i had a fine time at the movies watching it i had a fine time at the movies watching it too i had a nice time i i even i even i would even say i had a very good time yeah uh i would love honestly the uh house of gucci version of this movie which was mostly like him coming back from battle and her being like while you've been gone i have fucked another guy and watching him lose his mind. Like, I wouldn't have, I think we probably all would have been like,

oh, what would have happened if Ridley Scott had shot in Waterloo or Austerlitz? But I actually think that she was so powerful and so good that the gravitational pull of the movie sometimes goes away from the historical arc and the battlefields and the stuff like that. And you're just like,

she really put the zap on this guy stuff like that and you're just like she really put the zap on this guy's head you know and like how much of what he did outside of palace walls was

solely motivated by the fact that he couldn't get like an heir and like her full like loyalty

so that was very clearly to me the intention of the movie that's the big idea of the movie I don't know that the movie like at that. I don't know that we ever actually, and I think it's because of the way that it was edited. I think that they're probably in the four-hour cut, you will see a more clear correlation between military decision-making and his obsession slash concerns about his own impotence or inability to procreate or his own

confusions about masculinity or his height or all of that psychological stuff that we already assume is part of Napoleon. Because Joaquin is doing the part in such a pulled-back way, he's trying to not do the Pepe Le Pew voice. He's trying to not be too short. He's trying to resist. And there was this great story. I think it was in the Ridley

profile in The New Yorker, but it has been reported around that Joaquin, two days before they were set to shoot, approached Ridley and was like, I don't know what to do. I don't know how to approach this. I'm not sure what my move is. And so that they spent those two days going through the entire script together, beat by beat and unpacking how to approach it. And what he's done is like a pretty classic Joaquin Phoenix move, but not common for movie stars. He might be the only American movie star that can do this, but it's an anti-performance.

It's a non-performance performance. He almost never goes over the top in the movie. His physical gestures, that famous like move forward moment. Very subtle. So subtle, so soft. So, you know, this is not like a vigorous man yelling. In fact, he has lieutenants in his army who are his voice

about charging and about, you know, forward action. So, all of that seems very purposeful, but it's ultimately kind of hard for it to feel rousing if you don't have the psychological connection with Josephine and he's pulling it back,

not playing it tough, not playing it straight. So, I don't know. I was trying to think of who would have been a better Napoleon. Miles Teller.

It's pretty good. I'm not against it. I'm just going to say. Anybody you would want to see as Napoleon? I like the Joaquin performance. I'm not having as hard a time connecting socially and sexually frustrated Napoleon at home to just acting out, you know, on the battlefields of Europe. I was like, this is pretty clear. It's like a one-to-one

for me but you have openly and publicly fantasized about Joaquin Phoenix on this show um no I just like I get

I understand what's motivating this person what's underneath this guy's skin this sex scenes like actually the way

that Napoleon has sex explains a lot about what's going on everywhere else quick question you know do we know if in the uh early 19th century late 18th century anyone was having sex in a more romantic

way than that like was sex largely like like transition well they do show josephine having more uh a more uh related she's erotic erotic like she's involved in the in in having sex with the person who's not napoleon so like i always i always when when you say the word screwing i think of the late the late 18th century sure why because it's just like we're not even getting undressed we're just going right at it yeah you know on the other hand like they really didn't have as much to do back then you know so i think it was sort of i mean a wide way to kill time my counter argument to that is then like why did they have so many fucking revolutions i feel like something has happened in like movie and tv culture that has made this made us think this, which is that like the favorite

and the great and the Tony McNamara era of writing where it's like, just because this happened 250 years ago doesn't mean these people weren't perverts too.

Like point of view has now tricked us into thinking that that is how life actually was. Every single one was just, everybody was just buggering each other. Yeah, just Nicholas Holt

just like railing somebody from behind and you're like, well, that's how all sex happened. And it's like, based on what? Okay. Not based on the great sonnets

that were written, you know? Right. That was all about a kind of like prolonged intimacy. I'm just asking questions. Yeah. A lot of poetry written,

you know, in the Greek and Roman Empire That's true. suggests there's some exploration. Yeah. Much more tantric in their experiences. Wouldn't you agree?

There are a lot of Roman poems about tantric sex. Those were Sting's direct inspirations for Fields of Gold. How to hold an O in the Roman Empire. Yeah. Do you think this is actually a great man movie? I think it's an anti-great man movie. I think that's like kind of its idea. I don't know whether it fully conceptually succeeds at that,

but I, and maybe that's just how I roll up to great man movies. So it's like, Oh, that's clever. Okay. Do. Okay.

So I think one of your key misreads of oppenheimer is that it's a great great man movie um get the kevlar but uh in general like do they exist because everyone that i came up with i was like this is kind of an anti-great man movie it's kind of been it was kind of made to reveal that someone who was in power was kind of a dunce or not as powerful as you thought or not as great like in the 1930s or that being a great man is hard you know and that part of being

a great man is can you can you can you really be a great man do great men exist or is it all just us grappling I honestly think

Chris is a great man I think Chris is like one of the uniters of all time I would make a pretty boring movie subject so I disagree but okay that's why you shouldn't

write your own story I more want like just like a docudrama you've lived a a docudrama like a day to day like a Big Brother you can only see

the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday Friday of your life you can see oh I did this pod I had this meeting I had this annoying conversation but what I can see is the arc of you

yeah the rainbow of Chris the entire what part of my movie am I in? Is this my Elba? Yeah, descending action. Am I walking late at two? Russia in the winter is fine.

Just don't burn your house to the ground. Do you like great men movies? Do they exist? I think it's a genre, but I think it's a genre that is often... I think the movies that we respond to are often ones that interrogate the mythology of the great man

and or lampoon them. Right. Or talk about all the broken eggs that made that omelet. So it's... I mean, I was... Every time you say great man, I just think of Lawrence of Arabia

just because that's the sort of quintessential one to me. But there's a lot of that movie that is about his, candidly, his mania and his sort of desire to impose himself on what

he sees as a wasteland and a void and an empty canvas to paint his story and everybody's like, we fucking live here and we're going to be here when you go back to England. We have a say too about whether we go to acaba or whatever you know like yeah that's what i think what i'm thinking of is like the life of emil zola is like a great man movie okay it's a very famous oscar film from the 1930s that portrays the hardships and ultimate triumph of someone who meaningfully impacted our society right those movies are boring

and there's not a lot of them anymore well i mean so the great man theory is like it's originally about it's like a theory of history right and that like history is defined by these people like who are like were unique and did something that like super fast forwards something and i so most good movies about those people tend to complicate that like very basic history and you know and because otherwise you don't have conflict in a movie so i would agree with you that all of the good great man movies are about someone who has like held a significant you know a quote-unquote significant historical place uh and then you peel back the curtain and you're like oh but you know it's it's hard being great yeah which is like what Oppenheimer does which is why you know I

like make fun of it a little uh first two hours are an incredible technical achievement the point of the I I really I think insincere i know i know you're doing a bit and i get it and it's obviously been getting under my skin but like you sound stupid when you think the takeaway of oppenheimer is that it's hard for oppenheimer to be great when it's actually hard for the world to cope with what science has brought us. Like that you won't acknowledge that, you sound dumb. Like I need you to get around that. It's going to be such a long board season. You're so mad.

It's just a goofball take. Like you don't usually do goofball takes. It's a goofball ending where he's just like, I think we've already, you know, it's like, did we ruin humanity? I think we already did. Like, oh no. What did my genius do to the world?

But it is happening like literally right now again. Yeah. Okay. All right, JMO. Let's go. Sean wanted to come out. Of course you're right. Yeah.

I mean, AI is like, it's going to happen. And these guys are like. I know. You said you don't worry about Skynet. I don't because I am a childless freak who just cares about playing FIFA. Yeah. I don't have to worry about the future because I don't think the machines will rise. You think my take on like Oppenheimer is like, oh, it's okay.

Like everything, like you think that that's what it is. You think I'm just like, yeah, it's fine. I'm glad they built the bomb. Like what? You're overreading the character. Like it's not about the character. The character is an empty shell in the last two-thirds of the movie. That's the whole point.

Like, we don't really know very much about this guy because he turned his life over to this idea. And of course, like, some people are responsible for the progress or lack of progress that we get at the end. Right. But I don't think it's about the individual person. Like, the whole point of Oppenheimer

is that he was like an orchestrator. He wasn't actually the person doing the thing. So to me, like, I think it's the same for a lot of the movies that we could talk about here. Where, on the surface, it shows us that there's like one guy who's pulling the strings.

But when you look back, you realize that like everybody is in service of these problems. Thousands of people worked for Napoleon. You know, like, and they all went forward.

The deep state. The Napoleonic deep state. You're not helping. You're really not helping. I guess I don't see Oppenheimer as a great man movie but i guess maybe by your definition in its literary theory well it's re-examining how we look at singular historical figures of significance and what or what they are or not responsible for and maybe you're right that it's

rejecting this idea that he alone is responsible like you know we all are responsible

and it's not just like one person is just not responsible for history I think that's a a big part of the idea of of that movie that in a way

that it isn't like I can give you some of mine like if you want to just hear the movies I see in this field but like Steve Jobs I think is a really good version of a movie like this part of the reason that Steve Jobs works for me personally is because it never intends to tell the whole story the way Napoleon does

and uses a very discreet script structure to show us three events from his life and then better understand his genius and his flaws and who he was as a person.

It puts a little bit of a gloss on him at the end with his daughter that I've always kind of struggled with because he was such a Sorkin, man.

And it was complete Sorkin. Here you are. You in five years. You know? You just want to give Alice an iPod. I mean mean could be could be but i'm not making a movie i promise i'm not making a movie about it um but that movie is

a movie that like puts the the blame and the praise at his feet almost entirely you know it's like without him yeah and then and then seth rogan is as was yeah um i like i don't see oppenheimer in that way personally i see oppenheimer as like a team-up movie it's like oceans 11 and he's george clooney except but for nuclear i wonder if part of the disagreement if there is one here legitimately or if this is theatrical between the two of you but i wonder whether part of what we're talking about is each individual's filmmakers relationship to their subject because there can be hagiography, there can be this sort of like almost propaganda version of it,

which I think at the end of Steve Jobs we drift towards, which is not only did he do all this shit, but he was also a really good guy. Yeah. You know? I think you could make the argument that JFK is like this in that Stone sees himself as Jim Garrison and is like,

this dude was the best. Look at him take down this entire conspiracy. Whereas if you take a step outside of that story, people have lots of things to say about Jim Garrison. He was just basically a Kyoto character, tilting at windmills and everything.

I think that each time you see it each time you see one of these movies you have to ask yourself like what is the the sort of object of like or the goal of the filmmaker to make me think about this character and often like the sort of more sort of superficial ones are the ones where the filmmakers is like great guy loved him thought this guy was amazing yeah i don't think that a great man movie equals this man was great. None of our movies. None of our movies of the 10. Yeah.

Like endorse that. Yeah. And I don't even think that about Oppenheimer. I like. No, definitely not. That's what I mean. I think that this concept of understanding history through someone pushing it forward, I think is a little bit, it's just a

little oversimplified for me. And even in the face of a Napoleon adaptation that I pretty much enjoyed, what I felt was missing was like, how? Like, help me better understand how. Like a handful of foolish plutocrats within the French government, like didn't realize how powerful Napoleon was. And so he overwhelmed them. There was more to it than that. Like there, I know for a fact based on what I've read that there was more to it than that like there I know for a fact based on what I've read that there was more to it than that but it's not there

because that's not expedient for telling a story just like a lot just like the Steve Jobs thing is like well audiences aren't gonna want to go out of the Steve

Jobs movie thinking he was a real prick yeah so we got a lie your history dead air it's gonna be so beautiful I like I've been in it for years no but

like not in this way not in the just let me log on and tell you about like this, like book of Benjamin Franklin about like his ex wife or whatever. He's from Philly. So we don't, we're not going to rock with that. I guess he's from England actually, but one in the same.

Yeah. As far as this Irishman from New York is concerned. What, what, what's one of yours? So you, I mean, you took,

our lists are pretty obvious because the the thing about great men movies and i think the reason that you and i are both like skating around them with some skepticism or some like is this really good is that they they tend to be embraced by the academy in particular and they are sort of like stated as the like quote unquote good movies about important people to which, you know, all of our favorite filmmakers and the history of cinema in the last 40 years like have been responding. But also like I think that is sort of a simplification. Anyway, this is all to say these are like movies you've heard of, like no real deep cuts. I went with Shakespeare in Love, which is a you know like a pretty classic and i think

i guess this would count as hagiography but it's different when it's an artist versus you know someone who killed 40 000 people um i think this is a very clever and charming movie about obviously William Shakespeare and also, you know, what inspires creativity and it not just because of like the love story or whatever, but it does a lot about like the logistical stuff and the, how like Elizabeth, the queen and the court and all of that stuff worked. I don't,

I don't know. It's like, I, I am a sucker, I guess for like shakespeare recreations because i also think hamnet the maggie o'farrell novel is like an amazing um amazing work of fiction and it is that it is historical fiction but all these things about someone how who has like influenced the entire western world in terms of how we tell stories and whatever. It's interesting. I don't know.

I hadn't thought of any movies about artists, but that's a good call. I have another. There are other versions of that. I just have not seen Shakespeare in Love in a very long time. I know, because it beat Saving Private Ryan, and that was upsetting for everyone. And that, by the way, is like, could be another version of a great man movie.

Is the great man in that movie Edward Burns? He is to me. And me as well. Yeah, I don't know. Again,

that feels like a team movie to me, right? It's like a, it's about a troop. Yeah, well, that's like the point

of all, of a lot of the great men movies is that actually there were a lot of people behind the thing. You know, we're dispelling the myth. Anyway, continue. Can I throw one out there that I think is like a kind of like when you when you have this conversation is the one that jumps in is Darkest Hour.

Yeah, I purposefully didn't put Darkest Hour on there because I just how many Winston Churchill's do I need to see on screen? I think you're over indexindexed on Winston Churchill. Yeah, I am. You're probably in the one percenter of Winston Churchill fictional representation. But this Joe Wright movie with Gary Oldman

playing Churchill at a crucial moment in World War II, I just thought that was the first one when you guys were discussing the subject. Yeah, no, it's a good one.

He's in almost every shot or every scene. He carries the film and you are given the impression when leaving that it's like we're not for him we'd all be doing october fest right now um do you believe that about winston churchill yeah uh because that's what's that's kind of that's what we're circling here, right? It's sort of like, does history turn on one person? I think that the part of my brain

that likes stories likes to believe that. Do you know? It's unanswerable. Because I like to believe in a King Arthur. I like to believe that there is these sort of figures throughout history that are like... It's not even their impact or their influence on world events as much as that they just are...

They mean something more than just being an individual. Can I tell you what has disrupted my feelings in that respect a little bit lately? The United States presidency? No, although we can have that conversation if you want to. No, it's the end of the Brady Belichick era has complicated in a fascinating way this idea that like there is a genius

and the genius runs the team or the government or the corporation or the conglomeration of nations and

but it's actually you hit the lottery and got this fucking guy yeah Bill Belichick has sucked for four years like I just he's been terrible like the Patriots

have been bad. And it's been great for me as a non-Patriots fan. But make sure if people lose it, they get older or whatever. I'm sure that there's something to that. But that their union, of course, was the perfect match of the greatest defensive mind and the greatest quarterback. And it's often jobs and wads. You know what I mean?

It's often, it's not it's often Jobs and Wads you know what I mean it's often it's not one person and Napoleon attempts to tell you that it's two people as well but it's this kinky gal who's got who's got something

that keeps her man in line and pursuing greatness and I like that I don't I think it maybe depends like situation

situationally. But there are some cases where there's somebody who's like, I got this all by myself. Winston Churchill, I feel like he had a lot of people working with him, right? Sure. As the prime minister. Yeah. Now a lot going on.

But also a lot of prime ministers before him who were not making great decisions. Did you know that Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington, was a two-time Prime Minister of England? The man who defeated Napoleon at Waterloo? Doesn't he get invited back? Invited back to what? Being Prime Minister? Yes. I mean, that happens more over there. They've got a more

fluid system. You think we should have that? Oh, I mean, David Cameron just went. David Cameron's like Foreign Secretary now. No one ever really dies over there. Who knows, Liz and Teresa could come back soon. I mean,

I don't think that would go well for anyone, but it's not like... For the record, no one ever really dies in America either if you've seen our current political system.

It's notable because I had All the King's Men on my list, the 1949 movie that is technically based on a fictional novel, but is very clearly based on Huey Long, the Louisiana governor.

And I like that movie a lot because I haven't read the book, but the book, of course, has the same thing, which is like, it shows you for 40 minutes, how the character tried to be honest and got his ass handed to him. And then it was like,

the only way to win is to fucking cheat and to be, to be demonic in your actions. And then shows you the only way to win is to fucking cheat and to be to be demonic in your actions and then shows you all the way through how basically it works and sure you're a bad person and people hate you

but like if all you really cared about was winning there's a way to win you can do it and it feels like a very modern portrayal of that kind of ambition yeah

but it does take a quote unquote great man to be like all bets are off. I'm doing whatever I can. And even if the people in his life are like, no,

don't do that. Don't do that. And he's like, I got this. And then everyone around him, it's like, how does this guy keep getting away with this? Like,

how do we live in a world where this can happen? But I mean, it feels that way more than ever now where you look at the people in power around the world and you're like, what the fuck? Like why? Yeah. Why? Fascism reigns?

It's very confusing. So I like that movie a lot if people haven't seen it. What else? I've got Lion in Winter, which is really about a family of quote unquote great men and also one great woman. And it's really just about just how families screw you up. And like, it's the answer to why are you like this, the why are you like this question in every great man movie is like,

I don't know, because you have a dad and some annoying brothers and or you've been put in jail by your ex-husband and or you're the youngest and you suck, but you also signed the Magna Carta eventually. That's King John. It is, because it was in 1968, it is like ahead of all of the like oh your sad family like you know made you the way that you are and it's sort of like the not the urtext i mean shakespeare is in that one but it's it's a classic and i just also uh think that it

is i mean i just really like it great Great Katherine Hepburn performance. The famous, as if it matters how a man dies when the fall does all that's left. That's all that matters. Quotable. Yeah. That's very similar to fate is a placebo. Yeah. That's also, I think that was Shakespeare as well, as I recall. You got one, Chris? Yeah. You know what I'll throw out there just because I saw Matt Zoller sites did a big piece on this today on invulnerability. The right stuff. He interviewed Phil Kaufman about it. The right stuff is about the early space race.

It's about the test pilots like Chuck Yeager, and then the move into outer space rocket launches and exploration. It's got an incredible cast like Sam Shepard and Fred Ward and Scott Glenn, all these people. But I thought I would just mention it just because there was that piece about it. And one of the most interesting or my favorite pieces that William Goldman wrote in Adventures in the Screen Trade,

I believe it's Adventures in the Screen Trade, is about his work on the right stuff. And he goes into the movie with Phil Kaufman being like, let's fucking do it, man. Let's make the American, like, the galaxy of American heroes.

Let's, like, really imbue these guys with, like, these are the last great, great men that this country produced. And Phil Kaufman's like, absolutely not.

These were fuck-ups, and this technology was taped together. The heroes were the test pilots, but even those guys were jackasses. And I like the contrast and the fight in the movie that exists between those two. Obviously, if you watch it, Chuck Yeager comes off as the coolest person who ever lived because he's just like, give me some bubble gum before he breaks the sound barrier. But most of the astronauts are kind of flawed, goofy jocks,

you know? And it's an interesting tension. Pairs neatly with your number three. Yeah, Apollo 13. Which is sort of the flip side of that which is like this this is hagiographic but it is the hagiography of like the guy who doesn't make it to the moon um so like the the great men and absentia the greatness and failure and like also like a team-up movie of all of the people who you know help save them um but it is about someone who really wants to be a part of history and like the you know lance armstrong is like a bit character in apollo 13 is like comforting

jim level's mother at the end of the movie so it's just it's about um neil armstrong not lance armstrong sorry neil armstrong yeah that would be We should put Neil Armstrong in space too. I think that would actually be exciting. Sure, but it's like, I mean, it is about the idea of history and your individual place in it versus like actually, you know, surviving. Yeah, that's a good call. I guess I don't think of this movie in the same way because Jim Lovell seems so... Sure, but he's played by Tom Hanks as like, and it is like probably, you know, it comes right after Forrest Gump. But in a lot of ways, it is his most quintessential Great American.

Or one of them. I mean, he has played a bunch of them. The fact that it's Tom Hanks playing Jim Lovell at this phase of his career is also adding to this idea. What do you think is Tom Hanks' quintessential Great American role? I mean, maybe Saving Private Ryan? Yeah. G yeah but it's that those are like all literal those are right in a row pro gump i really don't want to go anywhere near what happened when you and bill did rewatchables so i like don't even want to go on record about that piece of yeah sure it's so beautiful and i listen to it every week.

I can see the face that Bill is making while imitating. I see this is what I did. Just getting it on. As soon as I brought up Tom Hanks, I walked into it. But I don't want to linger on that thought. I've had a long day. Multiple meetings, multiple recordings.

I put my head on the pillow. What's the first thing I see is Bill's eyes bulging out of his head doing the Gump voice. That's my life. I got like a surveying the scene text from Bill on that one. He's like, where are you on Forrest Gump? And I was like, well, you could not rate. But I know, would it have been better or worse if I were in the room? I was thinking about this because I was also thinking about Bill's face when he did

Migs coming in Silence of the Lambs and he does like a really hurling his seed. Do you think that Jizz Hall of Fame would do well on the big picture?

Because I hear there's some salt burn action, right? Oh, yeah. For sure. Coming on Monday, my friend. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So to speak. Yeah.

Hey-o. Yeah, sure. Yeah. Yeah. You want. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So to speak. Yeah. Hey-o. Yeah, sure. Oh my God, that was... Yeah. Yeah. You want the Jizz Hall of Fame. Yeah. Maybe just a new feed.

Just each week we do a new episode about a new film that features prominence. I mean, like I just, I thought of three scenes just like immediately. I bet you did. You know?

So I'm with Chris on this one. Okay, great. Yeah. Getting spunky. Yeah. A new pod from The Ringer. I'm with Chris on this one getting spunky yeah a new a new pod from the ringer I'm sold

yeah speaking of seed my number three is the assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford how is that

seed because Robert Ford had to get it on you know just to just to destroy his idea of heroism you don't think so

I mean this movie is one of my faves of the century, but I don't know what it has to do with Spunk. Because the idea is that he can hardly deal with the overwhelming power of Jesse James, his iconography, his fame, his skill, his power, but also that he's kind of revealed to be kind of an asshole dipshit and

there's something like kind of psychosexual equating with him taking him out and that that makes him like feel like a real man and then obviously when he takes him out he's ostracized but I feel like

this is a really cool examination of fame and power through a lens we don't often see it through through like a worshiper um and brad pitt's jesse james is not the coolest guy in the world and he's kind of over the hill he's kind of dumb and i liked the demythologizing of the jesse james character in this movie a lot i feel like that's a big you know it's kind of a movie about being brad pitt in some ways you know

that i don't know if he knows that. I think he knows that but you don't think so. Maybe. Maybe. OK. Yeah. You know like Vanilla

Sky is like about. Yes. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Being Tom Cruise is

fucking crazy. This movie is a little bit like being Brad Pitt is crazy and you might get shot in the street. Right. So I thought this kind of seemed like a no-brainer for me. That's a good one.

What's next? Amadeus. That's a good one. I mean, it's a pretty classic one. And it is like an inversion of the idea. Similar to Assassination of Jesse James. Exactly. This is told through the lens of arrival, which, you know, adds to the portrait of arrival which um you know adds to the portrait of of jealousy and also kind of like

adds to the idea of great man and great man because mozart just has something that is like completely out of reach for sally ari and for you know most people which we also know to be true irl um but you know just like formally inventive, memorable. And when you think of subverting this idea of like a really famous person turned out to be like a real sexual freak and weirdo, among other things. Amadeus. What do you got? Wyatt Earp. The Kevin Costner.

Let's just think about Costner because we were talking about Horizon and how jacked we are for Horizon coming next year. I wonder if we should revisit this. Another one that was like just an absolute like how do you fit this into a movie theater on one day

and that he had originally envisioned this was like I think almost like a six hour miniseries. Do you think that Amanda is prepared

for the pitch that you made while we were having a meal on Saturday night about what you want to do to Horizon? like around Horizon, like just doing like going full Western and doing like,

let's go back and- Like three months of just- I don't know, like three months. Of dust. Well, that's like- Of dust. That's, I mean, Horizon 1 is June something. Horizon 2 is August. The summer of the West.

I believe Chris pitched a John Ford Hall of Fame. Oh my God. I bet we could find 10 John Ford movies that you really liked. Sure. How Green Was My Valley? Especially in the summer,

you know, I'm not trying to be in the desert. I'm trying to be by the ocean. Yeah. The Jode family had similar feelings. Yeah.

But we couldn't get there, you know? That bowl was dusty. The Jode family is just like, can I please get to a lovely Airbnb with a pool? This is what you guys do when you go out to dinner? The three of you? Yeah. Yeah. Honestly, it is.

You just like sit there and. What do you imagine that we talk about? CR looks me right in the eye and he says what i want to do is rather than talk to you now i want to tell you that in six months i want to talk to you about drums along the mohawk just like round out the scene for people listening at home the third party i think we had just finished the oyster course course yeah you you were at dinner it was for chris ryan birthday. It was Chris Ryan, Sean Fennessey, and my husband, Zach. On Saturday night, you guys reserved childcare in the form of your wives.

Weeks in advance. Secured a reservation at a local hotspot. Went out to a drink before. It was just like a big Saturday night. Three guys on the town. And then the oysters go away. A chickpea fritter. Yeah. A bottle of Sauv did you have some sauv blanc you because you said yesterday you were like the wine was delicious and i was like since when not only haven't cr picked it out no no zach picked it out i was down to have the sauvignon blanc i will say that this restaurant with no

free ads is doing this new thing in la where it's like, we have one beer. And if it's not good, I'm just like, that actually is disastrous. And I'm just like, you just get Miller Lite then. Yeah. That's not really the vibe that that restaurant is going for. And I think that you are like probably the only person rolling in that's asking for a beer. We have a $19 Pliny the Elder. Or you'll have scotch.

They're like, there's even like either Belgian monk piss or you can drink what everybody else is drinking. So I was like, fine, I'll do that. I mean,

that's like a larger, that's a larger problem. You know, the LA restaurants are also into, they're into any alcohol that is so close to kombucha that all the Erewhon heads

are just like, i won't notice um it's fine and i'll pay like 30 for it it's garbage um the wine was quite good okay i'm glad and we did talk about how and then you sat down and you're like it's time for us to unpack the searchers i think chris is like my best friend like what are we talking about you're just like let's you're like planning around Horizon we were excitedly talking about

Kevin Costner in general yeah Zach was talking about Kevin Costner yeah and talking about our anticipation

for Horizon okay you know what we make here on the show is a part of our social lives as well unfortunately for

many of the listeners at home you know what I did? I actually already heard this. Yeah, I heard it yesterday morning. This will not be the third time I've heard this. But I want to hear it.

I think our listeners want to hear it. Share with the listeners. No. It's done. I'm going to do it then. You ruined that moment. Zach made Amanda

a pre-made Negroni which she had on an empty stomach while online shopping. She got a little too buzzed, decided to fire up some sushi, which I guess you don't fire up, you just eat it. And she had some sushi while watching

40 Minutes of the Gilded Age. And then in addition, didn't you also finish Patrick Radden Keefe's nonfiction masterpiece? Yes, then once the groanie had worn off, then I got into bed and I read the last 100 pages of Say Nothing, which is absolutely astonishing work of journalism and nonfiction writing.

A plus stuff. Yeah, you missed our conversation about the adaptation of that. She was asking what the fallout from that book was. I was like, I think Jerry Adams has been sort of diminished. Yeah. Speaking of great men. Or not. You know?

Do you want to go back to Wyatt Earp? I just remember the buffalo pelt scene in this being really good. This is a... But this is like... This is another one of those darkest hour. Like, Kevin Costner being like, only I can do this.

And I must play the greatest lawman in the history of the west and make a decade-spanning epic about it um so i i was gonna just throw that in there i'll give you my last two quickly then you can do your last one yeah um number two is lincoln which i think is actually it's very similar to me to oppenheimer um okay Which is a sort of like not quite as laudatory valedictory about its subject

as you might think it would be based on the branding and the people involved and that like it reveals a character at a complicated moment

without answers and seen not through this like purely heroic lens. Obviously, Lincoln is a great man of history but the portrayal of him is so restrained this like purely heroic lens. Obviously Lincoln is a great man of history,

but the portrayal of him is so restrained. And it shows that like the world is kind of like trapped by warring factions too. It's like also a very kind of resonant movie. Even what is it? 13 years later, when was it made? 2012. I feel like I'm overdue for a Lincoln revisit,

but I'm firmly in the Lincoln is very good. You could even say now, now, now. When's the time to watch Lincoln? Now, now, now. I was going to yell that, but I don't want to hurt your ear. Thank you for protecting me. Number one is Citizen Kane. Just kind of invented this little sub-genre of movie.

Where it's like, you think this guy's great? Let me show you what's really going on under the surface. And I will do so with revolutionary filmmaking technique. Because I am Orson Welles. Seen this in a game? Once or twice. It's good. It's a good film.

Did you revisit it before you revisited Mank for your podcast episode? I did. That podcast is 2 hours and 31 minutes, so I haven't listened yet. But this is an episode of a blank check that you appeared on. It's actually relatively short for this series of blank check episodes. It's usually quite long.

The blank check boys have booked me for a 2024 podcast. How exciting. It will be at least four hours. Do you already know the title that you're doing? Yeah, no, I know.

I don't know whether I'm allowed to... I don't think they've revealed their next series. Yeah, no, so I'm not allowed to share, but I I just I have been training this is a Black Friday treat though

yeah I've been teasing oh this is episode coming out on Black Friday no I think it's a Wednesday but you know nobody's gonna listen on Wednesday

they're gonna go see Napoleon anyway they're gonna hug their families on Thursday then Friday morning they'll wake up and they'll say

did Chris Ryan say jizz on a pod today I hope so what's your number one Malcolm X which is a pretty classic well

biopic and also here is the complicated life and very tragic and complicated

end of one of the great American you know like a hugely significant figure in American history

and it's just one of my favorite Spike Lee movies one of my favorite Denzel performances great American, you know, like a hugely significant figure in American history. Yeah. And it's just one of my favorite Spike Lee movies, one of my favorite Denzel performances. Yeah. You like Malcolm X? I love Malcolm X. You've seen it?

I've seen it. I saw Malcolm X, like, I think the weekend it opened. Were you more of a Malcolm or a Martin guy? I was more of a Malcolm guy. I got it.

Self-loathing. Interesting final pick because this is also the time of Rustin. Yeah. Which is another kind of a great man movie. Kind of a

guy behind the guy movie. Byard Rustin who is you know this very instrumental figure in the civil rights movement in the 50s and 60s

in the United States but not someone that's very well known. It's now available this movie's now available on Netflix. He's played in the film by Coleman Domingo.

It's directed by George C. Wolfe, the legendary stage director. And I did not think this was a very good film. No. I thought it was a pretty darn good Coleman Domingo performance. Great performance. And this is the very broad, like early 90s, like biopic version of this movie rather than what i think could have been a really fascinating process um and ideas movie because um the movie focuses on bayard rustin's

work in organizing the martin washington in 1963 um and and all of the many things that stood in that way in the organizations. And so I usually don't like process movies, but I think understanding what it took to gritty, and I felt in a way that the nitty gritty would have opened up more room to explore the Bayard Rustin character and his particular role in the civil rights movement. He was a gay man in 1963, and there was a lot of resistance on many different sides um to to that facet of his life so i think colman domingo is wonderful um in this movie and in all movies and i guess i learned some things but i couldn't help imagining the more sophisticated version of this movie yeah i think it's it's interesting you haven't seen it right chris i think it's interesting when the movie is showing the kind of warring factions between you know adam adam clayton powell jr and the naacp and their opposition to rustin's role in this in part because he's a gay man in part because they view him as like a little bit of a wild card in their estimation of being able to manage how the civil rights movement is being portrayed publicly some of that stuff

works really well for me i just it just felt like a tv movie it felt like a movie you would watch on hbo in 1997 and um it's just not very cinematic i didn't think cinematography was very good that really at all um the script is okay it's just it's another story there's like that's covering a lot of ground it like flashes way back into the past to his you know early goings as an activist and then you know slingshotting into the future it's tricky too because a movie like this feels like it's made as an awards platform um and i believe higher ground uh co-produced the film uh the obama family's production company and it's got a great cast glenn Turman, Chris Rock, CCH Pounder, Audra McDonald, like amazing actors.

Just kind of fell a little flat for me. You think Coleman Domingo will get nominated? Well, neither you or I put him in our fives when we did that absolutely insane exercise. That was one of my favorite recent episodes. Oh, really? Is the two of you just being like prognosticating those awards. That was very of my favorite recent episodes. Oh, really? The two of you just being prognosticating those awards.

That was very funny. Thanks. Thank you. Thanks for listening. Thanks for your support. Yeah, we appreciate you. I think that Colvin Domingo is really campaigning, and he's been at all of the various galas. Looking fantastic, by the way.

What's the... Okay, campaigning, like, so is Emma Stone really campaigning, right? Well, everybody's allowed to campaign now. No, I just mean, like, if you're, like... Pre-campaigning. You mean, like, it's just, like, out and about? Yeah, like, at every party,

at every, like, non-specific party. So the LACMA Film and Art, or Art and Film Gala, which was co-hosted by leonardo dicaprio was one that really raised my eyebrows it was held the weekend before the strike was resolved but like and it was co-sponsored by i believe gucci and so they were all there to like quote unquote supports fashion and then like art and film and museums i guess all all things all of my passions i just want to say i support art film uh museum and fashion may i just say yeah i support leonardo caprio rapping gangstar

at his birthday and people who think that's cringe can fuck off very tricky one for me because i would like to support leo in this effort without seeming like a fucking dill weed. And I'm working on that. I'm trying to get my... Wait, what effort? Wrapping Gangstar? That being something that he wants to do publicly as opposed to in his car like me. I think he thought he was doing it

relatively privately. At a party with every famous person in Los Angeles? Honestly, when my wife saw that news of that story, my wife, who loves Leonardo DiCaprio as we all do, was like, why did he do this? Why did he have a party? If you're Leo, why do you even want to have

a public party that could have paparazzi? Yeah, I guess so. Anyway, Coleman Domingo attended the gala. I believe he was the GQ Man of the Year Great record. Anyway, Coleman Domingo attended the gala. Uh-huh. I believe he was the GQ Man of the Year recently. You know, he has been on the party circuit.

And so Emma Stone notably hasn't been on the party circuit or was not, but she was just showing up to Q&As for short films. So, you know, different styles. And is now hosting SNL. Yeah. Speaking of campaigning, I'd like to draw your attention to my favorite campaign that is currently active on these press tours, which is Christopher Nolan coming out and saying that streaming services are evil, so we need to have strong physical media releases for our films. Just now, it appears that Guillermo del Toro has quote tweeted discussing film to show his support as well.

And he says, physical media is almost a Fahrenheit 451 where people memorized entire books and thus became the book they loved level of responsibility. If you own a great 4K HD Blu-ray DVD, etc. of a film or films you love, you are the custodian of those films for generations to come. And to Guillermo, I would like to say, sir, thank you. Thank you for all that you've done. Do you own any DVDs? Do you own a single film on DVD? This is great shit. He literally quote tweeted discussing film,

which has just a photo of Chris Nolan and then the Netflix logo. I'm going to start doing that. I'm going to get back on Twitter and start quote tweeting Pop Crave. This is incredible. Guillermo del Toro is like a living cinematic legend. Winner of Best Picture and he's like, I'm out here. He'll quote tweet Collider and be like, interesting.

Absolutely wonderful stuff. Will you get the Blu-ray of Napoleon? I don't own any Blu-rays. Not one? I don't know. Do I? Do you have a Blu-ray player? I don't know.

Are you holding onto any of mine right now? You have no problem asking to borrow mine in case you need it. Yeah, but I actually never do get to do that. The last time I did that was Intolerable. Intolerable. No. Irreconcilable Differences?

Is that the... That's the one. Yeah. Yeah, for the Nancy Meyers episode. Do I own a Blu-ray? Do you know whether I own a Blu-ray or a DVD? I don't think you do.

I don't know. No, we have one upstairs. And because sometimes you have to use it for screeners at the end of the year. Is it like a PS4? No.

Zach gave that away when we moved in together. I didn't ask him to. He just gave it away. Okay. The implication that I'm some sort of like an intellectual midget

for keeping my PS4. Not to me, Chris. I've got your back. If you want to do a John Ford pod right now, I'll do it with you. Right now. I've only led back if you want to do a John Ford pub right now I'll do it with you right now I've only led Nottingham Forest

to 13 European cups thanks again will you be buying the Napoleon Blu-ray no I know I'm going to be waiting for the Apple TV 4 hour cut yeah

me as well Chris are you going to have a fantastic Thanksgiving I think so I'm really looking forward to it where are you going to Portland can you Thanksgiving? I think so. I'm really looking forward to it. Where are you going? To Portland. Can you share the address so people can find you?

What are you most excited to eat? Me? Yeah. I could really hit the dessert table this year. You know, that's not always the case. And like a fall dessert year you know that's not always the case and like a fall dessert you know tense i wouldn't say that apple and pumpkin are traditionally my favorite pie fillings or my favorite pie or like dessert center also apples are taking on a new resonance for you in

your life yeah that is true we had to ban them from they're like a controlled substance in my house uh due to just absolutely psychotic toddler that i live with who he also says it wrong apple apple i'm like no um but shaming your two-year-old he's the best i love him so much he's cool you know he it's that's just it's it's in his bones self-awareness is coming um but you asked i i don't know i could really go for some pie crust and whipped cream you know i'm just i'm ready i'm i'm feeling that what's the uh the when do you guys do the movie is it the night before or night after thanksgiving that everybody goes yeah it's the night after but i think everyone might have aged out of that sadly it used to be because we go to my husband's family

then they have a gigantic Thanksgiving. They've rented a tent this year in Philadelphia. But Zach is the eldest of that generation. And so he would take all the younger cousins out to a movie and like, so to bring it back to the Hunger Games, did all the Hunger Games movies, did the Twilight movies. I snuck, I didn't't I guess he went with his mom but I took a 13 year old

to see Lady Bird and I he was very cute afterwards he was like I really liked that but now everyone's like in college or married

and so they don't no one really needs us to take them to see an 830 movie no it's time to take them to Saltburn you guys can all see Saltburn together

I am not seeing Saltburn with any members of my family also I can never see it with Zach again because we got into a huge marital spat that I'll talk about next week. I look forward to that. That's what we'll be doing on Monday. We'll be talking about Saltburn and Amanda's marriage. Seems fitting for these times. Chris, thank you so much. Thanks for listening.