The Big Picture - The Robert Zemeckis Hall of Fame, and ‘Here’

Episode Date: November 8, 2024

Sean is joined by Ringer editor-at-large and ‘Press Box’ host Bryan Curtis to discuss ‘Here,’ the new wildly experimental movie from Robert Zemeckis chronicling thousands of years of history in one corner of the world (1:00). Then, they build the Zemeckis Hall of Fame, choosing 10 movies from his roller-coaster canon to enshrine (46:00). Host: Sean Fennessey Guest: Bryan Curtis Senior Producer: Bobby Wagner Video Producer: Jack Sanders Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Everybody lies. But most of us don't like to talk about the lies we tell. Until now. From Spotify and the Ringer Podcast Network, I'm Brian Phillips. In my new podcast, Truthless, I'm talking to people about their best tales of deception. From changing an entire family history to building an award-winning Hollywood career on a lie. You can listen to

Truthless on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Sean Fennessey and this is The Big Picture, a conversation show about boomer exceptionalism. Today on the show, we are talking about one of the most fascinating, persistent, and inconsistent filmmakers in movie history. I'm talking about Robert Zemeckis, whose new film Here, which stars Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, in a reunion of the

Forrest Gump creative team, is in theaters right now. Joining me to talk Zemeckis Here, some of the craziest gimmicks in movie history, it's Brian Curtis. Hi, Brian. Great to be with you, Sean. Thanks for being with me. On this freighted day in American history. It is election day. We are recording on election day, but as you helpfully pointed out, there's not really anything for us to do right now. No.

We should just talk about this guy. And Tom Hanks' character in here talks a lot about tax rates. He does. How do you think he's voting today? Oh, boy. Feels like red at the top, blue down ballot. What do you think? Possibly. Kind of a humanist, but also a bottom line guy. So yeah, this is an interesting opportunity for us to not know the future, but to talk about the past. That's really what here is all about. The deep past. In some respects, here is a movie that I and perhaps I alone have been aggressively looking forward to.

I am deeply interested in the mission of Robert Zemeckis as a technology forward, emotions forward filmmaker. And you might think that those two things are in contrast with each other, but Zemeckis has been working very hard pretty much since the very beginning of his career to reconcile ideas of sentimentality and nostalgia with the technology that is inherent in filmmaking. So here is, as I said, this kind of reunion of the Forrest Gump collaborators it's not just hankson wright it's also alan sylvestre the composer it's also don burgess the cinematographer um and eric roth the screenwriter this is also an adaptation as forrest gump was of winston broom groom from winston winston groom groom's novel uh this is adapted from a graphic novel called Here by Richard Maguire, which takes

place almost entirely in one panel, one corner, one station in the universe on this planet over centuries of time. And this movie does the exact same thing. It is a kaleidoscopic snapshot of one place. And everyone that has lived there occupied that space, particularly focusing in on one family and their story from the middle of the 20th century all the way up until the 21st century. I will start by asking you, what did you think of the movie here? It is going to be very hard for us to do adequately convey to listeners how crazy this movie is what a massive swing across space and time this movie is holy moly sean i went in knowing the gimmick knowing what he was trying to do a little bit but i mostly avoided any reviews or anything like that even the trailer

and i sat there mouth on the floor of the Chinese theater in Hollywood, knowing, what am I watching? I mean, this feels like if I were a magazine writer coming to you and saying, you know what? Instead of writing about the Clippers' new arena, I'm going to write about everything that's happened on that patch of land since prehistory. It would be a good idea for a piece.

It would be. Well, you would have looked at me, and you would have given that kind of, you know, editor's smile and gone, well, that's ambitious. Try it. Try it. That's what Robert Zemeckis

and Eric Roth did with this movie. Yeah, so it's, you know, it's a movie that is very, very, very technology forward insofar as there is a series of cutting, but there is no moving. The camera is stationary at all times in this one space. So I think the best way to understand the movie

and one of the cases for the movie as a sort of a theater piece, as like a proscenium where you are looking out onto the performances of many people's, many creatures' lives over hundreds and thousands of years in that space, rather than as your standard issue narrative film, because there is a narrative about a couple and their life from the fifties and sixties all the way up and through the two thousands.

And I liked that part of the story, but that isn't ultimately the mission of the story. I think the mission of the story is to thematically convey that no matter what time in history we are in, that place is a profound but often overlooked aspect of our lifestyle. One of the reasons why I like the movie is it made me realize something that is very simple but oddly impactful which is that in your life especially when you're of roughly the age that we are which is to say middle-aged sentimental creatures increasingly sentimental creatures very and and and being a parent is an interesting uh contribution to this movie too but you don't realize until say you buy a house or you rent a home and you're in that space for a very long time that, in fact, huge parts of your life take place only in two or three or four places across a decade, two decades, five decades.

My office and my house and my living room are two places where I just spent an inordinate amount of time alongside the one weird room here in the Spotify office where I spend all of my time. And if you take those three places, I can chart huge moments of my life across those three spaces. And this movie is reckoning with that very idea. Yes. And there's also this selfishness, isn't there? That this is my spot. This is my family's memories and will be forevermore. I feel that way about where I live. I know you feel the same way. My mom still lives in the same house in Texas that I grew up in. I live in one house, still there. So when I go home, I'm like, here are my childhood memories preserved Zemeckis style. All in this place, good memories, some horrific memories, everything in one place. But of course that is our, you know, selfishness. That is our, you know, not look through time. So what Zemeckis is trying to do here is pull the camera way back and go, guess what? That meant something, perhaps something even

greater to a person before you and the person before that and the person before that when there was not even a home standing in that spot. Yeah. It's really interesting. This is very personal, but actually thinking about it helped me like the movie more. So when my mom passed away, we sold her home, which is the home that I grew up in, the only house I ever lived in. And we sold the home to my brother's best friend. And so he was recently married and was starting his life. And he renovated the home. And he tried to make it in his own image. And I would see photos of it or I would drive by and I'm like, that's weird.

That's like, that is my house, but it isn't my house. That very curious feeling that kind of scratches at your heart. And then he decided, and I hope he doesn't mind me talking about this, that the house wasn't big enough. So he tore it down and he rebuilt it in the space where my house was. And of course it's his house and he bought it and he can do with it whatever he wants. But watching a movie like this,

where you see one generation pass a home off to another generation and their inherent frustrations with it, but their inability to make real change in their life against it. I was like, this movie is incredibly deep. Like there was a real profundity to the movie. Now what's happening in contrast to it is

this bizarre thing that's been going on with Zemeckis where he's had a roughly 20 year cold period with the exception of a couple of movies here and there that people seem to like, in particular Flight. But now, once one of the most reliable Hollywood entertainers

now has this kind of stench around a lot of the most reliable Hollywood entertainers now has this kind of like stench around a lot of the projects he takes on in part because he's obsessed with this technology and in part because he's got this real sentimental streak he really does have this boomer emotionality to a lot of the movies that he makes and this almost feels like the culmination of those two things colliding and yet I feel like it's one of the more sophisticated movies he's ever made. Yes. There's a tension there, right? Because it is ambitious and strange in that way and very, very hard to describe.

This is a guy for his entire career who wanted to make hits. He was not trying to make personal obscure films. Right. He comes in in the 80s with George Lucas, who went to USC like Zemeckis did, Spielberg, who very much became his mentor in Hollywood and produced a lot of his early movies, and said, I want to make big hits like those guys. Right. I want to make movies everybody wants to watch.

So now, we are coming in this 20-year run where he said it's been a bit of a cold streak. Also, when he's just been consumed by technology. Talk more about that. And he makes this movie that no one watched this weekend, partly because it is a very, very hard movie to wrap your mind around either in a description, you did a wonderful job there, and watching it, it's hard to wrap your mind around. Yeah. So, you know, you just mentioned to me before we started, like even just remembering who are all of the figures that appear in this film is kind of difficult after you've seen the movie because it's essentially like a living history through seven stages that are captured. You've got dinosaurs and the origins of life on our planet.

Correct. You've got the Lenape clan, which is a Native American clan that is portrayed in the film. I think it's somewhere in the 15th or 16th century, though. I don't think it's clarified in the movie when they are living in that space. No, we didn't get a little inner title there. We did not. The 15th century. We've got William Franklin, who is Benjamin Franklin's illegitimate son,

who also was a loyalist to the crown in the 1770s yes in opposition to his father with whom he had a complicated relationship the decision to portray that is strange and we can talk about it if you'd like then we have a couple named john and pauline harder one of whom is a pilot and they move in and roughly the turn of the 20th century and up until about the era of the spanish flu in the 1920s and then we meet leo and stella who are a very horny young couple one of whom is an inventor and the other his cheerleading supporter and this guy goes on to invent the lazy boy uh chair we do see a contemporary couple devon and helen harris and their son a black couple who move into the house, presumably after our primary figures, which is the Young family. So the Young family spends roughly 60 years in this house, in this space, in this living room. Their living room and their home is where we see their life.

They are our main characters. If there are main characters in this movie, they are them. Truly. And so they are portrayed by Paul Bettany and Kelly Riley who play Alan Rose. Al is a, uh, a man like many men who came home from World War II and began a life in a suburban neighborhood. And during the rise of the suburbs in America, I guess this home is outside of Pittsburgh. I couldn't totally figure out where in Pennsylvania it was. You know, William Franklin was the former governor of New Jersey, but I think that that was when New Jersey was a little bit bigger. I'm trying to, a little hard to do some of the geography of this movie as well. This movie is not helpful. This is all we should note, you doing research after the fact. Yes, very much so. The movie explains none of this. Which, what did you think about

that choice to sort of just drop consistently because it is cutting not in a linear fashion. So the movie doesn't play out in the way that I described where the introduction is fairly linear of showing us new characters, but then he's cross-cutting all the time back and forth of these people's various lives. And you just sort of have to figure out who they are and figure out what they're about. I mean, I just want to pause for a second. Just think of the list you just gave. Those are the characters in this movie who are existing across a period of thousands of years. This all really happens. That sounds like parody.

No. That is what this movie is about. And some of it is, and the other thing that's interesting is some of it is quote unquote real and some of it is apocryphal. I don't believe that Leo and Stella were the inventors of the L boy chair in fact i think it was somebody in michigan but so he's taking some dramatic license with some of these things but then the facts of william franklin seem to be relatively true to what's portrayed in the movie but yet i mean this is and as ambitious as it gets in a hollywood movie what he is attempting to do both the very formal static

nature of the storytelling and also this like rich long tapestry that he's trying to show us in these flashes. Some of it works better than other parts. I think because roughly 80% of the story is dedicated to the young family, it still has an ultimately recognizable structure. I've seen some varying reports about the comfort with the de-aging technology. So obviously Tom Hanks and Robin Wright's characters are introduced

at a fairly young age. I think they're roughly 17 or 18 when we start to see them. Yes, they're horny teenagers. Robin Wright visits their family home because she's dating Tom Hanks' character.

And they have sex on the couch. They get pregnant. They soon get married. They go through the stages of life. What did you think about the de-aging stuff? It's very, very strange. It reminded me a little of De Niro and the Irishman. And also Harrison Ford in 95, where you have this crazy combat scene.

And then you see him walking, and he has a bow- legged, like my grandfather's senior softball team walks, you know, you're like, oh, you're not in fact 30, however many years old right now. Hanks has a little bit of that just by his carriage and his gate. It's really strange. The first shot you see of him when he's 16, 17, 18 years old and it's Tom Tom Hanks. Recognizably Tom Hanks, kind of maybe like, not even bosom buddies Tom Hanks, but. Yeah, younger than that. Younger than that.

It seemed like they did something to affect the timbre of his voice. So his voice is a little higher and younger. Yes. But you're right that they can't escape. And this has been true of all of those movies that you talked about where older actors are portraying their younger selves,

but they still move like men in their 50s, 60s, 70s, or 80s. I don't know what to do about that. On the flip side, I thought Robin Wright was like borderline immaculate. Like I bought her de-aging like entirely. Yes, more so than Hanks's weirdly. And I don't know, maybe because we're less familiar with her or we're less familiar with how she moves. You know, Hanks has been so central to our movie watching experiences over the last three decades, but she, her, her younger version just looked better to me. It did. I have to say for Hanks, we need to give an award to an actor who is able to fight through the de-aging process and be an actor. Like that's some amazing skill. It is. And I'm watching this movie and I'm like, this is recognizably a Tom Hanks performance.

Even if this is like, there's this technology that's almost strange and troubling and kind of hard to fight through. Yes. He's performing his ass off. He's good. Is there a world in which this movie works better if you have different actors

playing the younger versions of these characters? Maybe so. Though I'm going to have a whole list for you of ways this movie would work better. And I'm going to have a whole list for you of ways this movie would have worked better. And I think that's probably down the list. I would like to say about something about Zemeckis and technology, because this is a very, very interesting fascination of his. Yes.

He gets way into motion capture after the turn of the century, makes the Polar Express, which is a huge hit, and then decides, I'm going to make lots of movies like that. Yeah. I'm done with humans and this is funny right because this is a guy whose movies in the 80s and 90s were humanistic spielberg to use that word again right they are about people that have this energy to them and this real these kind of cool characters and and things like that and it's almost like if you remember who framed roger rabbit where we had the humans and the tunes he picked the tunes yeah he's like my my career is

with the tunes everything is going to be like created on a computer yeah he does it's true but there are a lot of movies in the last 20 years where he goes back to the raw real feeling of a certain kind of humanity like flight and the walk in particular i don't like those movies equally but they are both very much about movies about human spirit and so he's kind of constantly toggling the motion capture stuff i think is pretty widely derided at this point i continue to think the polar express is downright creepy i think it's terrible um it's a terrible movie it's really not good i tried to re-watch it last night and i could not get into it remember when they get to the north pole and it looks like a

city that's been cleared out during covid yeah you're like this is not my idea of the north pole but so you're right that it's kind of like this rejection of the thing that he was so good at which is pure entertainment you know like he was he's one of the great movie rejection of people it totally is i would not say that here is a rejection of people, but it is an attempt to do what he's always trying to do, which is basically like find some new expression by way of the tools of the trade to evolve the story form. And the question you ask is, does that help us here?

Because I'm watching this movie, and even the backdrops in the scenes with Tom Hanks and Robin Wright's characters, I'm looking at this going, is that a real set? Or is that CGI? I can't tell. I honestly can't tell.

That's not a great thing for a movie. And I'm not saying that because the CGI was so immaculate. I'm just like, I don't know what I'm watching. It feels like I'm watching AI. It's why I'm using the theatrical verbiage because it's the same way when you go to see a stage play.

But Sean, those are real couches and real lamps and things on a stage. Well, they were definitely real couches on the set. Yeah, but how much of the rest of it was real? I don't know. I genuinely don't know. I mean, I don't think any of the quote-unquote background that sort of threw that picture window out the back door,

I don't think any of that that's going on is real. But if we're making a movie about a place, a plot of land and a house, it seems like making it a real house or at least as much like a real place as we can would be helpful in helping us as viewers understand the value of this real estate. It's a good note.

I don't know if I agree though, because I think that that is sort of beyond the point that he's trying to make, which is that those are just things that the space is what matters. Like what we're describing here is like, but what if it's a space on a computer? to the point that he's trying to make, which is that those are just things that the space is what matters. Like it, what we're describing here is like, but what if it's a space on a computer?

You can't buy, well, I guess you can now. Sure you can. But I just, I just think it's, it's what's happened with him in a way is you've just crossed this line into technology.

And again, I don't think all the movies are bad. I even think some of the mocap stuff is kind of interesting in a way, but I just look at it and I'm just like, I've lost some connection here. And you're doing this in service of storytelling. I think that's interesting. And I think that's really ambitious, but something, some, some human connection to the human characters has been lost in the process. I agree. Do you think that that's just a product of enormous success and then being insulated and

then becoming obsessed with these tools? I don't know. I mean, you know, most directors his age, and I would say this as a compliment, are just trying to remake their old stuff. Yeah.

He's not. He's not. You know, he has been talking about doing a Back to the Future musical, The Movie, which seems like a wretchedly bad idea.

Let's not do that. But he's not. I seem to recall Aaron Rodgers recommending that musical, though, at the end of Hard Knocks. Do you remember that little segment?

Did that happen? Yeah, two seasons, last season. But, you know, to to his credit he's trying to do new stuff so I don't know if he's just trying to push so far away from what he did in the past maybe I I think you're right I mean I I am just I think significantly more sympathetic to someone who is his age who is just trying to do something new all the time. The same is true for Flight is a much more human story, but what he's doing in terms of the near plane crash sequence is as like thrilling and challenging

as anything he's done before. So I'm really impressed by that. And then the flip side of it is, I was just completely moved by the movie and I don't know what to say. It is absolutely a life insurance commercial. It is truly the sort of like most gloopy, sentimental, gosh, we sure do turn out like our parents or gosh, like raising children is difficult or gosh, making a living is hard. Or what is my purpose in this world? Or God, it's so hard to stay in a stable relationship or man,

it's terrible how, you you know our physical health dominates how we live our lives and we need to really take care of ourselves but we have these stresses like it's all of these very familiar overworked emotional but pat renderings of common life and still watching the young family i was like is feels weirdly, if not real and not surreal, but interested in a form of reality. It was like a remembrance of reality. The way you would look back on your memories, they don't look exactly like the world. They look like there's a little bit of a halo effect or a little bit of a cloud around the memory, but inside the center of the memory is a distinct experience. And maybe that experience was, oh my God, my parent had a stroke, or maybe it was the

day I got married, or maybe it was the day I lost something and I found it between the couch cushions. It's just got a weird knack for returning to those very specific moments. Maybe it was just the moment in which I saw it, but I totally connected to the movie. It is really funny because it is somewhere between a life insurance commercial and a movie you see on the IMAX at the science museum. Oh, totally. I said, I thought it was more like the hall of presidents at Disney, you know, where you're like, this is sort of like a rendering of real life, but we know it's fake.

Yes. I connected with it on, on the grounds you stated. I wish it was better. I wish the writing of wish it was better. I wish the writing of this movie was better. The writing of this movie is not good, man. It's really not good. There's a scene in the early 20th century where a husband comes back to his wife and he says, and I wrote this down, how is the suffrage going?

That really happened in this movie. Are you saying John Harder did not speak that way? There was another one where you mentioned a black family buys the house. It's clearly 2020. They don't say this, but we don't know this family at all. We barely know their names. We've seen like one or two just fleeting glimpses of them.

And then we see the dad sitting down with the son and talking about police brutality. Yes. That's a very serious topic. But I'm like, this is so patronizing. This is the one note that we know about this family. And then, spoiler alert, their housekeeper slash nanny dies of COVID. So it's like, well, you've gotten 2020 into this movie and that's it. And then they sell the house and we're like, okay, that was weird.

I, this is an unusual situation where I won't disagree with any criticism of the movie. The dialogue is incredibly leaden and overspoken. The Paul Bettany character who plays Al Young, the patriarch of the family, is just constantly over-explaining everything in his experience. Sean, can we talk about Paul Bettany's performance? over explaining everything in his experience. Sean, can we talk about Paul Bettany's performance? He's bad in this movie.

He's, he's, I think badly miscast. Um, Paul Bettany is a very like. It's not good acting, whatever it is, whatever happened, it's bad. But he's an actor who has like a roguish charm and is like a very alive as a performer has a sense of humor so to make him like a cranky um you know alcoholic father is just miscast and he's very miscast i would say he's the only of the performances that i really didn't think were very good there's some really talented actors who give are given nothing to do like michelle dockery is the suffrage suffragette that you're referring to and she has like nothing to do in this movie which is very strange and there's so much plot here yeah not only is it badly written but things just start

happening and you're like well who is that there were there were multiple instances where people died in this movie and i'm like who was that see i personally liked that though because i what i what i learned to do very quickly while watching the movie was turn off my narrative expectation okay and and just to see this as a series of portraits, not as like the true exploration of all of these lives, because that would be impossible. More just to say, a lot can happen in one space over a period of time. Totally.

But shouldn't we have just picked like three families? I wonder. I don't know. I think it's a better movie. I think you could argue you could do it all with the Tom Hanks family, with the two generations, and probably convey that same idea, making it the same way, using that theatrical conceit you talk about, and just setting the camera right there.

Maybe you could do it with them. You probably need a couple of other families. But I think if you're going to bring characters on screen, you should give them something. I mean, I understand the point about the portraits, but we mentioned the family at the end, the native people in the thing. We see them procreating. We see them like looking at the moon.

We see them like admiring a hummingbird that's in this movie. And then we see a funeral. And I'm like, this again is like an exhibit at a science museum. This feels very patronizing to me. This does not feel like you've made these real characters or real people that I can identify with. They're just going through life stages on the screen. I think you're right. I think that all of those things are there as matching tools against the young family.

In fact, often there are genuine match cuts where you have one character looking up at the moon and then another character looking up at the moon in the cut. I liked that as a tool. Again, like... Is that like when you go shopping for a house and they're like, hey, sorry, we're bound to tell you this, that the previous owner died here? Well, yeah. They died peacefully upstairs.

They always try to put it the best possible way. That's true, yeah. Another baby once looked up at a moon in this house. I can't even explain my generosity towards this movie. Yeah, and I understand it. Because I watched this movie for two hours or however, was it hour 45? Two hours?

Hour 45, yeah. And I was never bored. I'm going to be honest, there were times I started laughing during this movie out loud, not at the movie. I mentioned the hummingbird that we see with the native people.

At the very end, it comes back like a feather in Forrest Gump and there's just this hummingbird. Once again, CGI, of course. CGI hummingbird that we see with the native people. At the very end, it comes back like a feather in Forrest Gump. And there's just this hummingbird. Once again, CGI, because of course, CGI hummingbird screen. I just lost it. I mean, that just killed me. And I'm sitting there just laughing out loud. Apologies to anybody who was at the Chinese theater at 1.30 yesterday.

But I'm laughing so hard because I'm like, that's so bad, man. I mean, there were a lot of moments in the movie that I just thought were so corny and so weird that it took me out of the bigger point the movie was making. Do you like Forrest Gump? Sure. Do you see this as,

it's clearly not a structural sequel to Forrest Gump, but do you see it in the same lineage of storytelling? I think it's easier to care about the characters in Forrest Gump. Okay. I think it's easier to care about Forrest and Jenny in Forrest Gump. But do you see it in the same lineage of storytelling? I think it's easier to care about the characters in Forrest Gump. Okay. I think it's easier

to care about Forrest and Jenny in Forrest Gump. And that, I think, is one of the differences here. We get some, you mentioned we get a lot of the Tom Hanks family. Yeah.

But it's mostly just like, here's an important event in our life, next scene. Yes. Here's an important event in our life, next scene. You could keep going and go, eventually somebody gets dementia. Because they stop remembering things. And we're just like, event of our life. Next scene. You could keep going and go, eventually somebody gets dementia.

And they, cause they stopped remembering things. And we just like, now you have dementia. And I'm like, I did barely knew you before this, you know, and I would be sad, but I didn't, I didn't know you all the way. So I just think it would be, it's easier in his other movies. There, there is, you're right. There's a thread of storytelling here through a lot of his work. This is not a huge deviation in that way or that boomer ethos you talk about.

But it's easier to know the characters in the other movies. Well, the one thing that I'll say that I think somewhat undercuts our common understanding of Zemeckis' point of view is that all of his movies are tinged with a real genuine sadness. That the dreams that were promised to his generation are not going to come true and one of the things i like about the young story is that i guess this we're heading into spoiler territory but you know things for hanks and writes characters don't really work out the way that they had hoped they would in fact they reach an interesting end point that i think is common but you don't see portrayed because it doesn't have like there's no drama to its arc it is just a life lived maybe not portrayed with as much nuance or

depth as we would necessarily like but i really like this idea of like a couple that starts with all the hopes and dreams in the world, and they slowly but surely grow apart, and then they stay apart. And maybe they can reunite and still share things, but that there is an overness to their time together and to what they contributed and to what happened in that space. And I don't know.

I don't think it was sophisticated necessarily, but I didn't think it was as corny as everyone would like to believe that every Zemeckis thing is. The same way that at the end of Forrest Gump, it's like, Jenny's dead. That is in some way, it's like a bit of an awkward tragedy, that entire movie. It's been funny reading Robin Wright talk about, you see that interview in the New York Times with her talking about Jenny and how people are like, Jennyny is the villain of forrest gump and she's like well no it's not that but she was selfish but even even she's not talking about like the abuse that she experiences

at the hands of her father's character in that movie i think i think forrest gump is both ridiculous sentimental boomer crap and also like beautiful and special yeah and i feel the same way about this movie in many ways. Yeah. It's funny. And you're right about the ending of this movie, or at least the ending for the Hanks clan. It does deviate a little bit from the life insurance thing. And it does hit some of those Zemeckis. This is not the McFly family being like, oh, dad's a, dad's a winner now.

Right, right, right. He's got Biff out there washing the car. This is the opposite. And I did like that about this movie because it did show that, you know, just because you have the space where the turkey is served and the Christmas tree is set up and, you know, you're watching TV together and all that stuff, it doesn't turn out happy. It doesn't mean you are happy, which is an interesting portrayal. Also, the late in life divorce or separation, I feel is something that happens a lot and does not happen a lot in movies or television. That's exactly what I'm saying. I just think that's a very common thing.

Increasingly. So now where people can kind of like, can't afford to break up when they have children, but then when they finally can afford to, they do. Um, and so, um, um, I, I liked that part of the story. Look, this movie made $5 million on 2,500 screens. Like it is, it is a true bomb. Mine was empty, my screening.

How about you? It was, I would say about half full on a midday on a Friday. So that wasn't bad. I think we had like five people. I wouldn't say. One had a dog,

so I don't know if that counts. So six. It's not ideal. I'm really against dogs in the movie theater, by the way. I really hate that. Dog was shaking a lot

so you could hear the, you know, the collar, you know, the dog would go, and then you hear the collar jingle. Because they didn't know how to process this incredible technology. I guess.

Maybe they saw the hummingbird and wanted to leap onto the screen. We're going to talk about his Hall of Fame, Zemeckis, and what he's contributed to movie culture over the last almost 50 years. This isn't going to be at the top of the list.

I could see a world... Or the middle of the list. I could see a world or the middle of the list for me. Well, the middle is tricky. Okay. Because he's got, I'm ready. He's got 24 films.

It's definitely not his 12th best film, but it's the first of his films that I've genuinely liked in a while. Oh, so if we do all 24, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what I mean.

If you do the full stretch. There's definitely worse than this. Yeah, for sure. And worse recently than this. Like, did you see Pinocchio? The movie, like, Pinocchio that came out last year. I mean, that's, it's dreadful.

I know. And also just like the sad, like, thing of like, oh, you're just like the easiest IP Disney play. There's no, we'll make Pinocchio. Oh, what a great idea that is. I would just like to underline what you said about this movie, about being ambitious. First of all, in a proper country, we have more filmmakers adapting books and novels and not just superhero stories. This is a graphic novel. Movies are better, I think, generally when there's lots of adaptations of books because you get novelists pumping new ideas into the bloodstream.

I'm really happy with this. I was there on day one for Welcome to Marwen because I saw the commercials and I'm like, this looks batshit. This looks awful. But I want to see it because somebody is trying to do something here. And I went and saw it on the first day. I think I was alone or nearly alone in the theater that day. This may be more nuts than Welcome to Marwen,

at least in terms of storytelling. I think they're at the top of the heap in terms of his bold leaps. But I'm much happier to see a bomb or, for

me, a miss like this than a miss that's just made like, I just messed up the superhero movie or I messed up the Venom movie or whatever. I mean, I'm just so

happy that we can live in a culture that will cultivate this kind of stuff. Yeah, and or whatever. I mean, I'm just so happy that we can live in a culture that will cultivate this kind of stuff. Yeah, and I try, I know it's hard for people listening to the show to believe this, but I try to not grade on a curve as much as I can. I am definitely grading this movie on a curve because Zemeckis has kind of broken my heart

quite a bit over the last 20 years. And I think about my life as a movie fan and I think about how important his eighties movies were to expanding my imagination and getting me excited about what a movie could be that when he still makes another movie that I'm like, I didn't know a movie could be this. I didn't know a movie could take place in one place in one angle across thousands of years.

Is it a good version of that idea? It's debatable. Most people will say, no, I i say yes but it's new it is something genuinely new 100 years after we've been making movies so i i dig that about it i totally agree i wish it were better but it is something new um i was having a hard time coming up with like the craziest gimmicks in in movie history like there's some obvious ones right like 3D is an obvious gimmick. But then came back. Yeah.

And it's still sort of back. Will you ever take your kids to a 3D movie these days? Sure. Why not? I just don't want anything on my head when I'm watching a movie. Yeah.

You know? Yeah. Touching stuff post COVID. I know we can't get COVID from 3D glasses, but I just also, I'm just a little bit more of a germaphobe than I used to be.

Yeah. It seems uncomfortable. It was also weird when James Cameron brought it back. Remember like, wow, we're going back to Captain EO technology. Yeah. And we were, and it was weird. And then all movies became 3D and you didn't really need movies to be 3D.

I mean, you can see, I saw Avatar in 3D and it was for me like mind bending. It was awesome. It was an amazing experience. But then remember every action movie was just necessarily 3D after that. And it it was kind of like yeah yeah i don't know that we need this we don't and i don't feel that we need it really now have you done any of the like more contemporary versions of this stuff like um amanda and i did an episode earlier this year about 4d x 4d x and um gosh what was the stretch screen that's across the three panels? Oh, yeah.

The joining walls. I have not done that, no. Okay. I mean, those are more recent examples, but then you've got like in the 50s, you had William Castle making all of these horror movies and he's got, you know, Percepto and Emergo. He's the guy in Matinee.

He's the guy in Matinee. Well, it's loosely based on him. Yeah, that's fun. And the ant man comes out the best one that he did was um he took out a life insurance policy for people in the event that they died or had a heart attack because of how scary his film was and he would have a nurse come out to like support anyone who fainted during the playing of one of his movies was like a thousand dollar life insurance policy he had a lot of great examples of that john waters did odorama um

which was sort of like a play on the william castle style stuff one thing that i liked was clue having multiple endings that was so cool and i first saw that on tape so i did not do the thing where you had to go to multiple theaters to see the ending i didn't see it in theaters either but i would have loved that. And I think that I really think movies should be trying to do things like that again to get like repeat viewing and just to create like a sense of fun. You know, the idea of like what ending am I going to get and what are the other endings is really exciting. And if we're going to be making all these fucking superhero movies, like have some fun with it, you know, like show us a different, you know, stinger at the end rather than the one that we saw the first time around. I completely agree.

And you and I saw this movie, both of us, as paying customers. Yeah. And when you are a paying customer as opposed to a critic who's seeing a movie for free at a screening at the studios here in LA or whatever, you just relate to it completely differently. Definitely. I love listening to the crowd. I do. I love listening to the crowd. And I also just love like being like, I have now paid $15 to, and if I bought popcorn and

everything, it's like 30 bucks to watch this. So you got to impress me. You got to do something for me here because I could just be at home watching any movie in the world for this price for much less than this price, any movie in human history. So why am I here? So I agree with you. More chances, more weirdo stunts. You mentioned before we were recording popcorn buckets.

This to me is like, this is the vanguard of the movie going experience right now where Dune Part 2 comes along. You get your massive sandworm popcorn bucket. Terrifier 3 comes around and you get your art theworm popcorn bucket. Terrifier 3 comes around and you get your Art the Clown popcorn bucket. You know, obviously this is one way to just generate more revenue for a flailing theatrical exhibition business. But it's also kind of related

to what we're talking about. The kind of gimmicks of movie going and movie culture expanding into the real and the tactile. Like, do your kids want to get popcorn, like special popcorn buckets when they go to the movies? I don't know if they know about the buckets. They do see the toys and the tactile. Do your kids want to get special popcorn buckets when they go to the movies? I don't know if they know

about the buckets. They do see the toys that are there. And have you noticed there are toys for every movie? Yeah. So like the John Krasinski If movie had toys. Like anybody who bought a toy

has already forgotten about If. Yeah. It wasn't great. But it had toys. And also have you noticed that there's now Cheeto-flavored popcorn at just about every

chain theater you go to? Yeah. And they'll often have here's now Cheeto-flavored popcorn at just about every chain theater you go to? And they'll often have, here's the Cheeto popcorn and here's the fiery hot Cheeto popcorn. And these are just Cheetos mixed with popcorn. This is not Cheeto flavor. This is often just Cheetos mixed with popcorn. It's the crudest way to get you to buy stuff. What's your

go-to popcorn food? Or excuse me, your go-to movie theater food? A bucket of popcorn. Just bucket of popcorn just bucket of popcorn yeah i don't like to mix and match with the candy okay first of all candy is loud this is why i eat sour candy oh okay noise oh interesting yeah because i swear whenever anybody in front of me and there was somebody yesterday opens a box of candy every time it's the crinkle and then the crinkle and then they're reaching deeper into the movie thing. And I'm just, I just go like crazy.

You got it. You got to open the plastic intently. Okay. Wide open. And then you dump into one hand so it doesn't make any noise. You don't have to reach in. You just let it pour in your hand. I I'm big on don't make noise in the movie theater.

Yeah. Same. I've thought a lot about this, probably too much about this. Absolutely. Same. Um, I don't know.

Were there any other gimmicks that you can think of like found footage in theory like that's like more like here where it's sort of like a formal choice that is made that makes the movie watching experience more fun that's interesting how about the stinger at the end of the movie yeah that's a good way to keep you around for the entire movie absolutely also we've seen at places like the new bev here we're bringing back the pre-show entertainment. I don't mean the excruciating credit card commercial. I mean like, Hey, it's a three stooges short or Hey, it's a cartoon. And that's fun. I love that. It's like, Hey, we're back in the fifties again. And it's like another reason to go because if I watch this on streaming, if I waited, I wouldn't see this. I wouldn't see this, these cool old trailers and

stuff. I was sad to see that see that Pixar had discontinued their shorts program because that was also a modern version of that where you'd get a four-minute Pixar movie before your 90-minute Pixar movie, and they don't do that anymore either. A day at the movies used to be a day at the movies, and now if it's a day at the movies, it's just because you have 12 minutes of commercials beforehand.

It's not ideal. It's terrible with kids too. Oh, my God. I mean, kids that are squirmy anyway, and you're just like, folks, we have like 20 more minutes of this to go. Yeah. And then they finished their food. This happened to me when I saw the wild robot with my kids this weekend, all the food was gone during the previews and the commercials. And then I was like, now what do I do? Like I'm out. It's funny. That's my entire strategy is I eat my full snack before the movie starts which amanda and i talk about all the time i don't know what but i think that's just because

like i'm almost like fueling up for the for the fight for the race yeah and you want to pay attention when the movie comes out you don't want to be so we had a funny moment this weekend uh we live somewhat nearby years ago when you moved to south pasadena you recommended to me a video store called video tech that video store has since moved closer to my house now it's like a sean movie nerd tractor beam propelled it across suburban los angeles so i go there regularly maybe every couple of weeks i always bring my daughter because she likes all the video games there and also loves to be able to pull movies off the shelf i'm trying to encourage physical media appreciation in my home, as you probably know. And who did I run into when I was in there? But you. It was me. And I had just, I brought my son who's 11. I just told him,

Hey, you know, Sean, my friend from the ringer and I are going to do this podcast, but there's this one Robert Zemeckis movie I can't get on streaming. So I'll have to go. And we walk in and there you are. This was as on-brand Sean, you have ever been. Sean is just at an LA video store, a video store with very, very deep cuts. It's an amazing video store, Video Tech, in case anybody on the East side is interested in a video store. Holy cow.

It's so great. It's so great. But there you were with your lovely family and we got to have a little moment before we do our Zemeckis pod. It was very sweet. And you were trying to track down the very first Robert Zemeckis feature, right?

Yeah. So I don't know, what does Zemeckis represent to movies? Like who is he when we look at, you know, 78 is his first feature. So we are literally in the fifth decade of his career. We are. You know, it's funny. I kept, when I was thinking about this, kept going back to an only in movie reviewing word,

which I would never use in normal life, but just kept coming to me with Zemeckis, which is antic. There's just a certain antic energy to his movies. Yeah, yeah. Starting at the very beginning. You know, car chases. You know, 1.21 gigawatts. You know, like there's just this great, crazy energy to his movies.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then, of course, as we talked about, just this great kind of humanistic streak as told through mainstream movies. You know, as we talked about just this great kind of humanistic streak as told through mainstream movies, you know, as you know, and again, very much in the, in the, in the mode of Spielberg, I think, um, sometimes he out Spielberg Spielberg, as we'll get to on this list, there are moments where it was like, oh, that's a movie Spielberg would have made, but he had gone off in a different direction or he couldn't quite get there anymore.

Yeah. I feel like one of the things that happens is they're in this interesting kind of neck and neck thing where spielberg is always sort of like the elder and the better but they're they are kind of neck and neck in the 80s in terms of um experimentation and exploration and then the jurassic Park and Schindler's List year happens and Spielberg is just kind of off to the races and Zemeckis is kind of left in the dust behind him. Think of it a different way, though.

Zemeckis makes Back to the Future in 1985. That's basically when Steven Spielberg stops directing Steven Spielberg movies for a while. Yes, yes. And tries to be different and respectable and bigger.

Color Purple, Empire of the Sun, all that. And you could argue that Zemeckis sort of steps into the void. He does. And, you know, in 85, Back to the Future is kind of the last

great Spielberg movie that just is produced rather than directed by Spielberg. So it is a funny kind of give and take. Yeah. Spielberg's had the

belt for a while here, but they are very much twins. I mean, he's a better director, no doubt about it. Zemeckis tells a story about how, you know, when he was a student, he wrote to Spielberg and Spielberg was just like, absolutely, come on down.

Let's have lunch. Let's have a conversation when he was just a kid at USC and that they formed this interesting partnership. And, you know, the second half of his career is quite strange. I mean, I think there's maybe more hidden gems than he gets credit for, or at least more interesting experiments. But the lows are pretty low. And just kind of depressing. Yeah. And it does feel like it has tainted what was once one of the signature filmographies in movie history.

Yeah. I mean, there are always going to be downers for anybody. And sometimes periods of downers. This is a long period. And it's also, to me, just like, I mean, more than anything, more than just like making sure his Hall of Fame case is perfect. It's just like, I wish I had seen more Zemeckis movies that were like the other Zemeckis movies.

And it's one of those, I mean, Bill is fond of this construction, but like if he had died in 2000. Right after Castaway. Right after Castaway. This is one of the greatest filmmakers ever by far. Unbelievable two decade run. And so now we look at it a little bit differently. So the Hall of Fame is interesting here for this one.

So we've got, he's directed I think 23 films and he's got one screenwriting credit that I think is worth at least discussing here. Sure. So let's start in 78. You went to Videotech and you rented I Want to Hold Your Hand. Did you watch I Want to Hold Your Hand? I did.

Okay. What'd you think? I really liked it. It's really good. A lot of American graffiti. And I Want to Hold Your Hand with this kind of the world of kids that is only once in a while rubbing up against the world of adulthood. This is when the Beatles go on the Ed Sullivan show, 1964. And you got a gang of kids who are in around New York.

They actually live quite far away from New York, but have to be there and have to be in the company of the Beatles. The Beatles are not in the movie. They're just kind of always slightly off screen, or you're kind of seeing the backs of their heads. It's a really good, clever, wonderfully alive movie. Yeah, I think it's a really fascinating launch point for that antic sensibility that you're talking about too

because it's a really energetic movie. It's a movie about youthful exuberance, obsession, this kind of odd sense of desire and sexuality pent up in people's expectations of what the Beatles are and how it relates to them. Really good early Nancy Allen performance in the movie. She's wonderful. It's a darn good movie. You know, it is, it's not like it's some lost film. It's on, it's in the Criterion collection. It's in the Criterion and works in the era's tour era of American life. Oh, great point. Totally. Because that's what this is, just a different version of

it. It's, it's, it's a tricky one. Now one now now in the in the parlance of the hall of fames here on the big picture to me this would be a yellow so we will start out and we'll say i think this could be a green it could also be a red red would be out green okay in i always system you have here red green go red stop okay i think i got it i uh yellow i'm not explaining it to you if you want, if it's confusing at all. Yellow, press the brakes. But we may need, we'll circle back to it.

I usually like to put the debut in. I tend to think that the debut, if it's a success, and this movie is a success, should go in. 1941's his next film. He's partnered with Steven Spielberg. This is Spielberg's big studio

comedy movie set during world war ii a famous bomb a famous miscalculation in the career of spielberg zemeckis did co-write this with bob gale his longtime co-screenwriter and it's a significant movie for zemeckis because it kind of like confirms him in Hollywood as having this big screenwriting credit despite the failure of this movie. There are like, there's been some recent attempts to reclaim 1941. I'm not one of those people. Same dude. Not a movie I think has ever worked personally. No.

It's just, it's just, it's just kind of nothing. Yeah. It really is. And I remember it took me a long time to make it all the way through 94, even as a Spielberg person, because I would start it and be like, why am I watching this?

It's just a register that he's not comfortable in and you can tell right away. And he doesn't know how to modulate the performances to get the kind of like, it's a mad, mad, mad, mad world thing he's going for here,

you know, just not right for this kind of a thing. And that script, it's almost impossible to tell whether it's any good or not. Cause the movie is just all off. Totally agree. Okay, so that's a red. That's a red.

Red means stop, Brian. That's stop. No. 1980, the next year, used cars. Love this movie. So this is like a cable classic

for guys like you and I. It's so fun. On all the time about a couple used car salesmen starring Kurt Russell. Also written with Bob Gale. Also written with Bob Gale

and a movie that like, it's the indie band getting signed on the major label. You know, like it's not quite a blockbuster, but it's a sign

of things to come in terms of like attitude and energy and that like very odd sense of humor that is in all of his movies. Yes.

Sexuality again. It's a very over-sexed movie. It's funny. It comes out two years after Animal House and the same year as Caddyshack is very much of a piece with the Harold Ramis oeuvre, which is we, the young, you know, the not rich,

are going up against the swells and we're going to get one over on the swells. Yes. But it's a really fun movie. It is. Great Jack Warden performance in this movie. Oh, yes. And yeah, you're right the swells yes but it's a really fun movie it is great jack warden performance in this movie oh yes and yeah you're right it is like it's in league with like caddy shack you know it feels like it has that similar kind of vibe to it i i i would i think this movie is a green i think it's a it's an absolute green we might be on like a an incredible green run coming here and this movie feels like it's ripe for rediscovery, too. I agree. Really good young

Kurt Russell performance, too. Like, he's awesome. Very funny. Very comfortable in this mode. Okay, 1984, Romancing the Stone, a massive hit. One of the worst titles

in movie history. You know, it's... I mean, it's... I love the uniqueness, but, like, dude, that is, like, it's a line of dialogue that Danny DeVito says.

I rewatched it this week. I totally forgot about that. This is kind of like the Amazon Prime Day, Indiana Jones. And he makes this movie because he can't get back to the future made because used cars, and I want to hold your hand, have not made enough money. So he has to do studio work. This is like not his movie, but he makes a really good movie. And it's a really fun,

crazy romance caper in South America. He's great at adventure. Most of his best movies are adventures and this is kind of a classical adventure. You've got Kathleen Turner coming off of, you know, body heat and a handful of exciting performances. Michael Douglas ready to like truly emerge as a proper movie star. Oh yeah. He's so good in this. And it is sort of a straight down the middle sort of a movie. Like there's no complex contours to the way the story is told. Nope. But it's still entertaining. Still works.

I forgot in the 80s until I watched it this week, how many movies just had just continuous machine gun fire where nobody gets hit. That was big in the 80s. And also South American bad guys. The big, very big 80s subject. Very notable for both of those. Yeah, very easy for us to write those things off

as not quote unquote the real world. No, big green for me though on Romance in the Stone. Romance in the Stone, definitely green. 1985, Back to the Future. Safely said, this is a green, Sean.

I agree. It's like talking about Willie Mays or something where you're just like, well, it's one of the it's like talking about willie mays or something where you're just like well it's just the best thing that ever happened well it's great yeah like i just i was obsessed with back to the future i still think it's great it's kind of remarkable the way that it's a movie that is about the past with a kind of like retrofuturism style to it that doesn't feel like it ever ages no if there's something odd about the you know temporal um hold that it has on us you know what i mean like it's never really going to go away it's gonna like i assume your kids have dug it and

since you've shown it to them 100 and we live near one of the locations in the movie so that's kind of a big deal yeah but yes and i would say the Zemeckis filmography, a lot of stuff ages very well. It holds up. And a lot of it's the special effects actually hold up. They don't try to outkick their coverage at the time, so they actually look really good later. This movie, I read in the Wikipedia page, Bob Gale looked back at his dad's yearbook, his high school yearbook. And he said, what would it have been like for me to know my dad when we were in high school?

Would we have been friends? Would we have hung out? Or would I have just been like, high in the hallway and that's it? Like, or was it just blood that unites us

or would we have just been like, and like, that's a fascinating idea. It's a great conceit. And for all the giggle-watches and everything else in this movie, that's,

that's the great conceit. That's a great idea. It is, but I think that's true of most of the great movies that he's made where there's something very simple and human at the center of it, but he's very good at the scaffolding of the story that he puts around it. The contraption. Yeah, exactly. And they talk about this movie, because he couldn't get it made,

he and Gale just kept rewriting it and rewriting it, and it became more complex and then it's just this beautifully complex funny great movie by the time it got to the screen in 85 yeah and and to your point earlier just great that spielberg supported this and believed in it and allowed for something that is that seems conventional and normal now because it's been such a part of American culture for 40 years, but it's a very weird movie. I mean, it's a whole idea is very strange.

All the stuff with Leah Thompson and Michael J. Fox is incredibly strange and so strange, but it really works. It works. It's so good. Okay. Back to the future is in Hugh frame, Roger rabbit.

So, um, two weeks from two weeks from yesterday, I'm hosting, um, a series of screenings at the Frida Cinema in Santa Ana. Very excited about this. They asked me to

program four movies. That's a very cool theater. Yeah, very cool theater. I encourage people to come out to it. They look for four different types. One of them is an all-time classic. One of them is a movie ripe for re-examination. One of them is a movie ripe for re-examination. One of them is a cult movie.

So my loose idea for it was unlikely detectives. And so the four movies that are programmed, let me see if I can remember this properly. Long Goodbye, Robert Altman's all-time classic.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit, The Big Lebowski, and Under the Silver Lake. Under the Silver Lake is my movie that I think needs a second look that i think is a very seize the future kind of a movie in the age of q anon and conspiracy and always looking for um the truth online uh but who i picked who framed roger rabbit and i'll be at the screening of who framedamed Roger Rabbit at the Frida because I think this might be the single most influential movie in my life until I saw

Pulp Fiction. Wow. I think that this is the movie that I watched the most times, that I thought about the most, that hit me at a time you know, I was pretty young when I saw this movie and it is this collision of childlike entertainment, cartoons, animation with Humphrey Bogart movies, you know, saw this movie and it is this collision of childlike entertainment cartoons animation

with humphrey bogart movies you know with like real hard-bitten noir which is something i really like sexy there's a hot movie in many ways and not just because jessica rabbit is a kind of like life-changing concept no i forgot how horny this movie was. Very horny. And another movie that is very ornate and complex in the world that has been created and the way that it exists. And another movie that really has aged well in terms of how it looks and the interaction between the cartoons and the human people. It's a movie that should not work at all. No. On paper, it seems like a terrible idea. And yet it's so good. It's so entertaining. It's so smart. should not work at all. No. On paper, it seems like a terrible idea. And yet it's so good.

It's so entertaining. It's so smart. So such fun to watch. I'm really, I don't think I've ever seen it on a big screen. So I'm super excited to show the movie at this festival. I completely agree. I mean, in 1988, just think of what a swing this was. I mean, now we'd say, okay, you know, with CGI, like you can make it work with it.

After Jar Jar Binks, I think we see the path to humans talking to animated characters. But just think about this, how they made this movie. I looked this up. If you adjust the gross for Who Framed Roger Rabbit and constant dollars, which people should do, unless they want to lie to their readers, which a lot of people seem to want to lie. You're always on this. I know. Hey, I'm a trade publication, but I want to lie. Why not?

This movie made $937 million in 2024 dollars. A movie starring Bob Hoskins, Sean, made $937 million. Yep. Yep. That's unbelievable. It's another movie, though, that has a lot of Steven Spielberg to thank because all of the animated characters that appear in this movie from all of the various studios, various IP, this will never happen again. But because Spielberg

was so powerful and so beloved, he could call the studio chiefs of every studio and say, Hey, can I get, you know, the Warner brothers cartoons in this movie? Can I get the Disney characters in this movie? Can I get Betty Boop in the historical twenties cartoons in this movie? She's so good. Yeah, she is. Um, I love Who Framed Rogerger abbott it's definitely green if you came in here and said you hated it i still would make it green i'm just telling you it's a very important movie to me you ain't gonna get any uh argument from me okay this is the first interesting hinge point back to the future too we are headlong into the franchise era of hollywood sequels are more important

increasingly as we get through the 80s. Of course, Back to the Future being the phenomenon that it was. Galen Zemeckis write a sequel to the movie. They did not plan on writing a sequel, and you can tell when you see the end of Back to the Future and then the beginning of Back to the Future 2

because they famously said we would not have put the girlfriend in the car if we knew there was going to be a sequel. This is a movie I really, really, really loved as a kid that when I returned to have not liked as much as an adult. Where are you at on back to the future? Yeah, it's a light green for me. Yeah. It was fun as a kid because it was like, what are they going to do?

And you get to see the future, which was really cool. Instead of seeing the past and the first one, but it does feel like they're constantly like writing themselves into corners and then writing themselves out of corners. Agreed. Um, it, it's cool that it exists. It's better than it could have been for sure. Um,

so it's, it's a green for me, but it, it's sort of on the edge. Yeah, it's a big hit and it, um, it really certifies him as like a master of Hollywood.

It's, it's mega success. You know, they, they made these two movies back to back, part two and part three, and they were conceived as a complete trilogy. Three is more of an homage to Westerns and it's a trip back. A movie that I never, I was confused by as a kid and remain a little bit confused by. I get why he wanted to make it and what was appealing to him about it, but it never really

fits. Nothing against Mary Steenburgen, who I think is great in this movie, doing her best to convince us that she's in love with Christopher Lloyd. But two, I would say I agree is in and three would be not in for me. Three to me is always just like, it's a movie. It's fine.

It's totally fine, but they just wanted to make a third movie. This is a really weird era of Hollywood where you look at the top grossing movies of the year and it's like Crocodile Dundee 2 is on the list for some of these years you're like what the hell was going on so you had to make a back to the future 3 i mean there was no choice the economic imperative was you must make this movie um and it just kind of there for me yeah high concept low impact comedies um were very very popular at this time so it's not surprising that there are three of them 1992 death becomes her a movie that got past me when i was a kid i probably only saw for the first time within the last 10 years that is renowned for its extraordinary special effects and makeup

and also a movie that i think has a lot to say that still resonates about, um, beauty standards and our conception of, uh, who should look how and when and for how long, or no, I, I assume you have not seen the movie, the substance,

which came out this year. I have not. Um, I would say the substance is a sort of spiritual sequel to death becomes her in many ways about aging women in Hollywood. Put that on the poster. The spiritual sequel to Death Becomes Her.

I think some people have made that comparison so I'm not the first to say it. There are some people who really like this movie. I would say I'm mixed on it. I don't love it.

The performance style is really outlandish and really surreal. What do you think? I'm going to mostly punt this to you because I just have not seen this movie

in a really long time. But what I remember about it was surreal and just kind of overacted so much that I almost couldn't get into it and never really wanted to go back to it. Yeah. It's a, it's a tricky one. Early David kept script. Um, it was a pretty big hit. $55 million budget, $150 million at the box office. That's really good

and also getting cool that he made this again he's on this wild winning streak at this point i get the impression that after doing a third back to the future movie he was like i'm only doing what i like i'm only i'm only doing swings if i'm making a movie it's because it represents a new stripe a new experimentation for me and that this is a big announcement of like i'm done fucking around with you know sequels and ip and all that other stuff like i'm trying something fascinating every time out i'm inclined to give it a green but with regret because it pushes him into a series of experiments that start to go sideways in the 2000s why don't we yellow it death becomes our for now okay i like that force gum we've already talked about it somewhat of experiments that start to go sideways in the 2000s. Why don't we yellow it? Death Becomes Our For Now.

Okay. I like that. Forrest Gump. We've already talked about it somewhat here. You've done whole pods about this, trying to pull it apart. Yeah. I mean, I just go back. It is what it is.

Flaws and all. I go back to my original moment in the theater, theater seeing it back in the day and had the same experience with Pulp Fiction that year so take it for what it's worth but I was like this is awesome man this is great

and I still it's still green for me me too it's wild right and pulling this guy through time and space through the 20th century is something to watch

so it's an absolute great for me yeah it is for me too. I mean, obviously he won best picture and best director, so it's got to go into his hall of fame. Right. It is.

It wasn't that bad. No, it's not. I think it's a movie that was a, was a worldwide phenomenon. And then for 20 years was pilloried for not being pulp fiction. And then I would say in the last 10 years, as folks like me and you have gotten into their 40s and are starting to look at

the movie again with new eyes we're sort of like yeah it's sentimental yeah it's kind of treacly yeah it's like you know maybe a little bit insensitive to how some of the characters are portrayed yeah maybe that technology where you know he shakes jfk's hand isn't as good as you want it to be but there's still something, I don't know. There's still a little bit of magic in that movie. Oh yeah, I think a lot of magic in that movie. I really do. I mean, it's, it's again, it's not something I would put on all the time, but it's a, it's

a top five Zemeckis movie for me. Okay. So we've got two, four, six greens and two yellows. We're heading into an interesting phase. Contact. Wow. yellows we're heading into an interesting phase contact wow um this is very high on the bill simmons no-go list bill simmons does not like this movie it's an absolutely the opposite of a bill simmons uh i think it is like one of the coolest and bravest movies ever made by a major studio by a major filmmaker it it is very similar to here to me where it's sort of

like we're gonna look straight down the barrel of sentimentality what does a woman in her relationship to her father mean to the universe god space science love like it is trying to be everything to matthew mcconaughey yeah playing palmer joss with that accent that's unbelievable yes to to the the priesthood um there's there's so many huge ideas in the movie and there's also some like pretty typically clunky like hollywood storytelling stuff where we're trying to like race ahead to get to things or cast certain characters aside um again some of the way that the sort of like the the journey that she takes in the final act of the movie has not aged as well like it looks

kind of like a screensaver at times but i love how bold the movie is and so like i'm constantly impressed by his reaching for something even if it doesn't always get there totally i mean i saw this movie in college and remember the opening scene where you're close in on Earth and the camera pulls back and it's like three minutes of going out of the solar system and then out of the universe and then back, back, back, back, back. And we see the immensity. A little bit like here in that way, right? He's daring to show us like the enormity of the universe.

Everybody in the theater just started laughing. I mean, just laughing uproariously. And I'm sitting there as a film nerd, college kid. I mean, just laughing uproariously. And what I'm sitting there is, you know, as a film nerd college kid, I'm just like, why is everybody laughing? This is not funny. This is not supposed to be hilarious.

But I agree with you. It is brave. It's not my favorite movie of his. It's not mine either. It reminds me a little bit of Interstellar where I think it probably would have worked better with a different cast. Both of those movies oddly involve Matthew McConaughey.

Interesting. But like, I think- As a Texan, that's interesting for you to be rejecting your brother. I know, it's strange, right? But like, I almost think like a different actor or actress with a little more, I don't know, just a different relationship with the audience that might have worked a little bit better because it's kind of a cold movie in a lot of ways.

It is. An intellectual movie. It is. But it is an absolute green for me. No doubt about it. Yeah, I was gonna pitch a yellow to you because I don't really know how the final stretch of this is going to shake out. I mean, did you like this better? Would you put this in the player over Back to the Future 2? I would.

I think I'd rather watch this now than Back to the Future 2. I'm not sure what matters more to his career. So the Halls of Fame are, it's just like Apex Mountain. Like, is it about what are the most important movies in his career or is it about what are the movies of his that we like the most? Somewhere in the middle, ultimately, is what I'm trying

to accomplish here. Totally. And again, anybody, if somebody else had made this movie, imagine that, right? Like, we're putting him on the mountain of like, you made Back to the Future, dude. You made all this stuff and you're going to go make other things. But if somebody like Ron Howard had made this movie or something, I think we'd be like, this is,

you know, this would have been yuck. I totally agree. I mean, I, I'm, I'm grateful that he did make it. All right.

I'm going to yellow it for now. We'll come back to it. I lean, I lean green though, for sure. 2000, what lies beneath? Big hit. This is his Hitchcock movie,

essentially. The ultimate entertainment weekly movie, because the announcement was more interesting than the movie. Remember when you used to get the magazine and be like, Harrison Ford and Michelle Pfeiffer together with Robert Zemeckis, what could go wrong? And then the movie would come out and you'd never read. Wait, what happened to that thing? You were writing all that stuff about. I mean, it did well at the time and i think it was well liked it was also you know during a period where like harrison ford could do no wrong you know he was making hit after hit after hit um you're just starting to get to the end of harrison ford it is in retrospect it is i i'm okay on this movie as a as a horror movie snob i think it is is relying on some typical tropes and is not as surprising or as exciting as you want it to be.

There is, you know, the reveal was good. I didn't see it coming in whatever, when I was 18 when this movie came out. It was really like, oh shit, which I think is one of the reasons why it became such a hit is that people are like, you've got to go see this. Some wild shit happens at the end. It doesn't feel as good returning to it. No. It's a yellow for me

because I don't really like it, but I would watch it. If you told me, hey, before the returns come in tonight, let's go watch What Lies Beneath, I think I'd be like, I'm in. Wow.

Maybe you should do that. 2,000 cast away. Automatic green, I think. Easily. To me, it's the second best movie behind Back to the Future. Oh, interesting. I think so. It's a good take take re-watching it this week i watched roger rabbit and i love roger yeah um i felt more with this movie roger rabbit is it appeals to me as an intellectual exercise because it's just so it's just so like good and it's audacious and cool yeah i watch

this movie weird last act and all and i'm'm like, this is awesome. The plane crash is unbelievably believable. 20 plus years hence. One of the best sequences of the century. So good. The life on the island is like,

you just watch it. Like, I believe this man is stuck on this island and this is a real island. This is a thing. It's so funny though. I mean,

it's just so like, it's just Hanks carrying it. Like the filmmaking is obviously wonderful, but everything on the island, 99% of other actors trying to do that just you would not sell it it would have been a mess just a complete testimony to his greatness you know bill and i are always joking about hanks versus cruise on the rewatchables and stuff but this is one of those like irrefutable only tom hanks could have done this and made it feel um not believable, but real.

Can we imagine Tom Cruise talking to Wilson? No, no. Come on. It couldn't work. I did rewatch it this week as well. One of the few Zemeckis movies I did rewatch. And I stumbled but was fascinated by the ending this time around. In the past, you're so hung up on what's going to happen with

will he reunite with Helen Hunt? But to me, it's final like six minutes after he leaves and he goes driving and he finds himself at this intersection and this foxy gal with red hair gets out of the truck and she's like where are you headed to and he's like it is once again zemeckis trying to import this sense of like lost philosophy inside of an otherwise kind of conventional entertainment I really appreciate that he's like taking 150 million dollars from studios and being like life is like an intersection sometimes you go left sometimes you go right sometimes you go straight and you crash land on an island and like that is actually how it feels to be alive sometimes it's obvious and sentimental but weirdly true so i have

a lot of i have a lot of space for for those intentions um and i agree castaway is automatically in 2004 the polar express now this movie stinks right made a fortune it's a huge hit and motion capture is a very important part of movie making today. Now, this isn't the first movie to do mocap. It's coming off the Star Wars prequels. So you got Star Wars prequels. You've also got Lord of the Rings. So those two films, you know, Gollum, everything that happens with that.

You've got Planet of the Apes movies coming. You know, you've got a few things coming. You've got obviously like in the Marvel films, there's mocap. You've got some things coming that this is like bedrock filmmaking style for important movies to come. You could make a case that this movie, semi-demonic as it is, has an import to movie history. Oh yeah, absolutely. And it comes at a really interesting crux point where we're just crossing over the CGI threshold. Right, right. And it comes at a really interesting crux point where we're just crossing over the CGI threshold.

Right, right. The world has changed. I mean, to me, that's the big river in my movie-going life. Pre-CGI and then CGI. Yeah. And there's some crossover period where it's kind of half in and half out. Right. But now we're over the threshold.

Partly because of the prequels, partly because of Lord of the Rings, which are huge hits. And then he makes this movie, and it's like, oh, wow. Mm-hmm. This is a thing now. This is, to me, the opposite of here here where Tom Hanks cannot fight through this technology. He can't. He's not Tom Hanks anymore. I know.

I mean, think of that. You built a contraption that Tom Hanks couldn't smile through. That's kind of a thing. I know. I mean, part of it is just the testimony to where the technology is at the time. You know, the technology, three years later, he makes Beowulf and it's a little better, but the story is a little bit more kind of mythological.

And so even though the renderings are deeper, they're also more otherworldly because of the kind of story that's being told. A Christmas Carol is even better, but also it's a worse movie. It's like kind of a freakish disaster. So if you told me like all three of these movies should be relegated to the dustbins of history

and we shouldn't talk about them and they're not good and we don't want to rewatch them, I would be okay with that. There is a part of my technocratic mind though that is like to not acknowledge it at all would be odd. I don't know.

I mean, Polar Express feels important. The other two feel like he just had a hit and then he just kept going on this role. I mean, when was the last time you heard somebody talk about Beowulf or Christmas Carol? Yeah, I mean, never. Because Christmas Carol, also a hit, though. I mean, it was a Disney movie.

I remember Beowulf watching that in the theater and being mostly happy with that. Anything with Ray Winstone is a happy day at the theater for me. But I just was like, that's... And I remember it was before, you know, Game of Thrones and everything. So we didn't have a lot of things in that

kind of, you know, castle world. That's true. Um, it did sort of herald that sort of way that the movie going in television went. I completely forgot that, uh, this was his reunion with Crispin Glover, Crispin Glover as Grendel. Oh, yeah.

I did not know that either. What, what. And they famously had a falling out, you know, cause he's cut out at two and they had a dispute and it cut out. Talk about stunt casting. Grendel. He's a pretty good Grendel. I mean, I have grayed out almost all these movies and I think Polar Express is just as he's described, terrible, but important.

I'll yellow Polar Express just for the sake of this conversation. Um, okay. We're going to Red Beowulf and A Christmas Carol. No offense to Jim Carrey. 2012 Flight. Do we skip over Mars Needs Moms when he like basically bankrupted a whole because the technology then had just completely worn out? Yeah. I mean, he didn't direct that movie, right?

He was the overlord of the little mini studio, I think. Uh, Flight to me is, he's back. It's his back. I'm back movie. Um, the Denzel performance is incredible as I needn't say, back it's his back i'm back movie um the denzel performance is incredible as i needn't say because it's so obviously good second half of flight to me is a pretty conventional recovery story i like the first half of that movie a lot more than i like the second half but it's an absolute green i i agree but so then let's just take flight is i think excellent

features one of the great denzel performances. I don't like the needle drops and some of that boomer sensualism comes back there where it's just like Joe Cocker feeling all right and sympathy for the devil and just really the most obvious turns on serious XM one time kind of like 70s channel stuff.

But it's grounded by that great performance. John Goodman also great in that movie. And that, that near crash sequence is so thrilling. It's also like kind of, it's maybe the most adult movie that he's ever made. You know, you remember it opens with Denzel in that hotel room and the girl is naked. And, you know, like he's just had a long night

where he's like doing cocaine. Like it's, there's something, not just I'm back, but like, I'm not a kid. Like I don't have a childlike sensibility. I'm a man. And here's how I see my pain and some of my struggles. Also, Zemeckis is famously a pilot.

And so his experience as someone who flies is kind of essential to this story in the way that a lot of his work is like getting up in an airplane and you're taking a chance every time you get up in an airplane. And if something goes wrong, you could crash.

You know, like it's a very, it's an easy movie to project a lot of personal intention against. So I really, really like it. But that's the thing. He was always a little thornier than Steven Spielberg. Definitely.

Yeah. He was always, you know, you mentioned Roger Rabbit was like that. There's always more built into these movies with him with that. Yeah. By the way way the plane stuff is amazing we talked about castaway we talked about this there's a crash plane in romancing the

stone yep uh there's a pilot who dies in uh here a big through line through his work absolutely speaking of uh being up in the air 2015 the walk which is a film about the famous tightrope walk between the twin towers that was initially rendered in a great documentary and this is a film about the famous tightrope walk between the twin towers that was initially rendered in a great documentary and this is a sort of uh docudrama about that experience philly petite i believe the tightrope walker's name is uh joseph gordon levitt portrays him i remember this movie being really formally cool and exciting and really bland as a story. I did not rewatch it. It feels like the movie that has maybe the like smallest reputation of any movie that he's made.

It could, it's right up there. And, and I think the documentary was the reason for this. Yeah. We had reached a sort of time and movie going where you could actually see documentaries and documentaries that were hits were kind of widely available for the first time.

Man on wires. Man on wires. The book. Yeah. I was the documentary. the documentary and so it was like oh why do i need to see this yes i just saw the documentary and it was fantastic and it's also um part of the thrill of the documentary is that this is something that a person actually did and we have footage of the person actually doing it so movie magic is unnecessary in this particular case. Yeah, it's an odd movie. Some of the heist style sequence stuff about actually getting up into the towers is cool and well

done, but it's kind of slight in his career, so I'll say Red. I did revisit Allied last night and thought it was pretty good. I'm so glad you did, because this is actually a movie to me. It's not perfect. It's not. It's very flawed, but I enjoyed the hell out of Allied. It looks great.

Uh-huh. Great. Sumptuous. Yes, and it's a really rare example of the way that this kind of digital photography can look so beautiful and the way that the set design and the costuming and just having two knockout beautiful stars in Brad Pitt and Marion Cotillard. And the thing that hit me while I was watching it is, this was a time in the 2010s, and there were a bunch of movies

that were like this, but the two movies that popped into my head, and I'm not equating them, but were David Ayer's Fury, which was also a Brad Pitt movie, and Martin Scorsese's Silence, that were like, we have all of this incredible technology, and so we can make period

pieces that feel hyper real now that have like this extreme modernity to them but they're set in a different time and this is another movie that's like that this movie at times is almost like a video game yes but it's like casablanca the video game totally and while i don't think it's i'm not even sure if it's good, but I really liked watching it this time around. It's really, really good. Who is the British actor in this movie who plays the kind of functionary? He's also in Tinker Taylor's Soldier Spy, excuse me, playing almost the exact same role. Yeah. Simon McBurney. Simon McBurney. I love Simon McBurney because he's like a treacherous bureaucrat in movies. And you know, he's treacherous because of his thinning thinning hair I don't know I don't know if you have one guess why I picked up on that particular

what do you mean affectation but I love him whenever he's in movies I remember him coming up on the screen I just smiled really big he is excellent uh out of as an act of generosity I would yellow allied I don't know if it's going to make the cut here sure but but but again if you told me let's go watch this right now worth checking out if you haven't seen it and you had, had, you know, written off some X completely 2018, welcome to Marwen. Another example of a film that is a remake of a documentary. Uh, yes, that's right. I forgot about that part.

How do, how do we describe welcome to Marwen? I don't know man so it's about a man struggling with ptsd who creates this world of figurines that allows him to cope and to communicate about his trauma and so he has this like little village that he makes. Steve Carell plays the man in this film. The figures in this world are. World War II pilot. And the kind of surrounding figures within that world. And so this man who's experienced PTSD.

Like kind of slips in and out of that world. And then there are like these physical manifestations. Of the figures that he interacts with throughout the movie. it's basically like a man talking to his army men um and then the technology here is it's not just man talking to army men we will go in with the army men yes they will come to life yes uh it's it's based on a documentary called marwin call which is a just a heartbreaking movie um and an amazing portrait of a person working through an enormous amount of pain. This movie is also about that. It is about a person working through

an enormous amount of pain, but it is so fucking weird. It's so weird. And inscrutable at times. Yes, and not like, again, it's very, very hard to just wrap your arms around this movie

again if you just if we just described like the scene by scene people who hadn't seen it wouldn't believe us that this exists it's bizarre I mean it's a

it was also right at the end of Steve Carell's run I feel he had been in the tad friend New Yorker profile zone he'd had some hits some hits that he was

tangentially a part of and then all of a sudden this is felt like when it ended well or the first wave of it he was tangentially a part of, and then all of a sudden this felt like when it ended. Or the first wave of it ended. He was in the midst of making this very strong pivot into serious feature films. So he does Foxcatcher, Freeheld, The Big Short, Battle of the Sexes, Last Flag Flying, Beautiful Boy, Vice, and Welcome to Marwen, all in succession. What a run.

That's a four-year period where he's making big movies with big auteurs, almost all of which are very serious about big ideas. Half of which are, you know, big short, big movie, very successful movie. Foxcatcher, Oscar-nominated film. The rest? But man, some of this big movie, very successful movie. Fox catcher, Oscar nominated film. The rest? But man, some of this shit didn't work at all. Oh yeah. But it was, it was part of that run for him. I think of that.

It was. It was like he was, he looked like he could become one of the biggest actors in Hollywood. Yes. He went a different way. And, and this. He's really retreated in some ways. I mean, he, he hasn't made a movie in which he appears on screen with the exception of the cameo in asteroid city as the hotel man the motel manager and he

only did that part because bill murray couldn't appear in that movie he was the last minute villain but irresistible the john stewart directed election comedy drama which is a really a huge failure of a movie. That's really the last movie he made. And the movie he made before that was welcome to Morrowind. So you're right that that was, this is basically the end of Steve Carell, bankable star.

And what a way to go. What a way to go. It's a strange, again, I was there opening night. I had to see it. Big time. Red 2020,

the witches pointless film. Yeah. Um, an adaptation of the role doll novel who was weirdly I had to see it big time read 2020 The Witches pointless film yeah um an adaptation of the Roald Dahl novel who was weirdly hot at this point didn't Roald Dahl

get hot again yeah yeah I mean I I think he's sort of persistently hot he's kind of come out he's had some dips

yeah I've been wondering Roald Dahl IP do you read any of those books to your kids I've been wondering how they will hit I try.

You know, we have definitely James and the Giant Peach and stuff, but it's like, it was weird. I mean, it was almost like they couldn't quite follow it or weren't old enough for it. It was fine. Show them that movie. Matilda, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, the BFG. I'm trying to think of the key ones.

James and the Giant Peach, of course. There's a couple of other ones. Those books were just in big rotation in my life between the ages of like six and 10. I was reading those books all the time. But we had like 10 years of these movies. I know. Either remakes or first shots at them.

I know. The Witches, you know, there is an original film that is directed by, is it Ken Russell? I feel like it's Ken Russell. Maybe. That is downright horrifying. Like, incredible makeup effects.

Angelica Houston is one of the witches. This is a movie that like haunted my dreams when I was nine years old. I think Anne Hathaway is having so much fun in this movie, but it's not very good. It's kind of pointless. And it was like straight to streaming

during COVID. Most people ignored it. It's as if it doesn't exist in many ways. Two years later, basically the same exact thing happens again. And you just feel sad for everyone involved. It's a bummer. I mean, it is a Tom Hanks collaboration.

He plays Geppetto in this adaptation of Pinocchio. Doesn't that feel like a poster that's appearing in a comedy of a movie that didn't actually happen? It does feel like a fake movie, 100%. Most people also haven't seen this. It was critically destroyed. It also came the same year as Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio,

which was very well received. It was like when we had the talking pig movies and we had the competing Pinocchios. Yeah, it's the good one and the shitty one. That's obviously red. And then 2024 here, which... Are you going green or are you going yellow? No, look, it's not good, are you going yellow? No, I...

Look, like, it's not good, but it's good to me, damn it, you know? Like, we're in the mold of wrestling. Like, it's kind of a professional wrestling situation where I'm like, Robert Zemeckis still has this weird electrical power to my mind that I felt he hadn't

really gotten to it in quite this way since Castaway. That's interesting. I like Flight. I like Allied. I haven't had that feeling of like, this motherfucker has something to say. Yeah, those were more straightforward dramas.

Yes. This is definitely going for the old. And like I said, even me having more negative reaction to it, I watched the whole thing. I was laughing during some of it, but I didn't, I was not bored during that movie at all. I was, I was compelled. And I think anybody watches it will be compelled.

I don't, I don't think you can in good conscience make it green. So I'm not going to make it green despite my, um, appreciation for what he was going for. So that takes us to the end of our journey. So at this point right now, we've got two, four, five, six, seven, eight greens. We have two, four, six yellows. And Allied was the latest yellow we had, which is 2016. Correct.

So I'm going to read you the yellows and we can do some bargaining here. Okay. 1978's I Want to Hold Your Hand. That's a green for me. I mean, it's a, it's a, it's an early, it feels like a very much a, you know, apprentice young filmmaker film, but I really like it. I think it, I think anybody likes, you know, like I said.

I like it too. Works in the ears to her. We're going to make somebody unhappy here. Cause I think 1992's Death Becomes Her, 1997's Contact, 2000's What Lies Beneath, 2004's The Polar Express, and 2016's Allied. Allied is out. We're not putting Allied in.

I like it. We gave our recommendation. I would say What Lies Beneath is out. It was a big hit, but it's largely iterative of a lot of different movies. It doesn't feel essential at all. Yeah, I agree.

It doesn't feel essential even though it was a hit. Polar Express, I made my case for its import. I don't want it in the Hall of Fame. That's really what it boils down to. I'm glad. Which then takes us to

Contact and Death Becomes Her. Now, they're two sides of the same coin. Yeah, I guess I'll lobby for Contact because I just think it's, again, part of the thing here is there's so many good,

great movies that you don't really have to have contact in there to make a, you know, a full, uh, old country buffet of cinema. But I think context is a really good movie. Like, you know, again, I like it. I think it has some, a lot of flaws, but, but that I'd fight for that. But I, but I totally, if you left it out, I'd be like, okay, I'll go watch back to the future future again romancing the stone and i'll be happy this is a tricky one is back to the future part two essential it's right on the edge for me again there's something like look back to the future castaway who framed roger rabbit forrest gump flight romancing the stone use use cars do we get used cars in there i mean we're really good here right so it's like this is an interesting

one though because it's like there are roughly 12 important movies in his career and then there are another 12 that are various levels of easy to ignore and they suck so in some

ways this is a good test case for the value of this project I guess we can cut death becomes her and keep part two in and put contact in contact i think is the boldest thing that he's tried to do in this format it's like it is a combination of the sincerity of forrest gump with the like outlandish science forward ideas that are fascinating most of these other movies the sort it's like him actually putting on screen

the can we do it of what's happening behind the scenes of every movie he's made. So that would mean our Hall of Fame would be I Want to Hold Your Hand, Used Cars, Romancing the Stone, Back to the Future, Who Framed Roger Rabbit,

Back to the Future Part II, Forrest Gump, Contact, Cast Away, and Flight. It's a damn good list, man. Don't you think? Very watchable movies. That is a Hall of Fame worthy Hall of Fame.

Okay, let's do that. Any closing thoughts? First of all, I hope Robert Zemeckis directs more movies. Yeah, me too. I hope he has the means to direct more movies because we're now entering a zone where it's like is he gonna get um the budget he needs to do this kind of stuff i've been saying on the show recently that sony has been doing such a good job of getting people to go out to the movies to see their movies because

they're the only studio that doesn't have a streaming service and so the theatrical experience is very important for them so like even if their movies aren't very good like anyone but you i didn't think it was very good but a lot of people want to go see that movie. It became kind of a cultural phenomenon and it brought rom-coms back a little bit. And they've done this over and over and over again. Like Venom 3 is now like having great holds. You know, people are like,

actually, I do want to see Venom 3. Like they're very good at this, Sony, but they couldn't get people to see this movie. They couldn't find a way to communicate. I actually, so I watched the trailer to here and I was like, i feel like this is going to be a like a zemeckis classic whether it's a all humans classic it's got the bones of what he does well and you know scored with a you know the yes song which is just like the most perfect

like my dad likes this song more than anything in the world kind of situation but i never once for a minute thought anybody would want to go see it in a movie theater and they don't. And they didn't. And now that question of, will he make, keep making movies? He probably still has the juice to get certain things done, but he said publicly,

he can't get that back to the future musical done. They won't make it. And probably for the best. I mean, who cares? Right. Like, do we,

do we want that? I mean, I mean, if it, if it, if it got him another movie after that, maybe, but I'm also sure what he wants to make at this point.

Because I think this whole, the experience of going through the filmography with you, I don't know that I have a great answer to that question. There's some ambition there. I could also see him just going back and making a straightforward, old school Robert Zemeckis, you know, or maybe something like Flight. You know, maybe something a little bit more in that key. Yeah, I think part of what's so exciting about him as a director is there's no like, oh, that's just like a classic Robert Zemeckis movie.

It's like you, unless you came up with Who Framed Roger Abbott, you couldn't come up with Who Framed Roger Abbott. You couldn't just invent here in your mind. Like it takes, he has a very special brain for pushing movies forward. Yes. And so I, I really, I, uh,

I respect what he's been doing. I do. I do too. And it's just weird when that becomes divorced from commercial success, because like I said, he was doing that special brain and they were all hits. Yes. Big hits.

Yes. Monster $937 million hits. I mean, that's like, that's crazy. So again, when, when it becomes separated from that,

then it, then it does get a little bit weird. You love that adjusted for inflation situation. I do. I just, I mean, because, you know, Sean, I mean, don't you see these tweets? And they're like, Venom is the highest grossing movie of all time. I know it's not. That's bullshit.

You're lying. Are you slandering Venom right now? Well, you know what I mean? Like they do this and it's the highest grossing superhero. And I'm like, no, it's not. No, it's not. We just can do the calculator here. It's very true It was just, we just can do the calculator here. It's very true.

Uh, thank you, Brian Curtis. Thank you, Sean. Thanks to Jack Sanders. Thanks to our producer, Bobby Wagner for his work on today's episode.

Next week on the show, we are discussing Clint Eastwood. Speaking of boomer essentialism and the film juror number two. We'll see you then.